Spain’s Pablo Villa is racing the 2025 Transvulcania Ultramarathon, his fourth time at the event. In this interview, he talks about his long history with ultrarunning since he contested his first ultra at age 20, his impressions of the island and its recovery after a turbulent few years, and how he combines cycling and running in his training.
For more on who’s racing, check out our in-depth women’s and men’s previews and follow our coverage here on the website and on Twitter/X over the weekend.
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Pablo Villa Pre-2025 Transvulcania Ultramarathon Interview Transcript
iRunFar: Meghan Hicks of iRunFar. I’m with Pablo Villa. It’s a couple of days before the 2025 Transvulcania Ultra. Hi, how are you?
Pablo Villa: Very good. I can’t wait to start to run. These previous days are the worst because you want to start and you have to wait and relax. It’s not easy.
iRunFar: You come to the island, there’s this anticipation and then there’s the waiting days, right?
Villa: Yeah. Now you have to take care about your nutrition, your strategy during the race, check the weather a little bit, choose your shoes, choose your material. But yes, it’s part of the game.
iRunFar: Even though this is not your home territory, I mean, it kind of is. You have come to the Canary Islands for racing many times.
Villa: Yeah.
iRunFar: You’ve been to Transvulcania a couple times. You were here last year to take sixth. How familiar does it feel to you? Does it feel fairly comfortable?
Villa: Yes, for sure. My experiences here in the Canary Islands were always good. In the other islands, in Gran Canaria, I could win Transgrancanaria a couple of times. I was the Spanish champion here in the Canary Islands. I feel comfortable in this area, like at home. I know the landscapes. For sure, I love the hot weather, so I feel super comfortable with this weather.
iRunFar: The further you come south, the warmer it gets. You feel the heat and the warm.
Villa: Yes, for sure. I prefer this weather than cold weather. The cold weather destroys me, so I’m happy because I know that it’s not possible, cold weather, in this edition of the race.
iRunFar: What’s really interesting about you, to me, is how long you’ve been ultrarunning.
Villa: [laughs]
iRunFar: You are now in your mid-30s, is that correct?
Villa: Yes, 36 actually.
iRunFar: You started running when you were 20, is that right?
Villa: I would say my first trail running race was probably when I was 19, in 2008, probably. The first long race was the next year, in 2009, in Picos de Europa, in the north of Spain. I was like 20, 21 years. It’s true that I had different episodes in my career. I started with long distance, then I moved to a bit of Skyrunning races, but always combining with a long race per season. It’s a long time.
iRunFar: You’ve done so many different things over the years. Like you said, you did Skyrunning. You’ve been to the UTMB races. You’ve been to all these island races. You’ve served on Team Spain at the Trail World Championships at least four times?
Villa: Five times. Yeah.
iRunFar: Five times. You have seen many things in the sport change over the years. When you just zoom out for a second and you think about all the changes that you’ve seen in the sport in 16 years, what do you think about?
Villa: It’s crazy. When I remember my first races, the material was completely different. Now we have super shoes, lighter. For sure, for me, the most important change was the nutrition. It’s completely different. The strategies, the knowledge that we have of the nutrition. For sure, the training methods. At the end, trail running, I think, is a young sport. It’s growing, growing, and growing. At this moment, it’s getting more professional. It’s because every year we can see breaking records everywhere. It’s because they improve with the material and nutrition and training.
iRunFar: I want to ask you a little bit about this island, La Palma. You’ve come here many times.
Villa: Yeah.
iRunFar: You’ve seen lots of change. It’s had some hardship in the last five years with the isolation due to COVID, no races, no tourists. And then it experienced both a wildfire,
Villa: And a volcano.
iRunFar: And a volcano. But now, the island seems to have recovered. You feel and see this resilience, this bouncing back. What’s it like for you to see the island in all these different ways over the years?
Villa: It makes me happy because, for example, yesterday I was in Los Llanos and we saw multiple new shops open. So it’s a good sign that everything is growing and better than after the lockdown or the terrible volcano. I’m happy because, especially in this island, the community is very close with trail running. Everybody in the island understands what is trail running. They have knowledge about the runners, the elite runners. It makes you special because it’s usual that you are close with people that know you because of trail running.
iRunFar: You’re famous on La Palma.
