Shaped by insights from our athletes, the Cloudultra Pro was built for the moment the race really begins – when your body starts to fade. Fast, grippy and durable, our first trail super shoe is engineered to maintain high performance – knowing that winning won't be just about raw speed, but staying efficient all the way to the finish line.
Our team set out to create the ultimate trail-racing shoe – go behind the scenes with a few members of the product team.
What is your background? What brought you to On?
Sergi Jansa, Footwear Product Manager:
I studied product design and began my career in R&D, working in a lab that explored how scent could shape experiences in retail spaces. It taught me early on that product is never just physical, it's emotional, sensory, and deeply human. In 2019, I joined On as part of the Brand Experience team, focused on creating meaningful first touch points between consumers and our products. My love for sport, good design, and the mountains made On feel like the natural next step. I’ve been a runner since I was a kid, but when I was 14, I discovered trail running, and everything changed. What once took a full day of hiking with my family I could now cover in a few hours. That shift in perspective made me fall in love with this sport.
Edouard Coyon, Director of Product Vertical Running:
Running is a big part of my life. I like to say it’s part of my education too: the people I met, the values it taught me. I studied engineering and naturally connected my professional journey to running. I had a dream to make running more accessible, to share my passion with as many people as possible. My dream journey started as an entrepreneur and then took me to a few different sportswear brands, until 5 years ago when I landed at On. I was attracted by the Explorer Spirit and the ambition to create the leading running brand. It’s amazing to look at what we’ve achieved, and it is still the beginning of the journey!
Benoit Abel, Sports Engineering:
As a former biathlete, equipment has always played a crucial role in my performance. I was constantly searching for the best gear or tweaks that could help me gain an edge. After my sports career and completing my studies in Sports Engineering, I joined the Innovation department of a ski company, focusing on prototyping and testing concepts directly with athletes. In 2020, I joined On. I was drawn by the brand’s innovative mindset and fast-paced approach to product development but let’s be honest, the Swiss mountains sealed the deal!
What pushed you to change careers within On?
Sergi :
In 2022, as On looked to grow its Outdoor vertical, I felt something shift: a moment of clarity. It wasn’t just a chance to be closer to the product; it was a chance to be part of shaping it. After several conversations with Ed and going through the interview process once again, I transitioned into Product Strategy as a Product Manager. To me, being a Product Manager is about creating the space for energy to blossom. That means holding a vision while staying open. Listening deeply, to athletes, to teammates, to the product itself. It means shaping a shared purpose that turns individual sparks into something meaningful. Something that moves people. You’re planning 24 months ahead, yet using the present to inform insights – insights to shape briefings, and briefings to build the future. You’re not the loudest voice in the room; you’re the one making sure every voice is heard, aligned and moving forward together.
Walk us through your initial conversations.
Sergi and Edouard:
An informal discussion was sparked by a common love for trail-running and the mountains. And a similar mindset, a drive to “make a difference”. The big question was: “How do we become a leading outdoor brand?” We had the Swiss Alps, but we still needed to build credibility. We didn’t want to follow, we wanted to bring our own solutions in a world where the outdoors is becoming more and more popular and community needs are evolving fast. As a performance-driven running brand, we had expertise and access to the latest materials and technologies and experience working with pro athletes. We also understood that trail-running was a market ready for innovations. Not to mention, as a Swiss brand, we had a world-class playground, including a section of the most prestigious trail-running event in the world: UTMB®. How about bringing these ingredients together to create the ultimate trail-racing shoe on the market? This is the dream we brought to the team.
How did the vision for the Cloudultra Pro come together?
Sergi:
Not long after that coffee, we kicked things off with a workshop where we asked the real question: “What does winning a 100k race actually mean?” We dissected the race from every angle – mentally and physically, before, during and after. We analyzed every climb, descent and turning point. Looked at the science, the pacing and where the big moves are made. We took inspiration from previous work our teams had done with On athlete Hellen Obiri – specifically how athlete-informed design can unlock new levels of performance. And we came to a simple, powerful insight: This wasn’t just about building a fast shoe. It was about building one that helps you stay efficient when it counts, that saves your legs on the downhill and keeps you moving when everything else starts to fade.
Edouard :
It started with a dream that we could win the most prestigious trail-running race in the world. That vision helped bring a team together with energy. It sparked a strong team passion and obsession to identify every problem encountered by athletes during the course and to resolve them.
"When this journey started, we had nothing comparable in our product range. We knew we would not get it right on the first shot but we were determined to keep trying and testing until we had it figured out. To set ourselves up for success, we could not simply start to design another product but we first had to re-design the process of creation itself:
We came up with a toolkit of key components that allowed us to easily combine different pieces and quickly assemble prototypes in our in-house workshop. In this way, we were able to test countless combinations of components and geometries and receive immediate feedback from our athletes.
