Beat the City! Innsbruck’s toughest run: A first time participant prepares

25 June 2024

Post originally written in: English

Two years ago, a friend from New Zealand – Katija – came to visit Innsbruck for the first time. We took a tram ride out of the city, and when we got back to Innsbruck later that afternoon, the „Innsbruckathlon“ (under the banner of „Beat the City“) was in full effect: a ten kilometre run with 20 obstacles to negotiate enroute. It was a blisteringly hot day, so there were hundreds of very sweaty people everywhere. We stopped at a bridge as we were walking back home to cheer, whoop and just generally offer encouragement to the participants as they ran/jogged/walked past on their way to the next obstacle.

„I quite fancy doing this myself,“ I mused aloud. „I’ll join you!“ said Katija. Last year she came to visit at the end of June but neither of us had been in training so we wussed out of participating. „Next year, for sure!“ we told each other. So here we are.

Wanting to know a bit more as to what it's all about, I recently talked to Beat the City main man Andreas Mauerhofer. For Mauerhofer, it all started when a friend took him to see a similar event in Hamburg and he was completely blown away by the event. „Let's do this in Austria!“ he said.

The „Grazathlon“ was the first Beat the City event in Austria, with the Styrian capital hosting in 2012. Mauerhofer participated three times before taking on the role of chief organiser in 2017. When he did so, it was with the express aim of rolling the concept out through the rest of Austria. The „Linzathlon“ was next, followed by the „Innsbruckathlon“. The 2024 edition on the upcoming Friday and Saturday (June 28th and 29th), will be the fifth to take place here.

Despite the many obstacles (sorry!) that make taking Beat the City to the Austrian capital more difficult, it’s been Mauerhofer's dream to hold the event in Vienna since the start of his involvement. The „Wienathlon“ is now tantalisingly close to coming to fruition. „Hopefully October,“ he says. „If not then, almost certainly next year.“

The event is clearly going from strength to strength. This year’s Grazathlon was completely sold out, with 6,500 adults taking part in the main event and 1,500 children taking part in their equivalent run (numbers have to be capped, and start times staggered to avoid logjams at the obstacles).

As for Innsbruck, Mauerhofer expects over 2.000 adults to take part in the main event (up from around 800 for the first Innsbruckathlon) and more than 600 children for their child-friendly course on Friday (two kilometres with ten obstacles).

When it comes to my preparation, I looked up an old article I wrote for this website to use as a running guide. I’ve been regularly doing riverside runs, starting with a mile (1.6 kilometres) and slowly working up distance-wise. My aim is to do the longest bridge-to-bridge circuit (7.2 kilometres) on Thursday morning, before doing a light run on Friday just ahead of the big day.

I have been using the playground at Hutterer park as the start and finish point. As the playground also has a small outdoor gym, I’ve taken the opportunity to work on upper body strength as preparation for tackling the obstacles: parallel bar dips, chin ups and chair dips (using a park bench), ten before running, ten afterwards. Only time will tell if this is enough!

The aim is to just get through the course in one piece. If it takes us several hours, so be it. Me and Katija certainly won’t be racing!

But, as Andreas Mauerhofer tells me, „more than 80 percent just do it for fun ... it’s a real spectacle for the participants and for the town.“

If like me, you’re a first-time participant, unsure what to expect, prepare to get wet and probably quite dirty. The 20 obstacles include a net crawl, a water slide and „a box full of dirty water!“, Mauerhofer says, with a certain amount of disconcerting relish.