“Ethical fading is a form of self-deception. It occurs when we subconsciously avoid or disguise the moral implications of a decision. It allows us to behave in immoral ways while maintaining the conviction that we are good and moral people.” [1]
A decade and more ago there were “unwritten rules of race directing” within the ultramarathon running space. Some of those universally understood rules revolved around the idea that race directors cared about other race directors. If you were planning to introduce a new race you were:
• to make sure that your race did not encroach on an already existing race. You did not build a race on the same day, the same weekend, or even within 2-3 weeks on either side of another event. You understood that if your race was “too close” to someone else’s race, you could negatively affect their event by taking away registrants and volunteers.
• to not be “too close” in geographic perimeter to other events. I don’t think anyone ever spoke about what that perimeter was other than to apply “reason.” Reason may tell you that hosting a new race 100-miles away from another may be reasonable. For some that “reasonable distance” is greater, for others smaller. In any case, you would apply reason to argue why it was okay for you to host a race so close in geographic proximity to another.
• to make sure that your race’s route did not copy or encroach on someone else’s route. This was a major topic of discussion around 2011, when Ragnar started building new events by utilizing the same or similar routes as pre-existing events within the trail and ultra space. Ragnar was accused of “Stealing Race courses.” Ragnar engaging in this practice is what first sparked debate about “for-profit race conglomerates” within the sport. [2] [3] [4] [5]
The above were the three biggest rules of race directing. Collectively it seemed simple; be a good neighbor and don’t do anything to undermine someone else’s event, as we’re all a part of the same community. As our sport turned into a period known as “The Born to Run Boom,” the ethical compass we so easily followed without publication flew out the window. A sport that was once driven by non-profits hosting charity runs quickly began to turn into the next capitalist adventure, where even non-profits began to operate more like the “non-profit” National Football League. [6]
When “The Born to Run Boom” started around 2010/2011, there were very few race directors who did this as a career. We had yet to see “mega-series” or anyone who could truly argue that being a race director was a viable way to make a living. The few for-profit series that existed were modest in size, and there was no hurry to get as many races on the calendar as you possibly could. We could argue that because race directors followed the unwritten rules, there was no need or urgency to build more races in more places. The supply met the demand, everyone played by the rules, everyone succeeded.
Since then, the sport has grown tremendously. Despite the effects of Covid-19, our sport’s collective participation numbers have bounced back considerably, some could argue bigger than ever before. More runners = more demand, more demand = need for more supply. Or does it?
As the popularity of our sport has grown so too has the number of individuals who have decided to take on race directing. It is wonderful that so many want to give back to the sport by shouldering the labor or event production, regardless of what their end goal truly is. Some race directors have convinced themselves that the entire reason for accepting the role is to give back, when in reality it is to capitalize on the boom. This is an example of Ethical Fading, where the RD has disguised their true motives as altruistic and anchored in a desire to contribute positively to the collective, even though money is the true motive.
When I first started The Human Potential Running Series (HPRS) in 2014, another aspiring race director was starting his own series of ultras in Colorado. He did an interview for a now defunct online running magazine wherein he stated something to the effect of “Let’s face it, Ultrarunning is booming akin to the same boom road running experienced in the 1970s and 80s, and you would be foolish to not capitalize on that boom.” (not a direct quote, you get the idea) Having recently moved to Colorado from Texas, some suspect he was inspired by Trail Racing Over Texas’ founder and race director Robert Goyen, who himself had begun steadily building a race management behemoth on the coat tails of The Born to Run Boom.
The interview that race’s director gave showcases how money began to significantly alter the race management landscape, though I give him credit for at least being honest about wanting to reap the potential financial windfall associated with the boom. Little did we know that what he expressed in that article was merely a tiny glimpse into the future.
Ultrarunning is now in a time where race directors no longer follow those unwritten rules. We no longer care about the other races around us, or how our new event could negatively affect them. No, now is the time where we say “I don’t care” or simply “F*ck ‘em.” Like countless other aspects of our daily American lives, it’s us versus them. We have our opinions, our feelings, our lines drawn in the sand and those opinions and feelings revolve around who we like and support and who we don’t like and want to put under. We hurriedly add more races to our calendars to take up more space; to host races in an area before someone else gets to that area, to get a race on the calendar to try and prevent someone else from building a new race on the same weekend. We are no longer just motivated by supply and demand. We are motivated by forced saturation to ensure our own success.
