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≡ UIPM HEADS TO CHINA ≡
“While this sport certainly was Euro-centric for quite a while, you can’t ignore the rest of the world.”
With that backdrop, Rob Stull, the American president of the Union Internationale de Pentathlon Moderne (UIPM) introduced the federation’s “Race Across China” in 2026, coupling two of its major championship events together:
● 24-30 Aug.: UIPM World Championships in Guiyang
● 02-06 Sep.: UIPM Obstacle World Championships in Beijing
Guiyang, the capital of the Guizhou province in southern central China, is home to 4.5 million people and is the hometown of UIPM Secretary General Shiny Fang. Stull explained that what made an impression on the federation was Guiyang’s enthusiasm in “their presentation, what they’re willing to do for us in terms of showcasing the sport is not the sort of standard recipe … what they offered to us was a different approach in how to present the sport, in their style.”
He did not give any details, but these will surface later. The attraction for more events in China, of course, is the enormous market there:
“We’re trying to grow on all fronts. China is definitely a big market; we have some very strong commercial partners there,” and teased future announcements about television programming “and some really cool things.”
Again, nothing to announce in detail yet.
Stull also spoke at length about how modern pentathlon is changing, again. Having dumped equestrian for obstacle at the behest of the International Olympic Committee after the Tokyo 2020 Games, the sport’s format is continuing to change.
The UIPM Executive Board agreed with innovations to the format, with Stull explaining it’s about “how to keep the sport compact, the excitement level up, how to keep it dynamic, how to make it this 90-minute format” more exciting.
● Swimming will be reduced from 200 m to 100 m, which Stull said still kept the swimming component, but the 100 m is just a more exciting race,” and noted that the shorter distance will attract a different type of athlete.
● Shooting was expanded from four segments to five in the Laser Run finale. Stull: “Shooting is drama.”
● Fencing was previously compacted with a change of format, but a change to bout times from 60 seconds to 45 seconds was rejected, pending further study and trials.
“It’s all about maintaining the energy in the room,” said Stull. “As you transition from one sport to another, you have these transition periods that are very short – think of triathlon in a transition, right – as you’re going from one event to another, ours are just a few minutes, but we’re trying to make sure that even those transition periods are very exciting.”
He said that during the 2025 season, he would watch the eyes of spectators to see when they were fixed on the field of play and when they went somewhere else: “During that 90 minutes, you’re focused on the event. … This 90-minute format is not just a sporting event, it’s entertainment.”
Stull also hinted at further technical changes leading up to the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles, especially in the obstacle course, with the goal of not only challenging the competitors, but wowing the crowd and creating new fans, both in person and on television.
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The UIPM became the third International Federation this week to announce the re-integration of Russian and Belarusian youth athletes – age 19 and under – to compete freely and without restrictions. This does not apply to the UIPM Junior and Senior-level events.
He also noted the positive promotional opportunities that this creates for the UIPM, as obstacle is popular in both countries:
“Everybody knows that the demographic of obstacle sports tends to be to the youth … frankly, that’s the audience we wanted to catch. … How to be relevant to the youth of the world. That’s a challenge that I think every Olympic sport has, how do you stay relevant? Obstacle is our answer and it’s been very successful.”
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