Wild Florida Trail Run

The Wild Florida Trail Run is a point-to-point 50K on the orange-blazed Florida National Scenic Trail, following the Suwannee River downstream into Stephen Foster Folk Culture Center State Park at White Springs. Runners are bussed out before dawn and start upriver at the Linville Tract, then cross the Suwannee on the abandoned old US 129 bridge and run home under the oaks.

The race is not the flat Florida of the stereotype: the trail climbs and drops through ravines along the riverbank the whole way, though the high point of the course, Devils Mountain, is 126 feet above sea level. The 50K starts at 6:45 a.m. with a ten-and-a-half-hour limit, and a 25K and a 10K run the same morning. Entry is straight sign-up on UltraSignup, the event is cupless, and it largely benefits the Florida Trail Association.

Point to point on the Florida National Scenic Trail, 31 miles down the east bank of the Suwannee River from the Linville Tract of the Suwannee River Water Management District to Stephen Foster Folk Culture Center State Park. The first two miles mix dirt road and doubletrack before the course crosses the river on the old US 129 bridge; after that it is singletrack under large oaks, rolling in and out of ravines, with a diversion onto the Disappearing Creek Trail, whose creek goes underground several times before reaching the river. The Suwannee runs black with tannins from the Okefenokee Swamp. Three aid stations serve the 50K, with crew access at all of them and drop bags at Swift Creek; pacers are not allowed and the event is cupless, so runners carry their own container. The organiser publishes no elevation gain figure for the course.

Entry is first-come sign-up on UltraSignup, with no lottery, no application and no qualifying standard. The organiser publishes no field cap and declines to give one, saying it "can rarely tell you EXACTLY how many spots are left at a given time", and it points runners at UltraSignup's watch list instead. A waitlist appears only where one has been enabled, and none is shown. The 50K is $120 with no early-bird tier, entry closes the evening before the race, and the shuttle to the start is a separate paid ticket. Runners under 18 are not accepted for the ultra distances except by exception.