My ultra training recommendations include many miles of base-building runs, terrain training, a sprinkling of speed work, strength movements, warm-ups, and recovery sessions.

Why am I doing this?

As a former bodybuilding disciple, I am not a seasoned runner. I wasn’t the high school cross country star or the collegiate track athlete. In fact, after a short stint of track and XC in my tweens, I hardly ran a step outside of the tennis court for almost ten years. However, with my sights set on becoming an adventure-seeking renaissance athlete, the trail-run-through-mountains-til-I-drop bug has hit me recently like the Spanish flu. I am far from a specialist in ultramarathons, and some might consider me a bit of a dummy when it comes to running, but who better to learn from than a dummy who is somehow figuring it out?

My fascination with ultras started with David Goggins. I wish I could say that his book, Can’t Hurt Me, inspired me to sign up for an ultramarathon on the spot. It didn’t, but it did plant a seed in my mind. Running a hundred mile race without training? What a fascinatingly appalling (and appealing) thing to be able to do. On top of that, the Moab 240 tickled my fancy as the ultimate thing to do in life.

My whopping list of achievements…

While I won’t run a 100 miles without training because I value my longevity in sports, I will certainly be on that Moab 240 course someday, and I’m planning on completing my first 100 miler next year. My ultra “career” is on the come up, and I’m here to share with you all the tips you need to go from running dumb to at least crossing that finish line intact. If you aren’t convinced, I will cite my extensive resume of running experiences:

1. Couch to marathoning in 12 weeks while nursing a stress fracture
2. Surviving (some might even say thriving) in a mountainous 50k Spartan Race after ~10 mile training weeks
3. Now comfortably training for a 100k

Ok, that’s not all that impressive of a CV. However, I gain a plethora of valuable experience with each race prep, and I am living proof that you don’t need to grow up in running shoes or dedicate 40 hours per week to training to be an ultra runner. Perhaps we’ll detail the stories of my past races on another day; but for now, what you’ve been waiting for: the training tips.

Hill training.

First up, we have the hills, which deliver all the thrills (and in Wisconsin, the chills, since you can’t really do this session on a treadmill). Right now, this is my favorite workout of the week; it’s intentional, engaging, and something I quickly see progress with from week to week. These can be 30-60 minute workouts, and I recommend structuring them in one of the following ways and progressing through the list as you build strength:

1. Run up the hill, walk down the hill.
2. Run up AND down the hill to start, and switch to run up/walk down as lower leg impact gets too high.
3. Run up and down the hill.

Note that all of these workouts should be done at an easier pace (these are not hill sprints), but you should feel the strain by the end of the workout. You want to move fast enough that you’re staying engaged while focusing on perfect form and foot strike both up and down the hill. Move upwards with quick steps and power through your hips, and glide back down the hill with easy and efficient strides.

The reason I recommend starting with run up/walk down and not walk up/run down is because the purpose of this session is to build up the strength required to tackle uphills. Battling against gravity is obviously more muscularly taxing than letting your weight carry yourself down the hill, so you want to start adapting to that demand as soon as possible. Additionally, downhill impact is harder on the joints and the “strains to gains” ratio is higher. Save the downhill running for later, once your legs have built up more mileage and a solid enough eccentric strength to prevent excessive fatigue and injury in the lower legs.

Over time, gradually add in the downhill running. Remember: slow is smooth, and smooth is fast. Training your form and efficiency is just as important as building up tough legs and a durable cardiovascular engine.

Base building/long runs.

To be honest, I think a lot of people overcomplicate base building, especially for beginners. Once you’re giving Courtney Dauwalter a run for her money, come back and I’ll try to get fancy with the long run programming. But until then, it’s really about getting more mileage on your Hokas and improving your efficiency with your “all day” pace. The important thing that I stress with these is to just keep moving. Shoot for a pace that’s pretty sustainable for the duration (it might take a few runs to figure out how to not start out too hot), but it’s also ok, and even expected, that you walk a bit throughout some of these runs.

Especially with the longer ultras, walking is part of the strategy. Even the winners of the races do not run 100% of the course. The more you can practice hiking at a brisk pace on tired legs interspersed through these runs, the better off you will be when the inevitable must walk moment comes in your ultra. Practicing walking is just like practicing running. With both, you must be intentional with your form, efficiency, and focus. Honing both of these skills will make you a well-rounded ultra contender.

Once you’re successfully hitting 3+ hour long runs (whilst running for most of the duration), you can start playing with back-to-back days of long runs. Once you throw in that second day of base building running, start light and easy, and shut it down and cross train (more on that later) if you feel nagging pain anywhere you shouldn’t. Over time, build this up so you’re used to pushing through and continuing to move on already-tired legs.

Speed training.

It would be a dream come true if I could have my hill workout, two base building runs, and then about five variations of speed/sprint workouts all in one week. However, I live in the real world, where I not only have the typical human responsibilities to attend to (earning a living, sleeping, running errands, cleaning up after my rat of a dog, etc.), but I also chase five or more unrelated athletic goals at the same time. So no, I won’t be putting in nine running workouts each week, and I especially will not be heavily biasing those towards sprinting when my long-term running goal is to run a race that will span multiple days.

For the speed run, I recommend incorporating a Fartlek style run, where you vary your speed throughout. There are many ways you can do this, but ultimately I recommend 30 minutes or more per week of running with anywhere from a 4:1-9:1 time ratio of easy running to fast running. This could look like 4 minutes easy to 1 minute fast, 9 minutes easy to 1 minute fast, etc. The larger the ratio of easy:fast, the faster your fast intervals should be. Which interval you choose is really up to you, as long as you’re practicing holding a challenging pace on fatigued legs for your speed portion. You can increase the time and intensity throughout your prep, but bumping up volume on this run isn’t as important as bumping up the volume of your base runs. So, for the sake of keeping it simple, you can keep the total time of this run consistent. As with all of our training sessions, focusing on form is absolutely paramount.

