With the 2024 Western States 100 proper across the nook, I wished to higher perceive who can be rounding the corners come race day. For those who’re something like me, it is a bucket listing race in your calendar, however the prospect of getting in is so distant that it’s extra of an idea than a practical chance for therefore many people at this level.
Simply how tough is it to get into this occasion? What’s the greatest technique for getting in? Will I have the ability to run this occasion earlier than my physique offers out from overuse? On this article, I dive into the numbers in an try and shed some mild on these questions.
Kuni Yamagata ending the 2021 Western States 100 in the course of the Golden Hour earlier than the cutoff, as photographed in “Second Dawn,” a guide in regards to the occasion’s historical past by John Trent. Picture: Gary Wang
Breakdown of the 2024 Western States 100 Entrants
Western States is the oldest 100-mile race on this planet and attracts ultrarunners from across the globe to participate within the historic occasion. (See my earlier article for what this journey appears to be like like.) Entry into this race has continued to develop in demand 12 months over 12 months, with solely a tiny fraction of all candidates gaining entry.
When the 2024 Western States kicks off in just a few days, 375 people will toe the road. Here’s a breakdown of how these 375 people gained entry into the occasion.
2024 Western States 100 Entrants Breakdown
Supply: https://www.wser.org/automatics/
We basically have three most important methods to get into the occasion:
- Develop into very concerned with the occasion, equivalent to by being a board member or by volunteering at an help station for a few years;
- Be actually, actually quick; or
- Acquire entry by means of the race lottery.
With 72% (270) of individuals getting in by way of the lottery, that is the most typical option to get in. That doesn’t, nonetheless, imply that the chances are in your favor of getting in. Since choices 1 and a couple of are restricted to roughly 100 folks, whereas the lottery this 12 months had 9,388 folks, I can be focusing this text on the third group.
Western States is sort of clear with their lottery system — they don’t do an excellent job of selecting me — and offers an in depth breakdown of lottery statistics yearly. Right here you may see the expansion of candidates over time and what number of tickets they’ve amassed over time. The variety of tickets an entrant has is calculated by 2^(n-1) the place n is the variety of years coming into the lottery with out gaining entry.
The Development of Western States 100 Candidates From 2000 to 2024
Notice: There have been no lotteries for the 2009 and 2021 races as in every occasion entrants had been rolled over from the race being canceled the earlier 12 months. Supply: https://www.wser.org/2023/11/30/2024-lottery-statistics/
Due to this logarithmically scaled ticket system that rewards entrants who’ve been making an attempt for a few years, the 9,388 folks really interprets to 53,966 complete tickets. Western States runs Monte Carlo simulations — a statistics approach used to foretell outcomes of an unsure occasion — to point out the anticipated probability of an entrant entering into the occasion given a sure ticket quantity.
The chart beneath particulars your odds of getting in for 2024. With 1 ticket, your likelihood is lower than 1% and people probabilities solely enhance to above 50% with 128 tickets, which implies 8 years of coming into the lottery and never being chosen.
Based mostly on Ticket Numbers, the Odds of Getting Into the 2024 Western States 100
Supplied these dismal probabilities, I wished to know how lengthy it could take a median runner equivalent to myself to get into Western States. For the sake of this calculation, I assumed an applicant accomplished a qualification race yearly. Given the above odds and making an allowance for being chosen in a earlier 12 months, the anticipated variety of years to get into Western States is 6.79 years.
Notice that the above doesn’t account for extra folks coming into the lottery over time, which decreases one’s odds additional. If we take a look at current tendencies and apply a decay issue of 0.75 to replicate the change from the 2023 to the 2024 lottery, the anticipated variety of years turns into 8.3 years.
Perseverance is the important thing to being chosen for this race. Eight years is a very long time, however when you proceed to stack up these qualifiers, you’ll ultimately get in. By this level, in case your physique remains to be cooperating, you can be fairly skilled in ultra-distance occasions and in a great place to take advantage of the 100 miles.
A key half to this multi-year plan is to proceed to finish Western States qualifiers. Within the subsequent part, I break down the qualifying races and discover the panorama of those occasions.
