EXPLORE THE LOVE TRAILS
2024 LINE-UP

Hi! My name is Lucy Bartholomew, I am 27 years old from Australia. I ran my first 100km with my Dad at the age of 15 and haven’t stopped running since. I am sponsored by Salomon and chase summers and start lines around the world. Some of my bigger accomplishments include 1st at Ultra trail Australia 100km on my 21st birthday, 3rd place at Western States 100mile in 2018, 1st Tarawera 100mile in 2023 and 10th at the UTMB 100mile in 2023. 

I am well known for being a plant based athlete, a smiley runner and getting away with very little planning but a lot of stoke.

Billy Yang, a trail and ultra running aficionado, is a renowned filmmaker and storyteller, weaving captivating narratives through the lens of his camera. 

From conquering challenging terrains in races like Western States to documenting the profound human connections fostered on the trails, Billy's work transcends the sport. 

His passion for both trail running and filmmaking has made him a respected figure, inspiring a global audience with the beauty and camaraderie found in the world of trail running.

Andre Coggnis is the founder of Mafia Moves, a community of people that happen to run together, created from a number of significant role models, with the idea to engage the upcoming generations through movement.

We don’t just run, we share experiences, educate, support and empower each other while covering the importance of physical and emotional wellbeing. We focus heavily on building identities, helping identify their potential, and altering the socioeconomic barriers many people face within their communities.

The ethos of Mafia Moves is to get the whole community to explore something different through positive engagement and movement.

Hillary Allen is an accomplished trail runner, athlete, and motivational speaker known for her indomitable spirit and resilience.

Overcoming a life-altering fall during a race that resulted in severe injuries, Hillary has defied the odds to not only recover but also continue pushing the boundaries of her athletic pursuits.

Born with an innate passion for the outdoors, Hillary's journey into trail running has been characterized by determination and a love for the mountains. Her story is one of triumph over adversity, showcasing her unwavering commitment to pursuing her dreams despite facing significant challenges.

Hillary inspires audiences with her powerful narrative of overcoming setbacks, embracing fear, and finding strength in vulnerability. 

Her engaging talks resonate with individuals from all walks of life, encouraging them to persevere through their own challenges and reach new heights.

41 year old Ryan Sandes is a local and international trail running sensation, competing on all corners of the globe.

He was the first person to win all 4 races in the 4 Desert Series and in 2013 became the first person to ever winan ultra trail race on all 7 continents. In 2011, Ryan won the Leadville 100 miler mountain race in Leadville, Colorado, setting the 3rd fastest time in the history of the race and the fastest time by a non-American – it was his first 100 miler.

He is an ambassador of the prestigious Laureus Foundation and special mention about his phenomenal career was made at the International Laureus Awards in Abu Dhabi. 

Ryan’s biography, Trail Blazer, written by Steve Smith, was launched in English in 2016. In 2017 his book was translated into Spanish – the 2nd most spoken language on earth. What started out as a “passion project” turned into a best-selling book.

One of his greatest victories was in 2017 when he won the Western States 100 known as the world’s oldest 100 miler. At the beginning of 2018 Ryan and a friend, Ryno Griesel, set a new trail running record on a section of the Great Himalayan Trail through Nepal. An eye-watering time of 25 days 4 hours and 24 minutes was set on a combination of the high and cultural route on the GHT. A distance of 1,435km was covered, which the men ran virtually non-stop, climbing 63 721m in elevation gain which is the equivalent of climbing 7.5 Mount Everest’s.

Ryan is a doting father to son Max, as well as their adopted fur-child, Thandi and he has been married to his actress/business-woman wife, Vanessa Sandes for 8 years.

 People are inspired not only by Ryan’s athletic ability but also his humble and down-to-earth approach to life. He is a highly sought after motivational speaker and is considered one of the world’s leading ultra trail runners.

Phil Young has been an avid participant and notable figure in the outdoor industry for 3 decades. With a background in TV broadcasting he turned his sights to brand marketing, working with global sports brands to strategise and activate ground breaking events in BMX, snowboarding and skateboarding as well as acting as creative lead for several award winning international sport focused films. 

