The Ultra Minute: Let the Bell Ring
Lichter, Faukner, and Moreno go 1-2-3 at Broken Arrow 46K, course records fall, and the livestream sets a new bar—plus more from this week in trail & ultra
Issue 44
Broken Arrow Delivers Drama, Depth, and a Showcase of the Sport's Future
If you needed a reminder that the 46K at Broken Arrow is a must-watch ultra, this weekend delivered. The women’s race came down to seconds, the men’s race saw the course record crushed, and half the field didn’t even finish—but more on that in a minute.
All eyes were on the women’s field Saturday, and it did not disappoint. Jennifer Lichter took the win in 4:42:32, but only after holding off a furious charge from Helen Mino Faukner (4:43:08) and Dani Moreno (4:43:48). All three ran under the previous course record. The battle up front was electric: Lichter led nearly wire-to-wire, but Faukner clawed back time late, and Moreno ran the fastest second half of the day, rallying from over three minutes back at halfway.
Post-race, Lichter wrote that the win against such a stacked field "meant a lot," while Faukner called it "one of my favorite weekends of the whole year" and admitted the race was so hard she "can’t think too much about it yet or I just start crying." Moreno, whose 2025 has been a steady rebuild, showed she’s very much back—earning her fifth Team USA spot and capping it with a podium shared among friends.
On the men’s side, Eli Hemming delivered a masterclass, breaking the course record by 11 minutes and winning in 3:50:48. David Sinclair (3:54:10) and Ryan Becker (3:59:35) rounded out the podium, both doubling back from Friday's Ascent. Hemming, who’s been on fire since moving to the trails, looked smooth and in control even as storms rolled in.
That weather ultimately ended the day early: lightning and snow forced organizers to cancel the race mid-event, with only 163 of 553 runners officially finishing. Credit to the Broken Arrow team, who handled the chaos with calm and kept runners safe.
The top three men and women all earned spots on Team USA for the 2025 World Championships (Short Trail): Hemming, Sinclair, Becker, Lichter, Faukner, and Moreno.
23K: Downhill Moves, Broadcast Breakthrough
Sunday's 23K was a masterclass in tactics and top-tier production. Elhousine Elazzaoui (1:43:53) once again waited until the final descent to make his move, powering past Philemon Kiriago (1:43:57) and Patrick Kipngeno (1:44:11) in the closing stretch. Watching Christian Allen surge back to the leaders on the big downhill was thrilling and underscored just how much course knowledge and risk-taking matters here.
On the women’s side, Joyce Njeru took over on the descent to win in 2:01:16, breaking the course record she narrowly missed last year. Mădălina Florea (2:02:03) and Anna Gibson (2:03:46) completed the podium, with Gibson impressively doubling back after winning Friday's Ascent.
And the livestream? Genuinely next level. Split-screen camera work, on-screen splits, sharp commentary. The YouTube stream had some garbled audio, which chat couldn’t let go of, but the HBO broadcast was clean and polished. It felt like a turning point for the sport. Personally, I was so locked in I didn’t notice my kids coloring our floor with sidewalk chalk until the leaders came through the finish line.
The Ascent: Shortened, But Stacked
High winds on Friday morning forced organizers to shorten the Ascent to just 2.15 miles and 1,800 feet of gain, but the race delivered drama nonetheless. Christian Allen surged ahead around the 10-minute mark to win in 23:49, a commanding 23 seconds ahead of the field. Joseph Gray (24:12), Cam Smith (24:24), and Tyler McCandless (24:35) rounded out the U.S. men’s team for Worlds.
In the women’s race, Anna Gibson was untouchable, winning in 27:32, 95 seconds up on second place. Sydney Petersen (30:19), Hillary Allen (30:40), and Jessica Brazeau (30:56) rounded out the U.S. qualifiers, and notably, the top 3 are all Brooks athletes.
One of the biggest stories of the day? Pema Franchi Antelme, a 12-year-old (yes, 12) from Ecuador, finishing fifth in 30:37.
Also notable: Kilian Jornet, who was expected to contend for the win, led early before falling back to 23rd in 27:27, just one second ahead of Gibson. Afterward he posted on Instagram, saying he had a cold and that it was “Time to adapt, and focus on the week ahead.” He’ll toe the line at Western States this weekend for the first time since winning it 14 years ago.
