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Trail Running and the Olympics with Mike Duggan
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Trail running is growing fast, but with that growth comes big questions about governance, identity, and where the sport is heading next.
In this episode, James sits down with Mike Duggan, Australian representative on the ITRA Steering Committee, to unpack the global push to bring trail running into the Olympic Games. They explore why the Olympics are even on the table, what problem that pathway is trying to solve, and what still needs fixing in trail running regardless of whether 2032 happens.
The conversation dives into how ITRA and World Athletics work together, what this means for national bodies like AUTRA, athlete selection and funding, race formats, sponsorship influence, and the growing pressure around anti-doping and professionalism.
Whether you’re excited, sceptical, or sitting on the fence, this episode will challenge how you think about the future of trail running — and what it might gain, or risk losing, along the way.
https://trailrunning.org.au/
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Thanks for tuning in to Peak Pursuits! Connect with us on Instagram @peakpursuits.pod to share your thoughts, questions, and trail stories. Until next time, keep hitting the trails and chasing those peak pursuits!
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Transcript
00:00:15
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the Peep Pursuits podcast. My name is James Sieber and today's episode is a little bit of a different one. I'm joined by Mike Duggan, who is the Australian representative on the ITRA, the International Trail Running Association Steering Committee. and But more specifically, he's one of the driving forces behind the global push to see trail running into the Olympic Games. Now, if you've been following the podcast, across this year, especially in the last six months.
00:00:37
Speaker
There's been a lot of conversations about whether the Olympics is good for the sport, bad for the sport, and trying to present opinions on both sides of the argument. We're seeing a lot of other media outlets, a lot of other athletes in the sport using their voice. And so this was an opportunity to speak to Mike himself and see where their side is coming from.
00:00:56
Speaker
The point of this conversation is to go beyond all the typical headlines that we see. We're going to go into why trail running is even talking about the Olympics and what problem it's trying to solve and what still needs fixing in the sport, regardless of whether an Olympic start line ever happens. And that's something that this conversation has definitely highlighted for me is that there is an identity question that is going to happen regardless of the Olympics and or not. We're also going to look into how ITRA and World Athletics are working together. We're seeing that domestically with ORTRA and AA and who actually holds decision-making power, what that means for for our national bodies and for the events such as the World Mountain and Trail Running Championships.
00:01:33
Speaker
We're also going to go into a bunch of other topics, looking at race formats, authenticity, funding, sponsorship influence, anti-doping, and whether the Olympic pathway risks the sport, whether it's narrowing it or potentially if it's strengthening it. As I said, this isn't meant to be promotional. This isn't meant to be attack. This is simply a chance to get a bit of a balanced viewpoint and speak to one of the people who is essentially spearheading this campaign, see the trade-offs, the possible pros, the cons, and to see what the sport potentially has to gain, but also what it's not willing to lose to pursue the Olympic dream.
00:02:06
Speaker
So let's get to it, this podcast with Mike Duggan. Mike, welcome to the Peep Suits podcast. We really appreciate you being here today. How are you going? I'm well, James. Yeah, it's great. It's gay i'll coming into Christmas. Temperatures are nice and warm and humid up in Queensland is like as a Canadian by birth. um It always tests me this time year getting out of the trails, but um what a great time for family and friends and and a bit of fun as we get towards the holiday season.
00:02:31
Speaker
Yeah, I feel like we're recording on the 17th and it's like this mad rush to get everything ready to try and take this little bit of a break. and I'm still not sure if it's a nice thing this this last couple of weeks of December, but we've got got a time to do this. I'm excited to sit down with you today to have a chat. want to start off with For a lot of people listening, they may never have heard your name before.
00:02:51
Speaker
Can you just kind of set the scene for your your backstory a bit? You said you're from from Canada and how you've ended up working in the role that you're in right now. We're going to talk about today with the Olympics. Yeah, yeah. Quick quick little backstory. It's always fun, sets the scene, gives some context. Yeah, so i grew up in Canada, came to Australia in 1999.
00:03:08
Speaker
ninety nine And as the old story goes, it's been probably told a million times, I came here to study. I finished a degree, met a lovely woman named Lauren from Townsville, 20-plus years later of marriage, we've got a couple of lovely daughters. One just turned 16 on the weekend, and it's hard to leave Queensland. you know living Living in in Australia, but sorry, in Canada, I was really lucky. I got to travel quite a bit around the world and um always loved the really warm countries.
00:03:35
Speaker
And so coming to Australia, was I played rugby too. So you know for me, I was a massive kind of rugby fan, so I came here played a bit of rugby. um And so just really, really fell into the culture and just loved it here. i actually, i i was in saying rugby, I was probably about 15, 20 kilos heavier than that i am now. And I'm um probably about five to 10 kilos heavier than I am when I was actually doing a lot of kind of ultra running.
00:03:59
Speaker
um But I fell into running in probably about 2008. I'd stopped playing rugby. I was doing some other sports. You wanted to get in and do something different. So I started doing some, as you go, it's the gateway drug for you know, 10 Ks and then half marathons and then marathons on the road, realized I hated the road.
00:04:15
Speaker
Um, and so I decided to look, you know, in Canada, I was a canoeist and a hunter and, uh, you know, a hiker. So, i you know, I thought, why don't I get out, try these things in the trail. So I started running on trails and found that I, um was not really fast, never had been a super fast, fast. yeah I wasn't a winger. I was a a flanker in rugby. So you can imagine I was quick over five, five meters, but not over, over 20, 30.
00:04:40
Speaker
but I could eat well. I'm really stubborn, uh, and I've got good solid rugby legs for going up and down mountains. So I trail running was it and just fell in love with that and was able to kind of do some amazing runs and join an amazing community. Um, and that community really grew. And to tell you a little bit about from that, I'd, I'd kind of, I was doing some great you know races, 2017. I did UTMB and I came back from UTMB and, um, I really was just loving volunteering in the community as well as, as racing. And, um,
00:05:09
Speaker
I'd met a bunch of people that were part of the Trail Running Association of Queensland. And I went along to the Trail Co. in Brisbane um for an AGM. And I sat down at the AGM. And the president at the time, Hubertine Witches, looks around um during the elections and says, I don't want to be president anymore. Can someone like just take over president? And I will you know just be vice president and help you out.
00:05:32
Speaker
And you know I kind of looked around the room. And I went, OK. Sounds like fun. I'll do that. As long as you promise to help me. And so i without any intention whatsoever, I became the president of TRAC. was the president, the treasurer, um vice president for little while over about a seven-year period and just loved it. So I continued to volunteer and now I'm on the steering committee of the International Trail Running Association. um And in between the end of TRAC for me and the beginning of ITRA, um I got together with a few people interested in seeing whether we could get trail running in the Olympics. And in 2022, we launched that.
00:06:06
Speaker
um we launched that but trail running 2032 Olympics campaign. um And that's now been running for about three and a half years and hopefully another, know, kind of less than seven years, we might actually get there. Give me a lot to go off there. I thank you for that. I appreciate that backstory. But think it's important to understand that a lot of people that are steering the sport at the moment do have this very deep and detailed pedigree and history with trail running. You said that you came across over here to study. What's your professional role?
00:06:40
Speaker
Yeah, so i I was at that time doing an applied science degree very heavily focused. So one of the reasons I came here is because of the things like um sand dunes and the natural eucalypt forests. And so I'd come here to kind of do some studies and in um the natural environment and finish finish that degree.
00:06:57
Speaker
and But very quickly, that turned into me doing work in in what is now called kind of sustainability and climate. And, you know I guess a subsector that works across multiple sectors such as energy and resources and infrastructure.
00:07:11
Speaker
and So I fell into that in the early 2000s. I ran my own company for a number of years when ah kind of sustainability and climate related consulting wasn't wasn't something that a lot of businesses did.
00:07:22
Speaker
um And then I moved out into industry. So I've kind of worked in in big consultancies and out in in places like Gladstone working on you know energy and resource projects.
00:07:32
Speaker
I now work for a law firm, for a global law firm. so an interesting segue there. I'm not a lawyer myself, um but I do love working with lawyers and engineers on my project teams. um So i work within a law firm and direct part of their climate and sustainability consultancy.
00:07:48
Speaker
um Law firms are doing this type of work where they bring legal and and advisors together. um And i'm I'm one of those advisors in that law firm. And when you're sat in that AGM and you put your hand up for president, what gave you the confidence that you've got the experience and the potential to learn to take that role on?
