Kodiak Ultra Marathons by UTMB®

Imagine a mountain town so tranquil, so picturesque, that Hollywood filmed western scenes there for decades 🎬. Now imagine that once a year, hundreds of crazy runners descend, lace up trail shoes, and race through the pine forests at 2,000 meters above sea level ⬆️.

Welcome to the HOKA Kodiak Ultra Marathons by UTMB® in Big Bear Lake, California 🏞️. The name comes from rancheros who mapped these mountains in the 19th century and found a valley buzzing with bears 🐻. The name seemed logical... Until the intense hunting had become so radical that by 1906, all local grizzlies were exterminated 🤯. Big Bear Lake—without bears, it’s a bit like UTMB without elevation: the name is there, the beast is gone 😅. No need to speed around every bend fearing a wild animal might be chasing you! 😬

The race offers five distances for all levels: the 10K (10.5 km), 280 mD+), the 21K (19.5 km, 575 mD+), the 50K (48.4 km, 1 339 mD+), the 100K (99 km, 3 120 mD+), and finally the bieg Boss of the Kodiak: the 100 Miles with 162 km and 4 850 meters of positive elevation 😱. To put that in perspective: it's the equivalent of climbing the Eiffel Tower 135 times, running with a pack, at night. The 100M courses the entire Big Bear ValleyBig Bear Valley, with a few miles on the Pacific Crest Trail and a summit of the Sugarloaf Mountain at 3 047 meters 📈. It's a true mountain 100 miles, with a large portion of the course above 2 100 meters 🗻. This famous Pacific Crest Trail itself is legendary 👑. It spans over 4 200 km, from the Mexican border to Canada, along the ridges of the Cascades and the Sierra Nevada ❄️. Designated national trail in 1968, it was first proposed in 1926. Thousands of hikers take six months to complete it. 🥾. In HOKA Kodiak Ultra Marathons by UTMB®, you’ll log a few more kilometers before heading toward the Siberia Canyon again. All told, you’ll traverse three distinct ecosystems: the high desert, the subalpine forest 🌲, and the semi-arid zone, each with its own beauty, topography, and challenges 💪.

We can’t talk about Kodiak without mentioning what makes it so special: the Western States Endurance Run 🏃‍♂️. And here we touch on the very origins of the global ultrarunning scene 🤩. The Kodiak recently earned the title of UTMB World Series Americas Major, which in the UTMB ecosystem is like a promotion with a prize 😎. The Running Stones, those precious passes that grant entry into the UTMB Mont-Blanc lottery, are doubled compared to other World Series events 🤪. And the top runners at distances 100M100K and 50K earn an automatic qualification for the UTMB World Series Finals. Suffering in the Big Bear Lake mountains can thus lead directly to an invitation to the year-end ball in Chamonix ✨.

The cherry on top is the atmosphere that surrounds it all 🥳. The start and finish are right in the heart of the village, with spectators cheering every step. The festival offers stands of local food stands de restauration locale, a DJ, and a parade through the streets to greet the runners. A town of 5,000 residents that becomes a global trail capital for a weekend 🙌. That’s the charm of an event that keeps a human soul behind the UTMB machine ❤️.

The bears may be gone, but the bear remains, his name is Kodiak, and he’s just waiting for you to come run with him! 😝