Restonica Trail by UTMB®

But where is the Restonica Trail ? 🤔

In Corsica, of course! Blue sea, fragrant maquis, breathtaking landscapes and trails that push your legs to the limit 🦵. Welcome to Corte, the historic capital of Haute-Corse, perched in the heart of the gorges, where an exceptionally demanding mountain ultramarathon awaits you every July. And July in Corsica, it’s hot. Very, very hot 🥵. Even at night 🌙. The Restonica Trail offers five formats for all levels: a 9 km warm-up, the "Giru di Tumbone" over 17 km, the "Tavignanu Trail" at 33 km, the "Restonica Trail" at 69 km, and the "l'Ultra-Trail di Corsica" aka the monster of 110 km and 7 200 mD+ that you can try in a 4-person relay to share the pain with friends 😂. A maximum of technique, of rocky sections, pure mountain ⛰️. Friendly advice: bring trekking poles 🥢. The race of "l'UTC" will take you up to Bocca Crucetta at 2 415 meters above sea level (no, that's not a pizza place 🍕) with a 48-hour cut-off, proof of how brutal the course is. Some finish while others are just getting started with the soreness 🕐.

It all starts in the Tavignanu Biological Reserve, in the dark and under the smoky torches for the long distances 🔥. Put your headlamp in your pack, it’s going to be pitch black 🫣. At dawn, the landscapes reveal themselves in all their enormity: the sea in the distance, waterfalls, and at the col de Bocca alle Porte at 2 252 m ⬆️, a spectacular view of the glacial lakes Capitellu and Melu nestled in an Alpine backdrop ❄️. Running on the Restonica Trail, it's about meeting all the diversity of Corsican mountains in a single race: altitude, technical climbs and descents, creeky trail, lake 🏞️. The routes pass through the mythical GR20, which hikers take 10 to 15 days to complete and that some runners devour in chunks through the night 😅. The trails cross the Corsican Regional Nature Park, which covers 450 000 hectares – half of the island. You run in a protected area, among Laricio pines over a hundred years old and about pozzines, these little green bogs that look like a golf course laid out by nature 🌿.

Born in 2008 from the ashes of the Raid Inter-Lacs, a two-day trail where the route was free between control points, the Restonica Trail became Corsica's most popular trail, before joining the UTMB World Series in 2022 among the circuit's top 19 races 🌍. And despite this global consecration, the local soul remained intact 🤗. Each finisher leaves with Running Stones that bring the more ambitious closer to Chamonix, and the top three finishers in each event earn their direct ticket to the UTMB World Series Final 🎟️. But before or after the race, take time to stroll through Corte, to visit its famous Citadel and savor the Falculella, THE local specialty that will have you back on your feet after such an effort 💪.

The Restonica Trail by UTMB® reveals another island, wild, vertical, which can only be tamed on foot and with controlled effort 🏃‍♂️. And that’s exactly the DNA of trail 🤓.