103: Ukrainian Ultrarunners | Ultrarunning History

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By Davy Crockett

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Ultrarunning in Ukraine has had a long, wonderful history since the early 1970s. As the country is being ravaged from war, ultrarunners around Ukraine have turned their attention to survival, defending their country, or fleeing as refugees to other countries. Ultramarathons, once held regularly in Ukraine, are sadly gone for now.

This episode will highlight the history of ultrarunning in Ukraine and profile some of the very talented Ukrainian ultrarunners who over the years have been a great inspiration. Ultrarunners from Ukraine ran with joy in the past, but now they run in fear. With most communications cut off from them, thoughts and prayers go out as they deal with the severe violence taking place in their homeland. Some recent news is being heard from Ukrainian ultrarunners.

Over the years, there have been more than 5,000 ultrarunners from Ukraine who have walked or ran in ultramarathon events around the world from distances from 50 km to 3,100 miles. Before the pandemic, in 2019, there were 30 ultramarathons held in Ukraine and at least 1,300 Ukrainians finished ultras that year.

100km Along the Belt of Glory

The first ultra in Ukraine was started in 1974, while the country was still part of the Soviet Union. It is called “100km Along the Belt of Glory” held in Odessa, Ukraine’s biggest port city. The race has been held every year since, for the 48 years. It was established to dedicate the day of liberation of Odessa from the Nazi invaders on April 10, 1944.

The race, with a 24-hour cutoff, used to run a big loop around Odessa, but recently starts in Shevchenko Park, near the monument to the “Unknown Soldier,” and then runs a big loop through Odessa, visiting many of monuments of the Second World War. It was first organized as a walking event in 1974 with 128 starters, and eventually evolved into a running ultra. The race’s largest year was in 1988 when there were 2,111 starters and 889 finishers in under 12 hours.

The current organizers wrote this description, “On April 10, 1944, the troops of the 3rd Ukrainian Front liberated our city from the fascist invaders. And on April 6, 1974, the inaugural ‘100 km along the Belt of Glory’ took place. Since then, every year, without exception, at the beginning of April, a walking “hundredth” starts. “We can run because you stood still!” – this phrase has become the motto of the hundred. Sadly, and obviously, the race will not be held this year for the first time since 1974.

The Belt of Glory 100km has had many traditions through the years. Guitarists walk along playing songs, accompanying the walkers and runners for the first 15 kilometers. At the finish line is played, “We are the Champions,” recognizing all those that finish as champions of the event. Finishers then get to dine on a signature soup cooked with love in the field kitchen.

During the 1980s, the race was dominated by Vitalii Kovel (1947-) of Russia, a seven-time finisher, who still holds event record with a time of 6:14:12. He also holds five of the six fastest times in the history of the race. Among the women, Natalya Marimorich (1949-) of Ukraine has had the most wins, six from 1976 to 1985. The course record is held by Tatiana Khomich of Belaris with a time of 8:31:00, set in 1990. In 2021, the overall winner was Saaryan Andrey Pavlovich with 8:13. The women’s champion was Valentina Kovalskaya with 10:05.

The Stadium Run in Odessa

The runners in Odessa can be credited for being the pioneers of Ukrainian Ultrarunning. In 1988, another race was established in Odessa, a 24-hour track race that started a long tradition of fixed-time ultras in Ukraine. It was held annually in late October for ten years and called the “24 Hours Stadium Run” and held in Spartak Stadium. For the first year, there were 35 runners from Ukraine, Russia, Latvia, and Moldavia. Valerii Gubar (1948-) of Russia won with 163 miles/262 kms. Gabar was one of the greatest fixed-time ultrarunners in the world of that era. His mark at the race that year was the all-time race record and was the third-best 24-hour distance for a USSR runner, during the Soviet Union era.

The next year the race was expanded to also include a 48-hour race. A 72-hour race was added in 1990, a six-day race added in 1991, and an incredible 1,000-mile race was added in 1995. By 2001, a Ukrainian 24-hour team was formed that competed at the various 24-hours IAU World Championships.

Starting in 2007, Ukrainian ultras spread to other cities, Kharkov and Kyiv. The Kyiv 24 Hour Self-Transcendence race was held for 13 years, from 2007-2019. Odessa’s Belt of Glory 100km still was the most popular race. By 2011, a Ukrainian 100 km team was formed that competed in Winschoten, Netherlands.

Ukrainian Trail Ultra

Trail ultras in Ukraine began around 2015 with the Crimea X Run 52km and the popularity of trail ultras in Ukraine increased fast with many more races, including a 100-miler. Trailrunner Magazine reported, “Ukraine is a beautiful country with extraordinary nature and breathtaking landscapes, which makes it possible to run trails in nearly every part of our land, year-round. The best place for trails is the Carpathian Mountains, with some peaks above 6,500 feet, with high humidity in every season.”

