The internet had a fit.

What do we do with Adidas, Satisfy, and "The Circle Pit"?

I found it hard to move past the sight of a gong next to a bitumen pump track in the Arizona desert.

Traditionally, a gong has been a Buddhist tool for transformation, purification, and the clearing of negative energy. At the Adidas x Satisfy “Circle Pit” event, it became a memefied token in the opposite sense. The internet had a fit at everything that went on at what I’ll now refer to as TCP.

Before I swing at the low-hanging fruit (which the internet has already plucked and devoured), I want to start with what went well. As a creative director and brand co-founder in the niche running fashion market, it was impossible to ignore. Naturally, I took notes.

When a player like Adidas and a cultural shifter like Satisfy make moves, the downstream effects reach the rest of running quickly. Our world is increasingly homogenising itself in style, colour, taste, and every other possible expression. TCP was an act of divergence. That alone is worth paying attention to.

What went well

Visibility. Every corner of my algorithm was flooded with TCP content. No matter what platform you receive your digital running updates on, everyone got a taste.

With visibility comes conversation. Friends of mine who love Adidas but don’t run were sending me messages about it. TCP spiked heavily across my WhatsApp and DMs.

The pre-game rollout was well-paced. Highway billboards and the fashion week and expo photo leaks started whispers, and in any subculture, whispers usually convert to hype, demand, and lingering brand curiosity.

Satisfy’s product always photographs well, especially with some of the best contemporary running photographers in the park. The higher-end static imagery from the event is exactly the style that will appear in brand mood-boards around the world.

Meme pages performed better than ever. Engagement went through the roof. Better to be talked about than not. Right?

What didn’t

A preface: I have never been part of the Hardcore music scene. I don’t know much about that world, so I’ll stick to the circles I do know.

Shooting on iPhone.

TCP would have been received better if it had been leaked more slowly to the world. 60fps, poorly cut, jumpy iPhone footage was not the medium for the event. If Satisfy want to be (or present as) a cult, they need to act like one. All iPhones needed to be in lockboxes. The power of “if you were there, you were there” would have been far more potent if everybody in the centre of TCP wasn’t holding a phone. Influencer marketing is a useful tool, but in this instance, it heavily diluted the stylistic choices that Satisfy has been building for 10 years.

It’s worth noting that zines came from the band, music, and punk culture. I don’t expect every professional runner, influencer, and store owner to go home and scrapbook with analogue materials about the weekend, but a middle ground would have landed better.

Stickered Bananas.

My local supermarket has been individually plastic-wrapping fruit and stickering bananas for as long as I can remember. It’s always off-putting. Let fruit be fruit.

World-building in the brand space is predicated on attention to detail. But like going to an over-the-top wedding with embossed napkins, not everything needs the wasteful touch of marketing across it. There is a lot of waste that comes from events like this, which leads me to the next point.

The Pressure Problem.

With $14.4M across Series A and B, and a stated goal of growing revenue from €10 million to €100 million in the next five years, there’s real expansion pressure on Satisfy. Which is perhaps why Adidas have entered the equation. The two have just signed a multi-year partnership. The question worth asking: Is Adidas circling Satisfy (and its circle pits) for future acquisition?

What seems apparent is that Satisfy can no longer remain a trail brand, or at least, dress up as one. After spectating socials across the weekend, I don’t really know what Satisfy is anymore. Are they a trail brand? A road brand? A fashion brand that targets runners? Are they even a running brand? Outside of aesthetic (and disruptive*) pursuits, the mission isn’t clear.

*I don’t use the word disruptive in a negative sense. Disruption with intent is often what catalyses positive change.

I shared a note on Substack earlier, before compiling my thoughts:

When you could run on trails, build a pump track.
Nature looks funny in Arizona.

The reply:

“The pump track was hired, not built. And we did do trail runs, but the Adidas is a road shoe. It would be odd and inappropriate to launch a shoe for tarmac on the trails.”

Fair. I’m glad the pump track wasn’t a permanent installation in the desert. But the logic still doesn’t sit.

If Satisfy were a trail brand, the pump track would read as a complete lack of care for the environment. Without expecting Satisfy to act like Patagonia, most trail brands I know of still show some level of care or support for the environment. Banana stickers, again.

If Satisfy wants to be a road brand, the pump track felt disillusioned. What road runner wants to run on gradients like those of a pump track? I like new and innovative forms of running and racing, but running laps on a pump track reminded me of people running 450 laps in their living room during COVID. Ridiculous.

The Gong.

A gong, a skate bowl, hardcore music, road running, the desert, and a pump track. It reminds me of a smoothie with too many supplements, nut butters, and greens powders. Save at least one ingredient for another day.

The Defence.

Free food, shoes, flights, accommodation, and new friends are always a good time. I’ve been on that side of the equation, and I’ve made lifelong friends from brand activations. It’s a privilege to attend events of this nature. I hope to create my own events for the Notes Running ecosystem. On the inside, these events can be life-changing.

Anything of high energetic frequency, like the vibrations of a gong (signalling om), will always rise above the noise of low-frequency negative emotions. If you were fortunate enough to experience TCP, you’re allowed to have your opinion, which was overwhelmingly: “It was fun.” The people on the outside are allowed to have theirs, too: “This is cringe.” Both opinions can exist at once. Trying to convince those on the outside that it wasn’t cringe only digs a deeper pit. The cost of attending TCP wasn’t the time, views, or edgy photos. It was weathering the storm of the internet. Again, a reflective banana sticker over the top is not the solution.

Diversity.

Is this a conversation brands have stopped having? An action we’ve stopped making positive steps toward? Adidas, you have the pockets and resources to make this happen.

Bigger picture

Satisfy has been around for over 10 years. They’re coming into their teenage years. Don’t be surprised if they act like one as they grow into adolescence.

French culture and conversation are built on debate. Hate and division are not the answer. How do we have constructive global conversations when exhibitions of divergence occur like this? One of the best things to come from TCP could still be a conversation about the future of running. What are we trying to nurture?

It’s important to hold brands accountable. An activation of this nature in a more fragile ecosystem like Chamonix would be more damaging and more optically jarring. Satisfy, and others are increasing the size of their activations in the mountains every year around races like UTMB. What TCP highlighted is that the natural landscape is no longer enough. There is a growing desire to build on top of it rather than simply move through it.

Acknowledge the traditional land owners. That stretch of the Sonoran Desert is the ancestral homeland of the Tohono O’odham, Akimel O’odham (Pima), Hia C’ed O’odham, Yaqui (Yoeme), and historically the Hohokam. How does an event of this nature give back to the traditional land owners, or to the communities that exist around it now?

Questions for consumers and runners:

Are you aligned with the values of the founders and brands you buy from?

What questions would you ask those founders if you had the chance?

How do we champion and support simplification and resourcefulness?

Final note

I hope this prompts you to challenge your own consumption choices, both digital and material. Keep asking big questions of brands. Keep holding space for difficult conversations.

Big love,

JL