For the first time ever this year, the Asia Trail Master Championship was decided in a winner-takes-the-title race between qualified runners in national country teams of maximum five men and five women. Those runners qualified by scoring the most ATM points throughout the 2022 season: an easy, transparent, fair and non-arbitrary system. Arnie Maceneras from Team Philippines and Hau Ha from Team Vietnam were the strongest runners in the ATM Championship Final and were crowned as the new champions accordingly. Nevertheless, it’s nice to take a look at the final points scoring table of 2022 as well. With our 50-point ‘abroad bonus’ added, for running at least one race outside your country of residence, Hau Ha is also clearly the number one in the women’s ranking as she remained unbeaten in four ATM races. Her masterpiece was of course winning the 100km of Vietnam Mountain Marathon overall. During the ATM Final on Mt Apo, Hau Ha showed mental resilience, too, after a difficult start and finding herself chasing another woman for the first time: Vanja Cnops, who herself scored 3 ATM wins in 2022 and is a great second in the final ranking. Ultimately, however, Hau Ha still put a lot of distance between herself and the others with an incredible descent of Mt Apo, and it went to show that the exciting Vietnamese newcomer on the scene is ready to go global next year. Cnops is second in the ATM points ranking, ahead of another great Southeast Asian newbie, Sally Yap from Sarawak in Malaysia.

In the men’s ranking, however, it is Japan’s Hisashi Kitamura who finds himself on the number 1 spot. The ‘Karate Kit’ collected 2000 ATM points in 2022, with three race victories (Echigo Country Trail, Cameron Ultra and The Punisher) and a 2nd place in Borneo TMBT 100. Those were his best four results that counted for the ranking. He also was 3rd in Vietnam Jungle Marathon and BUTM 100, 18th in Izu Trail Journey and 5th in the Mt Apo Sky Race. All in all, it was Kitamura’s best season ever, even though a performance dip in the autumn and a bad spell of covid before the Final made most people forget that. Kitamura was happy with fifth in the final race, on a course that was not his. Heading the ATM’s final ranking is a nice price of comfort for him, ahead of a year that may see some changes in his professional career that could also impact his running ambitions. Yet, Kitamura will play a role again in 2023, no doubt. Sabah’s Milton Amat also had his best season ever, to the point a lot of people feared he would run totally out of gas by the ATM Final. He came just five minutes short of catching Macaneras in the Championship-deciding race, after the Filipino had dropped him earlier in the last section of the Mt Apo summit attack. Amat is second in the ATM points ranking, ahead of Macaneras.

Looking at the Top 10 below, there’s a great mixture between race winners, multiple podium placers and consistent points-scorers.

Congratulations to everyone, have a smooth rest and a great end-of-year party before reloading the batteries for Season VIII of the Asia Trail Master Championship series starting at UTKC in Thailand on 21 January. Everyone’s points tally goes back to zero and a whole new story begins!