I’m as guilty as charged. When I started HPRS my main mission was to push back against the corporatization of our sport. To this day, it still is. Yes, I produce over a dozen races, but you’d be hard pressed to argue how HPRS is a conglomerate or “corporation” by the definition many of us disgustingly think of. My goal was to push back against entities like LifeTime Fitness, The North Face, Ragnar, and Spartan. I’m certain we all can see and agree on many of the differences between a series like Ten Junk Miles Racing and the LifeTime Race Series; differences which are primarily founded in participant numbers, treatment of runners, footprint of the event, entry fees, and the overall experience.
When I first expanded my series in 2015, I built three races in Fairplay, CO. A marathon and half that took place a week prior to the Leadville Marathon and Half, a 50-Mile on the same weekend as the Silver Rush 50, and a 100-Mile close to the Leadville 100 albeit 2 weeks prior. All just 15 miles away as the crow flies, though at least an hour-long drive around mountain ranges. Yes, I was most certainly guilty as charged, but to my point… it was a different time in our sport back then.
When I expanded with those three events in 2015, I utilized “Ethical Fading” to justify my reasoning for creating those events, on those weekends, in that geographic area. Some of the Facebook Posts present on the HPRS Facebook Page sought to highlight the differences between Leadville’s Races and our own. Their entry fees were exorbitant, ours were below the industry average. They were owned and operated by a corporation, we are family owned and operated. We do trail work, they didn’t do any. They had hundreds of runners on their course, we had just over a hundred.
To me it was no different than Verizon and AT&T highlighting the differences between their two brands in national commercials. One was red, one was blue (imagine that). One had better coverage than the other. One had better contract language than the other. One cared about families, the other cared more about the individual experience. One was more into profit generation, one more into giving breaks via their family plans.
So there I was, a new race director, deliberately breaking the unwritten rules of race direction in the ultra space and justifying why it was okay to do so. I was immediately vilified by many in the Colorado trail and ultra scene. Many shunned me for “saying anything negative about Leadville” to which I replied that “perhaps what you view as negative is the sound of your own conscious speaking to you, as I am only presenting facts.” The outrage was palpable. The affect on myself and HPRS profoundly negative. People cared. I broke the rules, everyone knew I broke the rules, and I was condemned for breaking those rules even though the impetus for HPRS was anchored in those same disgruntled Leadville sheep yelling from the mountaintops “If you don’t like how they do it, build your own!”
In the years that followed, I was sure to keep my Marathon and Half off the same weekend as Leadville, though maintained that we offered a much different experience. I swapped the 50-Mile and the 100-Mile so that those events did not even come close to aligning with the Leadville calendar, which is why Sheep Mountain is now in August and Silverheels in July. The damage was done, however. I had amassed a huge number of enemies for even attempting to go toe to toe with another event, for trying to argue why that was okay, and for pointing out anything other than positivity towards a competitor. “Your only mission is to tear others down as a way to build yourself up!”
Despite knowing those unwritten rules, Ethical Fading had convinced myself that I was doing the right thing. That what I had done was noble, brave, courageous, and what was needed in our sport to save the roots and values we all had known for decades. My mission wasn’t to tear Leadville down, to this day I have never once thought that someone like myself could even come close to accomplishing that. My goal was simply to tell the truth. To highlight the differences between the corporate structure, the corporatized vision of trail and ultra, against the trail and ultra we always knew and came to love. To provide the facts plainly and to let the collective decide. The reason so many of us were even running ultras… was because they were grass roots, low frills, affordable affairs. I wanted to remind folks of that, and I had convinced my brain that my approach was the only way and the right way. Today, in hindsight, I can see where I was right and where I was terribly wrong. But I can also see how the landscape has considerably changed.
