Is there an ultra you've been dreaming about running... but just thinking about entering the lottery makes you nervous? Maybe it's a tougher course, a longer distance, or a race with tight cutoffs. You want to take on the challenge, but the thought of actually getting into the race feels overwhelming.
You might think the answer is to train harder than ever, but even your best physical preparation won't address everything that's making you nervous. In this episode, I'm exploring why training alone can't give you all the confidence you're looking for, and what it really takes to feel prepared for a race that currently feels beyond your abilities.
Tune in this week to discover how to turn an intimidating ultra into a challenge you know how to approach. I'll share how to identify what's making this race feel overwhelming, work through the unknowns one by one, and build the confidence to take on a big goal without waiting another year to feel ready.
Race Crafting is a four-session coaching process where we work together to build a complete plan for your next ultra, so you can manage race anxiety, prepare for challenges, and approach race day with confidence. Learn more about Race Crafting here.
What You’ll Learn from this Episode:
Why training harder doesn't necessarily make an intimidating ultra feel less intimidating.
How to recognize what's really making you question your ability to finish.
Why waiting another year won't automatically make you more confident.
How to identify the specific problems and unknowns standing between you and your goal.
Why solving those problems one by one makes a big race feel more achievable.
How to prepare for challenges beyond the physical demands of your race.
What it takes to approach the starting line feeling capable, prepared, and confident.
Listen to the Full Episode:
Featured on the Show:
The Ultrarunner’s Mastery Debrief Template helps you evaluate your races like experienced ultrarunners do - identifying what worked, what didn’t work, and what to do differently next time. Download yours for free here.
My 1:1 Mental Mastery Coaching for Ultrarunners is a six-month coaching program where we build the mental skills experienced ultrarunners use to handle difficult races well. Schedule a consult call to learn more here.
If you’re loving the show, please take a moment to follow, rate, and review wherever you listen to podcasts today!
Episodes Related to Taking On an Ultra That Intimidates You:
Full Episode Transcript:
The hardest, most intense training of your life won't fix what's really making that race feel intimidating. If there's a race that you've been eyeing, one that makes your heart rate spike just thinking about putting in for the lottery, you need to hear why. And what actually turns intimidation into confidence.
Welcome to Unstoppable Ultra Runner, the podcast for ultra runners who refuse to let anything hold them back. I’m your host, Susan Donnelly, veteran of over 150 100-mile races, and a coach who helps runners like you break through mental roadblocks, push past doubt, and run with confidence. Let’s go.
Welcome to episode 82. It is the start of November, and that means it's the start of lottery season. So, the next few podcasts are going to help you make decisions about those big, sweaty palms commitments, starting this week with how to do a race that intimidates you. Because you want to brave your way out of your comfort zone, you want to do that. And that means doing a big, intimidating race.
I mean, I'm talking about a mountain race, one at altitude, a bigger distance, maybe one in a different country, or one with a tight cutoff. Or a big-name race that you've always dreamed of doing like Western States. This is the type of thing that we all did to get into ultra running. We leveled up in some way. But maybe you're approaching lottery season with some degree of fear about actually having to do the race. To now put into the lottery and maybe get into the lottery.
Because you don't want to just get in the race and survive it. This is a big deal. You don't want to just get in and survive it or drop and get pulled. You want to do this thing successfully. You want to make it a fantastic race, your best. Like the best race of your life, and finish in triumph. So, you're thinking about putting in for that lottery and asking yourself while you're thinking about it, what if I got in? Could I actually do this thing? And feeling like the answer right now is no. Maybe next year. You'll be more confident about your running then.
If that's you, this episode is for you. And I want to celebrate you for wanting to do this, for wanting to put in for a lottery race, a big race that you've been dreaming about. And I also want to show you how to approach a race like this so that you go into lottery season with the best mindset you can about it.
So, let's play out that possibility. What if I did get in the lottery? The idea of doing that race is exciting. The concept of it is exciting. But you probably can't wrap your mind around the actual doing of it. Right now, it's like reading a story that you would like to have. But when you think about the reality of it, it freaks you out a little bit. And for a panicky moment, you either consider not putting in for the lottery this year or, if you do get in the lottery, for that panicky moment, you consider backing out of it because now you're committed. Your name is on the entrance list. People know.
