Update (04/05/2024 – five days after posting this question):

The TDS 2024 is sold out! Congratulations to the latest entrants for this final sprint. Your dream is about to become a reality.

UTMB just sent out a note inviting people to sign up to race TDS:

So it’s now or never to grab one of the last 83 race bibs for the TDS and its iconic route, which will take you through the Aosta Valley and the Beaufortain.

It’s almost April, and this race is still not sold out. (I don’t remember how this compares to last year. Was TDS sold out by this time around?) The race is harder, shorter and less iconic than UTMB – it’s not the full loop – but you’re still there in Chamonix during UTMB week, you still are part of the main gig, and you now even get 4 stones. Puzzles me why this event is’t as popular as the others.

In comparison, here are last year’s numbers:

• UTMB (170KM) Starters: 2,814. 2,473 Men, 340 Women (12%)
• CCC (100KM) Starters: 2,406. 1,932 Men, 474 Women (20%)
• OCC (55KM) Starters: 1,953. 1,409 Men, 544 Women (28%)
• TDS (145KM) Starters: 1,871. 1,662 Men, 209 Women (11%)
• MCC (40KM) Starters: 1,384. 934 Men, 450 Women (33%)
• ETC (15KM) Starters: 1,808. 1,035 Men, 773 Women (43%)

Fewer people ran TDS compared to the shorter OCC. And yes while it’s harder and longer this doesn’t usually scare trail runners away, as seen by the starter numbers for UTMB. I’m not sure what the total entry spots are for TDS for 2024, but with numbers for the lottery for UTMB, CCC, OCC up this year it’s fascinating that TDS isn’t sold out yet. Will be interesting to see if UTMB bumped up the entry numbers for this year.

Announced for 04/01/2024. This has been a long time coming and there’s no information on the website yet, so this better not be an April Fools’ Joke.

Updated: Now launched on the website. The women’s shoe is available now, the men’s shoe will be available on April 29th.

Adidas Terrex athlete Marcel Höche and I chatted about the shoes on Singletrack a few weeks ago.

The team behind the Swiss Alps 100 adds the popular Backyard Ultra format to their already massively busy race weekend. Their deceptively hard, yet beautiful 100 miler put this event on the map, but the team continues to innovate offering shorter distances and even a hike and fly event, an event which is like a small RedBull XAlps. Events like the Swiss Alps 100 proof that there’s lots of space in our trail running sport for race directors to innovate and create unique races that don’t fit the generic mold we’ve come to expect from the races most of the media tends to cover. More of it, please.

The ECC newsletter just went out to almost 3,000 subscribers. What is it? A summery of the links I share here daily, along with the latest Singletrack episode and a few other fun things. If you come here often and don’t want to mis a thing, consider signing up. I usually send it about twice a month. Here’s what this week’s and issue #168 looked like. And just like the website, the newsletter can be sponsored. If you have a product or service you’d want to share with my audience, do get in touch.

Aiways? You ask:

Aiways is the innovative electric vehicle manufacturer with visions for sustainability, innovation, and adventure. This collaboration marks a significant milestone in the realms of eco-friendly mobility and outdoor sports

Or in Aiways own words:

With the mission to drive this progress in a positive way, Chinese entrepreneurs Samuel Fu and Gary Gu founded Aiways in 2017. And the desire to make electric driving as enjoyable, exciting, and accessible as possible has turned into a global Aiways network.

I’m curious if this announcement will generate any online chatter? And if not, why? Is the Skyrunner World Series just too small compared to UTMB? Is this not news anymore because the UTMB Dacia partnership came before them?

New women-powered podcast incoming:

The Trail Network Podcast brings the untold stories of magical moments amongst trail runners to life. These stories of runners on and off the trail capture the spirit of trailrunning and the power of friendship and connection.

Hosted by ultra runners Leah Yingling, Rachel Drake, Katie Asmuth, and Hilary Yang. No website yet, here’s their Instagram and produced by Sandyboy Productions.

The Seattle Times:

Lou Whittaker, a Seattle-born and -raised mountaineer and glacier travel guide who climbed Mount Rainier more than 250 times, died Sunday at 95.

