By HPRS Race Director John Lacroix

PREFACE

When I started HPRS in 2014, I created a spreadsheet (like ultrarunners do) of every trail race in Colorado of a half-marathon in distance or longer. I then recorded how many finishers each of those races had that year, as well as for the 10 years prior, and in all years since then. Naturally, what I now have in my possession is a detailed tracking of every one of those races and the ebbs and flows in numbers they see from year to year. Essentially, it’s a total market analysis of every trail race in the state for the last 18 years.

One of the flaws in the spreadsheet is that it only shows finishers for each race, because it is impossible for any of us to track the total number of registrants any race has. In most cases this information is not public, and where it is we don’t get to see who or how many runners have withdrawn from a race in the months and weeks leading up. There are also anomaly years in the data where a weather event caused a race’s finisher number to decrease dramatically from one year to the next.

Generally, it’s not the year-to-year information that I am interested in as much as the 3–5-year trend information derived for each race. In other words, a weather event causing a decrease in finishers doesn’t affect my interpretation of the info, I just ignore the weather year.

This spreadsheet serves as an invaluable tool as it affords me a clear overview of how the sport of trail and ultrarunning is doing within the confines of the state of Colorado. When I write my “State of the Sport Address” in January, I use not only this information but information I am able to collect from Runsignup.com’s database and Ultrarunning Magazine’s database.

I preface this article with the above only to paint an accurate picture of what information I am working with to discuss the topic with you. While some of what you are about to read is a matter of opinion, it is an informed opinion based on factual data specifically gathered to look at trends in the market.

THE DATA

It’s a great time to be a trail and ultra-runner in the state of Colorado. In terms of ultra-running, Colorado hosted an all-time high of 122 ultra distance races in 2022, the fourth most of any state. Unfortunately for the runner, Colorado also has one of the most expensive average costs of entry in the nation. Entry fees for ultra-distances in Colorado are above the national average, and are high enough that runners from the eastern United States are often writing me to ask “Why?” I mean, if the supply more than meets the demand, why are Colorado prices so much higher rather than lower?

It really is a great question…   let’s dive in.

• As stated, 122 ultra distance events were on the Colorado calendar in 2022.
• Of those 122 events, 29 of them (24%) were held for the very first time this year.
• This is by far the biggest amount of growth in number of ultra-distance races that Colorado has ever experienced.
• 31 of the 122 races saw an increase in the number of finishers as compared to 2021, which accounts for just 25% of the ultra distance races in the state.
• On the other side of this statistic, 44 races saw a decrease in the number of finishers as compared to 2021, which accounts for 36% of the ultra distance races in the state.

Colorado Ultra Distance Events in 2022

Total = 122

New this year = 29 (24%)

Increase in # of Finishers = 33 (27%)

Decrease in # of Finishers = 43 (35%)

I want to also note that 17 races, that’s 14% of the 122, were either cancelled or had no finishers at all in 2022. If you were to combine the races that were cancelled, that had no finishers, and had a decrease in their finisher numbers over 2021, the total would be 60 races accounting for 49% (nearly half!) of all ultra-distance races in Colorado!

There are 82 total races that take place on the same exact day or weekend as another ultra-distance race in the state of Colorado. That represents 68% of all ultra-distance races in the state.

Please consider, that Colorado is HUGE at 104,185 square miles. You could fit all six New England states into Colorado nearly twice! If you live in Denver and are driving to Silverton for a race, it’s 6.5-7 hours away. It’s like comparing a race in the Boston area with a race in the Washington DC area to be fair. Despite Colorado’s size, a lot of folks like to keep viewing it as one state, rather than a massive state with multiple regions. For the purposes of this discussion, we will operate with that same frame of mind.

Of those events that take place on the same day, only 24% of those events saw an increase in their finisher numbers in 2021, 50% saw a decrease compared to their 2021 finisher numbers, and 26% of the 82 races took place for the first time this year.

