The Bukhara Night Race 2026 international race has received the Recognized Event environmental status from World Athletics

The international race Bukhara Night Race 2026 has received the Recognized Event ecological status from World Athletics.

It takes into account the event's impact on the environment, local economy, and society.

Recognized Event is an official level of recognition by World Athletics, confirming that the competition organizers comply with the sustainability requirements established by the ABW standard.

The status is awarded based on a comprehensive evaluation of the event, which is conducted across 120 parameters in six key areas: "Leadership in Sustainability," "Sustainable Production and Consumption," "Climate Change and Carbon Emissions," "Environment and Air Quality," "Global Equality," and "Diversity, Accessibility, and Well-being." These include the volume of collected waste, electricity and water consumed, as well as carbon dioxide emissions from vehicles used to transport equipment, participants, and the organizing team.

The ABW system includes several levels of recognition: Recognized Event, Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Platinum. Thus, the Recognized Event status is the first official level of recognition by World Athletics within this system, confirming the competition's compliance with the basic requirements of the ABW standard.

Since the launch of the ecological certification for athletics competitions in 2024, 130 events have undergone evaluation by World Athletics. Of these, 84 received Recognized Event status, 16 received Bronze Label, 16 received Silver Label, 9 received Gold Label, and 5 received Platinum Label. All races, except for the Bukhara Night Race 2026, were competitions aimed at professional athletes or events applying for World Athletics Label status.

Bukhara Night Race 2026 became the only competition from Central Asia and the CIS to be included in this list.

The system allows for tracking progress, celebrating outstanding results, and demonstrating best practices. Events with World Athletics status are required to submit reports on their results to the federation.

For instance, the organizers of the Bukhara Night Race recorded the approximate carbon footprint of the event, the volume of waste, and other indicators. As part of the race, they calculated the number of vehicles used—five trucks with a carrying capacity of 10 tons each—to transport the equipment necessary for the race, the volume of fuel they used (1,600 cubic meters of methane), as well as the approximate electricity consumption during the race (800 kW).

All waste during the race was sorted. Its total weight was 980 kg. The main portion of the waste (87.1%) consisted of food and other waste. The share of all types of plastic waste was 10.1%.

The competition is held under the principle of "Cleaner than it was," which is why the race is accompanied by plogging—a distance with waste collection. Plogging participants at the Bukhara Night Race 2026 collected plastic bottle caps. The total weight of the collected caps was 16.2 kg. At the subsequent races, Zaamin Ultra 2026 and Sky Camp Bo’stonliq 2026, participants of the Bukhara plogging distance received exclusive medals melted from the caps they collected in Bukhara.

The team of managers and volunteers tried to use reusable tableware. To reduce the amount of plastic at the food courts, 5-liter and 20-liter water bottles were used.

During the distribution of starting kits in Tashkent, a sports swap was held—an exchange of wearable sports clothing. After the swap, the organizers were left with 18 kg of clothing and footwear, including cycling and running uniforms and sports-style items. The cycling uniform was sent to a junior athletes' coach in Bukhara, the running clothes to the city's Youth Center, and the "urban" items to the Bukhara social center for homeless people and those in difficult situations.

The organizers of the Bukhara Night Race view these and other figures reflected in the report not so much as achievements, but as a starting point for tracking dynamics during future races within the Samarkand Marathon Series—a series of five races organized by the Art and Culture Development Foundation of Uzbekistan in different regions of the country. The team has already submitted a report on the results of Zaamin Ultra and is preparing an analysis of the Sky Camp Bo’stonliq event. Monitoring will allow for the improvement of each subsequent race.