Holy Hardrock(!!!!)

Some exciting news about a wild and tough run in July.

I entered my first lottery for the Hardrock Hundred Mile Endurance Run seven years ago. I had a .8% chance of getting into the race that first year. Which was good, because that lottery morning reminded me that I was very much not ready to run it yet.

Hardrock has a reputation as one of the toughest – and most beautiful – mountain 100s. The course squeezes 33,000’ of climbing into 100 miles up, down, and around the San Juan Mountains in Colorado. And the average elevation of the run is something like 11,000’ above sea level.

It’s a gnarly route, with steep and rugged trails that crest 13 stunning mountain passes and the 14k’ summit of Handys Peak. Runners need to be self-reliant because the aid stations are few and far between and the course is marked, but can be difficult to follow. The conditions are unpredictable and the race usually sees at least one high alpine thunderstorm after the runners start. One year, one of the lead men even got struck by lightning, and saved by his headlamp, which apparently absorbed the shock of the bolt.

The race warns you that safety is a real issue to be prepared for, as you may need to cross fast and icy streams, traverse slick snow fields and trails that skirt 300’ cliffs, “rock climb, mild, but hands required,” they say, and might be stuck above treeline when thunderstorms hit. (This is one of those runs that my mom would’ve been excited to see me do, but also *very* worried.)

So, it’s decidedly not an easy race or course, and runners need to be very ready to handle its particular challenges, which I was most definitely not that first year in the lottery.

And that hit on the particular Saturday in December, when my friends gathered for a short run around town and a lottery watching party, to tune into the drawings for both Western States and Hardrock.

On this particular morning, we went straight up one of the steepest hills in Eugene. It’s relatively short, but real punchy, and my body was feeling the punches.

My calves were on fire as we picked our way up the hill. I had to stop and let them calm down every 12 steps as they howled for relief. I remember thinking, between desperate breaths, that if that 700’ climb was demolishing me and Hardrock involves about 50 times that amount of climbing, on much harder and more altitudey terrain, that I’d have a real long way to go before the race.

Beyond my lack of calf fitness on that Saturday morning, I really did have a lot to learn and experience in the mountains before I’d feel prepared for Hardrock.

Any excitement I would’ve felt about getting in that first year would’ve been smothered in fear.

That hit even harder when I went out to the San Juans for the first time a few summers ago to check out the course with my friends Tory and Tara – something I wanted and needed to do before getting into the race myself. And I quickly discovered that the course had a very well-deserved reputation as one of the hardest mountain 100s.

My first mile at 10,000’ felt like my 100th mile at sea level. I found myself resorting to the butt scooch method of travel over the spicier terrain. And I spent a solid hour hiding under a tree with Tara as lightning charged the mountain around us. We hugged each other for warmth and jumped with each thunderous clash and electric bolt from the dark and rumbling sky.

When a storm hit during the race a few days later, I didn’t understand how the racers could keep going. After being that close to a high alpine storm, lightning shot right to the top of my greatest fears in life.

But that first trip to the San Juans also lit up my desire to run Hardrock in the hugest way. I left with a big bonfire of stoke for those mountains and that run burning inside me. The San Juans feel like something straight out of a dream. They are rugged, and wild, and endlessly beautiful. They are a squeal-with-glee-every-single-step kind of mountain range.

And the community around the race is so strong and energetic – there is such electricity surrounding the day, from the local coffee shop to the start line to every aid station (to the lightning storms…). It’s just so obvious that everyone there feels excited to be there for such a special run.

As I watched the runners march over the start line on that July morning, I fantasized about being one of them.

I left Silverton with a promise to be back in those mountains very soon and a dream to run Hardrock as soon as the lottery goddesses allowed.

There aren’t many races that I’ve been feeling really fired up to run lately, but that big bonfire for Hardrock has still been raging.

This past Saturday morning was lottery morning again. While my chances have drastically increased since that first year, they were still real pitiful: just over 10 percent odds that my name would get pulled. I had zero expectations that I would get in. After nearly a decade of trying and just barely cresting single digit odds, I’d resigned myself to the likelihood of getting in around the year 2057.

There was no lottery watching party this year. Instead, I was heading down to the North Umpqua to go for a run and meet a friend’s newborn.

As I climbed into my friend Eli’s truck to drive south on I5, I pulled out my phone because the lottery was starting. The first few names were already posted by the time I clicked over.

I started refreshing the page and laughed at myself.

“I know my name is not going to pop up,” I said. “Why am I even bothering with this?”

But I still kept swiping my index finger down my phone screen, asking the lottery page to refresh refresh refresh. Allowing a little glimmer of hope to burn each time I looked down at the latest batch of lucky runners.

We were on our way to a scrappy trail system full of steep and punchy hills, not unlike that climb from that lottery morning many years ago. I’d just been reminiscing about that run and liked that I was spending another lottery morning on calf-burning climbs. And while I knew I might feel my calves burn on the steep hills above the North Umpqua, I also thought about the fact that I’m such a different runner and athlete than I was seven years ago. I knew I’d have a much different reaction if my name were to get pulled now.

I’ve finished many more 100s, run across the entire state of Oregon, gotten into mountaineering, adventured on technical terrain and at high elevations, and I’ve run many miles in the San Juans and a good chunk of the Hardrock course. I’ve confronted many of the elements that make this race so tough.

I still see the run as one of the hardest possible runs in the sport and know the course would challenge the heck out of me, but I also know that I am seven years more prepared than I was when I started entering the lottery back in 2014. And seven really good and mountainy years.

As we drove down the highway, I realized that I actually felt ready.

Dilly had settled onto my lap and buried my phone beneath his puppy snuggles. I’d missed several rounds of lotterying while he was sitting there, but I figured he was just saving me from a few rounds of refreshing heartbreak.

When I finally pulled my phone out from underneath him, I looked down at the screen and saw a text pop up from my friend Alli that just said “HARDROCK!!!!!!!!!”

“Holy shit!” I yelped. My heart had jumped straight to my throat.

“I think I got into Hardrock!!!”

I refreshed the lottery drawing for the 178th time that morning and sure enough: Emily Halnon was there.

I looked down at my name. Stunned. Grateful. Giddy. Full of disbelief. And more than anything else, excited as all hell to head back to the San Juans in July. This time as one of the very lucky runners.

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