Trail Snacks- Issue 31, 2024

We are coming to the end of the year and that 2025 hype and 2024 review season is starting to bubble away.

Surely I’m not the only one nervously planning my 2025 race schedule (and associated annual leave and budget!) with that single asterisk indicating the most stressful time of a trail ultra runners year, lottery season.

Next years Western States is starting to shape up to be an absolute doozy and us normies are along for the ride. When I last checked the lottery stats, there were 9402 applicants. Last year when all entries were verified there were 9388 official entrants.

There’s still 8 days to go to get your qualifier in so this may end up being the biggest Western States lottery ever. Not good for my odds or the bloke with 8 years worth of tickets.

I found this piece in Ultrarunning Magazine really interesting and particularly relevant as the race gets more popular and it takes longer to get into. Entrants are only going to get older and making that cut off actively disadvantages older women.

With races starting to adjust their cut off or award times to account for the difference between men and women (7% at Western States according to their own numbers), is it time Western States did the same?

YouTube

Since starting my own YouTube channel I’ve been deep in the YouTube and working out what content I like and what I don’t. The back end analytics of it are really interesting and I’m sure I would have different responses to videos depending on if I was watching them as opposed to listening to them.

I’m sure I would get further into Helen Mino Faulkner’s Running Rants if I too was running or driving as opposed to sitting on my couch.

I’m also looking a lot into the different types on content on YouTube, the short form, the longer form, the educational, the inspirational, I’ve gone down quite the rabbit hole and I like I need multiple accounts to keep my algorithms in check.

So it was interesting to see Finn Malanson of SingleTrack has turned the camera onto himself and branch out into the old vee log space.

Look out other fast media guys, Finn’s got a new coach, new Mojo and a veelogging series in the works. I actually really enjoyed this and I usually hate the “watch my workout” style videos. I had to keep opening up the pace converter though and damn Finn was holding his own.

The SingleTrack crew (I’m assuming it’s just Finn) branch out into lots of different things and stick their fingers in lots of different pies. This looks like a pie I’m going to enjoy.

Also over on YouTube was another offering from OG Billy Yang. Billy used to be THE guy for the trail running films following other athletes but in more recent times he’s been producing more of the vlog style BTS videos of his adventures around the world. They are fantastic and always give me massive FOMO. The latest focuses on the Love Trail Festival in Wales is no different. I’m never sure if these are low key advertisements or not but it works!

Speaking of trail running movies, an actual movie dropped this week, Dreama Team, focused on Dreama Walton’s 2024 Western States. This is the content I’ve been waiting for!

But unfortunately it’s only for people in the US at the moment. There are multiple links to view it but definitely not from Australia. I might have a VPN play and see how I go.

Podcasts

• Killian on FreeTrail, I mean surely I’m not the only one who squealed a little (or a lot) when he kinda confirmed an attempted return to Western States.

• Hannah Allgood on Trail Society. I loved this conversation. It felt like a chat over coffee and cookies with besties and I’m not sure how but every time I hear another little tid bit about Javelina I want to do it more.

• Molly Seidel on For the Long Run. I’m a bit late to this one but Molly’s perspective and honestly is always refreshing from an athlete of her calibre.

I also really enjoyed Lauren Puretz on the Trail Network Podcast. It’s nice to hear how normal people, with normal jobs and normal lives, manage their training and racing. I also got a giggle out of banning her husband from crewing. I’m pretty sure I should do the same.

As an update on the last edition of Trail Snacks, I thought I would share the content that I actually pay for.

I subscribe to Like the Wind magazine, I’m a patreon subscriber to SWAP, a FreeTrail Pro member and I am also a paid subscriber of Dirt Church Radio.

It’s an interesting situation for creators. To be honest, I’m not sure I get a whole lot of value out of most of the things I pay for. They either post the paid stuff to the free feed anyway or it’s barely worth paying for, so I mostly pay to encourage and support the creators I want to see do well, as opposed to actually getting something out of it.

Are people other than friends and family subscribing to elite athletes substack etc?

I would pay to watch movies though. It’s more the subscription type service that I’m not quite sold on just yet.

Sound off below, and send in your nominations for the best trail and ultra running content you’ve seen this year.

You know the inaugural awards are coming up.