00:08:05
Speaker
Oh, yeah, that's a great question. um So one of the one of the things that are a foundational part of being a sustainability and climate consultant is a healthy understanding of strategy, governance, risk and compliance. You really almost have to learn those disciplines as kind of foundational tools to be able to deliver sustainability and climate related objectives and so um i you know I felt quite comfortable that I could develop a strategy that I could ensure that um you know track maintain their their compliance requirements that I could assess risks around their races and all of those things plus my love of kind of the outdoors and trail running kind of coalesced very quickly into me thinking look I definitely could put my hand up I know Hube
00:08:47
Speaker
would be there, who was the president at the time, as you know a very experienced race director and and president of Trail Running Association, um to really help me out. and I figured I could bring a new energy. um and I think I did. I think um you know ah at a time when when we were very focused on a particular you know an aspect of just races, I think I bought ah brought a bit of a different way of thinking about how we could expand track, which now through you the current president um Jeff Russell you know has just leveled up that strategy and the way that that track actually operates. So, yep, I got to put my little stamp on it for a little while, but now it's now it's certainly a heck of a lot more mature than when I was there.
00:09:24
Speaker
It definitely stands out to me having paid attention to more of the the state kind of, it's not even bodies, but state organizations like Track that exist or don't exist across Australia. And it does seem that Queensland has the strongest, a kind of most robust organization up there. like Looking at the time that you spent there, what do you think you did well that other states might be able to take on to kind of help create something similar in say Victoria or SA or wherever it is?
00:09:54
Speaker
I think one really simple thing is we we just focused on um the desires and the objectives of the of the local trail running community to you know put on great races, but also to expand the connection amongst amongst the community. And we focused on things like volunteers. So as opposed to maybe spending too much time on bureaucracy and and you know particular interests, specific interest areas, we just said the community's and the volunteers within it and the racers within it are the most important things to us and we'll just focus on them.
00:10:28
Speaker
I think sometimes um associations, and I've been i've been actually fortunate to fortunate to be a member of a number of different associations and not-for-profits, sometimes they can get very bogged down in trying to be too sophisticated with strategy or to you know pander to every you know a special interest group out there when really you just got to look at the core kind of fundamentals of you know who you're there to serve and why you've been elected to that to that particular community or you know association um and fulfill that. And for us, you know the people that actually raced or volunteered as part of races or were engaged in supporting races um were the most important people at that time. And so we focused in on that. And that's now expanded to be around you know environmental sustainability and keeping our trails in good condition that we can run on them for years to come.
00:11:18
Speaker
um But at the time, that that seemed like the smartest thing to do was really focus and hone in on the people. um And we did that well. And I think that's borne fruit as a result. I find this really interesting because I've, as as a race director and someone who's involved in events and obviously racing as well, you understand how volunteers are essentially the lifeblood of of any event. Like it's not going to run without it. And the same goes more broadly into the community. But you hear a lot of talk about people trying to invest and put back and to really put the focus on the volunteers, but maybe never quite having the the substance behind it. Like what did you guys do to two put that focus on them?
00:11:54
Speaker
Oh, something as simple as every volunteer got a track shirt, right? You know, they didn't have to pay for that. That was something that we made a conscious decision that the funds that track had raised would be beneficial in providing. So every every person immediately became part of the community when they volunteered by getting something that was actually branded and unique for them.
00:12:17
Speaker
um I think it just it's a simple gesture, but it it creates a sense of community and a sense of camaraderie. And I think that's really important. And then, you know, just demonstrating demonstrating the respect and the worth of the volunteer, I think, is is something really, really super, super simple as well. but and ah And I'll give you an example.
00:12:38
Speaker
um Safety. So every single one of those volunteers that go out into the bush and stand at a checkpoint have have a right, um and not just not just their own right, but actually a right under legislation to be safe and looked after.
00:12:52
Speaker
And so TRAC, you know, as and a community association would ensure that we had the provisions in place to make sure that those volunteers, just like the racers and anyone else involved in the in the race, um were safe.
00:13:04
Speaker
um Something as simple as every single race had to have a communications team um at the checkpoints. And we worked with a group called WISON, who were the effectively like the wireless radio club of of Queensland. And we just made sure that those people were there as as just one example of a safety measure that was always available to our volunteers and to our community of of race participants.
00:13:28
Speaker
um And just making sure that people realize that we cared about them, like through things like our safety initiatives, are again, are simple things where we don't have to to tell them that. They see it, they feel it, they understand they're safe, they understand they're well looked after.
00:13:43
Speaker
um And you know that's worth worth its white and gold to a volunteer and to you as a race director and ah as an association. ah Especially with the conversation around OTRA and looking at their policy, I think that's a very valuable bit of information that see it probably sounds very simple everyone listening to this right now, but it's not that simple to put these into place and actually to act on the words that you're saying. So it's a good example to be setting for other states across the country. Going from TRAC into the steering committee for ITRA, how did that transition happen?
00:14:14
Speaker
there Well, there's a there's a little there's a little ah part of the story i didn't I probably didn't tell that happened. um So one of um one of our key checkpoints, and we we refer to our milestones in the trail running 2032 campaign as checkpoints.
00:14:28
Speaker
One of the keymile key checkpoints was that Australia didn't have a trail running association um at ah at a at a national level. um And so one of the first things we did is a group of us came together and formed a working group and started progressing a discussion that had happened many times already around whether we could actually put together an Australian um trail running peak body. right um Now that's now Outra. So a group of us over 16 months came together multiple times, thrashed it out with all different types of stakeholders across the country. um And eventually ah through the relationship that we were we built with the Australian Ultra Runners Association, oh our Aura, um we were able to to
00:15:13
Speaker
define a way to be able to come together and as opposed to creating an entirely new body to bring trail running under the fold of the ultra running association and produce a unique, a unique and, um, and national body. Uh, and so that, that occurred. Um, I led that group, uh, had some amazing, amazing people involved, um, over that period of time, including Jeff Russell, um, Simone from, from, uh, Outra, John from down in Tasmania, you know, Lincoln from Tassie.
00:15:42
Speaker
Just you know really dedicated people. Got that across the line at the AGM. um And I thought, what's next? um i didn't I actually didn't want to become a part of Outra, other than a member. I'm still a member of Outra, but i didn't want to be I didn't want to be on the board.
00:15:58
Speaker
um I work in projects. And for me, that was a project that I really wanted to complete. It was a checkpoint. And then it was an opportunity then to progress past that to the next checkpoint. um And so I stepped away from from that. um but ITRA had their elections coming up.
00:16:15
Speaker
I think it must have been about maybe a couple of months after that, and I was encouraged to put my hat in the ring for these elections. um i want to I want to point out I was thoroughly beaten in the first two the first two ah they rounds, so they've got multiple rounds of elections where there's about 76 countries with um various different electors that that go and they vote on people, and I was pretty thoroughly beaten in those two and I decided not to give up and I wrote an email to every single one of them laid out my manifesto and somehow I snuck in as the fourth fourth elected um runners member for for um for the interest steering committee. So that's that's how it all really came to be. I woke up one morning expecting to hear great news about all these other people that were elected and had a congratulations letter that I was now now on the steering committee. So again, that became my project and and I've been you know really fortunate to now
00:17:09
Speaker
you know, be able to experience, you know a lot through my time with ITRA. It's been two and a half years now in a four-year term. um And, you know, I'm sure we'll get into that again, you know, further in the podcast. But um yeah, some some fabulous people and very dedicated people that are on that committee.
00:17:24
Speaker
And what does being involved on that committee look like day to day for you? um Day to day, it's probably a little bit more haphazard than that, um in in that the committee, so the way the committee is broken up is there's an executive board that the actual committee members vote. I think there's six on that executive board. They effectively have the dayto day to day operational control for ITRA. So there's a president, secretary, and there are four vice presidents.
00:17:51
Speaker
um and And they have particular areas that they focus on and effectively like the executive team. And then together with them and about another, i think it must be about 14 other elected committee members, um we make particular decisions that are under our constitution. So we just came to together recently and looked at our draft budget um and voted on that draft budget.
00:18:16
Speaker
We started looking at some of our reporting that we'll have to do for the AGM program when it happens, or the Congress, as they call it, when it happens next year. So there are there are various kind of procedural things that we do.
00:18:29
Speaker
Then some of us take on various subject matter areas to focus on. There are two. um And as you can imagine, with my background in sustainability and climate, that is one of the two. I work with the team around the Green Charter and some work we're trying to do with that and some partners to to evolve that and to support other other groups that are are progressing the sustainability and climate agenda globally. and That's one area. And then the other area, as you can imagine, is the Olympics. So it's ITRA's commitment to to trail running being being in the 2032 Olympics.
00:19:03
Speaker
um And so between those two, that keeps me fairly busy each month just meeting with various people. And um obviously, when ITRA made the announcement around their support for the for the Olympics, that then amped things up a bit because I had a much bigger reach and much more kind of larger community of people that wanted to speak to me, which is great. So I get to engage with those types of those types of things. and Anything else that they need a bit of a hand on, us committee members tend to pitch in.
