Brisbane Trail Ultra®
Our Trail Love Story
In 2013, Shona Stephenson returned to Australia after experiencing a world tour of iconic 100Mi events, one in Europe, the other in Japan, and inspired her to develop a World Class 100Mi event in Australia.
Shona Stephenson, Brisbane Trail Ultra, Race Director in a little piece if trail heaven on the BTU100Mi Course at Mt Glorious.
Most Important, the trails have to be AMAZING, trail love ❤️ has to be felt everywhere.
The combination of amazing rainforest trails, as many single tracks, vertical gain and loss, stunning views, packed into the course as possible, plus the finish line must have a bar, burgers, and chips. All this is packed into a trail-ultra party, where you feel the love for trails and your fellow runner, a place to chat post-event and share your experience with your newfound trail running buddies, with your endorphins pumping and the feel-good vibes keeping the smiles on everyone’s face 36+ Hours.
Plus we needed hotels to be only a few hundred metres away.
The research started, which meant loads of trail running, adventures, and discovery. The biggest vert gain and loss is needed to make sure the course made the most of the Queenslands' natural assets in the D'Aguilar Range, Mt Coot-tha Forest Park.
However, it took a few friends to get together over drinks in early 2018 for the Brisbane Trail Ultra® to be born and the BTU journey begins.
The Evolution of the Brisbane Trail Ultra
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2019
2019, Start Line was at The Gap State High School, Finish Line at the Queensland Maritime Museum.
2019 attracted over 540 entrants from all over Australia and the globe, with entrants flocking to the event from Japan, Thailand, Hong Kong, China, The United Kingdom, United States of America, New Zealand, Singapore, France, Estonia, New Caledonia, Spain and Malaysia. In 2020 we hosted a World Class event for our Queensland, Northern Territory, South Australian, Australian Capital Territory trail running community
Events
BTU100MI, BTU110, BTU60, BTU30
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2020
Start Line moved to Corra-Mulling Park, Finish Line is moved to River Life (after already being moved from Kurilpa Point Park) The course also needed to change due to track closures due to a landslide and scheduled works on a boardwalk at South Bank.
Covid19 hit, the July event was postponed until the October Long Weekend (this will remain our backup event date) we had 520 runners, a reduced field due to border closures, 200+ runners could not make it to our event, we offered deferrals to all runners who missed out for our 2021 event or 2022 event.
Events
BTU30, BTU60, BTU110, BTU100Mi, BTU- Red Bull® Climb
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2021
Start Line remains at Corra-Mulling Park, Finishline moves to the Iconic Kangaroo Point Park, yes runners have to climb those brutal stairs.
New Events are added, BTU10, BTU20. Brisbane Trail Ultra® joins the Spartan Trail World Championship, BTU30 and BTU100Mi are the chosen events.
Our prize money increased from $2000 to $17,000!
Brisbane Trail Ultra® is the AURA Long Course (100km) National Trail Running Championship, BTU110 is chosen.
Covid hit again, we had no idea who was able to come and who wasn’t, we again looked after anyone who could not make it to the BTU21 with deferrals to our 2022 event. In the end, we were able to run our event on the chosen date in July, we thought that the situation may be worse, not better in October. Our gamble was correct. We had 920 entries and just under 700 were able to make it to the Brisbane Trail Ultra in 2021.
The Brisbane Trail Ultra attracted the best runners from all the states who could make it, WA, TAS, NSW, VIC, ACT, NT we even had a New Zealander, Vajimn Armstrong, it was the event to do, with the Spartan Trail World Championship and also the AURA Long Course National Trail Championship for the BTU110. The Australian Team was to be selected at the BTU in 2021.
Our Event Line Up
BTU10, BTU20, BTU30, BTU60, BTU110, BTU100Mi, BTU- Red Bull® Climb
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2022
In 2022, we had the pleasure of hosting arguably two of the world trail runners to the BTU2022 as they race the Spartan Trail World Championship 🌏🏆 Sara Alonso and Antonio Perez. Both won their events and broke the record with stellar performances.
We watched them train on the course for the week leading up to the event. These tow professional athletes were taking no chances with a wrong turn!
We introduced the Suunto ( Now known as Shokz ) Stair Climb to the iconic Kangaroo Cliffs, and amazing Suunto Watch was given to the winning male and female of the event.
In 2022, here were no course changes until the severe floods and storms made the fire trails unsafe for 4WD vehicles. weeks prior to the race we made the call to use our contingency route. Many of the trails around Gold Creek Reservoir were closed.
We had to divert the course away from CP5 and return to the Start Line.
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2023
In 2023, we celebrated 1/2 a decade of BTU racing 🥳 and it was our best year yet!
The course for the BTU30 changes; we added in an extra 4km and MORE trails and MORE vert to make this event really stand out event with sweeping views of Enoggera Reservoir.
Another addition was the Wild Earth Kokoda Climb on the brutal Kokoda Track a well know local training hill climb on the course.
The course was returned to the BTU fair weather course and records fell in the BTU100Mi male and female with Piotr Babis and Cecilia Mattas, BTU20 male and female Jeremy Hunt and Channa Marsh, and in the BTU30 Ben Duffus and Courtney Gilfillian set a new course record for the event.
Beer flowed, pizza and chips were eaten from Brisbane’s favourite pizza bar Joey’s
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2024
In 2024 the evolution of the Brisbane Trail Ultra continues with the introduction of the Golden Trail Series to the event, the BTU is excited to announce thatSalomon Australia/New Zealand has become out presenting partner.
We are proud to be hosting the Golden Trail National Series Final for Australia, where Salomon Australia will be awarding 4 x Golden Tickets to the winning GTNS male and female in the over 23 year age category and winning male and female in the under 23 year age category.
We’ve also have a new sponsor for the BTU Stair Climb, Shokz Open Ear Headphones will be awarding top 3 male and female podium winners Shokz Headphones.