The most popular trail ultra in Ukraine is Chornohora Sky Marathon 62K that ran on six 2000-meter peaks in the Carpathians and had 364 finishers in 2021. It has been held for six years and was scheduled to be held again in August 2022. Watch Chornohora Sky Marathon 2020 Official Video

Notable Ukrainian Ultrarunners

Valeryi Khrystenok (Христенок Валерий)

The most prolific male ultrarunner ever from Ukraine is Valeryi Khrystenok (1961-) from Kyiv. During his hopefully continued ultrarunning career, he has finished at least 83 ultras. His first was run in 1987 at the Europe-Asia 100 km road race held in Orenburg, Russia where he finished 15^th, in 8:44:18. While part of the Soviet Union, only few ultrarunners were able to get permission to run in the many ultras held in western Europe. As the Soviet Union started to dissolve in 1990, Khrystenok started to compete in ultras in Western Europe.

He was the lone Ukrainian participant at 1990 International 24-hour Championships held inside the Milton Keynes mall in Great Britain, which was won by ultrarunning legend, Don Ritchie, “The Stubborn Scotsman.” The course was set with an 890-meter loop in the largest shopping mall in Europe. Cones were put out with long stretches of plastic tape. The surface was hard marble that became very slippery when wet. This race was referred to as “the greatest 24-hour field ever assembled.” Khrystenok finished in 37^th, with 104 miles.

Khrystenok continued to compete in many European championships across Europe in the coming years. He was the premier ultrarunner when a Ukrainian team was formed in 2001 to participate in the IAU 24-hour World Championship at Verona, Italy. He went on to run in six more world championships, including the most recent IAU 24-hour World Championship held in Albi France where world records were set by Aleksandr Sorokin of Lithuania (173 miles / 278 km) and Camille Herron of the US (167 miles / 270 km). Khrystenok finished in 274^th out of 346 runners with 91 miles / 146 km at the age of 58, one of 13 Ukraine team members who competed.

His greatest performance probably was at the 1991 24 heures de Niort in France. This was held on a 3-mile road loop with 114 runners. He was the overall winner with 161 miles / 260 km. He also won several other 24-hours races in Russia, Switzerland, and Ukraine. He has reached and passed 100 miles in more than 40 races during his career. His last known race came in 2020 when he ran in the 100 km Along the Belt of Glory where he finished 41^st in 15:39.

Larysa Labartkava (Лабарткава Лариса)

The most prolific female ultrarunner ever from Ukraine is Larysa Labartkava (1949-) from Lviv. During her hopefully continued ultrarunning career, she has finished at least 52 ultras. What is incredible is that she began to run at the age of 55 in 2004. In the years before that, she participated in mountaineering.

She ran her first ultra in 2009, at the age of 60, the Open Championship of Moldova 24 hour run which she won with 70 miles / 113 km. She kept improving into her 60s, winning a 48-hour race in Vinnitsa, Ukraine with an impressive 145 miles / 234 km. She also won a 48-hour race in 2018 in Belarus where she reached 137 miles / 220 km at the age of 69. That year she also ran at the 100 km European championships in Romania that was won by Aleksandr Sorokin. She won her age group.

In normal times of the past, each day Labarkava would work as a crossing guard in the morning helping children cross the street on the way to school. Then she would head off on her morning run. To keep herself fit, she does aerobics twice a week, in addition to running. Her instructor said, “She works hard, all the time. She does not miss training classes. She receives her physical preparation and relaxation after intensive physical loads during the marathon distance.”

During her golden years she has finished at least 140 marathons or ultras in Ukraine and other countries in Europe. Her son said, “I always wait for her at the finish line to take pictures and of course to support her.” A friend said, “Larysa is absolutely unique. She has a natural gift. She is an endurance athlete. Very few people can run two days in a row without any break.”

In her 13-year ultrarunning career she has averaged finishing about eight ultras per year and went over 100 miles in at least 15 of them. Her last ultra on record was in 2021, when at the age of 72, she covered 200 km (124 miles) in 48 hours, in Poland.

Viktor Lozovik (Лозовик Виктор)

Viktor Petrovich Lozovik (1965-), of Armyansk on the isthmus of the Crimean peninsula, was an elite ultrarunner from Ukraine with at least a dozen ultra wins, including three victories at “100km Along the Belt of Glory,” with his best time of 7:36:00 set in 1999. He also achieved 146 miles / 236 km in a 24-hour run, and 88 miles / 143 km in a 12-hour run.

