Trail running’s biggest week kicked off Monday on its most prominent stage in Chamonix, France, but it will be without several of its biggest stars when the marquee attraction known as the Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc gets underway on Friday night.
Founded in 2003, the race, simply known as UTMB, is the biggest and most prestigious trail running race in the world. It starts in Chamonix and sends runners on a very challenging 108-mile counterclockwise loop around the Mont Blanc massif through parts of Italy and Switzerland with approximately 33,000 feet of vertical gain and loss.
In all, more than 6,000 runners will compete for $316,000 in prize money in eight races of varying distances this week, including the three championship races of the UTMB World Series. While the majority of the runners are from France, runners hail from 97 different countries, including about 400 from the U.S.
The 2026 UTMB starts Friday, August 28, at 5:45 p.m. local time in Chamonix (11:45 a.m. EDT). Here’s how to watch UTMB 2026 live, along with the race schedule, top contenders, and what to know about this year’s course.
How to Watch UTMB 2026 Live
U.S. viewers can watch the UTMB 2026 live stream on FloTrack, part of FloSports, UTMB’s official U.S. broadcast partner for 2026. FloSports says most live events require a paid subscription. Fans can also use UTMB Live, the event’s official digital hub, for live race coverage, tracking, statistics, and results. The UTMB World Series YouTube channel will post race highlights after the broadcasts.
What Time Does UTMB 2026 Start?
UTMB 2026 begins Friday, August 28, at 5:45 p.m. CEST in Chamonix, France. For viewers in the U.S., that’s 11:45 a.m. EDT and 8:45 a.m. PDT.
Who Is Racing UTMB 2026?
Well, here’s who won’t be on the starting line due to injuries: elite Americans Jim Walmsley and Katie Schide, as well as Spain’s Kilian Jornet and top British runner Tom Evans. Evans won last year’s UTMB in dominant fashion, while Jornet, who is considered the men’s GOAT of the sport, is a four-time UTMB champion. Walmsley (2023) and Schide (2022 and 2024) are past winners as well as 2025 trail running world champions.
But they might barely be missed, given the competitive wave trail running is riding right now and the number of new stars that are emerging.
Women’s UTMB 2026 Favorites
One of the sport’s brightest stars is back: American Courtney Dauwalter is in search of her fourth UTMB victory, less than seven weeks after winning the daunting Hardrock 100 in Colorado for the fourth time. Last year, Dauwalter had an 11-minute lead through 60 miles of the women’s UTMB race and was still leading on the way to the 80-mile mark. But running through cold weather and blowing snow through the previous night took its toll, and she eventually faded to 10th place.
After an uncharacteristically lackluster year on the trails in 2025, Dauwalter, who many consider the GOAT of women’s trail running, ran two fast road marathons last fall and eventually regained her form in long-distance ultras. She came within a minute of qualifying for the U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon with a 2:38:55 personal best last December, which was about the time she and her husband Kevin Schmidt moved about 30 miles down the road (and about 2,500 feet lower in altitude) from Leadville, Colorado, to Buena Vista.
After defending champion Ruth Croft of New Zealand withdrew from the race on Wednesday, Dauwalter, 41, is the prohibitive favorite again this year. However, Fuzhao Xiang (China), Sunmaya Budha (Nepal), Blandine L'Hirondel (France), Lucy Bartholomew (Australia), and rising Americans Riley Brady (second at Western States in June), Rachel Entrekin (the outright winner of the Cocodona 250 in May), Abby Hall (the 2025 Western States champion), and Shea Aquilano (second at the JFK 50 last year) are all ready to mix it up.
The thing that makes the UTMB course so daunting is that it requires traversing steep trails over 10 high mountain passes. As she has in years past, Dauwalter has spent the past several weeks in Europe training on the course, something that most top Americans have deemed absolutely necessary—especially for a first-timer like Entrekin.
“There are a lot of trails on the UTMB course that are insanely steep, but there are parts that are really smooth and runnable,” Dauwalter says. “I have done most of the course sections three or four times since I have been here, and every single time it’s been a little bit easier. So I’m really happy that my expectations were terrifying and the reality that it’s gotten better. I’m excited to put it all together, but I’m sure it will be really, really hard.”
Men’s UTMB 2026 Favorites
In the men’s race, Ben Dhiman, a 34-year-old American who lives full time in France with his wife and young children, is considered the favorite after his breakthrough runner-up finish last year following frustrating DNFs in 2023 and 2024. He’ll face seasoned challengers in Zach Miller (U.S.), Baptiste Chassagne (France), Hannes Namberger (Germany), Vincent Bouillard (France), Josh Wade (United Kingdom), and Rod Farvard (U.S.).
