Ultrarunning Tradition – iRunFar

I used to be not too long ago strolling round my neighborhood with my husband, admiring lawns. I didn’t use to do this. It’s the type of factor that creeps up on you in your 30s. In the future, you might be cool. The subsequent day, you get up and begin admiring lawns.

Admiring Nature’s garden. Picture: iRunFar/Bryon Powell

What I’ve discovered is that good lawns don’t occur accidentally. They require foresight and diligence. They require lively cultivation. In any other case, weeds overtake them. The identical is true for ultrarunning. What we domesticate grows.

A Rising Sport

Ultrarunning is a rising sport. It was once a small group of oddballs who, for no matter cause, wished to run far. Now it’s a massive group of oddballs who, for no matter cause, wish to run far.

With the expansion of ultrarunning has come vital modifications. Coaching strategies are extra subtle. Media consideration has elevated, and there may be extra money within the sport. Occasions are larger, aside from those that stay the identical measurement however now have prolonged waitlists. The number of occasion distances, surfaces, and topography has elevated, and there are extra race alternatives than prior to now. There are additionally extra factions — dissenting teams with competing visions about what the game is or may turn out to be.

Ultrarunning is in an area of unimaginable progress. Picture: iRunFar/Eszter Horanyi

With the inflow of cash within the sport, have come manufacturers vying for market share. They bring about completely different aesthetics, branding, and competing messages about what ultrarunning is about. Generally they get into public feuds about it (1).

This competitors amongst manufacturers might be productive, because it means skilled ultrarunners are actually compensated at ranges commensurate with their worth (2). Nonetheless, it additionally means our consideration is directed towards trivial distinctions amongst clothes and kit, and away from the center of the exercise — the working, the factor all of us have in widespread.

Pay attention, I’m not going to be a “doom and gloom” girl. Ultrarunning is at an thrilling second. Progress is nice, and I feel the game is usually in good fingers with its present management and media. However a danger of progress and commercialization is that they’ll distract us from what issues.

Possibly we entered the game looking for respite from consumerism and immerse ourselves in nature, solely to all of a sudden discover ourselves shopping for extra stuff. Or possibly we wished peace and stress aid, solely to search out ourselves studying assume items about feuds between manufacturers now we have by no means heard of. Possibly we wished to edify our characters by means of endurance, and all of a sudden, we’re centered much less on substantial change and extra on our exteriors, dressing up in fancy working outfits extra pricey than our vehicles. We neglect why we began ultrarunning within the first place.

We shouldn’t neglect why we began ultrarunning within the first place. Picture: iRunFar/Eszter Horanyi

A good friend prompted me to sort out the query of tradition in ultrarunning’s present second of progress and alter. It’s a complicated query as a result of there isn’t a neat narrative for the methods through which the game is altering. A number of the modifications are nice, and a number of the modifications threaten to undermine a lot of what we love about ultrarunning.

The Idea of Tradition

“Tradition” is a notoriously ambiguous idea. In broad strokes, it captures a bunch’s conventions and norms, together with practices, traditions, and tastes. The etymology of the time period is likewise complicated, with a number of origins, most notably Latin and French. In some contexts, tradition is expounded to the “cultus,” or reverence and worship (3). It additionally captures agricultural actions equivalent to forming, coaching, and tilling the earth (4). To domesticate is to enhance and render fertile to yield fruit (5).

In assessing ultrarunning tradition, the agricultural picture will likely be useful for us. We will take into account three issues:

• We ought to be clear about what we intention to develop.
• Not all progress is productive; we must always be taught to determine weeds.
• Cultivation is tough work that requires foresight and diligence.

What Are We Cultivating?

If you ask youngsters how far they’ll run, they usually assume they’ll run eternally. In our sport, we measure, in exact phrases, how far we will run. On this manner, ultrarunning satisfies a pure curiosity about human limits. We check boundaries and discover ways to endure. That is humanizing and superior.

