John Medinger is the publisher of Ultrarunning Magazine, the race director and founder of the Quad Dipsea and the Lake Sonoma 50, and is on the board of directors of the Western States Endurance Run. Here in answer some of my questions about Ultrarunning Magazine and the state and future of the sport.First, could you talk about how you discovered ultrarunning and your transition into sport?
I think my transition was pretty typical for the era. I ran my first marathon in 1978, and focused on getting faster for a while. Starting in 1980, I would run further once or twice a year. In 1983 I went to Western States as a pacer and got hooked. Within the next year or so I completely transitioned to trails and never looked back.
Talk about the founding of Ultrarunning Magazine. How did that go from idea to the first issue? And, were there others there at the beginning who made it possible?
Stan Wagon, Fred Pilon and Peter Gagarin started the magazine in 1981. The first issue was published in May of that year, it ran to 16 pages. We have posted the entire first edition on our website at http://www.ultrarunning.com/ultra/reference/archives/0581.pdf. Don Allison was added as an Editor in the mid-1990s and eventually bought the magazine in 2000. We bought it from Don in 2007. I'd been a regular contributor for many years, and thought it would make a great post-retirement project. I was right! though it has turned out to be a lot more work than we thought it would be. The sport has doubled in the past five years. And we're really focused on trying to bring useful content and great photography to the publication.
UR must be symbiotic with the RDs and their races. Talk about what it was like developing relationships with that first generation of RDs and building UR from its roots to where it is now.
UR has always focused on printing results from races, all the results not just the guy who won. For most runners, it is a huge accomplishment just to finish an ultra. We treat every finisher with the respect they deserve, or at least we try to!
Race directors are a valuable commodity. Not only do most of them do their thing without pay, they really invest themselves in their events. We know – we're all RDs! Tia has done a fabulous job with Miwok, and Lisa and I put on both Quad Dipsea and Lake Sonoma. And I've been on the Board at Western States for nearly 20 years. There is a strong symbiosis between the race directors and UR – we rely on them to provide stories and photos and timely results. In exchange they get a forum for what amounts to free advertising for their events. With the huge increase in events, it's harder and harder to give each one the space it deserves, but each issue we intentionally pick some smaller low-key events to feature.
UR and a select group of voters determines “Ultrarunner of the Year” and the other categories such as “Performance of the Year” and others. What is that voting process like? Also, though there has been much debate, is it fair to say that the honor go to the “North American Resident” Ultrarunner of the Year?
We have a nationwide panel of voters. Almost all of them are race directors, a few are other careful and veteran observers. There are around 20-25 folks that vote. We compile a complete list of all the performances by the top 50 or so male and female runners and send that out to the panel. They have a couple of weeks to sort it through. Many say it is the hardest thing they do all year! You have to compare apples to oranges a lot. We ask the voters to give primary focus on events where the level of competition is high. Sometimes there is almost universal agreement, like Ellie Greenwood last year. And sometimes it is incredibly hard to find a consensus, as among the men last year, when the voting was so close you could throw a towel over the top 3. It's not a perfect process, but it has given consistently good results. When the voting is close, it's easy to argue that the second place guy might have won, or maybe should have. But that's all part of the fun I think. And yes, UR is basically a North American publication and the athletes must be North American residents (regardless of their actual citizenship) to qualify.
“Ultrarunning Magazine” is (in my opinion) to our sport what “Track and Field News” what it to theirs, eg “The Bible of the Sport”. You and your staff have been at the center of an utterly decentralized sport, and are really the only people to see “The whole board at the same time”. Talk about what that’s been like.
That's a really apt analogy, I've been a T&FN reader for 30+ years. TF&N is the "Bible of the Sport", UR has used the "Voice of the Sport" for a long time. Ultra is a really egalitarian sport. You see the winners hanging around the finish line for hours waiting until the last runners come in. I can't think of another sport like that. I think it's because it's just so difficult for everyone – there is a huge amount of mutual respect.
Most races take on the personality of the race director; the RDs, in aggregate, really control the sport. That's been really good for us all, race directors are almost all runners themselves – they get it. Most other US sports have an alphabet soup organization in charge and it eventually becomes as much about the organization as the athletes. Thus far we've avoided that, to our great benefit.