ATM Final Points Ranking 2022 - Men

1. Hisashi Kitamura (JPN) 2000 pts

2. Milton Amat (MAS) 1950 pts

3. Arnie Macaneras (PHI) 1875 pts

4. Mohammad Affindi (MAS) 1830 pts

5. Wilsen Singgin (MAS) 1700 pts

6. Thimo Kilberth (GER/INA) 1665 pts

7. Jeffery Budin (MAS) 1530 pts

8. Amir Zaki (MAS) 1505 pts

9. Gaetan Morizur (FRA/VIE) 1450 pts

10. Thang Hoang Huu (VIE) 1445 pts

ATM Final Points Ranking 2022 - Women

1. Hau Ha (VIE) 2050 pts

2. Vanja Cnops (BEL/SIN) 1975 pts

3. Sally Yap (MAS) 1900 pts

4. Cecille Wael (PHI) 1800 pts

5. Halimatun Sa’adiah (MAS) 1670 pts

6. Thi Lan Huong Vu (VIE) 1645 pts

7. Julie Ann Morales (PHI) 1640 pts

8. Irish Glorioso (PHI) 1600 pts

9. Emily Raga (PHI) 1570 pts

10. Izzah Hazirah (MAS) 1500 pts

Season VIII of the Asia Trail Master Championship series begins in Thailand, just like last year with Ultra Trail Koh Chang, one of the classic events in the southern part of the country. A colourful event offering a 100k and a 70k option for both ATM Championship points and a Grandmaster Quest point. UTKC is the first of three early season events that will all require a basic level of fitness and endurance. Our popular and traditional season opener before the covid-19 crisis in Indonesia, Bandung’s 42k Tahura Trail, has been postponed to 11 March in 2023. While Tahura was a rather fast and easy-going race going into the new season, UTKC can be a hot struggle for many participants. The great atmosphere around the event makes up for that, however. Two weeks later, the ATM circuit moves to Laos for the V Trail in Vang Vieng. What used to be a late-season event is now one of the first on 4/5 February. It’s still the premier trail running event in the country, and we are happy the event is back on the calendar. V Trail will offer two points race categories: the 85km and the 55km.

One week later we are back in the Philippines, albeit the northern island of Luzon. The Santa Ines Mountain Adventure was a successful Candidate Race last year and the 80km race will now be a Championship points race on 11 February. Organised by The Pace Republic including 2-star Grandmaster Rhea Batac, the event is held to the east of capital city Manila in the Rizal mountains.

After this trio, there will be a two-week gap to the new Candidate Race in Brunei, Simpur Ultra. Another week later, we move to Vietnam for the first time in 2023. The Dalat Ultra Trail will be held on 4 March and it’s a 85km race that matters there. A week later should be the aforementioned Tahura Trail in Bandung, Indonesia. On 25 March we have another event that used to be later in the season. Hong Kong’s classic Lantau 70 will be a points race for the Asia Trail Master Championship for the first time. One week later we return to another part of Vietnam, Ninh Binh, for the Cuc Phuong Jungle Paths 100k race - organised by the team of Cau Dat Farm Ultra in 2020 - a very strong Candidate Race at the time, which unfortunately cannot be held at the moment due to change in land ownership.

As you can read, the first quarter of 2023 will be filled with exciting trail action straightaway!

You can now watch the ultimate Tale of the Trail episode of 2022, with the race recap of last weekend’s ATM Final in Davao, Philippines. The 75 km Mt Apo Sky Race was won by local hero Arnie Macaneras and Vietnam’s Hau Ha. They are the new Asia Trail Master Champions, following in the footsteps of John Ellis and Veronika Vadovicova who both won the title before covid in 2019.

The new format ATM Final was held in national country teams, composed of maximum five male and five female runners - those who scored most ATM points during the season, which began in March.

The Mt Apo Sky Race was held for the 6th time since 2015 and is organised by Vertical To Sky Events, in cooperation with the Ministries of Tourism in Davao and Santa Cruz.

2022’s Season VII is a wrap, and considering the major post-covid difficulties many of us in the event industry still have had to face, it was definitely a successful relaunch of the Asia Trail Master Championship series. Our elite participation rate, Grandmaster Quest uptake, but especially our live race coverage viewership and followers have jumped to the sky in 2022, and we would like to thank all of you for your appreciation and trust in our work during the many events we reported on this season. 

Last weekend’s new format of the ATM Final, with the “race winner-takes-the-championship”  as most significant change compared to 2015-2019, was deemed by a big majority as very exciting and stimulating for competitive elites, and definitely a step forward. We hereby confirm that ATM will retain the same format in 2023. Runners score points in ATM races throughout the season and the best five men and best five women in each country will be invited to join the final race for the title. 

The 2023 ATM Championship Final is projected to take place on the weekend of 2/3 December 2023. 