00:19:29
Speaker
So when you originally applied to be part of the ITRA steering committee, was the Olympics within ITRA's attention at that point? it I think it's always been on the periphery of these peak organizations' attention. um And the other peaks that are very ah much there is a kind of a triangle of peaks. they're ah They're a bit of a union that come together for things like the World Mountain and Trail Running Championships that happened recently. um That's the World Mountain Running Association and the International Association of Ultra Runners, IAU.
00:19:59
Speaker
ah All of them have talked about off-road running at the Olympics in some form of mountain distance, you know, trail. But it hadn't really become a significant focus until I joined and really pushed it.
00:20:14
Speaker
um And of course, again, it's part of my checkpoints in the plan. to push it forward, this was now a great opportunity for me to progress it. When I've been thinking about, there's been a lot of conversations about the Olympics and whether people are pro it, con it, on the fence somewhere. The thing that I keep coming back to is we have the World Mountain Trail Rining Championships now. We have Sky Rining Championships. We have Golden Trail UTMB Series. So there's all of these entities, some of them under the um World Athletics Framework, others completely private.
00:20:45
Speaker
What does being in the Olympics like what problem is that trying to solve for trail running that these things don't hit? Yeah, that's an excellent question. you know, I've never been asked that one. What kind of problem is it trying to solve?
00:20:56
Speaker
um Look, I'm going to I'm going to throw a quote at you. All right. Let's see. Let's see if this opens up some thinking. It's a quote I've been thinking about a lot recently, and I think it goes to the to the it goes to the base of why something as big as the Olympics is required to solve this challenge.
00:21:15
Speaker
um There's a there's a design thinker and innovator in the US um called Margaret Whitley. And her focus has been very much around kind of writing, teaching and researching in the space of organizations, but particularly how organizations create some kind of um consistency out of chaos.
00:21:38
Speaker
And so she's always looking at at kind of organizations globally and how They really operate in very chaotic times. And the quote that I love that she said is, there's no power or ah for change greater than a community discovering what it cares about. No power of change that's greater than a community discovering what it cares about.
00:21:57
Speaker
And I think in my travels and the discussions that I've had and the engagement that I've had with people um on both sides of the fence and straddling the fence of the trail running the Olympics, what I've really realized is that we're in a time right now of almost organized chaos.
00:22:12
Speaker
um across the trail running community and it's trying to figure out what it actually wants to be. um And it's struggling with that. And it needs a big, it needs a big objective to actually grab a whole bunch of different ways of thinking and, you know, community sentiments um and, you know, challenges and opportunities and actually focusing and on something.
00:22:38
Speaker
And all of the various disparate, you know, trail running races or race series or you know peak series um create a lot of noise without a single kind of North Star for people to focus on. And the Olympics is as big as you could get for a sport.
00:22:54
Speaker
And it causes it forces people to have these conversations that will hopefully create something that's got a little bit less chaos and also helps the community to be able to identify really what it really what it cares about. And just to you know to to give you another you know basis understanding of why I've kind of done this is if we get to the point where at any of these checkpoints, the community of trail runners has kind of said, this is not right for us, then the race stops, right? And maybe you go on a different race.
00:23:24
Speaker
So i don't I don't think at any time that, you know, I'm a volunteer. So for me, I've got no ego in this at all. In fact, I've got a a compass that's but our pillars um that sits on the website, that's how I make all my decisions. It's not about me, it's about the five pillars and whether what we're doing actually aligns with those pillars.
00:23:42
Speaker
um And sort of, you know, what the community actually cares about. if they care If they care enough to tell us that it's not the right thing to do, then I think as a as a group, we should be in a position and comfortable with with stopping.
00:23:54
Speaker
pivoting changing direction right um okay just go go with this for a sec let's take the olympics out of the the picture it's not an option for whether the bid isn't successful whatever it is what would you do with trail running to help fix the problems you just identified without having the olympics as the that north star yeah it's just going to get this is going to get boring for the listeners, but let's have a little fun with it. um there are There are two observations I've made in meeting with, and I'm going to talk about a lot of these lot of these groups that I've met with, I'm sure throughout this this conversation, but um there's two things that jumps out of me across the board.
00:24:33
Speaker
One is either the lack of or the differences across the governance within the sporting environment of trail running. Now, this isn't just this isn't just you know localized to trail running. Many sports are challenged by this.
00:24:49
Speaker
um But if there's one one area that I'd focus on immediately would be around governance. And that may be some rationalization around the number of bodies, the number of race series, the number of of ranking systems.
00:25:03
Speaker
um But just being able to get to a point where there was a there was a level of governance that gave people a feeling that um the decisions that were being made across all of those bodies or one body or you know whatever, actually had the best interests of the entire community um in mind. And in my experience in in spending time, and and I'm going to humble brag here in that I don't think there'd be anyone globally that has um spent as much time with as many groups talking about trail running in the Olympics than myself.
00:25:33
Speaker
um And I've been a very fortunate position that I've been able to talk to all of these various different groups. And it's given me a really good perspective. And governance is one of our biggest challenges. And if we don't get that right, we're actually going to probably run into some really, and this is my second area, and that that is risk management.
00:25:50
Speaker
We're going to run into some really, really challenge big challenges around realized risks across the entire trail running community. um And that'll be everything from the safety risks that we're seeing pop up at various events that are actually happening at at a higher frequency.
00:26:04
Speaker
um to the you know the incredible growth in numbers using using the trails to recreate on that are going to cause significant issues from, let's say, an environmental or climate perspective. So I think hand in hand governance and and the management of risk, as boring as that may sound, but it is part of what I do every day. um Those two things, if you could just tweak those slightly and get them so that they had some balance and symbiosis, um the whole sport of trail running, I think, would, would regardless of whether it progresses to the Olympics,
00:26:34
Speaker
um see see strong benefits. From a governance perspective, there needs to be governing body. And whenever we're looking at, whether it's domestically and ultra and AA or internationally, ITRA and World Athletics, how can that work together to give a clear voice and direction and who can have that final say of this is where we're going to be taking that step forward?
00:26:56
Speaker
Yeah. So the the one of the things that's probably not widely known um is that trail running and mountain running, I should say, have a governing body, um and that's world athletics.
00:27:07
Speaker
So world athletics actually has, within its rules, um ah stipulations around the governance and delivery of trail and mountain running. And hence this past year at Incon Frank at the World Mountain Trail Running Championships, and which I was lucky enough to to go and experience um as ah as an ITRA representative,
00:27:27
Speaker
um World athletics for the first time were code co-deliverers of that, of that event. They hadn't been in the past. They'd been there as observers, but this time they were actually an official, um, um, delivery party of the world mountain and trail running championships.
00:27:41
Speaker
So world athletics, when it actually comes to holding the pen on how the sport should be governed, um, and how man at risk should be managed and even whether it should be put forward as an Olympic sport, um, actually sits sits with world athletics.
00:27:54
Speaker
Um, doesn't diminish the importance. of the the peak bodies, you know ITRA, WMRA, and IAU, because World Athletics is spread across a huge amount of athletics disciplines and just wouldn't have the bandwidth to manage without those peak organizations. so they And they work very much hand in glove um you know around World Mountain and trail running. and And that's fantastic because it's a very strong open dialogue. And I've witnessed that. you know We're meeting with World Athletics and those peaks.
00:28:25
Speaker
um I've seen the way that they come together to try to solve these challenges around around world trail running and mountain running. You mentioned about the different scoring systems and eligibility criteria and everything. Does it feel like the sport is coming towards a a point where there is like, for example, the ITRA and UTMB indexes have a massive weight for the elite participation um point of view, but both seem to have this this ambiguity around them. And I'm sure there are a load of other examples that come the top of my head, but like, is is there a point that we're coming to where there is going to be this mutual understanding and agreement of this is the the direction for the sport? probably two things that I'll just delineate in there. One is that um I think it is certainly coming to a point where um there will be one there will be one to rule them all.
00:29:12
Speaker
ah However, i think that I don't see a world where they actually come together in a completely happy marriage. So I think there are such differences amongst both the the groups that that put forward the the different the different ranking systems. And I should say World Mountain and Trail, or sorry, World Mountain Running also has another ranking system, much, much less known than the ITRA and UTMB systems. But I think we're getting to a point now where, um particularly since the growth is so big and having a couple of different systems is a real challenge.
00:29:45
Speaker
um You know, you've got groups like World Athletics, which are looking at it and thinking, look, how do we rationalize this? And if we are you seeing the sport grow and we do have to really consider our governance in the way that we manage the sport, um do we need two of these or is it better for us to have one and and rationalize it? And I think that's probably where we're heading.