More from Broken Arrow
Joe Gray brought the fire in his post-Ascent interview on Freetrail. After clinching his 17th straight Team USA spot, he called out Dylan Bowman for snubbing him in the pre-race predictions and made his stance on selection clear: “I earned those spots. I don’t like that resume stuff.”
The post-race interviews with the 46K podium finishers on Freetrail were also great, especially hearing the men dissect their moves and watching Dani Moreno reflect on what this podium meant after months of patient, careful training post-injury.
Emkay Sullivan raced the Ascent 22 weeks pregnant and finished just six minutes off a Team USA spot. “Little man” already has a WSER Golden Ticket, a podium at Silver State, and now a vertical finish at Broken Arrow.
Broken Arrow’s ongoing inclusion initiative, led by co-RDs Ethan Veneklasen and Brendan Madigan, got a spotlight this week in the Substack. With support from Arc’teryx, the race welcomed nearly 100 athletes from underrepresented communities, with plans to grow to 20+ run clubs in 2025. As Veneklasen put it: “We wanted to prove that you could do a world-class, highly-competitive event, and still create an environment that reflected the values that brought us to the sport in the first place.”
Catch the full 23k race broadcast on YouTube in all its glory here.
Additional Results
Anna Troup is back. After two and a half years sidelined by a long-healing foot fracture, Troup returned to the Summer Spine Race and not only won the women’s race, but beat the entire field outright in 84:56:37. It’s her third Summer Spine title and a stunning comeback after fearing she might never race again. “The real win for me was getting to the start line,” she wrote on Instagram afterward.
Nicholas Leo, 17, was the last man standing at this year’s Mid-State Mile, winning after 89 loops (97.9 miles, 30 hours, and more vert than Everest from sea level). According to Nick Kovar on Instagram, the New Jersey teen has raced Mid-State three years in a row, improving from 30 loops in 2022, to 56 last year, to this year’s outright win.
Speaking of backyard ultras, at Dead Cow Gully, 87 runners completed 100 miles (Loop 24), apparently setting a new world record for most finishers to hit triple digits in a backyard ultra. As of this morning, 8 runners remain after 86 loops (358 miles). Livestream here.
Joe Viger, who was on location in Stowe, Vermont, photographing the Catamount Ultra 50k, reported that Eric LiPuma smashed his own course record by 10 minutes to take the win.
The San Juan Solstice results posted this morning and it looks like Ryan Sullivan took the win in 8:12:04, while Becca Bramley was first woman in 9:46:16.
Reese Slobodianuk shattered the long-standing course record at the Kettle Moraine 100, finishing in a blazing 14:15:22. The previous mark had held since 2009 (Zach Gingerich in 15:17:32).
Dakota Goosby (@koda.runz), who's been documenting his “Couch to Cocodona” journey, ran his first race last week, the Blackout Runs 6K, and followed it up the next day with the Big Pine 13K. Afterward, he reflected on needing more technical terrain in training, calling his usual trails “too friendly.” His post-race joy is infectious. While confirming his Big Pine result, I noticed another relatable fan favorite at the top of the 50k results: Trueheart Brown.
Injury Report
Will Murray, who earned a Golden Ticket with a breakout 2nd-place finish at Black Canyon, has withdrawn from Western States just a week before the race. In a detailed Strava post, he shared that a surprise episode of atrial fibrillation sent him to the ER, followed days later by a fractured ankle while training on Cal Street. “It’s hard to accept that two random events like this could ruin things at the eleventh hour,” he wrote. Reflecting on the experience, he added: “Getting to the start line of a big ultra healthy, happy, and motivated is a huge victory worth celebrating.” He still plans to attend as a spectator, and has already set his sights on a 2026 Golden Ticket.
On the women’s side, Lin Chen has withdrawn from Western States due to lingering complications from a poison oak exposure during the Canyons 100 back in April. She shared on Instagram that the toxins had a “significant impact” on her blood and her body still hasn’t fully recovered.
Mike McKnight says spinal hardware from a 2017 injury is now causing arthritis in his lower back, and a herniated disc has left him with no Achilles reflex, possibly requiring surgery. But, he says “this is by no means a retirement” and that it’s “just a sign my training and recovery need to be more dialed than ever.”
Hayden Hawks is back to running after undergoing a minor meniscus cleanup last month—the injury that ruled him out of Western States. He called it “short and slow” for now, but added: “Let the build begin” as UTMB is his big goal on the horizon.
