LIVE: This weekend (Apr 26-27, 2024) on our Global Race Series Calendar:

Americas Major (for the last year – next year the Major will be Kodiak), the ‘Canyons Endurance Runs by UTMB’ is UTMB’s 6th race on the 2024 calendar, the second UTMB event of the season in the US and the 100M runners are already on the course.

I ran the 50K last year, got myself the double stones and that got me into OCC this year. These were my observations from running my first UTMB World Series event.

The course for the 100M and 100K has changed several times over the last few years and is becoming more and more a “Western States Lite” which feels a bit boring from the outside, but I don’t know the trail management realities on the ground so I won’t judge.

UTMB has made tons of improvements on their website, but the starting lists isn’t something they have fully gotten online ahead of the races yet. Freetrail is doing their Trailgating shows on Youtube and live tracking for the races can be found here. There will be another attempt (last year’s failed spectacularly) of live-streaming the finish of the 100M and the 100K and 50K races.

Find more trail races on ECC’s Global Race Series Calendar.

This coming month, in May, Run with Strava and Brooks get a discount of your online ticket for the Trail Running Film Festival Online Watch Party.

So stoked for this partnership. Cannot wait to share our films with y’all online!

Earlier this week UTMB announced their new broadcasting partnership with DAZN and a few folks have been wondering what would happen with their Youtube broadcast and their coverage on their own Live.UTMB.world website. I reached out to their press office to confirm and was told that this new deal has no effect on this efforts and UTMB will continue their coverage as before in these channels.

Speaking of which, Canyons is about to kick off.

The racing season is picking up steam, and I have a hard time staying on top of it all. Several big events are happening all over the world this weekend alone. Here are last week’s Mount Yun by UTMB results, some numbers and observations. (For full results visit the UTMB website):

UMY 100M (144KM – 4 STONES)

Women:

1. Wenfei XIE – China – 23:03:50
2. Ronghua DENG – China – 23:44:24
3. XIAOXIA YANG – China – 24:08:22

Men:

1. Jiaju ZHAO – China – 17:05:57
2. Jiqian WANG – China – 17:39:28
3. Weiqiang ZHANG – China – 19:15:32

DMY 100K (97KM – 3 STONES)

Women:

1. Anna LI – China – 11:53:08
2. Wenrong ZHENG – China – 12:03:02
3. Liping WANG – China – 12:12:46

Men:

1. Ji DUO – China – 09:36:05
2. ZHAO Hu – China – 09:47:07
3. Jiasheng SHEN – China – 09:59:37

MMY 50K (48KM – 2 STONES)

Women:

1. Fuzhao XIANG – China – 04:53:01
2. Ting ZHANG – China – 05:01:27
3. Na ZHANG – China – 05:09:16

Men:

1. Tao LUO -China – 04:03:39
2. Guangfu MENG – China – 04:09:34
3. Erqing WU – CNChina- 04:14:38

EMY 20K (21KM – 1 STONE)

Women:

1. Qinghua LE – China – 02:38:53
2. Sheyonghua SHE – China – 02:52:28
3. Jun LI – China – 03:22:08

Men:

1. Chaohai QI – China – 02:03:38
2. WANG Guolong – China – 02:07:19
3. Tiago VIEIRA – Portugal – 02:09:21

This was almost an entire clean sweep by Chinese runners, in a race in China of course. Special shout out to Tiago Vieira from Portugal who claimed a third place finish in the 20K race.

Combined, the events had 3,683 racers and 3,485 finishers, and another low DNF rate. Below are the numbers broken down by distance and gender :

• 100M Starters: 393 – DNF 86 – Finishers 307. Women: 65 (21%) – Men: 242 (79%)
• 100K Starters: 668 – DNF: 72 – Finishers: 596. Women: 149 (25%) – Men: 447 (75%)
• 50K Starters: 1,337 – DNF: 21 – Finishers: 1,316. Women: 409 (31%) – Men: 907 (69%)
• 20K Starters: 1,285 – DNF: 19 – Finishers: 1,266. Women: 490 (39%) – Men: 776 (61%)

In total the event saw 3,485 finishers, 1,113 (32%) women and 2,372 (68%) men reached the finish line and earned themselves stones and an UTMB index (or directly punched their ticket to the Finals in Chamonix for 2025).

When I think about this event I come to the sober realization that I really know very little about our world. Yes, the Olympics have been in China before and when it comes to truly global sports, of course they play soccer there, but I had no idea that trail running is as popular and when it comes to gender participation even quite diverse. Yes, it’s hard to travel there and so we see a very “regional event” with almost only Chinese runners (in the 100Miler, of the 307 finishers there were 294 from China). So maybe this World Series that UTMB is building is really about offering regional events for local runners to get their chance to earn their Stones for the Finals. Kinda like exactly how it has been advertised.