00:30:04
Speaker
Yeah. All right. And so coming back to the problem that Olympics is solving, you've potentially already answered this question in the risk management side of it. But from a participation growth, the general recreational runner, and also the pro runner, what benefits do those two different parties maybe together or individually see from getting into the Olympics?
00:30:29
Speaker
Well, if i'll I'll pick on one that's a fairly new one. um What the Olympics do is they they create a spotlight on a sport, right? And the spotlight on that sport is going to go one of two ways. It'll go the way of skateboarding, which has actually seen an increase, not necessarily in all demographics participating in skateboarding, but things like the culture being engaged with, the clothes and the style that skateboarders wear, I'm seeing a growth in in the actual you know products out there available for people to engage with that culture, not necessarily to jump on a skateboard.
00:31:06
Speaker
um Or you'll see it maybe go the way of breakdancing, where I don't know about you, but I haven't seen a brand new you know series of breakdancing shoes come out in you know the local footlocker here and in the in the mall available to people. But I have definitely seen lots of new know skateboarding streetwear related products come out. so What I'm trying to say is that that spotlight amplifies everything around the actual sport.
00:31:33
Speaker
And we're seeing this. I'm going pull one out right now ah because I'm staring it on the other screen here. I read it in the, in the and what is it? The trailhead from Ultra Sign Up this morning, but gravel shoes, right? You know, gravel shoes is an entirely separate product line within somewhere straddling between trail and road. have suddenly seen this growth as a potential product segment. And that's because, you know, as I'm reading the same article this morning, we've seen another like 1.5 million participants in growth of across the world in trail running, you know, over the last year, was it 13.2 million to 14.8 in a single year of people engaging engaging in the in trail running events. So, you know, you're going to see that as the spotlight grows on a sport like trail running, you're going to see all of the environment around it, um, grow and that, and brands are jumping into that. Um, but you'll see like so many other different, you know, um, aspects you'll see technology will, you know, increase. Um, and I'm not just talking about watches and, you know, and those types of wearables, but, you know, AI and VR, you know engagement in races will increase significantly because the money's coming into the sport, seeing the prices of the, uh, sorry, the, um,
00:32:51
Speaker
prize pools that have been put out by Broken Arrow. And you know you know was it another one's 150,000? It might've been Broken Arrow, I'm not sure, but just incredible growth in the prize purses as well. So all of this, and I think this is what I'm trying to say around the Olympics is you know that spotlight on the Olympics is not, it doesn't just drag just the elites up into the spotlight.
00:33:13
Speaker
It drags everything in the entire environment around it up with it. If it's run well, if it's run poorly, If it's delivered badly, it does it'll do the opposite. and That's where we almost have to get to in the next year. so we have to figure out what is the you know unique glide path to the Olympics, what's the counterfactual that's actually going to drag the sport down and and create you know keep the chaos within it. um yeah we can't see that kind of We don't want to see that trajectory.
00:33:39
Speaker
Do you see a future where if olympic if the Olympics doesn't happen, that the rapid growth that trail running is experiencing will cause a potentially catastrophic, maybe that's a bit too too big of a word, but identity issue within trail running and that we may, like this culture that everyone's trying to hold on so tightly and I think is one of the main arguments for not going into the Olympics, could potentially get lost anyway?
00:34:01
Speaker
Absolutely. And that's ah that is a classic environmental concept, right? and sustainability concept. It's actually called carrying capacity. And you know the big big aspect of carrying capacity right now in the world is you know people looking at carbon emissions and um you know biodiversity impacts and seeing that we've actually extended beyond the carrying capacity of what the world can absorb in terms of impact.
00:34:25
Speaker
You see this the exact same in communities um and trail running is just another community effectively, just in a different context with a bunch of different variables. And the community could get to a point, we actually don't know what that is right now, where it goes past its carrying capacity.
00:34:39
Speaker
um Let's say, I'll give you an example. I've got mates that have been trying to get into Western states. I was lucky enough to get into it in 2022 and race it. When I was when i got into it in 2022, was looking at the stats last week before last when they had the draw with a mate of mine who is going to be into a sixth year of trying to get in next year. He didn't get in again.
00:34:57
Speaker
um But when I got in, there was about 6,300 entrants in it. And maybe it was about 75,000 tickets or 70,000 tickets in it. In this one this year, so it's like three years later, there was almost 10,000 entrants and around 93 or 94,000 tickets in it.
00:35:16
Speaker
So you just think about that. That's the growth. The carrying capacity of that race has actually stayed the exact same in terms of the amount of people running in it. But the environment around it in terms of people entering you know has gotten to the point where people that ah enter you know six years ago can't get in.
00:35:33
Speaker
Yeah. and maybe seven years and maybe eight years, and maybe they're to have to extend it out beyond 500 and what is it, 26 tickets to 1,042 tickets, right? So, you know, I don't know, sorry, 52. Like, who knows? It's just because the perpetuity of people entering races and the growth, know, we'll get to a point where either have been able to figure out a way to manage the carrying capacity of the sport within boundaries,
00:35:57
Speaker
or it'll extend beyond those boundaries. And that's where we'll see the catastrophic of you know events, people leaving, for example, getting out of the sport as a result. Yeah. Okay. Talking about the actual Olympic bid at the moment, and I'm i'm not entirely sure exactly where we're at with this, where where does the bid stand and what's what's been achieved already and what's coming ahead in this six month, 12 month period in front of us?
00:36:23
Speaker
Yeah, well, um fortunately, anyone listening, and if they want to see kind of where where we're at and where we've gone, those checkpoints on the trailrunning.org.au website are a great place to take a peek because we do keep them up to date. But um effectively, we've, you know, we wanted the, you know, to put it forward to a national national group. We wanted to present it to a group like World Athletics.
00:36:45
Speaker
We wanted to extend past there and present it to the local local organizing committee for Brisbane. We wanted to go past that and and present it to the International Olympics Committee. We've been able to get through all of three of those, um and we've had a lot of help for for the last one with the IOC presentation with ah a number of brands that are very close close to them and some discussions um out of the peak organizations.
00:37:07
Speaker
um And that's great because we've actually got to the point where we now can communicate with them. We've put together um effectively plans that present the sport, um you know everything from the distances that we'd recommend through to how you'd actually potentially manage bringing in um ah you know people that are adaptive athletes ah to compete Paralympics.
00:37:30
Speaker
And we presented that through to them, giving them an idea of you know what the sport could look like um at an Olympics Games, which is which is fantastic. We've a little bit more work to do in that space. But the main thing and the main comment out of that is we've been able to communicate to the very highest level of the decision makers.
00:37:44
Speaker
And we've also got the support um across the board of of groups like World Athletics to have these discussions, which has been which has been wonderful. Is that one of the powers that Salomon has brought to the table when they've announced their support?
00:37:57
Speaker
Yes. I mean, Salomon's been a, been a, obviously a really great proponent of, um, trail running being in the Olympics. And, um, we've been lucky enough to have an open dialogue with them for over a year now. uh, well before they announced, announced, um, the, their Olympic kind of push, which has been wonderful.
00:38:15
Speaker
Um, they've been, uh, very you know supportive Scott Mellon there. um their chief brand officer who actually has just announced, i don't know if you saw the LinkedIn announcement, but he just announced this past day, a couple of days, that he's actually leaving Solomon in April next year, going off to ah another challenge, but they'll be looking to reappoint someone in that position soon enough. But, you know, Scott, and the team there have been exceptionally supportive, which have opened up some of those dialogues and given us some leverage, um you know, to be able to have these conversations, which is, which is excellent.
00:38:47
Speaker
um other Other brands are out there talking about it. Some brands have been very positive. Some brands have wanted to stay away from it. I think Salomon's probably planted the flag. And it's great to have at least one brand with a great and reach globally. And i should say I should mention, too, it's not just Salomon.
00:39:04
Speaker
it's um And it's beyond the Golden Trail World Series as well. It's um warner brisley Warner Disney Discovery, um Warner Brothers Discovery, WBD. as As you know, the global Olympics television partner already through 2032 are very strongly behind this as well and backing the push for trail running and the Golden Trail World Series to be expanded to get a really great viewership and hopefully to you know make it to an Olympic Games.
00:39:31
Speaker
Just looking, I have have the PDF in front of me and I assumed it hadn't been updated because the put forward to the IOC hasn't been highlighted yet.
00:39:42
Speaker
Do you and the date next to it was 2025 looks like potentially pushing towards 2026. So how how long do you feel like it's going to take for you to actually get in front of the the IOC and then to get to this shortlisted stage?