FKT News
John Kelly is over 1,700 miles into his Appalachian Trail FKT attempt and currently two days ahead of Tara Dower’s pace, per Roots Running’s . Now in Vermont (almost to New Hampshire), he’s navigating scorching heat with temps over 100°F and says he’s focused on staying cool and not overcooking himself. In his latest update, Kelly shared how his background as a data scientist plays a key role in preparing for big efforts like this. (Also: his Instagram handle, randomforestrunner, is a nod to both trail running and machine learning. Who knew?)
It also raises a question: as the planet warms, will the extreme heat and weather of future years start to outweigh any gains from gear, fueling, planning, or training? We might be witnessing the fastest these long trail FKTs will ever get.Over on the West coast, Nick Fowler ended his PCT FKT attempt this week with a post that simply read: “DNF. We tried our best.” He’d been averaging 65 mile days through the Southern California heat, but it seems mounting issues (vomiting, bleeding chafe, and deep fatigue) finally caught up. A day earlier he wrote, “I’d argue this is the best crew in history,” before adding: “I’m having a lot of fun when I’m not not having fun.”
is 11 days into a self-supported Pacific Crest Trail FKT attempt and averaging 43 miles a day, which is just shy of the 43.8/day pace of the current women’s record. Follow her on Instagram, or my preferred method, her Substack, Pink Feathers, where she’s posting daily updates.
Other News & Links
This past week my feeds were filled with folks calling attention to the public lands sell-off risk. It seems as if that risk is stalled for now at least. , who’s been covering this issue for months now, reported this morning the Senate Parliamentarian ruled that the budget-reconciliation amendment mandating the sale of up to 3 million acres of USFS and BLM land fails the Byrd Rule and can’t ride in the bill. Wilderness Society president Tracy Stone-Manning called it “a victory for the American public,” but both she and Siler caution that stand-alone bills or agency actions could revive the idea.
With Unbreakable 2 shelved, a new film is stepping into the Western States spotlight. Hilary Yang just dropped the teaser for a HOKA-backed project she’s co-directing with Carrie Highman, following Eszter Csillag, Heather Jackson, Fuzhao Xiang, and Cindy Shepard. “It’s an incredible moment for women in our sport, and we are honored to help share some of these stories” Yang wrote.
Anthony Fagundes will pace Kilian Jornet at Western States after being beating out over 1,000 applicants in NNormal’s open call. A Sacramento-area local with a UTMB Index of 748, Fagundes was 14th at the 2024 Canyons 100K (10:02:06) and has been on a tear this season with wins at Georgia Death Race (12:45:27) and Tiger Claw 50K (04:46:56). “It’s an honor to have this opportunity to help out and pace one of the greatest ultra runners of our generation,” Fagundes said.
Speaking of NNormal, they partnered with geospatial engineer Dr. Brianna Pagán to map the climate risks along the Western States course, highlighting everything from dwindling snowpack and rising heat to wildfire zones and water extremes. There’s a cool interactive map lets you explore projected impacts under both “mitigation” and “business-as-usual” scenarios.
, who turned down his Golden Ticket to run Western States this weekend, is targeting a sub-4-hour finish at this weekend’s Lavaredo 50K—a course he already holds the record on (4:02:16). In two posts this week, he broke down both the why and how: one reflecting on what that 2023 win meant for his career, and another analyzing exactly where he hopes to make up the 2 minutes and 17 seconds needed, which I found rather interesting as I would have just assumed “go faster” would do the trick. His thoughtful approach showcases just how high-level the sport is, and how fast his 2023 time was.
The Chianti Ultra Trail 120K has been confirmed as a Golden Ticket race for Western States 2026, with two spots up for grabs for top men and women. The announcement follows this year’s successful debut and means the race will return to the Western States qualifier slate next March.
At this point, I imagine most of you are familiar with David Roche’s heat training leading into Western States. His most recent video notched it up, with him telling us “don’t try this at home” as he ran 20 miles around Boulder fully suited up, seemingly on a mission to get as many weird looks from passersby as possible. Well, he’s not the only one pushing heat training to the extremes. Two examples that stood out in my feed this week: Adam Peterman riding a trainer in an ice fishing tent on his deck with heaters cranking and Jeff Mogavero saying he spent a week hiking in a heat chamber with a heat index of 195. I don’t know what a heat chamber is, but it sounds awful.