A long time advocate for diversity in the outdoors he is a co-founder of the multi-brand consortium OUTO (Opening up the Outdoors) and leading trail running charity Black Trail Runners. His current work sees him connect brands to diverse ethnic communities in the outdoors, creating authentic campaigns that offers knowledge, access and representation to marginalised groups. 

Phil also sits as chair of Snowboarding for GB Snowsports and is on the board of Breaking GB. 

He is a keen cyclist and snowboarder, a washed-up skateboarder and fairly reluctant runner. Given the chance he shoots photos and writes articles.

Allie Bailey is an ultrarunner, coach, speaker and podcaster who has run in some of the most extreme places in the world. 

In 2024 she released her first book “There is No Wall”, a brutally honest, sometimes shocking
account of alcoholism, depression and severe mental breakdowns that almost cost her her life. She would like it to be known that
despite this doom worthy introduction, she is “super good fun.” 

Allie was the first woman to run 100 miles across frozen Lake Khövsgöl in Mongolia and to run the full length of the Panama Canal. She has crossed the inhospitable Namib Desert three times, run the length of the
Outer Hebrides and completed a 1,000-mile off-road version of the
classic Land’s End to John o’Groats route in just thirty days. 

Allie has
finished over 200 marathons and ultramarathons all over the world, but the most remarkable thing about all of these achievements is that she accomplished most of them while battling depression and alcoholism.

Allie now works as a
coach with a broad range of runners and endurance athletes, helping them unlock their full potential and lives in Yorkshire with her rescue dog, Pickle.

Ash is one of the country’s top travel writers, who has penned articles for Condé
Nast Traveller, The Times and the Daily Telegraph, amongst many others. 

His broadcast credits include BBC R4’s From Our Own Correspondent and the
documentary series Expedition Borderlands with Levison Wood
for Discovery. 

He is also co-host of the First Mile podcast and winner of the British
Guild of Travel Writers’ Best Broadcast Programme of the Year.

Ash will be discussing ideas and themes from his new book 'Why We Travel: A Journey into Human Motivation'.

For many people, travel sits alongside home ownership and marriage as a significant life goal, and we Brits spend more on holidays than we do on any other leisure activity. It seems strange, therefore, that we rarely reflect on our reasons for doing so.

Whether it’s an epic adventure or a ‘staycation’, award-winning author, journalist and broadcaster Ash Bhardwaj explores how travel intersects with our entire lives and its powerful hold over us.

Sophie is a GB ultrarunner, mum of three and Founder of SheRACES. In 2010 she signed up for the Marathon des Sables, never having run more than a mile and has since run over 40 ultramarathons all over the world, from Bhutan to Iceland, including Spartathlon and the Summer Spine. 

Sophie came to the world's attention with a picture of her breastfeeding her 3 month old baby, whilst running the 106 mile UTMB. Since then she has advocated for womens' rights in sport, founding SheRACES, a campaign to make races better for women which has had a global impact. 

At the age of 41 she won her first GB vest and most recently finished top Brit at the 2023 24 hour World Championships.

Mark helps big companies think like small ones and small companies think like big ones. 

He works on innovation of products, services and business models; he works on sustainability and company purpose; and he coaches businesses and individuals. 

He has saved his clients in excess of £160 million per annum through environmental improvements, has increased sales of products by 8000% by introducing circular economy business models and trained over 2000 people in sustainability. 

He has worked for Patagonia, EE, Nike, Coca-Cola, Seedlip, Unilever, Hotpoint, Samsung, John Lewis, Fenwick, Teapigs, Bacardi, Diageo, Mars, Thorntons, 3M, Amazon, Panasonic and hundreds of funky 
little businesses like Propercorn, Teapigs, Hiut Denim, and Ugly Drinks. 

He was a lead for the RSA Great Recovery programme of Circular Economy and was once the Head of Environment for ASDA. 

He is a Founding Partner of the Do Lectures and author of three books: You Can’t Make Money From a Dead Planet (Kogan Page), Do Disrupt/ change the status quo or become it and Do Present/ How to give a talk and be heard (Both Do Book Co.). 

He is a coach, workshop facillitator and Qi gong teacher. Mark is also part of the Reasons to be Cheerful team, which he co-founded in in 2020.

