How To Train For Extreme Ultramarathons with Kris King

Dr Phil Price [: 00:00:00

Hello, and welcome to the progress theory where we discuss scientific principles for optimizing human performance. I am doctor Phil Price. And on today's episode, we are joined by Ultra Runner and CEO of Beyond the Ultimates, Chris King. Now ultra marathons are gaining in popularity. More and more people are looking to push their running performance further than they've ever done before. However, have you ever considered doing an ultra marathon in some of the harshest environments in the world? Well, that's exactly what Beyond the Ultimate offer. Providing ultra marathons in such places like the jungle, the desert, and the mountains. And Chris King created these races.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:00:41

So in this episode, Chris and I are gonna discuss exactly what you need to do to prepare for some of the harshest races in the world. As always, follow The Progress Theory on Instagram, YouTube, and check out all of our other episodes. Here is Chris King. Chris, thank you for coming on to the Vrogus Theory.

Kris King [: 00:01:02

Thanks, Phil. It's great to be

Dr Phil Price [: 00:01:03

here. Yeah. It's good to see you again. I know we lost, well, we met and last saw each other at the Omnia retreat, which was a really good experience. And you gave a great talk during that time. So that's why you've been in my mind ever since then because I wanted to elaborate on some of the things that we've discussed there. And I think it'd be great to link in with, you know, ultra marathon performance because you've got so much experience in that. So, yeah, looking forward to delving into some questions.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:01:28

Before we get going, do you wanna just give a bit of an overview as to who you are and, beyond the ultimate?

Kris King [: 00:01:34

Yeah. Okay. So, my name's Chris King, and for the last 20 years, I've either been running, coaching people for, or designing some of the toughest ultra races in the world. So, my company, Beyond the Ultimate, we do multi day events. So people may have heard of the Marathon des Arbes, which is was probably like the the first kind of big guts and glamour event in that field. We're like that, but we've kind of ratcheted up a bit, and all our races are environment based. So we've got one in the cold, one in the hot, one in the really extreme mountains, and we and one in the jungle, and we we really specialize in remote areas and hostile environments. So peak performance, really, in environments that are trying to not allow you to perform.

Kris King [: 00:02:22

And then we've also got the spine race as well, which is a non stop 268 mile race. It's self supported, self sufficient again, and, you know, even self nav and and and all that kind of stuff. So if I haven't been running them myself, I've had a front row seat to watching people make the mistakes or succeed and all that kind of stuff. And, yeah, it's been an interesting ride.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:02:42

Yeah. This sounds awesome. Where did what did the idea or where did the idea for Beyond the Wheel Ultimate come from? Because, obviously, Martin Dussab's very popular. And in my head, I'm thinking that a lot of people now are, yes, there's sport, but there's also that sort of different level above where sport becomes like a challenge that only a few people do. And I I know that kind of draws a lot of people to it. And that sounds like what Beyond the Ultimate is trying to and achieves. Because it's like, okay. You wanna do something which not many people can do, and that is incredibly impressive.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:03:18

You know? It is you're training for a challenge that is very unique. Is that kind of where the idea behind Beyond the Ultimate came from?

Kris King [: 00:03:26

Yeah. I think so. It was a combination of me being super interested in sustainable travel. I don't know why. I mean, this was when I was around about the 18 to 21 age range. I was really interested in sustainable travel before everyone was talking about it. You know, I felt like, I did a couple of trips away and just really was interested in getting into remote areas and and experiencing the people and the culture and and doing it in a way that, would benefit the people in that area. I really saw the impact of tourism on a local level, and loved that.

Kris King [: 00:03:58

So my mind at the time was going, I might guide, I might be a safari guide, I might be doing something like that. But similarly, at the same time, I was getting this love for endurance sport and running. And, you know, in the early nineties, the cool thing to do was a marathon. And then in the late nineties, early 2000s, the cool thing to do was an Ironman. And, you know, if you go to the marathon's a really good achievement, but if you go to an office space of a 100 people now and say, how did the marathon the weekend? It's not like, woah, that it was before. It was, oh, cool. You know, I know about 8 people back, you know, whatever. My old Dave did one or

Dr Phil Price [: 00:04:29

Next one.

Kris King [: 00:04:29

Yeah. All that kind of stuff. And, well done. You know? And and even though you are, what, in the real low percentages, in that world of people that you probably hang around with if you train a lot, it's not it's not anymore because people are just wanting that that. So we I was, I suppose, fortunately ahead of the curve on both both angles. So, you know, we've we we kind of got ahead, of the market there. And then obviously, ultrarunning endurance sport has blown up in the last couple of years, and I think it's partly to do with that, and I don't think it's any, coincidence, or probably, you know, a topic to go too deep too soon, but you know, when you when you look at the mental health crisis, I don't think that is a coincidence that you have more people on things like antidepressants, more people in therapy than ever before, and there's a rise in a sport that often has a link to people with trauma. So, you know, I think that those two things combined have been the growth of that.

Kris King [: 00:05:28

And we've kind of been the, I suppose, the pinnacle event for most people. It's the one thing that they might train for in their life that they think that's the top end of what we might be able to do.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:05:38

So what are the environments that you race under? So I know you when we spoke, you were talking about desert, and you've been in Kyrgyzstan, am I right, regarding a mountainous race?

Kris King [: 00:05:50

So, yeah, so mountain so that's high altitude. So every every race has got some element that you would have to ideally prepare for in a in a probably in a country that you can't prepare for. So, you know, the desert and the heat of plus 50s of what it was this year than in Namibia. You can saw I mean, nothing will prepare you for plus 50 in trying to perform at that, that, but you can replicate like sauna sessions and stuff. But the tougher ones really are the the altitude. There's no way to replicate altitude until you get there, so it normally takes an acclimatization phase. Or, the jungle, which is humid and hot and wet and slippy and all these kind of things. And that's really hard to kind of prefer, and altitude actually to begin with.

