Running Man Adventures · Head of Media · 2019–2022

In February 2019, Running Man Adventures approached me to help with Ultra-Trail Drakensberg. The race was just 10 weeks away, entries closed in 6 weeks and they did not have enough entries to justify the race. I had never been to the area. What I had was a folder of photos from earlier years, a Facebook page with 2,440 likes, and a pinned tweet about early-bird entries from the August before.

I also had a clear brief. The race had to fill up and pay its way, or there might not be a next year. The long term goal: acquire a title sponsor.

The problem

UTD is one of the most spectacular trail races in South Africa. The 160km starts at the highest pub on the continent, crosses into Lesotho and tags the highest peak in Southern Africa. The 100km traverses Sani Pass and the majestic Twelve Apostles. The race is in South Africa’s biggest and most remote mountains. It has the makings of a world-class event.

The problem was that it’s strengths were also it’s weaknesses. Geographically, it's remote and not an easy to get to. Very few trail runners in South Africa had been to the Southern Drakensberg at that point, and getting there takes time and money.

In 2018, only 133 people entered across all distances.

The plan

Building brands take time and I knew that I needed 3 years to get the UTD sponsorship ready. My job was communicating what it's like to run through mountains that big, that remote, that beautiful. Everything I did over the next three years was about getting that feeling across to people who had never been there.

Become the race with the best storytelling, copy and content of any race in the world. Authentic stories will draw the right audience,

2019:
10 weeks. Work with the content we have and double the entries. Use the event to show the world what it feels like being at UTD. The live updates and posts from the race weekend are critical for 2020.

2020:
A full year to plan. Refresh the brand, all collateral and website. Launch Merchandice. Use race weekend media momentum, grow the email database, attract elites, open entries in September (well in advance) and get a world class media team to cover the race.

2021:
Established brand in SA, grow internationally and attract a title sponsor.

2019: show people what's happening on the ground

Having only a folder of photos, and Spurge’s stories - I worked with the content I had. We defined what UTD as a brand is and is not, and how we envision the race to grow. We agreed that 2019 would be the start of the UTD-brand flywheel.

I overhauled the social media presence and email strategy and started telling the story of a race in the remote reaches of the Drakensberg. A key part of the build up was showing people what was happening on the ground: brush cutting trails, route marketing, visiting aid station locations. The making of the race.

Entries doubled, from 133 to 265.

On race weekend, I was a one-woman band, running all the live media across four races and three platforms. At the time, race photographers would shoot and send their photos days later. I briefed ours to send them during the race, so we could post as it happened.

Most race coverage follows the lead man and the lead woman. I followed everyone else too. The back markers. The volunteers at the aid stations. The supporters. The race director. The aid stations The mountains. It was a decision that Spurg and I took that the race will celebrate the running community as a whole, including the mountains. And that was our guiding principle all race weekend long.

Numerous people told us it was the best race coverage they had seen. And so UTD was finally on the map, and part of people’s consideration set.

2020: a rebrand on hold; and UTD Lockdown Edition.

For 2020, I planned a full rebrand: new race numbers, wristbands, start arches, banners and podiums. I also rebuilt the site on Squarespace (see it here), moved ticket sales to Quicket (see it here) and kept building on the social strategy and momentum we had. I created a UTD Merchandise range to generate additional revenue for the event. Ryan Sandes, South Africa's best-known trail runner, signed up.

Entries were up 48% to 390, with two weeks still to go.
Then Covid cancelled the race.

Race weekend happened to fall on the last weekend of South Africa's hard lockdown, so we moved UTD home: UTD Lockdown Edition was born (complete with race merchandise). Every race ran at 10% of its distance, at its original start time - only in gardens, driveways and on balconies. Entry was free and everyone who entered got their own race number by email to print and share on social media. Runners could donate to the race's charities - we raised over R100,000 in donations.

For the event movie: we asked every runner to film their race and submit the footage which we cut their into the race film. A few people ran the full 100 miles at home, trying to match the climb of the real course.

1,180 people took part, aged 3 to 82 - three times the number who had entered the real race.

It built the community UTD had been missing. When entries opened for 2021, people were ready.

2021: the re-brand, finally!

In 2021, the rebrand finally went live. With designer Marize Engelbreght, I gave every race its own mountain colour: dark green for the 100-miler, light green for the 100km, deep orange for the 62km and sky blue for the 32km . The race number, wristband, medal and ribbon all matched. The logo, the start arches, the finish chute and the podium all came from the same look.

The moment someone entered, an automated email sent them their own race number. Runners shared their bibs, and their friends signed up too.

This was also the year I brought in some of the best photographers in the country. I needed people who could show the scale of these mountains, and how it feels to be in them. I chose the music for every video and reel the same way. Nothing happy-clappy. Only music that leaves you in awe, and stirs emotions.

We told the stories behind the race. The team brush-cutting and marking trails through the Berg. The race director, a local dairy farmer, and what it took him to make it happen. The Basotho man carrying firewood up Sani Pass you might pass on your run. The horsemen guarding runners in Lesotho.

Everything went through one test: does this add to the brand we're building? If not, we didn't do it. if the feeling of the post, the copy, the video did not match the feeling we wanted to create, it was not posted.

Entries for 3 of the 5 races sold out for for UTD2021 - and the 100km and 160km events had the highest numbers in the race’s history.

I built a small team for race weekend, with two assistants writing and posting with me.

The #ultratraildrakensberg hashtag received well over 5 million impressions during the 2021 event weekend.

The results

Entries: 133 in 2018, 265 in 2019, 390 when Covid hit in 2020, a sold-out 775 in 2021, and [NEEDED] in 2022
The 100-miler: the field grew from 21 runners in 2018 to 92 in 2021. Ryan Sandes finally ran it in 2021, his first 100-miler on South African soil, and won.
Reach: 5.2 million people reached and 68,000 interactions around the 2021 race. Runners called it "the best race coverage".
Press: a feature on the 2021 race in Trail Magazine
Conservation: a share of every entry funds the park and local projects. That grew from R46,150 in 2018 to R162,540 in 2021.