Running News Daily

Three workouts for endless endurance

If you’re gearing up for a half-marathon distance or longer, you’re likely hoping to build your endurance tank to keep your race pace steady and strong through the hard final miles of your race. Pro ultrarunner Krissy Mohl, author of Running Your First Ultra, whose accomplishments include taking fourth place at both Western States 100 and Hardrock 100 (2012), schedules regular endurance-based workouts for the athletes that she coaches that are appropriate for runners targeting any longer distance race.

Before you tackle any of these workouts, make sure you have a strong training base, and schedule an easy running or recovery day to follow. Use these as your bread-and-butter workouts in your pursuit of crushing a consistent race-day pace.

1.- Pace repeats

Mohl has runners use this workout throughout their entire training build, beginning with 5 or 6 repeats and building from there.”It is key to find the pace you can manage the entire workout,” she says. Aim to be consistent and steady, with your final repeat at the same pace as your first.

Warm up with 15 minutes of easy running.

Run 7-8 x 5 minutes steady, with 1 minute recovery between each repeat.

Cool down with 15 minutes of easy running.

Adapt this workout for your ability and goals by adding repeats (or doing less), focusing on consistency.

2.- Endurance pyramid

These pyramid intervals are shorter than most endurance sessions, but they add up to a strong, leg-tiring session. Mohl suggests less technical terrain for this workout to work on turnover: “Make these intervals a little quicker than normal, especially the 1-and 2-minute ones.”

Warm up with 15-20 minutes of easy running.

Pyramid: Run 1,2,3,4,3,2,1 with equal recovery between each segment.

Cool down with 15 minutes of easy running.

3.- Steady hills

Whether your race is a flat road one, or an ultra that involves powerhiking, hill training will build confidence and strength. Mohl says that a consistent, runnable hill is best for this workout.

Warm up with 15-20 minutes of easy running.

Run 5 x 5 minutes hill running with one minute of recovery after each repeat.

Cool down with 15 minutes of easy running.

Make sure you are fuelling appropriately for long, tough training, and prioritizing quality recovery time that includes rest days (at least one per week).

This Teen Ultrarunner Wants to Take on the World's Most Prestigious Races

Last November, 17-year-old Sebastian Salsbury received an email reminder. He had 13 days to decide about entering the race lottery for the 2024 Western States 100 Mile Endurance Run, regarded as one of the most prestigious trail events in the world. 

Rules stipulate that each lottery applicant must be at least 18 years old on race day. On January 20, Salsbury will finally meet the age requirement, five years after he technically ran a qualifying time to enter the lottery for the first time.

It's been a goal he's been progressing toward for years. In 2020, when Salsbury was 13, he completed the Black Canyon 100K in Arizona in 15 hours 49 minutes and 32 seconds, well within the 17-hour time limit necessary to qualify for the Western States lottery. 

"It's hard to put that experience into words," Salsbury says. "It was one of the most beautiful courses I've ever been on. That race made me feel like I was doing the right thing in my life." 

Starting Young

Salsbury, who grew up in Santa Barbara, California, was attracted to the trails at a young age. Throughout his childhood, his parents often brought him to nearby trails to hike. The hikes gradually transitioned into jogs, and Salsbury's relationship with the outdoors continued to grow. The mountains, he says, were a playground.

Though Salsbury played basketball, football, and soccer growing up, his love for running took over. He quit the other sports after junior high school to minimize risk for injury, he says, and to dedicate more time to running.

A few years after Salsbury's entry into racing-his first was a local 5K on the road when he was four-he ran the Santa Barbara Red Rock Trail Run. Despite being just nine, he kept up with his father for all 28 miles. The following year, for the Santa Barbara Nine Trails, Salsbury traversed 35 miles with nearly 12,000 feet of vertical gain from the Jesusita trailhead to Romero Canyon trailhead and back, again alongside his father, a road marathoner.

Next, Salsbury entered the Black Canyon 100K in Arizona. He recalled the point-to-point race as one of his most difficult running experiences to date. 

"I was basically crying," Salsbury remembers, adding that his hydration vest kept digging into his ribs. "I loved the feeling of working hard and going through really low moments and overcoming them. I crave it."

Supported for the last 20 miles by his coach at the time, Tyler Hansen, Salsbury crossed the finish feeling both defeated and uplifted. The Black Canyon race gave him the confidence to continue challenging himself in ultrarunning.

"My best friends don't understand," Salsbury says about the pursuit of ultras, which he envisions including some of the most technically demanding and prestigious races in the world: the Western States 100 in California, Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc through the French Alps, as well as the Hardrock Hundred Mile Endurance Run in Colorado. Salsbury admits that running disrupts his social life, and also that he doesn't mind the solitude the sport necessitates. In fact, he welcomes it.

"I like the feeling of being alone in the mountains," Salsbury says. "It's a great way to free your mind."

Given that he is still a teen-the average age of trail runners is in the mid-30s-Salsbury has not been immune to negative comments over the years. "It's not cool at all to hate, but I can still see where someone would be coming from, seeing a kid doing all that stuff," Salsbury says. "There are going to be people that troll and hate for no reason. That's just life."

A Purposeful Progression

The training required to undertake ultras is out of this world for a typical high school runner. To ensure he's programming himself with sufficient miles without overloading his still-developing body, Salsbury sought the guidance of his longtime role model, pro trail runner Hayden Hawks. The two met when Salsbury was 14, and their camaraderie clicked naturally.

"I had lots of mentors help me at a young age in my running journey, and I felt the responsibility to do the same with Sebastian," says Hawks, 32. "We have taken a patient and gradual approach, developing strength, speed, and a foundation that will help him build into the longer distance races at an older age."

Hawks has coached Salsbury for the past two years, carefully mapping out a plan that tallies 50 miles weekly spread across six days. Salisbury complements the mileage with a combination of hiking, mountain biking, and intervals on an indoor bike as part of his cross training. Three days a week, he does strength exercises at Varient Training Lab in Santa Barbara. To fit it all in so he could have ample opportunity to train and compete, prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, Salsbury enrolled in West River Academy, an online private school program.

"I have zero regrets," Salsbury says. "The opportunity that it's given me to travel with my family and run and be able to guide my days how I want and learn at my own pace, I'm grateful for that."

The online program lasts up to three hours a day, which is "a lot less than standard high school," Salsbury chuckles. In 2022, he researched computer engineering and built a computer from scratch. This year, as part of the online curriculum, he's learning to speak German in addition to researching for a project about coffee and sustainability, which he is especially interested in as a part-time certified barista. Salisbury works at a local coffee shop twice a week. 

So far, he's enjoying the unique balance of online learning and ultrarunning. "I like to keep myself busy," he says. "I've always had this next-level energy. Obviously it goes into running, but it's who I am as a person." 

His days are hardly routine compared to the average high schooler. On a recent Thursday, Salsbury started the day with a three-minute cold plunge before he spent the remainder of the morning packing running shoes, thermal layers, his COROS watch, and a heart rate monitor ahead of a four-day trip to Boulder, Colorado, to train with a friend at altitude.

Living at sea level in Santa Barbara, Salsbury doesn't often have the opportunity to run at altitude beyond twice a year, mostly "just a vacation with my family where I get to do some running," he says.

As much as he has run over the years, Salsbury says he's been fortunate to never have had any serious injuries. This year, a growth spurt of eight inches led to severe shin splints, and Salsbury, who is now 6-foot-4 and 162 pounds, took four months off from running.

Now, life is back to business as usual. Salsbury is planning ahead. His next race is the La Cuesta Ranch 25K in San Luis Obispo, California, in late January. After he graduates from high school in June 2024, he wants to pursue a running career ideally full-time, though he hasn't stated when he aims to turn professional. 

"I've always had the intention to be one of the greatest ultrarunners in the world one day. That will continue to be my goal," Salsbury says. "I want to leave a positive impact on the sport and be an inspiration to other athletes of any age, but obviously the youth because that's how I grew up. People can judge and say whatever they want, but I do want to be the best of all time."

Jim Walmsley, Mathieu Blanchard will return to UTMB in 2024

2023 UTMB champion Jim Walmsley and 2022 second-place finisher Mathieu Blanchard have confirmed they will appear at this year’s Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc (UTMB) final, which takes place in Chamonix, France on Aug. 30, according to a report by iRunFar. A number of other ultratrail elites have also been announced, including the U.K.’s Tom Evans, who finished third in 2022 and who won Western States 100 in 2023, and Canada’s Christian Meier, the former pro cyclist who won the 145-km TDS race last year. 

On the women’s side, Canada’s Marianne Hogan (who finished second in 2022) is confirmed, as are 2022 champion Katie Schide of the U.S., France’s Claire Bannwarth and New Zealand’s Ruth Croft (who won Western States in 2022). (Three-time UTMB champion and course record holder Courtney Dauwalter does not appear on the list.)

Four-time champion Kilian Jornet and 2023 second-place finisher Zach Miller will also not be returning. After the October, 2023 announcement by UTMB and its minority partner, the Ironman Group, of a new race in Whistler, B.C. in 2024, and the Dec. 1 announcement that UTMB livestream announcer Corrine Malcolm had been fired, the two publicly questioned the organization’s decisions and its treatment of athletes. There was talk of a boycott, though Jornet and Miller dispute this; in the wake of all of this, regular discussions between UTMB and the Pro Trail Runners Association (PTRA), of which Jornet is a founding member, became more frequent, with a view to smoothing relations between athletes and the race. 

Walmsley moved to France for two years to hone his mountain-running skills before finally winning UTMB on his fifth try in 2023 (he Walmsley first ran UTMB in 2017, finishing fifth; he DNF’d in 2018 and again in 2021, then finished fourth in 2022). Blanchard, who has returned to France after living in Montreal for a few years (and taking out Canadian citizenship), finished fourth last year after following Jornet onto the podium in 2022. Hogan has been dealing with injuries for much of the last year and a half since her podium finish in 2022.

Canadian road and trail champ Anne-Marie Madden shares her wisdom

Canadian distance runner Anne-Marie Madden has been shining on both road and trails for years, most recently winning the masters division at the 2023 California International Marathon (CIM). Madden was third at Arizona’s Black Canyon 100K in 2022, earning her entry into the 2022 edition of the legendary Western States 100, where she took 11th place.

Madden, who works as a doctor in Vancouver, shared the secrets to her success in seamlessly transitioning between road and trail running with Canadian Running.

Early morning trail training

Balancing a thriving medical career with elite training demands a strategic training schedule. Madden’s weekdays are often dictated by long work hours, so she utilizes non-technical trails for pre-dawn runs with her dog, Tucker. Her days off become an opportunity for long, trail-focused runs.

“During this most recent marathon build, I made a concerted effort to do some long runs on the road,” says Madden. “My coach gave me a few workouts within a long run. This was useful on weeks when I had limited time off to do other workouts and it also built up my confidence running faster road paces again.”

Fuelling for both styles

Madden’s fuelling strategy adapts to the demands of each terrain. For shorter, more intense road workouts, she opts for liquid nutrition and gels, finding bars challenging to consume when running at a higher intensity. She uses different methods of staying hydrated during training: on trails, she uses a filter flask to refill water from natural sources, contrasting the convenience of refilling at water fountains on urban road runs.

Tips for runners hoping to shift between terrain

“One of the biggest mental shifts for road runners moving into the trail space is to let go of pace goals,” says Madden. “The terrain often dictates the pace. Running on trails is a great opportunity to hone in on perceived effort and to tune into our body’s cues.” Madden says this skill carries over to road racing.

“For readers with a road running background looking to do more trail racing, I recommend they introduce trail runs into their program on their easy days or for a portion of their long run,” says Madden. “They can eventually work in trail workouts such as hill repeats or speed work on gravel paths.”

Vert and alpine views

Madden’s social media posts highlight the beautiful B.C. trails where she runs with her exuberant dog. “The alpine views here are spectacular and the high numbers of park visitors means the trails are well maintained and great for running,” she says. She does the bulk of her long runs on the mountain bike trails in Pemberton and Squamish.

Madden says that while there are lots of great runs in B.C. with tons of vert., the snow pack can make it hard to find long sustained climbs to train on can be challenging in early spring: “something to keep in mind if you’re signing up for a big race with lots of vertical early in the race season.”

With that in mind, Madden will next be lining up at Black Canyon 100K on Feb. 10th, “a relatively low vert trail race which is easier to train for during the Canadian winter when a lot of the higher elevation trails are snow covered,” she says.

Courtney Dauwalter and Jim Walmsley win 2023 Trail Runner of the Year

Trail running media community Freetrail have announced the winners of the Trail Runner of the Year (TROY), and the epic champions weren’t really a surprise: Americans Courtney Dauwalter and Jim Walmsley, both winners of the 2023 edition of UTMB.

TROY is a global award intended to recognize pro athletes within the sport by ranking their performances during the 2023 racing season. “It’s our hope that TROY will become an annual capstone, celebrating the year in competition,” Freetrail said when they created TROY in 2022.

Traditionally, contests like this one have been country-based, so Freetrail is taking a step toward inclusivity by making the competition international. “TROY is an extension of Freetrail’s mission to elevate the profile of the professional athletes in our sport while helping casual observers and the general public feel connected to their stories – hopefully creating diehard fans in the process,” Freetrail shares on its website.

We had some stellar Canadian athletes on the list, including Ailsa MacDonald of Cochrane, Alta., Edmonton’s Priscilla Forgie, Chilliwack’s Ihor Verys and Montreal’s Marianne Hogan. Americans took the lead, however, after remarkable performances in 2023.

Courtney Dauwalter

Ultrarunner and coach Corinne Malcolm says in the Freetrail announcement that “we are living in the Courtney Era and we aren’t mad about it.” The trail and ultrarunning community witnessed a historic chapter in 2023 as Dauwalter conquered the elusive triple crown of 100-mile races (Western States 100, Hardrock 100 and UTMB 171K) becoming the first person to win all three in one season.

Malcolm captures the essence of Dauwalter’s remarkable journey in 2023 when she says, “We’ve reached peak Courtney.” Before the triple was even an idea, Dauwalter kicked off her season with wins (setting new course records) at Bandera 100K, Transgrancanaria 128K classic, and a record-breaking performance at Western States 100 (WSER).

auwalter’s 2023 season unfolded as an extraordinary narrative of triumphs. Fans watched in awe when she ran to victory at WSER, breaking Canadian Ellie Greenwood‘s long-standing record by 77 minutes, and three weeks later, dominated the Hardrock 100, setting yet another course record.

The unexpected revelation of Dauwalter’s pursuit of the triple crown at UTMB adds a surreal dimension to her already illustrious season. “While she would go on to convincingly win her third world-class 100-mile of the season, completing a triple that will likely never happen ever again, she would also show us she was human, gritting through the final 50 km of the course… Leaving us absolutely speechless in the process,” Malcolm writes.

Jim Walmsley

Walmsley is a beloved fixture in the trail community, known for his immense talent and dedicated work ethic. Fans have followed the evolution of his ultrarunning career. Walsmsley’s journey is one of continuous growth, from three consecutive wins at WSER to a strategic move to Arêches, France, to learn from the likes of Francois D’Haene how to conquer UTMB.

“Just like for many of his mountain colleagues, that would also mean coming into the first spring race of the season off of largely ski fitness,” Malcolm says. “To qualify for the UTMB Finals Jim ran, won, and set the course record at the Istria by UTMB 100-mile race—in the process winning his first 100-mile race that wasn’t WSER.”

While temporarily sidelined with an ankle injury, Walmsley’s determination prevailed as he clinched victory at Trail La Frison Roche and, ultimately, UTMB. Fans watched a nail-biting race, with some doubts as to whether Walmsley would best compatriot Zach Miller, but “a switch flipped at Champex Lac,” and Walmsley secured his win in under 20 hours. Jim’s subsequent triumph at Nice Côte d’Azur by UTMB 100K not only cements his legacy but also earned him a golden ticket to WSER 2024, leaving the ultrarunning community in eager anticipation.

5 creative ways to unlock your running potential

Every runner seeks the elusive formula for peak performance, and while traditional strategies play a vital role, exploring unconventional avenues can unearth untapped potential. Performance coaches, authors and the hosts of a new podcast called Farewell, Brad Stulberg and Steve Magness, recently shared some innovative ways to tap into your best performance.

These methods, adapted from the training of legendary ultrarunner Courtney Dauwalter, Kona Ironman champ Chelsea Sodaro, and Canadian Olympic champ decathlete Damian Warner, can help you build an arsenal of tools that will allow you to become your best running self, whatever your goals may be. Look Embrace curiosity over fear

In the premiere episode of Farewell, Stulberg interviews ultrarunning GOAT Dauwaulter, whose 2023 season saw her winning the triple crown of ultramarathons (UTMB, Western States 100 and Hardrock 100). Dauwaulter is known for her curiosity-based approach to racing and says that whenever she works her way through a unique challenge, she puts it into her “filing cabinet” of experiences built through more than a decade of running ultras.Consider approaching challenges with curiosity rather than fear.

Dauwaulter’s journey started with curiosity-driven road marathons, leading her to conquer ultramarathons and achieve astonishing feats. When faced with a daunting task, adopt a mindset of exploration, saying to yourself: “let’s just see what happens,” rather than feeling like you must succeed at all costs. The unexpected outcomes might surprise you and expand your perceived limits.Use the power of “yes”

Chelsea Sodaro, the Kona Ironman world champ winner, draws inspiration from a mantra the athlete and her husband taught their daughter when she was going through a “no” phase—“yes, yes, yes.” This simple yet potent affirmation becomes a guiding force during challenging moments. Applying this mantra encourages a commitment to embrace difficulties and lean into the hard aspects of training. The next time you encounter a tough run or race, channel the spirit of “yes, yes, yes” to shift from resistance to resilience.Less is more: subtract to succeed

Stulberg suggests challenging the instinct to add more when faced with a hurdle. Research shows that humans tend to be “adders,” inclined to incorporate new strategies, rather than simply subtracting impediments. When striving for behaviour change, consider subtracting obstacles instead of seeking additional solutions. Reflect on what you can eliminate or modify to clear the path to success, allowing simplicity to fuel progress.Consistency trumps perfect practice

Through several decades of elite competition, Canadian Olympic champion decathlete Damian Warner has learned the importance of consistency over perfection. His coach’s mantra—that there’s no such thing as a bad practice—highlights the importance of routine, unexceptional training days. Warner’s gold medal-winning experience underscores the power of sustained, consistent effort, even when conditions are less than ideal. Recognize that excellence is often built through everyday dedication rather than sporadic extraordinary performances.You are not your thoughts

In overcoming mental health challenges like OCD and anxiety, Sodaro shares a unique strategy—naming her brain (she calls hers Regina, after the character in the movie Mean Girls). By personifying intrusive thoughts, she creates distance between herself and her mental struggles. Runners grappling with mental hurdles can apply this concept, acknowledging that their thoughts don’t define them. Naming and dismissing unwanted thoughts can provide mental clarity and resilience during demanding runs.Ultrarunner Adam Campbell’s tips to master your mid-race mindset” — Canadian Running Magazine

View on the original site.

In your pursuit of optimal running performance, integrating these unconventional approaches can inject a fresh perspective, foster growth, and aid in unlocking your true potential. Remember, innovation often lies in the willingness to explore the uncharted paths of curiosity, affirmation, simplicity, consistency and mental resilience.

Five creative ways to unlock your running potential

Every runner seeks the elusive formula for peak performance, and while traditional strategies play a vital role, exploring unconventional avenues can unearth untapped potential. Performance coaches, authors and the hosts of a new podcast called Farewell, Brad Stulberg and Steve Magness, recently shared some innovative ways to tap into your best performance.

These methods, adapted from the training of legendary ultrarunner Courtney Dauwalter, Kona Ironman champ Chelsea Sodaro, and Canadian Olympic champ decathlete Damian Warner, can help you build an arsenal of tools that will allow you to become your best running self, whatever your goals may be.

1.- Embrace curiosity over fear

In the premiere episode of Farewell, Stulberg interviews ultrarunning GOAT Dauwaulter, whose 2023 season saw her winning the triple crown of ultramarathons (UTMB, Western States 100 and Hardrock 100). Dauwaulter is known for her curiosity-based approach to racing and says that whenever she works her way through a unique challenge, she puts it into her “filing cabinet” of experiences built through more than a decade of running ultras.

Consider approaching challenges with curiosity rather than fear. Dauwaulter’s journey started with curiosity-driven road marathons, leading her to conquer ultramarathons and achieve astonishing feats. When faced with a daunting task, adopt a mindset of exploration, saying to yourself: “let’s just see what happens,” rather than feeling like you must succeed at all costs. The unexpected outcomes might surprise you and expand your perceived limits.

2.- Use the power of “yes”

Chelsea Sodaro, the Kona Ironman world champ winner, draws inspiration from a mantra the athlete and her husband taught their daughter when she was going through a “no” phase—“yes, yes, yes.” This simple yet potent affirmation becomes a guiding force during challenging moments. Applying this mantra encourages a commitment to embrace difficulties and lean into the hard aspects of training. The next time you encounter a tough run or race, channel the spirit of “yes, yes, yes” to shift from resistance to resilience.

3.- Less is more: subtract to succeed

Stulberg suggests challenging the instinct to add more when faced with a hurdle. Research shows that humans tend to be “adders,” inclined to incorporate new strategies, rather than simply subtracting impediments. When striving for behaviour change, consider subtracting obstacles instead of seeking additional solutions. Reflect on what you can eliminate or modify to clear the path to success, allowing simplicity to fuel progress.

4.- Consistency trumps perfect practice

Through several decades of elite competition, Canadian Olympic champion decathlete Damian Warner has learned the importance of consistency over perfection. His coach’s mantra—that there’s no such thing as a bad practice—highlights the importance of routine, unexceptional training days. Warner’s gold medal-winning experience underscores the power of sustained, consistent effort, even when conditions are less than ideal. Recognize that excellence is often built through everyday dedication rather than sporadic extraordinary performances.

5.- You are not your thoughts

In overcoming mental health challenges like OCD and anxiety, Sodaro shares a unique strategy—naming her brain (she calls hers Regina, after the character in the movie Mean Girls). By personifying intrusive thoughts, she creates distance between herself and her mental struggles. Runners grappling with mental hurdles can apply this concept, acknowledging that their thoughts don’t define them. Naming and dismissing unwanted thoughts can provide mental clarity and resilience during demanding runs.

In your pursuit of optimal running performance, integrating these unconventional approaches can inject a fresh perspective, foster growth, and aid in unlocking your true potential. Remember, innovation often lies in the willingness to explore the uncharted paths of curiosity, affirmation, simplicity, consistency and mental resilience.

Running Through the Night to Confront the Darkness of Substance Addiction

Ultrarunner Yassine Diboun found his own unique way to help those in recovery move through darkness together. It’s working. 

Since 2020, Yassine Diboun has made it a point each year to black out one square on his calendar with a Sharpie.

It’s a gesture to signify that on this day, typically set around the winter solstice, this 45-year-old ultrarunner and coach from Portland, Oregon, won’t run during the day, as he does most every other day of the year. Instead, he’ll watch a movie with his daughter, Farah, or cook a meal with his wife, Erica, eagerly waiting for night to fall. Because that is when the action starts.

Diboun has become a fixture in Portland’s trail running scene, a Columbia-sponsored runner and one of the most electric and positive forces in the U.S. ultrarunning scene today. He is also an athlete in active substance addiction recovery since 2004.

And here, at the confluence of endurance and recovery, is where Diboun enacts an annual tradition in Portland called Move Through Darkness. From sundown to sunup, Diboun runs through the evening, covering a route that connects city streets with trails in Forest Park while accompanied by dozens of other runners.

On December 9, Diboun will start his fourth-annual Move Through Darkness run. It may exceed 70 miles. It may not. That’s not really the point, though in some sense it is, for the more miles he runs, the more pledge-per-mile dollars he gains to funnel into future recovery programs, the very support structures that saved his own life two decades prior.

In 2009, Diboun and his wife moved to Portland, where he pursued a career in coaching. One of the first things Diboun did upon arrival was to connect with the recovery community, which led him to The Alano Club of Portland, the largest recovery support center in the United States.

Diboun’s personal history of substance addiction is circuitous and complicated—documented extensively in Trail Runner, The New York Times, Ginger Runner interviews, and others—but what’s most important to know is that it led him down a path that wasn’t his own. Alcoholics Anonymous (A.A.) and the 12-step program threw him a lifeline and he white-knuckled it to shore, reinforced by commitments to a plant-based diet and a healthy dose of body movement. (That’s code for running a ton of miles.)

Such discipline brought him to the highest levels of ultrarunning. He’s a four-time finisher of the Western States 100 Mile Endurance Run (once in the top 10), a three-time finisher of the H.U.R.T. 100, in Hawaii, and he represented the U.S. at the IAU Trail World Championships in 2015. These accolades sit beside countless ultra wins and podiums.

His success story prompted Brent Canode, executive director of the Alano Club or Portland, to reach out to Diboun in 2018 with a proposition. Diboun had, by then, teamed up with mountain athlete Willie McBride, to start Wy’East Wolfpack in 2012. The business offers group functional fitness programs, youth programs, and personal guidance to get people outdoors and on trails.

Under Canode’s leadership, the Alano Club just launched The Recovery Gym (TRG)—a CrossFit-style facility offering courses for those in recovery, and Canode saw running as a natural extension of this program. He asked Diboun to spearhead a new running portion of the gym. For Canode, though models like the 12-step program were widely available and proven effective, he found the diversity of options for community lacking beyond that.

“What we learned was that a lot of folks don’t attend 12-step programs,” Canode says. “They haven’t found a connection anywhere else, and that’s a matter of life or death for a person in recovery.”

Together, the two started regular informal runs called the Recovery Trail Running Series, which evolved into a more formalized wing of the gym: Run TRG. This program quickly took off, offering evening group runs, outings that would often end in post-run dinners and fun gatherings. The groups grew bigger each week.

“We cultivated this community for anybody in or seeking recovery from substance addiction, and it really picked up some good momentum,” Diboun says.

When the pandemic shut everything down in March 2020, including The Recovery Gym and its new Run program, regulars instantly lost the group’s connection. Many relapsed and started using substances again. A few turned to suicide, including a prospective coaching client for Diboun who had met with him just one week prior.

“I know from personal experience that life can get too overwhelming at times and you get too stressed or overwhelmed and you can’t see anything,” Diboun says. “You can’t see any hope, so you just live recklessly, helplessly. In extreme cases, life can feel not worth living anymore.”

While running one evening by headlamp, Diboun thought about the fragility of hope, the pandemic, the recent suicides, and the ever-increasing need for community. The combination of isolation and mental health decline, paired with an uptick in running popularity during the pandemic (Run TRG, once relaunched, tripled in size), created an opportunity for Diboun to leverage his visibility as both a decorated ultrarunner and someone vocal about his addiction history.

An idea was born: Move Through Darkness.

For one night, sundown to sunrise, he would organize a run to crisscross the city, connecting various trail systems and raising visibility of the mental health challenges entangled with isolation and addiction. It would take place around the winter solstice, the longest night of the year.

The initiative would serve three main purposes: First, it would be a personal pilgrimage for Diboun, a reminder of his own ongoing relationship with sobriety. Second, it would offer another way for those in recovery to come closer during difficult times. And third, the event would raise financial support for the Alano Club of Portland, which serves more than 10,000 people in recovery each year through mutual support groups like A.A., peer mentoring services, art programs, harm reduction services, and fitness-based initiatives like The Recovery Gym and Peak Recovery, Alano’s newest program, which provides free courses in split boarding, rock climbing, and mountaineering. Over the last eight years Alano has won four national awards for innovation in the behavioral health field.

December 2020 was the first-ever Move Through Darkness event. About 30 runners participated throughout the night, joining Diboun in various sections of his sinuous route. Given that the invitation was to run upwards of 100K through the night in some of the worst weather of the year, the turnout was impressive. The group eventually made their way to Portland’s Duniway Track to complete a few hours of loops, encouraged onward by music.

One of those runners that first year was Mike Grant, 47, a licensed clinical social worker from Portland. Grant has been in long-term recovery with substance addiction and understands the initial hurdles of getting out there. During the event, Grant completed his first ultra-distance run by covering 50 miles. He hasn’t missed a Move Through Darkness run since.

This year, he’ll be joining again, in large because of Diboun.

“You hang out with Yassine for any length of time, and the next thing you know you’re running further than you ever have before,” Grant says. “He’s one of those people you just feel better when you’re around.”

The Move Through Darkness route is roughly the same every year, but it always starts and ends at the Alano Club, located in Portland’s Northwest neighborhood. This first year, his daughter, Farah, ran with him from Duniway to the Alano Club, which was a particularly special moment to share.

The fundraising component is a pledge-per-mile model, where you can pay a certain dollar amount for every mile Diboun will cover. All funds go to support the Alano Club, specifically the Recovery Toolkit Series. Other recovery-focused gyms are increasingly available nationwide, but The Recovery Gym is the only CrossFit affiliate in the U.S. designed from the ground up, exclusively for individuals in recovery.

Each week, TRG offers six to eight classes free of charge to anyone in recovery. Every coach holds credentials in both CrossFit instruction and peer mentoring for substance use and mental health disorders. An original inspiration for Run TRG was the Boston Bulldog Running Club, a nonprofit established in 2015 to provide running community reinforcement for those affected by addiction and substance addiction.

According to national statistics released earlier this year, 29 percent of U.S. adults have been diagnosed with depression at some point in their lives—the highest rate since such data was measured. Suicides in the U.S. reached all-time highs in 2022, at nearly 50,000 lives—about 135 people per day lost to self-inflicted death. In 2022, 20.4 million people in the U.S. were diagnosed with substance abuse disorder (SUD).