00:39:55
Speaker
We've been kind of going around it in a bit of a back in a bit of a back doorway in that we've had people talking to the IOC, not directly from the campaign, from the Trail Rain 2032 campaign, but from some of the um external supporters of it that you you could see on the website without going into too much detail in that space.
00:40:11
Speaker
um That has given us, it's almost been a bit top down, bottom up. Us being very bottom up, being very grassroots, driving it from Brisbane um with a few of the brands in the peaks coming from the top down.
00:40:22
Speaker
um and having direct kind of conversations with with um groups like the IOC, we've been fortunate enough to speak directly to the local organizing committee. And I should point out too that um it'll be the local organizing committee, the Brisbane OCOG, that recommends any new sports to the to the IOC and effectively holds the pen on making that decision. The IOC will will more rubber stamp it as long as the LOC sees that there's a business case in it and puts that sport forward.
00:40:51
Speaker
um And another little myth to dispel too as well, um although we could have gone down this track, but just to just to show people a bit of the direction that we're heading in, we're actually not approaching this from being a new sport.
00:41:03
Speaker
that's This is another both opportunity and challenge. We're not looking to become a um you know kind of ah one of those add-on sports like lacrosse is and flag football is at at the Los Angeles games, which are brand new disciplines.
00:41:19
Speaker
the path that we've been able to take is to actually be an athletics discipline under the banner of world athletics. So we're not competing with pickleball in Australia, right? They were pushing really hard to get into the Olympics.
00:41:31
Speaker
What we're competing with is we're competing within the athletics disciplines with all of the other athletics disciplines, which obviously, as you can imagine, brings its own level of complexity and challenge. But that is the path that we've decided to go down. And that is the one we've been encouraged to continue to go down.
00:41:47
Speaker
Does that mean that another athletic discipline would need to get cut for trail running to be included? There's a few, well, there's a lot of scenarios, but that would be one scenario. Other scenarios would be the number of athletes in particular disciplines, and therefore the number of medals that would be provided to that discipline would be reallocated.
00:42:05
Speaker
And effectively, if trail running would would be to come in as a athletics discipline, um you'd see that allocation, reallocation happen in some form. And that That's unfortunately well above my pay grade in terms of making those decisions.
00:42:17
Speaker
But um you know at at ah at a high level, that's effectively how it would look. Okay. Okay. When you're starting this whole this whole campaign and in your head you're thinking about the Olympics and the conversations that you've been having, is there anything that that the sport, ITRA, other parties you're spoken to is worried about something that trail running will lose through this campaign?
00:42:40
Speaker
Yeah, great, great question. And certainly one of the biggest challenges that I have across the peak organizations, um all of them, to their absolute credit, have within their charters an objective to be ah the voice for the community, right? And to make sure that they are only going down the track of of doing things that really, you know, advance the community of their sport, whether that be mountain running or ultra running or trail running.
00:43:07
Speaker
And I think this is one of the biggest challenges that we're we're facing right now. We've got to the point where i think some of the resolve across those peak organizations um is being tested.
00:43:18
Speaker
And it's being tested because there are you know there are loud voices in various pockets of of Trail, Mountain and Ultra that um have ah some opposition or have some particular agendas that they want to push forward. And I think that it's becoming very challenging for, and I'll just speak for, you know, speak in my my perspective on ITRA, not necessarily as an ITRA committee member, but certainly as a person who engages with ITRA and as a member of ITRA, I think that they have some a bit of soul searching to do right now around whether they whether they're comfortable that the community, the trail community actually fully, or, you know, for the majority endorses trail running's maturity as a as a sport heading towards perhaps something like the Olympics.
00:44:03
Speaker
think there's a big pocket of the trail running community that doesn't want to see that happen. And not just necessarily at the Olympics, but, um you know, something that that um brings the sport into a you know a more mature you know mature a space, which I get. I understand I'm a trail runner myself. I don't want to see the beauty and the magic of trail running disappear in any way either. Correct. But it also feels like it's it's already on that path and the momentum is there. like it does does it Is it realistic to say that we're just going to cut that momentum out from the legs?
00:44:34
Speaker
I would like to say it's not realistic, but I'd also say it's a very possible, possible, um you know, trail to go down if I was to use, going to use an acronym. um So I think, you know, at the point right now where hard decisions have to be made and people ah can't just kind of put out a press release. They actually have to put time, effort, um and, you know, in some cases their reputation into driving it forward. and and i And I have the feeling that that's being tested and I'm having to do a lot of work you know, talking with with um various different groups around the vision and the point of doing this um and yeah not trying to convince people because everyone has their own their own opinions, but trying to present a case for as to why this is so important to the sport, which I personally believe it is.
00:45:24
Speaker
um The pillars on the website, by the way, you know, the five pillars are community, sustainability, inclusivity, information and performance. And all all five of those have have a particular definition around them. And they're designed to ensure that as the sport grows, and it is going to continue to grow, um that it grows in a way that that, like I said, makes order out of that chaos and ensures that the community gets as much as what they can of what they care about. And there are going to be compromiseriss compromises that are be going to be going to be made. But I think you can see it at places like TrailCon that happened over in the US recently. And the amount of brands, and the amount of
00:46:02
Speaker
launches and the the new kind of technology that's coming in um it's not going to stop you know um it's just it's going to continue to grow and we're not going to be able to hold back that growth um unless i said like i said there's a carrying capacity issue that actually is so catastrophic that things head the other way it's going to continue to grow we've got to figure out a way to make those five pillars um be something that ensures that it grows in the right direction and doesn't go in a direction that the community doesn't want.
00:46:33
Speaker
And ITRA as a peak body, how much power in helping that direction do you actually have? ITRA or myself? ITRA. ITRA, yeah. I mean, ITRA is at the table with the decision makers in groups like World Athletics, right?
00:46:52
Speaker
And I get to be at the table sometimes, not all the time, because the you know the the absolute kind of executive needs to be there and it can't be everyone in the room. um But ITRA has a voice at the table and has been pushing you know pushing you know particular agendas for quite a little quite a little while that you know are are um there to kind of make sure that the community is protected and that you know it does grow in the right way. And I think that's admirable of them.
00:47:16
Speaker
um the challenge The challenge being that it takes a lot of work um to to you know drive an agenda in an organization um like ITRA and then to engage with multiple other organizations. And we haven't even got into the you know Pro Trail Runners Association or the various media groups um and influencers that are out there that are on ah you know on the radio and podcasts talking about trail running and and trail running in the Olympics.
00:47:42
Speaker
So it's a lot to juggle and they've got a really challenging role, but fortunately they are there to help make the decision to help facilitate it forward. The buck will not stop with them. It's going to stop with Rural Athletics, and eventually it's going to stop with the local organizing committee and the IOC.
00:48:00
Speaker
How, I guess, potentially damaging, but just just in general, how much how much weight does the likes of the bigger media organizations like FreeTrail, obviously, is probably the the the biggest one in the sport right now. They've had interviews with people that are pro and they've had interviews with people that are very much against it. how How much does that voice matter from the World Athletics perspective? Yeah, this is great. This gives me an opportunity to give a little shout out to Dylan and and Jim. um who I met both at the, at the world mountain and trail ring championships. I don't know if you caught their episode where I, um my little claim to fame is where I get mentioned in there that they, ah they mail met this Aussie Canadian.
00:48:39
Speaker
um and And look, I had a great chat with Jim. I mean, what a like fantastically passionate person, not just an amazing trail runner. I had a good brief chat with Dylan um and look, they present one view and that view does get a lot of air time.
00:48:55
Speaker
And I think it, I think, One thing i said to Jim is, have you talked about the Olympics and your thoughts on it publicly? And he said no. And within a week, he went on that. He hadn't had a real public conversation around He went on with Dylan and he had a good, you know verbose public conversation around it and gave gave his thoughts on it.
00:49:17
Speaker
And I think if if anything, that's fantastic. It just opens up the discussion further and it gets another point of view forward. However, it's not the only point of view. I've had many people contact me since that episode was launched. and actually you know provide different points of view, some you know very much in know opposition to what was you know what has been said.
00:49:35
Speaker
um And I think you know this is the best thing about a community that's trying to figure out what they care about, is it takes every community member to talk about it, not not ones to shout ones down, but to actually say every opinion, every thought is valid. Taking them all together will actually give us the right direction to be able to you know make a decision upon.
00:49:56
Speaker
um Now what I'm hoping is that enough voices um provide enough ah you know information that we can actually try you know try to make the right decision. um you know Because we haven't quite got there yet, I think we're still trying to figure a few things out.
00:50:10
Speaker
You mentioned before as well about the PTRA, the ProTrior Runners Association. What's the impression coming forward from from them as a group towards the Olympics?