That’s right: two weeks earlier than in 2022 and 2019. We aim to increase the gap between the end of a season and the beginning of a new season. Runners, but also the ATM crew, needs appropriate resting and battery recharging time :-) 

Talks with potential event organisers and locations have been ongoing since a few months. Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia are in the mix. Asia Trail Master is still accepting applications for hosting next year's ATM Championship Final until 15 January 2023.

Any organiser or destination with sufficient budget and government support is welcome to apply to us via kris@asiatrailmaster.com . 

FLASH NEWS - The 2022 Asia Trail Master Champions are Arnie Macaneras from Philippines and Hau Hau from Vietnam! Both class acts won the Mount Apo Sky Race 75km race in Santa Cruz, Davao, on Saturday aftervery competitive and exciting races. For the first time ever in her running career, Hau Ha was put under pressure early on by another female runner, Vanja Cnops, but ultimately once again smashed everyone. Local hero Arnie Macaneras executed his game plan and knowledge of the terrain to perfection, and was able to hold off Malaysia’ s Milton Amat by a sheer five minutes at the finish in the Playa de Oboza beach resort. Team Malaysia won the inaugural ATM Team Championship ahead of the home team Pilipinas and Team Vietnam. More news coming soon, meanwhile watch the videos from our live race coverage yesterday (more published on facebook and youtube).

The 2022 Asia Trail Master Championship will reach its conclusion this Saturday at the Mount Apo Sky Race in Davao, Philippines with a 75km sea-to-summit-return race. For the first time in ATM history, the Championship will be decided in a winner-takes-it final race with qualified runners, who scored enough points in ATM promoted races throughout the year to be in the top 5 of their country in our points ranking. It’s a new approach that has been applauded by as good as everyone in the competitive Asian trail community, and we are looking forward to see how it all pans out this weekend.

The list of favourites is long and it’s anyone’s guess who can clinch the first Asia Trail Master champion title since 2019, before covid interrupted everything. While reigning female champion Veronika Vadovicova has family priorities at the moment, 2019 male champion John Ellis did everything to get qualified for this year’s Final and will sell his skin and title at a very high price this Saturday. The race distance of 75km probably doesn’t seem long enough for him, but Mt Apo is not an ordinary 75km race. Pablo Diago Gonzales, a very decent reference, won the 70k race in 2017 in 12 hours, and that opens perspectives for an ultra specialist like John Ellis - now in his mid-forties but looking every bit as fit and stoked as three years ago. Kind reminder: nobody has ever won the ATM Championship twice. Two other former champions are also in the race tomorrow: 2018 hero Alessandro Sherpa, who qualified by finishing MMTF 50 and CMU 50 since he returned to Asia and is very much focused on this weekend, and 2015 inaugural champion Arief Wismoyono from Indonesia, who at Mantra Summits Challenge 75 was absolutely smashing it last July. Mind you, Mantra Summits 75 is the closest it can get to the Mount Apo Sky Race... It is truly hard to predict the outcome, which makes it so exciting and worthy of a championship race.