Imo is a 24 Year Old Ultra Runner, In 2022, she became the youngest female to have run the length of the UK and just over a month ago, became the fastest female to have run and summited the National 3 Peaks on foot.

Trina is a blogger and ultra-runner who uses her platform to support and inspire new and established runners and anyone who wants to improve their health and wellbeing through movement or just to try out something new. She also wants to make sure that women and girls are not excluded from the fulfilment and benefit that taking part in sports can bring.

Ryan Stephens is a Mindset & Well-Being Mentor, Ultra-Marathon Runner & Podcast Host from Swansea who is on a mission to change the world through empowering people. 

Ryan has a unique story, from setting up a business at the age of 19, going through mental health challenges and ending up in prison at the age of 21, to building communities for people to connect with others and improve their well-being and delivering talks, coaching and mentoring to over 10,000 people to-date. 

Ryan has also ran multiple marathons and ultra-marathons, most notably a 100-mile ultra-marathon in June 2023, after falling short on the two attempts before it. Lastly, Ryan is a strong advocate for challenging yourself, pushing boundaries, spreading positivity and connecting with nature – which he will be helping you to do at Love Trails Festival 2024!

Cameron James is an ex GB Pole Vaulter turned movement, yoga and breathwork coach.

Movement Decoded is a mixed medium style practice that draws upon refined technicality and spontaneous adaptation to create an environment fit for physical awareness and flow.

Decoding our subtle expressions : Encoding a broader awareness.

Merlin is the Managing Director of the Thousand Year Trust, the only charity in the UK dedicated to restoring our Atlantic temperate rainforests. 

His mission is to catalyse the movement to triple the amount of rainforest growing across the British Isles. Starting in Cornwall, these vibrant, unique and vital habitats will spread back over our western reaches to return balance to the natural world and to remind us all that we are a part of nature, not apart from it.

Hilary Yang is an award-winning photographer, graphic designer, writer, videographer, creative director, and she’s been a competitive ultra runner for the last decade. 

After quitting her corporate job to go back to art school in her late 20’s, she has since pursued an unconventional career as a female outdoor creative that allows 
her to combine her passion for endurance running with visual storytelling. 

Her over-arching goal is to challenge others to push outside their comfort zones, both through her work and her own adventures around the world.

Emma Stuart is a relative newcomer to the sport but has packed quite a bit into the last five years, including wins at the Lakeland 50, Lakeland 100, the Arc of Attrition, Ultratrail Snowdonia 165 and most recently TOR330, amongst others. 

She juggles running long distances with working full-time as a farm animal veterinary surgeon on the edge of the Lake District and loves spending time outdoors. She is particularly interested in training the mind for long distance running as well as trying to increase female participation in endurance events.

Simon is an International Mountain Leader, Alpine Trail Running Guide and Running Coach sharing his time between the Alps around Mont Blanc and the Chilterns in the UK. 

In 2013 he founded Run the Wild which was one of the first companies to offer scheduled guided trail running holidays and events. This was on the back of an expedition to an 8,000m peak in Nepal and completing the UTMB. 

Since a young age he has been passionate about the outdoors and sharing it with those around him, despite having major hip surgery. 

He is an outdoor instructor in Switzerland and Tanzania, guiding on Kilimanjaro and Meru and facilitating community projects for International Schools. 

As a consultant for Love Trails Festival on the run leader training program. He has experience in all weathers and temperatures, with adventures reaching from Alaska to the baking heat of the Sahara. 

He shares his life with his wife Karin, also a running guide and coach as well as their two dogs Bailey and Lottie.

Michelle is a Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) Practitioner, Certified International Health Coach, Integrative Nutrition Health Coach with a Gut Health Certification, Experienced Life Coach and Mental Health in Recruitment Ambassador. 

Michelle works with individuals and companies to help them understand their health and happiness goals: healthy diet, weight loss, reducing stress, increasing exercise, better quality of sleep, improved relationships, financial stability and exciting careers.

JoJo and Barrie Thomson are the co-founders of the Encouragement Manifesto. 

