Courtney Dauwalter won the 2024 Hardrock 100 and set a new overall course record in the process. In the following interview, Courtney talks about how she had to be patient with waiting for various body systems to come around early in the race, how she lost her stomach in the night and had to be okay with some puking, her motivations for getting through the final miles of the course, and what it was like to win this race for a third time.
For more on how the race played out, check out our in-depth 2024 Hardrock 100 results article.
Courtney Dauwalter, 2024 Hardrock 100 Champion, Interview Transcript
iRunFar: Bryon Powell of iRunFar here with Courtney Dauwalter after her win at the 2024 Hardrock 100. How are you, Courtney?
Courtney Dauwalter: I’m good, how are you?
iRunFar: Alright, beautiful morning here in the park.
Dauwalter: Oh man, walking over here we were just saying how lucky we are that this weekend has been primo weather for everybody.
iRunFar: Was it for you?
Dauwalter: Yeah. I mean, no thunderstorms. You know, no one had to hunker down and hide from lightning on peaks. But I would say if I was going to get particular, it could have been a little less hot. [laughs]
iRunFar: And it wasn’t crazy hot all of Friday. When when did it kind of impact your performance on Friday? Or your enjoyment.
Dauwalter: I felt it pretty early, yeah. I don’t know why, but from the jump it was just feeling hot and feeling like my body was not reacting to it smoothly. So, start until about Kroger’s was tough for a lot of reasons, but I think the heat was a factor in there.
iRunFar: What were the other reasons? What was going on?
Dauwalter: I don’t know, you know, some days it’s just weird. Like, my heart felt like it wasn’t regulating. My body systems were just kind of like, feeling sluggish, and then the heat was taking its toll. So I was just waiting for systems to join the party so that it could feel like smoother running.
iRunFar: Is that your experience coming through? Because like, you could panic. Like, oh my god, I’m only 10 or 20 miles into Hardrock, and this and that and the other thing aren’t going right.
Dauwalter: Yeah, but what I’ve learned is in these ultras, especially ones like Hardrock that are just tough and long, is you have to keep believing. Even if you’re faking yourself out, and you have to give it time. Because sometimes time is the thing that fixes everything. But also, I had my crew. So, I rolled into Telluride sort of in shambles, really overheating, and that’s about mile 27. And my crew had icy cold things, but also just words of encouragement and belief to keep me moving to the next spot, and to keep giving it that time to fix itself.
iRunFar: So, what were some of those actual things that they had for you in Telluride?
Dauwalter: A lot of cold things, but them not panicking gives it the vibe that like, there’s nothing to panic about, you know? So they were just like, “Yeah, okay, that’s fine. It’s hot out. Let’s cool you down, and then we’ll send you off with like a cold rag on your neck, and I will see you in the next spot.”
iRunFar: Which feels really good in this high elevation, dry air. Especially on a sunny day, that evaporative cooling.
Dauwalter: Oh, so good.
iRunFar: So good.
Dauwalter: Yeah.
iRunFar: Were you dipping at all in streams?
Dauwalter: All of them, yeah. [laughs]
iRunFar: Water levels come down in the San Juans.
Dauwalter: The amount of jealousy I felt when I was climbing up to Grant Swamp Pass and looking down at Island Lake.
iRunFar: Yeah.
Dauwalter: Everyone jumping in. People swimming in it. And I was like, that looks like the day to be having right now. That looks so nice.
iRunFar: So, did you start feeling better on the climb out of Telluride to Kroger’s?
Dauwalter: Yeah, I did start feeling better. It felt like systems came on board a little more. I was able to just self-regulate my heart rate and temperature better. And then Kroger’s is such a beacon of joy to get up there and to roll then down off of it.
iRunFar: Literally sparkly joy this year.
Dauwalter: Yeah. Some power glitter got put on, which was really helpful. And then things started clicking a little bit better headed down into Ouray.
iRunFar: So, if you had heat bother you early in the race, typically toward the front of the pack, the climb out of Ouray is really hot and like, almost oppressive. Did that touch you again coming out of town?
Dauwalter: No, surprisingly I felt really good on that climb. And we had a little breeze coming off the river there, so that helped for sure. But I had a good couple sections then where my head was in a good spot, my body was on board, and I was able to move better.
iRunFar: And it being Hardrock, those couple good sections don’t last.
Dauwalter: Yeah, guaranteed if you’re having a good one, a bad one is coming.
iRunFar: Just wait for it to come. It’s like the weather in Colorado. Wait five minutes. So, when did things turn south again? Because they did.