Oregon, specifically, is rated number one in the country for illicit drug use. In 2020, Oregon had the second-highest alcohol and drug addiction rates in the country, while ranking last in treatment options.

Canode says that, after 40 years of researching addiction and effective recovery, the single most important aspect of recovery success is authentic connection to a like-minded community. That’s why both Canode and Diboun are building an all-hands-on-deck approach to recovery through running, to strengthen connections through movement.

“In recovery, we know how to grind,” he says. “We are naturally great endurance athletes. We also know how to consistently move through darkness, which is especially true in the beginning of someone’s recovery journey. It’s often not rainbows and unicorns and lots of positivity. It’s a grind. It’s grueling.”

Annalou Vincent, 42, a senior production manager at Nike, is one of the many people who have reached out to Diboun from all over the Portland community.

“Finding Yassine and Run TRG saved my life,” she says. After starting a running practice in her thirties, she started feeling better and decided to question decisions like drinking alcohol. She eventually dropped booze and became a regular at the Run TRG. Vincent has worked closely with Yassine to develop and promote Run TRG, and has joined Diboun for various legs of Move Through Darkness over the years.

“I can’t imagine my life or my sobriety without running and this program, says Vincent. “Over the years I’ve seen it change the lives of many others. Move Through Darkness is an extension of that. This program and others like it are saving lives.”

Willie McBride, Diboun’s business partner, supports Move Through Darkness each year and has witnessed its evolution and impact.

“I think people really connect with this project because they understand those dark parts of life, and how challenging they can be. Darkness comes in all different forms,” he says. “But also the very tangible act of running all night, literally putting their body out there—coming together as a group sheds light right into that darkness.”

Diboun is reminded daily of his life’s work, to remain sober and offer his endurance as a gift to others, even when it gets difficult.

“I’m coming up on 20 years sober, but I’m not cured of this,” he says. “This is something I need to keep doing and stay on the frontlines.”

With record rainfall aiming for Oregon in December, this Saturday night calls for a 58 percent chance of rain showers, with the last light at 5 P.M. and the first light around 7 A.M. That’s potentially 14 soggy hours of night running. But this forecast doesn’t cause Diboun any concern. He’s used to it, used to running for hours in the dark, used to being drenched. He’s faced that long tunnel and knows that there’s always light at the end, as long as you keep trudging forward, and best when together.

“You keep passing it on,” he says. “You keep giving it away, in order to keep it. Gratitude is a verb.”

Who Is Courtney Dauwalter’s New Ultramarathon Partner? It’s Her Mom.

Here‘s how the Dauwalter duo completed a dream of crossing a finish line together

The last loop was quiet beneath the full moon. Their shuffling feet on the packed, pebble-tossed singletrack punctuated the sleeping Sonoran Desert as the duo moved through shadows of saguaro cactus and prickly pear. Millions of white pinpoints began to appear in the dark sky.

That’s when 66-year-old Tracy Dauwalter, mother of ultrarunner Courtney Dauwalter—who was coming off of historic back-to-back-to-back 100-mile wins of the 2023 Western States 100, Hardrock 100, and UTMB, including two course records—started resharing doubts with her daughter, who kindly reminded Tracy many times throughout the last 13 hours, “that’s not useful thinking, so let’s not think it.”

Occasionally, Courtney would redirect their attention, pointing out this unique section of the course that they’d been past twice before. This time, she built a 60-second container to stuff all those fears inside.

“Tell me all of your doubts and frustrations. You have one minute,” Courtney told her mom. “Once you finish, you can’t complain out loud anymore. It’s not serving us to get to this finish line.”

Tracy spewed all of her negative thoughts, from her rolling stomach to her aching muscles, which was an important reset to get out of the whirlpool of heavy thoughts. I signed up for this, Tracy humbly reminded herself. Nobody’s making me do this.

A dedicated team, the pair was running three loops side-by-side in matching long running shorts, white baggy tees, Salomon hydration vests, and cactus-themed socks, at the Halloween-themed Javelina Jundred 100K race. The ultrarunning event is held the closing weekend of October in the McDowell Mountain Regional Park, an hour northeast of Phoenix, Arizona. Temperatures can climb into the 90s by mid-morning and dip into the low 50s once daylight disappears behind the McDowell Mountain Range.

Now 38 years old and living in Leadville, Colorado, Courtney had participated in the event once before, in 2016, when she was the race’s outright winner. She set the then-course record for the 100K, one of several performances that drew national attention to her astonishing endurance and athleticism.

Tracy, who’d just recently started trail running, had covered ultra-distances at 12- and 24-hour events across flat gravel, but had never before run this far on a trail. They selected Javelina’s rolling 100K with 3,924 feet of vertical gain. The majority of the climbing is packed into the gradual ascent from the Javelina “Jeadquarters” aid station, which serves as the start and finish of the race and basecamp, to the far side of the loop, Jackass Junction.

It was exactly here, at this midway point, after slogging up the final climb over rolling hardened granite and sandy washes, where Tracy had a sticking point. Fortunately, Courtney was there to fill up her water bottles and point out all the tasty options when they reached the runner’s buffet.

“Please keep eating,” she said, as the electronic dance music bumped. A few hours earlier, they enjoyed a surprise pick-me-up of McDonald’s cheeseburgers, delivered by crew masters Dick Dauwalter, Courtney’s dad, and Kevin Schmidt, her husband. But one of the biggest highlights during the race for Tracy was watching Courtney interact and commune with so many people in the trail running community.

“Courtney does this amazing sport, but even more, I adore the person she is. It’s one of my favorite things to watch the love that’s out there for Courtney, and the way she responds. To be in that world with her was really special,” Tracy said. “She was also really kind to me, even when I was frumping and I’d fall down, she’d help pick me up.” Courtney let out a laugh.

“Mom, you only fell one time!” said Courtney, laughing.

“I know, but it was embarrassing,” Tracy said.

While Javelina was the mother-daughter’s debut trail ultra finish, side-by-side, the experience wasn’t their first race together. When Courtney was in high school, the duo finished a rollerblade marathon together in St. Paul. (Rollerblading is a major pastime in Minnesota, where Tracy grew up and still lives today.) Here, she met Dick and raised Courtney, a middle-child to two brothers.

While growing up, Tracy played softball and badminton. In college, she ran cross-country and track. “I’ve always been interested in sports and done them at a level that I could make the team. I was never a star. Being on a team is social and taxes your body while working up a sweat,” she said.

When the kids were interested in soccer, she and Dick organized an adult co-ed squad. Now, she jogs, plays volleyball, and golfs. She and Dick enjoy motorcycle tours, too, like venturing through the Elk Mountains in Colorado. “I’m not great at anything, but I can hold my own, and it’s super fun—I’m willing to do any sport,” she said. The motto was much the same for the kids.

"I thought that it would be so cool to share this sport that I love so much with this person I love so much. I knew she could do it.”

“They could try any activity. But once they committed, they had to see that season through—whether they enjoyed it or not, we were committed. We didn’t miss practices or games. We made sure those were a high priority for them and us. That drove our lives for many years with lots of fun times, but boy, that schedule was crazy—we’d slam-dunk dinner at 4 P.M. so that everybody could get to practice,” Tracy said.

An accountability mindset is one that leads to showing up in other areas of life from work to class to chores, following through on responsibilities and gritting out less desirable tasks. “When things get hard, like college classes, your option is not to quit,” Tracy said. “You dig in a little deeper, get help, and get it done, which is the same with any sport.”

But perhaps their most special ingredient is that the Dauwalters know how to have fun. “Having fun while doing those things is just as important,” Courtney said. “Our family always worked hard, but we play hard, too. All of that combined is what makes life special. Having that be deeply ingrained in who I am helps me in everyday life, but also, for sure, in ultrarunning.”

While watching Courtney grow up, Tracy noticed her daughter had a deep motivation as a person and athlete. One of her earliest memories was two-year-old Courtney, who could barely walk, repeatedly riding a Big Wheel tricycle downhill with a group of kids and insisting she’d wrestle the bike up the hill by herself. As a kid, Courtney and her siblings played soccer, often on the same teams. Later, they ran high school cross-country and track. To fill the winter months, she tried basketball, but she had a propensity to quickly foul out, taking the bench for the remainder of the game.

One day, she came home with a bright idea to Nordic ski instead, which was foreign for a family full of downhillers. They picked up the equipment, Courtney joined a competitive team, and she practiced in nearby school fields. “All she did was wipe out. All the time. Dick and I are thinking, ‘I wonder what this is going to look like?’” said Tracy.

During those foundational years, Courtney would rush home after a Nordic race to report the number of crashes she’d had. “In a 5K, I would be psyched if I only crashed nine times—tripping, planting my poles, tumbling the entire time. I was so bad,” she said.

But Tracy bought a beat-up pair of cross-country skis and started to practice alongside Courtney. “We learned together,” Tracy said. “It was more fun to crash with somebody than to crash by yourself.”

By the time Courtney graduated, she was an all-state runner and had earned All-American honors as a Nordic skier three times. She was a four-time state champion, and her team acquired two national championships. In 2003, Courtney moved west to Colorado, where she raced collegiately on the Nordic ski team at the University of Denver. Three years in, her DU team won 11 meets and the 2005 NCAA Championship.

“Courtney was really good at everything she did, and it wasn’t because she was a natural,” Tracy said. “Anytime she tried a sport, she didn’t have an immediate knack for it, but she hung in there to develop it. She was a hard worker and determined.”

Years later, in 2015, any remaining questions of physical stamina were laid aside—for both Tracy and Courtney, who proved to have a serious knack for endurance. Courtney broke the ribbon at her inaugural ultra race, the 2011 Prickly Pear 50K in San Antonio, Texas, and her curiosity about wanting to run longer continued to grow. The following year, she dropped out of the Colorado’s Run Rabbit Run 100 Mile race at mile 60 with throbbing legs, questioning her ability to cover that much ground in a single push.

Frustrated by not meeting her goal, Courtney registered for her first 24-hour race, the 2013 FANS Ultra Races, a more manageable format than an ultra on singletrack. Her family joined to crew and run laps, providing entertainment and support, including Tracy. They didn’t have much of a background in ultras and were green to any strategy.

Regardless, Courtney wrapped a total of 105 miles on that two-mile gravel loop around Lake Normandale Park in Bloomington, Minnesota, completing her first non-trail century-distance, and gaining confidence. Two months later, she crossed the finish line of the Superior Fall Trail Race 100 Miler in Lutsen, Minnesota, her first 100-mile distance on trail, and stood on the podium for second place.

Moving forward, the FANS Ultra Races became a family tradition. Courtney returned to the 2014 event, besting her first summer with 123.6 miles. Tracy decided, if she was going to crew and run laps with Courtney, she might as well sign up herself.

“She was like, ‘Heck, I’m going to spend the whole day out there anyways. Why not put some time on my feet?’” Courtney recalled.

In 2015, she tallied 109.2 miles while her mom, then 57 years old, covered 66.8 miles. Their annual pilgrimage continued in the 24- or 12-hour format, over the next several summers, coinciding with Courtney’s ultrarunning career picking up steam. She won the 2016 Run Rabbit Run 100 Mile with a 75-minute lead, and along with the title, the world’s largest ultra purse: $12,000.

By the summer of 2017, she retired from her position at the Girls Athletic Leadership School in Denver where she taught science and coached cross-country. “In an interview a few years ago,” Courtney said. “I was asked if I could run an ultramarathon with anyone in the world, who would it be? ‘My mom,’ I said. I thought that it would be so cool to share this sport that I love so much with this person I love so much. I knew she could do it.”

In an interview a few years ago, she was asked, if she could run an ultramarathon with anyone in the world, who would it be? “My mom,” she said. “I thought that it would be so cool to share this sport that I love so much with this person I love so much. I knew she could do it.”

Tracy heard the recording and, despite having never run on trails, she immediately called her daughter. “Let’s do it. I heard you want to run an ultra, so let’s sign up for something,” she said to Courtney. “If someone puts a challenge in front of me, it can even be pretty insane, and I’m a sucker for trying to rise to that challenge.” In addition to the competitive spark, the invitation felt sentimental.

Committed to doing an ultra together, they accepted that it might be a winding road to get there. The two picked the 2022 50-mile Superior Fall Trail Race in Lutsen. Mid-route, they missed the cut-off. Tracy shrugged and shook her head recounting the unfinished event. Courtney refused to let the DNF be a negative thing. “You learned so much in that first summer, mom,” she told her. “Dialing in all of those pieces helped immensely this year. And we decided, we’re not done. We still need a finish line together.”

As soon as registration opened in January, the duo signed up for the 2023 Javelina Jundred 100K. “I was nervous coming into this race because I was bouncing off of that epic fail of the first 50-miler we tried, which was a wake-up call. You have to prepare yourself,” said Tracy.

“It was not an epic fail,” Courtney countered.

That winter, Tracy clocked workouts on a treadmill. From April onward, she ran outside four or five days a week for 10 to 20 miles. Courtney researched singletrack trails around Lone Lake, which her mom became excited to explore. One of the biggest challenges of learning to run on trails is her tendency to shuffle and trip, Tracy confessed. Building confidence, she finished the Willow 20 Miler in May and Afton Trail Run 50K in July. Like her daughter, Tracy didn’t keep a close log of her mileage, and her training was not systematic.

Courtney’s advice, true and simple, rang in her mind: Spend time on your feet.

“People asked me if I coached her. Absolutely not,” Courtney said. “I did try to be helpful—harping on testing nutrition, wearing a pack so that her body gets used to one, and hiking uphills—so her race day could be much better. She was the one putting in the work and figuring out routes where she could do laps or get on hills. I admired from afar.”

“It helped that Courtney kept reminding me, ‘This was our run together, our race, and it could look however we could make it.’ If I crawled, that wouldn’t be disgusting. It got ugly, then it got not ugly,” Tracy added.

Staying lighthearted, Courtney countered, “It never got ugly. There was never a doubt that we would make it to the finish.”

Fortunately, the elation did come around. Next to her daughter, Tracy crossed the finish line of Javelina Jundred 100K in 17 hours and 38 minutes with a smile in the glowing lights, after staying up into the night running, eating, and sharing pain—but mostly, laughing—with her daughter. They’d gone full circle together, both on the circuit they’d traveled in the desert as well as in life.

“I think you beat me by, like, a half-second, mom,” Courtney said.

“I know,” Tracy bantered back. “I think I was really needing to be done, so I rushed with a half-second sprint.”

Canadian ultrarunner Priscilla Forgie loves this super-quick soup

It can be tricky to fit both healthy eating and regular running into an already jam-packed schedule, especially during the holiday season. This lightning-quick soup recipe, a favorite of Canadian ultrarunner Priscilla Forgie, is full of nutritious vegetables (easily tailored to your taste), with a lentil protein boost and lasagna noodles to up your carbohydrate game. It’s the perfect meal-in-a-pot to cook up in mere minutes after a nippy winter training session.

Forgie, an Edmonton-based ultrarunner, is coming off a stellar 2023 season, with a top-ten finish at Western States 100, and 12th place at CCC (100K) by UTMB. She enjoys experimenting with plant-based recipes (Forgie is vegan) to fuel her adventures, and for this soup, notes: “I always add extra nutritional yeast for added cheesiness.” While the recipe comes together in moments in an Instant Pot (or other pressure cooker), it can easily be made on the stovetop and left to simmer (leave the noodles out until shortly before you are ready to eat).

Instant Pot Lasagna Soup

(adapted from Vegan Richa)

Ingredients

1 tsp oil

1/2 onion chopped

1 cup chopped veggies (can be a combo of peppers, carrots, zucchini or whatever you prefer)

1/4 cup red lentils (uncooked)

1 cup tomato puree (or marinara or tomato sauce)

1-1.5 cups diced tomato

2 tsp Italian seasoning (1 tsp basil, 1/2 tsp oregano and parsley, with a generous dash of thyme/sage and rosemary)

1/4 tsp each onion powder, garlic powder

1/2 to 3/4 tsp salt (use less if there is salt in the tomato sauce)

2 cups water or veggie broth

5 oz lasagna sheets, broken into small pieces (or pasta of choice)

Black pepper and red pepper flakes to taste

1 Tbsp nutritional yeast

1 cup packed spinach (optional)

Directions

Heat oil in Instant Pot on sauté mode. When hot, add onion, garlic and a pinch of salt. Cook for two minutes, stirring occasionally.

Add veggies and stir in. Add red lentils, tomato purée, tomato, salt, Italian seasoning, onion powder and garlic powder and mix in. Add lasagna sheets and water or broth, mix in well (use smaller pieces for the Instant Pot).

Close the lid and pressure cook on manual high for three minutes. Let the pressure slow-release for 10 minutes, and if there is still pressure left in the pot, manually release it carefully to open.

Mix in the black pepper, pepper flakes and nutritional yeast. Taste and adjust salt and flavor if needed.

Fold in the spinach if using. Let sit for a few minutes before serving, and add vegan cheese (or regular cheese, if you prefer) for a more lasagna-like flavor. Enjoy!

30 Hours at Javelina Jundred, the Burning Man of Trail Running

Inside the spectacle of ultrarunning’s most festive top-tier 100-mile race

It’s a hot, sunny Saturday afternoon in the desert northeast of Phoenix, and Lindsay DesRochers is being chased by a dinosaur—as if 85-degree heat, a creaky left knee, and a hot spot on her right big toe aren’t enough to worry about during her first attempt at running 100 miles.

The 44-year-old senior creative recruiter from Scottsdale is 41 miles into the Javelina Jundred, and she also has to contend with a Tyrannosaurus rex who’s making her giggle. The dinosaur is, in fact, local trail running legend, Jerry Bloom, who is sweating and gasping for air inside an inflatable costume that’s kept afloat with a tiny battery-operated fan. He is dressed up as the dino-in-residence and runs alongside DesRochers briefly as she finishes the second loop of the five-lap course before sitting down to refuel and rehydrate in her crew tent.

“The problem with this thing isn’t the heat. It’s just that there’s no oxygen in here. If you run very far, you get oxygen deprivation,” says Bloom, 70, a three-time Western States and Hardrock 100 finisher who’s also run Javelina twice. “For me it’s all in good fun to support Lindsay. I’ve given up trying to be fast a long time ago. But what I’ve learned is that it’s not how far you go and it’s not how fast you go, it’s how you look while you’re doing it.”

Welcome to the Javelina Jundred—the biggest, wildest party in the trail running world.

It’s pretty obvious that the Javelina Jundred is the zaniest event in trail running and, to be frank, nothing even comes close to this dusty desert cavalcade of curiosities. It’s not quite the Burning Man of running, but it might just be better because, first and foremost, it’s a legit ultrarunning event.

More than 850 enthusiastic runners toed the starting line at 6 A.M. to begin the five-lap 100-miler, and about 400 more began the three-lap 100K an hour later. There’s also a single-loop, 19-mile nighttime race called the Jackass Night Trail for about 200 runners that includes a wild DJ’ed party at the Jackass Junction aid station and finishes as the Saturday night revelry is still going strong back at the race compound.

But because Javelina always happens on the weekend before Halloween, there’s a natural party vibe and a non-mandatory-yet-compelling reason for runners, pacers, and support crew to wear costumes. And, let’s face it, Halloween gives everyone license to fly their freak flag, so when you mix that with ultrarunning, just about anything goes. Only here it’s known as Jalloween.

This year’s most popular dress-up themes seem to be tropical and western, but, almost predictably, there are quite a few Barbie and Taylor Swift cosplayers, as well as a few heavy metal rock stars, glow-in-the-dark skeletons, and several very creepy clowns. Dozens more runners race through the desert wearing bunny ears, fox tails, and devil horns.

“This is a safe space for everyone to have fun in their own unique way,” adds Dan Gampon, a Hoka sports marketing representative from Hawaii. “It’s a fun way to give the people a chance to be weird and bring a part of themselves that they might have been wanting to bring out, and give them the opportunity just to have fun anyway they want to.”

Some crew tents are decorated with accouterments to match a particular theme, but most feature colorful holiday twinkle lights, camping chairs, sleeping bags, and coolers full of adult beverages. While there’s a stash of fancy engineered nutrition supplements and electrolyte drinks in every tent, there’s also the widest range of healthy and not-so-healthy snack food you can imagine. (I’m looking at you, guy simultaneously drinking a Red Bull and eating a handful of marshmallow Peeps.)

The Javelina staff and volunteers are fully into the Jalloween theme, too, especially race director Jubilee Paige, who dons several costumes during the 30-hour event—including getups she calls Race Director Barbie, Weird Barbie, The Dude, Cousin Eddie, Chef’s Kiss, and A Macaroni Penguin. She once again ends the event dressed as the Pope—a.k.a., “her Joliness”—because she considers Sunday “Jallelujah Javelina,” a day of celebration.

The Javelina Jundred was founded in 2003 by Phoenix ultrarunner Geri Kilgariff as an irreverent, party-oriented run on a multi-loop course, and gradually gained regional and then national popularity as word spread through the ultrarunning community about how much fun it was. Local ultrarunner Jamil Coury took over as race director in 2008. The next year he started Aravaipa Running, a Phoenix-based company that bought and now owns 75 other running events in Arizona, Colorado, Utah, Nevada, and New Hampshire.

Despite increased popularity and significant growth, Coury, Paige, and the rest of the Aravaipa crew have been able to maintain Javelina’s grassroots experience while growing it to about 1,500 runners in three events with at least that many pacers, crew, and family members hanging around the race compound. In many ways, it represents the best of both where trail running has been, but also where it could be heading.

“The race was born from a fun spirit of running with friends and looping in the desert—shout-out to Geri Kilgariff for her creation of the event in 2003,” Paige says. “But as it’s evolved, we saw opportunities to elevate the race to an ‘event’ experience for runners and crews—an ultra festival—the music and lights and entertainment just enhances that experience. However you experience Javelina, I just want you to have fun!”

As the sun begins to set, several top competitors in the 100-miler are scattered out on the remote sections of the course in hot pursuit of four Golden Ticket entries into next summer’s Western States 100. (Two tickets each for the men’s and women’s races.) That includes Boulder, Colorado, runner Jonathan Rea, who is back after a second-place finish a year ago, and—with newfound confidence from a fourth-place finish at the CCC 100K in Chamonix, France—is tearing up the desert trails on course-record pace. Triathlete-turned-ultrarunner Heather Jackson, who splits time between Bend, Oregon, and Tucson, Arizona, also takes it out hot, hoping to make up for a frustrating fifth-lap fade last year after unbearable quad pain reduced her to a walk and forced her to settle for a fifth-place finish in her 100-mile debut.

Earlier in the day, Denver’s Rajpaul Pannu and San Francisco’s Anna Kacius made quick work of the less-competitive, three-lap 100K race, finishing first and second overall, respectively, and setting new men’s (7:15:53) and women’s (8:13:07) course records in the process, while winning by more than an hour over their nearest competitors.

Ultrarunning GOAT Courtney Dauwalter from Leadville, Colorado, is out there, too, but she’s not racing for the win. She’s running the 100K with her mom, Tracy, a 66-year-old avid trail runner from Edina, Minnesota. They attempted a 50-miler in Minnesota last fall, but were timed out before the finish, so this year they chose the big party race in the desert where Courtney set a course record in 2016 before she became a household name. They’re not in costumes, but they’re running as Team Bucket List and wearing matching white shirts, cactus-themed socks, and olive-green-and-black shorts.

Because runners constantly revolve through the turnaround point at the start/finish area, everyone else is always on the move throughout the race compound. Some are drinking craft beers and mingling as they wait for their runners, while others are watching the race livestream on their phones or from the jumbotron in the Javelina Jeadquarters circus tent. Still others are devouring freshly cooked artisan pizzas made to order in the Freak Brothers Pizza mobile brick wood-fired oven.

Rousing cheers and applause catch everyone’s attention every few moments as an elite runner arrives—including the ever-smiling Jackson, who quickly heads out on her fifth and final lap with a 30-minute lead in the women’s 100-miler.

“Heather is just amazing,” says Troy Brown, 48, a trail runner from Coto de Caza, California. “She’s always smiling. I’m just a fanboy, but I like anyone who can smile that much through pain.”

After Jackson runs out of sight, Brown quickly shifts his focus to getting his feet into an inflatable T-Rex costume so he can participate in the costume contest, an informal event that brings out a sheriff riding an inflatable rooster, Minnie Mouse, a foursome of Teletubbies and, of course, several dinosaurs. There’s also a guy dressed as Aladdin wearing a large golden lamp around his waist who is joined by a scantily clad Jasmine character who not-so-discreetly rubs the lamp in a Not Suitable for Work (NSFW) scene that draws both raucous laughs and shocked gasps from the crowd.

One of the best dressed-up groups of the event is a foursome of women from California’s Healdsburg Running Company: Dominique Chevalier (“Western Barbie”), Krista Kappus (“Alien Barbie”), Saddie Alloway (“Rootin’ Tootin’ Diva Barbie”), and Susan Oh (“Disco Bob Ross”). But the costume contest winners are the Montana Mermaids, a bikini-and-grass-skirt trio from Bozeman—Lena Romeo, Kara Haskell, and Liv Bleskin—who were there to crew and support elite runners Rachael Norfleet of Montana in the 100K and Utah’s Ryan Montgomery in the 100-miler.

The sun begins to set, but the party’s just getting started as DJ Colter Stillwell pumps tracks through the sound system as a full moon rises in the eastern sky. One of the rowdiest dancers is Brendan O’Hara, a Colorado trail runner who’s dressed up in a red-and-white mouse outfit with flashing lights similar to what popular Canadian electronic musician Deadmau5 wears on stage. As lots of energized runners entered in the Jackass race are about to head out into the night, two professional fire dancers perform a mesmerizing routine adjacent to the start line.

Just after dark, Rea comes flying into the finish area, stopping just short of the finish line to pantomime deadlifting a colossal barbell before crossing the line in a new course record of 12:43:10. Seattle runner Blake Slattengren stopped the clock next in 12:58:07 to claim the second Golden Ticket, while Montgomery ran another strong race to take the final podium spot in 13:01:14.

Redeeming herself from last year, Jackson finishes strong to win the women’s race and finish sixth overall, thanks in part to the aggressive pacing of Devon Yanko. Jackson’s time of 14:24:47 is the second-fastest women’s time ever behind Camille Herron’s 14:03:23 course record from 2021. Spain’s Ragna Debats (14:55:27) outran Riley Brady (15:29:17) to earn the second women’s Golden Ticket.

Not long after midnight, the Dauwalters finish, too. Covered in dust, sweat, and even a little bit of blood—Tracy took a tumble on the first lap early the previous morning—they cross the finish line after 17 hours of running with big smiles and hug in a classic mother-daughter moment. Late Sunday morning, DesRochers makes it to the finish line, too, in 27:31:41, battling hard to overcome dehydration, an upset stomach, and nagging hip flexor pain at various points during the race.

“I was prepared for it to be hard, and I knew I was going to hurt. At some point, I was like, Oh, right, this is what running 100 miles feels like,” DesRochers says. “It was difficult, but I kept my positive mental attitude the whole way. I have a buddy who has a saying, ‘Forward is a pace,’ so I kept repeating that and kept putting one foot in front of the other and I didn’t quit.”

Something that’s especially apparent at Javelina is that everyone is celebrated as an equal, regardless of finishing times, trail running experience, athletic ability, age, or any other dissimilar details. The event goes out of its way to create an environment that promotes visibility and inclusion for everyone, and the community of participants seems to embrace it by cheering and encouraging for everyone the same.

It has partnered with Native Women Running, Latinos Run, and Black Men Run each of the past several years to bring their runners to the race, and it was also one of the first ultra events to offer a non-binary category. This year there were six non-binary runners racing over its three races, led by Willow Dolde in the 100-miler (20:01:29), Andreas Anderson in the 100K (13:54:30), and Tasha Hartwig in the Jackass 31K (6:42:07). (Although Brady, a non-binary runner from Boulder, was competing in the women’s division because they were racing for a Golden Ticket, they were also, unofficially, the top non-binary runner in the race.)

As the golden hour comes and goes early Sunday afternoon—and final finishers Holly Sitzmann,  Jim Buckley, Brittany Edmiston, and Leslie Astle squeeze under the 30-hour cutoff with help from their pacers and crew—it’s clear that everyone at Javelina is celebrated equally and enthusiastically. That also includes two unofficial finishers—Rayna Rodriguez and Tatiana Orozco—who complete the 100-mile course just outside of the time cutoff, but are welcomed by a scream tunnel of remaining spectators and the adulation of Paige even though neither will receive a finisher’s buckle.

“Javelina is a celebration, and the invitation to run and participate at Javelina extends to everyone,” Paige says. “I want to ultimately show how amazing the community is and that this sport is for everybody and every body—the spirit of ultra is diverse and should be celebrated.”

Australian ultrarunner makes history by racing UTMB and Ironman World champs

Ultrarunner Lucy Bartholomew made running and triathlon history on Sunday, becoming only the second woman ever to finish the 171-kilometre Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc (UTMB) as well as the Ironman World Championships in the same year.

Bartholomew ran remarkably well at both events, taking a tenth-place finish at UTMB in 27:39:22, and completing what was only her second Ironman in 10:43:41, with a 3:31 marathon time.

The double–nearly 400 kilometres of challenging racing–has only been conquered by one woman before Bartholomew: Ireland’s Diana Hogan-Murphy, in 2014. Bartholomew is also the fastest person of any gender to have completed both events in the same year.Bartholomew shot to fame in the ultrarunning world in 2018, when she was the third female at the Western States 100. The runner shared on social media that she lost some of the joy in racing in the years following her WSER podium, and after her 2022 race ended in a DNF, she wasn’t sure if she’d race 100 miles again.

