The Marathon du Mont-Blanc 90K delivered one of its most attritional editions in years, with Louison Coiffet and Candice Fertin-Baccon emerging as winners of a Chamonix classic that was reshaped by punishing heat. Over a course measuring roughly 88 kilometres with more than 6,000 metres of climbing, the race became as much about survival as speed, and by the finish the day's brutal conditions had forced more than 150 official abandonments. For a festival weekend that also encompasses the headline 42K marathon and the popular 23K, the 90K is the connoisseur's event, and in 2026 it asked the hardest possible questions of the field.
Coiffet, of France, won the men's race in 9 hours 37 minutes and 22 seconds, but the margin tells the story of how close it came. American Ben Dhiman pushed him all the way and crossed the line just 40 seconds adrift in 9:38:02, with Italy's Cristian Minoggio completing the podium a few minutes back. After hours of racing across exposed alpine terrain in temperatures that climbed towards the mid-twenties Celsius, a 40-second gap over 88 kilometres represented a genuine duel, decided by who could best manage effort, fuelling and core temperature through the closing climbs rather than by any single decisive move.
The women's race produced the day's biggest surprise. Candice Fertin-Baccon, a local runner racing on home roads, won in 11:53:31, a result that placed her an extraordinary 24th overall in the combined field and confirmed the depth of her performance relative to the men around her. In a discipline where pre-race favourites are often household names within the sport, Fertin-Baccon's victory was a reminder that the long mountain ultra rewards consistency, heat tolerance and nerve over reputation. Her ability to keep moving efficiently while others faded in the heat proved the decisive quality on a day that punished anyone who started too hard.
Heat was the defining variable. With temperatures reaching around 26 degrees Celsius on exposed sections of the course, the race exposed the fine margins of ultra-distance pacing and the danger of going out hard in conditions that magnify every error. The 153 official abandonments underscore the toll: even seasoned mountain runners found the combination of altitude, sustained vertical gain and heat unforgiving. For those who finished, simply reaching Chamonix in good order was an achievement, and several mid-pack runners spoke of treating the day as a managed effort rather than a race once the temperatures rose.
The result lands at a significant point in the trail calendar. The final weekend of June routinely stacks Mont-Blanc alongside Western States, the Broken Arrow Skyrace and the Skyrunner World Series, giving fans a saturated weekend of mountain racing and giving athletes a clear marker on the road to UTMB in late August. For Coiffet and Fertin-Baccon, victory in Chamonix is both a standout result in its own right and a confidence boost heading into the heart of the European trail season, when the sport's biggest names converge on the same valley for the year's defining races.