Four years ago we closed our coffee shop/deli to make room for new ideas and adventures. We sold our house and bought a van, travelling in Europe before buying a small, neglected farm in rural France. To help us take stock of the experiences, we wrote down the values embedded at the heart of our life, the things folk can expect to feel when they hang out with us. We turned the Manifesto into a programme of free mentoring for people who need a burst of positivity and enthusiasm. 

It feels like Encouragement is our superpower. We think it is yours too.

Mark White is the Founder of Run Grateful & Your Town Runners Mark is known as a creative, an ideas man, a go getter, a keen runner,  mindful mover & someone who wants to impact the world in positive ways. 

A proud moment was in 2019, when Mark was voted in the top 15 social entrepreneurs in the UK by Red Bull, through his community work with Your Town. 

Mark has since gone onto to creating a global movement with Run Grateful.

Mark is also a proud father to his two amazing daughters Sienna-Rose and Grace and his dog George! 

With over 21 years’ experience of living a sober life, Mark has learnt a great deal on how to manage his physical and mental health as he navigates his way through life.

Bethan Taylor-Swaine is a feminist sociologist of sport who advocates for inclusion and diversity in sport. Bethan's PhD thesis explores the representations and Identities of women in ultra-marathon.

Inspired by the idea that women could outrun men and that ultra-running could offer a more level playing field, Bethan wanted to see if it was true. Beyond her academic research, 

Bethan is committed to changing how we talk about running to encourage as many people as possible to enjoy the sport, creating conversations through thought-provoking content that gets people thinking. 

Oh, and she likes to run.

Nick Kershaw, the driving force behind the Impact Marathons events that have created 
a truly unique narrative within the running world over nine years, creating events in 10 locations including Nepal, Guatemala, and Malawi. These races have raised 
over $1.5 million for local social projects, deeply impacting thousands of lives. 

Expanding his vision, he's now launched Fastpack Global, making the greatest fastpacking adventures accessible to more runners than ever before. 

A Salomon Ambassador, Nick embodies the spirit of using running as a tool for personal and social change.

Jessica Holmes is an adventure traveller who housesits full time 
around the world, paying no household bills or rent. Looking after other peoples’ homes and pets led her to quit her job as a major crime investigator in the police and has enabled her to do more of what she loves; hiking, writing and travel. 

She has written a book, “The Housesitter’s Guide to the Galaxy”, which is a guide on how to housesit successfully around the world, whilst being an eco-conscious traveller.

Steve Tonkin is a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society and the Dark Skies Advisor to both
Cranborne Chase International Dark Sky Reserve and the Federation of Astronomical Societies. 

He has been passionate about astronomy since childhood, and taught astronomy to adults and children for more than 40 years. 

He writes equipment reviews and a monthly Binocular Tour for BBC Sky at Night Magazine, and will talk about the importance of responsible lighting to anyone who will listen.

David is the founder of kindredpacket, a grassroots non-profit organisation uplifting East and South East Asian (ESEA) communities through joyful activism, intergenerational storytelling and the decolonisation of wellness. As a core member of Britain’s East and South East Asian Network (besea.n), the organisation who initiated ESEA Heritage Month, David is working on a book alongside his peers highlighting UK-centred ESEA advocacy and activism. Within this capacity, David also delivers Active Bystander Trainings across the UK in collaboration with Protection Approaches to combat identity-based violence.

David Kam is a Malaysian movement artist, educator and speaker sharing queer practices of freedom and connection grounded in the philosophies of yoga, dance and architecture. He pitches movement as an expression between party and protest, a brave space #beyondasana to celebrate the joy of play and agency to combat oppression and cultivate collective care. David is currently an Activist in Residence at King’s College London researching the intersections of movement, migration and digital technologies while he continues to work across leading dance and wellness institutions, prioritising marginalised communities in London and abroad. 

Dr Mickey James is the founder of Girls To The Front and a children’s health and wellbeing research officer at Swansea University with a doctorate in human and health science. 

Specialising in the health and wellbeing of young people, her work encompasses play,  physical activity, and co-production, ensuring that young people have their voices heard. 

