Running ultra marathon not just physical but mainly psychological
The moment you have to perform physically when you should be sleeping requires a completely different dimension of your being
At this very moment I am in middle of organising the 9th edition La Ultra The High, which has 111, 222 and 333 kms category where one, two or three 17,400+ feet mountain passes respectively have to be crossed. This race is called by many as the world’s cruelest ultra marathon because here distance isn’t of much concern, low oxygen content is.
I took the opportunity to invite veteran La Ultra - The High runner, 54 year old Mark Woolley, who has run 333 kms thrice and this year has the unique distinction of first running 111 kms and then race directing 222 and 333 categories, to share his point of view on ultra marathons, as they are more than just being longer than marathons.
ULTRA MARATHON AND MARATHON MARK STEVEN WOOLLEY
So many beginners ask the question as to what is the difference between an ultra-marathon and a standard marathon. Officially, if a race is 42 km then it is a marathon. If it is more than 42 km then it is an ultra-marathon. In this way a 50 km race is an ultra-marathon. However, this is an arbitrary definition and anyone who has run a 50 km race knows only too well that it is really just a bit longer than a marathon. The experience is essentially the same.
As far as I am concerned the ultra-marathon starts when you have been running all day and then have to run through the night. That really eliminates any reference to distance but typically this would involve a 100mile race or at least a 100 km race in the mountains. The moment you have to perform physically when you should be sleeping, requires a completely different dimension of your being. If running a marathon is mainly a physical experience then running an ultra-marathon becomes not only physical but very psychological as well, even spiritual. I will attempt to explain.
When you start a long run, with the aim say, of running a distance that will take you about 24 hours, or more non-stop, that will take you through the night, you have to run this at a pace that is well below what you would normally do in a standard marathon. At the beginning it feels easy and your body slips into a happy flow and the kilometres just tick by. As you progress you start to get tired and your muscles ache. At the beginning this isn’t such a big deal and is generally easy to push through. But as you push on it becomes more and more difficult to maintain the pace as your body starts to hurt. Once again this is mainly physical and self-discipline is the virtue that will pull you through this stage and keep you going. So far so good and nothing more than you would experience in a normal marathon.
Where the ultra-marathon starts, in my opinion is where the psychological aspect becomes more important than the physical and this usually occurs when you should normally be sleeping. Pushing on when you should be sleeping is incredibly difficult. Every sense in your body is telling you to stop, to lie down and to sleep. The pain in the muscles only exaggerates this feeling. Stopping will stop the pain, both the physical and the psychological and having the virtues to pull through all this are the characteristics that make the ultra-runner. Bear in mind that the fatigue and the sleep deprivation may also induce hallucinations and the self-discipline to keep going is enormous.
But to describe the ultra-runner in these simple words cannot do it justice either. The most successful runners treat the exercise as one of self-fulfilment and aim to reach a meditative state where they simply live in the moment and go with the flow. In the eastern traditions this can be compared to the zen state. When in the flow, it is a beautiful painless state where thoughts enter the mind freely and then they leave. No particular thought is held on to and the mind wanders freely in an unrestricted and childlike manner. But by far the greatest aspect of this state of mind is that when you hit the zone, or enter the flow, or achieve the zen state or whatever you care to call it, the other virtues are no longer as important. Time melts away like butter on a hot plate and before you know it you have covered an insane distance and you can’t really remember quite how you did it. Timmy the Tractor sums it up very appropriately, “Time and distance become meaningless.”
Clearly this requires an enormous amount of practice but when you can do it you can truly claim to have reached enlightenment. For me this is the ultimate goal of the ultra-runner. It is about the distance, clearly it is about the distance, but then again it really isn’t. The distance is only the means by which the deep state of personal satisfaction is achieved, it is only the means by which the journey of self-discovery and self-realisation takes place and is only the means by which the nirvana, however short lived it may be, may be truly experienced.
Ultra running is a way of life.