Aid Stations 101
It’s time to settle the age old debate once and for all: how long is too long to spend in an aid (or water, for my US friends who don’t seem to have ones that resemble a drunk child’s birthday party) station? Race through in 30 seconds? Put your feet up and hang out for 45 minutes? And how surprised are you going to pretend to be when I say the answer is “it depends”?
When I ran my first 100 miler, I was genuinely surprised by what I saw at aid stations. Ever since I started running ultras, I had it drilled into me that you don’t mess around at aid stations. I’ve always considered it ‘free’ time - because it’s surprising how much time you spend at them will add up.
At Tarawera, in the miler, you have 14 aid stations. Say you’re spending a very modest 5 minutes at each of them - that’s more than an hour added to your time. If you’re someone worried about making the 36 hour cutoff, that’s suddenly an hour of extra time you’ve got to account for - now you’ve actually got to run the 165km in under 35 hours, not 36. Spending ten minutes at each? You’ve got 2 hrs, 20 mins to make up for somewhere along the course. Try and go for something in the middle - 5 minutes for un-crewed stations, 20 minutes where you’ve got friends and family there for support? Bad news, that’s actually worse - 2 hours at the 6 you’ve got your crew at, plus another 40 minutes for the rest. It adds up incredibly fast.
If you watch the front of the pack, you’ll notice they spend very little time at aid stations. They get in, they grab what they need, and they get out. If they have crew there, it’s planned like a military operation - it looks like a F1 pit crew when they come in. Someone will run out to them to grab the empty bottles they need refilled; they’ll sit down while someone else checks their feet and gets information about what they need. They’ll take off again within a couple of minutes.
Another thing to consider is that slowing your momentum down is cumulative. I’m efficient at aid stations and this happens without fail in every ultra I run: there will be people I’m running near; I’ll pass them at an aid station. They’ll pass me again on the next section. I’ll pass them at the aid station. And as we go through the day, they’ll be catching me later and later in each section before finally I’m out of an aid station before they even get there. And we all get it, right? When you stop moving, when you sit down and realise just how much your body is hurting, the energy required to get up and go again just seems to be more and more every time. That inner voice telling you this sucks, this hurts, you’ll feel better if you hang around for a couple more minutes gets louder and louder. There’s pizza. There’s coke. There’s people when you’ve been lonely on the trails for hours. When you’re running overnight, there’s the temptation of sleep. But the whole time, that race clock is still ticking.
A great tool to use, when you’re aiming for a certain time, is the website UltraPacer. It has most major ultramarathons loaded in there. You can load your time into it, and, crucially, how much time you are allowing yourself for aid station stops, and it’ll spit out the paces you need to keep in each section to reach your goal. (These are, of course, great in theory and sometimes problematic in reality - but it’ll give you a quick look at whether your aid station times are suddenly requiring you to run your 5k PB at the end of a 100k to make your goal.) I used it to go under 15 hours at Tarawera in February, and it kept me on track all day.
So that all brings us to the golden question: how do you get in and out of an aid station faster?
For me, it’s simple:
1. Have a plan. Know exactly how long you have at each aid station. My rule of thumb is 5 minutes, 6 if I have to do Invisalign admin, and I give myself a 10 minute hall pass if I’m really in trouble and need a break. (I’ve never actually broken the glass on that one, but having it there mentally is surprisingly motivational - because at each aid station you end up challenging yourself to not use it in case you need it later.) If you have crew, tell them when they need to kick you out.
2. Revisit the plan on your way into the aid station: what do you need? What do you want? Knowing this by the time you get there is crucial.
3. If you have a drop bag, grab that first. Know what’s in it, especially if you need to replenish gel or electrolyte stores. (More on drop bag strategy in a later blog!)
4. Refill your bottles if you have them - at quieter aid stations, volunteers will often do this for you or help you to do it.
5. Repack your bag with any replenished supplies you need to carry until your next drop bag or crew spot.
6. Attend to any hot spots or gear changes, use a foam roller or massage gun on any niggles if you have one.
7. Thank the volunteers, put your drop bag where it needs to be, and get out of there. Remember, you can always eat while you’re moving.
8. If your crew complains that they drove hours in the middle of the night to support you and saw you for three minutes, buy them dinner next week.
It sounds like a lot - but you just need to keep hustle in mind, and having a target to stay under makes that easier. Don’t trade off from earlier aid stations - if you’re two minutes in and out of the first one, that doesn’t mean you have seven minutes at the next - it means you’ve banked three minutes off your finish time, and that’s more important.
It’s also important to practise this routine - in less important races or in training runs, where you can set yourself up an “aid station” at your car or house. Get used to the speed at which you need to get through all these actions to get out of there again, and you’ll be far more prepared on the day.
Of course, there are exceptions to all the above if you’re really hurting - if spending another two minutes sitting down will stave off a DNF, it’s the right trade off. But as always, ask yourself whether you’re hurt or hurting - if you’re just hurting you can be hurting while moving, so get back on your feet and out of there!
So what’s your aid station strategy going to be at your next ultra?
