Strava and IAMS Want You and Your Dog to Log a Marathon in September

IAMS, the dog food brand owned by Mars, has bought a sponsored challenge on Strava that asks owners in the United States to log 26.2 miles with their dogs across September, capped at 5K in any single day, with a $10,000 cash prize for one randomly drawn entrant. Mars announced the campaign on Aug. 25. The window opens Sept. 1 and closes at 11:59:59 p.m. ET on Sept. 30.

This is not the brand’s first Strava challenge, and the feature it runs on predates the sponsorship. Strava introduced its Pet Tag in late 2025, according to Athletech News, and Mars announced a year-long partnership built around it on April 8. An IAMS challenge asking owners to log a 5K with a dog ran from Jan. 1. September’s is the first at marathon distance.

What the Challenge Actually Requires

The announcement does not spell out the arithmetic. Across 30 days, 26.2 miles is fewer than nine-tenths of a mile a day, and because no day counts for more than 5K, the fastest possible completion takes nine days. Athletech News reported that the monthly IAMS challenges also count walking, hiking, kayaking and snowshoeing.

The prize sits outside Strava. The sweepstakes is open to U.S. residents 18 or older in the 50 states and Washington, D.C., is free to enter, and runs through a separate IAMS site where entrants submit a name, email address, the dog’s name and a screenshot of the total. One drawn winner receives $10,000, branded gear, medals and 26 bags of IAMS High Protein dog food, and 26 further entrants receive gear boxes. Joining also unlocks a rebate of up to $10.99 on a qualifying bag. The winning dog’s face will be printed on a shirt worn by Tara Davis-Woodhall, the Olympic long jump champion, and Hunter Woodhall, who won the Paralympic 400m T62 in 46.36.

“At IAMS, we know dogs are more than companions,” Mindy Barry, chief marketing officer of Mars Pet Nutrition North America, said in the announcement. “They’re partners in the active lifestyles we share together.”

What Veterinarians Say About the Distance

The release tells owners to match exercise to a dog’s age, breed, health and fitness. The guidance from Mars’s own veterinary network is more specific. VCA, a hospital chain Mars names among its brands in the release, puts the earliest starting point at the closing of a dog’s growth plates, between seven and 20 months depending on breed size. Its instruction on surfaces is to test the ground by hand: “If it’s too hot for you, it is too hot for your dog.”

The American Veterinary Medical Association is blunter about which dogs should not attempt it. Short-nosed breeds including pugs, boxers and bulldogs cannot move air efficiently under exertion, the association says, and it warns that running may be too risky for them at any distance. Neither organization publishes a mileage figure, because the variables they warn about are heat, surface temperature and the individual animal, whose suitability for distance varies by breed. Owners training a dog from scratch need longer than 30 days.

The case for the campaign is real, and the release does not make it. The Association for Pet Obesity Prevention found in 2022 that 59 percent of the U.S. dogs in its survey fell into the overweight or obese categories, up from 56 percent in 2017 and 2018. Strava said in April that 76 percent of its users with pets report the animal motivates them to exercise.

An Advertising Product, Sold by a Company Going Public

Verification is the weak link. Because the sweepstakes turns on a screenshot rather than a total confirmed inside Strava, the check on a $10,000 prize is an image of a number. Strava has been moving the other way on its own leaderboards, deleting 4.45 million activities it judged fabricated or miscategorized.

For Strava, the challenge is advertising inventory. The company sells sponsored challenges through its business arm, priced by reach, season and duration, and claims an 84 percent brand-recognition advantage on the platform for the brands that buy them. It filed confidentially for an initial public offering on Feb. 2, while folding training tools into paid tiers. That filing put its user base at 180 million athletes. The IAMS announcement puts it above 200 million.