Next up on the UTMB World Series Calendar, and going live in just a few hours from April 26 -27 is UTMB’s Americas Major, the Canyons Endurance Runs in Auburn, CA.

LIVE: This weekend (Apr 26-27, 2024) on our Global Race Series Calendar:

The famous Mt. Fuji 100 events in Japan, the one previously named Ultra-Trail Mt. Fuji (until UTMB filed a trademark dispute) and the event who’s RD’s were instrumental on putting the World Trail Majors together.

This race explores the trails encircling Mt. Fuji, spanning 100 miles (approximately 160 kilometers), connecting the rich culture and communities intertwined with these paths and their surroundings. By organizing the race that continues day and night, without breaks for sleep or rest, we highlight the significance of self-challenge and showcase the allure of trail running as a sport. Additionally, we aim to share the rich culture and unmatched natural beauty of Mt. Fuji, a valuable Japanese treasure, with the world and future generations.

Courtney Dauwalter is racing the 100miler and is in search of Japanese candy.

Here are the full entry lists for the two distances offered, a 100miler and a 70K. At a quick glance the 100miler has 2,281 racers and the 70K 1,115. The official Mt. Fuji Youtube channel has a Japanese livestream and the English livestream is on the World Trail Majors’s channel.

Find more trail races on ECC’s Global Race Series Calendar.

The long running trail running podcast ‘Trail Runner Nation’ launches an app for iOS and Android:

Trail running continues to grow at an annual double-digit pace, bringing enthusiasts from a wide variety of sports and interests. To welcome everyone in true trail runner ethos, and ensure they achieve whatever aspirations they seek, safely, we’ve built a simple, FREE, mobile app.

I downloaded the app and took it for a spin, and while I’m clearly not the target demographic here – this app is meant for new-comers to the sport – I don’t quite understand what the app is meant to be or do.

On first launch you gotta submit your email address – which is a clever way of harvesting emails – but then you’re presented with a dozen+ buttons of common ailment “chafing, bleeding, muscle cramps” etc, and each button leads to a single page with a summary of symptoms, a single sentence of solutions and what to avoid. That’s it. That’s the whole app. It’s like a blog post wrapped into an app form. Yes, the app has the advantage that this information is available offline, like in the backcountry away from cell coverage, but to go through all the hassle to get an app into the Apple App Store (Android is coming), for just over a dozen paragraphs of texts feels a bit… overkill? It’s free, so I don’t want to look the gift horse in the mouth, but I am reading the marketing page for it and I am trying to figure out if there’s more coming and this is just the beta launch or if I am missing something here?

COROS just announced the Vertix 2S, an upgraded version of the high-end, all-out adventure watch. There are several minor improvements, including a new heart rate sensor which sadly reduces battery life overall.

DC Rainmaker has the full product review with the overall take-away:

As for upgrading from an existing Vertix 2? Probably not much of a reason. But if you’ve got a Vertix 1 or APEX series, this is definitely a solid upgrade.

COROS entered the marked a few years ago with a huge splash, competitive pricing, and dizzying speed of updates and product announcements. This clearly paid dividend and they were able to gain marketshare at a time when other watch makers (mainly Suunto) were struggling. Now it feel the product line is a bit more established and settled in, and as things are shaking out many of the competitors have now responded. As such COROS doesn’t feel quite like such a positive outlier anymore. Still solid, still a worthwhile product to consider, but not the darling on the block anymore.

Personally I was never a fan of the Vertix design language, that fake industrial bezel felt unnecessary and over the top burly to me, I’m curious if and how this product evolves in the coming years.

Singletrack – Episode 302:

Nick Triolo, writer, activist, and trail runner is back on Singletrack to share an update on his recent professional move and the giant leap of faith he just took. Nick and I chat about what motivates him to run, to share with others, and why he believes in beauty within our broken world. We also talk about running for a cause and the importance of story-telling in our overcrowded life full of churned out content.

LINKS

• Nick Triolo’s website
• Nick Triolo on Instagram
• Nick’s new book: ‘The Way Around‘
• Nick on Dirtbag Diaries

And The Green Runners are taking credit for the new sponsor rearrangements.

What more likely happened is that Hoka brought more money to the table to take on the title sponsorship for not just the Finals, but the Majors around the world too. Dacia is still premier sponsors and is still providing their cars as shuttle vehicles for the events in and around Chamonix.

