Going Pro

What I wish I knew before signing my first contract

Finding the right partnerships as a trail runner can take time, patience, persistence, and some luck. I’ve now been through a couple cycles of finding brand partners, negotiating, and learning. A huge advantage that I’ve had along the way is a strong network of well-connected friends who have advised me and helped me get in touch with the right people at the right places. I know many trail runners don’t have this sort of network in place, so I want to share some of what I’ve learned.

Just a disclaimer though- I’m not an expert on this. I’ve had some experiences that have taught me some things. Everyone’s situation is different and a lot of what I’ll say is pretty general. I’m not saying anything here that’s specific to any of my contracts, but I’ve talked to a few agents, athletes, industry insiders, and seen a decent number of contracts for myself. These are some patterns I’ve recognized.

Your Why

First, and most importantly, if finding a sponsor seems like an end goal for your running, stop and think for a bit. I’ve frequently heard people with the attitude that once you are a sponsored “pro runner”, you’ve made it. There are multiple issues with that idea. The biggest one might be that if you are running more to secure a sponsor and call yourself a pro than for the love of hitting the trails and competing, that motivation disappears once you find a sponsor. You’ll stagnate as you try to rediscover yourself as a sponsored athlete and find new inspiration. Improvements in results come naturally with a love for the sport and passion for training and competing, and given enough time and enough improvement in results, opportunities for sponsorship present themselves. While following this natural progression takes patience, it allows athletes to form a sense of internal value that isn’t tied to relationships with brands. The single best thing you can do if you want to be a pro runner is put that desire aside, enjoy your training, race competitive races, and patiently try over and over again until you’re getting top results.

Getting Noticed

As I’m writing this, I’m realizing there’s a lot of different directions to take and that this article might weave and wind a bit, so if you care about this topic, bear with me. Real quick, let’s talk about what I mean when I say “race competitive races,” because this is a big one. No matter how many local trail 50Ks you dominate in your hometown, you won’t get noticed by a big brand until you see where you stack up against a deeper, more recognizable field of competitors. This can be a challenge because it often means traveling, at least domestically, to the most competitive events in your country, if not internationally. I understand that this requires personal investment and that travel isn’t cheap. The good news is, whether that race pays off or not in terms of landing you a sponsor, these races are worth traveling for and are often very scenic, special experiences in their own right. With that said, if I was an up-and-coming American ultra runner, these are the types of races I’d be eyeing (in order of likeliness to get brand awareness):

1. Golden Tickets. American brands love Western States, and Golden Ticket races are your path to Western. Even if you don’t care about racing Western, they draw a deep competitive field and a podium finish at these races will be noticed.

2. “by UTMB”. Whatever your feelings are towards UTMB as a global race organization, they tend to get decent fields at many of their events for a similar reason that Golden Ticket races are competitive- people want an entry to race UTMB, CCC, and OCC. Understanding the UTMB qualification system can be tricky, read about it and put it on your bucket list to make it to Chamonix someday, it is worth it. UTMB Majors, which currently include the Kodiak ultra for the American major, are deeper than other UTMB events, though there are a handful of classics that are still deep, like the Speedgoat 50k.

3. The Classics. Maybe someone will debate me on which races should be included here, but think about the high-profile American races that don’t fall into the categories above. Run Rabbit 100, Chuckanut 50k, Way Too Cool 50k, and The Rut all come to mind.

4. World Trail Majors/Other International Classics. This one really should be near the top of this list if we’re going in order, but I figured it’s also the category that most people will struggle to pull off. The travel is more expensive, it requires more time away from work, etc. but they are beautiful and these are some of my favorite types of races. Think Transgrancanaria, Ultra Trail Cape Town, Lavaredo- and if you’re going, do the most competitive, marquee distance (feel free to reach out if you need help figuring out which one that is, or read their websites carefully).

Finding the Right Fit

Alright weaving back around to where we were, another issue with having “being a sponsored runner” as your goal is that there is a wide range of levels of sponsorships. Not all runners with a sponsorship are doing the sport professionally, in fact many aren’t getting much more than some free product. Currently within trail running, shoe companies are considered the primary sponsors: the ones with enough resources to invest in you that you could actually see yourself running full time, or at least cutting back a bit on work to focus more on training. These are the partnerships that can allow for breakthrough performances as your work-life balance shifts so that running becomes included on both the “work” and “life” sides. Not all shoe brands are equal in their abilities to support their athlete team. Look for bigger, better known brands if you want to be more confident in them having a bigger athlete marketing budget. However, if you love the vibe of a smaller, more niche brand and align well with their values, these can also be great fits, but they seem to be harder to come by.

