Earlier this year Ironman partnered with the UTMB (Ultra-Trail du Mont Blanc) series, giving the series some capital to help launch the UTMB World Series. The series races serve as qualifying events for the championship event, the UTMB Mont-Blanc race. (Sound familiar to the Ironman qualifying model?) Athletes earn “Running Stones” at qualifying races and earn double the amount of Running Stones at World Series “Major” events – basically these “Stones” are lottery entries for Mont-Blanc. When the new partnership and series were announced in May there were no American events on the calendar. Today it was announced that there will be two American UTMB World Series races in 2022, with a new American “Major” event coming in 2023.
The two new events coming to the United States next year include the Canyons Endurance Runs by UTMB which will follow the famous Western States Trail in California and the Speedgoat Mountain Races by UTMB in Utah. The latter event includes one of the toughest 50 km trail runs in the world with almost 4,000 m of climbing, most of which is above 2,700 m.
Today’s announcement also revealed the first two UTMB Majors in Spain (Val d’Aran by UTMB) and Hong Kong (TransLantau by UTMB). Other new events added to the 24-race calendar include Croatia’s Istria 100 by UTMB and Slovenia’s Julian Alps Trail Run by UTMB.
The 2022 UTMB Series is spread across 16 countries including two events in China, both with dates still to be announced. Here’s the current list of races in the series with the World Series Finals in Mont-Blanc, which takes place in August, at the bottom:
- Tarawera Ultramarathon by UTMB (New Zealand), 12 February
- Istria 100 by UTMB (Croatia), 7-10 April
- Canyons Endurance Runs by UTMB, (USA) 23 April
- Ultra-Trail Australia by UTMB (Australia), 12-15 May
- Trail du Saint-Jacques by UTMB (France), 11 June
- mozart 100 by UTMB (Austria), 18 June
- La Sportiva Lavaredo Ultra Trail by UTMB (Italy), 23-26 June
- Trail 100 Andorra by UTMB (Andorra), 24-26 June
- Western States 100-Mile Endurance Run (USA), 25-26 June
- Speedgoat Mountain Races by UTMB (USA), July
- Ultra-Trail Snowdonia by UTMB, (Wales), 1-3 July
- Restonica Trail by UTMB (France) 7-9 July
- Val d’Aran by UTMB (Spain), 7-10 July
- Trail Verbier Saint-Bernard by UTMB, (Switzerland), 8-10 July
- Eiger Ultra Trail by UTMB, (Switzerland), 15-17 July
- Wildstrubel by UTMB, (Switzerland), 8-11 September
- Julian Alps Trail Run by UTMB, (Slovenia), 16-18 September
- Nice Côte d’Azur by UTMB (France), 22-25 September
- Puerto Vallarta México by UTMB (Mexico), October
- Thailand by UTMB (Thailand), 10-13 November
- TransLantau by UTMB (Hong Kong), 3-6 November
- Panda Trail by UTMB (China), dates TBC
- Gaoligong by UTMB (China), dates TBC
- UTMB® World Series Finals; UTMB® Mont-Blanc (France, Italy, Switzerland), 22-28 August