This race is just so huge, it's overwhelming. You don't know where to start. And you feel like you need to start doing everything you can today, now. You need to be ready now. And you don't want to be complacent about it. You're not that type of runner. I talk to high-achieving, over-achieving people. So I know you don't want to be complacent about it. I hear that all the time. This is a serious undertaking. And most runners in this situation immediately focus everything they have on training hard, right out of the gate. Nothing left to chance.
We're going to do all the miles, all the hills, all the strength training, all the speed, all the everything. Sleeping in an altitude tent to acclimatize. Saunas for heat. No stone left unturned. You're going to run the race knowing you did everything you could to succeed. You want to be confident about it, and training the hardest you ever have in your life is going to give you the confidence that you want on race day. So you're going to go all out on it.
Now, training for the race is super, and I absolutely 1,000%, a million percent advocate for it. I have been in races where people have not trained and have gotten themselves into real trouble, and that's not smart. So training is smart and definitely advised, and I love training. But focusing solely on training is actually going to lead you to being more intimidated by race day, and I know that seems crazy. Because training doesn't solve everything that's making you feel intimidated.
Training gets your body ready. It answers one question: am I going to be physically capable? But that's the question, that's the only question it answers. Intimidation asks a bazillion other questions that your training can't answer, things like, what if I get stuck in a remote section by myself? What do I do at 2 a.m. when I want to quit or I'm falling asleep on my feet? Do I even belong at this race?
So, when you train your hardest and you still end up feeling intimidated by this race, you feel even more intimidated because you did all that work to not feel intimidated and now you still do. That hard work only nudged the needle of your confidence. It didn't get it to where you want it to be. Said in another way, your all-out best training is still going to leave you stressed out about the race. You might be physically ready, but you're still going to be stressed out. And that makes the race feel scarier and you feel even less capable because you did your best and it didn't work to make you feel better.
So, let's look at intimidation. What makes a race feel intimidating is your current, today, now self forecasting ahead about the future race-day you, the thing that future race-day you is going to experience. And picturing the entire race at once in your head and thinking, "Well, I'm not capable of this," or "I'm not the kind of runner who does this. I'm too slow. I don't belong there."
It's like sitting in an airplane cockpit for the first time, a jumbo 747 cockpit for the first time, and there are probably a million switches and dials around you and you think there's no way I could fly this. But feeling intimidated about this race does not mean that you're out of your depth or that you don't belong or that you can't do it. Intimidation is just letting you know that there are a bunch of problems to solve. That's all. And solving them replaces the intimidation with the confidence you're looking for.
Waiting until next year is not going to solve those problems. Those problems are still going to, for the most part, be there next year. When you do this, with every problem or unknown that you solve, you become more able to see yourself running the whole race and finishing triumphantly. And that becomes the reality that you're going to live on race day.
So, when you get in a lottery race, you're going to use the time between getting into that lottery, getting into the race, between that time and race day, to solve all those fears and questions and unknowns bouncing around in your head, to solve those problems. You're going to use all those months to do that. And here's how to do it.
List out everything that intimidates you about the race. Do not hold back. List it all out, get it all out on paper. What you don't know how to do or think you can't do or worry about or wonder what you're going to do when you encounter it. List all of that stuff out on paper. Things like, what's the course going to be like? Is it going to be more painful than I can stand? What do I do about drop bags and crew and travel logistics? What race skills am I missing? What do I feel weak in? I'm a slow runner. I don't feel like I belong there. What do I do about that?
List them all out on paper and then, in the months between getting into the race and race day, close that gap on each and every one of them to the extent that you can. Figure out how to do the thing. Build a race plan for nailing it. That's why I've got race crafting. That's exactly what we do in race crafting. And that's what I do for my one-on-one clients too. We build a race plan that shows them, that gives them a road map for nailing the race.
Learn whatever you don't know right now, like how to use poles or how to do downhills better, how to run through lows and stay in the race, how to stay focused on your end goal and not get distracted. Or how to ninja the negative thinking that took you out of that last race. Decide what you'll do if this happens or that happens. If you can't handle the elevation or if you're close to cutoff and tempted to drop. Fix feeling too slow and not belonging. And that doesn't always mean getting faster speed-wise.
