© James Poole

After lining up for her first ultra less than two years ago, UK-based Malaysian ultrarunner Alison Walker leapt straight into 100+ mile distances with events such as the Samphire 100 and Tooting 24 – her first 24-hour race, in which she ran 185.9km and broke six Malaysian national records.

Having completed a 108-mile ‘quarantine’ backyard ultra this summer and several Fastest Known Time achievements, Alison eyed up a new challenge and just over a week ago, she became the first person to complete London’s continuous ‘Smog Graham’ round. An urban nod to the Lake District’s legendary Bob Graham Round, the challenge saw Alison bag every ‘peak’ in all 32 London boroughs – no mean feat at 302km and 3211m of elevation. Despite some navigational issues, she finished in 54 hours and 33 minutes.

From McDonald’s meltdowns and non-existent naps to borrowed shoes and blisters, the 32-year-old inov-8 ambassador shares the ups and downs of her ‘Smog’ with me in this Q&A, where we also chat about her 100-mile training weeks and the steps she takes to stay injury-free.

© www.inov-8.com/ James Appleton

Rewind to 2009 and Sabrina Pace-Humphreys was looking for a way to get fit after her fourth child. Despite hating the idea of running, she gave it a go anyway, running for a minute then walking for a minute. Eleven years later, the British 42-year old mum of four and grandma of two is a Marathon des Sables finisher and has just completed her first 102-mile run on the Cotswold Way!

Sabrina is also co-founder of Black Trail Runners which was launched in July to create a safe, open community for black trail runners and campaign for greater access, skills and representation within trail running. We dive into this further in the Q&A below, where Sabrina also recalls her experience and preparation for the multi-day desert ultra, the Marathon des Sables (MdS), and her recent, epic Cotswold Way 100-miler (extreme nausea included).

Italian ultrarunner Francesca Canepa was a podium-bagging professional snowboarder before switching to running at the age of 38. Despite not having run before, she came tenth overall in her first race. Incredibly, just two years later, in 2012, Francesca came second at the Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc (UTMB). And if that wasn’t crazy enough, one week after UTMB she won the notoriously gruelling Tor des Geants, an unimaginably tough race covering 330km with 24,000m of vertical elevation.

Since then the mum of two has gone on to win more of trail running’s most revered and challenging races, including Laveredo Ultra Trail and, in 2018 at the age of 46, UTMB – six years after she ran it for the first time.

Incredibly, for an ultrarunner, Francesca avoids running as much as possible in training – yes, you read that right. In this Q&A, Francesca, who is a trained psychologist, shares what her training actually involves, how she fuels her ultras and what’s got her through the toughest moments she’s faced in her racing career so far.

©TRR Nutrition

Swedish IRONMAN athlete Sara Svensk’s journey into triathlon only began six years ago, but she quickly found she was a natural in the sport, going from a newbie in the 70.3 discipline to Swedish national champion in just a year – all whilst working fulltime as an intern surgeon!

More recently, in 2019, the TRR Nutrition ambassador came 10th at the 70.3 IRONMAN World Championships in Nice and clocked up the fifth-fastest women’s pro time (full IRONMAN) in history with her 8:34 win at IRONMAN Barcelona.  I got the lowdown on Sara’s background, training and the sessions she loves to hate, via email for this quick Q&A.

As a mental endurance coach Vanessa Foerster equips her IRONMAN triathletes with the game-changing mental skills to help them race their way to the ultimate IRONMAN event: the World Championship in Kona, so I am super excited to have her here to share her knowledge on how to improve your performance by training your mind.

Vanessa, who lives in Montana, USA is an IRONMAN age group athlete herself (with a Kona qualification, no less!) and revolutionised her performance and race success using the same coaching techniques she teaches her clients. In addition, she recently set up The Diversify Triathlon Movement in a bid to help change the landscape of what is a predominantly white sport and introduce more black, indigenous, and people of colour to triathlon. Read on for more on this, plus insider mindset tactics Vanessa uses to train her brain to endure mental discomfort and perform at her best.

