Jasmin Paris and Jonathan Albon are EXTREME Champions

Press Release / 19.09.2016

After an incredible weekend of Skyrunning in the Scottish Highlands, both Jasmin Paris and Jonathan Albon have won the 2016 Salomon Glen Coe Skyline™ in spectacular style. The race is the finale of the three-race Skyrunner® World EXTREME Series and Paris and Albon have also been crowned the inaugural EXTREME Series Champions.

Certainly the toughest race in the Skyrunner® World Series, the 55km course with a punishing 4,750m of vertical height gain over extremely technical terrain was a playground for today’s winners, who made the severe test for the 217 runners look almost easy (158 made it through the cut-off times to finish the race).

The EXTREME Series was introduced by the International Skyrunning Federation for 2016 to showcase the three most technical Skyrunning races in a stand-alone circuit: The Tromsø SkyRace® in Norway, the legendary Kima Trophy in Italy and the deciding finale, and Scotland’s first international Skyrunning race, on Sunday at the Salomon Glen Coe Skyline™.

Race winner and now 2016 EXTREME Series Men’s Champion, Jonathan Albon, is a 27-year-old Londoner who lives in Norway and appeared on the Skyrunning scene in 2015 when he won the Tromsø SkyRace®. A second place in this year’s race and a 7th place in Kima placed him on the second rung of the ranking behind Tom Owens. Yesterday, at the Salomon Glen Coe Skyline™, he seemed to cruise effortlessly over the rugged and demanding terrain to finish in an incredible 6h33’52”, slicing nearly one hour off last year’s course record, on an even longer and tougher route than the 2015 edition.

With respect to 2015, and with only minimal course changes, the first eight men finished faster than the previous record; testimony to the incredible talent out there in what is probably the best assembled field in the country to date.

“The race course was a mix of scrambling, hiking, running, amazing views, nature… the weather. It was a ride from start to finish.” Albon exclaimed. “I realised I could be the EXTREME Series champion on the last big climb when I saw Tom was struggling and Marc, who was second, had only done one of the Series races. I’m really happy for the title.”

Men’s race favourite and ranking leader Tom Owens led for most of the race although plagued by foot pain, which eventually cost him his crown, he finished just four minutes behind Albon. Switzerland’s Marc Lauenstein (winner of the SKY Series’ Ultraks 46K) placed third.

The women’s field was a different story with 32-year-old Briton Jasmin Paris, the Tromsø race winner, leading the race comfortably, especially on the technical sections which she loves. She finished in 8h15’56”.

“It was a great, great race,” she said. “I loved the race, the Series. I enjoy the energy you get. I really like that scrambling, technical stuff. I don’t really like trail, flat running. I wasn’t feeling that confident as Ruth caught me at the end of the trail in the valley and I could see Malene behind me. I couldn’t really sit around and wait so I pushed and joined a couple of guys who ran with me to the end where they dropped me,” delivering her to victory and the EXTREME Series Women’s Champion title.

The top five finishers were:

Women

1st Jasmin Paris (Great Britain) 08:15:56

2nd Malene Blikken Haukoy (Norway) 08:23:04

3rd Sarah Ridgeway (Great Britain) 08:44:40

4th Ruth Croft (New Zealand) 09:10:33

5th Martina Valmassoi (Italy) 09:14:37

Men

1st Jonathan Albon (Great Britain) 06:33:52

2nd Tom Owens (Great Britain) 06:37:21

3rd Marc Lauenstein (Swiss) 06:54:37

4th Finlay Wild (Great Britain) 07:00:57

5th Greg Vollet (France) 07:10:19

The UK’s First Vertical Kilometer

The precursor to the Salomon Glen Coe Skyline™ was an incredible weekend of Skyrunning kicked off by the UK’s first Vertical Kilometer® format race on Friday afternoon.

