Originally Posted by Happy

Amen. What WAS, is totally irrelevant to what IS now. I dont even get the point of why that was brought up.

However, the Fast Track does count award stay as qualify stay so you could do award stay to renew your Gold, provided 1) you can find low level award, 2) you are willing to do one-night stay to minimize your point cost.

Our recent trip had us finish the last 4 days in Istanbul where we hopped among 3 Hilton properties so my husband's account would finish the Fast Track challenge to retain his Gold thru March 2017. Just confirmed with HHonors via email that as of Mar 17 his status was "upgraded" to Gold (despite he is still Gold thru Mar 2015 without the Challenge) and that is thru March 2017. Natural stays we needed, just a little bit extra work by changing hotels.