Kris King [: 00:06:29

So that's got everything. And then, obviously, we have our our ice race in Northern Sweden, which gets quite easily down to minus 40. And, you know, preparing for that is is tough. But that's the exciting thing. Most people on the start line have never been to those extremes. So they're experiencing many things. You know, they're they're not all, they're all athletes, but they're not by any stretch used to that environment. And that's the whole part of the challenge.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:06:54

Which one do most people struggle with? I mean, they all sound like a struggle, but is there a particular environment that people seem to underestimate more?

Kris King [: 00:07:03

I I think when you, so when you look at the toughest environments, I think if you were to just every year, this will always churn someone up. I think the jungle is one of them. It's very unforgiving. It's just a lot of things go on in the jungle from even like a micro level, like, you know, you're more likely to get ill because of the, you know, the climate is so suitable for, you know, infections to move. So if you've got someone that's got a sickness bug or something like that, it spreads. But then you've also got just that insane humidity that doesn't drop throughout the entire day. In a desert, it gets hot in the day and cool in the evening. In the mountains, you can get high, then you can get low.

Kris King [: 00:07:44

But in the jungle, you're kind of in it. You're kind of just sat in this thing. And if it's says to be human, it's human. But actually, you know, as extreme as the minus forties, minus fifties are, you can carry kit for that. And it's not as bad as people think, you know, once you get moving. Some of the worst environments, I think, you we can experience in this country. Some of the most extreme ones. So, like, when you look at our spine race, January, penines, you throw sleep deprivation into wet, you know, saturated rain, heavy winds.

Kris King [: 00:08:13

It's only it might only be like minus 2, minus 5, but that kind of wet cold is super extreme, and, and, and, and exposes people to hypothermia. It's such a quick, timeframe that actually, you know, that those 2 polar opposites, that kind of wet cold, and then that wet humid, are the ones that kind of throw people off. Because it's really hard to regulate your temperature at the bottom end of that. And it's also really hard to regulate your, kind of, sweat levels, and your, kind of, stuff at the top end. So, yeah, I I think soon as you start adding moisture into the air, it kinda screws people up.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:08:47

Yeah. I can imagine. I've always thought because we had Lindsay Bruce on the progress theory not too long ago, and he talked about the jungle phase of SAS selection. And I always thought that must be the the hardest. It just looks it looks unrelenting. Yeah. And especially what you were saying about, you know, you're kind of stuck in that environment. Sometimes there's some changes to the environment, which you can kind of use as a bit of a not a cool down period, but a p a period of easing, but you just don't get that in the jungle.

Kris King [: 00:09:16

Exactly. And then you you're throwing sleep deprivation in there on our race, particularly sleeping in hammocks. And I think when you're looking at multi day races like ours, you're you're if you're in a if you're a top end athlete, you know, the guy, you know, the guy, the guy that goes to win this race, your race and your experience, your race might look like a nice increment going up of performance. It's like you're starting low, and you're starting to find it harder as you go and stuff like that. But most 99.9% of people are like this. They have good moments and low moments. And in the low moments on these races in the extremes, you haven't got long to mess around. You know? If you get really cold in the ice race at minus 40, you haven't got long to warm up before your race is over.

Kris King [: 00:09:52

If you get really hot in the desert, you haven't got long before you use cool your cold cool your cold temperature down and and, you know, low it when you're done. But in the jungle, not only is that time short, but you just it's really hard to get that back up again. Because once you hit that low, you're recovering in a place which you can't really get refuge from. So that's the only reason that I say, like, the jungle in that sense is tough. But they all have their own challenges. You know, you look at the desert race and trying to perform in minus, in, in plus 50, and it's a runnable race. So people are racing it. In In the others, it's more about survival, trying to get to the finish, but in the desert, they're racing.

Kris King [: 00:10:29

So they're trying to perform and run at the top end of their they in a in a plus 50 heat box, it's it that becomes an interesting dynamic as well.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:10:39

Yeah. I mean, there's so there's such different ways of tackling it. If you are doing a race to complete versus doing a race to get the quickest time possible, the preparation for both are very, very different, Aren't they? And I guess that takes into account Yeah. The actual physical training, the equipment, all of those types of things. Because I guess from from an equipment point of view, if you're trying to run for performance, you're going to take limited equipment. All the equipment that you take is literally the the minimal amount that you need. I mean, I even heard of people in Marathon des Arts were cutting their toothbrush in half. So they've literally got the end with the brush just to try and save a bit of weight and space.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:11:18

So, yeah, that's Yeah.

Kris King [: 00:11:19

Exactly. Small thing. Exactly. And it's all those micro details. It's those micro details that can make or break a race. And especially, you know, we've there's only 2 people that ever completed our entire series, and there's no one that's done it in the calendar 12 months. Everyone that's tried to do it in under 12 months has failed. Wow.

Kris King [: 00:11:34

There's 2 people that have completed our whole series. There's a there's a chap called Russell Jackson, who is a really solid athlete. He's not won any races, but he would finish top 10 in all of them, solid guy. And then Christina Madsen, who's a race winner. And so as a as a woman, she had to have the attitude of, if I want to race against these guys, I need to look at my pack and and really be as minimal as possible. Because every gram, every microgram matters because she's a very strong woman. You know, she she boxes, she cross fits, and all that kind of stuff. But she recognized that actually the weight carrying ratio to her body weight is is gonna be larger.

Kris King [: 00:12:14

You know? So she she might weigh, like, 60 kilo, I think, and and and her pack weight needs to be below 10, where she's racing against, you know, 75, 80 kilo guys that are carrying the same weight. You know? You might kind of work from parts, you know, their their entire rig, their entire setup is bigger. But that that that carrying ratio is is much larger for her. So she had to have a very minimalist approach. So she was really, really, really counting calories. She weighed everything. She had spread, like, and and this is the common thing across all. They have spreadsheets where you measure out everything.

Kris King [: 00:12:45

You have to really decide what you're gonna take, and and this kind of race strategy is is different because it can make a difference. It really can when you're racing over 8, 10, 10 to 12 hour days.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:12:54

But that also sounds really exciting because people like to really plan their training because it shows an element of control leading up to what they perceive to be achieving peak performance. But when doing the same with the equipment, the whole experience or process lean to event could sounds just really, really exciting, and something which must draw that type of personality, I guess.