If you’ve been trying to find a job lately, you may have noticed that just submitting your resume to an online application feels like sending it into the void, generally with no response. Reaching out to brands can feel similar. And, like getting a job, personal connections are hard to beat. Figure out which races/events the brand you like sponsors, and be there. Win those races, catch their attention, and talk to people wearing the brand’s gear after the race. Ask them to help you get in touch with the athlete manager. Ask friends who work at or run for companies you like for potential contacts. If you feel like you’ve got the results to back it up and you’re just missing a connection, consider reaching out to an agent to help you make connections. If all else fails, send a LinkedIn or Instagram DM, or a cold email, but don’t be offended if you don’t hear back from these methods.

When you reach out, include information about yourself and why you’re a good fit for that particular brand. Companies want to work with passionate athletes who are fans of what they do, and once you’re working with them you’ll be obligated to use their products, so make sure you like them first. Here’s a quick story about how I was introduced to Precision Fuel & Hydration to get a feel for the type of connection and amount of persistence it can take:

I puked a lot during my A-goal race of summer 2023. I had no fueling or hydration strategy and was using whatever gels I could find at the lowest price. I met Eric Lipuma, a PF&H sponsored athlete, and asked him about his fueling strategy. That was my first exposure to Precision. A couple months later I still hadn’t learned from my mistakes. I raced again and puked again, once again using an assortment of whatever I could piece together on a budget. I was staying in a house with Brett Hornig that weekend and he was using Precision and gave me a taste of one of his gels. It was good, and I knew I needed to change something, so I bought a bunch to use for my next race that year, which was the Grindstone 100k Golden Ticket race. That race went well, I didn’t puke, and I got a Golden Ticket. I asked Eric Lipuma for contact info for the PF&H athlete manager, reached out via email to tell my story and ask for support, and didn’t hear back. A month or so later, I was in Hawaii to cheer on my mom at the Ironman World Champs race. The Precision team was there too, including the athlete manager. I went up to their booth at the race expo, introduced myself, met the athlete manager, and got an invite to a happy hour event later that week. I attended and left a good enough impression that the next week I got a reply to my original email, and we started discussing a partnership that has since turned into a great relationship (and a lot fewer stomach problems).

My stories for how I got connected to my other brand partners are generally similar.

Know Your Worth

Now let’s say you’re through the door. You got a reply and a brand you like is interested in chatting. After an initial conversation to see if there’s a fit with the team, you’ll likely be asked what sort of support you have in mind. You should know that very little in any given contract is set in stone. From what I’ve seen, there is often a template used as a starting point that can be largely customized. This is where it can be very helpful to come prepared, and where I’ve learned a lot since my first experiences doing this. Here are some steps I would follow if I were doing this again now:

1. Try to take as much of an objective look at myself as possible. What tier of runner do my race results put me in? What sort of other value can I bring to a brand? Do I love content creation and have a popular YouTube channel, or a strong social media presence, or love product testing, for example. What is the market value for comparable runners? This is the tricky part. In most of our contracts, we are under NDAs and can’t disclose specific details of our compensation, so it is hard to know what athletes across different tiers are making.

   Also, when I say “tiers”, this is a made up categorization that has no measurable definition at this point, and everyone across any of these tiers is a great athlete. Maybe the closest objective measure we could use is UTMB/ITRA index score, but then there’s debate about where the cutoff would be for those tiers and the biases of these index systems. Despite the nuance, you can be fairly confident that a multiple-time UTMB/Western States/World Champs winner is going to be the top tier. The middle tier might be Golden Ticket race winners and podium/top-5 finishers at the biggest races. The lower tier might be Golden Ticket earners, top-10 placements at biggest races. I’m just making these up, and there’s a wide range within each of these categories, so let’s keep it really general. On the low end of the bottom tier we might be talking around $10k USD annual base pay, and on the highest end of the top tier we might be talking closer to $700k+ per year base total across multiple sponsors, but the majority of pro trail runners might fall somewhere in the $25k-$75k/year range.