“You show up (almost) every day to run so that you can run even more on the race day, finish and not be able to run, only to want to run, and then run to aid in the recovering of the running and to prepare for more running,” Bartholomew explained. “To take myself out of this cycle I decided to tick a bucket list idea to do an IRONMAN triathlon. It was a ‘one day, someday’ objective that I pulled forward to help pull me out of feeling stuck.”Bartholomew’s first Ironman, in Western Australia in December 2022, qualified her for the Kona World Championship event in Hawaii.

While the runner had only planned to complete one Ironman, she felt she couldn’t miss the opportunity to race in Hawaii. “Not being one who steps down from a challenge, it seemed right to go one more,” she said.

“I’ve swum, biked and run my way to fantastic recovery from UTMB and moderate triathlon fitness for Kona,” Bartholomew said pre-race. “It was a fun, fine balance to play with these two big events so close to each other.”

2023 UTMB Women’s Race

Was there actually any doubt that American Courtney Dauwalter (pre-race interview) would actually win UTMB? If her performances throughout the summer were any indication, it would have been foolish to bet against her. After winning and setting course records at both Western States 100 and Hardrock 100 earlier this summer, this win might just be the cherry on the cake, or the cerise sur la gateau, as the French would have it.

The legend of the sport led from the early miles, and in typical Courtney fashion, smiled and joked her way to the win with a time of 23:29:14.While Emma Pooley, of Switzerland, led for the initial kilometers of the race, it didn’t take long for Dauwalter to move to the front. Sporting her trademark smile and happily interacting with volunteers at aid stations whenever the opportunity presented itself, Dauwalter simply makes it look good.

The top three women, Dauwalter, Pooley, and France’s Blandine L’Hirondel, came into Les Contamines, 32 kilometers into the race, within seconds of each other. It would be the last time we would see the front of the race together, as by Col du Bonhomme, 12 kilometers later, the gap between Dauwalter and second-place Manon Bohard Cailler, of France, was nearly 10 minutes. L’Hirondel and Chiina’s Fu-Zhao Xiang (pre-race interview) came through another two minutes later. Germany’s Katharina Hartmuth (pre-race interview) came over the dark col another five minutes in arrears. The situation remained essentially unchanged through Les Chapieux at 51 kilometers and Lac Combal at 69 kilometers, except the gaps were growing. 

Nearly 10 hours into the race, Dauwalter came through Courmayeur at 81 kilometers, not even bothering to stop at the aid station. Bohard continued to keep the gap manageable at 18 minutes, but it was really starting to look like another runaway victory for the American for the top step of the podium. But the race for the rest of the top spots was just starting to get interesting. L’Hirondel and Xiang remained close in third and fourth, just a few minutes back of Bohard, and Hartmuth continued to lurk another 20 minutes back. This early in the race, there were still many within striking distance. Coming through Refuge Bertone at 86 kilometers, the top five remained unchanged and Canada’s Ailsa McDonald, Poland’s Katarzyna Solińska, the U.S.’s Sabrina Stanley and Leah Yingling, and Claudia Tremps of Spain filled out the top 10. 

Somewhere before Arnouvaz at kilometer 99, Bohard took a fall that would ultimately take her out of the race. She entered the aid station walking gingerly, but was determined to keep going. This development opened up podium possibilities even further, and Xiang and L’Hirondel continued to run together at Grand Col Ferret, 50 minutes behind the ever-steady, smiling, and happy Dauwalter. Hartmuth was just 15 minutes off a podium position. 

With the arrival of Saturday morning came renewed spirits for many. Dauwalter arrived to sun at La Fouly running 26 minutes under her own course-record pace. L’Hirondel and Xiang came in just under 50 minutes back, but now there was daylight, in the form of a couple of minutes, between the women. Hartmuth remained in fourth, 65 minutes down, Solińska in sixth, Yingling in seventh, and Spain’s Maite Maiora came through in eighth looking relaxed and focused. Stanley remained in the top 10. Bohard finally succumbed to injuries from her fall and would withdraw from the race.

By La Giète, 130 kilometers in, the gap between Dauwalter and second place was over an hour, but the fight between the rest of the top five remained tight. Xiang moved into second and Hartmuth third, just minutes apart, as L’Hirondel began to feel the distance and time in her legs and dropped back. Solińska and MacDonald continued in fourth and fifth, running together almost two hours behind Dauwalter and nearly 50 minutes behind second and third places. Things remained relatively unchanged at Trient at 144 kilometers. Dauwalter looked good, Xiang was 66 minutes back, and Hartmuth was a mere minute behind her. Solińska and MacDonald followed another 50 minutes back, with Maiora trailing them by 15 minutes.

With victory seemingly all but assured for the American, the battle for the other two podium spots started to get heated on the closing climbs and kilometers. Through Vallorcine at the base of the final major series of climbs, Hartmuth moved up into second after biding her time the entire race, now seven minutes ahead of third-place Xiang and fourth-place L’Hirondel, a further nine minutes back. Maiora led Solińska in fifth and sixth just under two hours behind the leader. 

Near the top of the final climb at Tête de Béchar, 161 kilometers in, it was Hartmuth in second, 56 minutes down. L’Hirondel moved into third 15 minutes back and Xiang kept the pressure on for the final podium spot, trailing by just four minutes. The next gap to Maiora remained about 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, Dauwalter made short work of the final descent to the finish line in Chamonix, finishing in 23:29:14 and completing the ultimate trifecta of ultrarunning, winning the Western States 100, Hardrock 100, and UTMB all in one year. “Anytime you have a chance to take on a crazy challenge, I think we should,” she said afterward.The battle for the final two podium spots didn’t let up until the very end. Coming through La Floria, just four kilometers from the finish, Hartmuth led L’Hirondel by a mere nine minutes, and both women looked strong all the way to the finish. They would finish just over 40 minutes behind Dauwalter, Hartmuth in second at 24:10:52. L’Hirondel, the multi-time trail world champion, finished in third at 24:22:50 for her debut 100 miler.Xiang would fade away from podium contention in the final kilometers but held on for an incredible fourth-place finish, improving on her seventh place in 2022. But really, the excitement of her race finish was only added by receiving a marriage proposal on the finish line. Having met her now-fiancé — she said yes! — four years ago at UTMB, the proposal really was a perfect ending to her race. 

Maiora finished fifth, an impressive result after her DNF in the race in 2021. 

Canadian trail superstar Priscilla Forgie shares plant-based tips and treats

Edmonton’s Priscilla Forgie is one of the hottest names in Canadian ultrarunning right now, and she has a wealth of knowledge about training and fuelling. The top Canadian at the epic Western States 100–miler in July (Forgie finished in eighth place), Forgie has taken the podium in a startling number of races in the past year, including first at the Squamish 50-mile and 50/50 (50 miles and 50K) a second-place finish at Canyons Endurance Run, plus an overall win at the Near Death Marathon, where she set a course record.

Forgie eats a plant-based diet and has some great tips for those of us who are looking to move toward plant–based fuelling.

“One of the biggest things I’ve learned with plant-based baking and cooking over the years is to stay curious and don’t be afraid to try new things,” she says. “Plant-based options do not need to be complex,” Forgie adds, and says being open to modifying recipes is key. “Be gentle with yourself, have fun, and fuel your body well.”

Quick plant-based meals and snacks

“These are all on-the-go meals full of protein and nutrition and are all delicious,” says Forgie.

Tempeh or chickpea salad sandwichesEdamame with salt and pepperPopcorn with coconut oil, salt and nutritional yeastHummus with veggies or crackersAir-fryer tofu bites

Oat bake with raspberries

“This is a recipe I’ve created over the past year, and it provides so many variations that I never get sick of them,” she shared. “I have the flexibility to use what I have in my pantry any given week.” Feel free to mix it up and use what you have in these delicious healthy treats.

Base

Mix the following together in a large bowl:

2 cups of oats (large flake or quick)1 tsp baking powder1 tsp cinnamon1/2 tsp salt (regular or sea salt)2 cups of milk (soy, almond, coconut, hemp)1/4 cup maple syrup (or brown sugar, agave, mashed bananas or applesauce)2 Tbsp of flax or chia seeds3 Tbsp of melted coconut oil (can substitute applesauce or mashed banana)

Add-in options (can also use any of the following as toppings after pouring into dish)

1/3 cup raisins or chocolate chips2 cups frozen fruit, sliced bananas or thinly-chopped apples1-2 scoops of desired protein powder1/2 cup of chopped walnuts, pecans, peanuts or a combo2/3 cup coconut flakes6 Tbsp cocoa powder

Directions

Pour into an 8×8, 9×9 or 11×7–inch greased baking dish (a muffin tin also works) and bake at 350 F for 35 to 45 minutes or until the top is golden.Can drizzle maple syrup, chocolate or brown sugar on top after baking. Allow to cool, slice and serve.Great to freeze for future adventures.

Montreal ultrarunner Mathieu Blanchard to join star-studded UTMB field

Montreal’s Mathieu Blanchard has confirmed he will toe the start line at Ultra Trail du Mont-Blanc in two weeks, joining an elite lineup that organizers of the 171-km race are billing the strongest elite field since the race began 20 years ago.

Blanchard will be vying for his third consecutive podium finish in Chamonix on Sept. 1. He ran last year’s race in 19 hours, 54 minutes and 50 seconds to finish a close second behind Spain’s Kilian Jornet, who ran 19:49:30 for a new course record. In 2021, Blanchard finished third behind French runners François D’haene (20:45:59) and Aurélien Dunand-Pallaz (20:58:31).

In June, Blanchard ran 15:37:02 to finish sixth in his Western States Endurance Run debut. He told Canadian Running after the race that Western States presented a uniquely difficult challenge: “I pushed through, I fought hard, my body was super painful like never before,” he said, adding he was proud to earn the “mythic buckle” awarded to Western States winners.

Among the giants of trail running Blanchard will be up against at UTMB is British runner Tom Evans, who ran the fourth-fastest time in Western States history (14:40:22) to win this year’s men’s race, and who finished behind Blanchard at last year’s UTMB to place third (20:34:35).

“I’m incredibly enthusiastic about the idea of taking part in the UTMB this year,” Evans recently told UTMB. “I’m coming into the event in a much better position than last year when I was fresh from a knee operation. The race is so full of history and for the 20th anniversary, I want to be part of the story by doing a Western States 100 Endurance Run and UTMB double. It’s a big challenge and with the strength of the peloton, it won’t be easy, but it’s a contest I’m looking forward to and believe I can achieve.”

In addition to Jornet, this year’s men’s field will see the return of American Jim Walmsley, who finished fourth in last year’s race (21:12:12) and who has held the Western States course record (14:09:28) since 2019.

Other notable entries in the men’s field include Swiss runner Jonas Russi (winner of the Lavaredo Ultra Trail by UTMB 2023), fellow Swiss runner Jean-Philippe Tschumi (who shared victory at the 100K Trail 100 Andorra by UTMB with the American Ben Dhiman) and Sweden’s Petter Engdahl.

Arguably the most compelling storyline from this year’s UTMB will be American trail running phenom Courtney Dauwalter‘s quest for the triple crown following her resounding victories at Western States (where she ran 15:29:33 to smash the 16:47:19 course record set by Canadian Ellie Greenwood in 2012) and Hardrock 100 (where she set a new course record in 26:14:08). The Golden, Colo.-based runner won UTMB in 2019 (24:34:26) and again in 2021, when she set the current women’s course record (22:30:54).

She stands to face fierce competition from an elite field that includes New Zealand’s Ruth Croft (who finished second at Western States last year), Germany’s Katharina Hartmuth (winner of this year’s Eiger Ultra Trail by UTMB), Italy’s Martina Valmassoi (winner of the 2022 TDS in Chamonix) and Hungary’s Eszter Csillag, who finished fifth at last year’s UTMB.

Courtney Dauwalter to race UTMB this year

The U.S. ultrarunning phenom, hot off her record-breaking finishes at Western States and Hardrock 100, will be looking to best her own course record in Chamonix in September.

Ultrarunning sensation Courtney Dauwalter has announced she’ll be toeing the start line at Ultra Trail du Mont-Blanc (UTMB) in Chamonix, France on Sept. 1, setting the stage for what is sure to be one of this year’s most highly anticipated ultras, following her recent record-breaking wins at the Western States 100-mile Endurance Run and the Hardrock 100.

The 38-year-old shared on social media Friday morning—with an apparent mix of excitement and trepidation—her decision to take on the famed 170-km course, which features 10,000m of vert around the base of Mont Blanc.

“We decided to do UTMB!” she wrote. “I have no idea how this will go, or what I’ll be able to squeeze out of my body & brain in one more 100 mile race this summer, but that makes it even more interesting to try! Mont Blanc, here we come! Race date: Sept 1”

The big question surrounding the September race will be whether Dauwalter, who holds the UTMB course record following her 22:30:54 finish in the race two years ago, will be able to best herself to claim the championships and course records at Western States, Hardrock and UTMB within a span of less than three months.

On June 24, Dauwalter not only demolished the Western States women’s course record that had stood for more than a decade (16:47:19 set by Canadian Ellie Greenwood in 2012), but beat most of the men, finishing in 15:29:33 and sixth overall.

Just three weeks later, she turned in another mind-blowing performance at the Hardrock 100 in Silverton, Colo., crossing the finish line in fourth place overall in 26:14:08. Dauwalter’s run was more than an hour faster than the counter-clockwise record set by Diana Finkel of South Fork, Colo., in 2009, and 30 minutes faster than Dauwalter’s own overall women’s course record set last year.

In addition to holding the course records at UTMB, Western States and Hardrock 100, Dauwalter, who is based in Golden, Colo., holds the record at Diagonale des Fous on Reunion Island.

Don’t tell me what’s impossible – Tom Evans confirms UTMB is up next

Tom Evans has announced that he will run at this year’s Ultra Trail du Mont Blanc (UTMB) after a late alteration to his 2023 plans.

The British runner claimed a “dream” victory at Western States last month to add to his “super fun” Ultra-Trail Snowdonia win in May and second place at Black Canyons 100K in February.

Evans crowned his return from knee surgery to finish third behind Kilian Jornet at last year’s UTMB, but had not scheduled in the iconic Chamonix race for 2023.

Western States recovery

His race calendar for this year, which he shared on Instagram in January, included a Fastest Known Time (FKT) attempt of the Bob Graham Round in September, but there was no mention of UTMB following Western States.

However, after his dominant win in California’s Sierra Nevada Mountains, a defiant Evans suggested that UTMB could still be on the cards.

“If I recover well from this, I’ll race UTMB this year,” Evans said at the end of adidas TERREX’s documentary on his Western States win.

“People have said it’s impossible to do. Don’t tell me what’s impossible or not.

Irresistible challenge

Over the next three weeks, Evans’ recovery clearly went to plan and yesterday he revealed that he was unable to resist the allure of UTMB, which takes place next month.

“Couldn’t resist the chance to make more memories like this,” he wrote on Instagram. “See you in Chamonix!

“Next up… UTMB.

“The Western States 100 / UTMB double is something that has always interested me. It wasn’t on my original plan but things have to change with how you’re feeling!

“And now, I can’t wait for the challenge!”

Three things ultra beast Courtney Dauwalter can teach all runners

Courtney Dauwalter has been stunning the ultratrail world over and over: not only does she keep winning every race she runs, but she’s been obliterating course records and beating almost all of the men. On Sunday, the Leadville, Colo.-based athlete annihilated the Hardrock 100 course record, finishing an incredible fourth place overall, only three weeks off setting a blistering new Western States 100 record. Here’s what you can learn (no matter your distance of choice) from the way Dauwalter trains and races.

1.- Run with joy and gratitude

It sounds simple, right? Running and racing should make us happy, but training can all too easily get filed as a chore on an endless to-do list. Dauwalter exudes joy and gratitude when she races, no matter the day or situation. Dauwalter is known by competitors and fans alike for the big smile she shares with everyone on the course. 

She effusively thanks volunteers and takes time to ask how her crew is doing. She high-fives all the little kids. On the Some Work All Play podcast, coach and ultrarunner David Roche asked Dauwalter what she would like her legacy to be. The trail phenom answered with her trademark humility and graciousness: “In general? That I made people smile and laugh and have a good time.”

Most of us won’t win a course record at a world-renowned event, but we can embody Dauwalter’s attitude in our own training and races. Checking in with others, savouring the fun of moving our bodies, and that simple thing, smiling, will make everything feel a little bit easier and a lot more fun.

2.- Adjust your training according to how you are feeling

Dauwalter has no coach, doesn’t follow a strict training plan, and goes by feel. She’s clearly perfected the art of self-awareness over time, but there’s a takeaway there for all of us. Even though it can be incredibly helpful for runners to follow a program or have guidance while they train, keeping a reserve of flexibility and using self-check-ins can help the regular runner optimize their performance.

“There are so many ways to train, enjoy, and go after running goals. Having a training plan, using devices and analyzing data, or not doing any of those things, are all great options,” Dauwalter recently explained to trailrunnermag.com “I think it depends on the person and how they find joy. But I also think there is no downside to occasionally leaving the watch at home and heading out the door for a run where you just listen to your body and not worry about metrics.”

Keep things loose, and be willing to adjust your plans if you feel the need for a data-free jaunt or when you note that your body is needing more rest.

3.- Eat with exuberance

Dauwalter is known for her sweet tooth and habit of fuelling long races with cheese quesadillas. She’s often heard asking for her post-race beer, and even her Instagram tagline declares her a lover of long inseams and candy. Dauwalter told Roche that she refuses to restrict what goes into her body: “If it sounds good, if it tastes good, if it fulfills a craving, then it’s exactly the thing that I’m eating.” Eating makes her happy.

Eating has a complicated dynamic for some, and runners come from a wide array of nutritional needs and preferences. Whatever your relationship with food and fuel, bringing Dauwalter’s enthusiastic spirit into your kitchen or food choices can make food more fun.

2023 Hardrock 100 Women’s Race

If it wasn’t for Courtney Dauwalter (pre-race interview) running the Western States 100 just three weeks prior, crushing the women’s record there, and potentially being a bit worn out at the start line of the Hardrock 100, it would have been hard to find someone to bet against her winning the race this year. But if she were to falter, there were several women who were ready to jump at the opportunity.

For the first part of the race, it seemed like France’s Anne-Lise Rousset Séguret was going to do just that. While Dauwalter led in the very early miles of the course, Rousset opened up a sizable gap coming through Maggie Gulch at mile 15.5 and was moving with enthusiasm toward Pole Creek, the next aid station. She came into Sherman at mile 30 in seventh overall in 6:29, looking strong. Dauwalter was just six minutes behind, and Annie Hughes (pre-race interview) came in next, 52 minutes off the lead. With still many miles to run, it was still anyone’s race. Frenchwoman Claire Bannwarth (pre-race interview) came through just seven minutes later and was followed by Japan’s Kimino Miyazaki (pre-race interview), who was 1:22 off the lead but looking spry and happy.

The top-two women came back together through Grizzly Gulch at mile 36 with Hughes trailing them at just under an hour back. When Rousset led Dauwalter into Grouse Gulch, mile 43.5, by nearly 10 minutes after traversing Handies Peak, the course high point, it seemed like maybe the Western States 100-Hardrock 100 double was going to be too much for Dauwalter to handle.

But it’s never a good idea to bet against the most dominant female trail ultrarunner of this generation. By mile 50, she’d closed the gap to four minutes, and in Ouray at mile 58.5, it was down to two minutes. When it came to the climb out of Ouray, Dauwalter made her move, and the elastic to Rousset finally snapped over the top of Virginius Pass. Dauwalter never looked back.

Meanwhile, Hughes stayed steady in third place while dealing with stomach issues and the rest of the women’s pack, including Miyazaki, Bannwarth, Christina Bauer, Whitney Mickelsen, Darla Askew, Becky Bates, and last-minute waitlist entrant Emily Halnon, who only got into the race the morning before, continued to chase — all within close proximity to each other.

Dauwalter ran into Telluride at mile 74.5, her pace still hovering just a few minutes over course-record pace, but now 23 minutes ahead of second-place Rousset, and executed the fasted crew stop of the Telluride aid station, getting in and out in under three minutes. She was on a mission.

Just 10 miles later, she was well below course-record pace, crushing the Bear Creek Trail climb out of Telluride and moving herself into third overall as some of the lead men began to falter. Rousset also continued her relentless march, and while she was 48 minutes back on Dauwalter at mile 84, she was only three minutes up on course-record pace.

In the end, there was no catching Dauwalter as she ran back to Silverton to kiss the rock with a new women’s counterclockwise course record of 26:14:08, besting the one set by the legendary Diana Finkel in 2009, and finishing fourth overall. She also set a new overall women’s record, beating her old time of 26:44:36, which she set last year.

Not only that, she set a new overall record for the Western States 100-Hardrock 100 double with a combined time of 41:43:42, beating Jeff Browning’s old record of 42:12:43 that he set in 2016.

Rousset would finish second after a gutsy run with a time of 27:29:55, which registers as the fifth-fastest time in event history, and Hughes would hold onto third with a time of 32:13:03 after spending nearly 100 miles battling stomach and breathing issues.With large gaps between the first, second, and third women, all eyes turned to the competition between fourth and 10th where the time gaps were tight and the women were often in the aid stations together in the back half of the race. Miyazaki and Bannwarth ran in close proximity to each other battling for fourth and fifth, while Mickelsen, Halnon, Bates, Askew, and Bauer seemed to maintain the same overall pace as the miles ticked by.

How to Properly Prepare for Hot-Weather Races

Ah, summertime! It's one of the best seasons for long trail runs, but it's also the hottest and one of the most difficult times to train.  

As temperatures and UV indices climb, runners in many regions can feel the dew point explode, and that can make it seem like any semblance of fitness gained over the winter and spring is suddenly gone. We can all recall an early summer run that makes us not only question our confidence, but whether we're going to make it through the next few months.

There are notoriously warm races on the horizon, and there's a lot of talk about heat and how to mitigate it: sauna training, layering, topical cooling-all the tools to get amateur and elite athletes alike through challenging conditions. Many of the runners who just raced the Western States 100 had relied on mid-afternoon runs when temperatures were at their highest, as well as sauna or hot water immersion training. The race, as with many other summer and early fall races, typically boasts soaring high temperatures along sections at lower elevations.

For decades, the three most-watched sporting events worldwide-the Summer Olympics, FIFA World Cup, and the Tour de France-are typically held during the hot summer months of the Northern Hemisphere. However, prior to 2012, most of the scientific literature on heat acclimation for athletes was based on laboratory testing and controlled environments, and not from real competitions in scorching conditions. With eight of the hottest years in recorded human history having been logged since 2015, global sport organizations such as the International Olympic Committee have finally placed enormous emphasis on providing up-to-date guidelines and recommendations in order to keep athletes safe.

The COVID-19-delayed Tokyo Olympics in 2021 were the hottest Games in modern history with temperatures soaring into the mid-80s and humidity hovering at 82 percent during the women's marathon. The good news is that it sparked considerable discussion and hypothesizing in sport-science communities about best ways for the athletes and their teams to prepare and endure heat. Ultrarunners everywhere watched as the world's best distance runners implemented topical cooling techniques such as pre-competition ice vests and bags of ice during the marathon-a relatively new or at least a more aggressive tactic to attenuate the impact of heat before and during competition.

Heat is considered an equalizer, an element that everyone has to manage, no matter if you're attempting to train or race through it. But does it have to be a performance-sapping equalizer? Can heat training (potentially year round) be viewed as an opportunity to improve fitness, tolerance, and mental strength for challenging race day conditions?

How Heat Impacts Performance

First up, let's discuss what happens when athletes exercise in the heat. Blood flow to the skin, as well as sweat rate, increase to promote heat dissipation. While aimed at keeping the human body safe, these processes increase physiological strain and the chance for dehydration in prolonged endurance events, leading to a subsequent increase in cardiovascular strain. This creates a chain reaction that negatively impacts aerobic performance. Researchers globally agree that the most salient way to lessen the strain that heat imposes is to perform a heat acclimation period ahead of race day.

Improvements in aerobic performance and thermal comfort achieved through heat acclimation are bolstered by these processes, as outlined in a 2011 scientific article from the U.S. Army Research Institute of Environmental Medicine.

Heat Acclimation

Let's dive even further into what the science says about heat acclimation, when and how to implement it, and what athletes of all levels can do to mitigate heat stress before, during, and after exposure to a hot endurance event.

A study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine in 2015 provided the first-of-its-kind, gold-standard consensus recommendations for heat acclimation, and remains one of the most cited pieces of recent literature regarding training and competing in heat, along with Julien Periard's comprehensive review from 2021 for the American Physiological Society. In both reviews, the authors discuss heat acclimation, hydration, and cooling strategies as the pillars of successfully competing in the heat.

The authors report that most adaptations happen within the first week and more slowly within the following ten days. In order to achieve near complete adaptations to fully optimize aerobic performance, athletes need to plan for two weeks of focused acclimation. A pre-Tokyo Olympics study from 2020 suggests following the gold standard of 10-14 days of long-term heat acclimation followed by a shorter five-day reacclimation period just ahead of competition (during the taper period) in order to get the most out of "peak weeks" of training without compromising the health of the athlete with the added stressor of heat training.

It is important to note that the average loss of heat acclimation is roughly two-point-five percent per day following 48 hours without exposure to heat. But reacclimation happens quickly. The rate of decline varies from individual to individual and typically occurs at a slower rate than induction to heat acclimation.

The literature favors training in the same environment as the upcoming race, and if that isn't possible, training indoors in a heated room is the next best option. These once-a-day sessions should last at least 60 minutes, at an easy effort, while keeping a close eye on heart rate (preferably at about 75 percent of max heart rate). Athletes should expect to see their heart rate decrease as adaptations continue to occur, and as such, the duration or intensity of the session should be increased in order to maintain the training stimulus.

What if you don't have access to the same outdoor environment nor the set-up to train in a heated room? A study from 2007 demonstrated that 12 sessions of post-exercise sauna bathing at approximately 190 degrees Fahrenheit for 30 minutes at a time over the course of three weeks enhanced endurance performance.

What about dry heat versus humid heat and acclimating to either? The science demonstrates that acclimating to dry heat improves exercise in humid heat and vice versa. But acclimating in humid heat evokes higher skin temperatures and circulatory adaptations. In other words, the stereotypical dad statement: "But it's a dry heat!" holds somewhat true.

Are there benefits to heat acclimation when your race is in temperate or cool environments? A study from 2010 on cycling performance demonstrated a five percent increase in VO2max in cool conditions versus an eight percent increase in hot; a six percent improvement in time-trial performance in cool conditions vs. an eight percent improvement in hot; and an equal increase in power output at lactate threshold in both cool and hot conditions of five percent.

Hydration

Training in hot conditions increases sweat rate, which leads to progressive dehydration (if fluid intake is not increased), causing a similar cascading effect that is essentially the reverse of what happens during heat acclimation: decrease in plasma volume, evaporative heat loss, and cardiac filling all leading to a reduction in capacity to tolerate the effort in the heat.

A 2015 study in the British Journal of Sports Medicine underscores the importance of starting training or competition in the heat in a well-hydrated state with sodium supplementation before and during the event, minimizing body water mass losses during prolonged exercise in the heat, and being sure recovery hydration regimens include sodium, carbohydrates, and protein.

A 2010 study published in the Journal of Applied Physiology demonstrated enhancement and acceleration of heat adaptations, as well as further increases in blood plasma volume by taking in a protein-carbohydrate mix (0.3g of protein/kg of body weight and 3.6kcal of carbohydrate/kg of body weight) within 10 minutes of heat training.

Cooling Strategies

Numerous studies underscore that cooling strategies implemented immediately before, during, or after competition should be used in addition to heat acclimation, not as substitutes. Cooling strategies provide the most benefit during sustained exercise, but should not be used for sprinters. They include both external methods like ice bandanas and saturated towels, cold water immersion, fanning, topical menthol sprays, and internal options such as the ingestion of cold fluids or ice slurries. (Did someone say post-run slushies?!)

Ice bandanas and saturated towels demonstrate the ability to lower skin temperature (without lowering muscle temperature and risking injury) and effectively lower cardiovascular strain. Ice slurries have been shown to be more effective at cooling athletes than cold fluid ingestion, as the latter has also shown reductions in sweating and evaporation. The literature encourages combining techniques (external and internal), as doing so has a higher cooling capacity than the same techniques used in isolation.

A meta-analysis from 2020 found that topical menthol spray caused cooler thermal sensation and improved thermal comfort, but no significant differences in sweat production, core temperature, or heart rate were demonstrated. Findings showed external application, warmer environment, and higher body mass indices as improving menthol's effects on endurance performance without compromising the body's response to the heat.

How to Apply This in Training?

For athletes targeting a warm or hot race, we have a few options in how to structure heat acclimation. As a coach, I recommend against adding in heat acclimation as a novel stimulus without an anticipated hot race on the calendar, because most athletes still have a lot of other low-hanging fruit to grab first. (Looking at you, quality sleep!). If you are a highly trained athlete, chat with your coach prior to initiating heat acclimation in the absence of a warm-weather event on your schedule.

If you have a history of RED-S (Relative Energy Deficiency In Sport), work closely with your coach and medical team to be absolutely certain you aren't adding in too much stress to your training all at once. Taking body weight measurements can be a part of hydration monitoring, but it's important to contemplate the pros and cons of doing so. Another consideration is making sure you have a clear picture of your iron/ferritin status prior to initiating a robust heat acclimation protocol, as iron is lost through sweat.

Hardrock 100 preview: will Courtney Dauwalter do it again?

The Hardrock Hundred Mile Endurance Run (HR100), known for its high altitude, deep elite field and challenging entry process, begins Friday at 8:00 a.m. E.T. This year’s event, the first ever to be live-streamed, promises to be a thriller. Runners will encounter over 10,000 metres of elevation gain while facing extreme weather conditions, navigating treacherous terrain and attempting to avoid altitude sickness.

