Train for a mountain ultra, while living in London
Years ago, while ski touring in the Alps, I watched a man struggle to descend the Aiguille du Midi arête, a narrow ridge that leads down to the Vallée Blanche.
True to form, a French lift operator marched down the arete past the queues of people and remonstrated with him. Having failed to persuade the man to turn back, the liftie spun on his heel and screamed, "You're going to die!"
It was dramatic, and I’m reminded of it when I hear certain (but by no means all) Snowdonia, or Lake District natives talk about mountain running, and saying things like, “If you don’t live in the mountains, you’ll never survive a mountain ultra.”
The trouble with that statement is, well, it's rubbish.
And here’s why…
The 80/20 rule of ultra training
Mountain ultra training is 80% general fitness and 20% specificity.
Yes, specificity is important, but it doesn’t mean you have to move to Chamonix or Snowdonia to prepare for a race in the Alps.
So, what do I mean by specificity? It’s about preparing your body for the exact demands of your goal race.
In mountain ultras, this means replicating elements like long climbs, steep descents, technical terrain, altitude, and even environmental factors like heat or cold.
If you have solid endurance, strength, and durability, you can build the specific skills you need in targeted blocks.
And what are these specific skills?
Uphill, it’s fitness
Uphill running…
…. is largely about aerobic fitness and strength endurance. If you can build a strong engine and powerful legs, you’ll climb well - even if you’re training in a city.
And downhill, it’s skill and strength
Downhill running…
…. is more technical and demands eccentric muscle strength. This is where smart training makes a difference.
But before we go into the where to train, there’s one more thing to keep in mind. The other key to surviving mountain ultras is in…
Protecting your quads
‘It’s not the uphill that breaks you, it’s the downhills,’ says me, and to be fair, probably a million other people.
Eccentric muscle damage occurs when your muscles lengthen under load. Like when you’re running downhill and your quads are repeatedly forced to absorb impact and brake your movement. This controlled lengthening creates tiny tears in the muscle fibers, leading to soreness, fatigue, and, if untrained, a catastrophic loss of strength mid-race.
Eccentric muscle damage from long descents can destroy a race, but you can prepare for it.
Thankfully, our muscles adapt to eccentric loading, meaning repeated downhill efforts reduce future damage (known as the “repeated bout effect”). This is why practicing downhill running in the final weeks before your race is crucial, so your quads don’t quit on you at 50K.
You can also do specific strength training:
Eccentric squats (slow on the way down)
Step-downs from a box (weighted or unweighted)
Reverse lunges (controlling the descent)
Plyometrics (bounding, hops, split squat jumps)
Including these in your routine 2 - 3 times per week will help strengthen key muscle groups and improve fatigue resistance on descents. Start with 3 sets of 8 - 12 reps per exercise, focusing on slow, controlled movement to really build strength and resilience.
If you’re feeling particularly brave, you can try downhill treadmill running. Now most treadmills don’t go downhill, so ‘apparently’ this is best achieved with a home treadmill and breeze blocks to prop the back up on.
NOTE: My lawyers have asked me to remind you that I don’t recommend this!
So with the all the above in mind, let’s get to the nuts and bolts of…
Training for a mountain ultra in London
Rather than grinding out massive weekly mileage, I focused on getting the most out of key hill sessions. Because in mountain ultras, quality beats quantity.
These involve a weekend of hill running in places like Box Hill, the South Downs, the Lake District, or even the Alps. Anywhere that mimics your race conditions as closely as possible.
If you take yourself very seriously, I believe you call these ‘training camps’. Or, if you prefer, just call them ‘big training weekends’, because that’s really all they are.
It can be great to combine training with recceing part of the course, where possible. If that’s not practical, aim for specific runs that match the elevation profile and terrain of race day. If your race has long climbs, find long climbs; if it features steep descents, find the nearest available ones. Your quads will thank you later.
That said, you don’t need to run the full race distance in training, especially for races beyond 50 miles. Specifically because the accumulated fatigue would be too stressful to recover from properly. Instead, simulate the demands by stacking efforts across two or three days, and gradually reducing the volume each day.
With that in mind, a peak back-to-back training block for a 100K race might look like this:
Day 1: 6 - 8 hours, focusing on sustained climbing and time on feet
Day 2: 3 - 5 hours, on similar terrain, but focus on maintaining a steady, controlled effort rather than pushing intensity. The goal is to keep moving efficiently without accumulating excessive fatigue.
Day 3: 1 - 2 hours, shaking out the legs and reinforcing movement patterns
The format is up to you. It can be a general weekend of good days out in the hills or something highly structured, like practicing race-day skills and pacing on a key section of the course. The only limit is your imagination… well, and your skill, fitness, and bravery, but anyway…
This approach builds mountain-specific endurance without requiring massive weekly mileage in the city. Primarily it’s all about training smarter, not just harder.
So, how do you make all of this work in real life? Here are some runners who trained smart and proved you don’t need mountains to run them.
Example 1: The Bob Graham Round…
…as a Weekend Warrior
Balancing the demands of a busy life, Suzy did most of her training for the Lake District’s Bob Graham Round (all 100 km and 8,000m of ascent) around Richmond and the South East.
She got her specificity through key weekends, including a recce week in the Lakes and the Great Lakeland 3 Day. Her 22:30 finish was a testament to making a smart training approach work.
I’ve never seen anyone smile so much in such a brutal event. It was a privilege to be part of it! 😊
Example 2: From Box Hill to…
…Transvulcania Ultramarathon (75 km, 4,500m)
Al’s life constraints meant he couldn’t travel far to train and as a result, he went no further than Dorking to train for the Transvulcania Ultramarathon.
He used Box Hill reps to prepare himself for the long ascent and descent that defines Transvulcania. Turning a constraint into positive, he finished strongly in what was his first mountain race.
Example 3: Tor des Géants…
…training smart when you can’t train high
For my own Tor des Géants (330 km, 24,000m) effort, I mostly trained on the flat; grabbing some vert by doing the the South Wales Traverse, supporting two Bob Grahams and while on a ‘romantic’ holiday in Grindelwald with Sally to practice long climbs.
Given the distance, I often did back-to-back long runs on the same day to mimic having to run on legs that didn’t want to.
I have to say I felt great on Tor! The only thing I missed in my training was understanding the impact of high altitude - it was hard going above 2,700m. I was never going to have time to acclimatise to the altitude but if I was doing it again, I’d go somewhere high in the Alps to remind myself of the challenges.
So, let’s sum(m)it all up
You don’t need to live in the mountains to train for a mountain ultra. Just remember that…
Consistency beats location.
Focus on building fitness first, then layering in specificity.
Structured training blocks (including big weekends away) work better than just grinding weekly mileage.
Eccentric training and downhill running are crucial. Don’t neglect them.
While altitude is hard to simulate, knowing how your body responds to climbing fatigue will still help on race day.
The mountains might be physically distant, but in reality, they’re closer than you think.
Train smart, get creative, and you’ll be ready when race day comes. With the right mindset and training, you’ll be standing at the finish line before you know it.
Good luck, and happy city/mountain (delete as appropriate) running!