Skip to content
Project Carbon X 2 - What, When & Where?

Project Carbon X 2 - What, When & Where?

What is Project Carbon X 2?

HOKA will be holding two 100k races on Saturday January 23. One will be held in Chiba, Japan. The other being held in Phoenix, Arizona, with all Hoka sponsored athletes looking to make history including athletes like Jim Walmsley, Camille Heron and our XMiles ambassador Carla Molinaro.

Due to COVID-19, unlike in the original Project Carbon X event the Japanese athletes are unable to travel to Arizona to race but will compete on home turf. Both events will start at local time, 7am on January 23 with the Japanese race to be completed before the US-based runners start.

Athletes in Japan will set off at 7:00 AM JST on the 23rd - that's 10:00 PM GMT on January 22nd. 

Athletes in Arizona will set off at 7:00 AM MST on the 23rd - that's 3:00 PM GMT on January 23rd.

Live Stream - See bottom of blog

Carla Molinaro: Nutrition and aiming for British and European Records

XMiles ambassador, Carla Molinaro has set her sights on breaking the British and European records as she takes on the 100km race with her teammates in Phoenix, Arizona!

Carla Molinaro Hoka

Photo by Darren Wheeler

The current British record for 100K Women is held by Carolyn Hunter-Rowe with a PB of 7:27:19, which was achieved on August 8, 1993. The current European record for 100K Women is held by Dominika Stelmach with a PB of 7:04:36.

Racing 100k for records, the Project Carbon X 2 event will not be an easy task. HOKA-sponsored ultrarunners Jim Walmsley, Camille Herron, Elov Olsson and Carla Molinaro will be going after individual records in Arizona, while Japanese runners Aiko Kanematsu and Yoshiki Otsuka will be racing the same distance in Chiba, Japan for the 100k world record.

All athletes have been training and planning for the event and individually preparing their race plans. We get an insight into this from XMiles ambassador Carla Molinaro detailing her race day nutrition, you can watch below:

Overall Records: Project Carbon X

At the first Project Carbon X in 2019, HOKA athletes attempted the 100K world record, with some attempting to break six hours. This is a lot faster than the current mark of 6:09:14 (men) and 6:33:11 (women). Along the way, Jim Walmsley set a new 50-mile world record of 4 hours, 50 minutes and 8 seconds, but no-one got close to records for the 100k mark.

Jim Walmsley Project Carbon X 50 Mile World Record

The men’s 100K world record is 6:09:14 (set by Japan’s Nao Kazami in 2018) while the women have a time of 6:33:11, which was set by Japan’s Tomoe Abe in 2000.

Driven by the launch of the new Hoka Carbon X 2 race shoe, on Saturday, January 23 (10pm Sunday, Jan 22nd GMT) the bar will be set again.

Lineups for Event

This is Project Carbon X 2: HOKA athletes will again take on the 100K world record from Chiba, Japan and the Phoenix, Arizona area wearing an all-new innovation from HOKA.

There will be eight women in total racing in Arizona including Canadian 50-mile record holder Catrin Jones and Camille Herron, who are genuine threats to Abe’s 20-year-old record.

The full lineups set for the race in Arizona are listed below:

Women

Caitriona Jennings (IRE)
Camille Herron (USA)
Catrin Jones (CAN)
Carla Molinaro (UK)
Courtney Olsen (USA)
Devon Yanko (USA)
Nicole Monette (USA)
Audry Tanguy (FRA)

Men

Tyler Andrews (USA)
Kris Brown (USA)
Fernando Cabada (USA)
Sage Canady (USA)
Dion Finocchiaro (AUS)
Tim Frericks (USA)
Hayden Hawks (USA)
Jared Hazen (USA)
Joacim Lantz (SWE)
John Lantz (SWE)
Kyle Masterson (USA)
Elov Olsson (SWE)
Rajpaul Pannu (USA)
Patrick Reagan (USA)
Peter Van Der Son (NED)
Jim Walmsley (USA)
Cole Wilson (USA)

How do I spectate?

The event will be live streamed from the Phoenix, Arizona area starting at hokaoneone.com/project-carbon-x-2; and from Chiba, Japan at hokaoneone.jp/project-carbon-x-2.

Previous article Benefits of Using Nutrition in Training