UTMB 2003: More Than 700 Starters, 67 Finishers in Chamonix

01UTMB history starts with four friends

At the start, there are four of them: Catherine and Michel Poletti, René Bachelard and Jean-Claude Marmier. “In the beginning, it was really just four of us,” says Catherine Poletti. Their idea: run the Tour du Mont-Blanc in a single race, across France, Italy and Switzerland. Michel Poletti remembers announcing registration at the end of 2002, and the first sign-up arriving on January 2. And the reception: “People in Chamonix thought we were absolutely crazy.”

02Hoping for 300, over 700 at the start

“We wanted 300 runners and thought 500 would be a great success,” says Michel Poletti. In the end, “Just a few more than 700 started!” The exact figure varies: 722 according to the Trail Endurance report, about 600 according to iRunFar. Each runner picks a distance along the way: you can stop at Courmayeur or Champex and be ranked, or go all the way to Chamonix.

03Dantesque

The gun goes off at 4 a.m., not in the evening as it does today. All summer, Europe has been baking in a heat wave. During the race, the weather turns: cold, wind, rain. The organization will speak of “Dantesque conditions (rain, cold and hail).” The weather forces them to shorten the course, from 160 to about 150 km, according to iRunFar. The American Krissy Moehl, who had prepared for heat, would admit it: “I was woefully underprepared for the weather shift.”

04A 33-year-old Nepali bricklayer

The first winner in history is called Dawa Sherpa. A Nepali bricklayer living in Switzerland, he is 33 and, he says, had “no specific preparation.” He finishes the loop in 20 hr 05 min, more than two hours ahead of the chasers. Since you could stop at Courmayeur or Champex, he had told himself: “we'll see how the legs feel.” They feel good. Later he would sum up the era: “It was adventure, whereas today it's competition.”

On the women's side, Krissy Moehl wins in 29 hr 38 min, on the longest race she has ever run. She will be back: she wins again in 2009.

0567

In the end, only 67 runners complete the full loop, 7 of them women. About one starter in ten, in a race a part of Chamonix didn't believe in.

06The rest is history

According to the book Grand Trail, by Frédéric and Alexis Berg, the pioneers wanted to liven up the valley and extend the summer tourist season. Mission accomplished: the race now brings together some 2,300 runners, every year on the last weekend of August. What was an adventure with 67 finishers has become trail running's great global gathering.