For breaking those unwritten rules I was excoriated and eviscerated. I became one of “the most hated people in Colorado ultrarunning.” When these same rules are broken today, nearly ten years later, no one bats an eye. There is no uproar, no speaking out, no excoriating or eviscerating the race directors who cross the boundaries of ethics, and use ethical fading to make themselves feel better.
A few weeks ago while in the process of permitting the newly re-designed Silverheels Trail Runs, I was asked for help from the Continental Divide Trail Coalition (CDTC) to create a list of trail and ultrarunning events that transpire on the Continental Divide Trail (CDT). During my research I happened upon a new race I didn’t know about previously. A brand new 200-mile race in Colorado’s Mountains. I dove in to see if I could figure out if this new race uses the CDT or Colorado Trail (CT). What I found was much worse.
While this new race does indeed utilize the CDT and CT, it also utilizes some of the same trails, trailheads (for crew support), and course direction of travel, as the Silverheels 100; and it is scheduled for just 10 days after ours.
Let’s back up for a moment… During the spring of 2015, I was driving the Silverheels 100-Mile course taking photos of the local scenery for promotional purposes. When I returned home that day, I noticed a post online from the new Colorado 200-Mile coming online that same year. In their post were pictures of their planned course, and I noticed one of the pictures was nearly identical to one of mine. In studying the pictures closely, I came to realize that the Colorado 200 was planning to use the same trails, roads, and trailheads (for crews) as our Silverheels 100-Mile, as well as The Silver Rush 50-Mile and the Leadville 100-Mile in Leadville.
I reached out to the race directors via email and explained the unwritten rules of race direction that we all followed. I also explained that they were going to be hard pressed to obtain permits for their planned route, as one of the jurisdictions they planned to go through had placed a moratorium on the issuance of permitting new events. I only knew that tidbit because I had tried to obtain a permit in their jurisdiction a year prior and again that year. It was clear to me that these RDs had put the cart before the horse and were advertising a route that they had no way of getting permitted for. So, I called them on it. I even gave them the contact info of the appropriate ranger, to hear it from the horse’s mouth that a permit was not possible. More importantly to me, was that these RDs were ignoring those unwritten rules, and pushing forward with an event that rode the coattails of other event’s routes designed prior.
Naturally they weren’t too happy. Of the three race directors, I received a reply from two of them. One was the “good cop” who apologized for stepping on our toes and would assuredly reach out to the permitting ranger in question for more info. The other was the pissed off “bad cop”, rude, told me that “Colorado is big enough that we can all share the resource” (right.. which is why it should be easy to find another suitable area for your event, further away), and ultimately some crazy allegation that the stress of my one email almost caused a miscarriage. Ultimately, after verifying the moratorium I told them about, the Colorado 200 was quickly moved to the Gunnison Area instead where it was held just 2 times.
Fast Forward back to 2024. I once again wrote an email to race directors whose planned course for a 200-mile ultra utilizes the same roads, trails, and trailheads as a portion of the Silverheels 100. Their route also utilizes the same roads and trails as the Divide 100-Mile, which currently is uncertain to occur again. My guess is that it’s not, but if that is true that decision was only made recently. A reasonable race director, who did their due diligence, would see that their proposed route utilizes the same roads, trails, and trailheads as two existing 100-milers, all within a 3-week period of the two existing events.
My email was about as nice as I could have possibly put it. I won’t deny that I am beyond upset by the facts present in this matter. These race directors have violated those three major rules. When I called them on it, enter ethical fading. In their response email, they provided the list of realities they have convinced themselves of that makes it okay for them to not only host the event so close to ours, but on the same trails. As an example, they explained they didn’t see Silverheels listed on Ultrasignup (because we don’t use Ultrasignup) so therefore they were unaware of our event’s existence in entirety.
Now why does that bother me so much? We haven’t been on Ultrasignup since 2020. Countless other ultras also do not utilize Ultrasignup. Of the 42 events of 50km in length in Colorado, 38% of them use a registration company other than Ultrasignup. Those other registration companies include RunSignup, RedPodium, Events.com, Active, and Race Roster. Of the twelve 100-Milers in Colorado, 34% of those use a platform other than Ultrasignup for registration. To think that just checking Ultrasignup concludes one’s market research is foolhardy and certainly non-exhaustive. It displays a lack of care. Stating, “Well, we didn’t see you on Ultrasignup so…” is ethical fading. Their email basically concluded with, “Thanks but F*ck off.”