Only 140 participants get to line up at Hardrock each year, and this year’s contenders include the remarkable Courtney Dauwalter, fresh off a jaw-dropping performance and course record at the Western States 100, and other well-known elites. The race will be live-streamed on the Run Steep Get High YouTube channel. Here’s what you need to know to follow along.

HR100 both begins and ends in Silverton, Co., and athletes are above 3,300 metres elevation for much of the race. It was founded in 1992 as a tribute to the miners who used to follow “their mules and instincts, prospecting the San Juans for gold, silver, and other metals,” the race website explains. With a finishing cutoff time of 48 hours, athletes know they are in for a long haul. The course switches directions every year, and this year runners are moving counter-clockwise around the looped course.

The women’s race

All eyes are on the phenomenal Dauwalter this year (but when are they not?) after a stunning performance three weeks ago at Western States, where she set a blistering new course record (78 minutes faster than Canadian Ellie Greenwood’s from 2012) and placed fifth overall. Canada’s Stephanie Case, who was second last year, has withdrawn from this year’s event. 60-year-old legendary ultra machine Pam Reed of Jackson Hole, Wyo., will be tackling the third part of her WSER/Badwater 135/HR100 triple this year.

Leadville, Colo.-based Dauwalter holds the course record for HR100 in the clockwise direction (26:44) from 2022; this year runners will move counter-clockwise, and that course record is 27:18 for women, set by Diana Finkel in 2009, and Dauwalter will most certainly be looking to challenge that time. Will her legs be tired? Will she win the entire thing? We can’t wait to find out.

Also from Leadville, 23-year-old trail phenom Annie Hughes won the Run Rabbit Run 100-Miler and High Lonesome 100 Mile in 2022, and the Leadville 100 Mile in 2021. She’s a high-altitude ultrarunning champ, and has also compiled some wins in really long races–she won the Cocodona 250 Mile in 2022 and Moab 240 in 2021.

If you haven’t heard of France’s Claire Bannwarth, it’s time to brush up: she was the first woman in the 432-kilometre 2022 Winter Spine Race (by more than 24 hours), and will be making her North American racing debut at HR100. Bannwarth races prolifically and runs long–she will be jumping into the Tahoe 200 Mile race a week after HR100.

Colorado’s Darcy Piceu, fresh off the waitlist, is a veteran of HR 100, with the 2023 edition being her 10th running. Piceu boasts three wins and five second-place finishes, and she was fourth in 2022.

The men’s race

With Kilian Jornet, last year’s winner (and course record holder in the clockwise direction) not returning this year, the podium seems up for grabs. None of the other top four men from 2022 will be headed to the San Juans, but a very accomplished group of athletes will be lining up and fans will be eager to see who holds up to the HR100 test.

Ohio’s Arlen Glick is a master of the 100-mile distance, running 12:57 to win the Umstead 100-miler in April and taking a speedy third at October’s Javelina 100. Like Dauwalter, Glick raced at WSER last month. He placed 14th, while he took third in 2022. Glick will be a hot contender and fascinating to watch at HR100.

California-based Dylan Bowman is a Hardrock veteran, placing second at the 2021 edition. Bowman has had a lower racing profile in the past year while working on Freetrail, a media business and trail running community. He’s been training in the San Juans pre-race and is eager to showcase his ability.

France’s Aurélien Dunand-Pallaz has over 10 years of ultrarunning success, but gained notoriety in 2021 when he took second at UTMB and won Spain’s Transgrancanaria. He missed the 2022 edition of HR100 for the birth of his child and is a favourite in his debut this year.

Oregon-based trail running legend Jeff Browning will be taking on his sixth Hardrock at age 51. Browning won in 2018, and finished fifth the past two years. In October, Browning won the Moab 240 in 57 hours, and more recently, he showcased his fitness by winning the Bighorn 100.

Courtney Dauwalter breaks record at Western States 100 by almost 80 minutes

Ultramarathon runner Courtney Dauwalter crushed the women’s course record at the Western States 100-mile race in California, taking more than an hour off the previous best time.

Dauwalter finished the Western States 100 – the world’s oldest 100-mile race – in 15 hours, 29 minutes and 34 seconds, almost 80 minutes faster than Ellie Greenwood’s record set in 2012. The race was first run in 1974.

“I just kept asking [my legs] to do one more mile for me and they kept responding, so I was very thankful for that,” Dauwalter told iRunFar about the last 20 miles of the race.

“I was definitely, though, deep in the pain cave and really focused on every single step, every single second.”

Cooler weather contributed to faster times at this year’s Western States 100, which started in the early hours of Saturday morning in Olympic Valley, California.

Snow covered much of the initial stages of the course before runners descended into a recently unshaded section scorched by last year’s Mosquito Fire.

After running with fellow American Katie Schide, Dauwalter started pulling away around the 30-mile mark, steadily eating away at Greenwood’s course record.

Covering 18,000 feet of climbing and almost 23,000 feet of descent across Californian trails, the race finishes on a high school running track in the city of Auburn in Placer County.

“I couldn’t believe when the track suddenly showed up and you make that turn, I was like: We did it! We’re here!” Dauwalter told iRunFar.

“Because that was the moment where I let myself actually believe that we had finished and we were about to be able to stop moving.”

Dauwalter, who is set to defend her title at the Hardrock 100 in Colorado in three weeks’ time, also won the Western States 100 in 2018, though her time this year was nearly two hours faster.

Most people’s idea of fun wouldn’t involve running for hours on end through brutal, undulating terrain – but ultra-marathon sensation Courtney Dauwalter is no ordinary person.

While an ultra-marathon is technically defined as any race longer than 26.2 miles, Dauwalter’s exploits tend to take place at distances far greater than that, usually between 100 to 250 miles. 

The 38-year-old’s list of achievements is almost interminable. Dauwalter, a four-time ‘Ultra Running Magazine Ultrarunner of the year,’ holds multiple course records for the obscenely long races around the US and abroad. 

Dauwalter’s breakout moment came at the Moab 240 – an annual 240-mile race in Utah. At the 2017 edition, shortly after making the decision to become a full-time ultra-runner, Dauwalter completed the course a scarcely believable 10 hours ahead of all other competitors – male and female.

The Transgrancanaria event on February 24 – Dauwalter’s most recent escapade - resulted in her 15th straight race win by gender dating back to March 2021, according to results database Ultrasignup. 

The Minnesota native completed the grueling 128km course (79.5 miles) – including over 7000 meters of elevation gain - around the Canary Island in a course record 14 hours 40 minutes: over 90 minutes ahead of her closest competitor.

2023 Western States 100 Women’s Race

None of the first four women from last year’s race — Ruth Croft, Ailsa MacDonald, Marianne Hogan, Luzia Buehler — returned. That made Zimbabwe’s Emily Hawgood (pre-race interview) the highest returning finisher from 2022. Hawgood’s pretty much a race local now too, living in nearby Roseville, California. But it was 38-year-old Courtney Dauwalter (pre-race interview) that came into the race as a favorite. She won here in 2018 in 17:27 and was looking to avenge a late drop at the 2019 race.

Dauwalter was first up the Escarpment. At 2,500 feet, it’s the race’s biggest climb and it happens right away in the first three miles. But 2022 UTMB winner Katie Schide (pre-race interview) was right there too. Schide, an American who’s lived in France for the past seven years, hit the top in 46 minutes with Dauwalter and the two dropped into the Granite Chief Wilderness together. Already Dauwalter and Schide, age 31, had a three-minute lead on third-place Ida Nilsson (pre-race interview) from Sweden.

By mile 11, Lyon Ridge, Dauwalter and Schide’s lead on third-place Nilsson had ballooned to eight minutes. And then it got even bigger as the two completely broke away from everyone else. At mile 16, Red Star Ridge, no one was within 14 minutes of the front two. Nilsson, Hawgood, 2023 Black Canyon 100k winner Keely Henninger (pre-race interview), Taylor Nowlin, professional triathlete-turned-ultrarunner Heather Jackson, Canada’s Priscilla Forgie and Jenny Quilty, and 2022 sixth-place finisher Leah Yingling (pre-race interview) all ran inside the early top 10.

The Mosquito Fire limited crew access this year and everyone met their crews for the first time at mile 30, Robinson Flat. Dauwalter was in at 5:07 and out within a minute, and still on her 2019 splits. Schide took a longer break and changed shoes, exiting the aid station three minutes behind the leader. The two had completely broken open the women’s race. Nilsson, in her 100-mile debut, had been alone in third to this point, but was now joined by Henninger, Hawgood, and Nowlin.

At mile 34, Miller’s Defeat, the course record watch started. Dauwalter and Schide were under Dauwalter’s own 2019 splits and Ellie Greenwood’s 2012 course record pace. Dauwalter was five minutes up on Greenwood’s splits, and Schide was three minutes faster. Even more, the two were over 30 minutes in front of third-place Hawgood at mile 38. Dauwalter and Schide were out front for the win and the course record, and the other contenders grouped behind them.

Dauwalter was red hot up the Devil’s Thumb climb at mile 48, but Schide hadn’t given up much time. She took longer in aid and left six minutes after Dauwalter. Hawgood, Nowlin, and Henninger came in together next, now 40 minutes behind second-place Schide.

At Foresthill, Dauwalter was 25 minutes up on record pace. Schide conceded only another two minutes over the last stretch and was 11 minutes behind Dauwalter. While Dauwalter and Schide were still off the front, the race dynamic was heating up behind. The third- through eighth-place women were all in Foresthill together with only three minutes separation. Hawgood was there first among the chase group, but Hungarian living in Hong Kong Eszter Csillag quickly jumped from eighth at mile 52 to fourth at mile 62. Nilsson was fifth, and Henninger, Katie Asmuth, and Nowlin were all there too.

Dauwalter ran 2:10 from mile 62 Foresthill to mile 78 at the American River. Only the men’s winner would run a quicker split on this day, and only eight men have ever run a faster split in the race. Dauwalter was five levels better than everyone else, and she was boldly racing without a pacer too. Schide stayed comfortably in second, but fell further behind Dauwalter’s quickening pace and river conditions necessitated that everyone cross the American River in a boat this year.

From Foresthill to the river, Katie Asmuth vaulted into third, past Eszter Csillag and Ida Nilsson. Asmuth was seventh at Foresthill and picked up four spots on the downhill Cal Street stretch, outrunning common expectations in coming back from injury. All three women split faster from Foresthill to the river than Schide did and even if the front two were gone, the women in general were running really fast. There’s bound to be some bad luck in a 100 miler though, and Henninger fell just before the river and dislocated her shoulder. She would then drop from the race at mile 80, Green Gate, due to that injury.

Dauwalter’s incredible second half and incredible race brought her to the Placer High School track finish in 15:29. Dauwalter completely shattered the record books and set a new standard that is likely to last for a lifetime. Ellie Greenwood’s 16:47 course record had stood since 2012. Dauwalter will next race the high altitude 2023 Hardrock 100 in Silverton, Colorado, on July 14. Dauwalter is the Hardrock course record holder, too, but Western States plus Hardrock will certainly be a challenging double.

Schide challenged Dauwalter early, and outpaced the rest of the women’s field in doing so. Schide was in second for much of the day, ultimately finishing as runner up in 16:43. That was also under the old course record.

Csillag, who was fifth at the 2022 UTMB, had a remarkable second half to finish third in 17:09. It is the race’s fourth-fastest run ever. And she just edged out Asmuth, who moved up from last year’s ninth-place run to finish fourth in 17:21. Asmuth’s time was just inside of Ruth Croft’s winning time from last year, and is the race’s fifth-fastest ever.

Hawgood earned a second straight fifth-place finish. In 2022 she was able to finish fifth in 18:16 and in this year’s faster race Hawgood was fifth in 17:26. That time ranks eighth-best ever and is just faster than what Dauwalter ran to win in 2018.

Taylor Nowlin improved her finish place by one from prior year, but like Hawgood greatly improved her finish time. Nowlin was sixth in 17:40. One-hundred-mile debutante Ida Nilsson was seventh in 17:43, and Priscilla Forgie was just minutes back in eighth at 17:46. Leah Yingling was a repeat top-10 finisher in ninth at 17:49. For perspective, no year had seen more than three women finish under 18 hours before. But this year nine women finished under 18 hours. It is the new standard for women’s racing at Western States.

The 25-year-old Meghan Morgan took the prized 10th-place finish in 18:11, thereby guaranteeing a chance to automatically return next year.

2023 Western States 100 Men’s Race

There’s nowhere to go but up at the start of the Western States 100, and Jia-Ju Zhao from China charged the opening climb. Despite snow, Zhao hit the top in 42 minutes. Slower to the top, Frenchman Mathieu Blanchard (pre-race interview) and Brit Tom Evans (pre-race interview) turned to greet the brilliant sunrise together.

Zhao won the Ultra-Trail Mt. Fuji 100 Mile in April 2023 and is a two-time winner of the Doi Inthanon by UTMB 100 Mile in Thailand. He pushed his early lead to five minutes at Lyon Ridge, mile 11, while 2022 fourth-placer Tyler Green led the early chase group. Green had finished as high as second here before, in 2021, but was running more aggressively toward the front earlier than ever before.From mile-15 Red Star Ridge to mile-25 Duncan Canyon, the chase group started to make up time on Zhao. Tom Evans, Chinese runner Jia-Sheng Shen, and Dakota Jones (pre-race interview) were among a group that cut four minutes from Zhao’s lead over just nine miles. Evans was third here in 2019 in 14:59, and Jones had just biked 680 miles from his home in Utah to the race start.

Zhao was quickly swallowed up in the next five miles to Robinson Flat, mile 30, and soon fell out of the top 10. A lead trio of Tom Evans, Dakota Jones, and Jia-Sheng Shen came into aid at 4:45, meeting their crews for the first time. At mile 30 and with Zhao falling backward, Anthony Costales (pre-race interview) was fourth, and then he was with Tyler Green at mile 38 in fourth and fifth. The two would barely separate the rest of the race.Evans and Jones dropped Shen on the climb to Devil’s Thumb, mile 48, and the two leaders came into aid together in 7:03. Four minutes back Costales had caught Shen on the big climb, and Tyler Green, Jeff Colt, New Zealand’s Daniel Jones, Ryan Montgomery, Mathieu Blanchard, and 47-year-old Ludovic Pommeret were inside the top 10. Those six were 14 minutes apart. 2022 third- and second-place finishers Arlen Glick (pre-race interview) and Hayden Hawks (pre-race interview) were back in 11th and 16th, respectively. After earlier moving up, Hawks had just lost several places and would later drop with injury at mile 55. Other top-10 finishers from 2022 Cody Lind, Scott Traer, and Alex Nichols were all noticeably outside the top 10 too.

As the race shifted to its mile-62 Foresthill hub, Evans gained some separation on Jones and entered the aid station first, but as Evans changed shoes and socks, Jones didn’t wait and exited first. Jones was now in the lead by himself for the first time and he was overheard voicing his intention to break Evans. Some 11 minutes back of those two leaders, Green and Costales were again together and in third and fourth. Shen and Jeff Colt were just minutes back of those two, and Colt was remarkably almost an hour faster than a year ago when he finished 11th.Jones and Evans separated leaving Foresthill and anticipation ran high for their next steps. The two had been together for nearly the entirety of the race to this point. Jones wanted to make a move and Evans wanted to keep up with (the) Jones. The duel ended quickly and dramatically though. Tom Evans dropped a 5:54 downhill mile and hit Cal 2, mile 71, in 10:12. That surge pushed Jones eight minutes back at mile 71. It was just nine miles from Foresthill to that split on Cal Street, but the front two had shattered and moved in opposite directions the rest of the race.

Evans ran alone to the river crossing at mile 78, and ultimately to the finish. Tyler Green, Anthony Costales, Jeff Colt, and Jia-Sheng Shen all overtook Dakota Jones on the way to the river too. Forget about Elm Street, Jones was having a bit of a nightmare on Cal Street.

Evans, the 2022 UTMB third placer, continued to put time on the field the rest of the way. He finished in 14:40 and that’s the race’s fourth fastest finish ever. The mark trails only Jim Walmsley and Jared Hazen in 2019, and Walmsley’s 2018 mark too. Evans was a runaway winner, but the rest of the top 10 was much more closely packed.Tyler Green pushed on in second, and held off an Anthony Costales chase over the last 15 miles. Green finished in 15:04. It was his second runner-up finish and a big personal best for the course. He was able to finish with his baby boy on his shoulders. Green’s 15:04 was the race’s 11th-fastest finish ever. Costales was third in 15:09, the race’s 13th-fastest finish ever.

Jia-Sheng Shen and Daniel Jones both finished fast. Shen clocked 15:19 and Jones was fifth in 15:22. Mathieu Blanchard and Ryan Montgomery both overtook Jeff Colt late. Those three — Blanchard, Montgomery, and Colt — finished in 15:37, 15:38, and 15:42, respectively. Local runner Cole Watson bettered his 2022 14th-place finish with a ninth-place 15:54.

In 2019 the top 10 all went under 16 hours. This year’s 10th-place man Janosch Kowalcyzk from Germany just missed matching that feat. He finished in 16:09.

Seven of last year’s top 10 returned, but only Tyler Green was able to again make the top 10. The 2022 top 10 finishers Ludovic Pommeret, Arlen Glick, Scott Traer, Cody Lind, and Alex Nichols finished 12th, 13th, 15th, 16th, and 28th this year, respectively. As earlier mentioned, 2022 runner-up Hayden Hawks dropped.

After running near or in the lead through Foresthill, Dakota Jones finished 17th in 17:00.

Early leader Zhao’s high risk, high reward start ended with a drop at Michigan Bluff, mile 55.

2023 Western States 100 Women’s Preview

The 2023 Western States 100 is just around the corner and we’re here to take a look at the pointy end of this year’s women’s field. Before we get started, in case anyone needs a reminder of this unique, point-to-point, net downhill course, here are the stats for the standard course: 100.2 miles, 18,000 feet of climbing, and 22,000 feet of descending.

At the time of writing this, we don’t know if the huge snows of this winter or last year’s wildfire on the course will necessitate any significant course modifications for this year’s running. However, we know the race organization is doing everything they can to host the race on the normal course. We also know that those conditions will likely play into the competition, with snow present on the first 25 miles of the course for a spicy warm-up, as well as miles of wildfire-exposed course that’s likely to make the middle miles feel more severe than normal. And, also, we are expecting the normal race-day heat.

Last year’s race further showed how much faster the Western States women’s field has gotten in recent years. While Ellie Greenwood’s 2012 course record of 16:47 has remained untouched, 15 of the 24 fastest women’s times at the race have been logged in just its three recent races — 2019, 2021, and 2022 — with those 15 times logged by 13 different women. Ruth Croft’s 2022 winning time of 17:21 was the third-fastest women’s time ever while fifth-place Emily Hawgood’s 18:16 would have won the women’s race in all but 10 other years.

We’re in for one heck of an exciting women’s race at this year’s Western States 100. None of last year’s top-four women are returning while everyone who finished between fifth and ninth will be returning. Lining up aside those five will be another half dozen women, each of whom could make a push for the podium, including a couple of the world’s best 100-mile racers at the moment. Another dozen strong women will add to the excitement in running for the top 10.

As you’d guess, iRunFar will be there to report firsthand on all the action as it unfolds starting at 5 a.m. U.S. PDT on Saturday, June 24. Stay tuned!

A special thanks to HOKA for making our coverage of the Western States 100 possible!

Emily Hawgood – 5th, 18:16:02

Well, look at that, Zimbabwe’s Emily Hawgood comes into the 2023 Western States 100 as the top returning women’s runner after her fifth-place finish last year. That fifth place is no fluke as over the past two years, Hawgood has been seventh at the 2021 Western States 100 as well as taking 10th and sixth at the past two UTMBs. Living over here in the U.S., she ran and won the same local 50k both last year and this February.

Leah Yingling – 6th, 18:32:31

After many years of quieter success, Leah Yingling made herself known with a great 2022 season. In addition to taking sixth at Western States in 2022, she was third at the Bandera 100k, third at the Transgrancanaria Advanced 60k, second at the Canyons 100k, and 19th at the Trail World Championships 80k. She’s started her 2023 just as strong with a second place at the Way Too Cool 50k in March and a win at the Bull Run Run 50 Mile in April.

Taylor Nowlin – 7th, 18:46:42

Although she’s run ultras since at least 2016, I’d have to say that 2022 was Taylor Nowlin’s best season to date. Not only did she take seventh in her 100-mile debut at Western States, she also took fourth at the Black Canyon 100k and ninth at CCC. We can’t find any race results for Taylor so far this year, so we’ll have to wait until race day to find out what kind shape she’s in.

Camille Herron – 8th, 18:51:54 (2022 post-race interview)

What a journey it’s been for Camille Herron at Western States! She DNFed in both 2017 and 2019 before finishing in 27:28 in 2021. She kept at it last year, finishing eighth in 18:51. I’d hypothesize that what’s sure to be a snowy course in 2023 could challenge that inspiring progression, but she’ll surely come into the race fit if her recent racing is any indication. In December she clocked 13:02 for 100 miles at the Desert Solstice races before setting the 48-hour world record of 270.5 miles this March.

2023 Western States 100 Men’s Preview

The Western States 100 is set for 2023. The iconic point-to-point, net-downhill course takes in 100.2 miles, 18,000 feet of climbing, and 22,000 feet of descending, as it starts at the Palisades Tahoe ski resort in Olympic Valley, California, and finishes at Placer High School in Auburn.

Environmental conditions will play into the race’s competitive story this year. With record snowfall throughout the upper elevations of the Sierra Nevada, the mountain range through which the race travels, runners will encounter plenty of snow over the course’s first quarter, along with numerous high water crossings lower down as all that snow melts.

Some 16 miles of the course were burned over by last fall’s Mosquito Fire, leaving miles of shade-less terrain. And of course, there will probably be weather at play, with the event’s notorious heat likely to encompass the middle and lower elevations of the course.

The men’s race at last year’s Western States 100 was sharp, with just 50 minutes separating the first and 10th finishers. Seven of that stellar line-up are back this year, as well as some serious additions like the U.K.’s Tom Evans, French-Canadian Mathieu Blanchard, and Dakota Jones.

Although there are notable absentees including reigning champion Adam Peterman and course-record holder Jim Walmsley, the depth of this men’s field suggests it could be an even tighter race this year.

As you’d guess, iRunFar will be there to report firsthand on all the action as it unfolds starting at 5 a.m. U.S. PDT on Saturday, June 24. Stay tuned!

A special thanks to HOKA for making our coverage of the Western States 100 possible!

Be sure to check out our in-depth women’s preview to learn about the women’s race and, then, follow our live coverage on race day!

The top 10 runners in the 2022 race were invited to return for 2023. Unfortunately, reigning champion Adam Peterman is out with injury, and seventh-place Vincent Viet of France has opted not to return. It also looks like fifth-place Drew Holmen has withdrawn, as he just finished fifth at the Trail World Championships 80k, held in Austria 15 days before Western States.

Hayden Hawks – 2nd, 15:47:27

Last year’s second-place man, Hayden Hawks, was pretty jovial in his post-race interview about not being able to best race winner Adam Peterman. But without the reigning champion present on the start line, this could be Hawks’s year. Despite struggling with the heat last year, his finish time knocked two hours off his eighth-place finish from 2021, and there are lots of indicators that he could have more to offer on this course.

Some of his previous top performances include a 5:18 win at the 2020 JFK 50 Mile and a win at the 2018 Lavaredo Ultra Trail. So far this year, he’s warmed up by winning the Canyons 50k and taking second at the Tarawera Ultramarathon 100k.

Arlen Glick – 3rd, 15:56:17

Arlen Glick surpassed a lot of people’s expectations when he took third at Western States last year. Although he went into the race with bag of form in the 100-mile distance — having won the Javelina 100 Mile, the Mohican 100 Mile and the Burning River 100 Mile all in 2021 — this was his initiation into mountainous ultrarunning. He took to it very well, running a stormer to place third, and has since logged more mountain miles, taking second in the Run Rabbit Run 100 Mile later in 2022, before returning to the 2022 Javelina 100 Mile to place third.

Tyler Green – 4th, 15:57:10

Tyler Green took fourth at Western States last year, and forced third-place Arlen Glick into an uncomfortable sprint finish as he closed on him in the race’s final moments. In terms of placing, he was back from his second-place finish in 2021, but improved his finish time by about 14 minutes in his third go at the race. In 2019, he placed 14th in a time of 16:51, in what was a very fast year.

Following on from Western States last summer, he had a below par run at the 2022 UTMB, making it just inside the top 50, but showed he is back on form with a third-place finish at the 2023 Transgrancanaria. Last year in his pre-race interview he spoke about stepping back from his day job of teaching to focus more on track coaching and his own running, so that may have allowed him to come into this year’s race with better preparation than previous years.

Ludovic Pommeret (France) 

Ludovic Pommeret, sixth at last year’s Western States, went on to inspire veteran racers everywhere with a commanding win at the 2022 TDS at age 47 — almost an hour clear of second place on the demanding route. Some of his other top performances include a win at the 2016 UTMB, where he also took fourth in 2021, and a win at the 2021 Diagonale des Fous.

He’s probably at the other end of the spectrum of Arlen Glick, in that his best performances have been on courses more mountainous than this one, but he’s still not to be underestimated.

Not many ultra-trail runners have made Kilian Jornet sweat to the degree that French-Canadian Mathieu Blanchard did at last year’s UTMB. The two battled it out all day for a close finish, in which Blanchard took second place — under the existing course record — thus earning his Golden Ticket into Western States. He’s been mixing it up a lot this year, taking second in the 146-mile Coastal Challenge Expedition Run stage race in Costa Rica, third in the Marathon des Sables, and running 2:22 in what looked like a fairly casual effort at the Paris Marathon.

After Mosquito Fire and Heavy Rains, Western States Trail Requires Serious Work

California's largest fire of 2022 never quite grew to a tenth of the size of 2021's nearby Dixie fire, but that isn't to say it did not have an oversized impact. 

Over 46 days spanning a portion of September and October, the Mosquito Fire burned more than 76,000 acres of forest from the town of Foresthill up to the edge of the Sierra Crest near Olympic Valley, costing state and federal fire agencies $181 million in firefighting salaries and resources. Beyond the monetary cost of the fire, far greater impacts were felt in the surrounding communities, including the loss of 78 structures and residual effects to livelihoods. The U.S. Forest Service (USFS) has focused a lot of its efforts on recreational infrastructure because of its economic importance in the area. The USFS has since performed an internal study to quantify the impacts of the wildfire, and related these findings to local stakeholders including residents and businesses. 

Existing within the boundaries of the Mosquito Fire is the Western States Trail, specifically, the 12.4 miles between Last Chance and Michigan Bluff, often known as the "canyons" of the Western States 100 course-one of the most well-known sections of the course. This relatively short section of trail ascends 5,226 feet and descends 6,406 feet, cresting at Devil's Thumb, traversing over 36 switchbacks, and passing Deadwood Cemetery that hosts the remains of the miners and Chinese laborers who built this trail, once among a litany of trails developed by the Washoe people that lived on this land, in the late 1850s. 

Thankfully, for those chasing a golden ticket entry or already accepted into this year's race, the staff at Western States has been communicating with the USFS since the beginning of the blaze and have been "working full-time on getting the trail open ever since," said Craig Thornley, Western States race director. Thornley says an agreement has been reached between the race and the USFS, to leverage private funds in order to repair the trail and open in time for the late June race. This is anything but the normal or anticipated result, Thornley said. 

"Both races I direct, the Waldo 100K and Western States, were impacted by wildfire in 2022, and that was in a relatively light fire year," he says. "What most race directors appear to do is take the approach of waiting for land managers to tell them when the trail can be used again. In this case we were front and center, asking: 'what do we need to do to get this open?' If we hadn't, it could be several years until the race would be feasible."

This work had, up until the December holiday break, included a number of volunteer days aimed at adding water bars and other trail fortifications to reduce erosion impacts from typical winter rains. These volunteer days were made feasible, in large part, thanks to the quick action of the USFS Burned Area Emergency Response (BAER) teams, which typically address wildfire areas to fell hazard trees and create plans for restoration work. 

Wildfire had impacted this trail in the past, most notably during the American Fire of 2013, lending the Western States team experience as to how to ensure the event would go forward. Also, the 2008 Western States 100 was canceled because of poor air quality, due to numerous wildfires in the area. 

Based on the efforts made last fall, Thornley believed the trail would re-open in plenty of time for the race this June. But that confidence was shaken at the end of December, when a number of atmospheric rivers crossed the Pacific Ocean and dumped heavy precipitation in California. 

On the evening of January 5, 2023, a forest order was issued by the Tahoe National Forest, noting extreme damage to the burned sections of both Western States Trail and Mosquito Ridge Road, a key artery to access aid stations in this stretch. Due to the damage, the USFS issued an access closure until December 31, 2023, which would threaten the possibility of this year's race happening. In most cases, this closure would last until the USFS accrued funding and fully repaired the trail and road, which typically takes two to four years, with orders being renewed each calendar year, depending on the forest region budget. 

A New Approach 

The Western States team is confident that the order will be reversed once trail maintenance is completed. However, due to USFS budgetary constraints, this trail maintenance will be funded by private donors through the Western States nonprofit structure, on the behalf of the government, a strong partnership and plan between event promoters and land managers. 

While it is impressive that the Western States staff has been able to, in all likelihood, stave off race cancellation or delay, there is a larger question to ask: what do individuals, race promoters, and sponsoring brands do under the face of rising hazards in the present and future? 

In California, the Santa Ana winds have driven wildfires followed by rain events for centuries, but climate modelers warn that the number and severity of wildfires of the past several years, as well as the frequency of high-severity extreme precipitation events, highlight a worsening climate trend.

