It’s been a good weekend for Kilian Jornet. The Cerdanya athlete returned to competition after his unfortunate experience in the UTMB and in Scotland has taken the World Skyrace title after winning the Salomon Ring of Steall Skyrace. The event, the fifth in the Golden Trail Series, will stage its grand finale on October 20 on The Otter Trail (South Africa). Today he also triumphed in the Salomon Glen Coe Skyline on a day when the weather played a key role.

World championship, Golden Trail Series and a record

On Saturday Jornet won a very fast Salomon Ring of Steall Skyrace, setting a new race record after completing the 29km and 2,500m of overall ascent in 3h04:34. Jornet knocked almost 20 minutes off the previous record set by Stian Angermund-Vik (3h24:51). In fact, all top 11 finishers finished within the record set by the Norwegian athlete..

Jornet shared much of the race with the Italian Nadir Maguet, who came second in a time of 3h06’05’’. “It’s a great race and I love coming to Scotland. It’s technical, there was mud, the terrain is like Norway. We had a great battle with Nadir and I managed to pull away from him on the last ascent. It’s great because this is what you want, to have a fight on your hands, and there were lots of strong runners in a perfect scenario,” Jornet said. The former record holder Stian Angermund-Vik (3h09:05) came in third to complete the Skyrace podium.

This victory places Jornet second with 300 points in the ranking of the Golden Trail Series which, after five races, will stage its grand finale on October 20 on The Otter Trail. The top 10 men and women in the overall classification will go to South Africa to contest a race over 42km and 2,600m of overall ascent.

Salomon Glen Coe Skyline

In 2017, Jornet won the 52km and 4,750m overall ascent event. This year weather conditions forced some changes in the course which was 32km and 2,700m of overall ascent. As a result, the race started later than usual, at 10h, and until half way Jornet ran with André Jonsson but crossed the line 3’16’’ ahead of the Swede, in a time of 3h37:17. The Italian Daniel Jung (3h42’33) was third.