00:50:22
Speaker
Yeah, there's been some really interesting discussions from them. I think there is a bit of trepidation um and ah for a few very i mean for very valid valid reasons. and And certainly, their opinions are are highly respected. um Some are simply just around, what would the event be? So is every athlete, particularly those ones that specialize in particular types of events, whether that's mountain or whether that's ultra, whether that's a fast 14 kilometer course,
00:50:49
Speaker
you know a kilometer course is every one of those types of athletes going to be able to experience and get to the heights of the Olympics? Great question. you know The answer is probably no.
00:50:59
Speaker
there's going to be There's going to be some disciplines that are not part of the Olympics. I don't think I see a world in the next few Olympics, let's say, where there's an ultra marathon. um It's not consumable. you just you know yeah A media station would would not sign on to kind of to run something like that, or at least they won't yet.
00:51:18
Speaker
um Will that change with technology that might be able to bring people you know closer to those races in an immersive way? Potentially. um So I think that's the challenge is that there there will be some really valid kind of reasons as to why pro athletes might think that the Olympics aren't for them. And then there'll be other ones like, hey, I just want to run great races and really good series in amazing places around the world. I don't want my sponsor to tell me what I have to wear because I'm training and getting ready for the Olympics. Yeah.
00:51:46
Speaker
Yeah. there I've got a few questions. Well, yeah, there's a few few thoughts now. The first thing I want to say is I still quite like Finn Blanton's Singletrap podcast. Their idea is just to run a backyard ultra across the entire time and just see how that goes. And that's great entertainment. always going on. It gives people to talk about it through the night. So I think that that has some some weight behind it. But you're you're right. Like the the consensus is you've just spoken about Salomon, Golden Trail and Warner Brothers being behind it, you can understand that they're trying to condense it into a probably two hour or less package. It's going to want to not be one big loop that people can't access from a spectator perspective. So that flower format that Golden Trail has been trialing and playing around with.
00:52:30
Speaker
I'm making an assumption that that's at least one of the avenues. And and you potentially also have the classic mountain distances like the the up uphill and and the classic as well. is Is that the direction that we're likely going to be be going in?
00:52:43
Speaker
Yeah. at I mean, at this stage, I'm going to put this in a bit of context for you. Our modeling has said that an event of approximately two hours at the to stage it at the Olympics, a trail running event, would cost about 50 million dollars.
00:52:59
Speaker
just for the one john Just for that one event, right? So the the um just the acceleration in costs, um logistics, just everything that goes to an Olympic level, just 10 times is everything. So the similar type of event, just to give idea, would be you know like 10% of that at ah at, let's say, a world championship level.
00:53:24
Speaker
yeah So you you mentioned a couple of areas there, but like, where is that 10X coming from? Because in my mind, you just have to get the athletes to the place, organize the course, run the event, get them back.
00:53:38
Speaker
Job done. yeah yeah I've never cited it, but there there's a multi-hundred page um kind of agreement and document that goes with the staging of any event um at an Olympic level.
00:53:54
Speaker
And that includes everything from the you know the uniforms that will be worn to the safety gear that will be available to the security requirements at the event, which you can imagine you know these these types of events are targets for all kinds of things and security has to be paid for. And the disciplines and the events you know have to build those types of things into their costs.
00:54:14
Speaker
So you're looking you're just looking at everything at an absolutely Olympic-sized scale, right? um So it's not it's it's a it's not a cheap thing to do. um This is interesting because it's going to bring up some questions about why the heck would you want to do it then if there's that yeah that much risk in it.
00:54:30
Speaker
um And look, I'll give you an idea from, you know, without putting it i will without putting words in a brand's mouth, um the exposure that they get from that and the ability now, there is, by the way, a brand new rule. um Oh, gosh, what is it? It's variation of rule. I think it's either 42 or 47, which in the the next, not this Olympics, but 2030, 3032, the um winter and then summer Olympics will actually allow brands to sponsor.
00:55:00
Speaker
So ah a stadium, for example, could be the X stadium for athletics sponsored by Budweiser. Right. i' saying That's the one that's going to happen. But this is this is new. This has been a ah change in the rules for the Olympics um that are that, again, this is this demonstrates why brands are now going, oh, that's interesting. um Because that type of exposure, you know, let's say a brand was tipped in five to ten million dollars to make the event happen. The actual exposure of that could be 100 times.
00:55:31
Speaker
Right. So their return on investment, you know, and they and they are the ones that are modeling this. And I should say I haven't talked to you know the the brands about that in so any specifics, but if they're you know, they will be modeling this and they'll be putting that money into the investing in Golden Trail World Series or whatever, you know, Hawker across all of the various different in a um UTV events.
00:55:52
Speaker
because they know there's a return in it. And at an Olympic level, if you imagine if it's $50 million dollars to run an event, and that's 10 times the brand return. you know They'll be modeling 10, 20, 100 times and know increase in brand exposure as a result.
00:56:06
Speaker
And that $50 million, their cost to put on the event, who who wears that cost? Is it the local organizing committee, so Brisbane essentially? It can be. you usually Usually there's a um you know the actual Groups that ah you know that um are the peak bodies behind the event have some skin in that game.
00:56:29
Speaker
um And you know there are contracts that will be starting to get written already and probably already have been written that will kind of articulate how that split of costs um will you know come to pass. The local organizing committee in Brisbane runs very lean um and they're not they're not expecting to put money into operating these types of events. They have a budget that's very specific to things that they need to do. um that that you know doesn't extend the $50 million dollars events being put on. And that's not a, that is, they they go much higher than that.
00:57:01
Speaker
um So one of the things that will occur, i think in the Olympics going forward, and part of this change in the rule is there'll be a lot more private in private investment that will come into yeah ensuring that the Olympics, you know, you can imagine like, oh gosh, at the 2032 Olympics, I could see OpenAI i sponsoring something, right?
00:57:20
Speaker
Because, The new technology of following a runner you know down the 100-meter track while there's, you know let's say, 60,000 people in the stadium, but then 60 million people around the world literally sitting sitting in virtual seats with AI helping them follow the runner down the track or race beside them. like That stuff will be happening. And so imagine OpenAI i you know putting in tipping in in ah half a billion dollars or something like that to be part of events.
00:57:48
Speaker
That'll be happening in another five to seven years. I remember when Rio was on, can't remember the exact value, but the the amounts that were London Olympics cost put on and then Rio and it is astronomical amounts. So it makes sense to have this this private funding channel. um It also then makes sense to a brand like Salomon of why it is worth putting so much money and attention and time into into seeing it as a potential avenue for them.
00:58:17
Speaker
One of the other, well, i guess from from an elite's perspective, the The concerns that I've definitely heard are, A, from the sponsors, like you just said, that that the sponsorship money is going to go, which has historically been more 100-mile focus, that's where a lot of you had to race to get it, is now going to be shifted straight into this sub-two-hour category, and it's going to be the short-trail athletes that get it, which is great for the existing ones. But if you don't want to conform to that that category, you're suddenly going to lose a lot of your potential, either as it is or for the for the future.
00:58:52
Speaker
And the other side of it is whenever you put something at the Olympics and there is more brand opportunities, more money coming in, accolades coming coming in, doping typically comes in a lot more. And the the doping regulations at the moment are pretty relaxed. And I know they're very expensive for an event organizer to to to put on and to have post-event testing. There's very few out-of-competition tests going on. So from the elite's perspective and and kind of take it as a few things in there, how how are you addressing those concerns?
00:59:26
Speaker
um Well, just speaking from from my experience at the recent championships in Con Frank with World Athletics there, there was a full, um you know, water set up available and testing was was occurring.
00:59:42
Speaker
So I think the the advancements again, this comes back to governance, right? um the last thing that World Athletics wants to see or any of the peak bodies or any of the countries that are represented there, um the last thing they want to see is the sport being bought brought into into disrepute because of you know significant doping challenges, which, by the way, we're going to experience. yeah We've already experienced some of them. yeah And it's going to be many, many more.
01:00:09
Speaker
And these are the uncontrollables that I think people think you know think that they that we can have any control on. um Because as the you know the pace of the sport grows, there are going to be people that are going to take advantage of it um and come into it with nefarious reasons. so But what i am what I am seeing is that the governance around that that space is really ramping up, particularly at those events that would be continue considered a championship level. And it and it it'll continue to filter into you know into the UTMBs and the various different kind of big American races like hard rock and Western States and canyons, et cetera. that's not going to slow down in terms of being almost a non-negotiable.
01:00:48
Speaker
So just to give you another reason for more growth in the sport is that's going to require these types of races to have more money coming into them to be able to foot the bill to have that type of facility available. Some of it comes at ah at a like at a cost. it It doesn't just come out of nowhere. So the either the organizations or the communities and the regions that are are staging these events are going to have to have find ways to pay for those types of those things.