NEW Ultra Distances This Year = 29 (24%):

HPRS (6): South Park 38-Mile – Cuchara 50mi/60k – Last Call 55k – Bingo L3/L4
GNAR (1): Red Feather 50k
Aravaipa (8): Ram Party 50mi – Durango Skyline 50mi/50k – Ring the Springs 100mi/50mi – Pike’s Peak Apex 50k – Rough Canyon 50mi/50k
Tempest (2): Creede 100mi – Rio Grande 100mi
Revenant (7): The Great Divide 100mi/100k – Tava Canyon 50mi – Tava’s Shadow 100k/50k – Above the Clouds 50k – Bridge Burner 50k, Cold Rush 50k
Misc. one-offs (4): Weld Your Mettle 50k – Running Up For Air 50k – Ole School 50mi/50k

DISCUSSION

As I stated above, the data I have shared above is usually where I start prior to writing my “State of the Sport” address in January. After taking a deep dive into Colorado, I back out and take a deep dive into the rest of the country. The data I collect and collected by others (Registrars, Industry publications and emails, and Ultrarunning Magazine), as well as the many discussions being had on email list-servs and in social media channels, is what informs the address I give year to year. This year I will also add information compiled from industry insiders (Brands, running stores, and industry data specialists) by having attended The Running Event (TRE) in Austin, TX this November.

For the purposes of this discussion, I want to focus solely on Colorado’s data and have an honest conversation with you about what the current scene is, and where I honestly feel it goes from here. This is probably one of those conversations where while the data and discussion is sound, you may not like the delivery. My intent is not to fluff the discussion or put a cherry on top, but to just give it to you real and raw.

I want to start with the data. With 35% of all ultra-distance races in Colorado seeing a decrease in their number of finisher’s as compared to last year, and with only 25% of all ultra-distance races seeing an increase, do we really need a 24% increase in new events?

It will be interesting to see how many more new events hop online in 2023. It is ever apparent that most race directors either don’t care (or know) to do a market analysis before deciding to create a new race, or they just don’t care what a market analysis shows. Anyone conducting a market analysis would conclude that if you were going to start a new event in Colorado, it should be during a time of year where there is little else scheduled. This means that August, September, and October are horrible months for starting a new event, but the “shoulder months” November-April are great times to give it a whirl.

There used to be a time in our sport (Yes, I know… another “Back in my day.”) where race directors supported one another. When you would go to most any ultra and in your race goody bag were the postcards of a handful of other ultras near-by, and those races were not a part of the race or series you were running with that day. In other words, we used to support one another by sharing space, volunteers, runners, and going so far as advertising for one another at our own events.

Today, race directors view each other as “competition.” We’re fighting over the same runners, we’re fighting over the same volunteers, and we’re certainly not helping to spread the word about one another’s races. We’re all fighting for the same dollar. Again, 68% of all ultra-distance races in Colorado took place on the same day or weekend as another race. Ten to fifteen years ago, if you built a race on the same day or weekend within a 2-hours’ drive from another race, you’d be labeled an “a-hole” and blackballed from the general ultra-community. Today, a lot of directors are deliberately ignoring the “unwritten rules of integrity” our sport was once known for and simply doing whatever it takes to serve their own interests, regardless of how it affects others.

“Says the guy who added new events in 2022.” True, HPRS added some new events in 2022 but let’s be real for a moment and talk about that. I actually do a market analysis as is evidenced by this article. First, we added a 38-Mile to the South Park Trail Runs and a 55k to the Last Call Fifties. South Park and Last Call are races that also features other ultra-distance options, and I think adding a distance to an already existing event (Since 2015) is much different than building a whole new event altogether. The rest of the new distances we added this year were not ultra-distance. We added a half marathon to Endure and an 8-Mile to Sangre de Cristo.

We added two new events to our Colorado calendar in 2022. We started with the Cuchara Trail Runs in June with 50-Mile, 60k, 5-Mile and King/Queen distances. June is the month where things start to get busy on the state’s ultra-calendar, which is why we were sure to put this race in a geographical location where few other races take place. It’s also the same day as the San Juan Solstice, which still sold out and requires a lottery for entry. Simply put, by hosting a race on the same day as San Juan, we didn’t put anybody out.

