• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
Breaking Muscle

Breaking Muscle

Breaking Muscle

  • Fitness
  • Workouts
    • Best Shoulder Workouts
    • Best Chest Workouts
    • Best Leg Workouts
    • Best Leg Exercises
    • Best Biceps Exercises
    • Best Kettlebell Exercises
    • Best Back Workouts
    • Best HIIT Workouts
    • Best Triceps Exercises
    • Best Arm Workouts
  • Reviews
    • Supplements
      • Best Pre-Workouts
      • Best Whey Protein
    • Equipment
      • Best Home Gym Machines
    • Certifications
      • ISSA Review
  • News
  • Exercise Guides
    • Legs
      • Back Squat
      • Bulgarian Split Squat
      • Goblet Squat
      • Zercher Squat
      • Standing Calf Raise
      • Hack Squat
    • Chest
      • Bench Press
      • Dumbbell Bench Press
      • Close-Grip Bench Press
      • Incline Bench Press
    • Shoulders
      • Overhead Dumbbell Press
      • Lateral Raise
    • Arms
      • Chin-Up
      • Weighted Pull-Up
      • Triceps Pushdown
    • Back
      • Deadlift
      • Trap Bar Deadlift
      • Lat Pulldown
      • Inverted Row
      • Bent-Over Barbell Row
      • Single-Arm Dumbbell Row
      • Pendlay Row
Fitness

Inside the World of Women Ultrarunners

The sport of ultrarunning is becoming more popular today, as athletes search for new ways to challenge themselves in competition and training.

Mindith Rahmat

Written by Mindith Rahmat Last updated on September 28, 2011

The sport of ultrarunning is becoming more popular today, as athletes search for new ways to challenge themselves in competition and training. Ultrarunning is defined as the sport of long distance running. The standard distance for ultrarunning is anything past the marathon distance of 26.2 miles, but distances can go up to 100K, and can include a series of time related events as well. Many times these events and races involve the additional difficulty of a rough terrain, trails, or routes that might require some navigation.

Ultrarunners are a extraordinary group of athletes, who are willing to push themselves mentally and physically to extreme limits. The sport of ultrarunning requires strong motivation, will, stamina, strength, and determination. There is relatively little data that exists on ultrarunners, and less specifically focusing on female ultrarunners. New research in Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, examined the motivation, goal orientation, demographic characteristics, training habits, and coaching preferences of 344 female ultrarunners. 

Researchers found that general health and psychological coping were the strongest motivational factors in these women. The female ultrarunners sampled were found to have very high task orientation, which relates to the ability to finish a race, or accomplish various goals. Scores signifying psychological motives were high, indicating that self esteem, life coping, and life meaning were noted as important sources of motivation among ultrarunners. Over 85% of athletes sampled set specific goals for their races or events. These goals were placed in four categories by importance including: top finisher/winner goals, time goals, distance goals, and a strong finisher goals.

Ultrarunners by nature follow a very rigorous training protocol, as a typical training run can be more than four hours in length. Athletes indicated that they trained an average of 12.49 hours per week, most trained alone (64%), and a large majority (80%) did not utilize a coach. Researchers explained that many athletes did not utilize a coach due to perceived financial costs. Of the women sampled 60% indicated that they did not have any children, and 78% reported being married or in a long-term relationship.

Researchers found female ultrarunners were primarily motivated by a sense of personal achievement first with general health goals being ranked second. Many ultrarunners indicated experiencing psychological and emotional personal rewards for pushing themselves past their perceived limits in an extremely challenging race. Researchers noted that having the strength and stamina to finish a race, increased the athletes’ perceived self-esteem.

Overall, researchers discovered that female ultrarunners were task oriented by nature, highly internally motivated, healthy, and somewhat financially conscious individuals. New and continuing research allows coaching professionals to take a look into the lives and inner workings of this specific population of athletes.

Mindith Rahmat

About Mindith Rahmat

Mindith is a born mover. She has spent her life exploring various athletic disciplines, starting with ballet and modern dance from an early age. She went on to become a E-RYT 500 certified yoga therapist and teacher and discovered CrossFit after the birth of her daughter.

Mindith coached CrossFit at a number of boxes near her home in Southern California, which lead to her involvement in Russian kettlebells and Olympic weightlifting. She has coached a wide variety of populations and cares deeply for women’s health, specializing in pregnancy and postpartum fitness. She is currently studying the principles of Natural Movement and Kettlebell Sport, and is working to complete an additional teacher training in the Taoist art of Yin Yoga with Master Paulie Zink.

Mindith founded Breaking Muscle in 2011. Over 5 million people a month have visited the site, hundreds of thousands of them follow Breaking Muscle on social media, nearly 2,000 coaches have written or appeared on its pages, and there are thousands of free, fully-formed training plans freely available. Breaking Muscle has won numerous awards in the industry and is recognized for pioneering new approaches to fitness and coaching techniques. In 2021, Breaking Muscle was acquired by Barbend. Mindith continues to devote time to her kids, pursue her doctorate in psychology, do research, and teach.

View All Articles

Recommended Articles

tsquare
How Women Should Train for Optimal Testosterone Levels
shutterstock_19723270
Running Kinematics of the Female Breast
feminine, female warrior, warrior athlete, willow ryan, female identity
Athleticism and Femininity: Can They Co-Exist?
shutterstock_31224070
Are Female Athletes at Higher Risk of Injury at Menstruation ?

Primary Sidebar

Latest Articles

Derek Lunsford, Nick Walker, And Other Men’s Open Stars Will Guest Pose at 2023 Pittsburgh Pro

Shaun Clarida Wants To Break Flex Lewis’ 212 Olympia Title Record

The Best Bodybuilding Workout for Each Body Part

Jay Cutler Shares How To Construct An “Olympia” Chest

Latest Reviews

ISSA Personal Trainer Certification Review

ISSA Personal Trainer Certification Review

Best Whey Proteins for Packing on Muscle, Shredding Down, Meal Replacement, and More

Best Pre-Workouts for Building Muscle, Running, Taste, and More

Best Home Gym Machines

Best Home Gym Machines

woman lifting barbell

Be the smartest person in your gym

The Breaking Muscle newsletter is everything you need to know about strength in a 3 minute read.

I WANT IN!

Breaking Muscle is the fitness world’s preeminent destination for timely, high-quality information on exercise, fitness, health, and nutrition. Our audience encompasses the entire spectrum of the fitness community: consumers, aficionados, fitness professionals, and business owners. We seek to inform, educate and advocate for this community.

  • Reviews
  • Healthy Eating
  • Workouts
  • Fitness
  • News

Follow Us

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • RSS Feed

© 2023 · Breaking Muscle · Terms of Use · Privacy Policy · Affiliate Disclaimer · Accessibility · About