UROC 2012 Pre-Race

The summer's over now and there's a bit more time to get into the mountains before the snow makes that more difficult, but that means that the Autumn road races are here in force with many of the big road marathons kicking off. However, UROC 100k makes for a fun transition by mixing in road and trail in equal measures as well as some decent climbing. In fact, the UROC website says only a bit over 7,000ft of ascent, but it's a very similar course to last year which was almost double that, so I'm not expecting anyone to run road-equivalent 100k times.

irunfar has written up a detailed preview of the deep men's field, but there's a danger that there'll be less female finishers in the elite field than there are prize money positions - 6 starters for 5 positions. I thought the fast female ultrarunners in the US were equally happy on roads and trails (look at how many fast trail women have represented their country at the road 100k...it's a lot). So come on ladies - give Ellie Greenwood some competition.

Anyone care to guess the men's podium in order? It's almost pot luck to get them all right.

Great work by Gill and Francesca to grow the event from last year and I still get that nervous excitement from lining up against a top quality bunch of guys to see how it plays out. I hope that never disappears, even when I get old and become a wheezy old man trying to get my 50th Comrades finish.

And for ultra/mountain/trail geeks (this definitely includes me), there are two other huge races going on over in Europe this weekend too - the Skyrunning race at Cavalls Del Vent in Spain and the classic Greek Spartathlon which is arguably based on the start of ultrarunning, 2,500 years ago. I'll be writing up a preview and description of the latter race for irunfar this week and it's on my extra long to-do list (currently penciled in for 2014).