We added the Bingo Trail Runs to our calendar in November, a month where the season has winded down and there really isn’t much else on the calendar outside of Mad Moose and Revenant. Their races are hours away from Byers, and we’ve also created this event to be our entry level offering at HPRS. Two levels below the marathon distance and two levels of ultra-distances. More a “trail party” than a race, we’re 4+ hours away from Mad Moose’s event in Grand Junction on the same day.

In 2023 we’ll be adding a snowshoe race to the calendar in March, a month where no one is racing in Colorado. The longest distance will be 50k, and the rest of the distances being 16, 11 and 5-Miles. We’re adding a 10k and Half Marathon to Stories Ultra, a 10k to Endure, an 18-Mile to the Sheep Mountain Ultras, and a 5-Mile to the Indian Creek Fifties.

So yes, we’re adding distances to already established events. Events that have been on our calendar for 5 or more years. We’re adding shorter distances for a reason, which I will explain below. We’ve added new events altogether but were careful to build those races during times of the year where no one else (or very few) is hosting a race. Today, no one care’s if there’s a race on the same day or nearby. It’s survival of the fittest. This is not how our community used to be. We used to support one another. We used to be careful to not step on each other’s toes. We used to respect that a rising tide lifts all ships. We used to.

Case in point: On the weekend of May 15, 2022 we held our 2^nd annual Endure event at Mueller State Park in Divide, CO. This event is on the same weekend it has always been for us, just in a new location as we moved from Golden to Divide. This is also a unique event in that there’s only one other that shares the same format in the country; but still an ultra and a half marathon.

Aravaipa came into the state and built a brand-new race called “Ram Party” in Colorado Springs. This entirely new race was scheduled on the same day as Endure and just 10 miles away as the crow flies. This after the owner of Aravaipa told me, and their race director told Jordan Ricks of Revenant, that they “don’t want to step on anyone’s toes.” Bluntly put, I feel like these folks lied to our faces and have done nothing but step on our toes. In my opinion, I’ll call it like it is and say that this is what happens when a once grass roots trail racing company turns corporate, and starts throwing their money around (A wolf in sheep’s clothing scenario).

Mad Moose held their women’s only Valkyrie event on the same day (a new date) at Cheyenne Mountain State Park, which is 15 miles as the crow flies from both Endure and Ram Party. It is to my understanding (What I “heard”… and I hate that I’m even saying that) that they moved their event to this date specifically out of spite of Aravaipa. The following weekend, Revenant Running held a new race of theirs at Mueller State Park, which was ultimately cancelled due to a late season snowstorm. Still… Three companies, three races, all on the same day within a 10–15-mile radius of one another, and a fourth company adding a race the following weekend in the same exact area.

Question: If four brands of trail and ultra-running events are hosting the same exact types of events, all on the same day or weekend, all within a 5–15-mile radius from one another, how can we all expect to survive? We’re all fighting for the same runners and for the same volunteers, and all in the same area. This is not at all sustainable. Essentially we’re all fighting and praying that our race isn’t the one that fails and no longer exists. Someone is not going to make it, and I’m astounded by the cut-throat nature others are employing to fight the competition off.

As registration numbers tumble, some race directors panic. Panic because it means a loss in revenue. Not every race director is in this to make money or turn a profit. Not every race director is in a position where losing money on a race is okay either. So their knee-jerk reaction to this panic is to create another race, so that they can recoup revenue loses that are being realized elsewhere. I totally get it and understand it, I also think it’s a reasonable expectation. When you feel like you’re sinking, you look for something to stand on, to keep your head above water. However, what everyone is failing to realize is that by adding more races, we’re further saturating the market and diluting our runner’s experiences because we’re all still fighting for the same runners and volunteers.

