Editor’s note: This interview, initially conducted in 2017, has been updated.
For some people, runger strikes after a mere hour or two without a snack. During the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, runner Rahaf Khatib—like other followers of Islam around the world—fasts from sunrise to sunset. That means she goes up to 17 hours a day with no food or drink at all, not even a sip of water.
Still, the Farmington Hills, Michigan, runner—who is on Instagram as Run Like a Hijabi—keeps up her training during the month (in 2021, Ramadan stretches from April 12 to May 12). In fact, she’s twice been in the early phases of marathon build-ups during Ramadan, with weekly mileage totals in the 40s.
Khatib, who has completed 11 marathons, finds staying active a complement to her faith and even feels stronger and better while fasting because of it. In this Q&A, edited for clarity, she explains how she does it.
→ Join Runner’s World+ for the latest running and health news! 🏃🏾♀️🏃🏻♂️
Runner’s World: What does your daily schedule look like during Ramadan, and where does running fit in?
Rahaf Khatib: There are two different times I might run. Lately, I’ve been running pre-Iftar [the evening meal after sundown]. So I’ll run an hour before I break my fast and usually I’ll get in a six-mile run, which is not bad.
If I want to do longer—eight or so miles—I’ll save my run for the nighttime after I’ve eaten, had time to digest, and gone to prayer. After Iftar we usually head to the mosque for late-night prayers. You don’t have to go, but to me it’s what Ramadan is all about—a time for forgiveness and reflecting. We do that until about 12:30 or 1 a.m.
After we come back home people usually eat more, or hydrate. Some may sleep, but others don’t, like me. Instead, I’ll run, if I haven’t already. I’ll run on my treadmill at around 2 a.m.
We eat Suhur, a really early pre-dawn breakfast, at 3:30 or 4 a.m. If I don’t have to take my kids to school, I might sleep from 4 a.m. to 10 or 11 a.m. Otherwise I’ll get up at 7 a.m., take them to school, come back home, try to get a nap in, and then wake up again to do my errands and read the Qu’ran.
RW: What do your morning and evening meals look like?
RK: At Suhur, I try to eat really healthy and get in as much protein as I can. The more I eat protein, the more it sustains me through the whole day. I’ll get hungry one or two hours before it’s time to break the fast, and by then it’s like, okay, you’re done with the day.
I’ll eat Greek yogurt, almond butter, toast, avocados, watermelon, peaches... You have to hydrate a lot, eat a lot of fruit. I’ll also eat a lot of smoothies, using dates to sweeten them up. We eat dates a lot during this month; we even use them to break our fast in the evening, it’s an Islamic tradition. They’re really healthy for you, high in good sugar and fiber.
At Iftar, I eat a regular dinner. We do a lot of soups. We also have desserts that we eat during Ramadan, kind of like having Christmas cookies or fruitcake. But I try not to eat a lot of that, because eating sweets and fried food when you’re going to fast 17 hours during the day makes you feel heavy and more hungry.
Between the time I break my fast at dinner time and my early breakfast, I’ve been taking in a lot of fluids, water, coconut water, sometimes Gatorade if I’m feeling really fatigued that day, and I know that I’ll need more sugar or carbs.
RW: What does it feel like to run when you’re fasting?
RK: You have days where you’re feeling amazing, you have days you’re feeling really low-energy. My pace will tell me. I will slow down even if I want to speed up … my body will feel heavy, and my feet will feel like blocks of concrete. The first couple of days were a little rough. On those days I take it really easy, one step at a time.
Then there are days when I just have this burst of energy. The other day, I had a really amazing run. I think it was because I had slept seven hours straight during the night. That’s really rare during Ramadan; you don’t sleep that well with all the intense prayers and everything going on.
When I have my run done before Iftar, which is the time to break your fast at sundown, I feel so accomplished. I’m ready to tackle the night prayers, and it’s so spiritually rewarding for me. Even when I’m running I’m always in awareness of my faith and reciting prayers in my head over and over again. It gives me such a sense of calm and peace within myself.
RW: Have you had to change your race plans because of Ramadan?
RK: I have trained for the Detroit and Chicago marathons while fasting. I didn’t intensify for those trainings until the last weeks of Ramadan. I was lucky about the timing, because there’s no way I could do 16-milers while fasting—some people do, but that’s just not me.
I have skipped a few races that are really early in the morning. Last year when I did try to run early in the morning, it was tough—I was so hungry by the end of the day, I was so weak. So now I’m sticking to the nighttime run or pre-Iftar run.
RW: You started running about four years ago. How has being a runner changed your experience of Ramadan?
RK: If you had told me five years ago I would be running while fasting during Ramadan I would have been like, “You’re crazy.” But slowly I’ve worked myself up to more and more mileage and more and more time working out. There are tons of Muslims that work out during Ramadan, actually.
People ask, “Aren’t you tired?” Yeah, I'll get tired but then I’ll sleep well during the night when it’s time to sleep. It’s a beautiful, rewarding feeling that you are submitting to God. Everything else we do in this world is for us, whereas fasting is just for Him and for the faith, to have a feeling of what the less fortunate are going through. It all goes hand in hand; it’s all about mind, body, and soul.
Khatib was a finalist for RW’s 2015 cover contest search. Check out her video below.
Cindy is a freelance health and fitness writer, author, and podcaster who’s contributed regularly to Runner’s World since 2013. She’s the coauthor of both Breakthrough Women’s Running: Dream Big and Train Smart and Rebound: Train Your Mind to Bounce Back Stronger from Sports Injuries, a book about the psychology of sports injury from Bloomsbury Sport. Cindy specializes in covering injury prevention and recovery, everyday athletes accomplishing extraordinary things, and the active community in her beloved Chicago, where winter forges deep bonds between those brave enough to train through it.
