Frenchman Vincent Bouillard, 31, won the 21st in Chamonix on Saturday shortly after 2 p.m.my edition of the Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc (UTMB) in less than twenty hours (19 hours, 54 minutes and 23 seconds). Several big favourites, including defending champion Jim Walmsley, threw in the towel during the night.
The American, who was aiming for a double victory in his sixth participation in the race, retired after about nine hours and 83 kilometres of racing due to a knee injury. Other serious candidates for the podium among the men did the same, notably the Frenchman Mathieu Blanchard, also injured, Aurélien Dunand-Pallaz, Germain Grangier and the British Tom Evans. Among the women, Anne-Lise Rousset also gave up, victim of a cold at the beginning of the evening.
There were fewer surprises among the women, where American favourite Katie Schide currently leads by around thirty minutes over her closest rivals, Canadian Marianne Hogan and New Zealander Ruth Croft.
Some 2,300 competitors took part in the queen of trail races in Chamonix on Friday. The 176.4-kilometre long route with almost 10,000 metres of gradient encircles the Mont-Blanc with several passes in the high mountains at an altitude of over 2,500 metres. The fastest are expected to start at 2 p.m. and return to the starting point in Chamonix.