With a lot of hands-on prototyping, athlete feedback and digital simulation tools, we were able to identify the best option for each component of the shoe step by step. Looking at the shoe today, I am still intrigued by how naturally all the different pieces came together. And this is because I know that every component is the best possible solution to a specific problem we had to solve."
– Nils Ferber, Footwear Design Senior Lead
What were some of the steps the team took to understand elite athletes using the product, both mentally and physically? Are you also running some ultras?
Sergi:
One of the most important steps was really listening, not just testing. We spent a lot of time with our athletes, trying to understand not just what they wanted from a shoe, but how they think and feel during races. We asked questions like “Where does it hurt? When does it break down?” And of course, I also try to live that experience myself. I ran OCC® (the 50K category final for the UTMB World Series) in 2023 with an early prototype and Transvulcania® (70K) in 2024 with a late-stage prototype, which helped me see things differently. Not just from a technical or performance lens, but from inside the athlete experience. When it comes to turning these insights into something measurable, that’s where Benoit Abel comes in.
Benoit:
We started by really listening to a wide range of athletes. We dove into product reviews, paid close attention to what was happening in other sports, and pulled inspiration from everywhere we could. Once we defined our main goal, creating a product that helps athletes preserve their legs when running downhill, we explored every possible path to test and validate our ideas.
We weren’t afraid to take risks. Scientific consensus takes time, and we knew we couldn’t afford to wait. So we adapted methodologies from road running and applied them to trail running, even though trail introduces far more variables: terrain, fatigue, vertical gain and loss. Road tests usually happen on flat surfaces, but we wanted to understand exactly how our prototypes performed both downhill and uphill, especially under fatigue.
To do that, we had to modify our treadmill, bypassing some standard safety to reach realistic downhill racing speeds. We spent countless hours running pre-tests on ourselves and with our internal elite athlete, Antoine Charvolin, before finding the right setup.
Mentally, one of the most challenging parts was narrowing down the options. The team placed a lot of trust in me and in the process – which meant I had to confidently say, “These are the eight prototypes we’re going with,” out of hundreds of potential combinations. That level of trust, paired with a shared sense of purpose and collective energy, is what made the process feel surprisingly smooth.
As for me, I don’t run ultras, but I do participate in ultra-distance events on skis or bikes. Trail running has always been a part of my training. Growing up in the mountains, it’s second nature. These days, running is mostly about sharing time outside with friends or athletes and observing how they move. I just try to stay fit enough to keep up while they’re training!
“For almost two years, the Cloudultra Pro was at the center of our lives. During the week, we were working hard on the development and on the weekends, we were out in the mountains testing the latest iterations with friends.
I have memories of one snowy 50km on the Uetliberg where we took a prototype out for a full day. Or a time I spent 8 hours on the treadmill with the Sports Science team to understand which combination was the most energy efficient. I also decided at one point to race one of my biggest competitions in a prototype we'd literally glued together just days before. I was honestly afraid I’d finish the race in my socks. But that’s how committed we were. This wasn’t just a work project. It was the shoe we’d all end up wearing in our own races, in our own adventures. So we had every desire to make it great. In the end, the Cloudultra Pro brought together our work and our passion. We built it not only for ultra runners, but also by ultra runners. And I think you can feel that when you put it on.”
– Antoine Charvolin, On athlete
How does your own love of the sport play into your work here?
Sergi:
Trail running has always been more than just something I do, but I’ve also learned not to let it define me completely. In the past, I let work and sport blur together too much. But over time, I’ve started to find more balance, turning long efforts into adventures, taking the pressure off pace, and learning to enjoy the process again. That mindset shift made its way into this project too. We weren’t just chasing performance; we were thinking about how to build something that lasts, that supports the athletes not just through races, but through the joy, the fatigue, and everything in between. When you live the sport, you design differently. And when you love it with perspective, I think you build better.
“Running ultras is very optimistic. Very free. Very simple.
Many people believe running ultras is ultra hard – when I find running a flat half marathon much harder. During an ultra, you go through death-valley-like downs to endless blissful highs – a bit like life itself. It’s incredible to discover how the body reacts to long efforts and how the mind can influence the experience, and vice versa. It’s a hidden strength that we have as humans, no matter the type of movement we do. The key is daring to try it out and being optimistic enough to believe that yes, there is a chance you might make it through those 100 km! Nothing beats running under the moonlight at 3000m, quietly.
Finally, there’s the community. I’ve had people cheer me on in moments of despair, and help me pass finish lines I never thought I would reach. And I’ve helped people do the same. Loving ultra cannot quite be explained, only shared.”
– Laurence Stoffel, Head of Group Creative, Performance Outdoor
Benoit: My passion for sport and athlete performance plays a huge role in what I do. It allows me to approach testing sessions with empathy, to truly listen and understand feedback, and most importantly to anticipate the real impact our products might have, both positive and negative. That personal connection to the athlete experience is what keeps our work grounded and purposeful. It’s not just about innovation and data for the sake of it, it’s about building something that genuinely supports how athletes move, feel, and perform.
