Kilian Jornet wants to summit the great peaks of the United States on foot and by bike.

BarcelonaKilian Jornet now has a new project. The Catalan has presented the States of Elevation, a journey in which he will use only human means to connect peaks of more than 14,000 feet (approximately 4,267 meters) in the United States on foot and by bicycle. An exceptionally demanding challenge, in which Jornet will complete each day the equivalent of a stage of the Tour de France and a marathon.

The project will begin in early September, starting from Longs Peak, in Colorado. Jornet will attempt to creatively connect the fourteeners (peaks over 14,000 feet) in the continental United States using exclusively human means: running and cycling. This project is part of Kilian's previous challenges, such as Alpine Connections and Pyrenees 3000, where he linked high mountain peaks in the Alps and the Pyrenees respectively.

In 2023, Jornet began the first of these challenges that combines sport, nature, and identity. He then wanted to reconnect with the scenes of his first summits, the Pyrenees, making an eight-day tour climbing 177 peaks of more than 3,000 metersCombining cycling and climbing, he crossed the Pyrenees on an emotional journey through places from his life. Jornet, who climbed the 3,404-meter Aneto peak at the age of five, grew up in these landscapes because his father worked at the Cap del Rec refuge and his mother was a mountain sports instructor. The 2023 goal led him to think about a new one, this time in 2024 in the Alps. So he decided to climb all the peaks over 4,000 meters in that mountain range, moving from one to the next on foot or by bicycle, which he accomplished in 19 days.

And now it's time for the United States, in a challenge with which he hopes to "inspire people to adopt values of adventure, responsibility, and respect for the environment." In fact, all these adventures are accompanied by a scientific team that studies the changes that occur in his body. "Throughout the challenge, we have been taking measurements of many parameters to try to understand what happens physiologically, metabolically, and cognitively during this type of effort. The interesting thing is that we can use a challenge of this magnitude to understand how the human body reacts," he explained in 2024 after the challenge in the Alps.