With an ultramarathon on the horizon, I need to increase my weekly run mileage.  The key however, is how quickly can I ramp it up?

The general rule of thumb, is to increase weekly run mileage by no more than 10-15% each week.  This ‘rule’ exists, because ramping up distance faster than that, significantly increases the risk of injury. This balance of avoiding injury and increasing miles is what I face in the coming weeks.

As the chart above shows, I usually top out my weekly mileage at about 30 miles.  This however, is when I am training for a triathlon. That 30 miles limit is constrained more by available training time, than anything else.  Now that I am not biking and swimming very little, I have much more time to run. This means I can run more miles in a week.

To complicate matters, I am running on both roads and on technical trials.  My pace is dramatically different depending on where I run. So, is time on my feet a better measure of injury risk, compared to just miles run?

I ran a total of 30 miles this week and my total running time was a little under five hours.  I think I am going to try running for six hours this week and let the miles fall where they do.  Paying very close attention to how my body feels, will also be critical. I will take a rest day, if I have any inkling of an injury appearing.

It is going to be a balancing act, but I do need to prepare my body for that very long run at the end of August.