How do you even get into something like running further than a marathon?

Did you even know that, that was even a thing? I did not.  I think before I learned about Ultra running I assumed everybody must stop at 26.2 miles – except perhaps for a careless heroic few – the kind of athletes who run across the world for fun or have a tragic sense of direction.

No, I did not know Ultra running (that is any event longer than a marathon) was a thing.  Even knowing it was a thing – it’s not something you might immediately leap to.  Running a marathon (or even just that first session of couch to 5 K!) was hard enough and now you want to run further?

The Lisbon Marathon (my first, and still only marathon, road or otherwise) was not a pleasant experience for me.  You can read about it in detail on its blog entry here but in short, I cried, I ached, I felt nauseous and couldn’t really use my right hip properly for about a week afterwards. I was physically and emotionally a broken wreck by the end.  Of course, this did not put me off running.  In fact, before halfway around, with tears streaked across my puffy and red face, I had already decided I needed to run another (to be continued).

But that’s a marathon – a physical feat of endurance we’re all familiar with.  Going beyond that… well, what’s the point?  Why bother?  A marathon was enough to make me suffer why push further?

Well, for starters, Ultras are easier.

Wait! Hear me out.

I had the same reaction to that news.  But marathons are often run as fast as you can on road.  Ultras… well… there is a lot of walking on trails and beautiful views and real food.  There was some running obviously, I am not suggesting you turn up to a 100 miler next week, you still have to train, but at those distances, time on your feet is just as good training.  Sure if you’re out for medals, you may need to rethink this strategy, but since for me the challenge has always been in completing something (hopefully before a time cut off) it’s not an issue.

Training must be a nightmare, you’d think.  Indeed, if you google “50 K training plan” you’ll get back something which looks like a monster.  Double runs in a day, back-to-back long runs at the weekend, more interval and cross training than ever before and scarily high weekly mileages… but, truthfully, I think it’s a bit overkill.  So long as you routinely run 25-30 miles a week and manage to get in a few longer runs of over 20 miles you can do it.

I was convinced of this by a former work colleague called Richard.  Richard, apart from running a histology department, also ran – a lot. In 2014 Richard ran a 31 mile, a 50 mile, a 57 mile, an 86 mile and a 100 mile race.  He did all this whilst working full time and with a young family (although he credits his wife for making it happen).  Spending time with Richard and talking about running was like the recently converted meeting the pope, I was utterly enthralled.  I read his blogs (https://richyla.wordpress.com/). Bugged him about kit. Wondered how on earth you make yourself run 100 miles.  Richard in turn sent me more reading material, showed me his shoe collection and told me anyone could run 100 miles if they wanted to, “and, by the way, there is this great intro to Ultra running event in July in the Chilterns and you should definitely do it”.  Which is essentially, how I ended up running my first 50 K (31 miles).  There were more doubts than I let on here.  And I postured for a bit, should I, could I – what about Andreas? But that is essentially the story.

How do you end up running further than a marathon? How do you end up doing any kind of challenge?

Be inspired.  Be encouraged.  Enter the event! Train as best you can.  Surprise yourself!