Start thinking like and doing things like and making decisions like the runner with a solid race plan who knows how to do it. I walk clients through all of this all the time in multiple races. I help them decide on their own solutions and we take that list that they have and whittle that list down one by one until that list is empty. It's kind of like you have this big tangled-up ball of yarn, lots of different colors and threads, and you're just untangling it one strand at a time.
And this is exactly what I did for my first 100-miler decades ago. I had to figure out before any real internet, it was like baby internet. Rudimentary. You wouldn't even recognize it now. I had to figure out how to run a 100 miles. I didn't know what that looked like. I didn't have people around me to tell me. The only people in Tennessee in my state who are ultra runners were my friends who hadn't done 100-milers. So I couldn't even ask them. I didn't know what a drop bag looked like or how it worked. I didn't know what to put in it. I had to solve that to the best of my ability at that time.
And it's the same thing I did for my first UTMB. So when I was standing there at the start in this sea of runners all talking other languages, no English around me at the time when I was doing it, I wondered what I had gotten myself into and how on earth I was going to do this race through the Alps of three countries when I didn't speak the languages. I figured it all out, one problem at a time.
And I did the same thing for my first 200-miler at Bigfoot 200, where I had to make new decisions about things I had never encountered in a 100, like where to sleep and when to sleep and how much to sleep, how to keep going through all of that, and how to fuel myself. I had to make all of those decisions, solve all those problems ahead of the race.
Confidence doesn't show up magically next year. It shows up when you solve all these problems between you and feeling confident in the race. Like that pilot in the 747, you become confident enough to fly that plane by learning one switch at a time. You don't just magically walk into the cockpit being ready. You solve those problems and you learn how to use one switch at a time. You see the path to getting the race you want, that fabulous race of a lifetime.
Once you solve all those problems, come up with answers to all those questions, those problems, those things that you don't know, you can answer, "Could I actually do this thing?" And the answer now is yes. And it's not just a concept, an idea. You actually have a road map in front of you on how to get there. The list of problems and questions that you think are blocking you are just the road map to getting there. They're the list of things to do between now and then, so you don't have to wonder if you're doing everything you need to do. If you list all those things out, that is your road map to getting confident walking into that race.
So that you're no longer in the position you otherwise would be in the week before the race, thinking, how on earth am I going to do it? You've spent the months leading up to that race answering that question, so the race finish, the race you want, not just the survival finish, but the race you want, is now even more in your favor. And on race day, when you line up and look around at everybody else, you feel like you belong as much as they do because you know what you're doing in the race. You've answered all the doubts. You've solved all those doubts. You've solved all the problems, answered all the questions. You know what you're doing.
Instead of letting the intimidation crush you, you're now free to run the race of your life. All right, you all, that's this week's episode. Happy lotterying. And if you know someone who could use this, share it with them. It might be exactly what they need to hear. See you all next week. Bye.
Thanks for listening to Unstoppable Ultra Runner. If you want more ultra talk, mindset tools, and strategies for running with confidence, visit www.susanidonnelly.com. This podcast receives production support from the team at Digital Freedom Productions. That’s it for today’s episode. See you next week.
Welcome to Unstoppable Ultra Runner, the podcast for ultra runners who refuse to let anything hold them back. I’m your host, Susan Donnelly, veteran of over 150 100-mile races, and a coach who helps runners like you break through mental roadblocks, push past doubt, and run with confidence. Let’s go.
Welcome to episode 82. It is the start of November, and that means it's the start of lottery season. So, the next few podcasts are going to help you make decisions about those big, sweaty palms commitments, starting this week with how to do a race that intimidates you. Because you want to brave your way out of your comfort zone, you want to do that. And that means doing a big, intimidating race.
I mean, I'm talking about a mountain race, one at altitude, a bigger distance, maybe one in a different country, or one with a tight cutoff. Or a big-name race that you've always dreamed of doing like Western States. This is the type of thing that we all did to get into ultra running. We leveled up in some way. But maybe you're approaching lottery season with some degree of fear about actually having to do the race. To now put into the lottery and maybe get into the lottery.
