Why Ultrarunning is Dumb

OK, that's great. So what's you're insecurity about someone else finding something that is meaningful to them?

More replies:

1. I don't think I have attacked ultrarunners as individuals. I respect Karno and Jurek and Pam Reed. I just think their sport is nutty. The same applies to ultra-triathlons, ultracycling, and to a certain extent, adventure racing. What I am getting at is the mindset behind these events which is different than the mindset of the mainstream of their respective sports. Let's apply the mindset to the major league sports:

ULTRA-FOOTBALL

You play 16 quarters (periods actually) of football with no helmets or pads.

ULTRA-BASKETBALL

The court is the size of a soccer pitch.

ULTRA-BASEBALL

Same as regular baseball except you have 30 innings and no relief pitchers.

Everyone acknowledges that ultrarunning is distinct from traditional distance running. I have simply explored the impulse behind this phenomena, and I have concluded that the mindset is more of a Stoic convention than an Aristotelian one. I don't think you can make something better by making it longer and more excruciating.

2. I think people have a curiosity about suffering which is why they do crazy things like pay for a weekend of SEAL training. They want to find out something about themselves. Aristotle's great souled man never does this sort of thing. He doesn't need to prove himself because he already knows who he is. There is also an implication that those who choose not to endure these masochistic tests are lesser than those who choose them. I think this is what burns a lot of people about the ultra crowd. Well, why not pay for a weekend of beatings and rape in a prison? Why not buy a plane ticket to Baghdad and walk the streets draped in an American flag and wearing a Star of David? Why shouldn't we admire leather S&M freaks? Clearly, spending a weekend suspended in a closet with a ball gag in your mouth has to count for something in the virtue department.

Ultra people engage in meaningless suffering. A special forces op endures suffering, but he does it for his country not because he is a "bad a$$." Similarly, we run to develop our bodies, to be in shape, to have fun, and to do something well. We don't run to simply suffer pain because this develops character. This is because virtue is determined by reason not insanity.

As Aristotle put it, "Dignity does not consist in possessing honors, but in deserving them." I can go out and buy a replica of the Congressional Medal of Honor, but this does not make me a hero. Similarly, I can go out and run a hundred miles in one day, but this does not make me a great runner. I already know I can do this. Anyone on this board that runs 50 mpw can complete an ultra. I could go run a 10-mile-loop ten times where I live with a few pit stops at my house to tend to blisters and confirm for myself that I have what it takes to be an ultrarunner. Or I could wear spikes in my leg like that crazy dude in The Da Vinci Code.

Or I could pursue excellence by training day in and day out and putting it all on the line in a single race months from now. That is hard. I may achieve that goal, or I might be crushed. Running is easy. Running well is hard. Ultrarunners fail to grasp this fine Aristotelian distinction.

3. For the ad hominem folks, I have a ridiculously small penis, so you might want to focus on that in making your case because it really stings. Just write, "Kilgore is wrong because he has a small wang and cannot bring a woman to orgasm."

Out.

Football vs. Arena Football

Baseball vs. Slow Pitch

Soccer vs. Indoor Soccer

Maybe we should have ultra sports.

I find it truly surprising that people who hate 50km, 50mile, 100km, 100mile races don't step back and look at the sheer number of events that they will defend as "required".

100m, 200m, 400m, 800m, 1500m, 1 mile, 3000m steeple, 5000m, 10000m, hurdles (of all lengths), 21.1, 42.2....

A bit of an arbirtrary stop don't you think. The Spartathalon has simliar historical relevance, why not make 240km the standard distance.

Going for 100miles requires a much different person and training then a marathon just like training for a marathon is different from a 5km or a 100m. Rather then being physically fast you have to be mentally tough. You think Bolt thinks you 2:30 marathon guys are "running" compared to him.

You can live in the box and be happy, you can think outside of the box and be happy. For those dogmatically stating that ultra's are dumb, you only have to look back in history to see our track record for being 100% right all the time.