In 2005, he put ultrarunning aside and took up ultra-distance cycling. He became very famous when he attempted a 7,230-mile (11635 km) bike ride in 85 days from Uzhgorod in Ukraine, to Vladivostok, Russia, located at the terminus of the Trans-Siberian Railway on the shores of the Sea of Japan, near the North Korean border. He started his journey on May 31, 2005 and crossed into Russia seven days later. He finished 85 days later at Vladivostok near the railway station, and proclaimed, “I did it! My dream has come true.” During his trip, he wore out three tires, a chain, nine sprockets, and four spokes had to be replaced.

In 2017, he took his riding to even greater extremes and peddled through 17 countries in 148 days on a homemade bike with the Ukrainian flag waving in front. Lozovik shared his impressions of how people treated the Ukrainian flag in other countries, “People who met me on the way always asked me about the events in Ukraine, no one treated the flag badly, even in Russia people looked at it normally.” When he was asked why he did it, his reply was simply, “Movement is life.”

Kateryna Katiushcheva (Катющева Катерина)

Kateryna Katiushcheva (1987-2020) of Odessa, was known as the “Iron Lady” of ultrarunning in Ukraine. She was a talented triathlete and began running ultras in 2016 with a second-place finish at 100 km Along the Belt of Glory, and a first-place finish at Kyiv’s 24-hour race with 97 miles / 156 km. She was a member of Ukraine’s National 24-hour team and ran at the 2016 European Championship at France (125 miles / 201 km) and at the 2017 World Championship at Belfast. In 2019 she ran at the IAU 50km World Championship at Brasov, Romania where she set a personal best of 3:52:31.

Sadly, in June 2020, at the 42-mile Odessa Ultra-Trail Kuyalnik race in Ukraine, she went missing. The tough course runs close to the Black Sea at Ukraine’s most southern point, “in some places impenetrable jungle, swamps, reeds, stones, steep ups and downs.” The race-day temperature reached 100 degrees F.

It was reported, “There were initial fears that Katiushcheva had been kidnapped when she didn’t reach the finish line in the expected time window. Police eventually located her due to her mobile phone signal.” She had collapsed and was in critical condition. It was hoped she would survive, but sadly later on she suffered a stroke in the hospital and died at the age of 33.

Kateryna Katiushcheva had said, “Believe in your strength. If you want to run, run! Even if something goes wrong, at least you tried.”

Igor Gotsuljak

Igor Gotsuljak is a computer programmer. In 2021, he was the first ever Ukrainian participant in the Badwater Ultramarathon and he came in second place in 26:35:08. He is currently fighting for his country.

Serhii Popov (Попов Сергій)

Serhii Popov (1980-), of Kyiv, is a running coach, a journalist and Ph.D student. He is the fastest trail ultrarunner in Ukraine. He has won national trail and long-distance mountain running championships almost every year since 2015 and took part in nine world championships. Popov began ultrarunning in 2016 as a member of the Kyiv Marathon Club and won his first trail ultra that year, a 60 km race in Poland. The wins kept coming. His most recent victories were at the 2021 Chornohora Sky Marathon 62km in Ukraine, and road races: The Garganon Ultramaratona 50K in Itala with 3:11:14, and the Taubertal 100-miler in Germany where he finished in 13:23:53.

On March 9, 2022, Popov published an article for Fox News. He had been training for an ultra to be held in Barcelona, Spain on February 27. He wrote, “On February 23^rd, prepared to fly to Spain the next day, my girlfriend and I fell asleep. We woke up at 5 a.m. because of the sound of explosions. The war had started. Our decision was to get to Zhytomyr, 80 miles from Kyiv, my girlfriend’s hometown.” The roads were jammed with traffic with thousands of cars trying to escape in panic. Instead of continuing, they opted to wait and stay at a friend’s home.

They did not sleep well because explosions continued all night. In the morning, they left town in their friend’s car but because of a destroyed bridge, they decided to stay in Zhytomyr. He said, “It is not the safest place, but it is a place where I thought I could do something to help fight against enemies.” He didn’t have the experience to join the army, but he and his girlfriend started to help where they could, including delivering water and snacks to soldiers on block posts, building fortifications, and doing other volunteer work.

Popov wrote, “The noise of approaching missiles or jets is terrifying. You feel shaking walls, think that this is the end. Just when I am writing this essay, I could hear jets and explosions. I am trying to stay positive and strong, but sometimes feel helpless. Before the war, I was a coach for a local running club. Now, that is not an option, so I have lost all my income. I left my home in Kyiv and don’t know if it still stands. But I don’t think myself as a victim. There are thousands of people in Ukraine who are in more danger than me, who lost much more. I just wish this war will end soon, we will rebuild our country and I will be able to run another 100 miles.”

Popov has been active on Strava, but his last recorded run was on February 23, 2022, an 8-mile evening road run in Kyiv. Before then, he had been training about 100 miles a week in 2022.