This isn’t just the reality in Colorado, it’s the reality nationwide. While the total number of North American finishes in 2022, as compared to 2019, is down 11%; and unique finisher’s is down 7%; is there really a justification for there to be a 9% increase in the number of races on the calendar? There are only so many weekends in a year, and only so many locales that can host a trail and/or ultrarunning event. We’ve been talking about the threat and realities of race saturation for years, and this is the first year where we can see for certain that there just isn’t a need for more races and more race directors. On top of that, land managers are starting to push back in earnest because they can’t handle the sheer tsunami of permit applications they’re receiving for special events. No one seems to be considering that we’re wearing the permitting land managers out and their response is to place a moratorium on the permitting of new events; in other words to simply say “No.”

Here in Colorado, you’re going to start to see more of the affects of this reality. You’re going to start to see several races disappear, simply because a lot of race directors don’t want to keep putting in the time and effort for all of 50-70 runners, and for maybe a $1500 profit. Race directors are not going to want to jump through even more hoops placed before them by a land manager to make it work. Most folks get into race directing under the assumption that their race will sell out, that they’ll have hundreds of runners. That’s just going to be a dwindling reality in the ultra-market for the foreseeable future. Unless we weed out some of these events, very few races are going to sell out moving forward, and very few races are going to see numbers in the hundreds. If you don’t have a grasp on the financial realities of race direction, you could very easily find yourself in the red and/or out of business.

While some race directors think they’re doing the sport a favor by creating a new race in a new location, the reality is that they’re doing no one a favor. Runners will sign up for a 100-miler that has all of 30 or fewer runners in it. You’ll spend most of that run alone wondering if there’s even anyone behind you. Volunteers hate sitting around in the woods waiting for just 30 runners to come through over the expanse of 8 hours (3.75 runners per hour average.. lighter on the front and back end of the 8 hours, heavy in the middle). We’re going to scare volunteers away by way of boredom.

The reality of having fewer volunteers is going to result in race directors finding folks to volunteer who are not privy to running trail or ultra, and your experiences will ultimately suffer. Think, ‘having a boy scout troop manning a 100-mile aid station and those boys and their parents have no idea what an ultra really is,’ all for the race director to donate $500 to the troop for doing so. I bet some of you have experienced something like this previously already. The other possibility is that some race director’s will raise their rates even further, so that they can pay staff to man aid stations, guaranteeing that someone will indeed be there for you.

I also warned about this possibility occurring at HPRS previously, and I am hesitant to go that route unless I find that it is imperative that we do so for the health and safety of our runners. What followed this warning was our setting a new HPRS record for volunteer hours in a year, with 3 fewer unique volunteers in 2022 as compared to 2021. Our community stepped up, so we stood down. The reality for us is that instead of raising rates due to a lack of volunteers, we’re going to end up shrinking our series. Fewer volunteers = fewer races.

Here is something that stunned me… I saw another race director in the periphery make the same threat, “If we don’t get enough volunteers, we’re going to cancel the upcoming race. It’s also possible that we raise our entry fees in order to pay staff to man aid stations moving forward.” While they did indeed get enough volunteers for the race that they threatened to cancel, they cancelled it anyway. Then a few weeks later, “Check out our new 100-miler!”  In my opinion, this reeks of hypocrisy. One day you’re threatening your customers with higher rates and cancelled races; then you cancel a race anyway and unveiling a new 100-miler?! This is what I mean by race director’s panicking and not making sound business decisions, while also passing the buck down onto the runner. This isn’t to disparage these RDs, it is to say that we came out of Covid with runner’s trusting race directors less, and this kind of behavior does nothing in helping runners to trust us more. It also shows evidence of RD’s building new “panic races” to generate more revenue even if they’ve already jacked their entry fees the last 2 years running.

Outside of “panic races” there’s also the race directors who are spiraling, lost, or burned out. They decided to not hold their races in 2022 with the idea of bringing them back online in 2023. Historically, this has been met with mostly failure as your inability to organize is on full display, and if it’s a failure to organize it’s a lack of passion to see it through.

Over the last year The Human Potential Running series has set all time monthly registration records in December 21’ (All time any month ever), then also in 2022 January, February, March, October, and November. That’s a registration record for 6 out of the 12 months of the last year. In October we once again set a record for most registrations handled in a single month within our 9-year history. We are well on our way to breaking that mark in December ’22 as well. We ended the last year up 19% on total registrations handled between December 1, 2021 and November 30, 2022.