01:01:16
Speaker
um And that's going to need more funds coming into the sport. So I'm very pro more funds coming into the sport of of trail running. um I think it's, again, comes down to governance and risk. And then the, you know, how we take opportunities that has to have some form of management and decision-making around it. Right now, I don't see that.
01:01:35
Speaker
It's very haphazard. And that that haphazard nature is actually what where a catastrophic event may come from. um Because you know maybe it'll be a loss of income because the sport's in such disrespete disrepute because there's too much doping and there's too many accidents, safety accidents, and therefore the brands pull out of it. We've already seen a few cases, haven't we, where brands pulled out of athletes um yeah because they they had reputational damage.
01:02:03
Speaker
Do you think we're going to get to a point where, and and and I actually don't know if if this is a formula that exists, but where national, hopefully national governing bodies, or in this case, let's say, ORTRO, who are empowered by AA, have a funding pool to be going to events and testing athletes, or is this going to continue to to fall on the event directors and organisers themselves to source the funding to then test?
01:02:26
Speaker
Yeah, wow. that's ah yeah That's a curly one. Jeff Russell, I'm going to call him out. He'd love to talk to you more about that one. Yeah, look, think I think it's really hard it's hard for the national bodies because they just live they run on the smell of an order. They rag themselves, right? they They don't have enough to go around, which is why ah why there is opposition in pockets from national bodies around trail running being in you know advanced as a sport.
01:02:52
Speaker
There's a few few countries, and i've I've met with and or spoken, or had colleagues within our within our campaign speak with over 70 countries. right And um there are pockets of those countries that are oppositional. And a lot of it comes down to just management um of a small price ah fund you know pool of funds um that they have to distribute but already across a stretched you know portfolio of athletes and sports. um And that's hugely difficult. So we actually have, we need new funding models. And ah look like I said, I'm pro funding models and pro money coming to the sport. I think, you know, an increase in brands comes with its own risks.
01:03:31
Speaker
um That's why governance and risk is so important, but it also comes with big, you know, dollars and those dollars are going to be the types of things we need if the sport grows to be able to manage what will be eventually a stronger governance regime. And that's going to come no matter what. I can a hundred percent guarantee you that governance across the sport is going to increase because it's going to have to to keep up with the amount of growth and also potential risk that we're going to continue to see.
01:03:58
Speaker
answering the other side of the question about the sponsorship attention and where their their funding does come from from brands. Like I definitely envision a world where we see more brands are entering both endemic like the shoe brands and and non-endemic sponsors coming in, which will be which will be good. But I do envision also the side where the ultras until they are given that that same level of stage are sort of not forgotten, but just put on the back burner.
01:04:24
Speaker
Is that something that that you have ah plans in place to be able to combat those potential issues? I don't, I couldn't say I have any, we have any plans in place across our campaign. So I think we've, we've stayed quite, we've tried to keep quite focused on those checkpoints and, and, you know, those pillars.
01:04:40
Speaker
um I think what we don't want to see is unintended consequences across other sports. And that's something that we will have to manage. um That could be the, you know, the, athlete positions in the Olympics, if we were to get there, that might discipline disappear from another discipline. We're going to have to think about, look, how do we manage the equity in that?
01:04:56
Speaker
um I think similarly for the you know the amount of people coming into various verticals of the sport, such as whether it's an ultra run or a mountain run or or a pure you know fast trail run, I think we're going to have to manage the distribution of people coming in into that as well.
01:05:11
Speaker
um i don't actually I actually, from from my own experience and from the experience of the community you know that I've run with and and volunteered with and be part of for years. um I actually see people kind of moving in and out of parts of the discipline within trail and mountain running, off-road running in general.
01:05:29
Speaker
um I think some will, like me, go through 10 years of ultra-marathoning um to the point where you know I've got a few parts that are broken that I've decided i've now i'm just going to run you know recreationally or run shorter races. So now I'm going to move.
01:05:43
Speaker
So it'll be cyclical in that you know some people will extend all the way to the end of, of, you know, doing an u an ultra, a hundred miler and God forbid those things that are getting longer than that, like two hundreds, which are mad.
01:05:55
Speaker
And there'll be those ones that, you know, are happy just to do the fast 10 Ks. And that's, that's what they do. And some that'll dip out of in and out of all of those parts of the disciplines. We just got to figure out a way to balance all of that and also make sure that, um you know, that there's, that the each of those disciplines are still, you know, getting participants and, you know being able to operate safely and, having enough income to be able to do it successfully for long periods of time.
01:06:17
Speaker
yeah And you see that very much with the the mass participation element of trail running that people will put 100K on their schedule and they'll also put a bunch of 20Ks and they'll happily move around and train for different things in different years. But from the elite's perspective,
01:06:34
Speaker
it does feel like there's a bit of a move towards them becoming siloed into becoming the best 50k runner they can be and the best 20k runner they could be. And and yes, there is a bit of move up and down, but they're just simply because the sport is getting so competitive, it's growing at this rate that you can't be a one hundred k athlete and then go and compete at Broken Arrow 23k, which I think we're going to see a lot of with the amount of money that they've put up for it. But it's unlikely that someone can then, you'd have to steer your entire season, if not longer, to make yourself be that. So It will be it willll be an interesting one to see and and potentially there are people and we've seen it with the likes of Katie jumping into Sioza now and putting out that performance just after Hard Rock. So it's like this there's anomalies to that, but it's... um Not all Katie Shides, right? Not all Katie Shides. But I'm conscious of our time. i just want to kind of finish off a a couple of kind of and i hypo hypotheticals.
01:07:27
Speaker
Trail running gets into the Olympics. What's the best case scenario for trail running as a sport in like after that 2032 time um event that that you can envision?
01:07:40
Speaker
i think pure purely in that it's not one and done. So if it makes the the Olympics in 2032, I think we if we run such a successful event that the world embraces it, that you'll see a very different type of sport in future Olympics that'll bring the natural environment of the you know host community much more closely to the people around the world than, let's say, 100 meters in ah in a um in a stadium does.
01:08:08
Speaker
So I think that's really exciting in that trail running's growth through the Olympics will actually connect people to the communities in which these types of events happen much more fully.
01:08:19
Speaker
um so I think that's exciting. I think the other ones, we've talked a little bit about technology, but I think having a, you know, post an Olympic Games, the sport will have embraced technology so significantly that I think you'll you'll see a sport that almost is able to come into your living room as ah easily as you are to get know out onto a trail at your local trailhead, um which I think is super exciting because it'll, you know those types of things.
01:08:44
Speaker
ah great example is Netflix. Like Netflix is just, they just bought Warner Brothers. right So they actually now own it. yeah i mean i We're going to be streaming Golden Trail World Series next year through Netflix.
01:08:57
Speaker
Like Dead said, it's going to be incredible. And there'll be my you know daughters or you know nieces and nephews that are a lot younger being able to watch and embrace and see that sport as opposed to having to go on YouTube and watch you know kind of grainy you know images. they'll They'll be able to engage with it in you know traditional, well, modern traditional multimedia um in such a way that you know that might they might become the next you know Katie Scheid, right?
01:09:21
Speaker
So I think that's exciting because it it brings the sport closer to the you know to the people that actually may want to be the future you know so sports men and women, which is super, super cool.
01:09:33
Speaker
I think the other thing is, one thing that we probably have a lot of in in trail running is information and data. And it sits it sits in pools within ITRA, Ultra Sign Up,
01:09:48
Speaker
UTMB, it's probably not really being used as well as it could be right now. So it's, I've got a, I've got a colleague in Brisbane. He's a researcher, PhD level. um He, a guy named Raimondo Sanchez, he's studying geospatial geospatial science and effectively looking at how you can um more more properly take data of trail races around the world. and ensure that they're on a level playing field in terms of their vertical, and the vertical of going up the hill, going down the hill, the distance, the various dimensions, the types of terrain, all of those things, and almost standardizing them. And he's using he's using data, both that he collects through his own his own technology, but also that's provided to him for by you know race organizers globally.
01:10:38
Speaker
I think that's really exciting because it takes data and it takes the information that's available and it starts to bring it towards a particular type of purpose. In his case, it's about standardization of the of races in such a way that um you know they can be compared globally, even though they might be in totally different places. But it's also safety related too. um you know The types of information he's showing is that you know points and races can be kilometers off what they actually are mapped to. is Now, if you're trying to get a helicopter in to get someone off the side of a mountain and you're a kilometer away from where that athlete that's injured actually is, this type of thing can save lives.