Sprinting is not necessary during an ultra prep unless you have goals to maintain speed independently from your ultra goals. Otherwise, it’s not worth risking injury and poor recovery by adding in more high-impact running training that won’t translate well to your race.

Strength training.

Strength training is a valuable tool for building up resilience in your tissues and stability throughout your body. Your lifting sessions don’t have to be extensive, but functional core movements and compound leg movements should be incorporated on a weekly basis. Developing power and stability in the glutes to prevent hip drop and encourage engagement of the larger leg muscles is vital, as well as progressing your ability to produce and resist rotational movement through the trunk, will do wonders for your running durability. Second to that comes developing elasticity in the lower leg – while maximum power in the calves is most important for sprinters, building up endurance in the lower leg muscles will reduce the likelihood of lower leg strains and stress fractures for distance runners.

Here are the following types of movements I recommend training for at least ~3 sets a week each:

1. Squat variation
2. Lunge, split squat, or step up variation
3. Hip hinge variation (vary between deadlift and hip thrust movements)
4. Unilateral hip hinge variation (vary between deadlift and hip thrust movements)
5. Rotational core exercise
6. Anti-rotational core exercise
7. Knee-raise core exercise
8. High rep, slightly bent leg hip abduction variation
9. High rep, slightly bent leg calf raise variation
10. Anterior tibialis raise exercise

This doesn’t have to be the extent of your strength training, but it’s a good template to use to start building your routines around to ensure that you’re building strength in the areas that tend to break down first when packing on the miles.

Warm ups and recovery.

Last but not least, we have warm ups and recovery, arguably the least sexy pillars to success in any sport.

Warm up before EVERY run – and I mean every. It does not need to be extensive. 5-10 minutes is often plenty. Drill knee drive, torso rotation, lateral movement, and calf elasticity. Gently stretch out your hamstrings and calves, and circle your ankles and hips through their full ranges of motion. When you find aspects of your form that tend to break down, add in drills to reinforce proper movement, and when you find muscles that tend to get tight, add in extra gentle stretching.

For recovery, I suggest having one day per week where you block out 30 minutes to run through a full stretching routine. With this routine, it’s important to hit your whole body, since running can cause just about everything to get tense and sore. Buildups of tension overtime can throw your body out of alignment and make running unnecessarily uncomfortable. Make sure your stretching routine incorporates the following areas:

1. Neck
2. Shoulders
3. Back
4. Abdominals
5. Obliques
6. Hip flexors
7. Glutes
8. Hamstrings
9. Quadriceps
10. Calves

I bet my favorite running shoes that if you skip warm ups and stretching for a few weeks, you will start to feel like a zombie straight out of The Walking Dead. Your performance on your runs will start to tank, and you will probably have to cut back your mileage.

Closing thoughts on training.

The running community pretty widely accepts that in order to prevent injury, don’t increase your weekly mileage by more than 10% per week. I also recommend this, as I have tried bumping up my training volume more rapidly and have paid the price. You can get away with (and likely will get away with) just a week of much higher mileage, especially if it’s just for a single run or a race, but a consistent buildup of much more than 10% per week will almost definitely produce a strain or injury that will set you back in your training.

Furthermore, it’s good to incorporate a deload every so often (generally every 3-6 weeks). I tend to schedule these in when I know I will need them, usually when I’m traveling or have more than I usually to in a week. With a deload, the idea is just to decrease mileage and intensity for the week, and after that week, bump it back up to approximately where it was the week before. I tend to drop my mileage by almost half. For me, this generally looks like eliminating the shorter of my long runs and shortening the longest run. Trust me, future you will thank you for scheduling in these vital recovery weeks.

Finally, if your legs are ever feeling way too beat up to handle the impact of running, don’t skip training. Take the time that you were going to run and spend an equivalent amount of time and intensity on another mode of cardio. Biking, aqua jogging, and swimming are my top recommendations for cross training. Kayaking, the rowing machine, and the elliptical are also fantastic alternatives. Pain is NOT an excuse to not train, it’s just an indicator that you might have to get flexible with your modality of training. Committing to yourself that you will train, whether or not you’re feeling great, will ensure that you’re not convincing yourself that you’re “injured” so you can skip runs just because you’re feeling lazy and don’t want to exercise.

Nutrition strategy is also pivotal to running ultras. However, I must admit that I have not had much success with my own nutrition strategies, and I still have the most to learn about fueling myself while running. During my 50k, I consumed 150 calories the whole race, which I can assure you is not a winning strategy. Replenishing the body’s glucose and glycogen stores is key to performing your best throughout the race, and in some cases, neglecting to eat can be the difference between you finishing the race or not. Once I’ve more confidently conjured up my recommendations, I will come back with an entire article dedicated to ultra food.

If you’re generally struggling to stay consistent with your training, whether it be for an ultra, a 5k, or any other kind of fitness, I think you’ll find my article How to actually be successful at fitness. extremely valuable. Being realistic with yourself about training, especially for something as demanding as an ultra, is the first step, before you ever start mapping out your training schedule and going for those runs.

As always, I hope you found something that helped you or inspired you in your athletic journey, whether you are a weekend warrior, and aspiring ultra running, or any other kind of athlete. If you no longer feel like a dummy, feel free to share this post with some other dummies who may benefit from my lessons learned. Ciao!