I gravitated from IM to Ultra's, as it seemed a natural progression of longer and further. After having done two IM's and also a 100, the 100 was way worse in abuse to my body. I still do both ultras and tris from sprints to IM and am planning my second 100 next year along with some tris and duathlons as well.

To be derogatory without trying to run 50 or more miles is a little inconsiderate. You never know until you try it. Come over the the dark side and get dirty.

For most of my triathlete friends they are intimidated by the trail runs. For me running through the woods is very freeing. Very primeval almost. Kind of like rubbing dirt on my chest and grunting.

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"Any idiot can run a marathon. It takes a special kind of idiot to run an ultramarathon." -Alan Cabelly

Here's why; The Western States, it's uphill for 100 miles!

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''Sweeney - you can both crush your AG *and* cruise in dead last!! 😂 '' Murphy's Law

No worries, i plan to join the dark side very soon. I'm pretty much there as 90% of my training is done on singletrack. My favorite workouts are definetly the late night trail runs thru the woods w/ a few inches of fresh snow on the ground. it's kinda scary, but definetly liberating. the only reason i haven't done one yet is that i'm still relatively young (21), and i dont want to put that much stress on my body w/o being properly prepared and trained.

thanks for all the points about why everybody has done/doesn't do ultra's v. tri's.

I don't know what profile you posted but it's not Western States. It's definitely not uphill the entire way. Western States is actually a net loss of about 4000 ft in altitude. 18k climb, 22k descend. In talking to friends, that's what makes the course so difficult, the extended, quad hammering downhills through the inferno like canyons.

http://www.ws100.com/...ast/topo/profile.htm

You're right. That was only the beginnning. It gets much worse!

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''Sweeney - you can both crush your AG *and* cruise in dead last!! 😂 '' Murphy's Law

I just signed up for the American River 50-miler on April 1st (Sacramento to Auburn). Is anybody else on board??


And it is also my first 50-miler and I'd like to share it with another BOP'er. Will probably take most of the 13-hour time limit to complete it. Oh come on, you know you want to!!

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Kicking butt and writing down people's names since 2001

This is a valid question. I've often wondered it myself. I think there may be a few reasons:

• Media attention on the Ironman in particular has driven athletes to that race as the de-facto gold standard of endurance events. The ultra simply get no media, that is a big reason why they are off the radar for most people.
• People think they are unattainable. They have done a marathon, knew how destroyed they were after that and can't imagine going farther. What they don't know is that after 26.2 miles it becomes a completely different game.
• There aren't very many races.
• There is a lot to know and it is hard to learn.

Those are probably some reasons why a lot of people haven't made the leap. It's a shame on the one hand, but then again, I am thankful on the other. It's nice to go to a coll 100 mile race somewhere and only have a few people in it. I like that.

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Tom Demerly
The Tri Shop.com