At the prompting of many longtime readers and supporters, we’re making our best attempt at maintaining a resource of not only what trail races and ultramarathons have been canceled or postponed as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, but also which races are still on, at least for the moment. We’ve tried to include pertinent information, such as when a postponed race has been rescheduled for, as well as interesting information, such as when any postponement or cancellation decision was first publicized. At the least, the project provides a snapshot of the current state trail and ultramarathon racing.
For more on what we can do as trail runners and ultrarunners to fight the COVID-19 pandemic, read our article, COVID-19: A Trail Running and Ultrarunning Community Guide.
We’ll take this opportunity to respectfully point out to race directors in doubt or frustrated would-be racers that the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidance calls for no gatherings larger than 50 people until mid-May, and the Ultra-Endurance Sports Science & Medicine, a non-profit group of sports researchers and physicians, calls for all events over 50 people to be canceled until at least mid-June. Elsewhere and increasingly in the U.S., group-size recommendations are lowering to 10-or-fewer people or even shelter-in-place requirements. While we’re all a part of a sport in which we’re proud to push many boundaries, this is not one of them.
Assistance with the Project
As long as the COVID-19 pandemic affects our community’s racing schedule, we’ll continue to build out this project in an orderly manner, and could really use your help along the way. Notify us:
- To update the status of a race in this table;
- To submit a trail race over 10 kilometers in length or a road ultra from the U.S. or Canada as well as internationally focused race from the rest of the world within the timespan that we’ve covered that’s not yet in the table; or
- If you find an error in the table.
When sharing information with us, please supply a public link to any information, especially news regarding cancellations and postponements. Emails sent to race participants can also be helpful.
Race Inclusion
Presently, we’ve included all trail races in the U.S. and Canada from March 18 through April 30 that we found on UltraSignup.com (some previously canceled races to be held in this time span may have already been removed), others we came across as part of our research, and races we’re simply aware of. We’ll continue to become more exhaustive in our near-term tracking as well as expanding out the time scope of our collection in the coming days.
We’ve initially collected a much smaller pool of races outside of the U.S. and Canada that were scheduled to occur within the next three months. These races are primarily from international-race series or are of similar international status. They are intended to be representative as well as to inform aficionados who are familiar with iRunFar’s coverage (both in-person coverage and in our This Week in Running column) which of these races may or may not be happening. We intend to expand the scope of this international section in time, but never intend for it to become exhaustive. This international section will remain representative only. (This is due to the scale of international trail running and ultrarunning, difficulty in finding comprehensive international race calendars, difficulty in accessing and navigating race websites solely in foreign languages, and the lack of utility in publishing comprehensive lists in English of races run almost entirely by local non-English speakers in other countries.)
By and large, we include only events that have at least one race longer than 10 kilometers.
Interpreting the Table
Where an event spans several days, we use a single date from that range to allow for sorting.
We use U.S. date format–month/day/year–throughout.
For races noted as postponed but without a date in the status column, we’ve not yet seen a makeup date set for that race.
We’ve color coded races by current status:
- Green=Still On. The events are still on as far as we know. (However, confirming cancellations and postponements is more certain than confirming a race’s continuation.)
- Yellow=Postponed or It’s Complicated. These events are officially postponed as well as a few cases for which “it’s complicated,” where the race organization has indicated uncertainty regarding the race’s status.
- Red=Canceled. These events are canceled with no indication of being rescheduled.
Global-Series Status
As a quick aside, here’s an update from some of the global trail running circuits.
With many early season races, the Ultra-Trail World Tour has now seen six postponements and five cancellations. You can find all the details of the first six postponements and two cancellations in their COVID-19 update of March 18. The Laveredo Ultra Trail was canceled on March 25, while the Western States 100 and Volvic Volcanic Experience were canceled on March 27. [Updated 3/27/20]
All eight races in the 2020 Skyrunner World Series (SWS) through the end of June have been canceled or postponed per a March 20th announcement. The 2020 SWS will not begin until July 26th at Skyrace Comapedrosa in Spain. [Updated 3/23/20] [The 2020 SWS season was canceled June 10, 2020.]
We’ve not seen any official statement from either the Golden Trail World Series (GTWS)or the Spartan Trail World Championships. This is not surprising as the series have been minimally affected so far, with Spartan Trail losing only Patagonia Run to postponement and Golden Trail remaining unaffected for the moment. [On May 27, the GTWS announced a 4-stage race in October as its championship with local qualification.]
Last Updated 4/20/20 (Full Table Last Updated: 4/17-20/20)
[We are no longer maintaining this table and, so, have taken it down.]
Large Scale Updates:
- 3/18-19/20: Initial addition of U.S. and Canadian races from March 18 through April 30, primarily via current race listings on Ultrasignup and internal knowledge, and high-profile international races from March 18 through June 17.
- 3/20/20: Added races from May 1-4 via race listings on Ultrasignup and internal knowledge.
- 3/23/20: Added races from May 5-17 via race listings on Ultrasignup and internal knowledge.
- 3/24/20: Added races from May 18-31 via race listings on Ultrasignup and internal knowledge.
- 6/11/20: Removed race table. Added updates to SWS and GTWS.
