Kilian Jornet is no longer the king of the mountains. UTMB has just updated their ranking and the new number one is Remi Bonnet. Jornet has dropped to second place. Patrick Kipngeno is third.
Jonathan Albon, winner of last year’s UTMB CCC and the Grand Trail des Templiers, is number 4, before UTMB winner Jim Walmsley. Stian Angermund is number 6. UTMB has decided that Angermund will keep his UTMB OCC victory of last year for now, as he’s in the process of proving his innocence, after testing positive on doping.
Golden Trail World Series
Bonnet is mostly active on the Golden Trail World Series (GTWS), with races that are up to a marathon long. Which means he doesn’t have an UTMB Index in the 100k or 100m category. He did have a very successful 2023, with victories in the (UTMB races) Marathon du Mont-Blanc, Pikes Peak and the Mammoth trail fest. He finished 4th in Zegama and in Golfo dell Isola and won the Gold Trail World Series.
Bonnet leads Kilian Jornet by only 3 points. Patrick Kipngeno, who is also a GTWS runner without any long UTMB ultras behind his name, is only one point behind Jornet, but is also leading Jonathan Albon by only one point. Meaning that one race could change it all.
No more Jornet?
However, it’s the big question if Jornet is going to take back his crown. This year he’ll be only running Zegama and Sierre-Zinal, besides some local races in his home country Norway and its neighbour Sweden, according to his announcement on NNormal’s Instagram.
Courtney Dauwalter
Courtney Dauwalter is still leading the UTMB women’s ranking. Maude Mathys is second, but the gap between the two is 28 points. In comparison the gap between Bonnet and Elhousine Elazzoui, the number 10 in the men’s ranking, is only 18 points.
Nienke Brinkman, the winner of Zegama in 2022, still holds on to third place. Last year she only ran one UTMB Index race: Sierre-Zinal, where she finished sixth. Blandine Hirondel (4th), the number 3 of last year’s UTMB, and Camille Herron (5th) complete the top 5.
Photo: Remi Bonnet winning the Marathon du Mont-Blanc – The Adventure Bakery