The Salomon Mamores VK™ was an incredible success. The pure ethos of sea to summit was personified with a course that provided all runners with a challenging 1000m vertical climb over a distance of 5km that was neatly split into three distinct sections.

The first third was runnable trail that may well have lulled everyone into a false sense of security. What followed was a wall of vertical fell with no path, just a line of orange flags leading to the sky. As the fell summited out, an arrow pointed left and the final section was a stunning rocky ridge that lead to the summit at 1000m+.

Runners were enthused at the finished and the phrase, “being Munro’ed”, has clearly entered the Skyrunning lexicon. Race Director Shane Ohly, said, “In our course design, we did not try to replicate a European style VK - we have a very Scottish mountain experience that is very much in keeping with the ethos of the other races that make up the Skyline Scotland™ weekend. Yes, it is a tough course, but it is also the stern reality of the Scottish Highland’s terrain!”

The Scottish weather played its part too, throwing everything at the runners in a 4-hour window; sun, cloud, clag, rain and strong winds. It was the luck of the draw what you received, however, for 4-runnners, the weather could have thrown anything at them and they would have still flown up the course. Experienced Skyrunners, Stian Angermund (VK World Champion), Alexis Sévennec and Francois Gonon took the top 3 spots with Sévennec pipping Angermund by just 7-seconds, 42:17 to 42:25. Francois Gonon placed 3rd 44:48 and Adrien Perret was 4th in 44:57.

In the ladies’ race, Georgina Tindley pipped Stephanie Provan to the top slot by 33-seconds, finishing 54:34 and 55:01 respectively. Zoe Procter was 3rd in 58:45.

The top five results were:

Male

1st Alexis Sévennec (France) 00:42:17

2nd Stian Angermund-Vik (Norway) 00:42:25

3rd Francois Gonon (France) 00:44:48

4th Adrien Perret (France) 00:44:57

5th Martin Mikkelsen-Barron (Great Britain) 00:45:03

Female

1st Georgia Tindley (Great Britain) 00:54:34

2nd Stephanie Provan (Great Britain) 00:55:01

3rd Zoe Procter (Great Britain) 00:58:45

4th Igone Campos (Spain) 01:04:34

5th Renoton Laurie (Great Britain) 01:04:57

Salomon Ring of Steall Skyrace™

Uncompromising mountain running, ridges, scrambles, steep ascents, boggy ground and a bucket full of technical running made the Salomon Ring of Steall Skyrace™ the UK’s Zegama!

Following in the tradition of Skyrunning’s iconic race, Zegama-Aizkorri, the inaugural Salomon Ring of Steall Skyrace™ has been touted by all who run it as one of the toughest 29km’s they have ever run! A sentiment echoed by race winner and Skyrunner® World Champion for the VK and SKY categories, Stian Angermund: “That was one incredibly tough and beautiful race. Wow, so technical and relentless. The ridges were long and challenging and the climbing kept coming. It really is an incredible race and one that I loved. I’d love to do more races like this!”

In the ladies’ race, Georgia Tindley did the ‘double’ by winning the Salomon Mamores VK™ followed by a stunning Salomon Ring of Steall Skyrace™ victory in 4:39:20. GB Orienteering team mates Hollie Orr and Jessica Tullie raced each other to the line in the battle for 2nd and 3rd place, with Hollie Orr just manging to secure second place.

The top five results were;

Men

1st Stian Angermund-Vik (Norway) 03:25:28

2nd Alexis Sévennec (France) 03:29:04

3rd Adrien Perret (France) 04:00:51

4th Luke Maude (Great Britain) 04:04:27

5th Rob Sinclair (Great Britain) 04:12:59

Women

1st Georgia Tindley (Great Britain) 04:39:20

2nd Hollie Orr (Great Britain) 04:51:53

3rd Jessica Tullie (Great Britain) 04:52:29

4th Joanna Zakrzewski (Great Britain) 04:56:50

5th Emily Hannah (USA) 05:00:25

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