Western States 100 Qualifying Races and Their Attributes
Western States qualifiers are “primarily based solely on the dimensions of the race” with giant and established races getting precedence, and the one restriction being that races shorter than 100 miles will need to have not less than 8,202 ft (2,500 meters) of elevation acquire. The race group reiterates its method is “primarily based solely on the variety of runners and never course issue.”
This method differs from that of different races, such because the Hardrock 100, the place many elements are considered for qualifying races. With Hardrock’s cumulative vertical acquire of 33,000 ft and a median elevation of 11,000 ft, its board has set stricter standards for its qualifying races. They take a look at knowledge about race traits equivalent to excessive elevation, lengthy steep climbs, extreme climate, and uncovered terrain to make sure entrants are ready to securely full the Hardrock 100.
Fascinated about this issue standards bought me within the variety of races included within the Western States qualifiers. As a result of there isn’t a issue standards, some races are inherently simpler qualifiers. On the finish of the day, every race is as tough as you select to make it and also you see runners push themselves to the brink from 100 meters to 100 miles. What I wish to concentrate on on this part are the elements that contribute to an athlete finishing a race within the requisite qualifying time for a lottery ticket. Which races are most certainly to safe the typical runner a qualifier?
Andre Blumberg ending the 2013 Western States 100, alongside his spouse and crew, Patchanida Pongsubkarun. Picture: Patchanida Pongsubkarun
Dataset
On this part, I take a look at all Western States qualifier races within the U.S. and Canada. The info is pulled from every race’s gpx recordsdata.
Utilizing a primary scatter plot view, I mapped the gap and elevation of Western States qualifiers for 2024:
Distance Versus Vertical Acquire within the 2024 Western States 100 Qualifiers
Just a few issues soar out about this chart. First, we now have our outliers up and to the correct, with 4 200-mile or longer races. These 200-mile races are out of the scope of this text — and don’t get me began on 300-mile races. For sure, when you full one in all these races, you’re a monster and never in search of the ‘straightforward’ lottery entry into Western States.
Eradicating these outliers, we will get a greater view of the 100-kilometer and 100-mile distances that I concentrate on for the remainder of this part.
On this graph, we see two most important clusters on the x-axis across the 100k and 100-mile distances, with appreciable variation within the vertical acquire (y-axis) for related distance occasions. For 100-mile occasions, this spans from the Hennepin Hundred Mile, which positive factors lower than 1,000 vertical ft to the Hardrock 100, which boasts over 33,000 ft of climbing.
This variation is big. A mountainous 100-mile course at elevation is a totally completely different race than a flat occasion of the identical distance at sea degree. Western States falls close to the center of the vertical acquire distribution for 100-mile occasions with round 18,000 ft of vertical acquire.
Vertical acquire is a vital issue, however what goes up should ultimately come down — except you’re the Cocodona 250 Mile, you then simply maintain going up. Taking a look at distance and internet acquire, we will see a barely completely different story.
Distance Versus Web Acquire within the 2024 Western States 100 Qualifiers
Most programs are near zero internet acquire, being run on loops or beginning and ending in related places. The California programs take the crown for internet downhill, with Western States itself having essentially the most internet downhill, edging out the Angels Crest 100 Mile and the Canyons 100 Mile.
The gap together with vertical acquire and internet acquire are important elements when analyzing how tough a qualifying race is. One other vital issue to contemplate when securing a qualifier is the cutoff time. Taking a look at distance versus cutoff time, we see a detailed correlation with variation as a result of different issue elements of the course.
Distance Versus Cutoff Time within the 2024 Western States 100 Qualifiers
Most 100k cutoffs fall within the 17- to 22-hour vary, whereas most 100 milers are between 30 and 36 hours.
Distance and elevation acquire are the 2 most generally obtainable knowledge factors round races and provides us an overview of the cutoff commonplace in extremely races. Fascinated about the Hardrock 100’s qualifier necessities, I wished to gather knowledge round some further traits like elevation and lengthy, steep climbs to color a extra detailed image of those races.
