A new running community ‘for trail runners, by trail runners; for women, by women’, Asia Trail Girls was recently founded by our Vietnam Jungle Marathon champ Veronika Vadovičová.
Asia Trail Girls (ATG) is a platform where female runners can meet and share advice, experience and inspiring stories with other like-minded women. The aim of the project is “to encourage, motivate and inspire women across Asia to run and race”.
We wanted to find out more, so we spoke to Veronika about the project. “It is a place for everyone – no matter if you are a beginner or an experienced trail runner. We want to give women the opportunity to share their stories, achievements, challenges as well as to read about stories of other women. We want to help provide answers to different running related questions that are specifically relevant to women,” Veronika told us.
To make it more connected, not only across the website, ATG will also create events and meetings to connect female runners across Asia.
“We want to connect female runners with each other in different regions of Asia and help to build their running confidence by talking to other like-minded runners. We hope that we can inspire enough women who will then become an inspiration for others thus creating a sort of a positive Domino effect.”
The idea of the project itself came from the inspirations from the women that surround Veronika.
“I get inspired by all sorts of women. I look up to those who manage to balance their busy jobs and trail running, I look up to those who manage having a family, being mothers and still run on trails several times a week. I also look up to those who keep running in their 50s, 60s, 70s and really wonder if I am able to do that one day. I get inspired by girls and women who find the courage to go out there and run despite other people telling them that they are not good enough or the society telling them they shouldn’t do so.”
“There is inspiration around me every single day and nothing makes me happier than seeing other women getting excited about trail running and about their own progress and achievements.”
The ATG founder herself is also an iconic trail runner in the Asian running community. Despite only taking up endurance sports in 2016, she was Vietnam Jungle Marathon champ in 2019 and overall ATM champ in the same year.
Her passion for trail running is also one of reasons she built up the ATG community.
“I fell in love with trail running a few years ago and in 2019 I have decided to join the Asia Trail Master Series. During this journey I have noticed that no matter which country the number of women participating in races was small compared to the number of men. I wanted to see more women out there running, pushing themselves and becoming stronger physically and mentally.“
“Trail running is a beautiful sport that is not only good for your body but also for your mind. Running is free and the outdoors is a space for everyone.”
In Vietnam, according to Veronika, trail running is still very new and so ATG intends to reach out here.
“There are a few inspirational women paving the way for others. Tieu Duong is definitely one of them. She is leading the way and I cannot wait to see more rising stars step on the podiums in the near future.”
Tieu Duong will be featured on our June newsletter – so watch this space to learn more about her.
If you want to learn more about the founder of Asia Trail Girls, check out our recent interview with Veronika here.
You can also read more interviews about our female runners including our VMM Champs Kim Matthews, Charmaine Thompson, Evelyn Lek, VTS Champ Vanja Cnops, Hong Kong based runner Fredelyn Alberto and more on our Q and A page.