…

In 1984, he led the first successful American summit of the North Col of Mount Everest. In 1989, the adventurer led the first American expedition of 12 climbers up Kanchenjunga, in the Himalayas, the world’s third-highest peak, and got six people to the summit.

…

When a Seattle Times reporter asked Lou Whittaker “Why do you climb a mountain” in 1989, he replied: “If you have to ask, you wouldn’t understand if I told you.”

Lou Whittaker is undoubtably a global icon in the mountaineering world, but he also put Seattle and the surrounding areas toward Mt. Rainier on the global map. There are very few big city urban areas, which are at sea level that are associated with the outdoors in the way Seattle is.

Singletrack – Episode 298:

Chrissi Faber is from Germany, lives in New Zealand and just very cool came in 3rd at the Tarawera Ultra Trail Miler. We chat about her race day experience, the event and its origins and the evolution under UTMB ownership.

Links

• Chrissi Faber on Instagram
• Chrissi Faber on UTMB
• Tarawera Ultra Trail by UTMB

This is a post mostly for myself, but having spoken to a few other folks it seems there was some confusion on how elites can qualify directly for the Finals in Chamonix by placing in the top 3, or top 10 (at Majors), and how this plays out in reality.

From the official UTMB website:

The qualification period for the UTMB Finals is the calendar year prior to the finals, Events and Majors in 2024 will qualify for the 2025 UTMB World Series Finals.

I never parsed this sentence correctly and not until I chatted with Chrissi Faber for Singletrack (will post episode this weekend!) who came in 3rd at the Tarawera Miler last month, was I made aware of this.

All races in 2024 will allow you to qualify directly for 2025. Not for 2024. This qualification window is closed. So… seemingly, if you race, and place in any of the races in this calendar year you won’t be able to make it “last minute” to Chamonix. That window is closed, as of 12/31, 2023, and your last chance for direct qualification via placement was in Thailand at the Doi Inthanon by UTMB events.

IMPORTANT: this only addresses the direct qualification process by placing in the top 3/top 10 and not the index selection process: If your Index is high enough you can get special considerations that are beyond this post.

Announced via the official press release tool Instagram:

Mile & Stone presents Trail Business Club, the podcast that takes you behind the scenes of trail running business.

Things are moving fast now in the trail B2B world. After Dylan Bowman launched his new venture ‘Second Nature‘ last week, the French outfit Mile & Stone launch their podcast focused on the B2B world of our little sport. There’s no mention of it on their website yet, but you can find the French language podcast on most podcast players.

And just what I said to DBO’s podcast launch, I say here as well: ‘Welcome to the party Trail Business Club!’

100% well deserved media hype over the achievement of a lifetime. So incredible we were able to witness this performance of the first woman finishing the Barkley Marathons.

Social media was all over this for days. Mainstream media picked it up as well.

It’s only March and we already have the ultra trail performance of the year wrapped up. Everyone else can just take a down year.

Here are the results for Chianti Ultra Trail in Tuscany, Italy on March 23-24, 2024, the second UTMB event on the 2024 UTMB World Series Calendar, and the first of the year in Europe. (For full results visit the UTMB website):

Ultra Trail Chianti Castles (103km – 3 Stones)

Women:

1. Azara GARCIA DE LOS SALMONES – Spain – 10:12:29
2. Heidi Annemarie SCHWARTZ – Germany – 11:34:08
3. Nicoletta GOSSA – Italy – 12:15:10

Men:

1. Andreas REITERER – Italy – 08:40:33
2. Sébastien SPEHLER – France – 08:52:02
3. Paul CORNUT CHAUVINC – France – 08:52:37

Chianti Ultra Trail (73KM – 3 Stones)

Women:

1. Emily HAWGOOD – Zimbabwe – 07:22:14
2. Tara GROSVENOR – Great Britain – 07:28:17
3. Paula BARBOSA – Portugal – 07:48:32

Men:

