What is the Chartreuse Terminorum?
An ultra like no other
The Chartreuse Terminorum is an extraordinary ultra-endurance event that takes place in the Chartreuse massif. Here, the goal is not just to go far: it's about enduring, navigating, staying clear-headed, and completing loops within a time limit, without the usual markers of trail races. For many, it is considered the toughest race in France.
An extraordinary race, inspired by the Barkley
Inspired by the legendary Barkley Marathons in the United States, the Terminorum embodies the spirit of a radical challenge: a deliberately confusing race, where the rules are simple on paper but unforgiving on the ground. Total commitment is required, and uncertainty is an integral part of the experience.
In a few numbers
Five loops. A strict time limit. A distance and elevation that place the race at the very top of the scale.
A hybrid and therefore unpredictable event
The Chartreuse Terminorum lies at the crossroads of several disciplines. Of course, there's trail running: elevation gain, demanding terrain, hours of effort. But there's also navigation, strategy, and a form of adventure where you progress without a track, without markers, confronting the massif as much as yourself.
Here, running is not enough
On a marked course, you can sometimes "hang on" by just enduring. Here, that doesn't work. You have to make decisions, re-adjust when you make a mistake, manage your resources, accept losing time, and then get moving again. The Terminorum doesn't just reward speed: it rewards clarity and resilience.
Vocabulary to know
Runners, and an unforgiving framework
Who comes to challenge themselves at the Chartreuse Terminorum, and what rules make this race so formidable? Here, the difficulty is not just about kilometers: it comes from the entire system.
Across all editions, only 6 finishers out of 274 starters completed the race, which is ≈ 2.19%. This rate illustrates a simple reality: in the Terminorum, failure is not an exception; it's the most likely scenario.
Not necessarily "the fastest," but those who seek a total challenge: ultra-endurance, navigation, self-sufficiency per loop, sleep management, and the ability to make decisions under fatigue.
The Terminorum attracts adventure profiles as much as experienced trail runners.
Secret course, deliberately elusive
The exact route is not known in advance. The course remains deliberately secret and can be partially modified from one edition to the next, which prevents any "recipe" or perfect reproduction year after year.
Copying the map as a first test
Even before the start, applicants must copy the map. The course is drawn by the organization on a 1:25,000 scale model, and everyone must accurately transfer it to their own map. Not all actual paths are shown: you have to read contour lines, anticipate the terrain, and verify, with the roadbook, that the route will match the ground. The books are indicated, but misplacing them is enough to jeopardize a loop. A copying error can condemn hours of "gardening" in the massif.
Loop autonomy: alone on the field
The rule is simple: during the loop, the runner is alone. All external assistance is forbidden between the start and the return to camp. Organization at camp (start/finish) may exist, but once you've set off, you must manage your progress, choices, and mistakes without help.
No GPS • No marking • No assistance during the loop
Navigation is old-school: terrain reading, map, compass, decisions under fatigue.
The books as ultimate judges
Checkpoints are not arches or markers. They are hidden books in the massif. To validate their passage, runners must find these books and bring back the corresponding pages. Without this proof, the loop is not validated.
When starting is already part of the challenge
The start does not follow a classic schedule. The exact time is kept secret and announced according to a specific protocol: the signal triggers a countdown, then the actual start. This ambiguity is part of the race: it breaks routines and requires managing waiting, stress, and sleep.
Time as the main enemy
The Chartreuse Terminorum is often won against the clock. Each loop must be completed in less than 16 hours, and the entire event cannot exceed 80 hours. Over the laps, fatigue and errors accumulate: the slightest "gardening," too long a break, or a bad decision can be enough to push an attempt beyond the time limit.
Why here, and nowhere else
The Chartreuse Terminorum could not have been born anywhere else. The Chartreuse massif is not just a backdrop: it is a territory that imposes its rules, its rhythm, and its silence. A slow, dense, demanding massif, where error is costly and progress is never fluid.