As the founder of GTTF, she aims to empower young girls to use their voice, take up space and be their own brand. Through in-person functional fitness sessions, Zine workshops and health and wellbeing education, Mickey provides safe and inclusive environments that prioritise autonomy, fun and a DIY ethos.

 From coaching to researching to living life, the goal is to break boundaries and rewrite the rules.

Matt is the co-founder of the movement project, Oxygen Advantage™ Master Instructor and Chief Marketing Officer of the revolutionary decarbonised data centre company Deep Green. He is also an ultramarathon runner. n 2024, Deep Green raised £200million to deploy their unique Data Centres across the UK. As an exemplar of a generative business, each decarbonised data centre recaptures heat from compute to heat public swimming pools, for free.

Matt coaches thousands of people worldwide in breath training, and wellbeing more generally, everyone, from elite athletes including Team GB duathletes cycling and football teams to companies to one-to-one clients, seeking ways to improve performance, focus and creativity, and recovery.

Matt also is a qualified EMCC Global Transformational coach, encouraging people as they make significant transitions in life.

In 2021, Matt ran 22 back-to-back ultramarathons across very county of England, raising awareness and over £53,000 for the Campaign Against Living Miserably, a charity focused on male suicide prevention.

Owen is a movement coach who’s passionate about meeting people where they’re at, to help them get where they want to be.

Founder of the Anti Gym Gym Club whose mission is to remove the barriers that conventional 
approaches create.

At the core of his coaching is play, drawing on his experience as a coach in strength and conditioning, running, gymnastics and physical literacy to create fun, challenging ways to make the rest of your life the best of your life.

Jo Hickman is a lawyer, former chief executive of a national legal charity, and an ethical leadership coach. She likes books, rivers and writing things about books and rivers. She has two school-age kids and an embarrassingly badly behaved dog. 
 
An advocate for accessible/family-friendly adventures in what remains of our natural world, she still loves swimming in her local river even though it’s an increasingly heady mix of nitrates, sewage and heavy metals. Jo is interested in what needs to happen to change that.     

Tina is a movement teacher with a background rooted in dance, Qi-Gong and mindfulness meditation. 

She has shared her research and teaching of movement alongside artistic and athletic performance with leading academic institutions and at workshops around the world to professionals and enthusiasts alike. 

Tina's teaching adapts content and context to everybody, prioritising a soft approach to failure with playful and sincere explorations of primary movement principles. 

Eben is the British Mountaineering Council’s Policy and Campaigns Officer in Wales, spending his time campaigning for more and better access to nature in Wales, as well as to preserve and protect our landscapes. 

He’s a keen climber and fell-runner and knows the transformative power of connecting people with nature and the land around them, having had the good fortune of being raised near common land in the foothills of Eryri. Living in the city now, he believes that the current default of exclusion when it comes to land access is far from equitable.

Since 2023, he’s been campaigning for a right of responsible access to land, similar to that enjoyed in Scandinavia and in Scotland, and he has been leading the BMC’s campaign work in Wales and is passionate about building a broad coalition for access reform. He believes that developing our own form of ‘Allemansrätten’ – the Swedish folk tradition of enjoying the land together, with a commitment not to disturb, not to destroy, is the long-term future of access to land in England and Wales.

Jon Moses is the current co-director of Right to Roam, a campaign to unlock access to the countryside throughout England and Wales. Before becoming a full-time campaigner he was an environmental journalist publishing profiles, essays and reportage for a range of publications including the Guardian, Businessweek, The Great Outdoors and The Lead. 

He is the co-editor of Wild Service (published this year by Bloomsbury on behalf of Right to Roam) which calls for a new grassroots ecology, rooted in mass reconnection to nature and the land.

Dr Amy-Jane Beer is a biologist, naturalist, author campaigner who’s been exploring the outdoors for over 40 years. She is a Country Diarist for the Guardian, columnist for British Wildlife, and frequent contributor to many other publications. Her latest book, The Flow: rivers, water and wildness, won the 2023 Wainwright Prize for nature writing. 

Amy-Jane has been a member of the core organising team of Right To Roam since 2022.

