From next year, TNF100 & 50 will be known as Ultra-Trail Australia®, encompassing a five-day trail running festival with a number of new events on the horizon too.
Previously branded as The North Face 100 and The North Face 50, the existing 100km and 50km events are now subsumed under the Ultra-Trail Australia® brand. It’s anticipated that both the 50 and 100km events will have new title sponsors in time for next year, as well as a new logo for the event too.
Ultra168 spoke to AROC head honcho, Tom Landon-Smith just prior to this announcement and he suggested that AROC may look to the community to help design a new logo, something that worked very well for the organisers of Six Foot Track.
With a new name and format, the event is also expected to grow and will play host to around 2,500 athletes, underpinned by the flagship 100km and 50km events, but with the addition of a 22km trail half marathon and a 2.5km dash through Katoomba town centre – the later very much aimed at bringing more community feel into proceedings.
The festival expo will also feature more offering from product exhibitors, gear demonstrations, nutrition workshops, film screenings, athlete forums and key-note presentations.
On the re-brand, Tom had this to say, “Since the inaugural 2008 edition, Ultra-Trail Australia® has experienced significant growth in participation numbers from 132 in the first year to over 2,000 across both the 50km and 100km events last year. As one of the largest trail events in Australia, Ultra Trail Australia is part of the Ultra-Trail World Tour® and the recent rebranding builds upon this distinction.”
The 2016 event will feature a start list of international trail running professionals, all vying for world tour points.
Last year saw US speedster Dylan Bowman take out the line honours in a close race with local Blue Mountains runner, Scott Hawker, which saw both take a significant chunk of time off the previously course record held by Brendan Davies.
We also saw a whole host of international athletes attend, such as the likes of FrancoisD’haene, along with Chinese runners Yun Yanqiao and Dong Li as well as US legend, Amy Sproston.