The Trail Running Film Festival is still touring the globe, but, if you missed seeing it live or live somewhere where we’re not having a tour stop (gasp!) we have a solution for you: Our Online Watch Party and Fundraiser. We’re pre-selling tickets now and the show airs online from May 30 – June 11, 2024.

Come join us, support great filmmakers and invest into the future of trail running film creation.

Monika Glenn writing on the Tailwind Nutrition blog:

Over the last two years, the scoop was redesigned a few times, building in strength for daily scooping, ease of use and not to forget making sure it is food-safe and can be added to our drink mixes. We literally “broke the mold” with the scoop, well there was no mold, so it got designed from scratch, Tailwind paid for it and this was a big commitment.

This was one of my biggest hopes when I was asked by the Tailwind team on how they could improve their product.

Two years later, we are adding this new scoop to our pouches and have removed all plastic scoops from the Endurance and Recovery Line.

This is such a win!

Yesterday Brian Metzler for Outside broke the news that Hoka is UTMB’s new title sponsor for the full World Series and today UTMB is sending their press release with a few more tidbits of information on this new partnership:

Extending its partnership with the UTMB World Series through 2028, with the UTMB World Series, HOKA secures the Title Partner position for the circuit’s flagship events – including the Finals and Majors – which will now bear the HOKA name

This reads to me that not EVERY SINGLE EVENT in the series will be get the “Hoka” branding added, only the Finals, and Majors.

HOKA Chiang Mai Thailand by UTMB® (known previously as Doi Inthanon Thailand by UTMB), UTMB World Series Asia-Pacific Major

No reasoning is given on why the name is being changed, but the Major is getting a new name “Asia-Pacific” from the previously named “Asia”.

… and the 2025 Americas Major being HOKA Kodiak Ultra Marathons™ by UTMB®

This is big news. Last year the Major announcement had been delayed for months with UTMB finally taking the Majors back to Canyons – which is something that clearly was a fallback decision. It’s possible that UTMB had hoped to make Whistler their American Major, but due to “the kerfuffle” it decided it wouldn’t be the right move for the foreseeable future. I ran Kodiak last year and thought the location would make a great place for hosting a Major. It’ll be interesting to see if they will move the date for Kodiak for 2025 – currently it’s fairly close to the Finals.

Check out the insane drone light show at the Mount Yun by UTMB trail races this past week.

And over here I just use a shitty $30 walkie talkie to try to reach my summit crew for my Beast of Big Creek race. This is trail culture.

Massive news dropping this morning not via the official press release emails from UTMB directly but via Brian Metzler for Outside Run:

Hoka Elevates Its Support of UTMB to Become New Title Sponsor

And as part of that deal, Hoka is asking their flagship athlete to go back to Chamonix answering the question he posed on Strava last year after the Whistler kerfuffle broke: “So what do we race next year then?“.

This article holds several other important breaking news pieces and I need to break them down individually:

As title sponsor all UTMB Finals and Majors will now be called *Hoka* Canyons Endurance Runs by UTMB, *Hoka* Kodiak Ultra Marathons by UTMB, etc. Yes, that’s a mouthful, and yes that’s how these sponsorship deals work.

What about Dacia:

Last July, Romanian auto manufacturer Dacia was announced as the title sponsor of UTMB and the UMTB World Series for three years. Dacia, which was onsite last year at UTMB week in Chamonix promoting its Spring EV, is expected to remain a premier-level auto sponsor in 2024.

The article doesn’t make it clear what happened here, but from what I am gathering Dacia was never the title sponsor of the entire Series, just of the Finals, and this new Hoka’s deal supersedes that with UTMB creating a new sponsorship level for Dacia.

More races to be announced:

The other UTMB World Series Majors include the Hoka Val d’Aran by UTMB (European) and Hoka Chiang Mai Thailand by UTMB (Asia-Pacific). Hoka will also be the title sponsor of a yet-to-be-announced UTMB World Series Oceania Major that will debut in 2025.

This indicates there not just being more events, but another Major coming on too.

The UTMB website isn’t updated yet and there’s no official press announcement from Chamonix yet. We will see how this deal will affect the messaging around the individual races and especially the Finals.

Lastly, this was announced via US media exclusive, with is 100% a deliberate move, most likely initiated by Hoka, to own the narrative. I have no idea what a deal like this is worth, but clearly Hoka is showing its commitment and negotiating power here which comes with deep pockets.

From Brendan Madigan, co-race director:

We are excited to announce the addition of a new 18K race at the 2024 Broken Arrow Skyrace, powered by Salomon!

The team at Broken Arrow really has figured out the challenge of how you scale a trail running event in the US. The event held at a ski resort. And while ski resorts usually don’t have enough trail mileage to make a classic US 100M race the team is growing their numbers beyond anything that we’ve seen over here by offering short distance races – so European of them.

