The Transvulcania festival returns to La Palma on Saturday, 9 May, with the 73-kilometre ultramarathon set to leave Faro de Fuencaliente at 06:00 for the long northbound traverse to Plaza de España in Los Llanos de Aridane. Five days out, organisers have confirmed a deeper-than-usual women's elite field and a refreshed men's lineup for the headline distance, with the marathon and half-marathon companion races already showing as sold out and a swell of registrations across the shorter formats hinting at one of the largest editions in the race's history.
The women's race looks the more open of the two on paper. Ekaterina Mityaeva, racing as a neutral athlete after finishing second on the same course in 2025 just 18 minutes off the win, leads a group that also includes France's Blandine L'Hirondel, the 2025 Diagonale des Fous champion and 2025 Mont Blanc 90k winner. L'Hirondel was fourth at last year's CCC and arrives off a low-key spring focused on volume rather than racing, while a sizeable Spanish contingent led by names familiar to the Skyrunner World Series rounds out the front of the field. The course's relentless ridgeline climbs and the long technical descent into El Time will reward conservative pacing.
The men's headlines centre on Matt Daniels of the United States, who set a Canyons 50k course record of 3:21 in his last race and is making the long jump up in distance off that platform. He will face France's Théo Detienne, whose 2025 included the Mont Blanc 90k crown and a UTMB DNF, and Italy's Tobias Geiser, who came through Chianti 120k just off the podium and brings the kind of grinding mountain mileage La Palma traditionally rewards. The race also pulls in a solid pack of regulars from the Spanish, Catalan and Portuguese trail scenes who know every metre of the climb out of Roque de los Muchachos.
The ultramarathon's 73 kilometres carry roughly 4,400 metres of vertical gain, taking runners from sea level up to the 2,420-metre summit of Roque de los Muchachos before the long, knee-emptying descent into Tazacorte and the final road grind into Los Llanos. Conditions on the climb tend to swing from mild Atlantic damp at the bottom to dry alpine air on the ridge in a single push, and the pre-dawn start means the leaders typically reach the summit before the heat properly arrives. Aid stations are concentrated at the upper sections, where the technical underfoot makes calorie management harder than the topography alone suggests.
Transvulcania's 2026 edition is also the fifth round of the World Trail Majors series, which means UTMB Index points and series ranking implications add to the race's stakes. With Madeira already on the books for Katharina Hartmuth in late April, a strong run from L'Hirondel or Mityaeva would tighten the women's series picture significantly, while Daniels has a chance to plant a US flag in a circuit that has been almost entirely European-dominated. Coverage will run on Aravaipa Live and the official Transvulcania channels, with cut-off rolling into Saturday evening and the prize-giving scheduled for Sunday afternoon.