At the 100-mile marker, Courtney Dauwaulter would typically be celebrating her race victory, but this time, she's got another 156 miles to go on the Cocodona 250 course.
Back in January, the reigning queen of ultra running announced she was leaving the 100-mile distance behind for a few months to try her hand at the 250-mile distance. On Monday morning at 5am, she took off along with 308 other runners in a race from Black Canyon City north of Phoenix to Flagstaff, Arizona.
"250 miles, let’s go!!! What will it take? What problems will come up? What new friends will we hallucinate? How much fun will we have? How much bigger will the cave get? Can I tell a joke at mile 240 with the correct punchline? Only one way to find out. See ya in Flagstaff!" wrote Dauwalter on her Instagram page before taking off.
The big news out of the gate was the weather: the runners were greeted with hail and rain shortly after taking off, proving a big mountain to climb in addition to the actual Bradshaw Mountains that the runners had to contend with just a few miles into the course.
True to form, Dauwalter, 40, who is a favorite to win, has been cruising along and smiling for the cameras. At the 77.5-mile marker, the runner had taken the overall lead, and video shows her coming into Prescott at sunset to fanfare and high fives as the overall race leader, with race organizers Avaraipa Running calling the moment "history in motion."
That was four hours ago, and while it looks like those S/Lab Genesis shoes might be working their magic once again, West Virginia's Dan Green has since taken the lead, putting about a mile on Dauwalter. The 28-year-old took third place in last year's Javelina 100, so he knows a thing or two about racing in the desert, but at this distance, anything can happen. In other race updates, Harry Subertas, who was a favorite to win the men's race, has reportedly had a fall and has dropped back to 11th place.
The next few hours will see the runners racing through the night in what will hopefully be more forgiving weather conditions. The Cocodona 250 takes runners across extremely varied terrain from the Sonoran desert to the 9,301ft summit of Mount Elden and through the largest ponderosa pine forest in the world. The course is 91 percent trail (45 percent of that is singletrack) and nine percent pavement.
We're nearly 20 hours into the race at the time of publication, and runners have 125 hours to finish, so pull up the livestream and settle in for a long show.
