Free. You can start with nothing.
Each leg is different from the others, with steep climbs, ridgeline running, long and short steep descents, creek bottoms, pine floor and jeep roads. There are several 35-40% grade climbs, each lasting .10-.30 miles. In January the trail freezes and thaws: firmer in the morning, tacky by afternoon, refrozen overnight. Expect mud, slick steep sections and possible ice on the trail, around the aid stations and on the bridge.
A winter ultra on the private trails of the Beaumont Scout Reservation outside St. Louis, Missouri. Five legs of 3.3 to 5.3 miles make one 20-mile loop, run 1, 2, 3 or 5 times for the 20 mile, 40 mile, 100K and 100 mile, with a 15.5-mile loop for the 25K and 50K. Both aid stations are indoors, 750 yards apart, so crews can camp in the Emerson Center and see their runner every 3 to 5.3 miles. The direction reverses each year: clockwise in odd years, counterclockwise in even years.
The Shippey began as an idea in early 2019 to bring together a growing set of St. Louis trail runners, and the first edition was held that August. The 2021 date was cancelled during COVID and the race returned in January 2022. A night 40 miler was added in 2023. Since 2024 PR Racing has hosted the event, and the course alternates direction each year. A 50K and a 25K are new for 2027.
| Mile | Station | Cutoff | Crew access | Bag | Pacer | Med | To next |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ? |
Start/Finish (Emerson)
None · basic first aid · Signal wrong?
|
? | ● | ● | ? | ● | ? |
| ? |
Sverdrup
None · basic first aid · Signal wrong?
|
? | ● | ● | ? | ● | ? |
2 people have been out there with a camera or a microphone.
These are other people's work and we link straight to them. Watching costs nothing and needs no account. More of them: every race we hold, on film.
Nobody sees it until we have read it. No account, no sign-in.
This changes nothing on the page on its own. Somebody checks it against the race first.
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.
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.
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.
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.
No account, and nothing to cancel.
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.