Viktoriia Nikolaienko-Bryantseva (Ніколаєнко-Брянцева Вікторія)

Viktoriia Nikolaienko-Bryantseva (1987-) of Kozhanka is the Ukrainian national champion and record holder of the 24-hour run. She started ultrarunning in 2019 and very quickly established herself as the best female ultrarunner in Ukraine. In 2021, she was the overall winner of Kyiv’s Last One Standing ultra with 191.5 miles/308.2 kms. She also reached 147 miles / 236 km at 24-hour UltraPark race in Poland, the same race where Aleksandr Sorokin of Lithuania set a new world record of 192 miles / 309 km.

Viktoriia’s dream was to be able to participate in the Big Dogs Backyard Ultra and to be able to meet Courtney Dauwalter, but the war has changed everything. Now her goal is to rescue her children.

Viktoriia Nikolaienko-Bryantseva with Aleksandr Sorokin

She recently fled Kviv with her 5-year-old son and 9-year-old daughter, in search of a safe place. During air raid sirens, she and her children had to run to a shelter and hide there. She reports they are safe but she “just can’t bear to leave her beloved Ukraine, yet.” She left behind her brother and husband, who chose to defend the city. Her other relatives were in the Kherson region, hiding from Russian shelling in basements.

Now the athlete’s thoughts are no longer about training or competitions: “My dream now is to see my husband, my brother and my parents alive. Before the war, I trained a lot and I was preparing to improve my national record in the 24 hours, but the war has come. It is scary to see how my homeland is collapsing. My dream is to wake up in my country and see from all the news that Ukraine has won. My dream is to see Ukraine as a whole, restored, invincible country.” When the U.S. National 24 Hour Running Team read Ultrarunning History’s post about her enormous trials, they hoped to arrange for her to meet Coutney Dauwalter in the future.

Andrii Tkachuk (Андрій Бродяга Ткачук)

Andrii Tkachuk, (1985-) of Zakarpatska, is the greatest ultrarunner ever from Ukraine and is their top runner on Ukraine’s National 24-hour team. He started running ultras in 2012. Victories started to come fast as he dominated 24-hour races in Kyiv from 2016-2018. At the World 24-hour championships at Albi, France in 2019, he took 11th place overall with 163 miles / 262 km.

In 2020 he won Ukraine’s Big Dog’s Backyard Championship with 170 miles / 274 km. In 2021 at the UltraPark 24-hour race in Poland, he finished second to Sorokin with 183 miles / 295 km for the third best mark in ultrarunning history. During that race he also reached 96 miles / 155 km in 12 hours and ran 100 miles in 12:32:33 setting Ukrainian national records. He also ran 270 miles / 435 km in 48 hours one month before this huge accomplishment, at Vinnitsa, Ukraine. That mark is second all-time, only behind Yiannis Kouros (294 miles / 474 km on a track). In 2021, he set a world best running 254 miles / 410 km on a treadmill in 48 hours in Poland. For that achievement he was named the best athlete of the month in Ukraine for the second time. He is currently ranked the best top trail runner from Ukraine.

Andrii Tkachuk is a reservist in the Ukrainian army and was called to fight for his country. He answered the call to defend Ukraine. Sadly, he was wounded and as of March 10, 2022, is in the hospital. “A few days ago, he was wounded near Zaporizhia. Andrew did not immediately understand what had happened, and then came when it was warm. The wounded man spent another night in the landing, but successfully got out and did not even want to go to the hospital. He doesn’t sit still and is already dreaming when he gets back.”

IAU Statement on Ukraine

The International Association of Ultrarunners (IAU) issued a statement that they strongly condemned Russian actions against Ukraine and that Russia had already been suspended from the IAU because of doping violations and therefore not eligible to host or send teams to IAU Championships. “The IAU is in touch with the ultrarunning family in Ukraine while several members of the community have been called to the frontlines. We are united among our community in support for runners and the entire nation of Ukraine. We extend our deepest thoughts, prayers, and strength to the Ukrainian community. We will continue to promote the message of peace and solidarity across the globe.”

Current conditions in Odessa

In Odessa, the birthplace of ultrarunning in Ukraine, people are fleeing, others are hoping and waiting nervously. Amidst the chaos, a Ukrainian Military Band held a concert recently outside. Band members were seen standing in front of sandbag barriers that are being put up for defenses. In front of the barrier was written, “Odessa-Ukraine.” It was reported, “Residents pile up sandbags and make Molotov Cocktails, as they prepare to defend their home. Ukrainian officials are becoming more and more certain that the southern city of Odessa could be Russia’s next target.”

It is hoped that this conflict will soon end, and that someday ultrarunning can return to Ukraine where people can again be seen running with joy.

Note: This article will continue to be updated. Corrections and additions are welcome.

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