Run Rabbit Run 100 will pay $100,000 to each winner
The Colorado 100-miler announced the purse jump on the eve of its 2026 race, and the sport's loudest voices started doing math immediately.
The Run Rabbit Run 100 Mile will pay $100,000 each to its women's and men's champions in 2027 and 2028. iRunFar broke the news on the eve of this year's race in Steamboat Springs, calling it "a rich win" with more information coming soon.
Sage Canaday says the race has been paying $20,000 to its winners, so this is five times the current check. He also says the funding was made possible by sponsor Insight Global, a recruiting and hiring company.
Why the money people reacted first
Ian Sharman's first thought was that the number should not be possible at a race unattached to the two biggest brands in ultrarunning. He wrote that it should make the races very competitive and maybe draw some UTMB top runners away from Chamonix.
Zach Bitter took it a step further. His argument is that the effect lands on shoe brands, not just runners. If a brand wants its athletes at UTMB events, it pays appearance and performance bonuses to get them there, and a six-figure payday somewhere else raises that price.
Andy Jones-Wilkins said he is curious how the payday affects other events. Canaday asked the open questions out loud, including whether it pulls more road runners into ultras and what it means for drug testing and media coverage.
Nobody has said what second place gets.
Meanwhile, the 2026 race was already running
The announcement landed with runners on the course. Jeff Mogavero and Ryan Sullivan led the 2026 Run Rabbit Run 100 Mile before Fish Creek at mile 17, ahead of schedule in 2:34 elapsed, per iRunFar. Hannah Allgood led the women through the same point in 3:05.
Then the weather turned. iRunFar reported rain coming down hard as the leaders headed back into the high country, with a climb up Fish Creek, rutted dirt roads at about 10,000 feet of altitude, and the descent of the Flash of Gold singletrack ahead of them.
What it actually means
The $100,000 is for 2027 and 2028, not for the runners on the course this weekend. What is genuinely new is a race outside the UTMB system putting up a purse that big, funded by a single corporate sponsor. Everything past that, whether it pulls stars from Chamonix, whether other races follow, whether the depth of the prize money changes at all, is people in the sport guessing on the same day the news dropped.
That’s insane! The sport is growing but I’d never guess a race outside UTMB or Comrades could afford this.
When a race outside of that offers a large potential payout, the price to incentivise athletes with appearance and performance bonuses goes up as well.
What do we think are the ramifications of this? What does 2nd place get then?
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