What stood out to me the most during my 50-miler last June were the last 5 miles. I hit a point where my mind was telling my body to keep running, but my body was just not capable of doing so. I was still strong mentally but had broken physically, and had to walk in the last 5 miles. A lot of training for my first 100-miler will be geared towards becoming a lot stronger physically, while maintaining a strong mental edge.

For the 100 miler, I am making some major changes to my training preparation, which you can follow along on my Strave page (under Jonathan Geerts). I am focusing more on the quality of miles rather than the quantity of miles. I am still targeting a relatively large total mileage per week, but will be accomplishing these miles in a more conservative manner to reduce wear on my body. Particularly I am focusing on:

1) Elevation gain: I am including a lot more vertical gain in my training runs, averaging 1000ft/5 miles (similar to the AC100 course elevation gain average). With that increased elevation gain comes a lot more exposure and time on technical trails, which will be critical in becoming a smarter runner, especially in the dark. Obviously, with climbing also comes descending. While the climbs tend to blow up the calves, the descends typically nuke the quads. Targeting an additional 1000ft/5 miles of descent will help condition to the bigger muscles. Application: For a weekly total of 50 miles, I will be targeting at least 10,000ft of cumulative gain and another 10,000ft of cumulative descend during training runs that week. Change: In the 4 month leading up to my 50miler last year, I only covered about 17,000ft of cumulative gain. This was the number one factor why my body broke down in a 50mile race that featured more than 12,000ft of total gain in one go. In the 5 weeks prior to my 100K in February, I covered 48,000ft of cumulative gain in training. This was the big difference as to why I remained stronger over the entire race distance.

2) Time on the feet: With more elevation and technical trails come slower miles. I typically average about 15min/mile (4 miles/hr) in the mountains, compared to an average of anywhere between 8 and 10min/mile on flat terrain at training pace. Spending more time on your feet is also a critical component, as it contributes to greater endurance and an overall stronger lower body.   Application: For a weekly total of 50 miles, I aim to spend about 500 minutes (8.3 hours) of running (at 10 min/mile pace). I can accomplish those 8.3 hours running with only 33.3 miles in the mountains (at 15min/mile pace). Change: In the same 4 months leading up to my 50-mile race, I averaged a little over 4 hours of running each week, compared to the 13+ hours I spend on my feet during the 50mile race alone. In the 5 weeks preceding the 100K, I spend an average of 10.5 hours a week on my feet.

3) Cross-train: To further reduce the shear mileage spend running required to prep for this hundred, I am using swimming, biking, and hiking to meet the total ‘run miles’. I count each swim miles as two running miles (swimming at 2 miles/hr), each five bike miles as one running mile (biking at 20 miles/hr), and each mile hiked as a mile run. Application: In the same 50mile training week, swimming 4000yds (2.2miles), biking 40miles, and hiking 8miles already covers [2.2x2]+[40/5]+8=20.4 of the total. Change: While I got plenty of biking miles in last year, I did not consider incorporating it in my overall training philosophy for an ultra-marathon. This drove me to over-emphasize running in the last few months leading up to the 50miler, tiring out my legs.

4) Weight-training: To improve strength, I am focusing heavily on incorporating weight training in my every-day workout routine. I now lift lower body four times a week [30min/ea] and upper body once a week [60min/ea]. I will break down my lower body weight training in both big muscle groups (all varieties of squats, deadlifts, and lunges) and smaller lateral groups (hip abduction/adduction, side lunges/squats, and various lateral platform exercise). Change: I can probably count the number of times I went to the weight-room all of last year on two hands. It was not a big focus in my training routine and I paid for it big time at mile 45 of 50. Together with the significant increase in elevation gain during training, the increased weight-training has already paid dividends in both running and biking stamina and speed of recovery.

5) Recovery: Recovery is a critical part of a solid training approach. A lot of people know this but many fall short in prioritizing it, and for a long time I was no different. But with the enormity of a 100-mile run goal comes the realization that there is not really a healthy way to train unless you make the time for recovery, to make it as important as the run training. This includes a wide spectrum that covers sleep, nutrition, mobility work, mental health, etc.

1. Sleep: To accomplish all this training and leave some time for other forms of personal growth, in addition to driving 2 hours a day for work, I have to get up early. There is no way around it. My weekday typically starts at 0330, and I make it a point to get at the very least 6 hours of uninterrupted sleep. When I wake up, the first thing I do is check in with my body. I can feel when my body is not ready for an early morning training session. Once or twice every two weeks, I may check myself at 0330 and decide to replace a grueling 10-mile trail run with an extra hour of sleep and an hour long yoga and stretching session to fill the two hour block. I am flexible in my training schedule and will move workouts around as needed.

2. Nutrition: My diet has slowly changed ever since I really kicked off my endurance sports journey with my first IronMan in 2018. I am now focusing more on eating foods associated with anti-inflammatory benefits (salmon, vegetables, berry-like fruits, etc.) and good energy dense fats (avocados, nuts, and bacon). It has made a big difference in my ability to put out over longer distances and my recovery. I haven’t been big on sugar, caffeine, or alcohol for the last five or so years, and staying true to these habits has played a big role in my ability to keep up large training numbers.

3. Mobility & flexibility: My mobility work consists largely of two to three 30 minute (YouTube) yoga sessions each week in addition to two 10-20 minutes of deep targeted stretching and foam rolling daily. For a good YouTube yoga channel, I highly recommend Marissa Walch’s channel, she has a great mix of instructional yoga and stretching videos for every preference. Going hand in hand with the increased amount of weight-lifting, mobility has played a big role in improving my strength and endurance. I takes me longer to reach my lactic acid threshold, and subsequently takes me less time to recovery back to normal.

To distill all of these changes into an actionable training plan, to the spreadsheets we go! Strava does a great job summarizing each week’s totals, making it easy to track progress. In addition to the mobility and weight training taking up about 6 hours per week, the numbers are broken down as follows:

1. The Swim (x2.0), Bike (x0.2), and Run (x1.0) miles are summed up into the Effective Run Miles. The Target Run Miles are my weekly total mileage goals doped out to build up to the 100-Miler. As long as my Effective Run Miles > Target Run Miles, we are in good shape.

2. To focus on the time-on-the-feet goal, the Target Run Time is simply the amount of time it would take to run the Target Run Miles at a flat-surface 10:00min/mile pace. Since I am focusing on a lot of climbing, my average pace is typically closer to 15:00min/mile. Again, as long as my Run Time > Target Run Time, I am spending some quality time on my feet and getting stronger.

3. The Target Vert (ft) is the vertical gain I would have to cover across the Target Run Miles given an average of 1000ft/5 mile (so for a 50mile week, that would be 10,000ft of elevation gain). The Vert (ft) column represents a cumulative of my running and biking vertical feet gain throughout the week. As part of my cross-training approach, I utilize the Zwift app in conjunction with my Wahoo Kickr stationary bike trainer as a tool to crush some soul-sucking hill workouts on the bike. In addition to my runs taking me well over the 1000ft/5 mile gradient, the goal is for the Vert (ft) number to largely exceed the Target Vert (ft) number each week.

4. I have been able to keep my training hours each week to around 20 hours, which is not uncommon amongst most IronMan prep schedules, and is fairly manageable for most dedicated amateur athletes.