The internet and especially the social media explosion of, say 2004 till now, has allowed for alternatives to print media, both organized and individual; Could you talk about how “Ultrarunning Magazine” has had to grow and adjust in response?
It's a tricky world for print media these days. The internet has provided a great amount of instant information, which is a really great thing. But there is also a huge amount of "noise". In some respects, our job is to sift through all the stuff that's out there and print only what we feel is germane. Most of what we print every month could be found someplace online, in some format. We try to synthesize that, boil it down to what really matters, make the format consistent, and present it with beautiful photography and well-written stories.
We do post a few things on a weekly basis on our website and Facebook page, as a kind of interim report until the next issue comes out. But ultimately, we're a print magazine. We think the time it takes to polish things is worth the wait, and hope our subscribers do too.
You’ve been witness to many of the trends in ultrarunning; One area that I feel is ready to reemerge (and I ask this in the context of the upcoming World 100k Championships) is the road ultra. Could you talk about the ebb and flow of that part of the sport?
Actually the trend is still drifting away from roads. I think the adventure element of trail running adds to its appeal. Generally speaking you don't get that on a road. At the elite level, most runners crave competition, so road events like the World 100K will always have appeal. But for the rest of us, the appeal of immersing ones self in nature and the adventure of being alone out in the woods somewhere is undeniable.
(related to previous) Do you think with Wardian, Sharman, Meghan Aborgast, Devon Crosby-Helms and others having success on both road and trail and influx of younger marathoners that we may see a resurgence of the times and competition of the 80s and 90s?
To some degree that's already happening. Ultra has become a bit more mainstream, and it is attracting more runners with a high level of ability as shorter distances. There were a number of sub-2:20 guys at Chuckanut last month. You've got guys like Max King, David Riddle and Leor Pantilat coming into the sport that were Division 1 track stars. Ultimately a lot of the times from the 1980s might survive, simply because there are so few flat, fast road courses where a runner can post a super-fast time. Most of the elite folks today are simply interesting in competing, over any terrain at any time.
Stan Jensen [on his website run100s] chronicles the proliferation of 100 mile races (95 North American 100s as of this morning, not including longer races, stage races, or timed races) and all areas of the country have new 50ks being created monthly. What has this explosion been like from your perspective? What has been the most exciting part? And, do you see any signs of an ultra-bubble, if you will?
It's been a bit hard to keep track of it all! And Tia Bodington, our Managing Editor, is often pulling her hair out trying to get all the results in the magazine each month and still leave some room for articles about training, nutrition, and the like. We've literally doubled the number of finishers since 2007. So there's lots and lots of columns of names and numbers each month.
I don't think it's a bubble, but I do think it will level off a bit at some point. We've been growing at around 20% compounded for the past several years. Obviously that can't continue forever, the sport will continue to grow but the rate of growth will likely slow some.
One of the biggest trends over the last 4-5 years has been the internationalization of the sport. Obviously this has been very exciting and “bar-raising” for competition. Do you see this contributing to the “professionalization” of the sport? Where do you see this going in the next 5-10 years?
We've seen an explosion of participation in both North America and Europe. I think Asia is on the precipice of doing the same. Obviously ultra is both time and energy consuming, so emerging countries will probably be a bit behind the curve until folks get more leisure time in their lives. But the personal challenge is undeniable, and is appealing to everyone. At the elite level, it is still hard to get a truly international field together, especially in the absence of prize money, travel stipends and high level sponsorship of individual athletes. You really only have Western States and UTMB. But as the sport grows in popularity, I expect we'll see more money come into it and perhaps that will grow. Transvulcania in the Canary Islands is a good example of what can happen, it will be highly international this year for the first time.
I do think we'll see more professionalization, some combination of more sponsored athletes and more prize money events. Our elite athletes deserve better, they work harder at their craft than most. This professionalism will probably grow somewhat slowly as, quite honestly, it is very hard to turn an ultra into compelling television for the average viewer. So, for the most part, the non-running related sponsors will still be on the sidelines. But that, too, might ultimately be a good thing as it will give us all a bit of time to sort things out, instead of having it explode in a dozen directions all at once.
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