No longer is climate change and public land management solely impacting individual communities for discrete periods of time. It is also placing a serious threat to the start line of arguably the most lauded trail running event in North America. The burning of one trail, which will likely require hundreds of thousands of dollars to restore and treat for public safety, is forcing the hand of major race promoters, and the entire outdoor industry, to consider where climate change fits in their yearly budgets. 

While the question as to what Western States runners should expect this year is clearly front and center, most see the writing on the wall-the industry must adapt to and address climate change. Fortunately, Western States will almost assuredly happen this year, but only because of the immense work ethic, generous donor giving, and long-term community building of the event staff. 

While Western States has the funding to avert disaster this year, both Canyons Endurance Runs by UTMB and the Tevis Cup equestrian event are held in April and July, respectively, on the same trails. There is no guarantee the trail will be open and usable as early as April, or in good condition for horses by July. At the time of publication, UTMB staff were in communication with Western States and land managers to find solutions for Canyons in 2023. However, no official statement has been issued at this time. 

Of course, these three races alone are not the first to be impacted by both natural disasters and a limited federal budget for trail restoration. For example, in the last decade, Santa Barbara's Nine Trails has seen the same cascading disaster chain. Such complications have also been experienced along trail systems in Flagstaff, Arizona, Glenwood Springs, Colorado, and across the Pacific Northwest. 

Thornley credits the decade-long relationship building with the USFS, California State Parks, and private landowners for their ability to quickly avert closure, noting the volunteer trail work days and private fundraising the event has done in collaboration with these land managers over the years. Western States has acted as an exemplar for other events to emulate in the coming decades, under a shifting climate system. However, one must ask whether other trail running event organizers have considered the time necessary to build these relationships with land managers, and to make plans accordingly before the next natural disaster strikes. The future of the sport depends on the urgent planning and trust-building of these various stakeholders.

Here's Why It Feels Like Every Elite Runner Is Changing Sponsors Right Now

Tim Tollefson celebrated the new year shoveling a lot of snow, dreaming about a summer of possibility, and changing his shoes.

After six years with Hoka, Tollefson, 37, the well-known elite American ultrarunner from Mammoth Lakes, California, signed a new multi-year sponsorship deal with Craft. It might seem like a curious move this time of the year, but, in reality, most athlete sponsorship contracts in running are one-year partnerships that end on December 31. That typically gives brands the upper hand in these situations because they can have an easy out whenever an athlete doesn't have a great year of results, or they no longer fit with their marketing goals. It always comes down to the money, though sometimes it's in the athlete's best interests to start fresh, to leverage their recent results and social media platform to find a better deal with a brand that better fits their racing goals.

Because there are more brands partnering runners than ever before, and presumably more sponsorship money available, top-tier distance runners who are still at the top of their game-like Tim Tollefson, Allie McLaughlin, Josette Norris, Paige Stoner, David Ribich, Dani Moreno, Erin Clark, Natosha Rogers, Colin Bennie, Dillon Maggard, Camille Herron, and others-have been able to seek out new opportunities to continue their careers with the necessary support.

The terms of the newly signed deals haven't been disclosed, but there is a huge range in pay for professional distance runners-roughly $15,000 on the low end for a partially sponsored trail runner without significant international results, to $300,000 at the high end for a top-tier marathoner with Marathon Majors podium results. Certainly that means some live a life of luxury, while others are forced to work part-time jobs and pinch pennies to get by.

But there are also often signing bonuses, as well as premiums paid for earning appearance fees, major victories, global medals, podium finishes, breaking records, and other incentives, so running faster can be a fast track to a boost in income. However, most athletes are considered independent contractors, and many have to pay for their own healthcare, body work, and travel, depending on the details of their brand partnership.

"You start getting an idea of who's going to be available, for one reason or other, in the last few months of the year, and that's when brands and athletes start talking," said Mike McManus, Hoka's global sports marketing director. "As an athlete, you're as valuable as whatever money anyone wants to give you, but it's a process and all about negotiating. Sometimes you can match the money being offered; sometimes it just doesn't make sense for the partnership."

What Tollefson liked about Craft was similar to what he liked about Hoka six years ago-an upstart brand ready to make an impact in trail racing, its new line of trail shoes, and the trail community overall. Craft sees Tollefson as a runner with name recognition and several significant race wins in the past three years, not to mention a leader in the sport who started the Mammoth Trail Fest last year.

"This [new partnership with Craft] has reignited my deep passion for the sport and has reminded me of the things I want to accomplish," he said. "It's almost like a start-up situation led by passionate people who are excited to make an impact and want to support the people who are along for the journey. Curiosity drives me and I like a challenge. I know I am going to have some lifetime achievements ahead."

More Big Moves in Trail and Ultra

After an extraordinary year of racing on the trails, Allie McLaughlin changed from On to Hoka as her primary sponsor. The charismatic 32-year-old from Colorado Springs won the daunting Mount Marathon race in Alaska, placed among the top five in several Golden Trail Series races, and won both gold and bronze medals in the inaugural World Mountain and Trail Running World Championships in Thailand. She'll be representing the U.S. in this year's World Championships in Austria, in June, while also returning to the OCC 54K race, as part of the Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc (UTMB) festival in Chamonix, in August.

"It was really interesting to see how much trail means to them [Hoka], not only with their sponsorship of UTMB, but in general how they're helping push the sport forward," said McLaughlin, who had been with On since 2021. "There are a lot of reasons I like what Hoka is doing, but ultimately, the emphasis they're putting on the team and their athletes is really exciting."

Other trail and ultrarunners who have switched brands include Erin Clark,  who finished 7th at last year's CCC, who left Hoka to sign with Nike, even though her partner, Adam Peterman, the 2022 Western States 100 champion and ultrarunning world champion, re-signed with Hoka. 

Spanish trail runner Sara Alonso has changed from Salomon to ASICS, while Craft also signed Arlen Glick, a prolific 100-mile specialist from Ohio, and Mimmi Kotka, a Swedish runner with numerous podium finishes in Europe, to its team. Meanwhile, previously unsponsored American trail runners Tabor Hemming (Salomon) and Dan Curts (Brooks) are among those who have signed new deals.

Meanwhile, Dani Moreno, a world-class mountain runner from Mammoth Lakes, California, and Camille Herron, a record-setting ultrarunner from Warr Acres, Oklahoma, are both also leaving Hoka for yet-to-be-announced brands that offered better deals.

Bigger Transitions for Road and Track Runners

For track athletes and marathon runners, a change of shoe brands is often a more involved change, mostly because it often means changing training groups and coaches, too.

For example, Josette Norris, the fifth-place finisher in the 1,500m at the 2022 World Athletics Indoor Championships, not only switched from Reebok to On, but she left Reebok's Virginia-based Boston Track Club, and coach Chris Fox, and moved west to Boulder, Colorado, to join the On Athletics Club under Dathan Ritzenhein.

Similarly, David Ribich, one of the best American mile runners on the track last year, switched from the Seattle-based Brooks Beasts track club to the Nike-backed Union Athletics Club under Pete Julian.

Colin Bennie, the top American finisher in the Boston Marathon in 2021-previously with Reebok but unsponsored last year-signed with the Brooks Beasts but will be training on his own in San Francisco. Dillon Maggard, who was second at the U.S. cross country championships and ninth in 3,000m at the indoor world championships in 2022, is returning to Seattle to train with the Brooks Beasts, after being unsponsored last year. Natosha Rogers, who was a finalist in the 10,000m at last summer's World Athletics Championships in Eugene, Oregon, has changed from Brooks to Puma, but will continue to train on her own in Colorado. Middle-distance runner Cruz Culpepper, after short stints at the University of Washington and the University of Mississippi, gave up his remaining college eligibility to sign with Hoka and its NAZ Elite (NAZ) team.

Last summer, Paige Stoner left the Virginia-based Reebok group and Fox, her longtime coach, to train in Flagstaff, Arizona, partially because she didn't have other marathoners to train with on a regular basis in Charlottesville. She increased her volume last fall training with Sarah Pagano and Emily Durgin and won the U.S. championship at the California International Marathon in December with a course record of 2:26:02, her debut at the distance.

In January, Stoner parlayed that into a new deal with Hoka, as she also joined the Flagstaff-based Northern Arizona Elite and will be training with a group of strong marathoners-including Aliphine Tuliamuk, Alice Wright, Kellyn Taylor, and the recently unretired Stephanie Bruce-under the guidance of coaches Alan Culpepper, Ben Rosario, and Jenna Wreiden.

"I was especially drawn to NAZ because they have proven to be a powerhouse in the marathon, which will likely be my primary focus in the years to come," Stoner said. "I believe the team has all of the tools it takes to compete at the highest level in the sport, and I am eager to begin this new chapter."

Learning the Ropes

For track and road running, the path to success for elite-level, post-collegiate athletes typically includes earning a sponsorship right after the track season in June and joining a sponsored training group and coach. From there, it's all about improving times and placing high in U.S. championship races, with hopes of becoming fast enough to earn a spot in elite track meets in Europe or one of the World Marathon Majors.

But most road and track runners have agents to help smooth out those transitions, whereas most trail runners do not. Plus, trail running is considerably more unstructured, with a greater range of race distances and a lot more unknown variables. That means the challenge of figuring out what opportunities exist on the trails-what races to run, how to train on trails, what gear is needed, how to race considerably longer distances, and how to attract sponsors-often requires them to learn on the fly.

Those are all reasons professional trail runner Andy Wacker recently formed The Trail Team, a non-profit organization that will help guide young runners along the path becoming successful, potentially sponsored trail runners, while also playing a role in boosting the level of competitive trail running in the U.S.

The Trail Team put out a call for candidates to become one of six inaugural team members in 2023. Once selected this spring, those athletes will go through a training camp, receive a stipend, get continued mentorship from Wacker, McLaughlin, Adam Peterman, and Grayson Murphy, and prepare for a variety of U.S. races.

"I've reached out to a lot of young athletes and the main thing I found is they need a mentor," said Wacker, a Salomon-sponsored athlete. "They don't necessarily need a coach-a lot of them have a college coach that they might continue working with-but they need someone who is going to help them with all of their questions and translate everything to trail running.

"It's still really hard to be an individually sponsored athlete, and I think it's hard for a young athlete to get recognition and build their brand, so we're hoping to help with that," he added. "There are more participants and more excitement than ever in trail running, but there are also growing pains. So there are a lot of ways we think we can help so they don't have to figure it out on their own."

Like Wacker, Tollefson is one of those athletes who did have to figure it out on his own. He was a good runner in high school and college, but he never qualified for the state meet and never earned All-American honors. But, with a relentless work ethic, he's become one of the most successful American trail runners of the past decade, having placed second at the CCC 100K in Chamonix, in 2015, and twice placed third in the Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc 171K in 2016 and 2017.

Although his personal race plans aren't finalized yet, those deals are allowing him to step away from his career as a physical therapist and become fully immersed in running for the first time in his career.

"All of us athletes are multidimensional; we're more than just a pretty face rocking a bib," Tollefson said. "Everyone has a unique story. I think there are more brands interested in telling those stories, and Craft is definitely one of them. Some people have written me off, but I'm confident my best races are ahead of me. Craft believes in me, and I feel like I need that belief to get the best out of myself."

More Prize Money Is Flowing Into Trail Running. What Does That Mean for the Sport?

Annie Hughes, one of the top trail runners in the U.S. for the past two years, had another amazing season running ultra-distance races in 2022. On September 17, the 24-year-old Hoka-sponsored runner and part-time college student won the Run Rabbit Run 100 in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, her fourth win of 100 miles or longer since April. Earlier this year, she won the Coldwater Rumble 100 in January, Cocodona 250 in April and the High Lonesome 100 in July. 

Those were all exceptional efforts in really challenging races, but the big difference she experienced after crossing the Run Rabbit Run finish line, 21 hours and 26 minutes later, was that she won $17,500. (And yes, she was handed one of those cartoonish, oversized checks at the awards ceremony.)

Run Rabbit Run is one of the rare American trail races that offers a relatively large prize purse, and for a decade, it's been the largest in the sport. Hughes earned $15,000 for winning the women's race and split another $5,000 with Arizona trail runner Peter Mortimer (who placed 12th overall) as part of the event's new team competition.

"That wasn't the reason I was drawn to the race, but it was definitely pretty cool to win that much money," Hughes said. "I'm glad I did it, because it wound up being a really great race with an amazing course on a beautiful day."

The origins of trail running were always more about the joy and freedom of ambling through the natural world, and less about the specific time and pace of any run or race, which is why winning big cash prizes is mostly uncommon in the sport, even for top-tier runners like Hughes. Over the past two years, Hughes has won 10 races of 50 miles or longer, yet her Run Rabbit Run victory was the first time she's ever earned money for her efforts. 

More sponsorship money and bigger cash prizes are flowing into the sport, helping the top athletes earn a full-time living in the sport and become global stars. But that evolution has also created a desperate need for a unified governing body and more consistent drug-testing as doping becomes a more acute concern.

A Windfall of Prize Money

Historically, America's biggest and most notable trail running races haven't offered any prize money at all-Western States 100, Hardrock 100, Dipsea Trail Race, Leadville 100, Mount Marathon Race, Seven Sisters, Black Mountain Marathon/Mount Mitchell Challenge-partially because races simply couldn't afford to pay it, and also because, at the soul of the sport, that's not what the races were historically about or why most top runners were competing. 

But with the continued growth of the sport-trail running has grown by 231 percent over the past 10 years, according to one report-and the dawn of a new level of professionalization over the past decade, there is a lot more money being injected into the sport. That includes more high-profile events and race series, more brands investing in the sport, more sponsored runners and trail running teams, as well as a growing expectation that prize money should be part of the equation as it is in road running, triathlon, and even obstacle course racing.

For many years, The North Face 50 near San Francisco was one of the only ultra trail races in the world to offer a significant prize purse. From its inception in 2006, until it disappeared after 2019, that race famously awarded $30,000 in prize money, which included $10,000 to the top finishers in the men's and women's races, plus $4,000 for second and $1,000 for third. It was a race to look forward to at the end of the calendar year, both for the cash awards and the prize-induced competition that drew top runners from around the world.

During that span, Run Rabbit Run, though a lower-profile race, quietly began dishing out some of the biggest payouts in the sport, in part because race organizers Fred Abramowitz and Paul Sachs believe in rewarding its top athletes for their efforts (as well as giving back to the community via even bigger charitable contributions). The race winnings come primarily from entry fees of the 600-runner event and sponsors, if and when the race has them. That wasn't possible back in the early days of the sport, when entry fees were minuscule and cash sponsors were mostly non-existent, but things have started to change.

Abramowitz and Sachs, who both earn their living as attorneys, are unique in that they want to give back to the elite athletes and the Steamboat Springs community, but they also want to help grow the sport. Abramowitz outlined what he calls "A Blueprint for Sponsors of Ultra Running," a three-page document that explains how and why trail ultrarunning-both as a sport and as individual races-can connect to more casual runners, sports fans, and the general public. 

He points to the rampant growth of NASCAR, Professional Bull Riding, and professional poker over the past 20 years from their roots as fringe sports, relatively speaking, to mainstream spectacles with massive fan bases, TV contracts, and social media followings. Trail and ultrarunning aren't there yet, Abramowitz has noted, but they've certainly been growing rapidly.

"Today millions watch those events, though the actual number of participants is minuscule," Abramowitz wrote in his missive. "Ultrarunning can learn from these events: it needs new ideas, new ways of attracting the already committed runners and the casual sports fan to our terrific sport. Fields need to be competitive and races [need to be] dramatic; there are hundreds of 100-mile races, but those that offer competitive fields are a handful at most. Most ultra-races offer spectacular scenery in interesting venues." 

Abramowitz said sponsors should support races such as Run Rabbit Run that offer prize money not merely because it's good for sport, but also because prize money can attract competitive fields, and competitive fields attract interest-from spectators, participants, potential sponsors, and the general public. He also points out that having prize money at more domestic races is a way to keep the sport from becoming entirely Euro-centric, which has been an increasing trend in the past several years.

The trend of cash purses seems to be increasing, and on the face of it, that's good for elite athletes capable of podium finishes. But it's a complex topic and one that certainly will simultaneously increase the competitiveness of the sport while, some argue, continue to pull the sport away from its organic, racing-in-nature roots that was mostly viewed as the antithesis of competitive road racing. 

On the same day Run Rabbit Run paid out  $75,000 in total prize money, the Pikes Peak Ascent awarded $18,000 in prize money for its top 10 finishers-including $3,000 apiece to the men's and women's winners-while the Pikes Peak Marathon, on September 18, had an additional $10,500 in total prize money for the top five runners. The races also offered $2,000 (Ascent) and $4,000 (Marathon), respectively, as course-record bonuses, and a $10,000 premium to any runner surpassing a pie-in-the-sky time well ahead of the course records. None of those records were broken, but the $28,500 in total prize money-partially backed by  the Salomon-sponsored Golden Trail Series-was one of several large prize purses offered at U.S. races this year.

Other big American prize purses were also primarily tied to the Golden Trail Series events-the $50,000 spread over four races at the mid-June Broken Arrow Sky Races in Olympic Valley, California, and the September 25 Flagstaff Sky Peaks 26K race in Flagstaff, Arizona, where runners competed for $18,000 in prize money and a chance to compete at the Golden Trails World Series Final, and the $15,000 winner's earnings at the Madeira Ocean & Trails 5-Day Stage Race in October. 

Also of note, the November 18-20 Golden Gate Trail Classic paid out $25,000 in total prize money to the top five finishers in both the 100K and half-marathon races, which were part of this year's nine-race $270,000 Spartan Trail World Championship Series.

Meanwhile, the Cirque Series, sponsored by On, paid out $3,600 in total prize money at each of its six sub-ultra mountain running races in the U.S., including $1,000 for the men's and women's winners. The Mt. Baldy Run-to-the-Top on September 5 in Southern California offered $3,000 to runners who broke the event's longstanding course records, and Joe Gray and Kim Dobson obliged by taking down each mark.

Most U.S. Trail and Mountain Running Championships have a minimum of $2,000 in prize money. Typically that comes from regional sponsors eager to support the local race organizations, such as the case with Northeast Delta Dental's contributions behind this year's Loon Mountain Race in Lincoln, New Hampshire, which hosted the U.S. Mountain Running Championships. That event had a $1,500 total prize purse that was paid out to the top three men and women in each race, but it also had an additional $1,500 for an Upper Walking Boss premium that was spread among the top three fastest times in each gender on the super-steep upper part of the course.

Meanwhile, the 2022 World Mountain and Trail Running Championships in Thailand paid out $66,000 to the top five finishers over four races, including $4,000 to the winners of each event.

"(The prize money) is way better than it's ever been, both for the athletes earning it and the number of sponsors who are contributing to it," says Nancy Hobbs, executive director of the American Trail Running Association and the chairperson of the USATF Mountain Ultra Trail Council that oversees national championship races and the U.S. Mountain Running Team. 

From a longer view over the past decade or so, Joe Gray agrees there is more money coming into the sport than ever before. As a top-tier pro since 2008 and 21-time U.S. champion, he's regularly won more prize money at high-level races in Europe for more than a decade. But more than the growth of prize money, he has seen more brands interested in putting money behind athletes, races, and the sport in general.

"I think there has always been prize money there, and if you're successful you could make a lot more money really quickly," said Gray, a two-time World Mountain Running Champion. "I do think there is more money coming from the sponsors paying out better contracts and bigger bonuses, which I think will wind up being more beneficial to athletes overall."

Most elite trail runners get annual stipends from their sponsoring brands and bonus money for top performances. Gray is backed by Hoka, but he also has sponsorship deals with Fox River Socks, Kriva, Never Second, Knockdown, Tanri, Momentous, Casio, and GoSleeves. In addition to Hoka, Annie Hughes gets additional support from Ultraspire, Coros, and Tailwind Nutrition. But the life of professional trail runners-independent contractors who don't get healthcare and retirement program benefits-can get expensive with the growing cost of travel, regular bodywork/physio treatments, and private health insurance. 

The sport's top-tier elite athletes-Joe Gray, Kilian Jornet, Courtney Dauwalter, Jim Walmsley, Maude Mathys, and Scott Jurek, among others-make a good living from their sponsorships. But there are really only a handful American trail runners making more than about $50,000 a year from shoe brand sponsorships. (Most "sponsored" trail runners are making somewhere between $10,000 to $30,000 per year.) The bottom line is that winning prize money, for those who are fast enough to consistently finish on the podium in big races, certainly helps make ends meet and is necessary to keep the sport's top athletes from having to work other jobs so they can focus entirely on training, recovery, and racing.

"This [2022] is the first year I've gone all-in on trail running," said Hughes, who worked as a waitress in Leadville the previous two years. "I'm able to live off what I make, but I'm not really saving anything. So it was really nice to win that money because then I can put some away in savings."

Higher European Standards 

So far, Abramowitz appears to be right about the sport shifting to more of a European focus, and it's, at least in part, tied to the increased prize money that has attracted competitive athletes. While many top-tier European events have paid out modest prize purses for years, some of those races have also helped out visiting runners by way of travel stipends, hotel accommodations, or appearance fees. That's partially because European races are generally larger (500 to 1,000 participants or more) than U.S. races (typically fewer than 500 participants).

Unlike Hughes, who only raced in the U.S. this year, American runner Abby Hall, who runs for the Adidas-Terrex team, raced three times in Europe and earned prize money each time. She placed second in the Transgrancanaria 126K in the Canary Islands in March (which doubled as the Spartan Trail World Championship), finished third in the CCC 100K in Chamonix in August, and won the Transvulcania by UTMB 72K back in the Canary Islands in October.

Like Hughes, Hall receives an annual stipend and race bonuses from her sponsor, but admits it's been nice to have more opportunities to win money-both because it helps her make a living wage and because it's consistent with other professional endurance sports.

"In the past, it hadn't even been a consideration before, for how income would work out as an athlete," Hall said. "But this year it actually added up to be a decent amount. I'm grateful for the opportunities."

In 2022, American runner Hayden Hawks won an off-the-radar 100K a race in Krynica, Poland, and brought home the 100,000 zloty winner's prize ($26,000), one of the bigger individual purses ever awarded in trail running. In 2017, when Hawks won the CCC race, he didn't win anything because UTMB had refused until 2018 to offer prize money at its races, partly because race founders Catherine and Michel Poletti have believed that increased prize money will bring more incentive for some athletes to consider doping or that agents would take too big of a cut. 

UTMB finally began offering prize money to podium finishers in 2018 with a total purse of about $34,000 (35,000) and continued that through 2021. But after forging a business relationship with Ironman and launching the new UTMB World Series, it has increased the prize money awarded in Chamonix. In 2022, UTMB said it paid out about $162,000 in total prize money (the approximate equivalent of its stated 156,000 prize purse) to the top 10 men and women finishers of the UTMB, CCC, and OCC races.

That includes $10,400 to the winners of each of those races, with approximately $5,200 going to second-place finishers and $3,125 for third. Fourth- and fifth-place finishers in each of those races earned about $1,500, while 6th through 10th took home $1,000.

While those more notable ultrarunning paydays can be big windfalls for a trail runner, they still pale in comparison to what elite-level road marathoners and triathletes earn at the biggest races that have a much larger audience, including live TV coverage. For example, the 2022 Boston Marathon awarded $876,500 in prize money and $150,000 to the winners, while New York City Marathon paid out $530,000 in total prize money at its November 6 race, including $100,000 to the men's and women's winners. The 2021 Ironman World Championships in St. George, Utah, had a $750,000 prize purse, including $125,000 to the winners, similar to what was awarded at the 2022 Ironman World Championships October 6-8 in Hawaii. 

While only a few top trail runners could have opted to pursue a marathon or triathlon career instead of trail running, what's more relevant is the spike of growth trail running. Although it is not yet internationally televised as major marathons and triathlons are, the surge in participation and livestream viewing options is starting to bring in more media attention and sponsorship money than ever before. And more media attention begets more participation and professionalization. 

"I think we'll definitely see ultra-trail running continue to grow for years to come," says Mike McManus, director of global sports marketing for Hoka. "I think it's at a point where it's just on the cusp of the real growth that's coming and all that will come with it, similar to where the marathon was in the 1980s and triathlon in the 1990s. It might never be as big as marathoning, but trail running will definitely get more built out as it continues to grow."

"It's nice to make some money for the sport we do. This is my job, and being able to support my family with a decent chunk of money is pretty nice," Hawks says. "I definitely don't go after races just for money, but if there is a gap in my schedule where I can win a little bit of money, I am definitely going to take advantage of that for sure. I want to continue to be in this sport and live this lifestyle as long as I can, so knowing that there are sponsors and races investing more in runners is something I am really grateful for."

The Ongoing Dilemma

While Abramowitz and Sachs have been eager to give out prize money at Run Rabbit Run, not all races are equipped to do so. Many U.S. races are garage-shop operations that barely break even, while some are just too small to make it happen. The Western States 100-Mile Endurance Run (WSER) is operated by a non-profit organization, and offering prize money goes against the mission of the race, says race director Craig Thornley.

The biggest concern that race directors have, including Thornley, is that prize money attracts athletes willing to use performance-enhancing drugs because the sport lacks a comprehensive anti-doping strategy that includes both post-race testing and out-of-competition testing.

"In general, I think the prize money is probably a good thing because professional athletes are able to make a living," Thornley said. "But I think, as a sport, we'll probably have to be more aware of people trying to use drugs or some other ways to get that prize money." 

A few years ago, the Western States 100 famously announced its zero-tolerance policy regarding the use of performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs) that prohibits any athlete who has been determined to have violated anti-doping rules or policies-by World Athletics, World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), U.S. Anti-Doping Agency (USADA), or any national sports federation-is ineligible for entry into the WSER. Although Western States has regularly drug-tested its top finishers, only a few other big trail or ultra-distance races test its finishers with a WADA-sanctioned program.

Thornley believes the incentive to cheat has probably increased as more brands have stepped up to sponsor athletes, but the increase in prize money probably makes it more tangible. 

He's not the only one. Ultrarunning coach and podcaster Jason Koop, an outspoken proponent for authentic drug-testing in the sport, agrees, saying that it's time for the sport to collectively start developing mandatory drug-testing protocols, even on a small scale. While he doesn't believe doping is prevalent in trail running, he believes it's definitely already an issue.

"People would be fooling themselves if they thought that every trail running performance was clean. If you think that that's the case, then I have a bridge to sell you," Koop says. "Prize money or no prize money, I think the bigger thing is that the ecosystem is developed enough and there is enough financial reward at stake to where everyone kind of owes it to everybody else to get something done."

In other words, it's time for the sport to take some next steps-either by big governing bodies or small factions of people interested in the long-term health of the sport-to develop more structure and universal anti-doping policies.

Didn't Get Into Western States or Hardrock? Here Are 10 Alternatives

This fall, 4,909 runners put into a lottery in hopes of getting one of 369 spots in the 2018 Western States 100, perhaps the most iconic 100-mile race in the United States. Similarly, this year saw 2,236 applicants for the Hardrock 100, a notoriously difficult high-altitude race in Colorado's San Juan Mountains with just 145 available spots.

If you didn't get into of these races (perhaps yet again), don't fret. There are plenty of other races with a similar combination of terrain, camaraderie and spirit.

There are now more than 150 100-mile races held annually in North America alone. Here are 10 races that can cure even the most stubborn Hardrock or Western-States FOMO and get you motivated about training.

1. Eastern States

Held in northern Pennsylvania, this a 103-mile, single-loop course is run almost entirely on singletrack. The race follows Pine Creek, a scenic river that runs through the Appalachian Mountains. But with more than 20,000 feet of elevation gain, it isn't for beginners-which makes it all the more rewarding.

When: August 11, 2018

Where: Waterville, PA

Register: www.easternstates100.com

2. Wasatch 100

Looking for an altitude-heavy race with terrain that ranges from wet scree to dry valleys and everything in between? The Wasatch 100 offers 24,000 feet of elevation gain over a point-to-point course outside of Salt Lake City, Utah. The point-to-point offers plenty of wildlife viewing opportunities, too: past participants have seen everything from elk, sheep and moose, to bears, mountain lions and rattlesnakes. Come prepared.

When: September 7, 2018

Where: Kaysville, Utah

Register: www.wasatch100.com

3. Fat Dog 120

If you haven't run a race across the border, you're missing out. Held in British Columbia's Cascade Mountains, the Fat Dog 120 is comparable to Hardrock in terms of difficulty, with more than 28,000 feet of elevation gain over its 120 miles. Running through three provincial parks and featuring everything from alpine meadows to technical singletrack to groomed trails circumnavigating aqua blue lakes, Fat Dog also brings the weather: expect dry heat, scattered lightning, torrential rain or crisp, nipping temperatures-sometimes all during the same race.

When: August 10, 2018

Where: Keremeos, B.C., Canada

Register: www.mountainmadness.ca

4. Cruel Jewel 100

Expect almost 106 miles of either up or down-there's maybe one part of this course that is flat, but even then your hip flexors will be firing off as you hop over myriads of logs. Cruel Jewel is not for the faint of heart: the event boasts over 33,000 feet of gain and your quads won't let you forget the 33,000 feet of loss. Out of the 106 miles, 95 are run on singletrack through the Chattahoochee Forest. It's an often-overlooked Southeastern event with plenty of shade.

When: May 18, 2018

Where: Blairsville, GA

Register: www.dumassevents.com

5. Ouray 100

The Ouray 100 is a close neighbor to Hardrock, and now in its fifth year of existence. It may not cover Handies Peak or cap out above 14,000 feet, but it does deliver 8,812 feet more climbing. Nestled in the ever-captivating San Juan Mountains of Colorado, the race is considered a "graduate" level 100-miler-after all, the last 10.6 miles of the event pass through the finish area (don't quit now!) to face a 4,844-foot climb before doubling back to the finish.