1. Aleix TODA MAS – Spain – 05:55:41
2. Davide CHERAZ – Italy – 05:56:38
3. Andres GARCIA BLANCO – Spain – 05:59:10

Chianti Marathon Trail (43KM – 2 Stones)

Women:

1. Nuria GIL CLAPERA – Spain – 03:20:45
2. Camilla MAGLIANO – Italy – 03:23:14
3. Theres LEBOEUF – Switzerland – 03:27:09

Men:

1. Robbie SIMPSON – Great Britain – 02:50:42
2. Simon PACCARD – France – 02:52:43
3. Bertie HOUGHTON – Great Britain – 02:56:56

Chianti Half Trail (20KM – 1 Stone)

Women:

1. Anna HOFER – Italy – 01:34:44
2. Franziska ALTHAUS – Germany – 01:40:07
3. Simona CARGNINO – Italy – 01:43:02

Men:

1. Matteo ROSSI – Italy – 01:21:40
2. Vincent LOUSTAU – France – 01:22:01
3. Fleury ROUX – France – 01:23:40

Chianti Wine Run (15KM – 1 Stone)

Women:

1. Irina MANIC – Moldovia – 01:17:44
2. Marcela VILLALOBOS MARTINEZ – Mexico – 01:19:57
3. Lara PARON – Italy – 01:24:34

Men:

1. Alvïn ALEXANDRE – France – 01:02:00
2. Karl MIDLANE – Zambia – 01:02:31
3. Thomas REICHL – Austria – 01:03:08

Combined, the events had 3,026 racers and 2,917 finishers broken down by distance and gender:

• Ultra Trail Chianti Castles Starters: 412 – DNF 30 – Finishers 365. Women: 52 (14%) – Men: 313 (86%)
• Chianti Ultra Trail Starters: 694 – DNF: 39 – Finishers: 655. Women: 111 (17%) – Men: 544 (83%)
• Chianti Marathon Trail Starters: 822 – DNF: 16 – Finishers: 806. Women: 181 (22%) – Men: 625 (78%)
• Chianti Half Trail Starters: 768 – DNF: 5 – Finishers: 763. Women: 268 (35%) – Men: 495 (65%)
• Chianti Wine Run Starters: 330 – DNF: 2 – Finishers: 328. Women: 161 (49%) – Men: 167 (51%)

In total the event saw 2,917 finishers, 773 (27%) women and 2,144 (63%) men reached the finish line and earned themselves stones and an UTMB index (or directly punched their ticket to the Finals in Chamonix for 2025¹).

Just like with most races and especially the big European ones the longer distances see a fairly uneven (and very sad) gender split. With the shorter distances the numbers reach the ballpark averages we see across most major races. So while the event weekend might start to feel reasonably even in numbers there’s still lots of work to be done to encourage women to aim for the stars and push themselves to achieve the bigger distances.

Chianti also saw a relatively low DNF rate (just over 100 across all events combined!), which is an indicator that this race might be pretty tame and a good way to get some “easy” stones.

Next up on the UTMB World Series Calendar: Istria 100 on April 4-7 in Croatia.

Why do I just count finish line numbers, you ask?
The UTMB Live webpage shows these numbers easily, and I don’t want to wait until full results are posted to share these numbers.

__________

1
Something I learned just recently: If you come in one of the top spots (1-3) at one of the World Series Events you don’t punch you ticket for this year’s Finals, but for the following year. So runners listed above get entry to the Finals in 2025.

From the intro on the website:

The Berkeley Marathons UK was conceived following a chance encounter with Lazarus Lake at The National Running Show UK in January 2020. After hearing that my family were from Berkeley, Gloucestershire, UK, Laz exclaimed: “you should set up your own race!” Armed with 2 rules from Laz, 1, make it open to all types of runner 2, make it nearly impossible, the story began.

Fascinating, on all levels, including the fact that Las went to the National Running Show in the UK at some point.

Via their email newsletter:

Over time, Fastest Known Time record keepers become aware of opportunities to refine and clarify the language defining FKTs. Since Outside’s acquisition of FKT in 2022, regional editors have reviewed the existing guidelines and agreed on modest changes including the use of public outlets, less specific restrictions on rock climbing within routes, and more.  