Jeff Campbell, Canadian residing in Hong Kong and running for Team Asia Expat, won Dark 45 and Vietnam Jungle Marathon 70 to qualify and is the most tipped potential champion. But isn’t 75km on a very technical mountain trail a bit too much for his very fast legs? The same can be said about Japan’s Hisashi Kitamura. Super fast on road marathon, and increasingly resilient on technical trails, but this is Mt Apo... Enter the pure mountain goats like aforementioned Arief Wismoyono, Malaysia’s Milton Amat and Wilsen Singgin and last but not least Quang Tran from Vietnam. Of all the highest ranked runners, Quang Tran is the least mentioned as a potential winner tomorrow, primarily because he is relatively unknown outside Vietnam still. He can change all that as we understand he is highly motivated to prove himself this weekend. We remember his easy victory in the Mantra Summits Challenge 116km race last July. Again, that race is the closest reference to what runners will get tomorrow. Malaysia arguably has the strongest team of all in the ATM Final, men and women, and are the top favourites to clinch the new ATM Team Championship. The finish times of the best 3 men and best 3 women of each team will be accumulated to produce the team result. Until a month or two ago, Sabah’s Milton Amat was arguably the man-to-beat in the Mt Apo Sky Race. Milton this season was better than ever. Maybe he still is, but the fact is that he has done a lot of racing over the past weeks so questions have been raised about his physical and mental state going into this last race of the year. If Milton Amat were to win tomorrow, a lot of training books would need to be rewritten, and we would certainly love that. Malaysia has more irons in the fire, however. Mohammad Affindi has also been exceptionally strong this year with wins in BUTM and Bali Trail Challenge. He could cause the upset if he has a good day, just like teammate Wilsen Singgin. You never really know with Singgin, who can be either superbly strong or remarkably below-par. In any case, Mount Apo is the kind of terrain Singgin, winner of MMTF 2021 and UT Chiang Rai 230 in 2019, likes a lot. Amir Zaki and Jeffery Budin - both race winners themselves this ATM season - are excellent backups and potential ‘helpers’ for Team Malaysia. Helping your teammates is allowed in the ATM Final, including carrying extra water or food for the captains - as long as every single runner respects the mandatory gear requirements. Mt Apo Sky Race is an out-and-back course, so the faster runners will come across the more slower ones at some point.

We have not even mentioned Team Pilipinas, the home favourites, and their star runner Arnie Macaneras, who will be running really in his own backyard. Nobody knows Mount Apo better than Macaneras and Sean Aying. Two weeks ago at Cordillera Mountain Ultra, Macaneras proved to be reaching his top level again at the right time. Many co-favourites fear him, and they have every reason to. Sadly, Philippines will be missing Larry Apolinario, who has been advised not to run by his physioterapist as an injury he sustained while winning MUSPO 100 in July is still not properly healed and recent race results suggest that it is doing Apolinario more damage than good. His

place in the team is taken last-minute by Rhys Pawid. Angelito Vertudazo is the fourth runner in the team. Poy Brillantes qualified by right as well, but a professional emergency prevented him from taking the flight from Manila to Davao yesterday.

The women’s home team will also miss CMU winner Cecille Wael, who unfortunately opted out just a few days ago. For the potential replacements Aggy Sabanal and Angelie Blanco it was too late to still make the trip to Davao.

The women’s race tomorrow is excepted to be an exciting first-time battle between Vietnam’s new star Hau Ha and Singapore-based Belgian Vanja Cnops. Both are unbeaten in ATM this season and actually looked unbeatable, too. Hong Kong-based Hungarian Ezster Csillag was also qualified for the ATM Final and keen to compete, but her busy racing schedule over the past weeks resulted into too much fatigue. The dual between Hau Ha and Vanja Cnops will be mouthwatering, though. For Hau Ha, on paper, it will be the first race she will normally be genuinely tested by another female competitor, who on top has faster road running times than herself, and credentials as a national cross-country and trail athlete. Vanja Cnops has been in Santa Cruz for a week and loved it. She has never run longer than 70km, however. Similar with Jeff Campbell, that is her alleged handicap, given Hau Ha has proven she can handle even 100km very well by comfortably winning Vietnam Mountain Marathon 100 overall, i.e. beating all the men in the process. The Vietnamese ace, who only started competing for real last March, is still prone to nutritional issues, however, and that could cost her against a seasoned runner like Cnops, who has been in several running ‘wars’ already.

Everyone expects those two ladies to fight for the victory and the ATM title, but behind them the battle for third place is also wide open. Julie Ann Morales and Irish Glorioso from Philippines will be keen to get a strong result, Malaysia has Sally Yap and Izzah Hazirah as arguable likeliest podium candidates, Vietnam also has Ngoc Lien Trinh and Lan Huong Vu, and Indonesia has its technical mountain ultra specialist Shindy Patricia in the race, too. From Japan, we can also expect Moeko Yasugahira to fight for third place.

