Simplified – and with a new director – the Durango Double is set to run again Oct. 11-12.
Online registration began Monday, and the hope is to attract 400 to 450 runners for the event, now entering its third year in its latest incarnation.
The event, which last year had a field of 70 percent women, will benefit the Women’s Resource Center.
The new director is Brendan Trimboli, a 26-year-old-sponsored ultra-distance runner who moved to Durango in August 2011.
He’s quickly established himself on the local scene and was recently named to the board of directors for the Durango Running Club (previously called Durango Motorless Transit).
“For me, it’s an exciting opportunity to show my passion for running with other people,” he said, “and to learn the ropes of what it takes to run a successful race.”
He replaces Matt Kelly, who founded the fall running event in 2002 as the Durango Marathon. The marathon continued until 2006.
In 2012, with Kelly again as director, it was brought back as the Durango Double, a weekend that included 25- and 50-kilometer trail runs on Saturdays and half- and full-marathons on Sundays.
Trimboli, in discussions with event sponsor Animas Surgical Hospital and after analyzing participant data, recognized that to continue the event, it needed to be simpler.
This year’s event will feature just one race each day – a half-marathon trail run Saturday and a half-marathon road run Sunday. Do them both, he noted, and you’ll have run a full marathon.
Not having the longer events might alienate a few runners, he said, but it’ll be better to focus on fewer events and reduce the load for organizers and volunteers.
“My thought was you could always add back later,” Trimboli said.
He himself has run several 100-mile events, including the Leadville Trail 100 Run and the Ultra-Trail du Mont Blanc, a 105-mile circumnavigation of Mont Blanc that begins and ends in Chamonix, France. Trimboli sometimes trains with Brett Gosney, the CEO of Animas Surgical Hospital who runs ultra-distances himself.
“Brendan Trimboli is immersed in the running world,” Gosney said in a news release. “Brendan brings new ideas and a kinship with the Durango running community that will take the Durango Double in an exciting new direction.”
Trimboli grew up in Woodland Park, west of Colorado Springs, and attended the University of Washington. He’d been eyeing Durango, and a job opportunity brought him back to the sunshine of the desert Southwest. He’s a freelance website media and graphic designer.
Both days’ races will begin and end this year at Animas Surgical. The trail course is a full loop that incorporates Horse Gulch-area trails.
“I love routes that don’t repeat themselves,” Trimboli said.
The road course will include stretches of Colorado Highway 3, the Animas River Trail and Florida Road. He called it “a big figure eight” with only small bits of repetition.
Ska Brewing Co. will host a post-race party with kid-friendly activities.
johnp@durangoherald.com
To enter
To register for the Durango Double, to be held Oct. 11-12, visit www.durangodouble.com or the event’s Facebook page, www.facebook.com/durangodouble. The entry fee is $65 for either the half-marathon trail or road race, or $100 for both. Those fees will rise as on June 1.
For more information, email durangodouble@gmail.com
