Ebensee, Austria - The WMRA Grand Prix continues on Sunday (9th) with the Feuerkogelberglauf in Ebensee.

The first ascent of the Feuerkogelberglauf was in 1997, when this was the venue of the second European Mountain Running Trophy. European mountain runners will never forget this race because of extremely bad weather as rain, wind and fog forced the organisers to shorten the race by moving the finish line from the summit to the upper cable car station.

Local favourite Helmut Schmuck won the men’s race in front of World champion Molinari and Erica Spiess won the women’s contest, and of those European Trophy participants, only the winner Schmuck, and Marcus Kroll, who finished 14th, will run the race on Sunday.

The 14th edition of the Feuerkogelberglauf should provide more highlights, as one of the WMRA Grand Prix events it attracts many international top class mountain runners. More than 200 runners from 12 countries have already entered the race.

Although some of the best are missing, a hard fight for the top positions is expected.

In the women’s race the main candidate for the first place is Andrea Mayr, the European Champion. Mateja Kosovelj and Lucija Krkoc from Slovenia and Iva Milesova from Czech Republic will also be in the fight for honours.

Andrzej Dlugosz from Poland, Mitja Kosovelj from Slovenia, Roman Skalsky from Czech Republic and local expert Marcus Kroel - currently fourth in the Grand Prix - are expected to find a place on the podium in the men’s race.

Men and women will run the same route - from the Ebensee (350m above sea level) to the Feuerkogel summit (1600m) - the only difference will be in the start location. Men will start in the city centre close to the lake, running past the lower cablecar station, whereas the women will start 2km later. In addition all will run the same course – 9km with 1200m to climb with 1000m alt. difference concentrated in the middle part from 3km to 8km; the last 3km are more friendly to the tired runners.

The men’s course record holder is Jonathan Wyatt with 55:19 (2006) and this result isn't expected to be threatened. The women’s record holder is Ana Frost with 1:02:46 and we can expect that it will be necessary to break this mark to win the first prize, which is the same for men and women (400€ + 250€ for breaking the course record).

Tomo Sarf (WMRA) for the IAAF