ITRA-NATIVE v1.0.0: A gender-disaggregated dataset of trail running participation across 94 countries (2003-2025)

ITRA-NATIVE (International Trail Running Association - Natured Aggregated Trail Index for Equity) is a gender-disaggregated research dataset derived from the ITRA public registry. It provides edition-level data on 14,801 trail running race editions across 94 countries (2003-2025), enabling quantitative analysis of gendered participation patterns in endurance sport at a global scale. The dataset was constructed through a six-layer computational pipeline (extraction, NLP, clustering, modelling, geomatics, visualisation) developed within the TRAILGENDER research programme (CNRS, UMR ESO 6590).

The dataset addresses a critical gap in sports science. A recent systematic scoping review (Espasa-Labrador et al., 2026) identified only 22 published studies specifically examining female trail running, with the vast majority focused on biomedical variables (physiology, nutrition, injuries) and none adopting a sociological or spatial perspective. ITRA-NATIVE fills this gap by providing the first large-scale, openly available, gender-disaggregated infrastructure for studying women's participation in trail running from social science, geographic, and computational perspectives.

The dataset includes: gender participation ratios (percentage of women finishers per edition), gendered performance gaps (median, winner, and top-10 finish time differentials), course characteristics (distance, elevation gain, technicality index), geographic coordinates and country-level aggregations, temporal trends spanning two decades, a four-cluster race typology derived from Gaussian Mixture Modelling and Ward hierarchical clustering, and event survival data tracking 21,177 race events. All variables are systematically disaggregated by sex, enabling five priority analytical axes: (1) ecology of gendered participation, (2) the ultra-distance paradox and female self-selection, (3) structural exclusion thresholds, (4) elite visibility and podium representation, and (5) temporal recomposition of gender gaps.

The sex variable used in this dataset refers to the administrative sex category recorded by race organisers through the ITRA registry. It operates as a binary classification (M/F) reflecting registration categories, not an ontological claim about gender identity. The dataset does not capture non-binary, transgender, or intersex participation, which constitutes a structural limitation inherited from the source data.

ITRA-NATIVE is distributed as a ZIP archive containing 16 CSV files, 60 PNG visualisations, and 51 analytical outputs. It is designed to be FAIR-compliant (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable) and follows open science principles. The dataset is released under CC-BY 4.0 International licence.

Companion to: Plard, M. (2026). ITRA-NATIVE: a global gender-disaggregated dataset of trail running participation (2003-2025). Scientific Data [submitted].