Trail Running Culture Doesn't Scale

Every few years trail running has the same argument: What happens to trail running culture as the sport grows?

Former ITRA President Bob Crowley’s answer is both simpler and more optimistic than most. Trail running culture doesn’t live in race organizations, private equity firms, governing bodies, or finish lines. It lives in behaviors passed from runner to runner, generation after generation.

Or as Bob puts it:

“We did not make this culture. We were made by it.”

It’s one of the most thoughtful responses I’ve read to the current conversation around growth, preservation, and the future of trail running.

I read Bob’s op-ed and responded on our latest podcast.

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Trail Running Culture Doesn’t Scale
Bob Crowley on why the culture of trail running exists beyond the institutions currently fighting over it.

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Tara talks like someone who still has one foot at a thru-hiker campsite, eating candy and laughing with people named Mudbag. Not the usual elite-athlete origin story.

Then again, after she DNF’d Mammoth 200, she was back at her Airbnb within about 12 hours working on her Javelina race document. Crew, pacers, recovery, beet juice, sleep. Already building the next attempt.

_{by Bryce Carlson}

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Nils Arend before The Speed Project became a legend. In 2017, Nils stopped running the race so he could care for the people running it.

a photo essay by Christian Brecheis

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When I got into running, I kept seeing her photos attached to the kind of people and brands that made the sport feel interesting to me. Brooks. Rabbit. Hoka. On. Norda. Big races. Cool athletes. Work that did not feel like stock running content. It felt like someone actually understood the sport.

_{by Bryce Carlson for Subwhatever}

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