This run in Nicaragua takes you over two volcanos while traveling around the island of Ometepe completing tasks that imitate daily local Nicaraguan life. It forces you to adapt to the challenges you face as you run 60 miles through a brutal course and the chances are that you will not finish.

The landscape was a patchwork of vineyards, olive groves, forest. Almost every hill had either a ruined fortress or a church on its summit. Villages with stone farmhouses and more churches punctuated the hillsides.

Anyone who has traveled into the Grand Canyon understands the great immensity of what they have entered into. You don’t really go into the canyon, it swallows you whole.

It was 7 a.m., six miles out in the high country above Tuolumne Meadows in Yosemite National Park. The four of us struggled up Koip Pass, gasping for oxygen at 11,000 feet.

The thunderstorm abruptly ended and I stepped out onto the cobblestone street toward the start line of the Lavaredo Ultra Trail in the historic plaza in the center of Cortina D’Ampezzo, Italy below the looming belltower that would soon toll 11 p.m. and our departure up into the mountains above town.

There’s no way we’re running up that, right? Wrong. Only six months before, while sitting in the relative comfort of my living room, I came across an advertisement for the Transylvania 100k, a race beginning and ending at “Dracula’s castle.”

Morocco conjures images of crowded souks, piles of spices, rolls of carpet, elaborate lampshades and incomprehensible bartering – these were the sights of Marrakech, our arrival city. Having survived its hammer-blow to the senses, we escaped to the edge of the Sahara desert. Here we stretched our legs on the first day with a half marathon though sleepy villages.

It all started about 10 years ago while visiting the Grand Canyon National Park with my wife. We took a quick look at the majestic canyon, did the touristy things, bought souvenirs and then drove back to Phoenix. I always carried this sense of guilt inside me, always knew that somehow I had violated the grandeur of that place by not even setting foot in its entrails!

We had been running through the desert of Baja California for 17 hours. Despite being followed by armed police, obsessing about water and losing a couple of runners to injury, it had been a great day so far. All that quickly changed once the sun went down.

On a Sunday morning in early March, an eclectic group of runners make their way into a small, crowded kitchen on top of Mt. LeConte. The LeConte Lodge is closed, but we’re here at the caretaker’s invitation, readying for a day of running in the Great Smoky Mountains. We drink cowboy coffee and hastily down donuts, indulging in what would normally be off-limits pre-race food.

During dinner at the Mammut sales meeting, Dave, the company’s hard goods manager, turned towards me and shouted, “That’s insane! The Grand Teton in under three hours?”

Last year, my friend Todd Jennings and I organized a race to celebrate the Shawangunk Ridge Trail (SRT), a magical footpath that traverses the entire 74-mile length of the Shawangunk Mountains in New York’s Hudson Valley.

The Incan Empire consisted of hundreds of thousands of square miles of land; its population blossomed, on some estimates, to…

If you were to visit or see pictures of the area slightly south and east of Marseille, France, which is…

Matt Maynard explores how running can be grounding, in his new unfamiliar surround-ings of South America

Europe is a popular travel destination for many reasons: its rich history attracts historians; its grand cities marvel visitors with eclectic architecture and centuries-old facades; the diversity among its different countries and cities make Europe favorable to nearly everyone; its skiing, hiking and running trails, and breathtakingly beautiful mountains and landscapes, attract adventurers and outdoors persons from around the globe.

London is flush with idyllic gardens, grand estates and impressive buildings, bridges and museums. Many of the city’s treasures can be absorbed, although perhaps not fully appreciated, after just a few minutes of viewing. If you want to see some of the iconic highlights of London quickly and efficiently, consider the London Scenic Route.

The Bighorn Trail 100 is Wyoming’s signature ultra and well worth the trip out to the uniquely beautiful Bighorn Mountains.…

The Miwok 100K is a longstanding ultrarunning classic for good reason. It draws a big field (450 entrants) and it’s competitive (past winners include Scott Jurek, Nikki Kimball, Hal Koerner, Anton Kupicka, Dave Mackey, Kami Semick, and Ann Trason). It’s also challenging with 12,000 feet of elevation change packed into its 61 miles and unpredictable weather.