Age-related performance at the Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc®

Abstract

Some of the effects of aging and inactivity can be confounded. Master athletes are an interesting model to investigate human aging as they are free from the deleterious effects of inactivity. The aim of the present study was to analyze the number of male finishers and their performance across age at the Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc® (UTMB®, 170 km, 10 000 m of elevation gain) and two shorter races organized during the same event, Courmayeur-Champex-Chamonix (CCC®, 101 km, 6100 m) and Orsières-Champex-Chamonix (OCC, 55 km, 3500 m). Eighty percent of the finishers were aged between 23 and 49 years when considering the three races together. Top 10 average speed progressively decreased with age independently of the distance of the race. For every competition, average speed for the Top 10 decreased by 10% between 23–39 yr and 40–49 yr, then by 20% per decade. Future interventional studies should investigate the physiological factors (e.g. neuromuscular fatigue) associated with the age-related decline in ultra-trail running performance.