Chartreuse, a field of commitment
Long before the creation of the race, the Chartreuse was the playground of Benoît Laval during his training for his participations in the Barkley Marathon in the USA. A massif he knows intimately, for its harshness as much as for its austerity. Here, nothing is spectacular, but everything is demanding.
A territory steeped in meaning
At the heart of the massif lies the Grande Chartreuse monastery, mother house of the Carthusian Order. While in Tennessee, the Barkley is marked by the presence of a former prison, the Terminorum is set in a territory shaped by retreat, silence, and duration.
Raidlight's historical presence in Chartreuse strengthens this organic link between the race and the territory. Here, the mountain is not an interchangeable backdrop: it is an integral part of the intention.
Solitude, silence, commitment
The Chartreuse imposes a rare form of solitude. Deep forests, cold valleys, the absence of constant visual landmarks create an environment where you find yourself facing yourself. The Terminorum does not seek to hide this: it fully embraces it.
A selection mirroring the race
The philosophy of the race extends to the selection of participants. You don't sign up for the Chartreuse Terminorum: you apply.
Selection is based on a letter of application, read by the Triumvirate, who chooses the participants and designs a partially renewed course each year, kept intentionally secret. This is a way of reminding that, here, nothing is owed and everything begins with intention.
Long considered impossible… until proven otherwise
In its early days, the Chartreuse Terminorum was quickly categorized as an impossible race to finish. Like the Barkley before it, it accumulated abandonments, failures, and aborted attempts. Many broke their teeth on it, convinced that the finish line was out of reach.
And yet, history shows something else. By dedicating time, energy, reflection, and experience to it, some manage to understand the implicit rules of the race. In 2023, for the first time, several runners completed all five loops.
This turning point does not make the Terminorum easier. It simply proves that it is precisely where it was conceived: at the limit of what is achievable.
Adapt without betraying
In the face of these successes, the Triumvirate evolved the race. The course was adjusted, certain difficulties were reinforced, always respecting the initial idea: to remain demanding without ever becoming arbitrary.
The Chartreuse Terminorum is neither static nor permissive. It evolves to remain true to its primary intention: to test limits without ever promising success.
Achievements & Statistics
Unlike classic races, the Chartreuse Terminorum's track record is best understood through its failure rate. Finishing is the exception, not the norm.
- 2023: Sébastien Raichon, Mickaël Berthon, Alberto Herrero Casas, Benoît Bachelet, Nicolas Moyroud
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2024: François Devaux
- Séverine Vandermeulen becomes the first woman to complete a Fun Run.
- 2025: No finishers
In the Terminorum, there is no classic chronological ranking: either you finish, or the race wins.
What the Terminorum says about trail running today
The Chartreuse Terminorum goes far beyond a simple race. It raises questions about the practice of modern trail running, its formats, its objectives, and its relationship to performance.
Breaking away from usual formats
In an era of marked, mediatized, and standardized ultras, the Terminorum offers a counter-model. No spectacle, no live coverage, no traditional ranking. Just a raw, unadorned challenge.
The Terminorum breaks the codes. It rejects benchmarks. It reminds us that trail running, before being an event, is a total commitment, with oneself, with the terrain, with uncertainty.
Accepting failure
Here, failure is not an anomaly. It is an integral part of the experience. Giving up, coming back, trying again: the Terminorum rehabilitates a more honest relationship with difficulty.
Training as the key to success
More than for any other race, success relies on the time invested: learning to navigate, testing equipment, understanding one's reactions to sleep deprivation and error.
Stories more than results
What we remember from the Chartreuse Terminorum are the stories. Those of Mickaël Berthon, Sébastien Raichon, Benoît Laval, and all those for whom the race was a foundational experience, whether they finished or not.
Touching his limits, sometimes exceeding them without knowing if he would reach the end of the road: this is what excited Mickaël Berthon as the Chartreuse Terminorum approached.
Accustomed to races with dizzying distances and elevation gains, he nevertheless approached this event with particular humility. Here, error is unforgiving, and every decision can turn the race around.