Kris King [: 00:13:15

Yeah. We get a lot of we get a lot of successful business people do our races because I think it gives them that same kind of founder, you know, that exciting bit of research, that exciting thing to kind of obsess over and stuff like that. So we get a lot of we get a lot and weirdly enough, the people that do well on the races, like the spine race, where the sleep deprivation kicks in, and where the micro detail really matters on navigations. There seems to be a weird percentage of scientists that, you know, John Kelly and all that. They have a science background, so they they have a very practical application to their training, a very practical application to their race strategy. It's very methodological, and it just seems to be a passover trait from their job, you know, it just seems to work well for them. But yeah, it's fascinating for me. I I mean, you probably say I love watching it.

Kris King [: 00:14:13

I love watching races unfold. I love the dynamic of it's a very friendly sport, so people will be friendly with each other. They're not, you know, they're not salty with each other in camp. They are talking, but then when the race starts,

Dr Phil Price [: 00:14:24

it's on, you

Kris King [: 00:14:25

know, you're looking at people. Yeah. And you're looking at these athletes, like, really, really, taking taking it seriously. And it's been years of prep and and commitment, and and sacrifice to get there. And, you know, it's not a big televised sport. It doesn't go on tele, it doesn't go out. It's the the pocket of the purse isn't massive for races and winning. So this is it's a it's a support for the love of it.

Kris King [: 00:14:47

And, you know, it's a fantastic thing to watch day in, day out.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:14:51

It sounds like it's the type of sport that would be perfect for, like, a Netflix series because Yeah. Because it's so long, you're not gonna oh, the the race is on late, so I'm gonna go check it out because it's so long. You, you know, you just tune in and out for certain bits. Whereas a, you know, a Netflix series will probably film all those key bits, and see the the changes in the athletes as they go through the event. You know, happy at the beginning, excited versus, you know, experiencing those lows and highs and kind of tell a story. And, I know I watched the the adventure race, the one in Fiji. It had Bear Grylls in it. Not yet.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:15:28

But it sounds like that would be perfect. Have the Beyond the Ultimate Netflix series where you see, like, you know, if I start with, like, 3 people that have to do all 4 races in the calendar month and see what happens to them, that would be cool.

Kris King [: 00:15:42

We we end up talking to Netflix and Disney and all that kind of stuff all the time. The problem you've got is the application of filming. You know, like, it's just so hard to film in these places and get regular coverage and stuff like that. But, yeah, we're it'll happen as things get move move on, and and, yeah, it would be fascinating to just bring that to a wider audience, because I think people will, look, there there are some really good documentaries out on YouTube now. I think if, if anyone's kind of this isn't of my races, but if anyone's new into this world and wants to watch just a fascinating look into to that kind of world, there's a there's a race called the Barclay marathon that that people may have heard of, and it's a very unique, very kind of obscure race. And there's a documentary called the race that eats its young.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:16:23

Okay. And

Kris King [: 00:16:24

that's a really good yeah. So that's a really good film to watch, which kind of gives you the insight into these people. And John Kelly, who I mentioned, who's the the person that does really well and has a very, like, really structured approach, and very he's in that. You get to see him in that. So, it's that and that's a race that really pushes people to the to the end of, you know, maximum human performance. I think only, 3 or 4 people have ever done it here in in history. So Yeah. Yeah.

Kris King [: 00:16:51

It's it's a fascinating play.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:16:52

The Berkeley marathon, it was quite a while ago since I've seen that. So I think a few people have completed it since then. Now they should do another update one because, you know, when you've got something that difficult and really challenges people, you've got plenty more stories since the last time they filmed. So maybe they should think of doing that again.

Kris King [: 00:17:09

Yeah. Well, that that's the thing. That's the beauty of that. Las is a wonderful mind who has that race, and he's a he's a purist. So he doesn't like to let film cruise in. He doesn't like, you know, and you're I I don't wanna say too much, but you kinda you'll understand why there's no global it's amazing how it's become that big considering Laz has tried to make it a cult thing that's not big. And it's just this weird, wonderful, wacky thing, that I think highlights the the mindset of the people that perform at the top end of the sport.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:17:39

Which races from beyond the ultimate have you done?

Kris King [: 00:17:42

So I've designed them all, essentially. I've ran the desert race, when we were training another RDE up, we I ran that, and then obviously in the jungle, been out there, but I I I was designing it. I didn't run it as a as a race, if you know what I mean. I ended up doing it over 8 or 9 days. We did more mileage over different bits and stuff, so it was a different thing. But I've done a lot of my own stuff, so I kinda got into this. I I did, I ran from, Johnny Goetz to Land's End, self support with a mate of mine, Adam Kimball. We did all the 3 peaks at the same time.

Kris King [: 00:18:13

Did that in a month. We we could have done it a lot quicker. We were averaging about, I think the minimum we did was 30 miles a day. And then towards the end, we was getting up to like 70, 80 mile days. Just because we we were zigzagging across the country. My mate Kimbal from America want to see the country and we were just, yeah, alright, let's do a jogger. Alright, let's do the 3 peaks. Alright, let's go see our mate Steve, who you did the race with and, you know, and so we ended up doing this really, like, we call it the great British adventure, and we just kind of zigzagged our way down the country with a backpack running stupid about miles a day.

Kris King [: 00:18:47

So, yeah, that kind of self sufficient getting a backpack on and going is like what I've always loved. And then, yeah, I ran and cycled around the coastline of Britain, back in 2012, I think it was. That was a good little adventure. And then, I suppose, when I was trying to test my top end performance, I was going for a speed record of Mount Killy, and I did I ran that in about 9 hour 40 something, I think, from bottom to top, which was, slow for me. I was aiming for a sub, 7:15, but got caught in a whiteout. But, yeah, so I'd that was that was my kind of break into these. I was already in that world before designing these things, as an athlete. But, yeah, I tended to do my own stuff because I just had a project and ran with it.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:19:36

Yeah. But that's the beauty of it. You can kind of create your own goals, can't you? And just tailor things to whatever you want to particularly achieve. But all of them sound wicked, especially the Kilimanjaro one.