2. After getting a feel for your current market value, think about time. What contract period would you like to see? Sometimes it makes sense to test a brand out, do a shorter (1 year) contract, and see what happens next cycle. Oftentimes brands will want a longer term relationship (2-4 year contract), which can also provide the athlete with security. What sort of trajectory are you on in the sport? Do you have a feeling that you’re already competing at your potential, or are you on the rise with plenty of room to grow? Over the contract period, where do you optimistically see yourself as an athlete by the end? Does the contract seem fair for an athlete at that potential future level? Are there ways to adjust the contract during the period if you level-up as an athlete? The answer to this last question is usually yes, and sometimes it requires a bit of creativity, but things like a healthy bonus structure, rollover clauses, or option years could help future-proof a contract, but it seems like this varies considerably from brand to brand.

3. Finally, consider your costs and what it would take to feel fully supported. What is preventing you from competing at your highest level? What categories of expenses can you justify for brands to support? For example: travel, coaching, nutrition products, and massage/PT might be more common expenses. But outside the box, if you were to go fully all-in, these might also include childcare, private healthcare costs, a solid enough base payment to cover rent/mortgage and primary life expenses, etc. Even if you don’t think a brand can/will pay the amount you come up with through this exercise, showing them what your situation is and how they could help will at least let them know what they could do to let you unlock more of your full potential as an athlete. Partners can also support in non-monetary ways, like providing access to a sports scientist, nutritionist, additional product, or race crewing. Good partners know that when you win, they win. They’ll want to help you do that as much as possible.

Once you have one good partnership with a sponsor, additional partnerships become easier. You’ll know your market value for that first company, and you know what obligations you have for them. You can reach out to other companies and scale both the pay and level of obligation depending on what you’re looking for with them. If you’re a big fan of certain brands or products, use them in racing and training and let the brand know about it. Set a baseline floor pay amount for yourself that you can use to filter out partners that don’t want to make a serious investment in you, and negotiate hard to get above that floor with partners who are a good fit. If you’re not stoked about the agreement, don’t be afraid to walk away. More opportunities will come along with time.

The stereotypical trail runner is just doing this for the love of the game, not for money, and comes at brand partnerships with a bit of a dirtbaggy “I’m just excited they’re taking a chance on me” kind of attitude. Some of that is good, and we are lucky to be able to make money doing something we love, but the more we all realize our worth in this rapidly-growing industry and ask for fair pay, the more all athletes are rewarded.

Your Responsibilities

All contracts come with obligations. Race results, team camps, product testing, media shoots, social media posts, hosting community runs, etc. Some are easy, natural, and fun. Others are challenging and can be stressful or cause interruptions to training or family life. Maximize the ones that sound fun and authentic, minimize the ones that don’t. Try to negotiate out anything that causes stress, or make sure you are well-compensated for that stress. If the stress will negatively impact training or performance, it’s not worth it. This sounds obvious but it can be hard to have an honest conversation about what you will and won’t do when there’s the pressure of being on a call with a potential sponsor that you want to keep happy. That’s where changing the perspective from “I’m lucky to be talking to this sponsor” to “I want this partnership if we can come to a mutually beneficial agreement” is valuable. Ask for a day to get your thoughts together then continue the conversation if needed.

Communication is key. Quick responses keep things moving along. Follow up if you haven’t gotten an update for a while. Be respectful and professional. Once you have a contract ready that you’re happy with, get it signed and live up to your side of the agreement. Continue communicating with the athlete manager or marketing point of contact openly throughout the contract duration. Let them know if there are projects you’re excited about that could be a good fit for them to support beyond the original scope of the contract. Ask for feedback and check in regularly with them, especially making sure to reach out well before the contract expires if you’re interested in renewing.

Final Thoughts

I kind of like this stuff. I think in an alternate/future life being an agent or at least an unofficial mentor type person within trail running would be fun. I do think we’re hearing more about agents in trail these days, but this definitely still isn’t the norm for most pros and if you like advocating for yourself and don’t mind the learning curve, I don’t think an agent is necessarily worth it. There’s a lot more I’d like to write about all this and resources I could share, but some of that feels like the sort of thing that would be better to do once I’m less involved in the competitive side of the sport.

The process of finding products and brands that match your vibe or work well for you, getting results using those products, and then working to form a partnership with the companies making those products is pretty cool. When done right, it should be a win-win relationship that allows the athlete more freedom to pursue their goals to the fullest, while promoting products they believe in. Sponsorship isn’t the goal, it’s a tool.

Chasing Trail is supported and presented by Precision Fuel & Hydration. I’m a long time user and fan of PF&H products and use them exclusively for my training and racing. Find out more here.