Daily News Aug 14 | One Chapter Closes and Another Begins
The week in ultramarathon and trail results, compiled by Justin Mock at iRunFar. Special attention to Sophia Laukli for that performance at Sierra Zinal. Wow! I watched her kill it at Broken Arrow last year and see that she’s on the list for the Mammoth Trail Fest next month. Ooooooh, that’ll be good. More analysis from Brian Metzler right this way.
Also a shoutout to Bev Abbs (ahem, 59 years young) who finished 1st female and 2nd overall (8:31)at the Headlands 50 miler this past weekend. (Official results not posted yet.) Simply astonishing. Want to know her secret? Follow along on Strava and check out the myriad activities she does each day.
LetsRun thread: What non-running activities have led to more successful running? (For me the answer would be inline skating and pedal boarding.)
Something we can all relate to: Portable toilet anxiety. Occupied!
More great industry analysis from Matt Walsh at Trail Mix. If you’re new to MUT media, be sure to subscribe.
Karel does it again…The Belgian dentist sets a new trans-california FKT in 29 days, adding to his list of endurance-related accomplishments. Ongelofelijk!
What are the folks at FreeTrail reading, eating, drinking, and using in July?
Where are the 2022 UROY Men and Women now?
Another reminder to be safe out there. Wait, Australian Alps? (Just teasing. A good friend was on the Aus ski team and had to show me pics of snow in Australia to convince me.)
And with that, folks, wraps up thirteen years of URP.
Sunny starts high school today (!) and my priorities will be shifting towards her and my son (Van, 11) as they both enter important stages of life. Something’s gotta give.
This will be the last post and let me tell ya, I’ve written, re-written, and hovered my cursor over the “publish” button more times than I can count. One of these times I’ll click it and it’ll mark the end of an important part of my life.
What was once a daily routine for me–URP Daily News 5x/week and at least one episode each week for ten years–has changed since the Covid response and it’s time to close the doors.
Both my personal life and the sport have changed a ton in the past thirteen years and more changes will certainly occur in both. Overall, I expect the MUT world to continue to improve, grow and innovate as our funky little hobby creeps closer to “the mainstream” and I’ll be watching along with you. Like the trails, there will be ups and downs, easy portions and also sections where we struggle to stay upright. I honestly don’t know where we are in that landscape right now but I’m dying to know what the next section looks like.
My hope for the sport and its growing media bubble is that the focus is redirected towards the trails, roads and athletes and away from the social issues and away from some of the narcissistic behavior that unfortunately comes with commercial growth. Neither of those will lead to growing the sport in a healthy way and in my opinion, they detract from the egalitarian, community nature we’ve long enjoyed for so long.
Big thanks to my co-hosts and reviewers Ethan, Sarah and Ben, and huge thanks to the guests…Your insight and stories were transformative for me as both an athlete as well as an interviewer. You taught me about story telling, empathy, and, hey, sometimes even BDSM! And to the sponsors and Patreon crew, this couldn’t have happened without your support. Thank You all.
I’ll still be around announcing races, cheering for friends, strangers, (and Sunny’s HS team!), running smooth trails and tweeting about the sport, but this site will shut down soon. I’m not sure what will happen to the episode files, so if you want them, better download them soon.
Opportunities or ideas, I can be reached at ericryanschra[email protected] or for a limited time, [email protected].
I never imagined I’d still be doing this thirteen years after Scotty, Scott and Don brought me on board, but now it’s time to say goodbye.
Thanks for everything and I’ll see you out there,
Eric
Update/edit: Thanks for all the kind words. I’m going to step away from the computer for the remainder of the day.
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