When: July 29, 2018

Where: Ouray, CO

Register: www.ouray100.com

6. San Diego 100

San Diego is a year-round running destination, which means by the time June rolls around, the temperatures are often in the 90s. In some years, this can mimic a hot Western States, making it a great alternative event. The San Diego 100 course covers five unique areas featuring pine forests, manzanita scrub, a scorching climb through the heat-trapping Noble Canyon and sweeping desert views as the route traces parts of the Pacific Crest Trail.

When: June 8, 2018

Where: Lake Cuyamaca, CA

Register: http://www.sandiego100.com/

7. Bear 100

How many 100-milers take you from one state to the next? The Bear 100 begins in Logan, Utah and ends 100 miles later in Fish Haven, Idaho, all while taking advantage of the changing fall scenery. Expect to see bright red maples and shockingly yellow aspens while climbing more than 22,000 feet. For those who suffer in high-altitude races, the Bear tops out at 9,000 feet, making it a bit more manageable. Bonus points for the overall male and female awards, which feature an engraved picture of Old Ephraim, a famous Grizzly bear who reportedly once roamed the wilderness areas that runners pass through.

When: September 28, 2018

Where: Logan, UT

Register: www.bear100.com

8. Plain 100

Tired of aid stations? Bored with just finishing? Looking for something soul-numbingly hard? Try the Plain 100. In its first eight years, the event had zero finishers. Even today the race has less than a 50-percent finishing rate.  What makes Plain so tough? No course markings; no aid stations; two humongous, remote, gorgeous and difficult 50-mile loops with a single re-supply point between. Never mind the elevation gain (and the endless hours alone on the trail.) You know you're in the Plain 100 when, as race participant Martin Miller explained, "you quit at mile 70, but have to drag yourself to the finish line to find anyone who cares." This event is just plain tough.

When: September 15, 2018

Where: Leavenworth, WA

Register: www.plain100.com

9. Cascade Crest 100

The 20th edition of the Cascade Crest 100 (affectionately called CCC) will run the regular route despite 2017's reroute due to nearby wildfires. The trail follows the Pacific Crest Trail for the majority of the beginning miles before dropping down via a steep, roped section. From here runners will work their way through a 2.3 miles-long tunnel before emerging on the latter half of the course. Unfortunately, it doesn't get easier. Expect to hit "The Trail from Hell," which is more bushwhacking than running. The crowning point of the race is a series of steep climbs and descents called the Cardiac Needles, which, at 80-something miles into the race, are no joke. Be sure to pause along the way to look up and out; the views alone make this one worth running.

When: August 25, 2018

Where: Easton, WA

Register: www.cascadecrest100.com

10. Mogollon Monster

The Mogollon Monster traverses one of the most heinous routes in all of Arizona, the technical, undulating Highline Trail, (which also happens to be home to the notoriously difficult Zane Grey 50.) At first glance, the event's 22,000 feet of climbing might seem average amongst other 100-milers on this list, but know that within those 100 miles, you'll be hard pressed to find more than 100 feet of smooth trail. The region is remote, rugged and covered in more loose rocks and fallen trees than you could ever dream up.

When: September 15, 2018

Where: Pine, AZ

Register: www.mogollonmonster100.com

Western States 100 aims for inclusivity in updated policies for transgender, non-binary, and pregnant athletes

One of the oldest and most respected ultratrail races in the world has taken a further step at making their race more inclusive. On Wednesday morning, the board of Western States Endurance Run (WSER) released policy updates around transgender and non-binary entrants, as well as an updated pregnancy deferral policy.

WSER says that these new rules align with their “goal of ensuring fair and inclusive practices that respect the personal rights and dignity of transgender and nonbinary entrants while preserving the integrity of competition for awards and records.”

In October, Riley Brady became the first ever non-binary athlete to secure a golden ticket to WSER, finishing second at Javelina Jundred 100-mile race. While Ultrasigup allows runners to choose from three gender categories, it was the first time that Javelina Jundred organizers had included a non-binary division. An already urgent and important conversation about the need to expand inclusivity in ultrarunning–and inclusivity in general in the sport–became heightened after Brady’s remarkable performance.

In an article Brady coauthored with coach David Roche in trailrunnermag, Brady explains: “Leading up to Javelina, I had emailed the race directors to inform them that I was seeking a Golden Ticket, which the race organization asks you to do. On my Ultrasignup page, I have indicated my gender as ‘nonbinary’ and my division as  ‘female.’

As this was the first year Javelina had a non-binary division, the live results updates defaulted to the gender category. “As I understand it now, that misunderstanding may have contributed to some confusion online after the race, even as I emailed them in advance and followed the rules at every step,” shared Brady.

While WSER already had policies in place for transgender athletes, they have now clarified and updated those regulations, as well as added clear rules for non-binary entrants and an updated and more inclusive pregnancy deferral policy.

Updates for transgender athletes

Transgender women can register to compete in the female category, provided they have been undergoing continuous, medically supervised hormone treatment for gender transition for at least one year prior to the race, or in the male category with no restrictions.

Transgender men can register to compete in the male or female category, unless they are undergoing hormone treatment related to gender transition that includes testosterone or any other banned substance in which case they must register in the male category.

Policy for non-binary athletes

During registration all entrants will have the opportunity to select their gender category–male, female, or non-binary. Entrants who select nonbinary will also need to choose a  category (male or female) for results and awards.

Non-binary entrants who are male-assigned at birth must select male as their category for results and awards, unless they meet the requirements for transgender women to compete in the female category under this policy.

Non-binary entrants who are female-assigned at birth can choose the female or male category for results and awards, unless they are undergoing hormone treatment related to gender transition that includes testosterone or any other banned substance, in which case they must select the male category.

Pregnancy deferral policy update

In order to defer a race entry due to pregnancy, entrants must submit a pregnancy entry deferral request in writing to the race director no later than one pm on the Friday before the race, as well as provide written confirmation of the pregnancy signed by a physician or medical professional.

The pregnancy deferral policy applies to anyone with a race entry who is pregnant at the time they enter the lottery and gets selected, becomes pregnant after the lottery and prior to race day regardless of how they obtained their race entry (lottery, sponsor etc.), or is an automatic entrant (top ten, golden ticket, etc.) and becomes pregnant or gives birth after obtaining their race entry and prior to race day.

Apple Fitness+ Aims to Make Yoga More Approachable for Runners

Think you don’t have time to stretch it out? The app routines last just 10 minutes each.If you ever wanted to make yoga a part of your regular routine and then got distracted by the need to chase more miles, cross off to-dos, or maybe spend some much-needed R&R on the couch, you’re certainly not alone. An hour-long yoga class can seem like a big commitment, even if you do want to reap the rewards of the practice, like better recovery and wellbeing. 

Research shows that yoga is, indeed, good for runners. It can support heart health, reduce anxiety symptoms, and bolster your bones—not to mention the poses simply feel good for the tight hips and calves many marathoners tend to struggle with thanks to clocking many miles.

With this conundrum in mind—runners wanting to do yoga, but not making the time for long sessions—Apple Fitness+ teamed up with well-known ultrarunner, Scott Jurek, who won the Western States 100-Mile Endurance Run a record seven straight times and once held the fastest known time for completing the Appalachian Trial, and who has also been practicing yoga for about 20 years. They also tapped yoga instructor and Fitness+ trainer, Jessica Skye, and created a six-session series, with classes lasting just 10 minutes each. 

Runner’s World sat down with Jurek, Skye, and Jay Blahnik, vice president of fitness technologies at Apple to talk about the yoga program, what it’s all about, and how it aims to open the doors to the mind-body practice for more runners.

What You Can Expect from the Apple Fitness+ Yoga for Runners ProgramBlahnik says that to make the shortened sessions in the program work for runners, they decided to get specific. Each session targets a goal: hip mobility, core strength, glute work, looser legs, stable ankles, and shoulder mobility. 

Skye tells Runner’s World that they chose these themes by thinking about what runners need to address—or as Jurek puts it, considering the “problem areas” of runners—starting from the feet and working up through the shoulders. Each pose is meant to address issues runners face in those areas of the body.

During each class, you’ll move from one pose to the next in a sequence, but not in a flow-style (or vinyasa) in which movement is linked to inhales and exhales. Nevertheless, Skye still puts an emphasis on deep breathing throughout each 10-minute sequence.

“This is geared for the person who doesn’t think yoga is for them. And we always have a modifier—in all of our workouts, there’s always someone that’s showing an option that has a smaller range of movement, or they might be using blocks, or something like that, just so wherever you’re at on your yoga journey, even if you’re right at the beginning, you can always do it,” Skye says. 

Blahnik adds that the goal of the 10-minute sessions was to make them easy to squeeze in before or after a run or in the morning or evening. This versatility would, therefore, make it more seamless to maintain a regular yoga habit. And it is often true, when you know you only have to commit to 10 minutes, you’re more inclined to press play. 

The Mental Side of Yoga for Runners

Jurek says one of the biggest benefits to these sessions, and yoga in general, is allowing you time to tune into your body and recognize the benefits of slowing down. This can pay off on the run when you better notice the way your body is moving ant the beginning of the workouts, Skye encourages you to remember your intention and why you decided to take class or move your body. In a panel at the Apple store after the Runner’s World interview, Jurek talked about this intention-setting practice coming into play on the run—especially during long races in which you’ll likely experience tough mental moments.

“Whether it’s prayer, intention, or having something to look to beyond your own state [of hurt during a marathon]…just having that hope out there and realizing ‘I can get through this, because of A, B, and C,’ I think those are really important things to have,” Jurek says. “Try to cling onto those things that can motivate you and help you get through those dark spots [in a long run], because they happen and they’re normal.” 

Why Apple Fitness+ Wants to Make Yoga Less Intimidating

Some runners feel the need to be super bendy in order to take a yoga class. But the truth is, there’s no being “good” at yoga—you don’t have to be flexible at all in order to do it or gain advantages from it. That’s what Apple aims to convey, simply by having Jurek in the frame and not afraid to wobble throughout class. 

“I was the person that had all the blocks and all the props and all the extra help that I could because I was the most inflexible person in the room,” Jurek says about his first experiences in the studio. “And I think that can be intimidating to runners, because running isn’t something [in which] you need mega flexibility. But you want to avoid injuries, develop body awareness, and you want to have the strength. So, for runners, it’s about making [yoga] approachable, and having a setting where they feel like ‘okay, I can be stumbling.’”

While taking the yoga sessions, you’ll hear Skye suggest body placement for certain poses and Jurek almost always mentions that it’s okay if you can’t get there—that shortening your stance, or using props, or looking different than Skye in the pose is perfectly acceptable. 

The message: Instead of focusing on how good you are at yoga (or running, for that matter), focus on consistency, being in the moment, and enjoying it. “It’s just like running—there is one day where you decide, I’m going to put one foot in front the other,” Jurek says. The same goes for yoga. To make it a part of your routine, you simply need to take it one breath, one pose, one session at a time—even if it’s just 10 minutes. 

Setting running goals

Why did that race not go as planned? I have had that thought several times in my running career. Is the race not going as planned, or is it more that I did not begin my training by setting proper race goals?

Setting proper race goals begins with the training plan. As I look back over races where I achieved my dreams, my training plans were built around realistic expectations and training specificity.

The principle of specificity states that sports training should be relevant and appropriate to the sport for which the individual is training in order to produce the desired effect. … Essentially, specificity training means that you must perform the skill in order to get better at it. When it comes to running, this means…race is on hills = train on hills, race is in the heat = train in the heat. (Defined on verywellfit.com)

When I achieved my goals, my training plans were founded on establishing proper training paces and allowing for a small amount of natural progression in my ability as the training weeks unfolded. In training leading up to not-so-successful races, I lacked focus on training paces. Instead, my main goal was purely to achieve higher weekly mileage. This training approach is entirely acceptable if the goal is to cross the finish line. However, as these race dates approached, I began to formulate unrealistic time goals that had no connection to the results of my training plan. In other words, I got caught up in the excitement of the upcoming race and how I would like to finish but was not capable of at that moment.

Set Goals Before the Season

Before beginning any training plan or racing season, I write down my planned races. I not only set goals for each race but set progression goals for the entire season. My loftier goals either come at the end of a training cycle or the racing season. It can be easy to get excited about an upcoming season or training plan, but if I don’t think through my schedule and goals first, I find that I never quite reach what I set out to achieve. Dreaming grand accomplishments in my mind is great, but putting them on paper and building my training plan around these goals creates both accountability and opportunity for reflection during and after the season.

What are Your A, B, C Goals?

I set several goals for every training cycle and almost every race. For example, my recent training and racing goals for the Canyons 100k were sub-12 hour finish (goal A), sub-15 hour finish (B), and finish for my Western States 100 qualifier (C).

As I progressed through training toward this race, I kept these goals in mind. I set up training paces based on what would allow me to achieve Goal A. However, when I could not take as much time as desired to train my ability to climb, I knew this goal would be a stretch to achieve in races like Canyons 100k. The race features 16,000 feet of elevation gain, and without training specificity, the course would present as more of a challenge to me. Before the race started, I settled with Goal A being out of reach and focusing on achieving either Goal B or C.

My result of Canyons 100k was 14:44:44, just under my B goal of sub-15 hours. The development of the race was much more than just the time goal, though. With the proper time to set goals initially, track my progress toward the goals throughout training, and adjust my plans accordingly, the result was a 100k race where I truly enjoyed the journey from start to finish.

Set Goals That Are Not Time Specific

There are other achievable goals than running a specific time in an upcoming race. And, it may come as a shock, but there are other goals you can set besides just those related to pounding the pavement or trails! What might those goals be?

(1) Overall Fitness

In the middle of planning our race calendar and training plan, are we considering our overall fitness? As runners, we often neglect the importance of strength training, cross-training, and other activities that may complement our running. Maintaining our overall fitness does require spending time on other activities besides running. When we complete these complementary activities, we are improving both our bodies and minds, the latter being very critical to a long and successful race season. To re-kindle the interest in a sport from your past, join a recreational soccer or softball league, or plan to attend a weekly yoga or spinning class at your local gym. Mix it up, have fun, and watch your overall fitness soar!

(2) Improve Nutrition

We run to eat or drink! I’m sure you have heard or used this line many times before, but have you stopped to consider how your eating habits could be impacting your performance and ability to reach your running goals. It’s not to say that we should not enjoy mixing both eating and running. However, we should be mindful of what we are eating and how much. I know in the weeks that I have a few fewer drinks and bowls of ice cream, I feel better and perform more to my expectations. Plan ahead and prep your nutrition just like you plan your run training.

(3) Impact Your Community

It’s easy to get so focused on our training plan and running goals that we forget about all those that support the running community and us. Take time to welcome new runners into your group runs, volunteer for a park clean-up, volunteer at races, or say thank you to those who support your crazy running habit and dreams!

(4) Becoming a Smarter Runner

Just like reading this article on Setting Proper Race Goals, invest in your running performance by taking time to educate yourself. Make it a goal to read a new book, watch an inspirational documentary, or attend a running or fitness clinic/camp. We will never become so experienced as runners that we can not learn something new. The sport is still evolving, technologies are changing, and our bodies are constantly changing as well.

Ultrarunner Tim Tollefson shares mental health challenges in new film

Tim Tollefson is a celebrated American ultratrail runner with wins at big races like the Javelina Jundred, Lavaredo Ultra Trail 120K and Ultra Trail Australia 100K; in 2017 he was third overall at Ultra Trail du Mont Blanc (UTMB), finishing well under 20 hours.

But then followed a string of failures, including at this year’s UTMB, which went badly from the start, forcing him to drop out about four hours in. (Tollefson went into the race with a positive COVID result.) A new film, What Goes Unsaid, reveals something only those closest to Tollefson knew previously–alongside his many successes and the admiration of his fans, for years Tollefson has been dealing with poor mental health and an eating disorder.

Tollefson, who is sponsored by Coros, had a tough adjustment when his family moved from rural Minnesota to the Auburn, Calif. (the sight of the iconic Western States 100 finish) when he was 10, and he was bullied– for wearing glasses, for his accent and his haircut. He started running in middle school, which helped him feel more accepted.

But it also made him want to be leaner, and more like the other runners’ body types he observed on the team; and since he wasn’t the only one trying to eat less to force his body to conform to an “ideal” body weight, he didn’t realize how insidious and dangerous it could be. 

Tollefson qualified for the 2012 Olympic Marathon trials, but struggled in his brief marathon career, ultimately switching to trail running, which he hoped would bring greater success (and therefore self-acceptance). UTMB represented, in his mind, the acme of achievement in the ultratrail world–and he describes his 2017 podium finish, where he broke 20 hours (along with winner François D’Haene and runner-up Kilian Jornet) as the best race of his career. (He finished third in 2016 also.)

But the euphoria was short-lived. In 2018, he returned to UTMB and DNF’d–and again in 2019 and 2021. In the flim, he reveals that, even during the good years, he would almost be paralyzed with anxiety over being seen by others, and by perfectionism, severe body dysmorphia and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD).

Interestingly, this is one of the reasons he was attracted to UTMB: it starts in the evening, and much of the first half of the race takes place in darkness. By the time the sun rises, he has run long enough to feel slightly less bad about being seen. “I feel thin again, because I’ve run for 12 hours,” says Tollefson.

Tollefson says it’s not the running, or the altitude, that strikes fear into his heart–it’s being seen by other runners. He says he has been counting calories since 2003, and he only sought therapy recently. He now recognizes that what he sees when he looks in the mirror is distorted and not real. 

Having grown up in the area and competed at Placer High (where Western States runners finish), Tollefson avoided it until 2021. He admits he was always critical of the race, whose course is not as technical or as spectacular as UTMB’s. Ultimately, he realized he was holding it to an unfair standard–much as he had always done to himself and his body. And he decided to run it.

He finished fifth last year, and as his fans already know, this year he finished, but not without struggling mightily–against dehydration and a powerful urge to quit. He placed 33rd overall, with a time of 20:41:28. “I decided that I wasn’t going to give up on myself,” Tollefson told filmmaker Billy Yang, who was commentating, after finishing. He also felt he owed it to his crew the volunteers and the runners who didn’t make it off the waitlist, to finish. 

He shares his story now in the hope that it will encourage others to do the same. Several female athletes (including Olympic bronze medallist Molly Seidel, trail runner Amelia Boone and steeplchaser Allie Ostrander) have shared their stories, but as Tollefson’s makes clear, eating disorders are not limited to female athletes. (Canadian beer miler Corey Bellemore opened up about his own experience during the pandemic.)

“When other people share things publicly, and I relate or emphathize, it makes me feel less alone,” he says. “I’ve never had the confidence to reach out to those people and say thank you, but I know it has an impact.”

Will Jim Walmsley Be the First American Man to Win UTMB?

Jim Walmsley has always been an outlier among American trail runners.

Not only is he as fast and talented as any ultrarunner the U.S. has ever produced, but he's also been bold and even a little brash about his intentions. His off-the-front racing style is something to be revered-and respected if you're one of his competitors -because the lanky 32-year-old Hoka-sponsored runner from Flagstaff, Arizona, has proven time and time again that it works for him. 

On August 26 in Chamonix, France, Walmsley will embark on his latest and most prodigious quest yet: to win Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc (UTMB). It's his fourth attempt at trying to follow up on his stated intention of becoming the first American man to win the race, but he's gone to extra lengths this year to prepare for it. It would certainly add to what has already been a great year, given that he and longtime girlfriend Jessica Brazeau got married on May 4 in Silverton, Colorado.

But if Walmsley is going to pull it off this year, he will have to fend off three-time UTMB winner and 2022 Hardrock champion Kilian Jornet, of Spain, among other strong runners in the talent-loaded field.

UTMB has been one of the pinnacle events in the sport of trail running since its inception in 2003. Not only does the course send runners on a grueling 171.5K loop (106.5 miles) around the Mont Blanc massif with nearly 33,000 feet of vertical gain, it also brings together the deepest international field of the year and more hype and media attention-including epic coverage and commentary via livestream-than any other event in the world by far.

One of several top-tier Americans in this year's UTMB field, Walmsley skipped the Western States 100 this year and since June has been living and training in the mountains of the Rhne Alpes region of France near Beaufort, not far from good friend Franois D'Haene, who knows a thing or two about training for big mountain ultras. 

Last year, D'Haene not only became the first male runner to win UTMB for a fourth time, but he also became the first runner to win both Colorado's Hardrock 100 and UTMB in the same year.

The Frenchman was crewed and paced by Walmsley at Hardrock in 2021 and was one of the first people to suggest that Walmsley spend a summer training in the French Alps in order to best prepare for UTMB, rather than showing up in Chamonix 7-10 days before as he-and many other American men-have in the past.

Aside from Jornet, who won this year's Hardrock 100 for the fifth time on July 16, the top international runners include Frenchman Aurelien Dunand-Pallaz, the runner-up at UTMB last year; Germany's Hannes Namberger; New Zealand's Scott Hawker; and Spain's Pau Capell, who won the race in 2019.

D'Haene certainly thinks Walmsley is capable of winning UTMB, but points out that there are always numerous capable runners who are contenders and it all depends on how the race plays out. The idea of Walmsley stating his intent out front-that he wants to win UTMB-is more of a bold American approach, D'Haene says, as opposed to a more subtle European style he prefers.

"Just to explain to people, 'I am here to be the first American to win the UTMB,' puts a lot of pressure on him," D'Haene says. "He thinks UTMB, he sleeps UTMB, he eats UTMB, so it's a lot of pressure. If you take the approach that I just want to smash that course and win that race, then it's a lot of pressure. I'm not sure if he'll win or not win, but at least he's training well in the Alps and his confidence is up."

Walmsley has raced UTMB three times already-taking fifth in 2017 but DNF-ing in 2018 and 2021. The fact that no American man has ever won UTMB is irrelevant in the scope of this year's race, but it certainly adds a heightened focus in Walmsley's quest and a brighter spotlight on him before and during the race.

Whereas four American women have won the women's UTMB race a total of seven times-including the 2019 and 2021 champion Courtney Dauwalter-only a handful of U.S. men have made it to the UTMB podium. The highest finish came when when Topher Gaylord and Bradon Sybrowsky tied for second in the inaugural race in 2003. 

While Walmsley appears to be the top American this year, it would be foolish to focus on him as the only American capable of winning. Other U.S. runners with momentum and motivation heading into UTMB include Tim Tollefson, who finished second at CCC in 2015 and third in UTMB in 2016 and 2017; Tyler Green, fourth at Western States 100 this year and 10th in the TDS 145K in Chamonix last year; Zach Miller, winner of the CCC 100K in 2015 and sixth and ninth, respectively, in UTMB in 2016 and 2017.

Miller went for broke trying to win UTMB in 2016 and held a 35-minute lead beyond the halfway point. He still led at the 100K mark, only to struggle over the final 50K and wind up sixth. What makes UTMB different, he says, is that the endless string of long climbs and descents demands a more moderate rhythm and effort over the first half of the course so you don't blow up before the race really begins.

"I don't think there's a super-secret code to crack. We've had a number of really good American men run there, it's just we have to have one of them have a good day all day one of these years," Miller says. "It's not anything we can't figure out or accommodate for. I think we've done it in other European-style races. It's just this one has kind of eluded us. I think it's possible that someone is going to have that 'right' day, but you almost have to have to get a little lucky, too."

Tollfeson is coming off three DNFs at UTMB in 2018, 2019, and 2021, and had a tough Western States this year (21st). Miller also DNF'ed at UTMB in 2018 and 2019 and then was away from racing because of injuries. He finished his first long ultra in several years in late June, winning the Andorra 100K to earn his place in Chamonix.

Other Americans in the field include David Laney (third at UTMB in 2015), Jason Schlarb (fourth in 2014), Seth Swanson (fourth  in 2015 and seventh at TDS last year) and Sage Canaday (48th at UTMB in 2017), who is back after suffering a pulmonary embolism and a devastating house fire in 2021.  

As for Walmsley, his front-running style has helped him snag three Western States 100 titles, three JFK 50 wins, a 50-mile world-best time, a 100K American record and the Fastest Known Time running across the Grand Canyon and back. It also helped him produce a solid 2:15:05, 22nd-place effort at the 2020 U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials. 

Most recently, he tore up the trails (and the competition) at the rough and rugged Madeira Island Ultra Trail 115K in Portugal in April. Otherwise is been running in the Beaufortain Mountains with D'Haene and training a lot on a Wahoo bike trainer in France. Two weeks ago, he completed the arduous 114K (71-mile) Ultra Tour du Beaufortain loop with 7,300 meters (25,000 feet) of vertical gain as one of his last big training days. 

"I hope Jim can change it this year," D'Haene says. "I hope he will be OK and can run a good race, of course, but it's UTMB and, of course, it's always difficult."

How a Two-Time Olympic Marathoner Finished Western States 100

For a guy who's run solid marathons at the world's most competitive level, Reid Coolsaet admits he felt like a wide-eyed rookie at times during the 2022 Western States 100.

The two-time Olympic marathoner for Canada turned in a solid performance in his first time running 100 miles, finishing in 19 hours, 27 minutes, and 3 seconds. That placed him 25th overall and 17th among men, which isn't bad for a guy who has been more accustomed to running sub-5-minute mile pace for 26.2 miles at the peak of his career. (For reference, his Western States time averages out to 11:39 per mile.)

The 42-year-old from Hamilton, Ontario, had great moments and humbling moments during the race and says he learned plenty along the way, including a slow run-walk effort over the final 20 miles to the finish. Still, he left Auburn in good spirits with the notion that he might run another 100-miler at some point in his future

"I actually feel pretty good," he said this week after returning home. "I thought I would be a lot more wrecked than I am, which is a bit of a weird thing with ultras. I find myself barely able to run at the end and figure I won't be able to walk for a few days, but then I feel OK and think, 'Why didn't I run harder?' I feel like I had a 30K cooldown at Western States and I think that's what helped me recover."

Coolsaet owns a respectable 2:10:28 marathon PR at the 2015 Berlin Marathon and also raced well in two Olympic games - all before the advent of carbon-plated super shoes. At the 2012 Games in London, he finished 27th in the marathon (2:16:29) and four years later improved to 23rd overall (2:14:58) in Rio de Janeiro. 

He's believed to be the only Olympic runner to run in the Western States 100 aside from Magda Boulet, a 2008 Olympic marathoner for the U.S. who was the 2015 Western States women's champion and 2017 runner-up. 

Coolsaet started running ultra-distance races last summer after ending one final quest to qualify for the Tokyo Olympics. In his last attempt to run 2:11 or faster at a race in Siena, Italy, last April, he went through the halfway point in 65 minutes but faded to 2:16:38.

From there, he shifted to trail running and won the Quebec Mega Trail 110K race last August (14:24). But even though he was successful, he found out that he needed to do a lot more work to handle long descents and technical trails after his legs locked up on a long, downhill section.

He's believed to be the only Olympic runner to run in the Western States 100 aside from Magda Boulet, a 2008 Olympic marathoner for the U.S. who was the 2015 Western States women's champion and 2017 runner-up.

Coolsaet trained through the winter and turned in a good performance at the Canyons Endurance Runs 100K in Auburn in April, placing 15th overall (14th among men) in 10:12. He didn't earn a Golden Ticket, but was able to get a sponsor's entry for Western States.

When he arrived in Olympic Valley before the race, he hoped to compete for a top-10 finish and pegged Scott Traer and Jeff Colt as two runners he might be able to run with based on the smart races they had run at the Canyons 100K. He said his first 25 miles went about how he hoped as he was in the top 15 and staying hydrated and fueled.  

He prepared for the heat by doing considerable sauna training in the weeks before the race. When temperatures rose into the mid-90s by mid-day, he kept the sun's impact at bay by taking on ice and wearing white arm sleeves and a sun hat. But from about the 30.3-mile Robinson Flat aid station to roughly the 50-mile point on the descent from Devil's Thumb to the El Dorado aid station, he started to lose contact with Traer and Colt (who would go on to finish 10th and 11th, respectively).

Thanks to his crew, Coolsaet recovered and still had a competitive mindset when he left the 62-mile Foresthill aid station, but running alone in the heat down to Rucky Chucky and the river crossing was the beginning of the end. By the time he picked up his second pacer at Green Gate near mile 80, he felt nauseous and had dead legs, which forced him to shift to survival mode.

"I was like 'Yeah, I'm just finishing this thing.' At that point, in my mind, I was just determined to finish," he says. "When I'm hurting that much, I have to be really excited about trying to catch people. And with the way I felt, I would have had to kill myself to catch two more people. That was a big ask for a little reward. I was just struggling to get one foot in front of the other for the last 30K. My legs were just shot. I could always run slow, but I would find myself at a small incline and just have to start walking."

He finished at 12:27 a.m. and was surprised to see his family there to greet him. He ran the final 300 meters on the track at Placer High School with his wife, Marie, and kids, Louis, 5, and Elodie, 4. 

"It's fun because it's a lot more interactive than running marathons, where I won't even break a stride when I pass someone," he says. "In road races that my kids saw me run, I would zoom by at a fast pace and that was it. But in ultras, my wife has helped out a lot by crewing me, and I can high-five my kids at aid stations and then run the last 300 meters with them, so that's pretty cool."

For the time being, Coolsaet says he'll take time off to recover but quickly adds that he's as motivated as ever to run more trail races, both sub-ultra and ultra-distance events. Although he has no plans for another 100-miler anytime soon, he says he'll continue to pursue trail running and develop his technical trail running skills.

"I'd always rather been on the trails, but there just wasn't the Olympics on the trails," he says. "Without the Olympics, this is really where I want to be. Obviously, I would like to do really well at it, but I don't feel like I need to do well. When running was my job, I was super-motivated to be at the top in Canada and be on an international stage. There is just so much more unknown, but I'm not really dwelling on it too much and more just enjoying it. It's not that I don't want to be competitive, but I don't feel the same urgency to be at the top. So if I'm just doing all right at it and having fun, that's fine with me."