After several attempts, the 2023 edition marked a turning point. Mickaël finally managed to complete the five laps, realizing an obsession of several years.
Sébastien Raichon approaches the Chartreuse Terminorum with an approach made of experience, lucidity, and patience. Accustomed to extreme endurance formats, he knows that in this race, success does not rely solely on physical condition, but on the ability to endure, to navigate, and to remain in control of his decisions when everything becomes uncertain.
In 2023, he made history in the Terminorum by becoming one of the first finishers, completing the five loops in a demanding and unpredictable massif. Two years later, in 2025, he completed a Fun Run, reminding us that, in this event, every validated loop counts.
Discreet and persistent, Sébastien embodies a vision of adventure where the essential is not to shine, but to endure.
"Neque porro quisquam est, qui dolorem ipsum, quia dolor sit, amet... Cicero reminds us that no one desires pain for its own sake. The Chartreuse Terminorum starts from the same principle: we don't seek to suffer, we only accept that certain answers require going through discomfort, fatigue, and doubt."
Founder of Raidlight, former member of the French trail running team, Benoît Laval has long explored the Chartreuse to prepare for his participations in the Barkley. He never finished this mythical race, like almost everyone who attempts it, but it left him with a conviction: some events must test something other than speed.
It was with this in mind that he created the Chartreuse Terminorum in 2017: a race without GPS, without markings, without certainties.
A radical challenge, designed to shake things up, not to seduce.
A return to the essence of trail running: getting lost, deciding, starting over.
To go further
Books, films, and resources to delve deeper into the world of the Chartreuse Terminorum and so-called "impossible" races.
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Film - Chartreuse Terminorum: Conquering Oneself, a film by Jean Despiau & Maxime Audouard, 2024
A documentary focused on the Terminorum 2023 offers a visual immersion into the event. Through the eyes of Ronan, a passionate Pyrenean runner, the film explores the mystical atmosphere of the massif, the selection of applicants, and the extreme effort required by this Barkley-inspired race. Jury Prize at the "Le Trail fait son cinéma" 2024 festival. uptrackplus.com
👉 Watch the film -
Official Chartreuse Terminorum Page
The official race page gathers all essential information: history, philosophy, registration procedures, and archives of past editions. It is the reference source for those who want to understand the rules, follow upcoming events, or apply as a participant.
👉 The official website -
Book - Simon Lancelevé - La Quête: Behind the Scenes of the Chartreuse Terminorum, De Boeck Supérieur editions.
Simon Lancelevé is a sociologist and journalist, specializing in endurance and race narratives. He followed the Terminorum community for four years to understand what this event reveals about human trajectories and profound commitments.
👉 His book La Quête
2 comments
J’adhère totalement à l’Esprit d’une telle Aventure ! Aujourd’hui trop âgé (81 ans) pour envisager participer à un tel rêve éveillé… J’ai eu la chance de participer aux premiers UTMB où malgré de nombreux participants, j’étais le plus souvent seul sur le parcours… Puis à la première Petite Trotte à Léon de 2008 qui se rapprochait de l’esprit de votre Terminorum, nous l’avions faite sans instrument ni trace enregistrée, un souvenir inoubliable, avec ses mirages nocturnes et ses épuisements diurnes… Un Aconcagua en traversée, le premier Raid de la Voie Sacrée pour honorer mes 2 grands-pères victime de Verdun !
L’an dernier un Mont-Blanc dans la tempête pour honorer mon fils décédé m’a obligé à me dépasser, à chercher ma forge intérieure pour l’atteindre…
Aujourd’hui l’UTMB commercial et bruyant me ferait fuir même si j’en avais encore la capacité (pour ma 1ère édition je me suis inscrit 15 jours avant le départ… inscriptions fermées ! Inimaginable au temps du trail business).
BRAVO à Vous pour l’Esprit “inspiré” de cette Chartreuse Terminorum !
(Que n’ai-je 35 ans de moins pour postuler ?)
marc
Quiero más información de la carrera