“I’d say the mixed bag was heavier on the disappointment side than the excitement side,” says Dhiman, who grew up in Cincinnati and played soccer for Emory University in Atlanta. “I just expect to win. That’s it. It’s really simple. Those are my standards and my expectations. So, you know, if you ain’t first, you're last. But all in all, I was really proud of myself for toughing it out because I crashed hard and had to gut it out and really had to find the resources to hold on to that position.”
Miller has four top-10 finishes at UTMB dating back to 2016, including a runner-up finish to Walmsley in 2023. Bouillard outran Chassagne to win UTMB in 2024 and just won the Western States 100 in record-breaking time. Wade, meanwhile, was third in UTMB last year, while Namberger is a three-time top-10 finisher. American first-timers Caleb Olson and Chris Myers, who finished first and second, respectively, in the 2025 Western States 100 in Auburn, California, are also in the mix.
What Is the UTMB Course?
The 2026 UTMB course covers 174 kilometers, or roughly 108 miles, around the Mont Blanc massif, with runners crossing France, Italy, and Switzerland and climbing about 9,900 meters (32,500 feet) along the way.
From Chamonix, runners head over a ski resort and a mountain pass on their way to the towns of St. Gervais and Les Contamines before passing into Italy via the 8,250-foot Col de la Seigne mountain pass. After reaching the Italian ski town of Courmayeur, runners continue over the 8,170-foot summit of Grand Col Ferret into Switzerland. From there, it’s four more steep climbs and descents on the way back to Chamonix, where more than 50,000 fans are expected to line the streets to greet the winners.
“I would call this course relentless. So many things make it challenging,” says U.S. athlete Corinne Malcolm, who is doing pre- and post-race commentary this year. “It is a very interesting course in that there is a lot of climbing. We’re talking more than 30,000 feet of climbing, but there are so many runnable miles in this course as well. So I think it takes a really well-rounded athlete to excel here. It is a mountainous course, obviously, but there is a 13-mile downhill off of the Grand Col Ferret. You’ve gotta have legs to run that, but then there are the three monster climbs that make up the back 50K of the course. There’s a lot of good running in there, but there are so many really brutal climbs.”
UTMB 2026 Schedule
In addition to UTMB, the OCC 60K and CCC 100K are also championship races of the UTMB World Series. The OCC began Thursday morning in Orsières, Switzerland, and sent runners over a series of steep mountains on a point-to-point course to Chamonix. The CCC starts Friday morning in Courmayeur and, after a demanding 4,300-foot climb in the first 6 miles, follows the UTMB course into Switzerland and back to Chamonix.
French world champion Frédéric Tranchand won the men’s OCC in 5:10:08 on Thursday afternoon, while American Lauren Gregory won the women’s race in 6:08:07. Gregory was in third place for much of the race but timed her late-race surge perfectly and outran British runner Naomi Lang by just 3 seconds.
“I knew to sit and gauge my effort based on her effort and kind of play on her,” Gregory said. “I didn’t know how far we were from the finish and I thought, ‘I really hope this is enough,’ as I was trying to put on the afterburners.”
American Jenn Lichter, coming off a record-setting Western States 100 win, is the headlining favorite of the women’s CCC on Friday morning, but China’s Miao Yao and past CCC winners Yngvild Kaspersen and Toni McCann will be tough to beat. Americans Dani Moreno, Robyn Lesh, Klaire Rhodes, and Erin Clark also figure to be in the mix.
On the men’s side, there could be a battle between Americans Eli Hemming (the OCC champion in 2024), Adam Peterman (the 2022 Western States champion), and Hans Troyer (last fall’s JFK 50 winner), with Italy’s Cristian Minoggio, China’s Guangfu Meng, and New Zealand’s Daniel Jones among the top contenders.
How to Track UTMB 2026 Runners Live
If you want to follow a specific athlete, use UTMB Live and LiveTrail for real-time UTMB 2026 tracking. You can search for individual runners, monitor their progress and estimated arrival times, compare athletes, follow the race leaders, and see results and other race information throughout the event.
Brian Metzler is a Boulder, Colorado, writer and editor whose work has appeared in Runner’s World, Sports Illustrated, ESPN, Outside, Trail Runner, The Chicago Tribune, and Red Bulletin. He’s a former walk-on college middle-distance runner who has transitioned to trail running and pack burro racing in Colorado.