James Grasby is a senior building and landscape curator for the National Trust whose work is to sustain for public benefit historic buildings, collections, gardens, landscapes and archaeological sites found in the Trust's care: from farmsteads to country houses, priceless masterpieces to bedside tables, ancient ship burials to garden privies, and treasures houses as sensational as Stourhead, Kingston Lacy and Penrhyn Castle. 

He has also curated the homes and achievements of some 'great Britons' on a journey that took him from the poet and novelist Thomas Hardy's humble cottage birthplace, via Lawrence of Arabia's hideaway Clouds Hill, through the composer Sir Edward Elgar's lifelong lodestone 'The Firs', to the engineering marvel that is Thomas Telford's bridge at Conwy, one of the world’s first suspension bridges. 

James is passionate about the charity’s role in connecting people with place, conserving and finding purposeful uses for the once threatened, to bring what was private into the public domain, and in providing different forms of access and pleasure for visitors (without spoiling the surprises). He also presents the prize winning history podcasts for the National Trust.

David Starley is a Cornwall-based Ultra Runner and founding member of The Green Runners. At 27, he is still early in his ultra-running “career” but has already achieved 2nd Place finishes at the Round Reading 50km and Orion SCS Ultra. He also holds the Fastest Known Time for the Cornish Skyline round on Bodmin Moor, his local FKT. 

In his day job David is Group Climate Lead for a FTSE250 engineering company, and was selected for the Edie 30 under 30 sustainability leaders in 2023.

For David, there is an intrinsic connection between trail running and caring for our environment. This led him to help launch The Green Runners, a community making changes for a fitter planet. Other founding members include elite British runners Jasmin Paris, Damian Hall, and Dan Lawson, with Kilian Jornet also an active supporter. Since launching on Earth Day in April 2022, they have brought together hundreds of members across the world, from America to Indonesia and launched campaigns including the high profile DUtMB challenge against Dacia’s title sponsorship of the UTMB which made waves in the ultra community.

In his talk David will ask the big questions around running’s impact on our environment, and invite you to join him in a brainstorming session for how we might progress on our journey to achievingThe Green Runners vision of Running without the Footprint.

Dr Brian Briggs is a conservationist and musician on a lifelong quest to tune into the natural world.  He is both a manager of an internationally important nature reserve in Wales, and the singer/songwriter for the band Stornoway.   

Stornoway were the first unsigned band to appear on Later… With Jools Holland and have subsequently toured worldwide and enjoyed main stage appearances at festivals including Glastonbury, Latitude and Isle of Wight.  

Stornoway's four acclaimed albums and three EPs combine Brian's two great passions of music and nature and many of his songs incorporate field recordings of birds.

Andrew is a fell-runner based in the Scottish Borders and founder of ESEA Outdoors UK, a grassroots community tackling racism by celebrating the representation of East & Southeast Asian people in the outdoors, with community members across England, Scotland and Wales.

Andrew is also a Trustee at National Trails UK, campaigning for access to nature for all.   

James is the head of Midnight Runners in London, enthusiastic runner of all distances, coffee fanatic, and backpack collector.

Tom has spent the last 10 years working in the health and sports performance industry. With a BSc in S&C Science, he held roles at The Royal Ballet School, Fulham FC and most recently as Lead Academy Strength and Conditioning Coach for Millwall FC.

During this time, he also built his private practice CoachColville, which facilitates performance improvement for endurance athletes. 

More recently, a personal passion for music has also drawn him to found Balance, a community-based organisation that creates shared experiences through the power and synergy of wellbeing, music & art. 

Balance also offers wellbeing & performance support for artists, as well as representing talent through a unique booking and management agency.

The Balance mission is to connect like-minded individuals through unique, community experiences that promote a healthy outlook and a balanced lifestyle.

Amy is a medical doctor, running coach and project lead of the Race Ready app. She has a Masters in Sports Medicine, Exercise and Health and has volunteered as a medic at multiple running events, including Brighton and London Marathon. Amy has launched the Race Ready app to increase awareness of the medical problems that can occur during training and racing so that runner safety can be improved. 

Amy is also a committee member for the London Marathon Medicine Conference, an event which aims to bring the latest running research to runners and clinicians ahead of the London Marathon each year. She is a qualified running coach with UK Athletics and hosts a blog and podcast ‘Marathon Medic’ which shares training tips and exercise advice. She is a keen runner herself, mainly enjoying long distance trail races. 

