Blue Sky Marathon
Race Day Weather
Cool start, warming finish
Runners will face a cool start at 43°F, maintaining this temperature until reaching the higher elevation at mile 4. As they descend back to the finish, the temperature will rise to 61°F, creating a warmer finish. With light wind at 8 mph, runners should focus on pacing conservatively in the early laps and prepare for the warmer conditions of the later laps, ensuring adequate hydration.
This course climbs 988 ft to its high point and back, so we look at it at 2 points, not just the start line. In a typical year, at 9:00/mi, you start at 43° and finish around 10:55 AM in 61°.
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Race Info
The Blue Sky Marathon is a 26.7-mile trail race in Fort Collins, Colorado, run on dirt trails between Horsetooth Mountain Park and Devil's Backbone Open Space along the Front Range foothills. The course has about 3,500 feet of elevation gain and loss, mostly singletrack with sections of rocky terrain and dirt road. First run in 2008, it is organized by Gnar Runners, which bills it as Fort Collins' original and only trail marathon. A half marathon (13.4 miles, 1,800 feet of gain) runs the following day over a shorter loop of the same terrain.