Kris King [: 00:19:47

Yeah. Well, you know what? That was a different thing for me. Like, it was I'm not really a racer that compete. I am a very competitive person, but I'm not motivated to train for these things to be competitive. I train for these things because I think it's awesome adventure. I wanna be fit and stuff like that. But I have been competitive, and the Achilles thing brought that competitive edge out of me of, like, how quick and how efficient can I get at running quickly uphill? And I and and it was all about, you know, body weight ratio to to that. I was I was in this labs with, Sheffield Hallam, with, Doctor.

Kris King [: 00:20:18

Charlene Rudock, and we were doing, you know, the a 2 max testing, gas analyzer testing. So I was bringing science into my training, learning all about that, and and and trying to get those extra percentiles out of my performance. And, you know, I was I was very, a very specifically adapted athlete at that time. You know, I could run up most near vertical hills at a frightening pace, but, you know, wasn't really I'd lost all my kind of strength. I'd I'd not really even though I was weight training, you know, just the amount of miles I was doing a week and the kind of importance of keeping my body weight at a certain point to to perform. But, yeah, that that whole Kilimanjaro thing brought out a whole different type of athlete in me, which was quite interesting as a journey to go on to to become quick, you know, and and get really, really, you know, world class quick at running off a hill. So, yeah.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:21:08

Did you have to acclimatize beforehand? So did you scale up up to so I my wife and I did Kilimanjaro for our honeymoon. So I kind of roughly know roughly know key parts and and and the and the trail. I'm just trying to think of where was because the initial summit day is quite actually quite it's like 1200 meters. So, like, the last camp before the summit is is quite low in comparison to, I guess, other 5, 6000 meter mountains. And I just remember that particular summit day. Like, quite a few of our group struggle with the with the altitude. So how many days did you spend acclimatizing beforehand before you went back to the bottom and then did the race?

Kris King [: 00:21:52

I did a training camp prior. So I went to Chamonix Mhmm. Which is ground level 800 meters. You can get up to about 21. I was doing, I did about 2 weeks in Chamonix, where I was running at least 15 to 2000 meters of climb a day. So, you know, he was looking at 15,000 meter week of total vert that I was I was running. And what I would do is I'd get up to about 2,200 meters, as high as I can get, and take a blood sat reader and just note it down. Sit there for a few hours, come back down, and and organically with these trails, sometimes you're up and below that.

Kris King [: 00:22:32

But I want it to be at a 100%, 2,100 at least, at the very, at least before I turned up at Killy. And that whole training camp was more about just long uphill sessions. I've kind of run out of hill in the peak districts in Pennines of, like, long continuous stuff in the Chamonix. You've got these good 1 1000, 2 1000 meter climbs where you which are runnable. So then after Chamonix, I went to Killy, I had 2 days down, just to recover from the flight, and then I did a 5 day rotation. So we did, an up and down each day. So went from like 1500, I can't remember the exact split, but like 1500 to 3000 slept for a little while in the afternoon, came back down, camped to 1800, went to 3,100. So, obviously, when you do killie, you normally just limp up, don't you, in little bits and stuff like that.

Kris King [: 00:23:23

I was I was doing almost like Everest style rotations, like up down, up down, up down, until we got to the I did a I didn't actually summit in my rote in my acclimatization. I did I wanted to save the summit to the attempt. So I kinda went as close as I dared up to the glacier, and then came back down. And then, yeah. Camped up at about, camped down at the bottom, and about midnight, set off, so I got to experience I ran most of it in the dark, you know, it was in the cool, it was in the, and I summited as the sun was was kinda coming. It was a beautiful thing. I I was just a bit pissed off because I got caught in the kind of bad weather. I just what I what I learned from there is I should have given myself a couple of days of attempt to to pick the best weather day.

Kris King [: 00:24:07

If I waited another 24 hour period, I've had this clear day of weather. But foolishly, I left a summit day to this day, lined up all the PR, all the stuff, and the tracking back home for this day, thinking that Kilimanjaro's weather is quite stable, and it just happened to be a absolutely awful day to Yeah. Just try and summit. So yeah. Sounds like you're Lesson learned.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:24:27

You're very prepared for all of your challenges. It isn't just like, okay. Here's a challenge I would like to do. It's slightly different. I'm gonna train as I would a normal Ultra to do it. You kind of do that, but also at least try and expose yourself to similar environments that you're going to experience in the actual event. Like you said about seeking out inclines that were long enough to be able to, I guess, condition your body for constant uphill running. It's because that must be a real you People think about the physiological system, but you gotta think about your ankles and your ability to be able to, you know, just bounce your way up at such dorsiflex angles.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:25:05

You know, with your Achilles, the the the gastroc, you know, completely lengthened. It's a very specific strength that's needed there, and you sort out how to train for it.

Kris King [: 00:25:15

Yeah. Exactly. And I think, you know, you've gotta you can't write off the the impact of lots of percent work. So when you're trying to put a lot of incline into your training, you you also add a lot of decline, impact. So what would happen typically is I'd be running up the hills and walking the downs just to make sure that I'm saving my efforts for the things that matter. And when you're doing that in, you know, hills, you could search out decent hills in in the UK. In the peak of Pennines, I had loads of them, 20% aisles and stuff like that, but they just weren't long enough for me to work on continuous pacing. You know, what is it gonna be like when I have 3 hours of just constant up? I can't I can't experience that in this country, so I had to move to it.

Kris King [: 00:25:56

And I think physiologically, I felt really confident. Like, I I thought that, you know, I know that my I was actually worried about things like, you know, calves getting to the point where you run uphill for that long, they just pump. It's just like doing like bicep curls for hours and hours and hours. Imagine what I was gonna do to your bicep, your calves get to that point. And I can remember there's a fixed period in training, which I had to overcome that and and kind of, like, work on and on taking my overload a little slower. But the the the main thing for me was it was more psychological. This is a big scary thing. I was going upper altitude in a very quick way.