2022 Western States 100 Men’s Race

This year’s men’s race had the notable absence of course record holder Jim Walmsley, who has dominated the race in recent years, leaving it wide open for a good number of runners with potential to win. Among them were seven of last year’s top 10, including second-place finisher Tyler Green, and Tim Tollefson, who was fifth last year but hotly fancied to be capable of winning this race on a good day. Last year’s eighth place man, Hayden Hawks, who ran Western States as his debut 100 miler, was also believed to have more to offer in this race.

Notably, joining them as a Golden Ticket entrant was Jared Hazen, the second fastest Western States finisher of all time.

And last but certainly not least, the relative new kid on the block, who has quickly shot up through the distances and dominated every ultra he’s ever started — Adam Peterman.

Peterman won his way into Western States at the Canyons by UTMB 100k, where he toppled the course record in his first ever 100-kilometer race. He took a gamble by taking on his first 100 miler a little over two months later, and defended the decision to iRunFar in his pre-race interview saying: “I don’t feel like I always need to just make logical steps because we’re running 100 miles, that’s an illogical game.”

The first 3.5 miles of Western States features 2,550 feet of climbing, to the first landmark at the Escarpment. First to the top was Adam Kimble, closely followed by France’s Ludovic Pommeret  — with Hawks, France’s Seb Spehler, and Hazen coming through in quick succession.

Tollefson, Tom Owens (U.K.), Peterman, Jonathan Rea, and Alex Nichols completed the front 10, all within a couple of minutes of each other.

By Lyon Ridge at mile 10, Ludovic had taken the lead and he came through Red Star Ridge at mile 15, four minutes clear of Spehler in second, with Kimble in third, and Hawks and Tollefson a few minutes back, followed by Hazen, Peterman, and Arlen Glick. Nine minutes separated the first eight runners to this point.

The two Frenchmen held the top positions into mile 24, just before Duncan Canyon, with Pommeret coming through six minutes off course record pace. At this point Tollefson had moved up to third and Hawks and Peterman sat comfortably in fourth and fifth, 8:10 back from the lead, with Glick following 10 seconds behind.

Pommeret held the lead into Robinson Flat, mile 30, with the pressure starting to show. Hawks had moved up to second by now and was looking a lot more comfortable, just two minutes back from the leader. Peterman had then moved up the field also to third position, just in front of Spehler, who’d dropped back to fourth, with Tollefson seconds behind. This chasing pack were just four-and-a-half minutes off the leader.By Millers Defeat at mile 34, Hawks had closed the gap to a minute, and by Dusty Corners, mile 38, he’d taken the lead from Pommeret.

Through Deadwood Cemetery, mile 49.5, Hawks maintained the lead and looked like he was having a super day. There had been some reshuffling in the other top positions, with Peterman, Hazen, and Glick all still in the mix.

By Foresthill, mile 62, Hawks was still in the lead but Peterman had separated himself from the other chasers in second. He arrived just three minutes back from Hawks and almost eight minutes clear of Hazen in third. Spehler, who had a promising first half, had dropped back the field suffering stomach issues, and Tollefson had also fallen back from the front runners.

Hawks was still in the lead after Foresthill, but by Cal 2, mile 70, Peterman had joined him at the front and the race was on! Hazen held third place, 14 minutes back from the leaders, with Glick in fourth another 15 minutes back from Hazen.

When the race reached the Rucky Chucky river crossing at mile 78, Hawks still looked comfortable but Peterman had stretched four minutes ahead, putting 30 seconds per mile on his opponent since Cal 2, showing unbelievable strength and determination for a 100-mile debut.

Hazen maintained third position, now 24 minutes off the lead, with Glick and France’s Vincent Vietmaking up the front five.

Hazen had started to struggle and dropped out at mile 85, with Glick moving up to third. Peterman had by now extended his lead to 10 minutes.

The top three positions remained unchanged for the remainder of the race, but Peterman utterly dominated in the closing miles, finishing in 15:13:48, almost 34 minutes clear of Hawks in 15:47:27. Glick rounded out the top three in 15:56:17.

t’s clear from this 100-mile debut that we will be seeing a lot more of Adam Peterman. He executed this win in a similarly patient manner to his win at the Canyons 100k, and he races like a runner with a lot more ultrarunning experience than he has.

Moving up all race again, Green ended the day in fourth position in 15:57:10, what was two places back but some 13 minutes faster than his debut at this race last year. Drew Holmen (pre-race interview) finished fifth after a strong, all-day performance. His 16:09 finish this year is also two places back but 14 minutes faster than last year. These two gentlemen have much in common.

Frenchman Pommeret stayed strong to finish in sixth place and first masters, and he was closely chased by fellow Frenchman Viet. Nichols moved up two spots this year to take eighth. Cody Lind moved back from fourth last year to ninth this year. And Scott Traer meted out his race effort perfectly to run his way into the men’s top 10 for 10th place.

Men’s DNFs included Spehler and Hazen, both due to various physical issues.

2022 Western States 100 Women’s Race

Last year’s winner Beth Pascall was absent from the start list for 2022, but there was still plenty of talent toeing the line. Six of last year’s top 10 made the final starting list, including hot favorite and previous second-place finisher, New Zealand’s Ruth Croft and last year’s seventh-place woman Emily Hawgood, who was believed to be capable of ruffling some feathers on her second attempt.

Outside of the returning top runners, this year’s start list also featured 100-mile world record holder Camille Herron, former podium finisher Lucy Bartholomew (Australia), and second-place woman at last year’s UTMB, France’s Camille Bruyas.

Herron was first to the top of the Escarpment, the race’s high point at mile 3.5, with Ellie Pell hot on her heels. They were followed by Keely Henninger, Poland’s Dominika Stelmach, Katie Asmuth, Canada’s Marianne Hogan, Lindsey Hagen, and Camille Bruyas, all within a couple of seconds of each other. Hawgood followed along in ninth position, followed by Switzerland’s Luzia Buehler in 10th.

The race had yet to space out at Lyon Ridge at mile 10, with Stelmach, Herron, and Hogan coming in together, closely followed by Henninger, Hawgood, Asmuth, and Pell.

By Red Star Ridge at mile 15, Croft had begun to make her presence felt and climbed up the field to fourth position. Hogan led the field into Duncan Canyon, mile 24, just 20 seconds clear of Stelmach in second, then Hawgood, Henninger, and Croft.

By Robinson Flat, mile 30, Hawgood and Croft had moved up to share the lead and they continued to run together through mile 38, which they passed just under course record pace. Stelmach followed about 90 seconds back in third, a minute clear of Henninger in fourth. Herron had moved back to seventh position but still looked good.

The two leaders were still together at Devil’s Thumb, mile 47, but shortly after Croft managed to break away and ran through Deadwood Cemetery, mile 49.5, seven minutes back of course record pace. Hawgood came through just 30 seconds later, still looking happy and fresh and Henninger looked strong in third, 1:15 back from Croft.

The top two remained the same through mile 62, Foresthill, but Herron had begun to fight back and moved up to third position, about 18 minutes back from the leader and four minutes clear of Ailsa Macdonald in fourth. By the Rucky Chucky river crossing, mile 78, Croft had further extended her lead, but the real action was taking place behind her, with Macdonald making moves and climbing up to second place, 24 minutes back from Croft and three clear of Hawgood. Then with 10 miles to go at Quarry Road, Marianne Hogan, who had never been too far out of the frame, made a push and climbed up to third position. 

Croft sealed the deal with a 17:21:30 finish to take the win, the third fastest women’s time on record. Macdonald finished impressively close, just 25 minutes back in 17:46:46. Marianne Hogan took the final podium spot in 18:08:32, less than three minutes clear of Buehler in fourth, in a race that really wasn’t over ‘til it was over.

Hawgood, who ran a brave race, finished fifth in 18:16:02, almost an hour better than her previous time. We expect there will be more to come from her if she takes her place on the 2023 start line.

Leah Yingling was sixth in 18:32:31, and Taylor Nowlin, who had a strong second half, took seventh in 18:46:42. Herron, who’s had bad luck in this race before, had a strong eighth place finish in 18:51:54 and Asmuth and Bruyas rounded out the top 10 in 19:30:26 and 19:34:24 respectively. Overall, 11 women broke 20 hours this year, with Anne-Marie Madden finishing just outside the top 10 in 19:38:44.

Women’s DNFs included Bartholomew and Henninger, both due to injury.

Western States 100 Time Predictions Based On Historical Data

The Western States 100 is the Super Bowl of US trail running, just with fewer cryptocurrency commercials. Every year, the race gathers some of the best athletes in the world to test themselves on the world-famous course. The competition, along with comprehensive data gathering by the race organizers, provides a massive statistical opportunity.

Marshall Burke, associate professor of Earth System Science at Stanford University, seized that opportunity with some wonderfully cool data analyses heading into the 2022 race. The research question he sought to answer: how are race times progressing as the sport grows, and how are those times affected by temperature changes?

Marshall is a wonderful athlete himself, with an April 2022 Fastest Known Time on the Buffalo River Trail in Arkansas, so he's used to moving fast. In his spare time, between research and Zoom calls, he compiled the data on finishing times and temperatures, controlling for years when there was snow on the course or when the course was altered. 

"I may never run Western States," Marshall says. "But I can run statistics on it!"

He's doing world-changing work on climate change at Stanford University, and that made his quest have both a personal and academic interest. "This combines my research focus on the impacts of climate with my hobby of running slowly through the mountains," he says. Since this was a quick analysis for fun (and to help me with coaching; helps to have really, really smart friends), Marshall wants to be clear that the numbers could change. And I want to be clear that any errors are the fault of the field of Statistics for being the worst.

Let's all run fast through some of the fascinating data he gathered!Finding #1: Times of top finishers have progressed rapidly.

Since 2000, a linear model of top times for men and women shows bonkers improvement. Bonkers is a scientific term; you'd know it if you, like me, took an Intro To Stats class in 2004. The male winner is about 2 hours faster on average, with the same general improvement for the average of places 2 through 5. The female winners are around 1 hour faster, with places 2 through 5 improving more than 2 hours.When not accounting for temperature, times would be expected to drop considerably each year-around 4 minutes per year for men since the 1980s, and about 4:45 per year for women. Interestingly, the women's top 5 times are coming down faster than the winning time, showing a tighter race at the front.

I asked Marshall to run the men's times with Jim Walmsley being removed. Want to see a cool chart of just how much of an outlier he is? Taking out Jim's winning times moved the linear regression substantially, with the new red line predicting substantially slower times overall. And if he didn't get lost in 2016, the effect would be even more pronounced! You know you're a good runner when you mess up the statistics.  

Finding #2: For all finishers, men are improving gradually, while women are improving rapidly.

Since 2000, the average women's finish time has improved by 5 minutes and 15 seconds per year! Meanwhile, the average finisher independent of gender has only improved around 2 minutes per year. So women are driving the sport forward in an emphatic way! Bosses!

Finding #3: Heat has a massive performance impact.

Let's start with a simple scatterplot of heat versus winning time.There is clearly a ton of variation in the scatter. Heat is not destiny. But there is some clear relationship, so maybe it's destiny's child. If you go too hard on a hot day, the body has to pay the bills bills bills later.

Marshall ran multiple regression analyses to combine the effects of overall time improvements with heat increases to give us a more sophisticated analysis, again also controlling for whether there was snow on the course. He is so damn sophisticated! Using times since 2000, the general rule is that for every 1 degree F increase in temperature in Auburn, California on race day, there is a 2:48 increase in winning time for men and a 2:52 increase for women. Removing Jim's times (Mr. Mess-Up-Your-Stats), there is a 3:26 increase for men for every degree increase.

For the average finisher using the same regression analysis, 1 degree F increases correspond with 2:34 increases in finishing times. DNFs go up about 0.5% for every 1 degree F increase as well. The ratio of times for men and women is not significantly impacted by temperature, so even though the hot year in 2021 saw women absolutely rock the list of top finishers, that may not be explained by heat in the way that everyone assumed.Finding #4: Predictions for 2022

The forecast from Weather Underground is currently 97 degrees F on race day in Auburn, relative to an average of 89. Combining the heat data with the overall improvement in times as the sport progresses, here are the predictions from Marshall's model, again based on data from the last 20 years.

For the male winner, it depends heavily on whether we remove Jim from the data. Assuming Jim is a true outlier, we can expect a winning time around 15 hours. For women, it's 17.5 hours. For the average racer, times should be around a half hour slower than normal, but that is affected by a higher DNF rate, so I'd suggest athletes build in much more buffer.

The trend in the 10th place times is most instructive to me, as a coach that is trying to help support athletes getting an invitation to next year's race. Those 10th place times have come down by massive margins over time, 9:22 for men and 12:50 for women. But the times are also more affected by the heat relative to the top 5 finishers. Put it all together, and the model predicts that 20 hours will place in the top-10 for women, and around 17 hours for men.

My personal prediction will be for fast winning times, but a greater spread after that, with the 10th place man and woman being around 30 minutes slower than predicted. The faster times as the sport progresses will not follow a linear model eventually, and my guess is that we are starting to approach an asymptote. To paraphrase Mark Twain, there are lies, damn lies, Statistics, and a running coach pulling wild guesses out of his butt.

Three Big Conclusions

Respect the heat, but don't respect it too much.  

It's good to have brilliant friends like Marshall when you're looking for a possible coaching advantage. 

Finally, Jim Walmsley breaks statistics.

Is Multiple 100-Mile Races In A Single Season Too Much?

Jim Walmsley absolutely destroyed the competition and the course record at the 2018 Western States 100. Rather than kicking back and enjoying the win, however, Walmsley needed to quickly return to training for the Ultra Trail du Mont Blanc (UTMB) just two months later. While he started out strong in UTMB, he eventually took a DNF, his legs drained of all energy.

Now that he's had time to reflect, Walmsley admits that top results at two 100-milers within a couple of months might be a stretch.

"My training went well and I was able to get in more tapering for UTMB than last year," he says. "But the combination might be asking too much."

The experience has left Walmsley reconsidering how he might approach his 2019 season.

Walmsley's two-big-100s-in-a-season approach is something several elites have attempted, with mixed results-Darcy Piceu, Jeff Browning and Karl Meltzer, among them. Fellow elite Tim Tollefson focuses only on UTMB each year. Magda Lewy Boulet passed over Western States in favor of a good go at UTMB as well (both Tollefson and Boulet took hard falls and had to pull out last year).

Which begs some questions: Is more than one 100-miler feasible in a given season? And how does the question differ for elites vs amateurs?

Figuring the Formula

The formula for successful marathoning (if your definition of success is placing well) is somewhat tried and true at no more than two per year, says Mario Fraioli, author of the "Morning Shakeout" and coach to Tollefson.

"For most athletes, even elites, racing two high-level marathons a year, between the buildup, the race itself and recovery afterward, is a big ask of the body and mind," he says. "Two a year is all most people can handle if they're committed to training properly, performing optimally and recovering adequately."

In contrast, runners and coaches are still tinkering with the right mixture of 100-milers. It pays to consider the toll that mileage takes on your body, a toll that varies depending on distance and how hard your effort was.

Recovery First

"The intensity of a 50K or 50-miler is a lot higher than it is during 100," Fraioli says. "On the flipside, 100 miles is a lot longer time to be out on your feet and more things can go wrong. Your body goes through a lot when it's out for that long (as does your mind), the nutritional demands are different, sleep gets affected, and it just beats you up in a different way under the hood."

Ian Sharman, coach and founder of Sharman Ultra Endurance Coaching, says that pulling off multiple 100s in a season is doable, but  should be a game of patience.

"Unlike marathons, where being in top shape on race day is necessary for hitting goal pace, ultras are more forgiving," he says. "Someone like Walmsley can go into a 100 out of peak shape and that won't be the biggest factor for how the day goes."

Temperature, nutrition, trail conditions and the way a race unfolds within the field all play a role, as can plain old luck. Consider the falls that took out several top contenders at UTMB last year, as well as the blistering pace laid down by the early leaders-a pace that eventually chewed them up and spit them out.

Still, Sharman says, elites and amateurs alike should take a long time to build up to the challenge of two or more 100s in a year. "Don't get greedy," he cautions. "Make that first race a big deal, and then wait to see how recovery goes."

That means not fixing a set time to recover or having a second 100 lined up. "Listen to what your body and mind are telling you and don't force the issue," Sharman says.

Look for positive recovery signs like a return to normal resting heart rate, the ability to get a good night's sleep, lack of muscle soreness and mental enthusiasm for a return to training. All indicate you may be ready to return to more normalized training and, eventually, racing.

Fraioli says that because Tollefson is still relatively new to the 100-mile distance, as a team they have approached it conservatively. "A big reason is that at his level, there's a physical and psychological toll to the volume and intensity," he says. "The prep is arduous and we need to build in adequate recovery."

The rules for amateurs, however, will take on a different appearance.

What About the Rest of Us?

For amateurs, the edge needn't be as sharp. "Many age groupers are running 100s as an experiential event-it's not their job," Fraioli explains. "But the same principles of recovery should apply."

That means not jumping back into training quickly after the first event. "You have an incredible base built up from that first race and that's probably your best training for your second," says Fraioli. "Detach from a schedule and keep your running loose and unstructured."

Until you've reached a fully recovered state, run when you feel like it, leave the speedwork at home and keep distances and paces on the shorter/easier side.

That was the approach Jason Bahamundi of Dallas, Texas, took in 2016, when his desire to qualify for the Western States lottery forced him into running two 100s, by accident, just two weeks apart. With seven 100s and several other ultras under his belt, the consistently high-placing age-grouper Bahamundi treaded cautiously in order to pull the double off.

"I ran the Coldwater Rumble in January, mistakenly assuming it was a WS qualifier," he says. "It wasn't so I began looking for a second option. Rocky Raccoon was two weeks later, so I went for it."

Knowing that his only focus between the two races was recovery, Bahamundi completed only a handful of runs, all five miles or shorter.

"I focused on eating healthy and getting plenty of sleep," he says. "I needed the swelling to go down so I'd be prepared to race again."

He also approached the second 100 with a conservative mindset. "I was only concerned with finishing and I know I can walk a 15- to 18-minute mile and still finish under 30 hours," says Bahamundi. "I was able to finish out in 20 hours, three hours faster than at Coldwater. Rocky Raccoon is an easier course so you can wear yourself out pretty quickly if you're not careful."

Your Mileage May Vary

Fraioli says that the quest to run multiple 100s in a season will look different for each runner and that there's no real blueprint to follow. That said: "As a general rule, prioritize rest, recovery and cross training between 100-mile efforts," says Fraioli. "For most people, you won't have to rebuild the wheel in between, but you do have to recover and reset so that you're ready to go to the well again."

"There are more ultras and more interest in running 100-milers than ever," he says. "There's just not much data available yet to understand the toll they will take on a body, so everyone has to figure out their own balance

American Jim Walmsley will be taking another stab at UTMB

The 2022 edition of the Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc (UTMB) is seven months away, but the elite fields have been made official. Although he has never done better than fifth (and that was back in 2017), American Jim Walmsley will be gunning for a podium finish again on Aug. 28, along with seven of Canada’s top ultrarunners, including last year’s third-place finisher, Mathieu Blanchard. Check out the top athletes who will be racing this year.

UTMB — men

Blanchard, who is from France but lives and trains in Montreal, is among the top men who will be competing this year. Going into the race, Blanchard says his goal is to win the race, and he’ll have two main focuses for his training: “the first will be to prepare myself mentally, to visualize, to accept this possibility of a big goal because I still have trouble believing it today,” he says. “The second will be to build a logical race path to prepare for this race, choices of reason rather than choices of the heart.”

Last year’s second-place finisher, Aurélien Dunand-Pallaz of France will be returning, along with 2019 UTMB winner, Pau Capell of Spain. Walmsley, whose top finish was fifth in 2017 but who has won the Western States 100 for three consecutive years (2021, 2019, 2018) will also be challenging for a podium spot, as will France’s Xavier Thévenard, who has won UTMB three times (2018, 2015, 2013) and placed second in 2019. Nine other recent top-five finishers will also be joining them on the start line.

Notably absent from the start list is last year’s winner, François D’Haene and three-time UTMB champion, Kilian Jornet.

UTMB – women

Canadian ultrarunning fans will have plenty to cheer about in the women’s race in August. Three top Canadians will be on the start line, including Montreal’s Marianne Hogan, who won the 2022 Bandera 100K and placed second at the Ultra-Trail Cape Town 100k. Toronto’s Claire Heslop, Canada’s top finisher in 2021, will be joining Hogan, along with Alissa St. Laurent of Moutain View, Alta., who placed fifth in the 2018 UTMB TDS 145K in 2018 and sixth at UTMB in 2017.

“My dream result would be a top 10 at UTMB,” says Hogan, “so I will definitely shoot for that. A lot can happen come race day, so I will make sure to show up to the start line as ready as possible.”

Other top contenders on the women’s side include Camille Herron, who won the 2021 Javelina Jundred Mile (and broke the course record) in 2021 and set the 24-hour world record in 2019, Anna Troup, who won the 2021 Lakeland 100 Mile and the 2021 Spine Race Summer Edition 268 Mile, Sabrina Stanley, two-time winner of the Hardrock 100 and Beth Pascal, winner of last year’s Western States and two-time top-five finisher at UTMB.

There will be five other recent top-five finishers on the start line as well, but running fans will be disappointed to hear the two-time winner Courtney Dauwalter, 2019 third-place finisher Maite Maiora, among several other past winners, will not be in Chamonix on August 28.

CCC — women

There will be three elite Canadian women in the 100K CCC, including Victoria’s Catrin Jones, who placed in the top-10 at the 2019 Comrades Marathon 90k and holds the Canadian 50-mile and six-hour records. She will be joined by Ailsa MacDonald of St. Albert, Alta., who won the 2020 Tarawera 100 Mile and the Hoka One One Bandera 100K, and placed sixth in the CCC in 2019. Rounding out the Canadian squad will be Vancouver’s Kat Drew, who was third at the 2019 Bandera 100K, first at the Canyons 100K and eighth at Western States in 2019.

Other notable runners in the CCC include New Zealand’s Ruth Croft, who won the 2021 Grand Trail des Templiers 80k, placed second at the 2021 Western States 100 and won the UTMB 55K OCC in 2018 and 2019. France’s Blandine L’hirondel will also be looking to land on the podium after winning the OCC last year.

Canadian Reid Coolsaet set to run the 2022 Western States 100

The lotteries for the 2022 Western States 100 and Hardrock 100 took place this weekend, and Canadian Olympian Reid Coolsaet got his name on the Western States list. With over 8,000 applicants vying for only 340 lottery spots (221 for Western States and 119 for Hardrock), runners without automatic entry have a slim chance of having their names pulled, but 34 lucky Canadians got a spot on the start lines.

Western States

Of the top 10 male finishers at last year’s race, eight will be making their return to Olympic Valley, Calif., including second- and third-place finishers Tyler Green and Drew Holmen. Jim Walmsley, who won the race in 2018, 2019 and 2021 (the race was canceled in 2020 due to COVID-19), has not elected to return for the 2022 race. The top three podium finishers from last year’s race, Beth Pascall of the UK, Ruth Croft of New Zealand and Ragna Debats of the Netherlands, will all be returning, as will six more of the top 10 women from 2021.

Canada’s Ailsa MacDonald received automatic entry, thanks to her 13th-place finish at the 2019 Western States and first-place finish at the 2020 Tarawera 100 Mile. Other fast runners who have received automatic entry include Sébastien Spehler (second at Ultra Trail Cape Town this year), Tom Owens (fourth at UTMB in 2019), Cole Watson (third at the Javelina Jundred), Stephanie Auston (third at the 2020 Black Canyon 100K and second at the 2019 Tarawera 100K) and Zoë Rom (third at the 2021 Rio del Lago 100 Mile and third at the 2021 Tillamook Burn 50 Mile), among others.

Coolsaet will be one of the top Canadians in the race, despite being relatively new to the ultramarathon scene. In August, he won his first-ever ultra, the Quebec Ultra Trail 110K, despite missing a turn and having to run an extra 10 kilometres. He will be joined by several other Canadians, including:

Leo Fung, Calgary

Jesse Hulley, Calgary

Mike Jollie, Calgary

Kevin Jansen, Calgary

Rohan Aurora, Vancouver

Steve Day, North Vancouver

Adam Harris, Squamish, B.C.

Patrick Humenny, Kimberly, B.C.

Ricardo Tortini, Port Moody, B.C.

Dawson Mossman, New Maryland, NB

Aytug Celikbas, Oakville, Ont.

Matt Lowe, Hamilton

Derek Mulhall, Tecumseh, Ont.

Norman Nadan, Orangeville, Ont.

James Swartz, Toronto

Vincent Gauthier, St-Zotique, Que.

Fanny Barrette, Calgary

Tara Chahl, Edmonton

Chelsey Topping, Lethbridge, Alta.

Kelly Haston, Toronto

Karen Holland, Kimberly, Ont.

Hardrock 100

Hardrock is particularly difficult to get into, because the only way to gain automatic entry into the race is by winning it the previous year. A unique addition to this year’s lottery: entrants who were chosen for last year’s race but were unable to travel because of COVID-19 were given automatic entry for 2022, which included 16 men and two women.

There are some big names on the 2022 start list, including Courtney Dauwalter, Sabrina Stanley, Magie Guterl, François D’Haene, Kilian Jornet, John Kelly, Luke Nelson and Jeff Browning. Canada’s Stephanie Case, who was the first woman (and third overall) at the 450km Tor des Glaciers race in Italy, will also be on the start line.

Other Canadians who received entry into Hardrock include:

Suzanne Johnson, North Vancouver

Dana Samis, North Vancouver

Joanna Ford, Calgary

Larry Kundrik, Lethbridge, Alta.

Ken Legg, Powell River, BC

Randy Duncan, Victoria, BC

Christopher Aubrey, Sherwood Park, Alta.

Nathaniel Couture, Fredericton, NB

Matthew Fortuna, Oyama, BC

Leo Fung, Calgary

Javelina Jundred is the Ultimate 'Jalloween' Party

There's going to be one hell of a Halloween party held on the outskirts of the Phoenix metro area this weekend.

Part authentic endurance running race and part freak show with costumed trail runners constantly in need of rehydrating, the Javelina Jundred trail running races and post-race party are the stuff of legend. As the race producers at Aravaipa Running proclaim from the start, "it will test your endurance and challenge your sanity."

The 19th annual Javelina 100-mile and 100km races begin Saturday at 6 a.m. and send runners out on a mostly flat and fast multiple- loop course through the desert terrain of McDowell Mountain Regional Park. And while fast running isn't discouraged - the women's 100-mile winner usually finishers under 16 hours and the men under 14 hours - costumers definitely are encouraged. There's also a nighttime race called the single-loop Jackass Night Trail 31km that finishes as the Saturday night party is starting to rev into high gear. 

Javelina is a trail running party that really wants to be an all-night rave. As much as it offers great fall racing opportunities (with 2022 Western States 100 Golden Ticket qualifying spots for the first time), it's really more about being a massive Ultra Jalloween Party for the ultrarunning community. The races draw both elite pros, middle-of-the-packers and novice runners alike, but it's the colorful costumes, free candy at aid stations, all-night music, spontaneous dance parties, fire dancing, misfit parade for waitlisted runners and other festive craziness that runners remember the most.

The race was started in 2003 by Phoenix ultrarunner Geri Kilgariff as an irreverent, party-oriented fun run on a multi-loop course and eventually later taken over by Aravaipa Running in 2008.

"She created this event to basically troll everyone, and thought that it would be funny," Matt Feldhake said during the race's video preview released this week. "And it's turned out to be this incredible, fun event in the desert. She created something great and we've been grateful to continue to put it on since 2008." 

How wild is it? Put it this way, no other race has an aid station with the nickname of Boner. (It's a skeleton figure you'll encounter at the Jackass Junction aid station.) There's also a "Best Ass Award" at this desert party, which coincides with the adult-themed "R" rating Aravaipa brandishes on its website.

As for the racing, there are plenty of talented runners among the 588 entrants in the 100-mile field. That includes Devon Yanko (39, San Anselmo, California), Camille Heron (39, Oro Valley, Arizona), Brittany Peterson (35, Pocatello, Idaho), Meredith Edwards (37, Durango, Colorado), Lisa Robert (42, Tucson), Tessa Chesser (34, Flagstaff, Arizona) and Lotti Zeiler (25, Austin, Texas) on the women's side and Dave Stevens (39, Canada), Adam Dalton (27, San Diego), Michael Demarco (34, Baton Rogue, Louisiana), Zach Merrin (36, North Canton, Ohio), Charlie Ware (36, Tucson) and Joe "String Bean" McConaughey (30, Seattle) among the top men.

Also in the field are 13-time finisher Susan Donnelly (58, Oak Ridge, Tennessee) and 11-time finisher Fred Roberts (61, Tucson). And then there's Ed Ettinghausen (59, Murietta, California), a six-time Javelina finisher who has made a name for himself by taking on the Javelina Jundred in a full suit and heavy jester hat.

In the 100K, Tyler Andrews (41, Concord, Massachusetts) leads a strong men's field, while Cat Bradley (29, Boulder, Colorado) is one of the top entrants among the women's field. 

"It's definitely a one-of-a-kind race," says Phoenix trail runner John Byrne. "But even if you don't run fast or well or very long, it's an amazing party."

Timothy Olson (Probably) Just Nabbed the FKT on the PCT

After 2,652 miles, 400,000 feet in elevation gain, and more than 51 days, the ultrarunner finished his PCT thru-hike.