I recently had a phone call with someone affiliated with Ironman Trail. In our conversation he mentioned how a lot of folks in the ultrarunning space are claiming that Ironman/UTMB’s mission is to “take over trail and ultra running.” The best point he made on the call went something like this. “We have 6 events on the North American calendar at present. We plan to add 2-3 races to that calendar, each year, over the next 2-3 years; and then we’re done. That will total 12-15 races, the same that HPRS has. Aravaipa now has over 70 events in the trail and ultra space. They’re buying up races all over the country. So who is really taking over, and who is far from it?”
Aravaipa has always held races in Colorado’s Southwest corner in and around Silverton. In 2021, they decided to expand and start hosting races in the Colorado Springs area. A fellow race director and I have had many candid conversations about Aravaipa’s move. Most notably because of events like their Ram Party in May. Ram Party is on the same day as HPRS’ Endure Trail Runs, 12 miles away as the crow flies, with some of the same distances present. It also has and does conflict with Mad Moose’s Valkyrie event, Revenant’s Great Divide Ultras, and events hosted by Pikes Peak Road Runners. My fellow RD asked the former RD of Aravaipa Colorado why someone like Jamil is not honoring the unwritten rules of race direction, and the answer he got was “Because Jamil believes there’s a reason those rules are unwritten. If not etched in stone, do we even need to follow them?”
The only legitimate race director certification for trail and ultra race directors is hosted by Road Runners Club of America (RRCA). RRCA is one of the few entities in our sport that race directors interact with regularly, particularly for insurance purposes. As a condition of their race director certification program, race directors are required to submit a notarized copy of the “Race Director Code of Ethics” [7], which reads in part:
“(17) Race Directors should keep informed and be sensitive about how their event affects the community in which their event is held. Race Directors should share that information with their staff, event committee or interested persons. They should be sensitive to community needs and work in partnership to better the health and wellness of the community and not be disruptive to citizens.
(20) Race Directors are expected to conduct themselves ethically, honestly and with integrity in all dealings. This means principles of fairness, good faith and respect consistent with all laws, permit regulations and or internal policies that govern their conduct with others both inside and outside the community.”
Just a decade ago you would have been eviscerated and excoriated for creating a new race on the same day/weekend, or on the same routes as other events. Today, you won’t even hear a whisper. You were careful to not build a new event that would undoubtedly undermine the success of others in your geographic area. Today, we build races in the same geographical area specifically to screw and disrupt someone else. The ethical agreements, whether they be written or not, were ideals that most race directors subscribed to as a matter of ethical and moral high ground. Today, it’s “Go f*ck yourself.”
Yet through all of this, those who choose to act against the ethical and moral guidelines we followed for decades, now utilize ethical fading “to behave in immoral ways while maintaining the conviction that we are good and moral people.” [1] Capitalism is now the guiding star in a sport where community once was.
This article does not include a call to action. I honestly don’t believe there is a way to turn around from this, or for us to enter into new agreements. The words and actions of race directors are showing the way. It is what it is. This article is to say, that ultrarunning has truly lost its way, Ironman/UTMB are not those whom we should worry most about, we should be taking longer looks in the mirror and deciding if our actions are indeed ethical and moral, or if we’ve simply convinced ourselves that we’re doing the right thing even though we’re clearly not.
Ethical Fading
Ragnar
[2] https://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=4228721
[3] https://justacoloradogal.com/uh-oh-ragnar-running-drama/
[4] https://timberlineevents.com/ragnar/ragnar_relays_is_stealing_races.html
[5] https://www.denverpost.com/2011/09/26/meyer-ragnar-relays-colorado-plan-is-bad-way-to-do-business/
NFL Non-profit
[6] https://www.irs.gov/charities-non-profits/other-non-profits/professional-football-leagues
RRCA RD Code of Ethics