Kris King [: 00:26:33

You know, pulmonary edema, cerebral edema is a a a very life threatening, and I just wanted to make sure that psychologically I was in a good place where I knew that I could ascend that quickly and be okay. Because what you're what you're doing then, if you're if you're at a base altitude and ascending to 5,000, I think it's 600, isn't it, Achilles? In a very quick you're basically asking for a pulmonary edema. You're basically asking for a cerebral edema. You know, people have have got them at much less, kind of. So I needed to make sure that my I was at least acclimatized to like 4000, 4,500. So the stress strain of going over that extra 1000 meters was not gonna give me any particular problems. And that I was also fit enough to descend quickly if something went wrong. And and and descending quickly under fatigue as well.

Kris King [: 00:27:23

You know, descending technical when you're when you're absolutely, you've been running uphill at a solid pace for right now now. So, yeah, there's a lot to that, and I loved that kind of finding out about it. No one had really done it before, apart from a couple of like Kilian Joyner, who's obviously one of the best, he is the best all touring in the world and stuff. So, and he didn't really put his training notes down. So, you know, it was just one of those things where it was just really fascinating for me as a coach and an athlete to kind of sit and go, right. How how can I adapt my body in the best way for this? So, yeah.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:27:55

You mentioned how you have it's great to watch all of the athletes perform the races for Beyond the Ultimate. What qualities, and this could be both physical or mental, but what qualities do you think separates those that do very well? Well, either either that they're winning the event or they're consist consistent top ten, for example. But what policies do you think those athletes have versus those that quite often don't quite make it?

Kris King [: 00:28:23

In in our race in particular, there's a a different thing. So if you've got a 100 mile race back here, for example, in the UK in temperate weather, I'd say it's those that are are willing and more experienced at being in that kind of level of discomfort. No matter how prepared you are to run a 100 mile is so Adam Kimball, a good mate of mine, is probably one of the best 100 mile races in the world. Like, he loves that distance, and he'll cruise for 60, 70 miles, and then at this kind of, like, final 30, which is mad to say out loud, isn't it? But this is a guy that can 6 minute mile comfortably for 70 miles, and then the race is on. And he has races, of course, where he feels shit, like, shitty at 30 and 40 and stuff, and it's just how it goes. But he is one of those guys that can kind of get into a pain cave and just he has such a positive attitude that he can kind of bring himself through it. In our environment, if you come in with that attitude, you're probably gonna get wiped out quite quickly because you have to have an ultimate respect for the environment that you're racing in. So it's slightly different.

Kris King [: 00:29:13

If you're in a temporary environment, the best ultra runners, the ones that can kinda go into that pain cave and hold it. The the ones on our races in particular, the ones that recognize that when they're there they need to adjust their strategy to what they normally do, and respect where they are. And because it's a 5 day race, it's having the confidence to know that you're going to get better. You're you're if someone is an hour ahead of you, it's fine. There's still 4 days to go and and all that kind of stuff. So, I think that's, one of the best parts of the job, really, is watching those people get completely broken down and built back up. You know? So the people that are looking at not competing, but completing are the ones that really go through the the ringer. You know? They're probably out in the environment for longer.

Kris King [: 00:29:54

That it's the biggest thing they'll ever do. And watching them kind of hit these massive lows, because then when they get to the finish line, it's the biggest high ever. And you you've been involved in that remark, like, remarkable journey for them. But when you've got the competitive side of it, you have to have an absolute faith and confidence in yourself and your abilities. And that comes from all of this preparation time and taking it seriously. And I think, I think there's a lot of similarity between me and a couple of the people that have won our races is actually fear a loss of a performance over the effort level that you put in to get there. Ultra running is time consuming. It's a time consuming sport.

Kris King [: 00:30:38

You know, Your your winners of these races are dedicated in 10 to 16 hour weeks of training. You know? You've got hour 2 a day of either running or that kind of stuff, your nutrition on top. So you're you're looking at 10 to 16 hours of dedicated training time per week, plot probably plus research, probably, but further. And you're just terrified that when you come to the performance, all of that may be wasted. So you're dead you're dead determined on making sure that your performance, and your and you get that, you know, finish, and get there, and stuff. And and so there's a yeah, it's it's it's the ability to be able to deal with that pressure as well. You know, because chances are if you're at 16 hour training weeks, you've probably put if you're a family person, you've probably put some strain on your family life. You've probably said no to a lot of friends' parties.

Kris King [: 00:31:26

You've probably not gone on that stag do. You've probably not gone to that wedding and gone full send. You know, you've you've not gone to that kid's party and had the party rings. Yeah. All those kind of little decisions is what you've done for, like, the last year, and you've been a really boring friend, to those that don't run. And then you're just at that day, and it's the people that can control that that stress and anxiety and rein it in and be like, no, this is it. I'm confident. I'm gonna go and have the right level of confidence to not become too arrogant and succumb to the environment.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:31:58

And they I guess, you were saying how it's like that fear of that you've missed something. You've gone and spent hours of preparation, but the fear of not being fully prepared means you have a bigger respect to the challenge ahead. Would you say that is kind of Yeah.

Kris King [: 00:32:16

And you can't there's no yeah. And there's no perfect way to prepare for these things. So there's an acceptance actually that you're on a start line in an environment that you can't fully prepare for. So you've everyone's the same. It's gotta be better than the next person.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:32:28

Person's and the fact that having a respect for the fact you can't fully prepare, but I'm gonna be prepared as much as possible, whereas you might have the next person say, well, I can't really I don't really know what's gonna happen. I have a rough idea, And that might make their preparation slightly complacent. And then all of a sudden, either they're not physically ready or equipment or their tactics are not quite there, And that leads to poor performance, especially once they get into the middle or when they get to the harder parts, you know, those troughs of performance that they're going to go through during the event.