01:11:12
Speaker
So data information coming off the back of something like the Olympics, but I think just in the growth and the maturity of the sport is, you know, going to continue to become a um ah ah really strong weapon for good, um which I'm really excited about. I think that'll be, it'll be amazing to see how data is used going forward.
01:11:29
Speaker
That mapping of events, can that go into the ITRIP indexing as well to improve the, or to make it more robust? Certainly could, you know, if the, if he, and he's writing the papers right now, in fact, we, his first paper,
01:11:41
Speaker
ah that was published. um I was a co-author in that. And um we actually, another one of our co-authors was Kilian Jornet. So Kilian, you know, he looks at that type of things. He loves data and information. And he was he was part of that that article. So we're trying to see whether we can take things like data and information and use it as a um kind of a strength of the sport, um you know to keep people safe and to to obviously make sure that that races can be run run well and and safely across the world.
01:12:08
Speaker
And just to close us out, as we've kind of gone through, you've been in the sport for a long time, held multiple roles and very much sound like the pioneer, the spearhead for this Olympics bid as such, like the one that's putting in all all the hard yards and and you've managed to create yourself in the position where this can become true. But for you personally, like what what do you feel like the sport can't afford to give up if it means that to get into the Olympics? Like what's, where's that line that goes, no, this isn't, this isn't worth it. This, this is not right.
01:12:40
Speaker
no that's a great question. Um, you'd love to hear that it's probably something as simple as just like the soul of the sport, but I think, I think it just, that means just so many different things to so many different people. yeah Like the people that I've talked to, they have very different souls or, or, you know, opinions on what a soul is. Um, so it's not, it's not that, um,
01:13:01
Speaker
I think the thing that, I mean, for me personally, the camaraderie and um and the the friendships that you make along the way, and the and I guess the way that the community comes together um around ah around a race or around a particular you know trail event um is pretty special.
01:13:18
Speaker
And I think that kind of, if I was actually, if I was to give it one word, it's the connection. I don't think, I think if we start to lose the connection between um the groups or you know the the athletes you know in a particular community. I think if that connection starts to to wane or fray, that that would be a real loss to the sport. And I think if we started to see, so for example, if we started to see people um off the back of this podcast and begin to troll anyone that was involved in wanting to see trail running in the Olympics, I've never experienced that. I've never had anyone come to me and you know give me an absolute blast about it I've had people with very different opinions but completely respectfully present those to me and I was able to either present a very similar opinion or a counter opinion.
01:14:02
Speaker
um I think if we got to the point where the the connection and um and people felt very oppositional and that created a ah fraying of connection within the communities um that are part of our sport, that that would be tragic and that would be one of those catastrophic events that would actually probably have people leave thee leave the sport.
01:14:19
Speaker
um So I would never want to see that concept of ki of of connection be broken within our sport. and For me, that's probably the main thing is if I i start to get a feeling, and actually I'll but i'll be honest, I'll finish by saying that um I am getting the feeling now that we're in a position where some of that connection is is beginning to fray.
01:14:40
Speaker
And I think that's an interesting time for me, for someone who's been part of this for a number of years, is to start taking stock of you know, are we actually on the right trail? Is this the right direction we should be heading? um is this Is the fraying of this connection going to be detrimental and catastrophic for the for the trail running as ah and their communities?
01:14:58
Speaker
And I think if i if I get to that point, that that'll be a point where I naturally, um you know, perhaps bow out myself and and make it clear that that maybe we've gone as far down the trail as we can.
01:15:09
Speaker
um In saying that, you know, those types of decisions around getting into the Olympics will be, kind of made for us over the next six to 12 months. The decisions are from the local organizing committee around new sports, from world athletics around if it is an athletics discipline will be made and we'll we'll know whether 2032 is going to happen. um But I guess the promise to the community from myself and from all of the other people that are part of the campaign is that those five pillars are things we're going to continue to work on.
01:15:36
Speaker
It just might be something, another, you know, something else. Another project. Another project. Yeah, that's right. But I think connection is the missing one of those five pillars, but it sits across all of them, right?
01:15:47
Speaker
if that connection's gone, then the sport's in ah in a free fall and I'd hate to see that happen. Final final question, just because comes up from what you said there. Not World Athletics, not the local organizing committee, so kind of taking the, again, the Olympics out of it. Do you think we have the right people in the right places within the sport of trail running and the peak bodies that gives you confidence that we're going to end up in the right place? ah Obviously, you personally, not speaking on behalf of anyone else.
01:16:12
Speaker
Yeah. i Look, I think we have people in positions of of power that are exceptionally passionate about the sport and are trying to help the sport to grow in a way and and to you know progress in a way that they believe that the community and wants to take it.
01:16:33
Speaker
I think that the challenge is is that some of them haven't been armed with the right compass um or perhaps aren't using it and therefore some of the decisions that are being made are ones that are less to do with actual facts, figures, information, um community sentiment, and more to do with ah personal opinions, single pieces of information, and all of those things, all of those things that unless they're actually taken all together analyzed, are just single pieces of information that you can sometimes make the wrong decisions around. And I think that's the challenge, and that's the challenge that I'd lay down for anyone in ah in a position of
01:17:13
Speaker
decision making is to really consider what your compass is, ensure you understand what that is take any ego out of the decision that you can and focus in on on what the you know what the compass is actually telling you.
01:17:26
Speaker
um Or else we'll get it we'll be in a position where, um and i'm and I'm seeing that now, where people are tired and and they've been pushing a barrel pretty hard for a number of years um and coming up against some opposition and that gets challenging. um Us as trail runners, that's where we shine, right?
01:17:45
Speaker
Going up that mountain, you're tired, just suck it up, you know have another gel, get to the top and you know work your way down. um so I'm trying to encourage all of our team and anyone else I engage with just to think about yourself like a trail runner.
01:17:58
Speaker
Don't give up. Um, and you know, it's okay to walk sometimes up the mountain, but get to the top. Yeah. Lean into the high carb fueling and you'll get through. Yeah. I love it. Exactly. It's very much passion as, as beautiful as it is. It doesn't equal competence. Um, and it's, and, and it can be misguided if, if it doesn't have the right framework around it. So yeah, I think that's probably a good way to end it Mike, thank you so much for doing this. be great to get to know you and also.
01:18:25
Speaker
understand a bit more of of this whole pursuit here, your side of it. Hopefully everyone listening will also get the same. ah Yeah, just really appreciate your time and and for for coming on board to have this conversation with me.
01:18:36
Speaker
James, been absolute pleasure, Matt. I hope you're going to get out for a few trail runs over the holiday. holiday season get out of the um studio and and hit the trail that's where the magic happens hopefully hopefully all right have a great rest of your evening Mike thanks so much thanks Mike cheers once again i want to thank Mike for coming on he definitely did not need to do that and was incredibly invested and eager to come on before we jumped on the podcast, he told me that he hasn't been on for about the last year because there's been so much happening and that it was a good time for him to talk about where the bid is at the moment, but also to share some concerns and hopefully light some fires. um He really highlighted the fact that this
01:19:15
Speaker
is going to be a really tough road ahead after the podcast finished recording. He did say that I could say in the intro or outro that there are some real risks, some real compromises. um The sport is going to have to converge at a point that is going to leave some parties not as happy as others, as is typically the case in these sort of situations. And while 2032 remains the immediate focus, it is an incredibly tough goal to get there. And we're going to know in the next six months. But what he has then said is that the work won't stop there. And if trail running doesn't make it into 2032, there is a very real chance that it will get into 2036
01:19:50
Speaker
That is what the peak bodies decide is still best for the sport of trail running. I am sure that this will have left you with a whole bunch of questions, whether it's topics that we didn't dig into enough, viewpoints we didn't share, or just general questions towards Mike, Itra, and the Olympic dream that they are...
01:20:09
Speaker
targeting. So please do leave any questions you've got. If you're listening on Spotify, the Spotify comments on this episode is a great place to do that. Otherwise, send us a message on Instagram. You can reach out to Mike as well. He's happy to field any questions. And if we get enough, I'm sure that we can ask Mike to come back on in the not too distant future and have another discussion about this and sort of share some of your questions that you might ah be having and whether that is an elite that's listening or one of the more recreational trail runners to see what all this means for your sport, your experience in trail running and the potential positives or negatives that could come of trying so hard to get into the Olympics in 2032. Thanks again so much for listening. I hope you enjoyed this one. Again, as I said in the intro, a little bit of a different take on our typical interviews, but just like we had with Gary Mullins from Ortra a couple of months ago, i do hope that you have found this one really interesting. And if anything, just shared a bit more of an insight into what this whole Olympic campaign looks like, the cost of running an event and what it takes to get a new event into Olympic Games.