The 75km race will be covered live on our usual ATM media channels, and there will be live GPS tracking of all the runners via: https://live.asiatrailmaster.com/mtaposkyrace22/

The traditional end-of-season event in Japan’s Izu peninsula south of Tokyo is once again open for international competitors this weekend. For many who have run Izu Trail Journey it is an absolute highlight on our ATM calendar, but this year the late reopening of the country and the still high cost of travel have led to rather modest number of foreign names on the start list. Global trail star Dylan Bowman from the USA will be running, though, and also Hisashi KItamura.

Kitamura is returning from a long spell of illness, which began at Vietnam Jungle Marathon mid-October, where he still placed third but was never really himself. In fact, after showing his best trail form ever from March to July, his performances had already been going downhill. Even at Borneo TMBT 100, where he finally wanted to defeat local hero Milton Amat he was basically no match for the Sabahan. It would appear the Karate Kit was hit harder by a covid infection than most elite athletes. However, he showed optimism again after he ran MMTF 25km two weeks ago. And this weekend at Izu, he hopes to get the feeling back to run well over 70km without seeking a top result. The ultimate goal has always been the ATM Championship Final on Mount Apo, a course that partially suits him well, but also partially not-so well. Kitamura knows he will need to be strong and sharp to handle the summit attack and descent to have a chance against pure mountain runners such as Milton Amat and Alessandro Sherpa to get the ATM title next week.

One of the dark horses in next week’s female ATM title race will be Moeko Yasugahira from Sapporo. She was a great winner of Seoul 50K last month and has shown great motivation to be part of Team Japan at Mt Apo. Yasugahira will be fine-tuning her form also at Izu Trail this Sunday.

Hisashi Kitamura aims to build up his form again for next week’s ATM Final after a long spell of illness

You can now watch our race recap of the Cordillera Mountail Ultra in Tinongdan, near Baguio, Philippines on 4 December. The 50km points race was won by Kristian Joergensen and Cecille Wael.

The video is available on our YouTube channel and Facebook page, or you can just watch it on our Tale of the Trail webpage.

As previously announced, UTKC will open the 2023 Season VIII of the Asia Trail Master Championship series on the 21/22 January weekend, just as it did this year. Ultra-Trail Koh Chang is a classic on Thailand’s trail calendar and it certainly is a great event to begin a new story, a new year of exciting racing for ATM Championship and Grandmaster points across the continent.

Koh Chang is one of the southern islands of Thailand, reachable by ferry from Trat, which in turn is connected to Bangkok by highway or a short domestic flight. The island is in fact the home base of teelakow CEO Peeradon Suksawat, and he of course spares no effort to ensure ‘his’ event will leave nothing but great memories to the 2000 or more runners that every year take part in the event. ATM-wise, the focus has always been on the two Grandmaster distances of 100km and 70km and 2023 is no different. Ultra and medium distance specialists both can start their ATM season with a bang.

Registration has been going very well, as expected, and anyone keen on joining UTKC on 21 January should book very soon.

This year in March, the races were won by Britain’s George Burkin and Chonlada Kappiyanond in the 100km, and Danon Rattanatumrong and Areerat Kareeklin in the 70km.

This is what the 100km course looks like on Koh Chang island

Running back in time

The home team is known! Team Pilipinas for the 2022 Asia Trail Master Championship Final will consist of Arnie Macaneras, Larry Apolinario, Sean Aying, Angelito Vertudazo and Poy Brillantes in the men’s, and Cecille Wael, Irish Glorioso, Emily Raga, Rhea Batac and Julie Ann Morales in the women’s. Last weekend’s Cordillera Mountain Ultra concluded the Filipino ranking for this ATM season, as nobody of the potential contenders is lining up at Izu Trail Journey in Japan this coming Sunday.