Kris King [: 00:32:58

Yeah. And that's a, you know, ultrarunning essentially is a is a is an energy and is is a balancing of energy in the mind. You know? And and the ones that are top end know what they're experiencing more because they've been through it. So why am I feeling the way I'm doing 9 times as well? I would I would guarantee that actually there's a process that you would go through or or I would get, why am I why do I feel rubbish? Is it my hydration is the first question. Is it my food? Is it my salt? Is it my sleep? They're the kind of 4 things that you kind of go in order, and chances are, or 5th, is it my pace? Depend on there might be a slight change, but those 5 things are the questions you're going to ask yourself if you're starting to feel a bit shitty, and I guarantee it's probably in that like hydration food, pacing, sleep, you know, that kind of stuff. And if you can work through that and fix them, then you're fine. But the ones that haven't experienced that before, you can sometimes muddle around and just not not fix it and then it gets too late. You get to this point where you can't sort your hydration, you can't sort your food, you can't you just hit this.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:34:03

You can't recover.

Kris King [: 00:34:04

Hit this wall. And no matter how strong you are mentally, you're done. You're done. You know? So the the your mental capacity will get you to a certain point, but then your body will just shut down. And and that happens when people don't look after their their admin.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:34:19

How would you physically prepare for one of your races, especially a 250 Marler? And I'm thinking more physically because we've talked about, I guess, equipment and also going to try and find some environment that is relatively similar to what you'll be experiencing to help with developing those qualities. But say that you only had the ability to train in the UK, and you mentioned, like, 10 to 16 hours seems to be a common, number of hours per week. What would you fill

Kris King [: 00:34:50

That's for that's for winners. For winners. Okay. That's for race winners. Yeah. Yeah. So for people that do most of these things, I could I could I could confidently say that if you're training smart, you'd only need 6 hours a week. Okay.

Kris King [: 00:35:00

You'd and you'd build to that. So if you've not done ultrarunning or you're new to ultrarunning, you would build 6 hours. I think a word that's not used enough in ultra, endurance training is prerequisite. You've gotta have that to you've gotta earn the right to do 6 hours a week, you know, so, and the reason why I use time as a variable is because mileage can vary massively on terrain. It can, you know, early Kipchoge's 100 mile weeks is gonna be very different to a 100 mile week that you might run or I might run. So, you know, you would start off with a, you know, 3 hour week, Make the session time, you know, you might, you might look at some kind of frequency. You might say, I'm gonna run every day this week, little and often, or I might do 3 1 hour runs, or I might do yeah. It it depends on your schedule.

Kris King [: 00:35:43

And actually, the beautiful thing at the beginning is that you can fit around your freedom. You're not gonna get it wrong. But what I would say to people is if you can get to 6 hours a week of running comfortably, I. E. You haven't got any niggles, you're cruising a low heart rate, and you're finding it comfortable, possibly a tad boring now. You know, like, you're at 6 hour weeks, and you're you're kind of going, yeah. I can run. It's part of my life.

Kris King [: 00:36:04

It's part of my schedule. You're in a very good position. You've set a very good foundation for adding the things in like we discussed, like getting ready for the event in particular. I wouldn't I wouldn't add those things into the like, the last phase of the training. You know, you don't want to be adding backpacks in, you don't want to be going out looking for, you know, sitting in a freezer a a year out from the event, you know, unless it's a particular concern of yours if you if you were training for the ice in that example. So you would just look at getting the basics right, getting the consistency in, getting all of the things that any athlete needs, good nutrition, good sleep, good support network. And then once you get to that 6 hour week, which I think is like a good I use a 6 hour week, like a 10,000 steps marker, you know, it's not the exact science behind it, but actually around about that time is a good marker. And then, yeah, dependent on what you wanna do, and which way you wanna travel, and how well you wanna do on the event, you might take that up.

Kris King [: 00:36:58

But there is often a decent correlation between time spent in a lower heart rate per week, performance. If you can if you can take it there slowly and in the right way.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:37:09

Go say you've worked your way up to 6 hours. By that point, would you then start to incorporate some of those hours dedicated to more high speed running? And then the rest is kinda like that low easy pace just to mix up? Or Yeah. Because of the type of event it is, do you encourage people to, don't worry. Just find an easy pace. Spend time time on feet, and enjoy that low intensity, sort of lower heart rate, just getting used to it. And that will hopefully over time provide further prerequisites for the specific stuff you do later on.

Kris King [: 00:37:45

I think with, even in that first initial phase, introducing sprint work and kind of interval training is key. You know? Even if it's just a one session a week or a quick session, couple of sprints, just to get kind of prep the body for that. You know, one thing that I think all ultraruners should be is adaptable. And when you look at the best ultrarunners, they, you know, kilos journay is basically a walkie set of lungs and a heart on legs. You know, he's he's he's completely adapted to it, but he can, at demand, hammer it up a hill in 2, 3 minute intervals and recover really quickly. And and he does that because he's he sometimes just race he races hard and races often, and he's been fortunate enough to to have a long career at it. So, you know, the Kenyans, for example, will do hard brick sessions. They don't really do the interval stuff, but they do, you know, the at race pace because they're training for being quick marathoners, you know, so they need to.

Kris King [: 00:38:41

So I would do that, but then as you start to get to 6 hours, yeah, I would I would be chucking more of them in. I would I would be doing at least 1, possibly 2 week. And, actually, as your mileage starts to go up and your time starts to go up, I actually started to transition off of sprints into gym equipment onto a rower or a bike just to make sure that I was lowering the impact where where possible, just reducing that risk of injury. So I would, when I was at that 6 hour level, let's call it like phase 1 is getting to 6 hours, phase 2 is now developing on and becoming a better athlete. That's when I transitioned to a what bike or a rower, and just do, you know, your 20 seconds on, 40 seconds off for 6 times 2, and and really, really focusing on max effort, you know, turning up with the intent to be proper max effort, not not to fuck about. You're there to create an adaptation and and to go hard. So you know you know you've got it right when you turn up to the gym that day and you're kind of dreading it. You know, and then I always used to try and get someone to be with me on that.

