RE:RUN 2024 – June

This article is part of Electric Cable Car’s RE:RUN 2024 – The Year in Review.
This was June 2024 in our world of trail running and mountain culture.

June is Western States Month. And what started as a single race increasingly includes the Broken Arrow Skryrace as these two race organizations are fusing their events together (Jim Walmsley loves racing the Broken Arrow VK ahead of Western States – what a fun double. This year there’s ‘The Taste of Trailcon’ that gives us a hint at the glue that brings these two events closer together = more activities in Olympic Valley. What will be interesting to watch is how Hoka, which re-upped their sponsorship if Western States and Salomon which is all-in on Broken Arrow will play the handoff midweek, probably sometime on a Freetrail podium.

And while in the US, on that fabled last weekend of June everyone celebrates Statesmas and 375 lucky ones get to run it, in the Alps a combined over 18,000 runners compete at the Lavaredo Ultra Trail in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, at Marathon Mont-Blanc in Chamonix, France, and at Kaiserkrone Trail in Scheffau, Austria.

This year I sit on the couch during that weekend and I’m taking in all the media and reporting on all the events. I write:

No sporting event solves political problems or cures small-mindedness over night. But what sporting events offer us is a shared experience in a peaceful gathering. These moments can give us hope. They create a break in our daily worrying and struggle. Yes, I may ask a lot, maybe too much of these events. After all they are still managed by corrupt leaders and corporation use them to sport wash their image while destroying the planet. But dammit, we, as people, living on that fucked up planet need a fucking break. We need a breather. You know when you for yourself decide that you had a long week/month/season and all you want to do is watch some shitty TV and eat a pint of ice cream? Or when you know you shouldn’t spend frivolously but you had a rough day and then you buy yourself a new book? When you give yourself a break, a little treat? That’s what these events feel like. We, as people of this earth, as fans, as societies, as communities, we get a little break. These sporting events are our little treat.

In 2025 I’ll be in Cortina d’Ampezzo racing Lavaredo – finally, my dream race!

June is also Electric Cable Car’s birthday month and for the second anniversary I announce the following:

ECC started off as a companion to Singletrack, my podcast. I’m working on reversing the order of priorities. There are SO. MANY. PODCASTS out there. There are very few blogs. Singletrack will remain, but the frequency, and focus will change bit.

Since this statement everyone started their newsletter/blog and is writing now. This is great and I get to link to their content – keep it up everyone!

And fine, I’ll mention Spring one more time… this month, all the big races are dropping them as nutrition supplier and sponsor, Spring finally makes an official announcement and they relaunch the re-tooled Awesome Sauce. Is anyone still using it? Is it still awesome?

The Women’s Trail Running Fund launches their quite brilliant campaign ‘Here for the Women’s Race’ with a simple shirt and a powerful message. All the cool kids in Olympic Valley and later in the summer in Chamonix are wearing the shirt. When I report on it I quote:

The shirt is currently only available in Olympic Valley, but an online ordering system is being setup.

Well, I’m here to share the new website and online shop is now live. And we picked up a shirt in Chamonix during UTMB week.

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This post is part of Electric Cable Car’s RE:RUN 2024 – The Year in Review. I’ll be dropping the June edition in the coming days. To catch up on all of them visit RE:RUN.