Key elements that jumped out on me:

• Must be at least 5 miles long or with at least 500 feet of climbing.
• Can be on any surface – road, trail, or off-trail.
• It’s great that people are out doing fun local routes. However, Fastest Known Times is a “bucket-list” of the best routes in the world!

Especially the last point is probably the one many folks have been asking for the most. With the greater visibility lots of routes were submitted that felt too regional, too personal and too arbitrary at times… or seen from a business perspective: too hard to monetize.

You can see the side by side comparisons on what has changed in this document.

I had read about this awhile back but totally forgot, but the French have a race inspired by Barkley Marathons: ‘The Chartreuse Terminorum’

40 entrants in search of the Lost Time between Valleys and Peaks of the Exceptionnal forest of Grande Chartreuse.

I know nothing about this event, but looking at the photos on their official Facebook page it looks EXACTLY like Barkley… just in French.

Who, you ask? Oh just former German National Team soccer player and 2014 World Champion who got the assist for the only goal in the Finals against Argentina. He also scored two goals in the semifinals against Brazil. That Andre Schürrle just ran the Chianti Marathon Trail by UTMB in 05:43:49. Came in 486th place – out of 806 and got himself 2 Running Stones. Welcome to trail running Andre!

The Strava marketing team seems to have been taken over the band’s Instagram:

Calling all runners! To celebrate the release of “Running” we’re inviting you to the Pearl Jam Running Club. Want to join? It’s simple…

Something like this you expect from U2, not Pearl Jam. Feels a bit more cringe than grunge?

Dylan Bowman and Aaron Lutze launch a new media venture – for now a podcast and Substack:

Second Nature formed after years of Dylan and I talking daily about the business of outdoor sports. Our shared fascination with the brands, athletes and media that make up the outdoor sports world has always been a mainstay of our discussions.

We’ve always done deep dives on brands and had in-depth conversations with other athletes, and now we’re organizing it into a podcast and newsletter format so that we can share what we’ve learned with everyone here.

Expect the pod and newsletter to share news, insights and the occasional interview focused on the business of outdoor sports. Our backgrounds have given us different perspectives on this world, and we’re keen to share what we know.

I listened to Dylan and Aaron on Freetrail back in November and I had a hunch something like this was brewing. With our sport growing and Mile & Stone and others entering the space aiming to track the business side of things, it seems to make sense to split that B2B convo from the Freetrail general feed and leave that one focused on athletes and their performance. I, here at Electric Cable Car say: welcome to the party.

LIVE: This weekend (Mar 23-24, 2024) on our Global Race Series Calendar:

XTERRA heads to Asia this weekend:

Kenting, Taiwan’s tropical landscapes will set the stage for the 2024 Asia-Pacific Championship for an exhilarating race weekend of off-road racing that will also play host to the highly anticipated Asia-Pacific Trail Run Championship.

8 different type of events are offered, including a full triathlon, and a mountain bike race. For trail runners a marathon and half marathon distance are on tap. For Elites there’s a combined prize purse of US$30,200 up for grabs.

Some of the more interesting sponsors include: SEIKO and INEOS Grenadier among others.

Here’s a link to the full XTERRA race calendar.

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

LIVE: This weekend (Mar 22-24, 2024) on our Global Race Series Calendar:

‘Chianti Ultra Trail’ is UTMB’s second race of the 2024 calendar year and the first one in Europe. The Alps are still covered in snow, but Tuscany, among the lower lying areas of Italy are ready for trail racing among wine country.

Several big names on the starting list among them Andreas REITERER, Pau CAPELL, Scott HAWKER, Dani JUNG, Cody LIND, Emily HAWGOOD, Robbie SIMPSON, Dakota JONES.

Chianti offers runners a 103 KM, 73 KM, 43 KM, 20KM and a 15KM race with a chance to get their stones for the lottery.

Once the results are in I will post the gender splits for the various distances.

Here’s a link to the UTMB live feed for the races.

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