Chris Taylor is an ex-Royal Marines Commando turned running coach and event organiser with a BSc in Sport and Exercise Science.

He also organises ultra marathon events all over the world. Since shifting focus to concentrate on planning bespoke challenges a few years ago, he has managed and coached 7 world-record breaking challenges, with a 100% success rate.

He is also an accomplished ultra runner, having raced at some of the world’s most challenging ultra marathons, including Dragon’s Back “The World’s Toughest Mountain Race”, and the 330km Tor des Géants.

From learning to walk again after getting paralysed when she was 18, Esmee has made it her mission to get as many people moving as possible. 

Esmee's community The Say Yes Club is all about saying Yes to movement because one day you will have to say no. And it doesn't have to be outrageously challenging it can be a walk, a jog, a run, a half marathon or a marathon. The Say Yes Club give people the confidence, physical ability and friendship circles to go and take on life changing adventures out in nature before it's too late.

Jonty is a Type 1 diabetic vegan ultra runner who started running in lockdown and is now blessed to be a part of multiple running communities across London. He is an adidas runners coach and co-founder of runlimited. A community focused run hub opening early next year, breaking down barriers, connecting runners, communities and individuals through the power of running.

Eleana Matos is a 18-year-old talent from Manchester, has quickly risen to fame in the trail running world. With notable achievements from winning the YCC UTMB in 2023 to finishing third place in the UTS 25km race in 2024. 

Eleana first discovered trail running through the Alpine Run Project, an initiative which aims to get young people growing up in inner cities running in nature. Now representing the UK at the Sky Running Youth World Championships, Eleana aims to inspire others while continuing to break new records.

Emilia Platt is a 19-year-old talent from Manchester, is making her mark in the trail running world. Earning 3rd place in the British Cross Challenge, Emilia has proven her mettle at a young age, even competing in the Elite Women's category at just 17 in the Manchester 10K alongside elite athletes, Eilish McColgan and Mortimer Farrah. Emilia recently won 1st place at the Maverick Peak District race through the Alpine Run Project and continues to keep pushing the boundaries for herself and others to step out of their comfort zones.

Play & movement help us explore & connect our inner and outer worlds. 

Jeni has been teaching yoga for over 10 years & running wellbeing workshops for children in schools & communities since 2015. As an osteopath and adventure sport enthusiast, she loves the way yoga invites curiosity & compassion, with ourselves, our community & the world around us. 

Presenter and lover of a good story, I am excited to be helping host Love Trails 2024 inspirational speakers and workshops. 

Having worked with the Love Trails team before in the background, I am jumping on stage this year to dive deeper with our awe-inspiring guests. 

Big epic landscapes and adventures fill my soul, while asking loads of questions and chatting with others is my favourite thing to do. Let’s spark ideas, conversations and questions or equally sit back and listen with me as we feed your adventurous minds with our speakers.

Nimrah Sohail, 18, was one of 12 young people from across the UK chosen for the inception of the Alpine Run Project. Having grown up in Newcastle and never been to the mountains, she had always dreamt of going one day. With the help of a dedicated trainer, Nimrah threw herself into months of hard training with one goal clearly in sight: to reach the finishing line of the UTMB Mont Blanc in the French Alps. Now, Nimrah’s goal is to inspire other inner city youth to do the same.

Abdul Zlitni, 18, was one of 12 young people from across the UK chosen for the inception of the Alpine Run Project. From being a regular footballer in Manchester to seeing how the power of trail running has changed his life, Abdul took on the challenge of the UTMB last year. In the future, Abdul aims to be the youngest Arab to complete all 6 major marathons, inspiring the new generation of ARP participants through his dedication and personal growth in the process.

Chris, an ex Royal Marine turned leading UK breathwork facilitator, NLP coach, and hypnotherapist, found profound transformation amidst the chaos of Afghanistan's battlefields. His life-altering experiences sparked a deep dive into self-healing and higher consciousness, leading him to trade the tools of war for those that unlock inner wisdom and potentia