Because you don't want to just get in the race and survive it. This is a big deal. You don't want to just get in and survive it or drop and get pulled. You want to do this thing successfully. You want to make it a fantastic race, your best. Like the best race of your life, and finish in triumph. So, you're thinking about putting in for that lottery and asking yourself while you're thinking about it, what if I got in? Could I actually do this thing? And feeling like the answer right now is no. Maybe next year. You'll be more confident about your running then.
If that's you, this episode is for you. And I want to celebrate you for wanting to do this, for wanting to put in for a lottery race, a big race that you've been dreaming about. And I also want to show you how to approach a race like this so that you go into lottery season with the best mindset you can about it.
So, let's play out that possibility. What if I did get in the lottery? The idea of doing that race is exciting. The concept of it is exciting. But you probably can't wrap your mind around the actual doing of it. Right now, it's like reading a story that you would like to have. But when you think about the reality of it, it freaks you out a little bit. And for a panicky moment, you either consider not putting in for the lottery this year or, if you do get in the lottery, for that panicky moment, you consider backing out of it because now you're committed. Your name is on the entrance list. People know.
This race is just so huge, it's overwhelming. You don't know where to start. And you feel like you need to start doing everything you can today, now. You need to be ready now. And you don't want to be complacent about it. You're not that type of runner. I talk to high-achieving, over-achieving people. So I know you don't want to be complacent about it. I hear that all the time. This is a serious undertaking. And most runners in this situation immediately focus everything they have on training hard, right out of the gate. Nothing left to chance.
We're going to do all the miles, all the hills, all the strength training, all the speed, all the everything. Sleeping in an altitude tent to acclimatize. Saunas for heat. No stone left unturned. You're going to run the race knowing you did everything you could to succeed. You want to be confident about it, and training the hardest you ever have in your life is going to give you the confidence that you want on race day. So you're going to go all out on it.
Now, training for the race is super, and I absolutely 1,000%, a million percent advocate for it. I have been in races where people have not trained and have gotten themselves into real trouble, and that's not smart. So training is smart and definitely advised, and I love training. But focusing solely on training is actually going to lead you to being more intimidated by race day, and I know that seems crazy. Because training doesn't solve everything that's making you feel intimidated.
Training gets your body ready. It answers one question: am I going to be physically capable? But that's the question, that's the only question it answers. Intimidation asks a bazillion other questions that your training can't answer, things like, what if I get stuck in a remote section by myself? What do I do at 2 a.m. when I want to quit or I'm falling asleep on my feet? Do I even belong at this race?
So, when you train your hardest and you still end up feeling intimidated by this race, you feel even more intimidated because you did all that work to not feel intimidated and now you still do. That hard work only nudged the needle of your confidence. It didn't get it to where you want it to be. Said in another way, your all-out best training is still going to leave you stressed out about the race. You might be physically ready, but you're still going to be stressed out. And that makes the race feel scarier and you feel even less capable because you did your best and it didn't work to make you feel better.
So, let's look at intimidation. What makes a race feel intimidating is your current, today, now self forecasting ahead about the future race-day you, the thing that future race-day you is going to experience. And picturing the entire race at once in your head and thinking, "Well, I'm not capable of this," or "I'm not the kind of runner who does this. I'm too slow. I don't belong there."
It's like sitting in an airplane cockpit for the first time, a jumbo 747 cockpit for the first time, and there are probably a million switches and dials around you and you think there's no way I could fly this. But feeling intimidated about this race does not mean that you're out of your depth or that you don't belong or that you can't do it. Intimidation is just letting you know that there are a bunch of problems to solve. That's all. And solving them replaces the intimidation with the confidence you're looking for.
Waiting until next year is not going to solve those problems. Those problems are still going to, for the most part, be there next year. When you do this, with every problem or unknown that you solve, you become more able to see yourself running the whole race and finishing triumphantly. And that becomes the reality that you're going to live on race day.
So, when you get in a lottery race, you're going to use the time between getting into that lottery, getting into the race, between that time and race day, to solve all those fears and questions and unknowns bouncing around in your head, to solve those problems. You're going to use all those months to do that. And here's how to do it.