Villa: Yes, not at the level of other sports for sure. But in this island, everybody is familiar with the trail running community, so it’s cool.
iRunFar: Let me ask you also about this race. This is the 15th anniversary this year. You were here last year, and then there was a gap of time. You were here maybe 10 years ago.
Villa: Yeah, my first time was 11 years ago.
iRunFar: Okay. It’s also a very different race over the years. To me, what’s unique is that it has stayed independent. It sort of marches to the beat of its own drum. It keeps its own personality despite the sport changing so quickly around it.
Villa: I think, my first experience here in 2014, I remember that it was one of the key events of the season. A lot of very good runners were here. Luis Alberto, Kilian [Jornet], Timothy Olson, Dakota [Jones]. The level was high. Then I think the race had a kind of break. The level of runners went a bit down, but now I think it’s coming back stronger. One thing that I love of this race is that it’s always the same track. It starts in the lighthouse of, oh, I don’t remember the name of it. Fuencaliente.
iRunFar: Fuencaliente, yeah.
Villa: Across the island in the middle and goes down fast to Tazacorte and then to Los Llanos. It’s 15 years the same circuit, so you can compare the times and everything that I love. Yes, I think now the race is still with this special environment, community. I love this race because it’s a bit different from the rest of the races.
iRunFar: Let’s talk about the course specifically for a second. It’s an island course. It’s a volcano course. You start at sea level, you go all the way to the high point of the island, and then you descend back to sea level really quickly. When you think about the course and you think about yourself on it, how do you think about strategy and how you’re going to take this very unique terrain?
Villa: I think, as you said, you go from the sea level to the top of the island. The top is 2,500 meters, more or less. You have to take care about when you break the 2,000-meter border. I think it’s a key moment of the race because in altitude, the body was a bit different. Then you have a very, very long downhill.
iRunFar: So long, it’s like 2,500 meters downhill.
Villa: Yeah, from the top to the sea level again. I think these two moments, running in high altitude and the big descents, are the key moments of the race. And also the heat. If you don’t feel comfortable with the heat weather, it could be another problem. Also, the cold weather, because at the end you are running at 2,500 meters, and it could be bad weather, cloudy or foggy, or also a rainy day. But yes, I think the strategy would be to be patient until the 2,000 meter border, and then it’s the key moment.
iRunFar: Once you get above 2,000 and then also the long downhill is the other one.
Villa: Yeah, yeah. These are for me the two key moments.
iRunFar: And then a question about your preparation. It’s early May. It’s kind of early season for some people. Some people are coming off of ski seasons. I think you said off-camera that you do cycling in the winter.
Villa: Yeah, yeah.
iRunFar: What has your spring training looked like?
Villa: I combine the full year, cycling and running, and also strength workouts in the gym. Actually, I am in the middle of my season. Because I did a build-up for Tenerife Bluetrail. And this race, I was three weeks in Sierra Nevada, in the south of Spain. It’s an area for training in high altitude. Yes, this is a key moment of my season. Hopefully, I need another chance to get a ticket for UTMB in June.
iRunFar: Got it.
Villa: If I get my ticket, my goal would be UTMB in August.
iRunFar: What’s the race in June that you’ll do for your ticket?
Villa: Mozart 100.
iRunFar: Ah, got it. Mozart. In Austria.
Villa: In Austria. Yeah.
iRunFar: Cool. Maybe for you, your season is a little bit further started than other people who come off of skis.
Villa: Yes, it depends. At the end of the winter, I do cycling, but not at the competition level. I combine cycling with running to do my build-up. Now I am in one of the key moments of the season. Now with this race and then with Mozart to get the ticket. It depends. If I get the ticket, I spend the summer preparing the UTMB, and after UTMB, the season for me is over. Maybe other people are still competing after end of August. In my case, if I do a good race or a good training block, I need to rest after a challenge like UTMB.
iRunFar: Cool. Best of luck to you this weekend at Transvulcania, as well as getting your UTMB ticket.
Villa: Okay. Thank you very much.
iRunFar: Thank you.
