Female-Focused Trail Running Clubs: Girls On Hills

Promoting female participation in sports is crucial, especially in trail running—a sport traditionally seen as male-dominated, with women currently representing just 29% of the ITRA community. To address this, we’re launching a series spotlighting female-focused trail running clubs from around the globe. These clubs share their inspiring stories about how they were founded, the motivations behind them, and the challenges they’ve faced and overcome.

Name: Girls On Hills

Location: United Kingdom

Description: Girls on Hills is a guided trail, fell and skyrunning running company designed specifically for women. Our guided runs are aimed at women who want to break free from the road and take their running into the mountains. We also offer navigation, mountain safety and hillwalking courses suitable for beginners. Based out of Glencoe and operating across the Scottish Highlands.

1. What Inspired you to create a female-specific trail running group?

Keri Wallace and Nancy Kennedy set up Girls on Hills in 2018 with a vision to empower women with the skills and confidence necessary to become self-reliant in the mountain environment. Creating a safe, inclusive and supportive space for women to spend time together in the mountains. At our core, we simply enjoy a relaxed and sociable time in the hills, showing our runners and hill walkers that they are far more capable than they think, regardless of fitness, age or experience. 

We always heard ‘I could never do what you do’ from other women! We recognise that there is a myth around mountain running – namely that you have to be very fit or fast to be able to do it. We have tried to reframe the narrative and emphasize the journeying and restorative effects of running in upland spaces. Compared to road running, it’s less about pace or distance and more about the aesthetics of reconnecting with nature or about ‘me-time’ away from the hustle and bustle of daily life. It’s an opportunity to stretch yourself and explore your comfort zone – and maybe even push that back a little, learning new skills, experiencing greater freedom and building confidence.  

2. What challenges do women face in trail running, and how can the community address them? 

Women experience many 'soft barriers' to access when it comes to mountain recreation. These subtle obstacles stem from historical (and often very physical) barriers which prevented women from engaging in sport, racing, hill-walking, exploration or mountaineering (for example), on account of being regarded the 'fairer' and weaker sex. Today these same barriers have all but disappeared. However, we are still left with a less obvious cultural bias and a number of inequities that make it more difficult for women to engage with these same activities today. Examples of these include;

- Concern about personal safety due to being the only woman, alone or out in the dark (i.e. at risk of harassment).
- Concern about pace, fitness, ability and 'holding others back'.
- Concern about getting lost (worries about poor navigation skills).
- Toileting in the outdoors (in a group setting and 'how to go outside'.
- Managing periods in the outdoors.
- The right clothing and sports-bra (fit, comfort, sweating and body image).
- Time availability (childcare and caring responsibilities).
- Financial freedom (equal pay and financial independence) and transport (access to a vehicle, driving long distances and travelling alone)
- A lack of diversity and inclusivity (not 'looking like' everyone else), aka. representation.
- Role models and mentors (low numbers of female instructors and male-dominated clubs/events), aka. representation.
- Low levels of female participation in certain event types and mountain sports (e.g. ultrarunning, mountaineering or winter climbing), aka. representation.
- Expectations of physical ability (women have less strength, weight, power and endurance in most cases than men, with a performance gap of approximately 15-10%).
- Low engagement/low confidence in young girls in sport/exercise (often also reduced opportunities), which results in negative early experiences

As a community we can address these challenges in a number of ways. Here at Girls on Hills, we feel women's-only spaces are a crucial step in achieving equity; about stepping up to fill that gap where data, manufacture and support has been lacking. It is about finding out what different people want from trail running and recognising women’s unique needs in this sport. 

We are also a big believer in speaking openly about gender bias and inequality as it helps normalise the subject and reduce awkwardness. Often, we are so used to the ‘way things are done’, that we don’t even realise there is inherent bias until someone points it out to us. 

Additionally, advocacy and growing female participation have helped bring about equality in sponsorship deals, results reporting and prize money, as well as the introduction of pregnancy deferral policies etc, which are all helping improve accessibility for women. It is essential that brands and event organisers continue to do this to further increase female participation in the sport. 

3. What advice would you give to women hesitant to try trail running?

At Girls on Hills, we believe it's easier than people think to transition from either hill-walking or road to trail and mountain-running. With the run/walk approach moving at a leisurely pace we believe that if you can do 10km on the road continually, you can do bigger distances in the trails and mountains going at your own pace. 

There is a big misconception about the difficulty of trail running with technical ground and steep hills, thinking you need to run all of it at the same speed. If you get out there and go by feel rather than pace, enjoy the views, walk when you need to walk and take some tasty snacks you will have a brilliant time. 

Knowing that you have the skills and experience you need to look after yourself on the trails, and carrying everything that you need on your back is a liberating feeling. Providing full independence; you can take complete control of your situation, and make every decision yourself without influence, opinion or supervision. Time spent in this way can be really therapeutic, especially if you lack control in other areas of your life. 

Take the plunge – you’ll be so glad you did! It doesn’t need to be something huge to begin with. Take small steps and enjoy the process. Join a like-minded group or tap into the knowledge of a more experienced friend. Empower yourself with new skills and new experiences. Come on one of our courses and find out what it’s all about!

4. How does your group create a supportive and inclusive environment for women?

Girls on Hills group events are women-only spaces delivered by a female guide providing a supportive and inclusive environment to empower women with the skills and confidence to become independent in the mountain environment while showcasing Scotland’s stunning highland landscapes. Many of our events are suitable for beginners and our events are also ideal for solo adventurers looking to explore Scotland or meet like-minded people. We welcome women of all abilities, shapes, sizes and colours to join our events and there is no upper age-limit at Girls on Hills, we see a wide range of ages attending our courses, with most women probably being 30-50 years. We do get our fair share of over 50s and even over 60s, especially given a few of our guides (including co-founder Nancy), also fall into this category of inspiring women! 

At Girls on Hills, the emphasis of the day is always on the journey and on learning rather than a target pace or particular summit goal. Nobody gets left behind and we encourage a supportive 'team' vibe out on the trail. Where possible we tailor our groupings and routes to suit the fitness and ability of those booking with us – we try and tailor our courses to you!

In 2024, we set up an Access Fund that has fully financed 86 places on events open to women facing additional barriers to access. This has included a number of direct applications to skills courses, as well as the delivery of 6 new 'not-for-profit' events across Scotland, N Wales and the Lake District, covered hillwalking, trail running and mountain running respectively). These events were created exclusively for women who were eligible for Access Fund support.

For more information on Inclusivity please see our recent blog:
https://www.girlsonhills.com/post/inclusive-tourism

Follow Girls On Hills on Instagram, and on their website.