Over 3,000 runners will run the various distances at Broken Arrow in 2024 with an additional 1,400 on the waitlist.

Registration for the new 18K race will open April 29th, but folks currently on the waitlist will get first dibs.

Back in 2018, their third year, I ran their double loop race when it was still a 52K and had an absolute blast. Can highly recommend it to anyone.

Geoff Nudelman for Barrons interviews Michael Martin, CEO of Strava:

 In the U.S. running is now the most popular sport, followed by cycling, which used to hold the top spot.  

The app which started of as a biking app is now an app for runners.

One of the core reasons that people come to Strava is to find out where they can do an activity, not just who they can do it with. Strava as a tool is best-suited to do that with the data our users  shared and trusted with us, but in our “Maps” tab, we didn’t give you any prompts or tools to find these routes or locations, even though our geospatial data set is absolutely unmatched. To fix this, we recently launched an app update that used AI and machine learning to suggest some routes. This massively increased the use of the Maps tab, and it’s an early example of the things we can do. 

It didn’t take long for him to drop the magical word “AI”, cause that’s exactly what I think the app and service was lacking – more AI!

I get that a service used my millions of users will have millions of different perspectives of what the app is supposed to do for them and clearly there’s a distinct difference between the power-user and the causal “I just track my running here” user. But the app is incredibly sticky and has no real competition out there and in a case like this we’ve seen what happens next. Let’s hope that the VCs of Silicon Valley don’t fuck this up like almost every other app that has had this status at some point.

Host Salomon Alpenstadt City&Trail is bringing two shows on April 22+23 to the Park Kino in Bad Reichenhall, in southern Bavaria in the German Alps.

And we made it onto local TV, which is always fun.

Another day, another press release from the UTMB Group:

UTMB^® World Series and DAZN, the world’s leading live sports streaming service, have signed a groundbreaking two-year global broadcast partnership to showcase UTMB World Series in 2024 and 2025.

This covers the “rest of the world” while Outside will continue to be the provider for the USA and Canada,  L’Équipe in France and iQIYI in China.

Now with just over 4 month to go until the Finals the UTMB steam engine is gaining speed. Will be fun to watch what else will come down the pike…. and it’ll be fun to see if the proposed live streaming of Canyons will be improved over last year (and by improved I mean actually happening).

It’ll be free to watch:

What’s more, fans will be able to access all the best of the UTMB World Series for free as the content will live within DAZN’s ever-expanding global free tier. 

What’s not clear with this announcement is if this DAZN deal replaces Youtube as a platform for streaming the UTMB races or will be an addition. I will update once I find out more.

Alright, bear with me here. There’s a new “2024 Endurance Trail World Championship” in town.

There are so many over-the-top claims on this website, I can’t even list them all:

The Real Global Competition: Challenge your idols in a true, global mountain trail competition across continents with the One Hundred World Series…

Who’s racing here?

Qualifying for the OneHundred World Series doesn’t need to be complicated.

The ranking for 2022 has 61 people on it. There’s no ranking for 2023. Yeah, it’s not complicated to list runners if no one runs.

All qualifying races will be broadcasted live through One Hundred TV, so that you can still be a part of this global event even from home!

Here’s a sample of the stream. The parent website calls itself “broadcasting powerhouse”, “sports tech innovation”… oh and guess what other word you find on that website “A.I.”, of course.

MetaRace is reshaping endurance sports, blending technology and creativity for a unique experience. It brings to life authentic virtual running through kinetic signature analysis and altimetry conversion, ensuring realistic and fair races.

Got that?

Total prize purse of $100,000 USD

Checks breakdown for each race/racer: For the Finals, a first place in the 100K gets you $1,000. And only “elites” are eligible.

Starting in 2024, qualifying for the Gold, Silver or Bronze starting Elite boxes at the One Hundred® Endurance Trail World Championship Final will be a fairly straightforward process.

The key word in this sentence is “fairly”. There are categories, statuses, age groups, points… it’s confusing as hell.

Their Rules section lists the possibility of having 50,000 racers across 50 races annually. In 2022 they had 62.

There’s a “rewards card”:

The OneHundred® ‘Runwards’ Miles Card is a digital card that can be added to your digital wallet. No physical card will be issued.

It’s like a frequent flyer credit card, I guess.

And finally: the event website has a tab called “Investing”?

Venture into the next frontier of trail and virtual running with One Hundred Sports Group. We are on the lookout for visionary investors ready to fuel the future of sports technology and media innovation. 

This entire concept….I’m utterly speechless.

Fun interview with Friend Adam Lee on ET2media, not sure if the question was ever answer though.