1a) Everyone acknowledges that ultrarunning is distinct from traditional distance running. - Several have argued above that the only difference is the arbitrary distance between the starting line and the finish line, so this is a false premise. Clearly not everyone acknowledges this.

1b) What I am getting at is the mindset behind these events which is different than the mindset of the mainstream of their respective sports. . . - Argument by analogy is weak. Like your strawman examples the duration of other sports and the dimensions of their playing field are as arbitrary as running race distances. There may be limits imposed to make the events spectator-friendly but they are not inherent to competition. Lacrosse, as played by the indians, was sometimes played with hundreds on a side, fields that were miles long, and several days duration. Can anyone explain why hockey has three periods instead of two halves or four quarters like those other sports?

2a) Your argument is circular. You need the premise that ultrarunning is dumb to infer that any personal insight or achievement from the sport is meaningless to infer that the sport is dumb.

2b) There is discomfort associated with running races. The character of that discomfort is different between 400m and 5k as it is between 5k and marathon and between marathon and ultramarathon. Why are the first three honorable and the fourth masochistic?

2c) There is also an implication that those who choose not to endure these masochistic tests are lesser than those who choose them. I think this is what burns a lot of people about the ultra crowd. - I've never run an ultra and possibly never will. I presume the same is true for you, yet you've argued (unconvincingly in my opinion) that people who run ultras are doing something inherently dumb, that is, they are inferior to those who don't. Are you not then guilty of the same offense you presume of them?

No. Sorry. Wrong. He doesn't talk about how tough he is. Let's come back to reality now, shall we? This silly little fantasy is straw man number one for the insecure crowd. I've seen it used here to bash anyone who is not just a runner of the "approved" set of distances. In fact, I've seen it used to bash them too.

What this guy does (granting he actually exists) is talk about what he did too much. He overshares. Big deal. Everyone knows someone like that. They are far more often runners than ultra-runners.

But you, like all the other insecure children here, desperately project your own character flaws upon him.

"Too much" becomes "non stop". His exuberance becomes (to you) an attempt to impress you with how "tough" he is. So much so that we are to expected to believe he actually says that or anything like it.

So is running. There are no "true" distances except in the minds of children. Please grow up already.

Are you telling me that the difference in physiology between a 500 mile runner and a 1000 mile runner is more different than say a 400 meter runner and an 800 meter runner? They're competetive distances built around natural human physiology whereas the next higher ultra event is a competition of yeah I can go further on you on this day or three because I had the least amount of muscle damage going in or didn't lose any fluids through the business ends during the race. There's credit to be had for managing your body over the enormous distance, but it gets further and further away from training and effort and strategy of the act of running. And I would think the reason in the head of a 100 mile runner when offered to train and race for 1000 miles, would be exactly the same reasons most "competetive" distance racers would think when offered to do ultras: Nah no thanks not worth proving it really

Wow this mindless blather is still going on? Let this Kilgore douchie think the unintelligent things he thinks and start talking about New York or something.

And yet you had to respond and bump this thread back up.

breathe rite wrote:

[quote]And I would think the reason in the head of a 100 mile runner when offered to train and race for 1000 miles, would be exactly the same reasons most "competetive" distance racers would think when offered to do ultras: Nah no thanks not worth proving it really

Of course you would think that. This is precisely what is meant by "projecting". Look it up.

Every one of your concerns has been answered quite intelligently, yet you keep repeating the same things. I have nothing more to say, as you obviously can't think outside the box. The only reason ultrarunning is distinct from "regular" running is because of the social and historical significance of the marathon. Nothing longer than the marathon has any historical background. That doesn't mean it's no a legitimate distance to run.

