H.E. Dr. Thong Khon believes that the Angkor Ultra Trail next year will have more participants to develop the Siem Reap-Angkor Park Area with the Royal Government

 (Siem Reap): H.E. Dr. Thong Khon, Senior Minister and President of the National Olympic Committee of Cambodia (NOCC), hopes that the Angkor Ultra Trail in the Angkor Park area will have more participants in the future to participate in the development of the Siem Reap-Angkor region with the many major development projects of the Royal Government of Cambodia.

This was stated after H.E. Dr. Thong Khon attended the award ceremony of the 8th Angkor Ultra Trail event in the evening of January 18, 2024 at the Elephant Fighting Ground after successfully completing the run, after athletes in each discipline set off early in the morning, especially the 100km and 64km races, which set off at 4am on Saturday.

Taking this opportunity, H.E. Dr. Thong Khon expressed a warm welcome to all national and international athletes who participated in this year’s Angkor Ultra Trail event, with a total of 1,720 registered athletes from 50 countries, increased 15% if compared to 2024, with the most participating countries such as France, Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, and the United States.

H.E. Dr. Thong Khon continued that: “We hope that the 9th Angkor Ultra Trail event in 2026 will have more athletes participating with the many major development projects of the Royal Government, such as the implementation of the “Siem Reap Tourism Development Master Plan 2021-2035” in order to promote the development of the Siem Reap-Angkor region and the surrounding area as a famous world heritage tourism area, with sustainability and high responsibility, in line with the motto “Conserve to develop, develop to conserve”.

At the same time, H.E. Dr. Senior Minister reminded that, this long-distance running event has been organized 8 times ago, since 2016 with only 232 athletes participating, under the joint collaboration between NOCC and Phoenix Voyages, which have Mr. Edouard GEORGE and Jean Claude Le Cornec as co-chairman of the organizing commission, and the number of athletes participating has increased every year, except for 2021 and 2022, which were canceled due to the spread of COVID-19.

He added that: This adventure sports tourism event is organized with the aim of promoting and developing of the sports movement, urging and increasing the informal economic development, enhance the environment of heritage area, attracting tourists and supporting humanitarian projects that is a rare and wonderful event, with participants must run through the jungle, rural areas, villages and passed by many ancient temples in the Angkor National Park Area, which is the most magnificent and famous cultural heritage in the world.

At the same time, he also thanked all relevant parties for continuing to collaborate with NOCC to organize this attractive tourism sports event successfully, after receiving the support and permission from the Royal Government. He also thanked all national and international athletes who continued to support and promote this sports event.