Hey Run247, Western States Is Still Not By UTMB

Last year I browsed the new-to-me website ‘Run247, and found an article written by Patrick Ryan about Western States adding the ‘by UTMB’ handle to the full name of the race. This year, they refreshed the article for the upcoming Western States race for 2024 but they left the wrong title in there.

I know that in many ways, this is an SEO play and adding all the optimized words in all the right places is supposed to help with search engine placement, and yes, RUN247 is a British website and Western States is an American race, but this is really not that hard folks.

Western States is an independently run nonprofit that has partnered with UTMB to have their event included in the World Series. The partnership details aren’t disclosed, but both organizations are heavily sponsored by Hoka which seems to be the glue that holds these two together. The UTMB Group hasn’t acquired and does not own Western States. The ‘by UTMB’ addition is used by UTMB for EVERY OTHER RACE IN THEIR SERIES, but not for Western States. Every other race in their series has a subdomain now on their UTMB.world website, but not Western States. Not all UTMB events on the World Series are owned outright by UTMB. Some are owned by UTMB Europe. Some are owned by Ironman/UTMB and some are partnerships with local events managers in countries these two organizations don’t have a local presence.

Alright, carry on everyone, just had to get this off my chest.