Kris King [: 00:39:45

You can you'll always kind of push out that extra percent if someone is in your ear or, you know, down here. I'm quite fortunate in pools to have a lot of rowers in the area. So, you know, getting on a rower next to a rower that's setting the pace for you is is brutal, you know? So, yeah. So I I would definitely do that in phase 2. And then, yeah, you'll kind of find a phase 3 as you're getting close to the event, as you're bringing in specifics like your your backpack, if it's our race, or your environment, or your terrain, or your distance, or time on feet. You know, a lot of our races are actually there's a fair bit of walking because the terrain's not runnable. So spending longer out in in the hills on and stuff like that will be more beneficial to to the event prep.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:40:28

What's your next personal challenge? Because I remember when we were chatting last time, you had a few events planned. What's, yeah, what's next for Chris?

Kris King [: 00:40:37

So I'm I'm gonna attempt to be the fastest southwest coast path, which is a 638 mile trail down on the south coast. I'm I'm nowhere I'm I feel a bit like a fraudy messianic because I'm nowhere near that fit yet. You know? I am 10 k fit at the minute. I've I've had, a pretty busy year at work. I've had a long period of time off as I've become a dad. So I'm slowly kind of bringing myself back into that 6 hour week and bringing some consistency into my training. And then I'll probably have a good 12 months of just solid and the thing I'm going to enjoy about this one is it combines that kind of Killy training in that hill. The the Southlake coast part is insanely hilly.

Kris King [: 00:41:11

You know, you you I will need to do 60 miles a day of 2, these are 2, 3000 meters of climb every day for 10 days minimum to to have a chance of the of the record. So I'm gonna have to have both. I'm gonna have to be amazingly good at uphill and downhill, and distance, and performing without sleep and and and so I'm looking forward to diving into that. I just haven't had the time or headspace with work and young toddler to get there and and give it the full throttle. But the the research has started. There's printouts on my desk of sections and inclines and declines and all the kind of obsession is starting. And then, yeah, I just need to put the time in, to kinda get into learn the route and and the, you know, the the hard drive, the mileage, which I'm not too worried about. That'll come this year coming year.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:41:55

What do you expect to be the hardest part of that particular challenge? The sleep deprivation or literally the undulation of the coast?

Kris King [: 00:42:03

The the final 48 hours. So the the a lot of people have got this, have tried to break this record and failed because they've gone with that attitude of only 60 miles a day. I'm going to kind of flip it and say I'm going to run for 16, I'm going to move for 16 hours a day. So 16 hours is focused to, to getting along that trail, whether it be run, walk, or, yeah, I might stop to eat for a little while, but the 16 hours of focus, and then the 6 hours or so of recovery, or 8 hours, get my maths right. So the, that's, that's what I'm gonna do. But as we get closer to the end of that, I suspect as body breaks down, I'm gonna lose that 16 hours. It's gonna turn into a 48 hour slog fest with no sleep. And I think that's all you're doing on a record that long is playing it safe until you can be in the game.

Kris King [: 00:42:49

You know, until you and then the thing is as well, there's people out there. There's people like Damien Hall. There's runners out there that are better runners than me, that could run a different way. But for me, I've got to stay in the game and then go to war for 48 hours to break it. And then Chrissie Morgan has got the record on the mat, is a fantastic runner. So, you know, it's not a record that's gonna go lightly. So I need to spend 8 days kind of just staying with him, being kind of there, and then having a mindset switch the last 48 hours trying, this is where I chip away at it and, and go and, and, and, yeah. So I'm kind of dreading that because I know what that's going to feel like, you know, that lack of sleep and constant moving on a broken body is gonna be pretty brutal.

Kris King [: 00:43:30

And that was the thing that Damien Hall, who set the record initially,

Dr Phil Price [: 00:43:43

type of runner that kinda just needs to stay in the game and then a big final push versus another runner that just has an ability to, you know I'm gonna hit this type of output on these days. And if I plan it correctly, I should be able to maintain that through the whole race. Because, I think I think both are valid strategies. But how do you determine who does what? Because I'd feel like I'm more like you. I would probably maybe it's just because I'm heavier or a weaker runner, but I would need to think about just staying in the game because you can't complete it if you're injured. And then doing the last bit. Yeah. But we yeah.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:44:19

What what do you think?

Kris King [: 00:44:19

I I think if I I think if I'd been consistent through the years of my training, I'd not had this gap of time out, I'd probably be a bit different at you because I'd be a different athlete. I've not competed in a while, I've not raced in a while. I will be coming to a certain type of fitness because I'll be training specifically for that event rather than being a quick ultra runner that's adapting to it. So if I if I think of people that have won our race, so a chap called John Shield, if John Shield ran it, John's a much better racer runner than me. He'd be able to, you know, knock that out. And his problem would be, yeah, staying injury free because he has large mileage weeks and all that kind of stuff, and his performance is at the peak, where I know I'm going to be slower. You know, I know I'm going to walk sections that I probably can run. I know that I'm going to be a bit slower in the first few days.

Kris King [: 00:45:05

But I also know from these kind of things is you can adapt into it. By the 1st week of the great British adventure running 34 about days, I was in pieces. By week 2 and 3 my body had just adjusted and actually doing 60 70 mile days wasn't bad it was just a thing you know, and it seems crazy, but your body kind of, so I will be approaching this where I'll be really trained, but actually my, I'll do a heavy phase probably about a month out, and then I'll do very little, so I'll feel undertrained, I'll feel under prepped for it, but I just want an absolute recovery before that. And I think that's probably a mistake that a lot of people will make as well is coming into that thinking, you know, I'll do that, I'll have my taper a week before. And then they're coming into that with without realizing, you know, they're not they're exhausted. They're they're not fully recovered, where my tape is probably gonna be 3 weeks of complete rest, probably some walking. And then I'll I'll feel unprepared and scared. And then as soon as I get moving, I'll figure it out.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:46:05

I guess if you're if you turn up to an event really tired, even with the taper, the taper didn't wasn't really a taper because the taper didn't do its job. No. So

Kris King [: 00:46:14

No. And it's hard to taper when you're when you're running a 100 mile weeks or, you know, 10 to 14 hour weeks. It's really hard to taper. It's really hard to taper effectively because, you know, I don't think there's an exact science on it yet. I I always say to people, just 20% your your peak week, and and just look at that as a just take 20% of your peak week, keep moving, keep running. Cause sometimes you can take, and I don't know what the science is behind it, but I've experienced it myself, you take a complete rest. And sometimes you just don't, when you're trying to race then, going straight to it, you just cannot get your body moving. It just it doesn't feel like it's in sync, where if you've got that 20% of your volume done in a tape a week, you you're still running at least.