I pulled this data and compiled a dataset for all races from their gpx recordsdata. The extra variables I checked out apart from distance and ascent had been common elevation, most elevation, sustained climbs of over 2,000 ft, and sustained climbs of over 3,000 ft. Initially, I wished an outline of which variables had been most intently tied to course cutoff occasions. By plotting a heatmap of correlation between variables, we will see which variables are intently associated to different variables.
The above plot may be very colourful and enjoyable, however what does it actually inform us? The row I’m most interested in is how sure variables are correlated with cutoff time.
Zooming in on this backside row we see that distance is most correlated with cutoff time — no shock there — whereas the variables subsequent most intently correlated to cutoff occasions are vertical change and sustained climbs, which refers back to the variety of sustained climbs of greater than 2,000 and three,000 vertical ft, suggesting a mountainous course.
Predicted Instances for Ultramarathons In comparison with Their Cutoffs
Contemplating these variables, I used to be curious to see if we may decide which races are theoretically essentially the most cheap to finish throughout the cutoff time. We’re, after all, restricted by knowledge and the next evaluation doesn’t seize the numerous nuances of an extremely race. Regardless, I hope you discover the next evaluation attention-grabbing when it comes to interested by the relation between race options and cutoff time.
The group celebrates after Gunhild Swanson completed the 2015 Western States 100 with six seconds to spare. Picture: Ted Knudsen
Taking the earlier scatter plots completely different options, I wished to suit a regression mannequin to view the anticipated cutoff time. Right here we will see the anticipated line for cutoff time primarily based off essentially the most intently correlated function, distance.
Regression Fashions Present Anticipated Cutoff Instances for the 2024 Western States 100 Qualifiers
Taking out the 48-hour cutoff races outliers of the Hardrock 100, Fats Canine 120 Mile, and Merciless Jewel 100 Mile, we will higher examine races with related cutoff occasions within the scatter plot beneath.
Including in additional variables we will proceed to enhance the accuracy of the mannequin as we account for extra options of the race.
After accounting for all the variables collected we will graph a residual plot exhibiting how a lot a race’s cutoff time deviates from what can be anticipated primarily based on its options.
A Residual Plot Exhibiting How A lot the 2024 Western States 100 Qualifier Races’ Cutoff Instances Deviate from Anticipated
The above graph is attention-grabbing as a result of it permits us to have a look at the information factors with the biggest residual. These are the races which have a decrease predicted cutoff time than the precise cutoff time, i.e., a beneficiant relative cutoff time. If you’re chasing cutoffs, a change of an hour or two might be the distinction between finishing the race and timing out.
In accordance with this mannequin, the races with the biggest residuals (most beneficiant cutoffs) throughout 100k and 100-mile distances are the Dinosaur Valley 100k, the Misplaced Soul 100k, the Extremely-Path Harricana 125k, the Quebec Mega Path 100 Mile, the Superior 100 Mile, and the Zion 100 Mile. To reiterate, these should not the simplest races, reasonably these with essentially the most beneficiant cutoffs primarily based on the options accounted for on this mannequin.
I’d have beloved to spend extra time on this space to construct out a extra full mannequin round ultramarathon course issue (keep tuned for this sooner or later), however, alas, cutoffs, this time of the editorial selection! Onto the takeaways.
Takeaways
- There are greater than 200 qualifying races for Western States to select from. When contemplating a qualifying race, it is very important word that races differ considerably in distance, elevation, and quite a lot of different methods.
- If you’re seeking to get a Western States qualifier, it is very important think about the cutoff time. A race could seem ‘simpler’ on paper, however may need a much less beneficiant cutoff time, thereby making it tough to finish throughout the time constraint.
For these of you racing Western States this 12 months, better of luck and take a second to understand what bought you to this second — particularly these of you who bought in with one lottery ticket!
Name for Feedback
- I like knowledge, however acknowledge it doesn’t inform the complete story. What different elements do you suppose contribute essentially the most to races being extra ‘tough?’
- For the races I recognized as having essentially the most beneficiant cutoffs, are there any that you just disagree with primarily based on different elements that weren’t included within the mannequin?
- Are there any races you suppose are ‘simpler’ qualifiers?
Girls’s champion Ruth Croft on the Rucky Chucky river crossing at mile 78 of the 2022 Western States 100. Picture: iRunFar/Bryon Powell