Sprinters are cocky, does that mean their sport is illegitimate? Plus, the only reason you think ultrarunners are cocky is because of the ones you read about, which are often the craziest ones that do the craziest things. I admit that 1000mile races you start to wonder 'why would anyone do that?' but that doesn't make me look down on their willingness to do it. The whole sport of running is for thrill anyway, and some people just prefer to do it differently than others. Their attitude shouldn't be generalized to all ultrarunners, and it should not have anything to do with how legitimate the event is as a competition.

Freaking Out.

My criticisms of ultrarunning are grounded in Aristotle's teaching on the mean. Essentially, virtue is the midpoint between excess and deficiency.

Ultras are the excess of their respective sports. It is what binge drinking is to drinking. Because ultrarunners cannot achieve excellence, they choose excess. It is as simple as that.

Out.

To this I have one quote, written with humor but speaks the truth nonetheless

"Live by the foma that make you brave and kind and healthy and happy."

Foma: harmless untruth

Main point, stop putting your narrow ideology on other people. Excellence doesn't mean only one thing (fast times), and for many ultras, its more of a mental barrier.

Stop telling others what to do, aswipe.

ilgore wrote:

My criticisms of ultrarunning are grounded in Aristotle's teaching on the mean. Essentially, virtue is the midpoint between excess and deficiency.

Sports are all about breaking away from the mean, my simple friend.

But if you wish to bring your half-wit understanding of philosophy into the discussion, we await your companion thread on why sprints are equally dumb

ilgore wrote:

Or I could pursue excellence by training day in and day out and putting it all on the line in a single race months from now. That is hard. I may achieve that goal, or I might be crushed. Running is easy. Running well is hard. Ultrarunners fail to grasp this fine Aristotelian distinction.

You could also pursue excellence by training day in and day out putting it all on the line in a single 100 mile race months from now.

If you do better at the 800m than the 1,500m you run the 800m if you do better at the marathon than the half marathon you run the marathon. If you run better at the 100 mile than the marathon you run the 100 mile.

People run marathons just to finish and say that they did it and many of them walk much of the way. Also, while the marathon admittedly is not as dangerous as an ultra don't forget that there have been deaths in marathons. That doesn't make the marathon excessive.

In addition, upping the length of a football game to 16 quarters isn't much different from going from 400m to the mile, both require more restraint and pacing.

Plus, ultrarunning can be very exciting (Ann Trason vs. Juan Herrez Leadville Trail 100 1994) much like the marathon, mile, 100m etc.

People hate on runners enough without us turning on ourselves ultras are just a different kind of racing like the 100m is different from the marathon so letsrun whether it be for 10 seconds or 10 hours.

lets keep this conversation going!

I hang out on LR because it's usually full of funny people and funny posts. Hell, I even troll a fair amount. However, I run ultras exclusively because I enjoy them more. I don't think ultras are dumb, nor do I think short races are dumb. I love watching marathons and even the 100m (Bolt and others, for example). But for me, I simply like running long much more than I luck running fast. I don't need to justify this to anyone, ever.

Geb has 26 World Records (although more unofficially like the 15K or 10 mile) in his career and is chasing 30 right?

Okay, so if he gets the WR in the 50K, 100K, 100 mile and 24 hours, do those count? Does he then get the "30" in our sport that he's been chasing?

Hell, why not go after the 1000 miles, 1000 KM, 12 hours, 48 hours, 6 day races etc and the others and get it up to "40" world records.

Would that count? Would he then be considered the greatest distance runner in the world?

...or do the 30 world records need to come from the somewhat standard events? Despite what people say about how people like Geb "can't beat Jurek at western states, it's such a different race etc", yes Geb could get those World Records, and if you really want to still talk about terrain and weather etc,okay fine he could get the 50K road WR, 100 mile Road WR, the 12 hr, 24 hr, 48 hr road and track WRs without a doubt.

So what do you guys think? Would those count in part of his quest for 30 World Records before his career is over? Surely he knows he is capable of them, yet doesn't decide to chase them. Why would this be?

ilgore wrote:

blah blah blah

yawn