Kris King [: 00:46:57

You're still kind of moving it through the gears, kind of taking a complete rest in a taper, and then and kind of going into a top end performance is tough in this world. Like, I I I just don't I think, personally, I would rather risk the the kind of niggles and injuries. If I was racing in a 100 miles or 60 miles, this is different. But, yeah, it's a it's a tough thing. And I don't think anyone the taper suits the athlete, I think. I don't think there's any kind of standardized way to taper for for endurance sport.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:47:23

I mean, I guess, ultimately, all you need to do, say if you've got 3 weeks, you need to do a certain amount of movement. Let's call it movement volume. That's going to maintain the aerobic fitness that you gained through your peak block, but also is considerably low enough that the body just recovers in different ways. Yeah. Yeah. Because all you need to do is maintain what you got. You're not trying to add on fitness during that last bit. And people probably don't realize you probably don't need as much to maintain.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:47:55

You need considerably more to gain, but not as much to maintain, and you probably need a bit longer to try and fully recover. So

Kris King [: 00:48:02

Yeah. Exactly. And you're as fit as you're gonna be 3 weeks out. You're not gonna get much more on that. So, it's just that realization that you're you've kind of done the work. But, yeah, people get touchy, people get itchy, and either push too hard or they get too scared and don't do enough. So, yeah, it's it's tough, and I don't think I've ever ever, if I'm honest, got a taper completely right. I've never been at a start line of anything and gone.

Kris King [: 00:48:22

I feel Great. 100%. Yeah. Yeah. And it's probably because I'm about to do something that hurts.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:48:29

Yeah. Yeah. It's that little anxiety that you have that just makes your body feel a little bit painful in preparation.

Kris King [: 00:48:37

Yeah, I think so. I can remember a 60 mile race that I did in particular, and the start line was really stacked. You know, there was a lot of people there that I knew I'd raced them before. They'd beat me before and I was I'd train really hard for a podium and I really, really wanted it. And I knew that to get one, these guys that I just knew it was going to really hurt and I was really, I was really fit at the time, so confident and, and yeah, low and behold it was probably one of the most painful races I've done because from about 40 mile, normally at 60 mile race you kind of know your winners around about the 40, 50 mile mark, you know, they're kind of making their move and this one started at about 20. So about 20 miles in, some idiot went, and we all had to go with them, and, you know, it became a very horrible experience. Yeah. I finished 4th in the year as well, which was gutted.

Kris King [: 00:49:23

Yeah. I finished 4th, I got chipped by my own physio. She, she did me in the final 2 miles, which if anyone was going to pump me down to 4th, I'm glad it was her, but yeah it was brutal to get that far and I was about 2 k away from a 3rd position, and, yeah, lost it

Dr Phil Price [: 00:49:39

to Sally. Got it.

Kris King [: 00:49:40

She was a GB runner at the time, so I'll take it.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:49:42

Of course. Well, Chris Yeah. That was amazing. What recommendations would you have for anyone looking to sign up to one of the races for Beyond the Ultimate?

Kris King [: 00:49:56

I think, it depends where I would say on our race in particular, if you're not an ultra runner. There's races like our jungle race and stuff, which people come from multi disciplines. It's not an ultra running race, actually. There's people that have won that race that have come from OCRs and and CrossFit and all that kind of stuff. I think it's one of those things where you can kind of look at the pinnacle and work backwards. So if you think like this is probably gonna be like something that interests you or something that you like the look of and think, well, that's beyond my reach now. You know, you can look at it as a 2 year journey and and and say, right, well, that's what I'm gonna work towards. What do I need to do to get there? Our qualifying criteria is that you've run a marathon at least 12 months before the event.

Kris King [: 00:50:35

K. Knowing that ultra runners do well, sometimes non ultra runners do well, but if you've got the time and you've, you want this kind of projection, just the ultra running now, there are tons of events, Tons of really, really good events ranging from 50 ks right through to a 150 ks single day events, and multi days and all that. You know, when back in when I started this thing, there was probably about 50 races in the UK. I think it's close to 600 now, you know, plus more more loss count. So there's there is probably wherever you live in the UK or wherever you live in Europe, America, whatever, there will be an ultra race near you. Quick Google, get step into the world. Step into the world of ultra running and just see if you like it, and we'll be waiting to see if it's a progressive journey for

Dr Phil Price [: 00:51:22

you. Brilliant. It almost feels like you're the one where like, try an ultra, then you can join join the big leagues where you can get involved with all sorts of environmental fun.

Kris King [: 00:51:34

Yeah. Yeah. We'll see you. We'll see you someday soon.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:51:37

How can I find more about Beyond the Ultimate on the socials?

Kris King [: 00:51:42

So, we've got Beyond the Beyond the Spirits on every social or beyond the ultimate dotco.uk. If anyone's interested, we've just if you go to the update section on Beyond the Ultimate, I've just released an article a couple of weeks ago, and the second one's following, and it kinda topics on this. So, yeah, you can you can you can find me. And amongst all that as well, I'm I'm Chris Kingy on Instagram and stuff. And if you've got any questions, you can fire them through.

Dr Phil Price [: 00:52:05

Brilliant. And I definitely recommend anyone that's listening to check them out. Even if you're not thinking about an ultra marathon at the moment, definitely, have it on your radar because the more and more people try new sports and challenges, these are the sort of pinnacle of something,