How does it feel to run a 100 km run?

One of the most frequent questions I get asked is: How does it feel to have run 100 km? Actually, I’ve been asking this question myself for a while now and until recently I didn’t have an answer. The first few days after the event I thought, I just need to process and realise it all and then I’ll be able to put it into words. But that didn’t happen. I simply couldn’t tell you how it feels to run 100 km. I thought it was simply too big to grasp and comprehend for me.

But, as so often, I found the answer when I started training again after the ultra challenge. The answer seemed so simple and clear all of a sudden. I wasn’t able to answer that question because in my head I never ran a 100 km ultra trail run in one go. I broke down the course into multiple parts. I visualised them all as part of my preparation for the challenge. I trained the specific parts and engraved them in my head. And that’s exactly how I approach it on the event day.

I didn’t get to the starting line thinking “Ok, so now I’m going to run 100 km. Let’s just run it all.”. Instead I was telling myself “Alright, this is what you’ve been training for. Take it step by step, part by part. First things first: So start with your warm-up round and then think about the next part.”. That is how I approach every single challenge: Break the big, massive and impossible, audacious looking goal into small junks so it becomes manageable. So I can tell you how I felt during the different parts I was running but I still can’t put them together to a whole 100 km. Not sure if that makes sense to any of you but this is how I feel about it. So my answer to the question “How does it feel like to run a 100 km?” my answer still is: I can’t tell you but I can give you a run-through of the day and how I felt during the different sections - experiencing all the feelings, lows and highs.

If you are interested to know how I split the course into different sections, check out this article.