How One Runner Gamed The Toronto Chipotle X Strava Challenege

How far would you run to win free Chipotle for a year?

For Marley Dickinson, a Toronto-based writer and runner, the answer was 375 laps of a brutal one-block loop around his city’s congested downtown core.

And after of a month of weaving around suits, dodging cars, sidestepping tourists, and waiting at the same series of street lights (over and over again), he’d tallied up 140 miles (225 kilometers), which appeared more than enough to win what has become one of the most bizarre and spicy events in running.

Or did he?

The Chipotle x Strava Challenge: Misery in the Name of free bowls

Dickinson was one of a group of runners who went all-in on the Chipotle x Strava Chellenge, the fast-casual chain’s annual marketing initiative, which reinvents a block around a strip mall in Middle America or a horrible run through the heart of a metropolis into an ultra endurance proving ground.

Those who take on the Challenge take it seriously; perhaps too seriously.

The conceit is simple enough: Strava transforms the immediate streets around 25 of Chipotle’s locations throughout North America (as well as one in London and another in Paris) into delicious little segments, most in the range of 400-600m. Runners then enter into a competition to see who can run the most laps around the designated Chipotle location in their city throughout the entire month of January, with their progress shared on Strava.

Dickinson, who is training for this April’s Boston Marathon, decided it would be a novel way to guarantee that he’d hit some high mileage in his training build, with the added motivation that perhaps he’d score the Challenge’s grand prize: a year’s supply of “Lifestyle Bowls” from the location (approximate value: $850).

He quickly took the lead for the segment, holding and expanding it from Jan. 2 all the way to Jan. 31. He says he noticed a couple of fellow competitors, both on the “course” and when he’d upload his daily run on Strava, and was enthusiastic about the friendly competition.

And although Dickinson was comfortably in the lead by the midway point of the month, he did note the second place challenger, Jerome Sakoun, looming not far behind.

But on Jan. 21, Sakoun appeared to tap out of the competition. The sommelier and wine importer posted on Strava what appeared to be his final run of the Chipotle Challenge: a 10.21 km effort.

In the post, he included an image of him receiving acupuncture treatment, and entitled it, “Hips and ankle down,” His caption read: “Chiro told me to stopped a bit [sic]. It was fun, ngl.” (Sakoun appears to have edited the caption at some point between Feb. 5 and Feb. 6, to now read: Chiro told me to calm down. It was fun, ngl.”)

In the comments, one of Sakoun’s followers wished him a “speedy recovery,” to which he replied “Don’t think so, I’ll do 1-2 times on the segments to say I did it again, but I think it’s done.”

Dickinson says he then assumed Sakoun was finished with the Challenge, as his closest rival’s Strava went dark after that Jan. 21 upload. Dickinson says he never saw Sakoun on the segment from that point on.

The King of Barbacoa Mountain

Dickinson carried on with the challenge, building what he thought was an insurmountable 150-lap, 55-mile (90 km) lead heading into the final day.

On Jan. 31, just to be sure he had the proverbial burrito in the bag, Dickinson camped out at a restaurant next door to the Chipotle. He sat by the window, working there for the entire day, just to be sure no other runner decided to show up and put in an ultramarathon’s worth of segments to take his crown.

Satisfied, he had his girlfriend meet him in front of the Chipotle, and he ran a victory lap followed by a celebratory photoshoot. Dickinson even donned a modified Burger King cardboard crown with a “C” tapped over the BK logo for his moment of triumph.

In his final Challenge upload on Strava he added “After 240 kms of running in circles —kings stay kings.”

Deceived and Dethroned

On Feb. 1, Dickinson awoke feeling hungry for his spoils (a free bowl, perhaps) and eager to peer upon his newly conquered virtual kingdom.

Instead, he was served a nauseating plot twist: he got duped by the sommelier.

At roughly 11 p.m. the night before, with less than an hour left in the Challenge, Sakoun dollopped 112 miles (180 km) worth of runs on the Chipotle segment in one shot, putting him about 18 miles ahead of Dickinson for the crown.

Adding insult to (fained) injury, Sakoun even ran a 15K personal best on Jan. 22 while crushing the segment, the day after he’d supposedly dropped out of the Challenge. He then squirted metaphorical Cholula (the red one, not the green one) in Dickinson’s eye by throwing down another PB, this time in the 20K, on the final day of the Challenge.

Is Sakoun a Chipotle Cheater?

The Chipotle Strava challenge has one simple rule: whoever runs the most laps wins.

And Sakoun followed that rule. “If I knew the “injured” guy was still in it (even if he took the delayed approach to hide his uploads), I would’ve gone 40-50 kilometers in the final day to put it out of reach,” Dickinson says. He also noted that he would have enjoyed the competitive camaraderie in the final 10 days of the Challenge if he’d known Sakoun was still in it.

“I do not personally know Mr. Sakoun, or anyone in his circle,” Dickinson told MH. “So when he posted he was injured on Strava on Jan. 21, how was I supposed to know he wasn’t telling the truth?”

Dickinson also said he never saw Sakoun on the segment after Jan. 21, and speculates that his rival purposely avoided crossing paths in order maintain the deception and gain a competitive edge. Dickinson, for his part, uploaded and made public all of his runs on Strava upon their completion.

Dickinson says he feels Sakoun actually may have broken a key clause in the contest, which prohibits runners from “acting in an unsportsman-like or disruptive manner, with the intent to disrupt or undermine the legitimate operation of the Contest.”

“In this case, it was the athlete faking an injury in order to gain a competitive advantage (over myself) to think he’s done, while he’s out there still doing laps,” says Dickinson, who feels this is a was a clear violation of the sportsman-like clause.

To make things even wilder, this isn’t the first time something like this has happened in a Chipotle Strava Challenge. Last year in Washington D.C., a runner won by hiding his efforts all month, keeping his Bluetooth off, and uploading every one of his runs in a massive data dump at the last second—besting the second place finisher, who had led the entire way.

Dickinson, feeling as though he was the rightful heir of the Chipotle Toronto crown, escalated the case to the company’s PR and communications department, which eventually reached VP Erin Wolford. Her response? “After reviewing, we are upholding the Local Legend as they completed the segment the greatest number of times in January, and Toronto was not the only city where runners used unique tactics to throw off their competitors.”

In other words: Sakoun’s dirty tricks paid off, in bowls.

He told Canadian Running, where Dickinson is a web writer, “When I said I was ‘done with the challenge,’ that was genuinely how I felt at the time due to an injury. However, after visiting my chiropractor, I was able to get some relief and continue competing within the rules before the deadline. It was never my intention to mislead anyone–I was just sharing how I felt in the moment.”

We reached out to Sakoun, and after initially agreeing to reply to our questions via email, he ultimately declined to comment.

So Who’s the Real Winner?

On one hand, it is true that Sakoun put in the miles. On the other hand, if Dickinson had known Sakoun was still out there, ghost-running loops around the Chipotle at Front St. And York St. at odd hours, he says he would’ve kept pushing, too. Was Sakoun’s Strava hi-jinx tactical brilliance, or foul play?

“I was at a dinner on Saturday night and told the story (without names) to a table of six people I’ve never met,” Dickinson says, reflecting on his bittersweet (or is it bitterspicey?) Strava segment saga. “The votes were split 3-3 on who they thought should be crowned champion—I assume the public would be the same.”

One thing is for sure: Dickinson says he’s been left with a bad taste in his mouth, and probably won’t be dining at a Chipotle any time soon. And certainly not running loops around one.