Rainier to Ruston 2025 – A Memorable Event!
By Dan Bucci, President, Foothills Coalition
The 23rd running of the annual Rainier to Ruston Relay took place on June 7th, 2025 with 309 teams and approximately 1,500 runners taking to the Foothills Trails in Pierce County to celebrate National Trails Day. The event serves as the single largest fundraiser and revenue source for the Foothills Coalition Operating budget making it an extremely important event for the vitality and sustainability of the coalition.
The 2025 edition did not come without challenges! With just about two months until race day, the Washington State Department of Transportation announced the closure of the historic Fairfax Bridge just outside of Carbonado. The bridge serves as the only access point to cross the Carbon river and reach the traditional starting line for the event just outside the Carbon River Entrance to Mount Rainier National Park. This also caused the event to lose any access to the first two legs of the race which totaled about 13 miles. Race Director Sabrina Seher and Course Director Jerry Gamze quickly began scoping alternative routes and moved the start line to the town of Carbonado and replaced the two lost legs with legs in Tacoma which ran through downtown Tacoma, Stadium District, the North End and along the Tacoma Waterfront. Despite the change, the spirit of the event held up and runners made the traverse across a large part of Pierce County under sunny skies and warm temperatures on a beautiful summer day.
When runners finished, they were greeted at Cummings Park along Ruston Way in Tacoma with beautiful views of Mount Rainier and Puget Sound, as well as a beer garden featuring beer from Silver City Brewery and Athletic Brewing, and sandwiches and snacks to begin their recovery! Many teams hung out at the park for hours enjoying the wonderful weather and cheering for teams as they finished.
Teams of 2, 3, 4 or 6 runners tackle the 51 miles split over 12 legs running through the Foothills Communities of Carbonado, Wilkeson, South Prairie, Orting and Puyallup following the Foothills and River Walk Trails. As they progress further west the runners generally follow the Puyallup River through Fife and the Port of Tacoma. The race is designed to showcase the future vision of a non-motorized trail connecting Mount Rainier National Park to Tacoma. While large segments of the trail still don’t exist, the race generally follows the envisioned future routes that a trail might follow once it is developed.
In addition to the scores of runners that participate in the race, the event requires upwards of 100 volunteers and crew members to make the event a success. As always, the running community, Foothills Coalition members and supporters, and Foothills Coalition board members stepped up and gave their time to make the event a huge success.
The event will continue to face routing challenges with the long term closure of the Fairfax Bridge, and it will be many years before the race can return to Carbon Canyon. With that said, the race crew is already looking at ideas for the 2026 event to bring more of the event back to trails, and showcase other communities along the Foothills Trail as a long term alternate route. A huge amount of gratitude goes out to all the participants, volunteers, race staff and supporters for making the 2025 event a huge success!