Back in April, we reported that Katie Schide and Germain Grangier left The North Face and re-signed with On—largely after testing a prototype super shoe they felt was a leap forward. That shoe is now here. On officially launched the Cloudultra Pro last week, their first trail super shoe designed specifically to win UTMB. I chatted with product lead Sergi Jansa, who said every design decision came back to a single insight: the athletes who win UTMB are the ones who fade the least, especially on the long descent from Grand Col Ferret to La Fouly. And apparently it’s not just great for UTMB, as I’ve been told we’ll see it on Adrian MacDonald and Jeff Mogavero at Western States this weekend, and on Schide and Grangier at Hardrock in a few weeks’ time.
Defending Hardrock 100 champion and course record holder, Ludovic Pommeret, revealed he’ll have quite the duo of pacers for this year’s race: Jim Walmsley and Vincent Bouillard, 2023 and 2024 UTMB champions.
Jon Albon is officially in for UTMB this summer, marking his debut on the full loop. With past wins at OCC (2021) and CCC (2023), a victory at UTMB would make him just the second athlete (after Xavier Thévenard) to sweep all three UTMB World Series Finals.
Speaking of UTMB, the organization appears to be eyeing a new race in Quebec. Samuel Matte-Thibault, director of Événements Harricana, posted on LinkedIn that the UTMB Group recently visited Mont-Tremblant and confirmed they’ve been exploring a partnership for several months. “Several inspiring avenues are emerging,” he wrote. “Quebec has everything you need to be one of the great trail running destinations.”
Cristina Santurino, a respected Spanish trail runner and sports nutritionist, died unexpectedly on her 36th birthday earlier this month, Canarian Weekly reported. A multiple-time winner at the Gran Trail de Peñalara and CCC finisher, she was preparing to race Trail 100 Andorra and had plans to run TDS later this summer.
Gemma Hillier-Moses has signed with the HOKA Elite Trail Team ahead of her debut at CCC this summer. She won Chianti 100K earlier this year in the Tecton X3s and said “I knew I didn’t want to race in anything else!”
Trail Roots, announced that the Big Bend Ultra will add a 100K distance for 2025. The race, set in Texas’ Big Bend Ranch State Park, is a single-loop 100K, and is apparently their most technical route yet. Registration opens July 4; race day is January 18. As a Texan myself, this race has been on my radar for a bit, so it’s cool to see them add a 100k. If you’ve never been to the Big Bend area, it’s a must-see, and this is as good an excuse as any to check it out. Race website.
That’s it for this week. No YouTube & Podcast Highlights or Reads of the Week. Those are still in my notes, just not fully typed up, and it’s officially time to press send and shift into family mode before I fly to Reno to cover Western States.
It’ll be my first time experiencing the race in person, and I’m excited, both as a fan of the sport and as someone still figuring out what it means to be part of trail & ultra media. I’m not sure yet what my coverage will look like, but I plan to keep the main thing the main thing (i.e. this newsletter), and mostly observe—then distill the experience and share it in true TUM style.
I’ll also be starting a Western States chat thread here on Substack where I’ll share insights and observations throughout the weekend, and we can all follow along and talk about the race together. Look out for an email or notification about it in the next couple days.
Lastly, if you’ll be at the race, hit reply or drop a comment. I’d love to say hi!
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While it doesn’t fully cover the cost yet, your support is part of what’s making it possible for me to attend Western States in person this year for the first time. That’s a big milestone for TUM, and I’m excited to bring that experience back to all of you through this newsletter. You’ll also see a paid sponsor in next week’s issue helping offset some of the costs—another piece of the puzzle as I work to grow this sustainably.
TUM also had its first little viral moment last week, when David Roche gave us a shout in his Instagram story, saying it’s one of the sources he and Megan check before recording the weekly SWAP Podcast. Thanks, David, and good luck this weekend. Looking forward to cheering you (and everyone else) on as you run by!
Ken
Wow Ken so much going on this week! Thank you for keeping me up to date.
I just want to add a little bit of other news from Broken Arrow (because my first love is cross country skiing) ......via @fastwomen here on Substack - "Jessie Diggins, who has an incredible resume in cross country skiing, does what she calls a “big stupid” adventure each year. She explained that the adventures aren’t necessarily wise from a training standpoint, but they fill her soul. This year, she opted to do Broken Arrow’s triple crown, which meant running all three races. She held her own, finishing fifth among the triple crown participants."
Have a blast at Western and great work as always!!