RE:RUN 2024 – October

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

As we’re entering the last quarter of the year and the mountains receive their first dusting of snow we turn our attention away from the action on the trails and back to what the businesses and organizations that outfit us are up to. And we start with a gut punch. Patagonia is announcing layoffs, a first in a long time (ever?). And this ain’t a canary in a coal mine. The is a clear sign that even the established, measured and highly regarded companies are struggling trying to find footing in this volatile business environment. And hey, tariffs are coming, 2025 will be a wild ride.

In further business news:

• we see Naak securing more funding to grow their global nutrition domination game,
• Mammut attempting a marketing campaign to one-up The North Face and falling flat,
• Strava adding AI features no one asks for other than their investors,
• Coros adding a new Pace Pro watch to their lineup, but it’s the USB-C charging connector that steals the show,
• HOKA continuing to fly away on a bed of foamy dollars,
• and Mont Blanc Marathon not wasting any time and announcing New Balance as new title sponsor less than 30 days after Salomon departs.

Oh, wait, we weren’t fully done with trail news yet. This fall a FKT attempt by Michelino Sunseri who runs up and down the Grand Teton has everyone talking. I had sort of missed the initial news dump as I was in Europe at the time, but Alex Rienzie’s blog post brought the story back onto my desk. I chat with Alex, who was on the mountain documenting the run, on Singletrack about how to look at this from the various angles by the various parties involved. And while I certainly support a conversation about the style and ethics around how we run and record these FKT efforts, I find myself wondering if taking the lawsuit route is really the best thing for everyone involved and for the larger outdoor community. The verdict is still, literally pending.

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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 September edition in the coming days. To catch up on all of them visit RE:RUN.