Is UTMB Too Big? A Week in Chamonix Has Left Me Wondering
- 2 days ago
- 6 min read
Published August 2026 | Written by Andy Hood
Last night I was at the world premiere of The Hillbilly Scientist, the film about Lazarus Lake, the man behind the Barkley Marathons and a handful of other events built to test physical and mental endurance to the absolute limit. It was screened here in Chamonix during UTMB week with Laz himself sitting in the room, and it's a fascinating insight into how he thinks and how he builds the things he builds.
But it was the Q&A afterwards that gave me the most to chew on.
Someone in the audience asked Laz why he limits the Barkley Marathons to forty entrants. The answer came back in that pure Tennessee way of his, completely direct and with no interest in dressing it up: because the parking area only has space for forty vehicles, and any more runners would have a negative impact on the environment.
Forty cars. That's the whole methodology. Work out what the place can physically take, and don't take more than that.
I sat there thinking, that is exactly the argument going on right now in Chamonix. Same question, wildly different answer.
Is UTMB too big?
Plenty has been written about that over the last few years, and a lot more in recent weeks now the new mayor of Chamonix has given us his thoughts. I'm not going to add to that pile. What I do have is a full week here on the ground, and a perspective I haven't seen anyone else put down.
Sitting next to me at the screening was a guy from one of the major shoe brands. We got talking about what UTMB actually is now. Not what it was. What it is today.
From one shakeout run to a daily launch schedule
It used to be simple enough. A race, with a few brands dropping into town and spending some marketing budget.
Then came the shakeout runs. Anyone can join in, you don't need a bib, and you get to feel a bit of the UTMB magic even if you're not racing. I've done two this week, one with Scott Running x Run4Adventure and one with Runderwear. Both were great mornings. Genuinely. Running under Mont Blanc at 8am with a load of strangers is a good way to start a day.
The focus of the week, though, was always the racing. Watch the starts, cheer the finishers, go to bed far too late.
This week I've noticed something quite different.
Brands are now running "activations" on an almost daily basis. That word gets thrown about here like it's the coolest thing anyone's ever said, and I'm fairly sure a lot of the brand reps genuinely believe it is. An activation, stripped of the language, means they're launching a product and finding a way to celebrate it while extracting money from as many pockets as possible by making you want the latest widget.
What was once a one-off shakeout run or a party has turned into a daily affair. Multiple activations per brand, per week, each day with a fresh focus.
"It's changed a lot since COVID"
That's what my film companion said, and then he finished the sentence: "it's changed a lot since COVID and is now a large networking event."
He works for a major shoe brand. He is, in other words, one of the people doing the networking. And it confirmed exactly what had been nagging at me for days.
The COVID marker is worth sitting with. The events that came back after 2021 came back into a very different industry, one where every brand had discovered what a captive audience of ten thousand runners in one valley is actually worth.
So which is it? Is this a race, or a set of nine races once you count the Mini UTMB, with a brand presence bolted on as a supplementary feature? Or is it now a large brand networking event with some races thrown in?
I'm starting to suspect it's the latter.
The UTMB Village, as they call it, is essentially a retail park. It is smaller this year, because the new mayor has confined it to a more concentrated space. But walking round it, my strong feeling is the organisers have been clever about that constraint and simply narrowed the walkways between the stands to cram in as many exhibitors as before.
Smaller footprint. Same number of pockets to reach into.
Why I won't race UTMB in Chamonix
People ask me whether I'll ever run a UTMB race here. The answer is a flat no.
I've ran the Tour du Mont Blanc twice, in 2023 and again in 2025, both times on my own terms. There's a reason for that.
A couple of years back I ran UTMB Côte d'Azur in Nice. I couldn't fault the organisation, and the support on course was excellent. What I disliked was the sheer number of runners. Hit a narrow bit of single track, or a steep climb, or a technical descent, and you were reduced to walking. Sometimes to standing completely still, waiting for the line to shuffle forward.
That's not ultra running. That's the New Year sales.
Some people will tell me the crowds are all part of the experience. Fair enough. It just isn't the experience I'm looking for.
So is UTMB too big?
I'm not anti-UTMB. Some of the best moments of my week have been the ones nobody is monetising. Standing at the barriers watching the last TDS finishers come round the final corner after forty-odd hours in the mountains, with the whole town making a noise for them. That's the thing. That's why we're all here.
But that thing is now wrapped in several layers of something else, and the layers are getting thicker every year.
The real question isn't whether the mayor and others will force changes through. They probably will, and 2027 looks like the edition where we find out how far that goes. The question is whether those changes get us back to a week of racing rather than a week of networking.
Because if it's networking we want, there are already running shows for that.
Frequently asked questions
How many races are there at UTMB?
Nine, once you count them all properly. The eight that get the coverage are the PTL, MCC, ETC, YCC, TDS, OCC, CCC and the UTMB itself, and then there's the Mini UTMB for the kids, which most people forget about entirely. That's nine start lines and nine sets of finishers packed into seven days in one valley, which is a large part of why the week feels the way it does.
Why do people say UTMB has got too commercial?
Mostly because of what happens off the trail rather than on it. The race itself is still the race. What has changed is everything wrapped around it: a brand village that fills the centre of town, unofficial brand races running alongside the official ones, and product launches dressed up as community events on an almost daily basis. Add in the growth of UTMB Group into a worldwide circuit of events, and the argument that the thing has drifted a long way from a mountain race is not a difficult one to make.
Do you need a bib to join a UTMB shakeout run?
No. That's the whole appeal of them. The brand shakeout runs during UTMB week are open to anyone, they're usually free, and you don't need to be racing anything. Most are announced on the brand's social channels in the days beforehand, some ask you to register a place, and a few just tell you where to stand and what time to be there. If you're in Chamonix for the week and not racing, they're the easiest way to feel part of it.
About the Author
Andy Hood is an ultra and endurance runner based in North Devon, and the man behind Running WestwardHo.
In 2021, at 48, a testicular cancer diagnosis took his running away from him. Surgery and chemotherapy followed, and what came back out the other side is what he calls Andy v2.0, a runner with a mission attached. Since then he has designed and run a string of deliberately attention-grabbing ultras, from 24 hours on a treadmill in a busy shopping centre to 170 miles of the South West Coast Path, and has raised more than £27,000 for cancer and mental health charities along the way.
He is the founder of Check Ya Balls, a men's underwear range with a cheeky look and a serious point to it, and a Runna ambassador. He has circled Mont Blanc on foot twice, in 2023 and 2025, and was in Chamonix for the full week of UTMB 2026.
His writing here covers race reports, training guidance, honest kit reviews and the occasional strong opinion. The message underneath all of it stays the same: check yourself, and don't wait to be told twice.
You can find Andy on Instagram @runningwestwardho, or read more at runningwestwardho.co.uk.
Comments