Some of the qualified runners were already guaranteed of their team spot before CMU, and underlined why they may also play a very prominent role in the Mount Apo Sky Race on 17 December. Arnie Macaneras has shown increasing form over the past weeks, and Cecille Wael found speed and resilience we had not come to expect from her so late in a season, in which she was accumulating podiums once again without an ATM race win. Both of them have experience on Mount Apo, too. Macaneras lives in Davao and it’s basically his home terrain. Nobody of the ATM Finalists knows the mountain trail better than him. Ces Wael, she ran the 2019 edition of the Mt Apo Sky Race. She came fourth. Post-covid, however, Wael has reached a higher competitive level.

Team Pilipinas is strong overall and will be a great challenger for Team Malaysia and Vietnam, and others, for the ATM Team Title (ranking will be based on race result of best 3 men and best 3 women of the teams). Larry Apolinario may have struggled with his stomach and nutrition in races abroad the past few months, but let’s not forget his dominating display at MUSPO 100 in July and the Sierra Madre Trail (ATM Candidate Race) in May. As it goes in elite sports, today, nobody may be thinking of Apolinario as a potential championship winner…. but wait and he might just as well upset the whole order. Macaneras and Apolinario are in theory the fastest men, and they will be backed up by two more Mindanao talents - Sean Aying and Angelito Vertudazo, and Luzon’s mountain trail expert Poy Brillantes. Brilliantes had a late surge in the rankings thanks to his performances in South Korea at the Ulju Trail 9 Peaks and CMU. Just outside the top 5 we find Koy Grey, who scored very well in both his two comeback races, and Yojong Sacayle, who unfortunately was not in a position to fly to CMU and saw himself being overtaken on points as a result. They are the two reserves in case one of the top 5 cannot make it.

Behind Ces Wael, we find Irish Glorioso - who kind of quietly collected bags of points in four races this season. She never finished outside the top 6 and was 2nd in UTOP in Penang early October. Emily Raga was already qualified before the weekend, too, and decided to take a rest after what was a very busy period for her in the middle of the season. Emily will be well-rested in two weeks, normally, and we are curious to see if she can carry the fast speed she often has shown in the early parts of races towards a longer distance, in this case the 75km of Mt Apo Sky Race. Rhea Batac is always a solid finisher, and when she decides to push can actually challenge for a podium place. Second place in Jember Hills Classic in Indonesia this year was evidence of that. Julie Ann Morales is new to trail running and entered the scene with some impressive results, including a win at The Punisher and third place, just behind Ces Wael, at MUSPO 100. Morales is highly motivated to give it her best at her home race in the outfit of Team Pilipinas by OTSO. On the reserve list for women, we actually have two very strong runners: Aggy Sabanal and Angelie Cabalo. Sabanal did not make the team despite one victory and one second place, because the others had three or more races this season (remember it’s a four-best-count system). Cabalo is the exciting newcomer, who burst onto the ATM scene just ten days ago by winning MMTF 100 as an unknown. Cabalo was still tired from that performance at CMU last Sunday, but nevertheless still got third place. Even if both are not at the start line this year, both Cabalo and Sabanal - back from maternity leave after finishing 2nd in the 2018 ATM Championship - will certainly be Filipino protagonists in ATM next year.

After 7 podium places in ATM points races since the 2018, Cecille Wael delivered an impressively quick performance at last weekend’s Cordillera Mountain Ultra to claim her first major victory in her trail journey. The UGLOW runner was on fire from the start at 3am, showing remarkable speed despite still being ‘in recovery’ from the previous weekend’s MMTF 90km ultra race. Motivation and determination is key to win trail races, and Wael probably wanted to make a statement. She was nearly 20 minutes ahead of 2018 vice-ATM champion Aggy Sabanal, who had prepared well for CMU in a final attempt to get into the top 5 of the Filipino ATM ranking, and almost 50 minutes ahead of Angelie Cabalo! Cabalo, yes, the winner of MMTF a week ago who on that day beat Wael by nearly 50 minutes. All things considered, competitively-speaking, this was Ces Wael’s masterpiece run to date.