As a result of our central activity in ultrarunning is endurance, we must always give attention to that. We should always intention to domesticate our capability to persevere, studying to stay in place in pursuit of arduous items. This pursuit is worthy of our power and a focus for its personal sake, insofar as it’s pleasant. However working far may refine us in some ways, requiring that we turn out to be affected person, resilient, and diligent to carry out properly. It’s good in itself and for its penalties.

There are different items, or fruits, that we will intention to develop. Group has lengthy been a precedence amongst ultrarunners — group runs, shared service, crewing, and mentoring. I’ve written prior to now about how ultrarunning is the hospitality sport. We will proceed to domesticate a welcoming reception for brand spanking new runners.

One other good price cultivating is sustainability work. We spend a variety of time outdoors on trails and within the woods. Extra so than different sports activities, ultrarunners are sometimes engaged within the work of preservation and look after the forests we run by means of.

Gabe Joyes’ crew on the 2025 Hardrock 100 proving as soon as once more that ultrarunning is a group sport. Picture: Niko Carste

Study to Determine Weeds

Ultrarunning is a rising sport, however not all progress is our good. We should always work out what’s productive within the altering panorama and prune away the issues that choke out the great.

What are the proverbial weeds of ultrarunning? A few of them could also be structural. For instance, possibly we don’t like races being consolidated beneath main corporations. Or possibly we do. A few of them could also be private or dispositional. Gossip (unrestrained speech about each other), vainglory (caring extra concerning the picture you place ahead than the particular person you actually are), elitism (which undermines hospitality), and materialism (a preoccupation with shopping for stuff) all come to thoughts. I additionally talked about that there are extra factions than earlier than.

To some extent, factions and dissension are inevitable as the game grows. That’s how people function. In “Federalist 10,” James Madison wrote that factions are “sown into the character of man” due to differing opinions, tastes, and pursuits (6). Hopefully, we will disagree in constructive methods and bear in mind the very massive, glorious factor all of us have in widespread: working far. If we will’t, then unproductive discord is one other weed that may choke out the great.

Cultivation Is Onerous Work

Good lawns don’t occur accidentally. A superb working tradition received’t both. We have to collectively spend money on the factor we care about, with the “repetitive, persistent, and loving care of the farmer (7).”

Which may imply encouraging others, supporting their races, serving on committees, and doing path upkeep. If neighborhood is an asset, then now we have to figuratively get our fingers soiled, cultivating friendships.

It’s simple to complain about weeds. It’s a lot more durable to actively thwart them and develop one thing good of their place.

There are various methods to domesticate neighborhood. Picture: Ron Heerkens Jr

Last Ideas

Ultrarunning is at an thrilling second of growth, commercialization, and alter. A lot of this transformation is productive. However a danger of business progress is that it may possibly undermine tradition and choke out what’s particular concerning the sport. Like garden steward, we must always diligently domesticate the great and be taught to acknowledge weeds.

Name for Feedback

• What does working tradition imply to you?
• What different methods can we domesticate good working tradition?

Notes/References

1. See Okay. Frost. 2026. Fulfill, At present Operating, and the Struggle Over Operating’s Aesthetic. Right here & There. Accessed 6 April 2026 Hyperlink: https://www.hereandthere.membership/p/satisfy-currently-running-and-the-fight-over-running-s-aesthetic
2. A minimum of a few of them are. Ultrarunners stay the proverbial ‘ravenous artists’ of sports activities.
3. Pieper, J. 1998. Leisure the Foundation of Tradition. Transl. by G. Malsbary. St. Augustine Press.
4. Oxford College Press. (n.d.). Tradition, n., Etymology. In Oxford English Dictionary. Retrieved April 7, 2026, from https://doi.org/10.1093/OED/2200472041
5. Oxford College Press. (n.d.). Domesticate, v., 1.a. In Oxford English Dictionary. Retrieved April 7, 2026, from https://doi.org/10.1093/OED/5406101325.
6. Madison, J. 1787. The Federalist Papers. No. 10. The Avalon Challenge. Net Accessed 7 April 2026.
7. Malsbary, G. translator word in Pieper, J. 1998. Leisure the Foundation of Traditionp. 70.