UTMB is this week and Chamonix is supersaturated with events. Not sure how much truth there is to it, but I saw that shakeout runs by brands were discouraged. Good idea! I worry for the local scene, and know my friend who lives there is largely staying away from downtown while it 10x’s in size.
This week’s newsletter covers a bunch of new releases from your favorite trail brands, collab wars by the watch brands, and some rampant copycatting by brands both big and small.
In the midst of a big move and have unearthed a ton of vintage that I’ve collected and will have some locally but more importantly at Rec Room NYC with Katherine Douglas and Lee Glandorf! Substack Team holler at us, we’re doing something IRL.
Good Guy Flotrack: FloTrack is making the remaining Diamond League meets including the final free on Prime Video per Dennis Young, reporter and former employee. Lausanne and Silesia will both be ones to watch with a stacked 5k, Ingebrigtsen back in the mile, and a champions face off in the Women’s 100.
Jenny Simpson is recovered from her shocking incident, but will no longer be able to run again. More here.
US Olympic Trials will be held at Hayward Field again, not Icahn Stadium. Not that surprising. What is surprising is that it’s condensed to 6 days rather than 10. The 800m and 1500m trials will be tiring for the athletes.
Rolling Stones and Carnival Running out of Bangkok rolled out a collab in the same breath that 247 Represent and Avenged Sevenfold did. While I’m probably more of a Stones fan than A7X, I’m not a fan of what either of these “running brands” are doing, co-opting the popularity of running into licensed lifestyle merch. Neither of these collabs make any sense other than trying to tap into the rock-n-roll vibe that SATISFY already occupies, and already worked with Joe Strummer of The Clash on. I try not to cover brands like these, but was hard to ignore just how painful these collabs were.
Meanwhile, Carnival didn’t tie in any of the story about how Mick Jagger is a big runner, getting out daily for at least a few miles while touring.
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Somewhat behind the curve, watch brands have adopted the energy playbook that running’s been employing for the last few years. Collabs will soon become the default here as they try and claim the lifestyle runner category and reach the new wave. In the last newsletter, I covered the Garmin x Carnival collab with the Bangkok streetwear store. SATISFY just announced their collab with COROS on the top-of-the-line trail watch, the Apex 4. Co-designed with custom bands, custom digital faces, and training plans by SATISFY ultra pro Stian Dahl. Both reach a categorically new audience, and the SATISFY collab and product choice make a lot of sense: SATISFY customers reach for top of the line and tend to spend, perfect for a $520 running watch.
I barely finished writing this before I saw Amazfit partnered with Currently Running’s Practice program, their pro team, to provide athletes with both free watches and a stipend to cover training expenses. Less of a collab than a brokered partnership, which honestly is even cooler.
Trend hop and you might get sales, but you’ll always be behind the eight ball. A few clones here of Unna’s popular Breton stripe LS have popped up on my IG feed. Wile Unna hardly owns the breton stripe (which arguably Tracksmith could have), but there are copies down to the brush script on the back! Lazy clones.
Egregious by H&M who are in the same city as UNNA and are probably quite aware of the brand if they’re designers. Screenshot from a shoot outside the H&M office.
Another Cotton Lab even used the same model that Unna had for their Unna x HOKA campaign…come up with something different or better please!
Altra's third iteration of their carbon-plated racer — light, responsive, and finally seems fast. New FAST RCE midsole (SC two-piece full PEBA), split-toe carbon fiber plate for rigidity + big-toe engagement, and a roomy anatomical toebox for those that want a more natural foot shape in their racing shoe.
Core Altra people might not love this but it makes the brand more appealing to those looking to dip into the natural foot shape and footstrike category. At $240 it’s not too shabby either.
Camo pattern released from Nike ACG for Chamonix, widely available. The brand has already worked closely with RealTree™ on some camo patterns but this one is specific for UTMB and released amongst their closer running store partners. Treeline pattern based on the Chamonix terrain for shorts, tops, Pegasus Trail, and Zegama. I feel like the camo appeal is uniquely American so I wonder how this does in Europe. The popup looks rad.
SATISFY has a popup at UTMB each year, and this year have more than just some graphic MothTech Tees. This year they have some graphic tee merch, but also a special Mud-Dye program with custom dipped colorways hailing from Japan (why?) that are a fun spin on what they normally do.
They also have a collab on the Oakley Suture (thank god not another Eye Jacket) in Grenoble Green with some airflow holes. These look pretty slick and sporty without giving police officer or truck-driving-Monster-drinking.
Probably a collab coming Sep 5. Nike has already kicked off some Nike Run Specialty Group collabs, starting with Renegade. This is probably a teaser for a track spike and trainer from France based Distance Athletics. Forward-looking tease from Nike × Distance Athletics. Cool animation they made to promote it.
Back with another collab on a trail shoe, do not ignore the Chinese running brands! Li-Ning tapped techy streetwear brand Nine Point Nine to add some sauce to a trail shoe and apparel line.
That’s all for this week leading into UTMB. Expect an overview of what went on there between racing and mobbing the town with popup events.
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