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Ultras change constantly, sometimes the morning of. Always confirm with the race director and the official website before you rely on anything here.
A single 50-mile loop through Porcupine Mountains Wilderness State Park, starting and finishing at Presque Isle. Six aid station stops at five locations, hot food and drop bags at some, belt buckle for finishers.
Climbs and descents are steep; flats are muddy, rocky, and rooted. Remote wilderness: if a rescue is needed, rescuers travel on foot, so help can take a long time to reach you. Black bears live in the area and bear spray is not allowed. There is very little cell service anywhere in the park, so download offline maps and the GPX file before race day.
The race
What this one is
A 50-mile single loop and a Heavy Half Marathon in Porcupine Mountains Wilderness State Park, on the south shore of Lake Superior in Michigan. The park covers 60,000 acres and has over 90 miles of trail, including a section of the North Country National Scenic Trail. The course was designed to show off the park's most scenic and demanding terrain rather than for speed: steep climbs and descents, muddy, rocky, rooted flats, and a night that may feel desolate as you spend hours alone in the wild. 50 mile finishers receive a belt buckle and Heavy Half finishers a medal. Organized by Ornery Mule Racing.
The first Porkies race was run on September 19, 2026. A 100 mile and a 200 mile course have been designed and are planned for a later year.
Getting in
Getting in
Entry, lottery and what the race asks of you before race day.
Crew may only go to the aid stations marked crew access: Start/Finish, Lake of the Clouds (overlook parking lot only) and Summit Peak. Crew who go to a No Crew Access station, even if it provides no aid, get their runner disqualified, unless they are picking up a runner who is dropping. Runners may not accept crew aid outside a crew access aid station. Crew must respect no parking signs. All crew vehicles need a Michigan Recreation Passport for the park.
porkiestrailrace.com
Somebody has been out there with a camera
the tables say the climb is long. these say what long feels like.
Nobody has been out there with a camera or a microphone yet. A gap means nobody has found it, not that it is not out there. Seen a course preview or a film of this one? Send us the link.
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What you know
every one of these is read by a person before it changes anything
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Somebody watches it before it goes anywhere near this page. What we are after is footage of this course, on the ground. If it would be just as true of any other race, it is not this.
Have the GPX? Send us the link.
We want the address of the file the race publishes, not the file. We download it from there so the page can say where the line came from.
Are you the race director? Get in touch and we'll make it right.
We read every one of these and we write back. Every fact here carries the source it came from, and the way a wrong one gets fixed is a person checking it against what you tell us.
Where this came from.
Every fact on this page records its source and when we last checked it: 136 sources for this race. Hover a source link to read the sentence it came from.
40% of what we track for a course is filled in. The rest says "not checked yet" rather than guessing.
Ultras change. We will tell you when this one does.
Cutoffs move, races get postponed, lotteries open and close. We read the race's own sources and record where every fact came from. Put your email in and we will send you what changed, and where we read it.
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What happens to your email. Nothing else. I do not sell it, and I will not send you anything except this race changing. One click gets you out.
I keep this catalog because the information is scattered and hard to trust. Telling you when it moves is the same job.