Despite these records, we’re still feeling the strain, as we’ve had fewer volunteers this year put in more hours per volunteer than normal. At the end of the day, a lack of volunteers and tired volunteers has a negative affect on everyone’s experience. We’re seeing the decline in ultra-distance events, with longer events taking the biggest hit. Meanwhile, shorter distance trail running is picking up steam. We’ve added a lot of shorter distances in 2023, and that’s not a knee-jerk reaction to panic as we’re doing just fine. We’re doing it because we see that while ultra-running is in an ebb pattern, trail running is growing. We want to be at the forefront of welcoming new folks into the sport, showing them the way, and watching them discover their human potential along the trail.

As we head in to 2023, we’ll be launching several initiatives at HPRS to help more runners get into trail running while also understanding the basic rules (written and unwritten) of the sport. We want to continue doing the same for trail runners making the move up into ultras. It is imperative that as new runners move over from the road, or up from shorter distances into ultra, that they truly understand the differences and nuances between road and trail in a way that sets them up for success by helping them manage adequate expectations for themselves and their experience.

It is also imperative that race directors take a good hard look inward at their races and series and figure out how they can: decrease spending, decrease the number of permits required, increase community initiatives that will spawn community buy in, and improve volunteer initiatives to ensure runners know that it’s a part of the fabric of what we do. Also, not every place is “the greatest place ever for a race.” All of these things can help us control our expenses and not just flippantly starting new events “just because.”; if we can accomplish that, then it negates our knee-jerk panic reactions.

If we continue to raise our already higher than the national average rates, we’re setting up a situation where runners are less likely to sign up for as many races in a year as they have in the past. Don’t just take my word for it, take our runner’s word for it.

In our November monthly newsletter we asked the question:

Rate your level of concern for the ever increasing entry fee’s in trail and ultra.

Here is how they answered:

1.) I am concerned, while I’m not priced out yet, I will be soon = 36.6%

2.) I am concerned, but this is how the story goes in a capitalist society = 26.8%

3.) I am really concerned, we’re turning into Ironman = 15.9%

4.) I am neither concerned or not concerned, they could continue to rise or fall = 12.2%

5.) I am not concerned at all, I’ll pay whatever the entry fee is regardless = 8.5%

While 20.7% of respondents are generally not concerned about the cost of entry, 79.3% of respondents are. Nearly half of whom say that “while [they’re] not priced out yet, [they] will be soon.” If that’s not reason to sound the alarm, I don’t know what is.

This brings me to the discussion on inflation. Yes, it’s affecting all of us. It affects us/you at home. It affects the amount of expendable income you have for spending on races. While it does affect us race directors when we’re buying things for a race, I want to ask everyone to not get caught up in an RD justifying an increase of their entry fees with a basis on inflation.

If the cost of shirts has gone up $1.00-$1.50 a shirt and you have 200 runners, you’re talking an additional expense of $200-$250. Food and gas has also been more expensive; and I’ll tell you honestly that this expense is also another $200-$300 per race. We’re talking a total of $400-$550 additional in expenses compared to previous years. If a RD raises their entry fee $10 per runner for the same 200 runners these expenses are for, they just generated $2000 more in revenue to cover an increase in costs of $400-$550. In other words, the runner ends up padding the profit margin for the RD by some $1450-$1600.

I think it’s time we get real in Colorado. It’s time for us to stop raising rates and consider decreasing rates. It’s time to realize that the supply more than meets the demand, and for aspiring RDs to stop popping up on the scene, and for existing race directors to do more homework before they make decisions based on panic. The “Born to Run Boom” IS BUST!

While it is a great time to be a trail and ultra runner in Colorado based on the opportunities to run that exist, it is not a great time for race director’s based on the real suffering and potential suffering that is starting to loom over the horizon and is already here. Either we’re going to work together to live harmoniously amongst one another like our sport once did, or we’re going to go to war in ensuring the survival of our events and businesses. I’m preparing for war given the shots fired across the bow by other directors, and I guess that’s what a capitalist society is.