Regular readers will remember I last interviewed French lawyer Perrine Fages back in 2018 when we chatted about her incredible Arch to Arc world record, which involved running 87 miles from London’s Marble Arch to Dover, swimming the English Channel and then cycling 181 miles to Paris (I know!). Since then, Perrine hasn’t stopped – she took the crown of the BikingMan Ultra 2018 women’s champion, ran the Oman by UTMB ultra, gravel biked the Annapurna route self-supported and last week completed a relay swim of the English Channel in a swimsuit.

In March this year, Perrine joined fellow ultracyclist Steven Le Hyaric in attempting a crossing of Siberia’s frozen Lake Baikal by bike. Their 635km ride, which took place in -30°C temperatures, was cut short due to the unusually snowy conditions (it’s usually ice, not snow) which delayed their journey and risked Perrine missing her flight home for work. To find out more about this and Perrine’s Himalayan cycle adventure, I put some questions to her via email.

© Yoshi Tanaka

I’m thrilled to have American pro surfer Nique Miller as today’s Lessons in Badassery interview. Nique resides in Waikiki, Hawaii (check out her Instagram handle for crystal clear turquoise ocean shots) and is self-taught in both longboarding and stand-up paddle surfing. She competes in both and reached a ranking of fifth in the world in stand-up paddle surfing in 2018.

To find out more about Nique’s surfing, I caught up with her via email where she shared details of her pro career so far, including the reality of choosing between entering a contest or paying rent, and the sponsorship challenges of being an Afro-Latina surfer. Nique also reveals her typical day in Waikiki and her aspirations to pave the way for minority surfers as she moves towards her first world title win.

© Skyrunner World Series

American ultrarunner Brittany Peterson is on fire. Last year, the 34-year-old moved from short, technical Skyrunner World Series races to the ultimate benchmark of the 100-mile distance: the Western States Endurance Run, where she battled it out with eventual winner Clare Gallagher to place second and record the fourth-fastest women’s time in history.

Then, in June of this year, Brittany and her ultrarunning partner, Cody Lind, set a new fastest known time (FKT) on Minnesota’s Superior Hiking Trail, a super-gnarly, 300-mile route that accumulates almost 40,000ft in elevation gain. It took the couple four days, 9 hours, 27 minutes and 18 seconds, and at one point, due to 94 per cent humidity and an electrolyte issue, Brittany was peeing blood for six hours. Gulp.

As you’ll see from this email Q&A, Brittany is a total badass and I’m thrilled to have her on Lessons in Badassery.

© Matthew Hoffman

Eight years ago, Favia Dubyk was halfway through medical school and making great strides in her side passion of bouldering when she developed problems breathing when lifting her arms. After investigative surgery and an initial misdiagnosis, she was told she had Hodgkin lymphoma and subsequently spent six months bedbound during chemotherapy, which left her so weak that even opening the refrigerator door was a struggle.

A passionate climber, Favia used her return to bouldering as a goal during her recovery. Seven years after her last surgery, she is a kickass climber and qualified pathologist, and on the side, runs the blog Traverse Girl, a guide to the best bouldering traverses in the US, from her home in New Mexico. A two-time Ninja Warrior contestant, Favia also has insane upper body strength – check out her weighted pull-up and one-arm pull-up videos on Instagram after you’ve read our Q&A!

© Colin Clarke

In 2017, Jacqui Bell hit rock bottom after enduring a downward spiral that included breaking multiple bones and becoming addicted to prescription pain killers. Struggling to find a reason to get out of bed, she signed up for a crazy challenge that would change the direction of her life – to complete four multi-day ultramarathons across the world’s most inhospitable deserts, from the Namibian Desert to Antarctica, the Atacama Desert and the Gobi Desert.

With just eight months to train, Jacqui threw herself into the world of ultrarunning and at the age of 23, became the youngest woman to finish Racing the Planet’s Four Deserts Grand Slam. Since then, Jacqui, who is an Ultra X pro athlete, has become the youngest person in the world to run an ultramarathon on all seven continents. I caught up with her via email to find out more about how it all came about.