Trail running media is primarily driven by groups of passionate individuals wanting to advance the coverage of the space. Over the past few weeks I’ve really enjoyed talking to many of you about trail running media, and I’d love to hear from more of you. Whether you’re agency side, brand side, have a podcast, magazine, shit-hot Twitter account or just have opinions about trail running media, reply to this email or email me on matt@wearetrailmix.com.
Often it is creators or independent media operations driving these changes, but race directors are increasingly adopting livestreaming to promote their races and becoming one of the key sources of trail running content in the scene.
Today we have an interview with one the leaders in this field, Jamil Coury, on how he started and evolved his livestreaming operation. Jamil is a genuine legend in the field known for his YouTube channel, his race directing for Aravaipa and enviable ultrarunning resume. A few years into his race directing career he started livestreaming his races and has built up his extensive capabilities and knowledge since then.
It was an honour to speak to Jamil about livestreaming and I hope its inspires other RDs to explore how to bring livestreaming to their races.
Where did the idea for live-streaming come from in the first place? What was the inspiration?
The initial inspiration was providing a way for those from afar to tune in and take part in our events. I've been running ultra marathons since 2005 and almost immediately began volunteering for events back then. I helped behind the scenes at an event called Across The Years. Even back then we had a webcam going and as technology has evolved so has our live video broadcasting. More recently I'd say what Mount Marathon and UTMB were doing the past several years served as a huge inspiration to what was possible. Of course they had large TV backing or production companies which we don't really have here in the US to cover races in remote areas. We did however level up our coverage for the 2018 Desert Solstice 24 hour with the purchase of a SlingStudio live video switcher which allowed for me to use a couple of remote video feeds and iphones to put together a simple 4 camera setup. It wasn't until the pandemic and the 2021 Black Canyon 100K that the technology had advanced enough for me to figure out how to pull together all of the live feeds remotely. The story behind that was due to pandemic related restrictions, we were able to obtain permission to run the race, but no spectators were allowed on race day, only volunteers. I knew we had to bring the race in a live format to those friends and family who came out to Arizona and who also wanted to see things remotely. So that was likely the biggest inspiration to go all in on broadcasting that race in the way we did with remote cameras and drone feeds.
When I looked at the volunteer page for Javelina there looked to be 50+ volunteers needed to make it work - can you give us a breakdown of the logistics of creating a livestream?
We have heavily relied upon volunteers for our version of a livestream in the sport. We absolutely don't have the budget to hire a large production company required to make something like this possible, so we crowdsource it. Utilizing a team of some paid staff and a volunteer team with phones and gimbals provided by us we are able to put together something that is more on the professional side, but still has a grassroots feel. It has gotten the ball rolling for us as we work to professionalize our streams over time.
As far as logistics go, there are a lot involved. We broadcast out of our Phoenix, Arizona studio where we have an office. That room has sound dampening, lighting, climate control and a consistent internet connection. That is where our commentary team is and a producer (which is sometimes one and the same with our commentators) work for the duration of the stream. We coordinate with a team of staff and volunteer filmers in the field who are utilizing static cameras on tripods, phones on gimbals and drones for aerial shots. We do our best to seek out where good cell phone reception is on race day but sometimes it is a gamble. Over time we've spent more time, money and resources on improving our internet connections with either wifi, internet companies and/or starlink satellite options. So there is a lot of equipment that goes into this not just from cameras, phones and gimbals, but networking, modems, internet routers and more.
There is also a fair bit of planning to do in order to create a compelling graphics package, sponsor logos, athlete bio cards and integrations with timing systems when possible. Once we graduated from SlingStudio to OBS (Open Broadcaster Software) we've really been able to unlock a whole new world of options. We spend a fair amount of time setting up our possible scenes and a Streamdeck in order to quickly switch between camera angles seamlessly. We are always looking for ways to stay on top of the latest tech, ideas and integrations to make it more modern and compelling to watch.
I can imagine its is quite an upfront and recurring cost to run a livestream - do you build the cost of the livestream into the ticket price or do sponsors cover the cost?
We have honestly had minimal sponsor support up until now, so much of the investment comes from our overall event budgets, but we do get sponsor support for those larger events which some of that does go towards the livestream. We've had some great partners including HOKA, Salomon, Goodr, SaltStick, Kahtoola and more that have contributed to these events and specifically the livestream because they believe it does make an impact. A lot of the time that goes into the creation comes from me personally which wouldn't be possible without the work of our entire Aravaipa staff and team, the volunteers that make the events possible not just from a livestream perspective but the actual event operations and our Marketing Director Matt Felthake who has literally slept on the floor at our office from time to time to make these livestreams happen.
Has there been any interest from sponsors to bring in ads or sponsored segments into your streams? Are you looking to turn your livestreams into a revenue source in the near future?
We haven't cast too wide of a net asking for sponsored segments or direct ads into the livestream model, but we are definitely talking about it and would like to pursue some level of partnerships to continue to up the quality and number of live streams we can do in a year. I'm not necessarily looking to turn livestreams into a revenue source at the moment, but would love to be able to bring on more professional filmers in the future.
What are the main challenges to running a livestream? I’m sure there are several, but what are the ones that continually frustrate you?
Some of the biggest hurdles are internet connectivity out in remote areas. These are areas that are far from civilization and the cell networks that are setup are not meant to stream high quality video. The other challenge related to that is for some of our larger events that attract a lot of runners and spectators, the cell network might be ok when you go to test it, but on race day with so many people using their phones the speeds literally go to zero.
How did you think this year's Javelina live stream went?
This year was a vast improvement upon last year on many fronts at Javelina. We had way better video quality, more camera angles and hours upon hours more of aerial footage to choose from throughout the race. I think we still have a ways to go to improve upon things, especially better integration of the timing and results software, more pre-produced content to flesh out athlete storylines and continued more dynamic camera angles and on course / on site commentary directly with athletes. I think this was a big step forward in our production value and we learned a ton.
These are very personal reflections, do you judge the success of your livestreams by any quantitative metrics, for instance does viewership matter to you?
Viewership is definitely a metric that is important to us, but not the only thing we look at when wanting to produce these livestreams. It is a metric we track and like to see year to year that we are growing and improving. That can be a sign of the health of the industry too. The fact that over 100,000 people watched the Western States livestream and many of the Golden Trail World Series European races this year is definitely awesome. We currenly don't pull those numbers for our events, but if we see growth year to year say for Javelina Jundred (which we did this year) I think we are on the right track and people are enjoying it. We also do look at average watch time as a metric.
You’ve successfully managed several livestreams now in varying locations for different events, are you looking to scale your live-streaming operation at all?
I think we are interested in continuing to provide new ways to view events, but we aren't only focused on live streams. We like to consider ourselves a leader in all aspects of media for the sport and hope to complement our live coverage with better YouTube videos and other social media content to share the best of our sport and these events.
I'm very interested to hear from the community how valuable they think these livestreams are and if they'd like to see it expand to more events and weekends throughout the year.
With many races now taking up livestreams, competition for attention is growing. How do you intend to keep viewers coming back to your livestreams?
I think for us, continuing to improve the broadcast quality, interactiveness and quality commentary are some of the most important things when it comes to continuing to attract viewers. We hope that our complementary content on other social channels and other YouTube vidoes will also continue to grow interest in our races and in our livestreams. If the race itself isn't very exciting or lacks competition, it doesn't matter how good your livestream quality is. You've got to have a compelling reason to watch. I think the golden ticket races are a good storyline as there is something on the line and we can follow that arc not only across one race, but throughout a season.
