On Stubbornness, Trail Running, and Questionable Decisions
Reflections from my first intentional trail race (plus a couple other endurance experiments)
Last weekend, I joined a friend to race the Ram Party 24K Trail Race in Colorado Springs. It was my second-ever trail race, but the first one I’d actually planned for. My first was last summer at FIBArk in Salida, a 10K I ran for a friend’s birthday, where I realized somewhere mid-race that I had, in fact, never done a trail race before.
Important caveat: I’m a very amateur runner. But I really enjoy pushing myself, sometimes stubbornly so.
Last September, I ran my first (and only!) road marathon and finished the first half in around 2 hours and 20 minutes. This trail race had quite a bit more elevation with an elevation gain of 1,576 feet (source) so I figured I’d likely finish sometime under 3 hours.
I was also hoping to count this race toward the NYRR 2026 Virtual Brooklyn Half, which allows runners to self-track a qualifying race via GPS (e.g. smartwatch or phone) and submit results for credit toward programs that help secure entry into high-demand 2027 races. With my move to NYC coming up, and having been too slow to snag spots in any in-person NYRR races this summer or fall, virtual credit felt like a great workaround. And with the Ram Party falling on May 16, just one day before the submission deadline, it felt like the perfect opportunity to kill two birds with one stone.
The Ram Party 24K began at 7:00 AM Mountain Time, and I dutifully started the NRC app on my iPhone, confirmed it was tracking, tucked it into my running vest pouch, and promptly forgot about it. I suspect I somehow tapped (or double-tapped?) it at exactly the wrong moment right after the start, because unfortunately the race didn’t track at all. I only discovered this at the finish line. Oops.
Let’s rewind a bit, though. The Ram Party 24K is an out-and-back race that goes up, up, up to the halfway point at the Water Tank aid station, before rewarding you with a long downhill all the way back to the finish.
The uphills were not my friends. At one point, as I trudged (read: walked) uphill, I distinctly remember thinking: Why did I ever decide to do this?
That said, some of the other runners on the course were absolute gems. One thing I’ve really loved about both of my trail running experiences is that while you’re technically “competing,” the other runners I encountered were, by and large, incredibly supportive and encouraging. One even gave me uphill tips around visualization and form that genuinely helped make the climb feel a little less painful and a little more dynamic.
If that was you, thank you.
The police officers, aid station volunteers, and course photographers (shoutout Rachel who I saw, as well as Twain) also brought good vibes and kind words of encouragement, despite actively working.
One other really neat thing about an out-and-back course: getting to see the faster runners flying past me on their way down while I was still grinding my way uphill. After a slow start (and a strategically timed slice of watermelon), I finally got to enjoy the downhill. It was fast and fun.
And then I got to return the favor, cheering on the runners still making their way up, including one very dedicated friend who was unknowingly battling the stomach flu (a fact she only discovered later).
While I tired out again towards the very end of the race, I still don’t fully believe my downhill splits but somehow was really moving going from the top to the next aid station.
I had an absolute blast. However, just after the delight of realizing I’d finished much faster than expected came the horror of discovering my NRC app tracking had failed, almost certainly due to user error on my part.
In a flash of stubbornness and grit, in a decision more than one friend described as “insane,” I decided to run another half marathon the next morning (much more slowly, to be clear) to earn the NYRR credit. My partner found some nice flat trails, and I set about hydrating aggressively while cheering on the rest of the runners finishing their races.
One especially cool thing about Ram Party was that all race distances shared the same finish line, so I got to watch runners come in from much longer races than mine, including the 55-mile, 60K, and 50K events. Even cooler: two women won their races outright, not just as the fastest women, but as the fastest runners overall.
Addie Bracy won the 55-mile trail race and I believe was 5 minutes off the all-time course record for any gender and Lauren Puretz won the 60K race outright as well. It was incredibly cool to watch these extremely fast, strong, gritty women absolutely dominate the course and the competition.
After watching and cheering on lots of finishers, and taking a brief break for a pasta dinner, I headed to bed early ahead of my admittedly unhinged plan.
Sunday morning, I slowly made my way through another half marathon, finally earning the NYRR virtual race credit I’d set out to get.
Then, because we weren’t not sure we’d have another chance to make it back to Colorado Springs before our move to New York City, and because I’d never done it, my partner and I decided to tackle the Manitou Incline, which involves gaining 2,000 feet of elevation in less than a mile via 2,768 steep steps and, according to the official description, offers “a heart-pounding workout with unmatched views as your reward.”
The summer after my freshman year of college, I spent time at the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs as a competitive fencer, and I remember athletes talking about doing the Manitou Incline and Pikes Peak. Somehow, I’d never tried either.
That changed last Sunday. We faced rain, light hail, and more steps than I’d ever attempted in one go. I finally got the answer to a question I’ve wondered on more than one mountain hike: what would it feel like if there were no switchbacks and you just had to go straight up?
Curiously, the hardest part of the Incline for me was more mental than physical. I got winded well before my legs gave out, taking breaks to catch my breath before realizing, each time, that I could keep going. Right after I finished, I watched a family celebrate as an older gentleman (the dad of one of the adult “kids”) reached the top. We exchanged fist bumps all around.
We took the scenic route down, not the stairs. Then headed back home to Denver, where it was straight back to my normal life as a founder first thing Monday morning.
I share this story primarily because it led me to an interesting insight about myself: I’m stubborn as hell, and that’s actually a good thing. As founders, we often celebrate grit and tenacity, but those qualities can be nurtured, revealed, and tested in surprising ways.
This rainy week in Denver, I’ve been mostly content to recover physically while pushing myself mentally as we work on a new version of our product at CodeYam . But on Monday (Memorial Day), I’ll be back to my usual shenanigans, taking on the Bolder Boulder 10K road race for the second year in a row. My goal: finish faster than last year, and have even more fun.