List out everything that intimidates you about the race. Do not hold back. List it all out, get it all out on paper. What you don't know how to do or think you can't do or worry about or wonder what you're going to do when you encounter it. List all of that stuff out on paper. Things like, what's the course going to be like? Is it going to be more painful than I can stand? What do I do about drop bags and crew and travel logistics? What race skills am I missing? What do I feel weak in? I'm a slow runner. I don't feel like I belong there. What do I do about that?
List them all out on paper and then, in the months between getting into the race and race day, close that gap on each and every one of them to the extent that you can. Figure out how to do the thing. Build a race plan for nailing it. That's why I've got race crafting. That's exactly what we do in race crafting. And that's what I do for my one-on-one clients too. We build a race plan that shows them, that gives them a road map for nailing the race.
Learn whatever you don't know right now, like how to use poles or how to do downhills better, how to run through lows and stay in the race, how to stay focused on your end goal and not get distracted. Or how to ninja the negative thinking that took you out of that last race. Decide what you'll do if this happens or that happens. If you can't handle the elevation or if you're close to cutoff and tempted to drop. Fix feeling too slow and not belonging. And that doesn't always mean getting faster speed-wise.
Start thinking like and doing things like and making decisions like the runner with a solid race plan who knows how to do it. I walk clients through all of this all the time in multiple races. I help them decide on their own solutions and we take that list that they have and whittle that list down one by one until that list is empty. It's kind of like you have this big tangled-up ball of yarn, lots of different colors and threads, and you're just untangling it one strand at a time.
And this is exactly what I did for my first 100-miler decades ago. I had to figure out before any real internet, it was like baby internet. Rudimentary. You wouldn't even recognize it now. I had to figure out how to run a 100 miles. I didn't know what that looked like. I didn't have people around me to tell me. The only people in Tennessee in my state who are ultra runners were my friends who hadn't done 100-milers. So I couldn't even ask them. I didn't know what a drop bag looked like or how it worked. I didn't know what to put in it. I had to solve that to the best of my ability at that time.
And it's the same thing I did for my first UTMB. So when I was standing there at the start in this sea of runners all talking other languages, no English around me at the time when I was doing it, I wondered what I had gotten myself into and how on earth I was going to do this race through the Alps of three countries when I didn't speak the languages. I figured it all out, one problem at a time.
And I did the same thing for my first 200-miler at Bigfoot 200, where I had to make new decisions about things I had never encountered in a 100, like where to sleep and when to sleep and how much to sleep, how to keep going through all of that, and how to fuel myself. I had to make all of those decisions, solve all those problems ahead of the race.
Confidence doesn't show up magically next year. It shows up when you solve all these problems between you and feeling confident in the race. Like that pilot in the 747, you become confident enough to fly that plane by learning one switch at a time. You don't just magically walk into the cockpit being ready. You solve those problems and you learn how to use one switch at a time. You see the path to getting the race you want, that fabulous race of a lifetime.
Once you solve all those problems, come up with answers to all those questions, those problems, those things that you don't know, you can answer, "Could I actually do this thing?" And the answer now is yes. And it's not just a concept, an idea. You actually have a road map in front of you on how to get there. The list of problems and questions that you think are blocking you are just the road map to getting there. They're the list of things to do between now and then, so you don't have to wonder if you're doing everything you need to do. If you list all those things out, that is your road map to getting confident walking into that race.
So that you're no longer in the position you otherwise would be in the week before the race, thinking, how on earth am I going to do it? You've spent the months leading up to that race answering that question, so the race finish, the race you want, not just the survival finish, but the race you want, is now even more in your favor. And on race day, when you line up and look around at everybody else, you feel like you belong as much as they do because you know what you're doing in the race. You've answered all the doubts. You've solved all those doubts. You've solved all the problems, answered all the questions. You know what you're doing.
Instead of letting the intimidation crush you, you're now free to run the race of your life. All right, you all, that's this week's episode. Happy lotterying. And if you know someone who could use this, share it with them. It might be exactly what they need to hear. See you all next week. Bye.
Thanks for listening to Unstoppable Ultra Runner. If you want more ultra talk, mindset tools, and strategies for running with confidence, visit www.susanidonnelly.com. This podcast receives production support from the team at Digital Freedom Productions. That’s it for today’s episode. See you next week.
Enjoy the Show?
Don’t miss an episode, follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, RSS, or wherever you listen to podcasts!