The latest La Sportiva Mountain Cup Series is out. Ryan Woods of North Carolina won the Uwharrie Mountain 20 miler with a time of 2:23:02 and a new course record! The Uwharrie Mountain Run was the first race of the La Sportiva Mountain Cup Series. There are ten races in this series that span the across the United States. The next trail race in the series is Moab’s Red Hot 33k here in Moab, Utah. Ryan Woods will be attending this years Red Hot 33k and can he keep up his winning streak? The Red Hot 33k course is a challenging course for anyone who has run it in the past. Runners coming from outside the Four Corners Area who are not familiar with rough desert trails have their work cut out.

The Red Hot 33k course traverses over broken slickrock benches and meanders through sandy washes for 20 miles. The terrain is not the only thing runners need to adapt to, runners need to adapt to the weather. The past couple of years Moab’s Red Hot 55k/33k has been hit with bad weather. Three years ago the runners were hit with mounting snow on the rough moab trails. There were sections on the course that had up to 3ft of snow making it difficult for any runner to set a course record. Last years men 33k winner is Dan Brillion from Boulder,CO. Dan Brillion was last years overall winner and has the 33k masters course record, 2:31:35 in 2010.

Dan Brillion is returning this year to the Red Hot to defend his title. Dan is very familiar with this course because this his third Red Hot 33k. He does well each year at the Red Hot placing in the top 3 in his category. I’m excited to see these two go at it at this years Red Hot 33k. I wish them both the best of luck!