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While watching the UTMB finals and Phil Gore’s amazing Project 168 last week, I was struck by the contrast between the two events.

They were both amazing, featuring awesome feats of endurance. But in many ways, they couldn’t have been more different.

At Chamonix, UTMB showcases the sport’s “top end” - full-time athletes leading fields of thousands of people around a course that’s both impossibly beautiful and cruelly demanding.

On the outskirts of Perth, Project 168 - while no less epic in its own way - was a much more modest affair. Its main purpose was to raise money for children’s charities.

The entire event was only really conceived six weeks out and was mounted by Phil Gore and his wife Gemma with the help of a dozen or so volunteers. At UTMB, there were more people involved in mounting the live coverage of the event on YouTube.

For me, this contrast underlined something I’ve been thinking about for a while. It feels like trail running has reached an inflection point. With more money pouring into the sport, we’re seeing advances in the tech that underpins it - think carbon-plated shoes - and the science behind it - think of advances in nutrition and hydration.

This investment also means there is a rising class of trail runners who have been able to go full-time professional and, unsurprisingly, they are beginning to monopolise the podiums at the big events. (Don’t get me wrong - I love this … but it has broader implications.)

Not exclusively of course. In 2024 Vincent Bouillard, who was a shoe designer with Hoka at the time, won the UTMB finals. Even this year, the women’s winner Blandine L’Hirondel balances running with her career as an obstetrician and gynecologist.

So while the pros don’t have it all their own way, stories like Bouillard’s and L’Hirondel’s are becoming more and more rare. Which is a shame, because I’ve always thought they’re a big part of the romance of the sport.

You’ve only got to look at race results to see evidence of the impact this “professionalisation” has had. On the men’s side at UTMB this year, Ben Dhiman took more than an hour off the record Tom Evans had set in 2025, winning in 18 hours 16 minutes.

In the women’s, L’Hirondel took almost 15 minutes off the record Katie Schide set two years earlier. While it’s impossible to compare year on year performances with precision at UTMB because the course changes due to weather and trail conditions, the downward trend in finishing times is undeniable.

This is not a UTMB phenomenon. It’s happening in major trail races everywhere. Perhaps most remarkably at the Leadville 100 miler. On the men’s side, Matt Carpenter held the record for 19 years until David Roche broke it in 2024 and again in 2025.

The women’s record was held for an amazing 31 years by Ann Trason until Anne Flower broke it in 2025.

Watching the live coverage of UTMB you see another expression of this professional approach. Runners no longer take a seat, have something to eat and get a pep talk from their crew. The top contenders are literally in and out of the aid stations in under two minutes.

This is because literally every second counts. The difference between second and third in the men’s race this year was 46 seconds. In the women’s race, the gap was 94 seconds. That’s the definition of fine margins in races that are more than 170k long!

Last year Tom Evans talked about having practiced putting his waterproof pants on and off while running so as to avoid delays during the race. And those fine margins tell you why.

It’s a far cry from Anton Krupicka running shirtless clutching just a handheld water bottle to finish second to Geoff Roes at the 2010 Western States, as featured in the legendary doco Unbreakable: The Western States 100.

Fuelling this new professionalism is the running boom we’ve seen take off in recent years. Wherever you look now, there are people running. Marathons are selling out in days. Parkrun is thriving.

That boom in road running is flowing through to the trails - hardly a surprise, road running is like listening to music; trail running is like listening to music while also dancing like no-one’s watching!

In 2025, more than 140,000 people took part in UTMB events around the world. That’s the population of Darwin. One of the biggest of those events takes place in Katoomba every year - Ultra-Trail Australia.

Backyard ultras are also having a moment, at least in part due to the efforts of people like Phil Gore. The inventor of the format, Gary “Lazarus Lake” Cantrell, wrote on Facebook earlier this week (in his own, typically idiosyncratic way):

So, as trail running’s popularity continues to rise and events become more like elaborate, multi-day running festivals, where does that leave your traditional, grassroots events?

And as the sport becomes more “professional” and therefore more commercial, is it in danger of losing what makes it special?

I’m sure I’m not the only person who loves trail running at least as much for the community spirit it engenders as for the running itself. I’ve run plenty of road marathons and while I’ve enjoyed them, they are just different.

A road race feels like a competition, a trail race feels like an experience. On the roads it’s you versus the other runners with time the adjudicator. On the trails, it’s you and your fellow runners versus the terrain.

It’s that “we’re all in this together” spirit that inspires so many trail runners to talk about finding their tribe when they find their feet in the sport.

Can that spirit survive as the sport expands? Will we see smaller events sqeezed out by the big guys?

Best of both worlds

I hope there’s room for both the glitz of the big events, and the homespun charm of the grassroots. In the past 18 months I’ve seen both ends of the spectrum, and I’ve enjoyed both.

UTA in 2025 was my first big event. The UTMB organisation says UTA is the second biggest trail running event in the world, second only to the UTMB finals at Mont Blanc. Based at an outdoor activities centre in Katoomba in the Blue Mountains, it’s like entering a mini trail running city.

It features races over five different distances - from 11k to 100 miles - plus a 1k dash for kids. There’s a huge expo, all kinds of branded merch, start and finish line announcers, a finish line medical tent featuring doctors and nurses (I had a cardiogram at the finish line in 2025 - I kid you not).

Then there’s the live streaming coverage via YouTube and the UTA website. I have a background in media. For years at the ABC I managed the team that makes ABC News Breakfast every day, so I’m familiar with the workings of a TV control room.

I can tell you, the ABC would weep for access to facilities like those the UTMB folks have to mount their events’ outside broadcasts. So it’s no surprise that the coverage is as good as you’ll see on TV.

At the other end of the spectrum is Dead Cow Gully. There was certainly no glitz on offer on the Walsh family cattle station outside Nanango, when I took part there this year. Race director Timothy Walsh says this is deliberate - the event doesn’t even have a sponsor.

There’s merch - your choice of a black hoodie or a black trucker’s cap - and rather than a finisher’s medal, runners go home with a slice of fence post cut from the property, on which a volunteer has scrawled “DCG 26” on one side and the number of loops completed on the other.

Yep, that’s grassroots alright.

But I have to say, I loved both. I’ve already signed up for Dead Cow in 2027 and I’m weighing whether to run UTA - entries open in a few days. UTMB remains on my bucket list as an event I’d love to run.

I love seeing more people coming into our sport. I know it’s been a great influence on my physical and mental health, and it’s broadened my social circle - all great things that everyone should have access to.

But I do worry a little about the sport’s ability to absorb this surge in popularity and the implications for its personality. I think it’s resilient enough to serve both the glitzy and grassroots ends of the market.

I guess only time will tell, but I hope I’m right.

Upcoming Events

There are way too many events for me to list everything that’s happening around the country, but here is a selection of upcoming races (with a bias towards South East Queensland).

The Running Calendar website is a great source if you want a comprehensive understanding of what’s available around the country.