Fifty-two days, eight hours, and twenty-five minutes. As of Thursday evening, that’s the record Timothy Olson appears to have beat running from border to border, Mexico to Canada, on the Pacific Crest Trail. Once Olson’s own time is confirmed, he will have completed the PCT faster than anyone ever before. According to his Instagram account, his unconfirmed time is 51 days, 16 hours, and 55 minutes.

When Olson arrived at the northern terminus of the PCT at 10:48 P.M.on Thursday, he seemingly surpassed the record held by Karel Sabbe from Belgium since 2016. An FKT on the PCT, which winds through 2,652 miles of rugged mountain terrain in California, Oregon, and Washington, is one of the most prized speed records in thru-hiking and ultra-running. And for good reason: Olson averaged more than 50 miles a day for seven weeks straight for this record, often at alpine altitudes, gaining more than 400,000 feet in elevation. Not to mention another 400,000 feet of elevation loss.

Olson wore a GPS tracker for the length of his run, and once the data is confirmed, the official time will be released. (The complete tracker data has yet to be made public.) He started his journey in Campo, California, on June 1, which suggests he beat Sabbe’s time by less than 24 hours. The record comparison is complicated by the fact that trail adjustments, closures, and above all, seasonal wildfires, mean that the Pacific Crest Trail varies in route and length every year. This means that Olson, along with every thru-hiker, had to improvise: at least once, Olson ran up to a trail closure, turned around, ran back to a trailhead, and was driven to the other side of the closure. The extra added miles approximately equaled the distance of the closure, so even if Olson could not run every mile of the trail, he likely ran as many miles, if not slightly more.

Olson is not an amateur athlete, and this isn’t his first ultrarunning record. He once held the record for the Western States 100-Mile Endurance Run, which he won in 2012 and 2013. But running the PCT is a fundamentally different challenge, physically and logistically.

Many FKT attempts on the country’s “triple crown” of thru-hikes, which also includes the Appalachian Trail and the Continental Divide Trail, end in failure, often due to injury, inclement weather, or sheer exhaustion. Olson was supported by a team of seven following along in two RVs, rendezvousing with Olson as he passed through trailheads, and handling logistics like food and laundry. Most nights, Olson slept in an RV. But in several especially isolated sections, such as the Sierra Nevada, Olson spent the night alone, sleeping on the ground along the trail Sweetening the moment of victory for Olson is that his wife and fellow ultrarunner, Krista Olson, is eight months pregnant with their first daughter. “Each step of the journey, I am connected to my family,” Olson wrote on his Instagram as he ran through Snoqualmie Pass in Washington. Krista and both of his sons, Tristan, 8, and Kai, 5, were active members of his support team, meeting him at trailheads and assisting with logistics. Sometimes, his sons even joined him for brief sections of trail.

In addition to record-chasing, trail running has helped the Olsons cope with loss—in particular, two miscarriages they experienced before their current pregnancy. As part of the FKT attempt, they’ve been raising money for Return to Zero: H.O.P.E., a non-profit that supports families going through pregnancy loss or baby loss.

Thru-hiking the Pacific Crest Trail is an elite physical challenge, even at a normal pace. In 2019, the Pacific Crest Trail Association issued 5,441 thru-hike permits, and another 2,437 permits for section hikes. Of those, only 1,181 people self-reported as having completed the entire PCT. Typically, thru-hikers finish in five to six months, carrying their own food and gear, and sleeping in tents each night. Completing the trail in less than two months, and the logistics needed to make an FKT attempt possible, registers on an altogether different scale of magnitude.

“In a normal year, only around one-fifth of the people who set out to hike the entire PCT actually succeed,” says Scott Wilkinson of the Pacific Crest Trail Association. “To travel the entire trail in a single season is remarkable. To do it faster than anyone ever has? It’s mind-boggling.”

The number of thru-hikers grows each year, as does the number of competitive ultrarunners. For those reasons, Olson’s FKT attempt certainly won’t be the last. But for now, he can rest easy knowing that he is very likely the fastest known PCT thru-hiker of all-time.

2021 Hardrock 100 Preview

Come the morning of Friday, July 16, 146 lucky runners will set off for 100 miles of beauty and challenge through southwestern Colorado’s San Juan Mountains in the Hardrock 100. Along the way, they’ll climb (and descend) 33,000 feet, all at elevations of up to 14,000 feet. The course switches direction with each event edition, and 2021 sees the route run in a counterclockwise direction.

Despite the insistence of some that it’s a ‘run’ rather than a ‘race,’ there’ll certainly be some at the front of both fields going for the win or another top position. This year’s edition will feature strong women’s and men’s races for the win, even if there’s not the competitive depth that the larger fields of other events allow. In the women’s race, we’ll see defending champ Sabrina Stanley challenged by Hardrock newcomer Courtney Dauwalter and three-time winner Darcy Piceu. The men’s returning champion, Jeff Browning, may have even taller task in holding off a pair of talented Hardrock first timers in François D’haene and Dylan Bowman. We dive into the details of each field below!

2021 Hardrock 100 Women’s Preview

Despite only 16 of the 146 runners slated to start this year’s Hardrock at the time I’m writing this, it wouldn’t surprise me if three of this year’s overall top 10 were women. In fact, we could see a pair in the top five if things play out just so.

It’s also worth keeping Diana Finkel’s course record of 27:18:24 from 2009 in mind. She set the course record traveling in the counterclockwise direction, the same direction as this year’s event. It’s also fun to note that the three-fastest ever women’s times at Hardrock were run in this counterclockwise direction.

Although she’ll be a Hardrock rookie, Courtney Dauwalter has to be the women’s favorite at this year’s race. In recent years, she’s won the 2019 UTMB, 2019 Madeira Island Ultra Trail, 2018 Western States 100, and 2018 Ultra-Trail Mount Fuji 100 Mile. Just a few week ago, she set a new course record at the San Juan Solstice 50 Mile, run not far to the east of the Hardrock course. What’s more, Courtney now bases herself up at 10,200 feet in Leadville, Colorado, so she’s plenty accustomed to the thin air she’ll find along the Hardrock cour

Sabrina Stanley returns to Hardrock as the defending women’s champion, having won the 2018 race in 30:23. Since then, she’s won the Hurt 100 Mile (2019) and Diagonale des Fous (2019) along with the shorter Mount Cheaha 50k in February 2020 and Quest for the Crest 50k this May. Last year, Sabrina managed to set the women’s supported FKT for Nolan’s 14—twice. A resident of Silverton, Colorado, she’s fully acclimated to the altitude and knows the course well.

If there’s a current Queen of Hardrock, it’s Darcy Piceu with her three Hardrock wins (2012-14) among her seven finishes while she continues to be a near lock for the women’s podium any given year. Indeed, she finished second in 2015 and 2017, her two most recent runs at the race. More impressively, she has twice as many sub-30 hour Hardrock finishes (six) than another other woman (Diana Finkel has three), and, as far as consistency, Darcy has finished all seven of her Hardrocks between 28:57 and 30:15!? Back in 2018, Darcy won both the Andorra Ultra Trail and Angeles Crest 100 Mile. Darcy did battle a serious injury earlier this year, but bounced back with a win at the Jemez 50 Mile in late May and a second at the Squaw Peak 50 Mile in mid-June.

Meghan Hicks has a pair of Hardrock finishes, with a rough 39-hour finish in 2015 and an improved 34:25 in taking fifth in 2016. In 2016 and again in 2020, she set the then women’s supported FKT for Nolan’s 14. This spring, she took third at Scout Mountain 50 Mile. More important, she’s been living and training on the course since March.

2021 Hardrock 100 Men’s Preview

While this will be his first time running the race, that makes France’s François D’haene no less of a favorite to win this year’s Hardrock. Why? He’d be on a very short list of best mountainous 100-mile trail runners in the world with three wins at UTMB (2012, 2014, and 2017) and four wins at Diagonale des Fous (2013, 2014, 2016, and 2018). Without Kilian Jornet, Xavier Thevenard, or, maybe, Jim Walmsley (he knows these mountains well) here, it’s François’s race to lose outside of the San Juan Mountains and the challenges they hold taking it from him. After a light 2020, François tuned up for Hardrock in taking third at the 112k Ultra Cabo Verde Trail in May. It’s worth noting that when snow canceled Hardrock in 2019, he came over and spent a few weeks training on the Hardrock course anyway and he’s back in the area acclimating and scoping the course for at least two weeks again this year.

After trying to get in for seemingly forever, Dylan Bowman will be another Hardrock rookie challenging for the men’s win. Bowman’s damn good at mountainous 100 milers and spent plenty of years living and training in the Colorado Rockies. Among the reasonably recent results that show his chops in the mountains are a third at Transgrancanaria in 2020, wins of Ultra-Trail Mount Fuji in 2016 and 2019, and a seventh at UTMB in 2017. While he lives in Portland, Oregon these days, he’s been living at altitude in Mammoth Lakes, California and training in the Sierra Nevada for much of the past month.

Jeff Browning returns to Hardrock as the defending champion, from winning in 26:20 back in 2018 following the disqualification of Xavier Thevenard. Among his three other Hardrock finishes, he took fourth in 25:42 in 2016 and fourth in 26:58 in 2014. Earlier this year, he won the Zion 100 Mile. Late last month, Browning dropped out midway through the Western States 100 due to dead quads and wanting to save something for Hardrock. In 21 years of running ultras, it’s only the second time he’s DNFed a race, with the other being due to a sprained ankle at UTMB 2015. Browning will be 49 years old on race day.

High-altitude 100 milers seem to suit Ryan Smith, who won Leadville in 2019 and High Lonesome in 2018. Going back a few years, Smith was ninth at UTMB in 2015 and 22nd there the following year. Other top results include fifth at the shortened to 47k Ultra-Trail Mount Fuji in 2016 and 16th at the 85k Trail World Championships at Penyagolosa in 2018.

One shouldn’t underestimate Trevor Fuchs on a mountainous 100-mile course. He’s won the Hurt 100 mile in 2020, taken second at the Bear 100 Mile in 2019, and won the Wasatch 100 Mile in 2016 and 2017. I’m looking forward to finally seeing Trevor race in person.

Although it’s been quite a while, Julien Chorier has twice run Hardrock, winning in 2011 in 25:17 and taking second to Kilian Jornet in 2014 in 25:07. This Frenchman may no longer be able to run that fast of a time, but he continues to have success, placing ninth at TDS and seventh at Ultra Pirineu in 2018 and finishing fourth at Transgrancanaria and 17th at UTMB in 2019. Earlier this year, Chorier took 13th at Transgrancanaria.

If you’re going to follow this year’s Hardrock, you should know Troy Howard, who finished third in 2018 after finishing second in both 2009 and 2013. One could be worried that he took 14th at the relatively small San Juan Solstice 50 Mile in late June, but he was 12th there in 2018 ahead of his third place at Hardrock. Troy simply knows what he needs to do for a good finish at Hardrock. I should add that Troy will be 48 years old on race day. That goes along with Browning at age 49, Smith at 42, and Chorier at 40. That’s a solid masters field right there!

2021 Western States 100 Men’s Race

It would have taken a lot to convince most everyone to bet against Jim Walmsley (pre-race interview) this year. And yet some of us still somehow did, because Walmsley took an unconventional path to 2021 success. But we all should have known better.

With many of the international men choosing not to make the trip over the various ponds, it was going to be a showdown of domestic talent. Listening to Walmsley talk before the race, it was clear he was in a good place mentally and physically. An IT band injury in the spring may have cut down on his training volume, but in the end, it may have ended up being a blessing in disguise. He went into the race with the experience of two well-executed States performances, and he surely he drew on that knowledge to put together a smart and measured race from start to finish.

Hayden Hawks (pre-race interview), on the other hand, was making just his second attempt at the 100-mile distance. But after setting a course record at the JFK 50 Mile last fall and a solid block of training leading up to Western States, he was out to race and win. Jared Hazen (pre-race interview) was hoping that fourth time would be the charm for Western. After a third and a second in previous years, he hoped that a training block that started in February would deliver results.

It didn’t take Walmsley long to make it the 3.5 miles up to the Escarpment. He was accompanied by Hawks and followed closely by Hazen. This order was entirely unsurprising given that all three men had the confidence to try to win the race.

Early on at Red Star Ridge at mile 15, Hawks and Walmsley were already running three minutes under record pace, the lack of snow clearly saving them time. Hazen followed in third two minutes back with other race favorites Tim Tollefson (pre-race interview), Matt Daniels (pre-race interview), and Mark Hammond close on his heels. Just under an hour later at Duncan Canyon, Walmsley and Hawks had pushed the pace another four minutes under record pace, both running smooth at 24 miles in.

By Robinson Flat at mile 30, Walmsley’s pace had become too much for Hawks. He passed through five minutes under course record pace and 45 seconds in front of Hawks. By this time, Tollefson, running toward his childhood home in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada, had moved into third, just over 12 minutes back, looking very relaxed. Thirty seconds later, Hazen came through, already looking decidedly rough.

Sometime before mile 38, Walmsley had donned a bucket hat and continued to cruise at six minutes under record pace, slowly pulling away from the rest of the field. Hawks held the gap to just six minutes while Hazen and Tollefson joined forces nearly 17 minutes back. The likes of Alex Nichols (pre-race interview), Drew Holmen, and Max King stayed close, just another seven minutes back.

By mile 50, Walmsley had put eight minutes into the course record. Maybe it was the bucket hat, but the only word to describe his appearance was relaxed. It was a full 26 minutes later before second place Hawks rolled through, still seemingly running within himself. Nichols led Tollefson through, both looking strong. Hazen continued to suffer, dropping back to fifth.

By the time the leaders rolled through Foresthill at mile 62, it was 93 Fahrenheit in the shade and 97 in the sun. It was time for the heat management strategies to come into play. “It’s not the heat, it’s the hills,” said Hawks, coming through after losing 10 minutes to Walmsley in the previous five miles. He was now 48 minutes back and had Nichols to contend with who was slowly closing the gap.

That ever-infamous Cal Street, stretching between Foresthill at mile 62 and the Rucky Chucky river crossing at mile 78, is where the day started to catch up to Walmsley—just a little bit. At the Cal 2 aid station, he’d given back his advantage on the course record. From there on out, he moved faster than everyone else behind him, but slower than a 2019 Walmsley.

By Green Gate at mile 80, Walmsley was five minutes over course-record pace. But Hawks came through a full 77 minutes back. A surging Holmen was just 11 minutes behind and didn’t even stop. This was his first attempt at 100 miles, and he’d clearly done his homework on pacing and patience. Tyler Green was close behind. With a 14th-place finish at Western States in 2019, Green was on a mission to do better.

By the time Walmsley made it to Robie Point, just a mile to go, and with the course record was off the table, he stopped for a Coke and walked the climb. He would continue to cruise the final mile in his bucket hat to win his third Western States in a row with a time of 14:46:01.

Behind him, the race for the podium stayed intense. Somewhere between Green Gate and Pointed Rocks at mile 94, Hawks disappeared from the front of the race, leaving Green in second place with Holmen chasing just six minutes back. Cody Lind followed in fourth and just 17 minutes back.

At the end, Green would hold off Holmen with a time of 16:11:00 to take second, a massive jump up from his 2019 finish. Holmen completed the podium with a time of 16:23. Both had started off conservatively and had it pay off in the end.

Lind would finish fourth in 16:49:40, an impressive run for his first 100 miler and first attempt at Western States. He clearly had insider’s knowledge as the son of two-time Western States finisher Paul Lind and the grandson of the event’s original medical director Dr. Bob Lind.

Tollefson rounded out the top-five men with a time of 16:55:49. He’d put off running Western until he felt ready to do the race justice, and clearly, he was ready. The fact that he’d grown up in the area and run the last miles of the course hundreds of times certainly paid off in the race’s most difficult miles.

In the back half of the men’s top 10, we had sixth-place Kyle Pietari, who executed yet another well-played top-10 performance, Stephen Kersh who finished seventh for the second time in a row after curiously bouncing around almost all the top-10 positions over the course of the day, and Hawks who ultimately crossed the line in eighth place after experiencing physical struggles and a long stay at the mile 94 aid station to regroup.

Among the day’s breakout runs was ninth place Kyle Curtin, who moved up into the top 10 late. And Nichols rounded out the top 10 in what looked like a difficult finish after an even more difficult day.

And just to clear the air for those wondering, Daniels DNFed at mile 55. Hazen and Jeff Browning left the race at mile 62. And Hammond and King tapped out at mile 80.

2021 Western States 100 Women’s Race

With three women inside the top-10 overall, some of the fastest times ever run on the course, and tight competition wire to wire, the top-10 women changed Western States 100 history—and women’s ultrarunning history—this weekend.

Numerous international women chose to make the trip to the States for States. Among them were Beth Pascall (pre-race interview) from the U.K., who’d spent the past 10 weeks in the U.S. after running the Canyons 100k. Ragna Debats (pre-race interview), who is from the Netherlands but who lives in Spain, was present, running her first Western States, as was Ruth Croft (pre-race interview), all the way from New Zealand, lining up for her first attempt at 100 miles. On the domestic side, defending champion Clare Gallagher (pre-race interview), Brittany Peterson (pre-race interview), Addie Bracy, Camille Herron, and so many more women all hoped to have a good run. What ensued was tight racing from start to end with impressive performances all around.

The race started under clear skies, a setting moon, and a comfortable 53 degrees Fahrenheit. Fast out of the gate, France’s Audrey Tanguy was the first over the Escarpment, mile 3.5, followed a minute back by Herron. Gallagher, Pascall, and Bracy filled out the top five just two minutes back from Tanguy. All the women received enthusiastic encouragement from the resident Yeti of Olympic Valley who’d come out to spectate.

By Red Star Ridge at mile 15, Pascall had moved to the front. After finishing just off the podium in fourth in 2019, she was eager to move up in the final standings and wasted no time making her intentions known. Tanguy, Bracy, and Gallagher gave chase, all within 90 seconds, and a long string of women trailed just as closely behind.

By Robinson Flat at mile 30, we understood that Pascall meant business. Looking relaxed, she’d moved to just three minutes off of course-record pace. Bracy and Debats continued to chase, holding the gap to within five minutes. In the next eight miles, Pascall went from three minutes over record pace to nine minutes under it. She flew in and out of the Dusty Corners aid station in a minute.

Halfway through, many of the top women were looking comfortable. Pascall even claimed that it didn’t feel too hot. Still, the heat must have been affecting her as she slowly lost some time on the course-record pace. Debats continued a steady march forward, keeping the gap at a manageable size. Katie Asmuth, now running in third, received the award for the happiest runner through midway, and the one with the hat with the most flair.

By mile 61, Pascall had worked herself into 10th overall, but the full group of top-10 women were running within about 45 minutes of each other. And at 10.5 hours in, there were 19 women in the overall top 40, a testament to the depth and talent in the field.

At mile 71, along the infamous Cal Street, the race was on. Pascall came through at 11:51, moving up to ninth overall with a fast transition. At just 14:15 back, Debats barely stopped at the aid station. Two minutes later, Asmuth ran through, only grabbing ice. Croft followed less than four minutes in arrears, and Peterson came through flying two minutes later. Tanguy left a mere four minutes after that. Count them! That’s six women within 27 minutes of each other almost three quarters of the way through a 100 miler. What, what?

In the next 14 miles, Croft made her move, coming through Auburn Lake Trails, mile 85, in second, just 18 minutes down on Pascall, but only a mere two minutes up on determined Dabats. A charging Peterson moved by Asmuth. With the top-six women now within 45 minutes of each other at mile 85, there was still plenty of racing to be done in the final miles.

But no one could stop Pascall. Consistent from Olympic Valley to Auburn, she finished in 17:10:41, the second-fastest time in women’s history. She was also seventh overall, continually moving up through the field as the day wore on.

Croft finished a strong second in the women’s field and ninth overall with a time of 17:33:48. Debats would hold on to finish third with a time of 17:41:13, putting three women into the top-10 overall.

This trio was followed by Peterson and Asmuth rounding out the top-five women. For the balance of the women’s top 10, sixth place was ultimately Tanguy, her first Western States finish. This year, seventh place belongs to Emily Hawgood, the Zimbabwean who lives in the U.S., and who has a charmer of a story. Hawgood tried three Golden Ticket races to gain Western States entry this year, achieving it on the third try. In eighth was Camelia Mayfield, who follows up on her fifth-place finish in 2019 with another smartly run race in this gnarly year. Keely Henninger gains the F9 bib in her debut 100 miler, and 10th place belongs to none other than Kaci Lickteig (pre-race interview), whose finish marks her seventh at this event.

Together these 10 women finished within the top-21 overall. Let’s just pause a moment to let that significance soak in.

And to bring this full circle, Gallagher and Herron crossed the line outside of the top 10 having their own challenging days. And Bracy threw in the towel at mile 62.

Jim Walmsley wins his third consecutive Western States 100

On an exceptionally hot day in California, Jim Walmsley won his third consecutive Western States 100 title Saturday in 14 hours, 46 minutes. Walmsley came through the Pointed Rocks aid station at mile 95 with a comfortable lead of about 81 minutes, and the live webcam followed his final mile by bike. 

Walmsley, who lives in Flagstaff, Ariz., had admitted earlier in the week that he hadn’t been entirely healthy throughout his build up and had been nursing an IT band injury, leading to speculation that he might not even make it to the start line, but apparently he had nothing to worry about, as his remarkable result proved. 

Walmsley ran 14:09:28 in 2019, the last time the race was run (it was cancelled in 2020 due to the pandemic), smashing the course record of 14:30:04 that he set in 2018, in his third appearance at the race. Today, he had put considerable distance between himself and Hayden Hawks by around mile 35, but it was clear another record was not going to be possible. (Hawks was in second position for most of the race, but shortly before Walmsley’s arrival at the finish line, announcers Dylan Bowman and Corrine Malcolm mentioned he was in danger of being passed by Tyler Green and Drew Holmen.) 

Walmsley is only the third man with three consecutive victories; the other two are Scott Jurek, who had seven straight victories from 1999-2005, and Tim Twietmeyer, who won five times, three of them consecutively in 1994-1996.

Beth Pascall of the U.K. led the women’s race all day and is a good bet to win, but the top five were very close together throughout, making it too risky to call. Pascall won the Canyons 100K race in California in April, and shattered the record on the Bob Graham fell round in the U.K. last year. At the time of Walmsley’s finish, she was sitting at 7th or 8th overall, with Ragna Debats of the Netherlands (who is 42) and Ruth Croft of New Zealand (in her 100-mile debut) just outside the top 10 overall.

For the first time, there were live broadcasts on YouTube and by iRunFar, so fans could follow every minute of the race, with constant well-informed and passionate commentary from Bowman and Malcolm about the oldest and best-loved 100-miler in North America. 

The Western States 100 Is Back and It’s Going to be HOT!

Western States is famously competitive - and this year is shaping up to be one of the toughest competitions yet with hot temps, and a stacked field.

Jim Walmsley and Magda Boulet will be back at the Western States Endurance Run this week.

And so will Clare Gallagher, Patrick Reagan, Max King and Brittany Peterson. And, so too is race pioneer Gordy Ainsleigh and 312 other inspired runners who have been training for more than a year and a half to get to the starting line. In fact, we’re all heading back to the Sierra Nevada range this weekend — even if vicariously — to what feels like a bit of normalcy returning.

After a year mostly away from the trail racing running scene, things are starting to feel like old times. With stacked men’s and women’s fields, scorching heat in the forecast and last year’s Covid-19 hiatus hopefully mostly behind us, it’s definitely the event the ultrarunning community has been looking forward to. The race begins at 5 a.m. PST on June 26 and it looks like it’s going to be an epic one. (Follow via live tracking or the live race-day broadcast.)

“Yeah, it will be good to be there and see people and actually be in the race,” says Walmsley, who won the race in 2018 and 2019 in course-record times. “It’s been an odd year.”

Odd for sure, but with deep men’s and women’s fields, hot weather, dusty trail conditions and the late June gathering of a few hundred runners on this hallowed ground feels somewhat normal. The mountains and canyons in and around Olympic Valley northwest of Lake Tahoe have been a sacred place for the native Washoe people for thousands of years before Gordon Ainsleigh’s first romp over the Western States Trail in 1974.

It’s been an especially odd year for Walmsley, who, for the second straight year, had planned to use the first half of his year training for the 90K Comrades Marathon in South Africa. But that was canceled last year (with just about every other big race, including the Western States 100) and this year, too.

So instead, after setting a new U.S. 100K road record in January, he took a sponsor’s entry into the Western States 100 from HOKA One One and will be once again lining up in America’s most celebrated trail running race. With notable first-timers Tim Tollefson and Hayden Hawks in the mix along with Walmsley, Reagan, King, Matt Daniels, Alex Nichols, Kyle Pietari, Mark Hammond, Stephen Kersh, Jeff Browning and Jared Hazen all returning with previous top-10 finishes, on paper anyway, the men’s race is shaping up to be one of the most competitive in recent memory or maybe ever, even though it’s comprised entirely of domestic runners.

The women’s race might be even more competitive with former champions Boulet, Gallagher (2019) and Kaci Lickteig (2016) leading the way, plus elite American runners Camille Herron, Addie Bracy, Camelia Mayfield and Keely Henninger and international stalwarts Ruth Croft (New Zealand), Audrey Tanguy (France), Beth Pascall (UK), Emily Hawgood (Zimbabwe), Kathryn Drew (Canada) and Ragna Debats (Spain) joining the fray.

Who are the favorites? It’s hard to tell. Most of those runners, including Walmsley and Boulet, have admitted to having dealt with some minor injuries, inconsistent training, a lack of motivation and other setbacks over the crazy year that was. Based on what runners have been reporting, it seems like most are just eager to get back and immerse in a competitive 100-miler and see what they can do.

However, one of the keys will certainly be who can survive the heat the best. The forecast is calling for high temperatures in the upper 80s to the high 90s on Saturday after and the canyons between Robinson Flat and Michigan Bluff could even reach over 100 degrees.

Walmsley has said he’s dealt with some IT band issues and has focused mostly on running with a lot of vert, focusing on getting optimal recovery, strength sessions and body work, as well as spending as much time running in extreme heat as possible. That includes running and hiking countless laps to the summit of 9,298-foot Mt. Elden in Flagstaff, averaging 20 to 25 hours per week on the trails and also spending a lot of time on a bike trainer.

But he’s also spent a lot of time in the infrared sauna in his home and spent time with family in the Phoenix area, where he ran in the afternoons amid 115- to 120-degree heat.

“The heat training is kind of lucky for me, because growing up in the heat in Arizona, I didn’t know any different,” Walmsley says. “I just thought everyone was roasting in the heat. It’s what I grew up with and I try to lean into those memories and embrace the heat.”

Boulet, who lives in Berkeley, Calif., has also gone out of her way to train in the heat. While she says her build-up has been inconsistent compared to previous years, she’s been doing a lot of climbing and descending in the heat, and also working on box jumps to strengthen her legs for the long descent into Auburn. She says a recent 40-mile run up 3,849-foot Mt. Diablo east of Berkeley, is a good indicator that she’s ready to roll.

“I’ve definitely been spending more time in the heat lately, which is something I personally don’t enjoy running in,” says Boulet, who won the race in 2015, DNF’ed in 2016 and placed second in 2017. “But I know the importance of preparing in the heat and falling in love with running in the heat by race day. You can be as physically as ready as possible in terms of your fitness, but if you don’t have the heat training and you’re trying to tackle some of the parts of the canyons that are in the middle of the race, It’s really tough.”

Given the extreme heat, it’s not likely that anyone will challenge Walmsley’s 14:09 course record set two years ago, when it was in the low-80s and cloudy on race day. But there’s also no snow on the course this year, so the early sections that have previously forced runners to hike and walk early on will likely be faster, and that will likely result in fatigue that will slow them down in later stages of the race.

“You’ve got to take what the course gives you,” Walmsley says. “I’ve learned that you don’t fight the course where you shouldn’t. I have some splits in mind that would get me there under 15 hours and maybe close to 14:30, but it’s going to be all about feeling out what the course is giving me, following those guidelines and not forcing it. Because anyone who forces it in that heat will be doomed.”

Jim Walmsley opens up about injury ahead of Western States 100

The defending WSER champion has been dealing with knee issues over the past few months, but he says he's ready to race this weekend

If you follow American ultrarunner Jim Walmsley on Strava and wondered why he’s been so quiet lately, he posted on Instagram on Tuesday to talk about an injury that has been nagging him for the past few months. Walmsley wrote that he has been dealing with knee and IT band issues, but he added that he has been pain-free for the past couple of weeks. His recovery couldn’t have come at a better time, as he is set to race the Western States 100 (WSER) in California on Saturday. Walmsley is the two-time defending WSER champion and course record holder, and he will be looking to make it three wins in a row this weekend.

As Walmsley wrote on Instagram, his knee and IT band issues began about three months ago. “It was at a point I saw as a crucial time to take it seriously and take some time to address it,” he said. He made big changes to his training schedule, taking five days off of running each week for the better part of a month. Walmsley said the injury came as a surprise, noting that his training load had been steady and his workouts had been going well for the previous month.

After his “reset with running,” Walmsley said he had eight weeks to go until WSER. While he might have felt better, he didn’t push himself too much, and he spent the next while taking care in his workouts and visiting his physiotherapist regularly. He added that he spent a lot of time riding his bike to make up for his lack of run training in this period.

Walmsley races at Hoka One One’s Project Carbon X 2, where he ran 6:14:26, just 12 seconds off the 100K world record. Photo: Hoka One One

“This block has been so much more work than usual,” he wrote. “I went through ups and downs with emotions, not knowing if I’d be able to line up healthy.” With just a few days to go until WSER, Walmsley’s careful training and build to race day worked out, and he said he feels better and healthier than he has at any point in the past three months.

“I feel like I’m gaining momentum at the right time,” he wrote, “and I couldn’t be more excited to be back at Western States ready to rock.”