Ultra Marathon Mental Tip 1

One of the things necessary for running a Ultra Marathon (or should that be Ultramarathon ?) is great mental strength – it’s gonna hurt, so having the will to continue regardless if critical. It is too easy to talk your self into giving up:

I deserve to stop and rest at the aid station, as I’ve been running for 9 hours.

…or…

I should give up as I ache all over and have been in pain for the last 4 hours and still have 4 hours to go..

Here’s a little mental strength builder tip – find a (short) loop that passes the front of your home (or close by) and run it that two or more times. For example I use a 6 mile loop – on a wet, weekday evening I run it multiple times to get my mid week long effort in.

I get mental strength, and satisfaction from running past my front door and carrying on for another loop – it really helps with those long dark ultra marathon training runs.
It has the added benefit of being able to resupply, or ‘stash’ water/food on part of the loop somewhere and pick it a few miles later.