South Korea’s Boyoung Jang secured fourth place in the race, not too long after Cabalo. Boyoung is also qualified as part of Team Korea for the ATM Final on Mount Apo, together with her husband Kim Jisub, amongst others. Irish Glorioso did a great run to protect her qualification for Team Pilipinas by coming in 6th and ahead of Julie Ann Morales in seventh. Their respective results meant Aggy Sabanal and Angelie Cabalo are now in the waiting room as first and second reserves for the ATM Finals, in case either Emily Raga, Ces Wael, Rhea Batac, Irish Glorioso or Jullie Ann Morales cannot make it to the Mt Apo Sky Race in 2 weeks time. Let’s also note the surprising and interesting result of newbie Myra Montiveros in 5th place at CMU, right behind Boyoung Jang. One to follow in 2023!

The men’s race was won by Kristian Joergensen, which was no surprise and yet Arnie Macaneras was able to challenge and push the Philippines-based Dane forward all race. Macaneras, like Wael, is still searching that breakthrough victory in an ATM race after several impressive podium places. Could Mount Apo be that moment on 17 December? Macaneras’s competitive form has been rising since a number of weeks and nobody of any qualifyer for the ATM Championship knows the mountain as well as him - being a Davao resident who climbs Apo for training on a regular basis. He is part of a strong men’s team that also includes Larry Apolinario, Sean Aying and thanks to their great runs at CMU, also Poy Brilliantes and Angelito Vertudazo. The latter duo managed to jump Yojong Sacayle in the rankings. Sacayle, unfortunately, could not make it to CMU last weekend. Behind Joergensen and Macaneras, 2018 ATM Champion Alessandro Sherpa continued his comeback in Asia and claimed the third spot on the podium. His focus is exclusively on Mt Apo and CMU for him was ‘training according to programme’. In fourth and fifth we had Koi Grey - proving he is really back - and Jeffery Zonio, in his first ATM points race. Zonio has been winning domestic races in Philippines throughout the year.

Below are the two finish videos of the top competitors. Check out all the ATM race videos on our facebook channel, as well as a great photo collection by Adventure III .

The 2022 podium placers of the Cordillera Mountain Ultra 50km

Kristian Joergensen was as expected the strongest man, but Macaneras kept him focused nonetheless

Arnie Macaneras’s form is growing steadily. The Davao’s top runner scored another ATM race podium

Koi Grey in his 2nd race of 2022, just a week after a great comeback at MMTF

ATM Grandmaster Shashwat Rao scored an impressive maiden victory in Malnad Ultra 100 last weekend, the first points race in India that counts for the Asia Trail Master championship. Rao dug very deep to achieve this feat on a runable yet hilly course through a major coffee plantation area six hours south of Bangalore in Karnataka State. Malnad Ultra is the most popular trail running event in India, but changed location for this year’s 6th edition. The new venue and course was liked by the 1000 runners at the event, offering great vistas of the mountainous area and a great feeling of remoteness. The weather on race weekend also played ball and made for an exciting weekend of trail running for the many newbies on the 30km as well. No doubt about it: India’s trail running scene is blossoming. And not only in quantity of numbers, but also in the quality of its top runners. We have known the high level of Shashwat Rao since 2018, but consider the Malnad 50k race winner Sannat Sachdev. 50k trail with 1700m of elevation gain in 4 hours and 38 minutes! In a clear statement after the finish, Sachdev proclaimed he is ready to experience the Asia Trail Master Championship in 2023. We are looking forward, indeed! Sachdev was not alone, he was pushed forward for a long time by another Asian top class act Opendro Singh Thoudam. In third was Ganesh Kumar. The women’s race was won by Unived talent Lipi Kalita.

Shashwat and Ashis did the full 100k course in well under 13 hours. The podium was completed by Raman Kumar. The women’s 100k race was won by Anuradha Bhat in 17h52. Anita Shivanna and Talisangla Jamir joined her on the podium. Jamir actually led the race halfway, but dropped back in the second part. It was her first 100k.

Lipi Kalita (middle) won the women’s 50k race in 6h32