Dauwalter: Yeah, they for sure turned south again. I guess my good sections were out of Ouray, all the way until Sherman. So, even up and over Handies was great. I got to pick up my pacer Mike [Ambrose] at Animas.
iRunFar: You had such a smile when you picked him up.
Dauwalter: Yeah, so pumped. And then when I got to Sherman, my stomach turned, and then we just sort of started the swirl around the drain of like, energy depletion, and yeah, leaving a little trail along the rest of the path.
iRunFar: A vomit slick.
Dauwalter: Yeah.
iRunFar: This way to the next station.
Dauwalter: My apologies. [laughs]
iRunFar: [laughs] Yeah, how did you work through that? Because you can convince yourself early in the race. It’s a little easier maybe that like, all right, I’m going to come around. Things have flipped. The switch has flipped. How do you deal with that again?
Dauwalter: We just kept trying things to see what would stay in. So it was being patient with it. And every time I would throw up, I was with Mike that whole time. I’m sorry, Mike. But we would just say, that’s okay. That’s fine. There was no problems with it. I also have been learning over the years that it doesn’t have to be the end when you get on that. When you climb aboard the vomit train, it doesn’t mean it’s a lost cause to keep pushing forward.
iRunFar: Because that happened to you. You dropped out of Hardrock. I forgot what the exact year it was.
Dauwalter: ’21?
iRunFar: Okay. Because you were puking and you ended it.
Dauwalter: Yeah. And like, working with my good friend Meredith Terranova, who’s also a nutritionist, has helped us see that when you’re going through the steps of plan A, B, C, and D, and everything’s failing, there’s still more plans you can keep trying. So, that was running through my head for sure, as I was struggling to keep calories in. But still moving forward as best we could. It was a hard night.
iRunFar: Yeah. But you were still making good time. Things came around. There wasn’t much competition late in the race in the women’s field. You were well ahead. You were well clear. Were you starting to think at all about your previous times here, either in the clockwise direction, or the overall course record? That are both yours.
Dauwalter: So, I picked up Kevin [Schmidt] at Cunningham for the last section of the course. And he took me up and over Little Giant. And, if he hadn’t been along, I don’t think I would have even known the times, but he’s a numbers guy. So.
iRunFar: He was well organized.
Dauwalter: Yeah. He was well in tune with the numbers. And when we got to the top of Little Giant, which is a very big climb at the end of the race, we looked at our watches. And I was like, “Do you think the clock could read 25 as the first number? You know, get under 26 hours?” And then we’re looking and we’re like, man, there’s a lot of miles. And I’m not moving that smoothly yet. Probably not. But then he was like, “Yeah, but your other number is, this.” So, we actually were trying then to see if we could get under the previous number. Just to have a carrot, basically.
iRunFar: Yeah.
Dauwalter: It helped to make the end trail section, like, go a little faster, because I was trying really hard to move. Versus, maybe like, just slogging it in, because I was suffering greatly.
iRunFar: And you could. You had a number of hours up on second place there.
Is it still exciting when you like, run a time no woman has ever run? Like?
Dauwalter: [laughs] I mean, it’s painful.
iRunFar: You’ve done it three straight years here. [laughs]
Dauwalter: But it’s a cool course. And I know that women can bring that time down even more. So, just to have been part of that has been cool.
iRunFar: Perhaps even someone with the name Courtney.
Dauwalter: [laughs] I don’t know. Maybe I need to come back and volunteer a few years before I’m back on this course.
iRunFar: Well, fair enough. Do you have anything planned coming up for the rest of the summer?
Dauwalter: Kevin is in the Leadville 100. So, I’ll be crewing and pacing him. Hopefully doing the crewing job justice like he always does. And then we’ll see.
iRunFar: Maybe not quite up to Schmidty level, but do the best you can.
Dauwalter: I could never reach Schmidty level of crewing, but yeah, I’ll give it a shot.
iRunFar: And then your season’s probably not done. You’ll probably find something to?
Dauwalter: Yeah. There’s a lot of months left in the year, so. And way too many cool things to do. So we’ll see what happens.
iRunFar: All right. Well, congrats on your run here.
Dauwalter: Thank you.
iRunFar: And I look forward to seeing what you do this summer.
Dauwalter: Thank you.
[Breakfast of Champions post-interview clip]
Dauwalter: I had a hamburger for breakfast, so it’s possible. [laughs]
