I first attempted the Hardrock 100-Mile Endurance Run in 1998. I was miserably underprepared, naive, and weak. I dropped out, embarrassed, with my tail between my legs, at the 30-mile mark. I came back two years later to complete the race in 45 hours. I may never start or finish another Hardrock (HR), but now I’ve got more interesting Hardrock things to do. Last summer, race director Dale Garland asked whether I would serve on the HR board of directors. Having lived in Durango 50 miles from the race start for 13 years and served as president of Durango Motorless Transit Running Club for four years, I suppose that Garland figured I was qualified and sensible enough to help out with policy decisions, planning, race application selection, and other administrative duties. “We meet three or four times a year,” Garland said. “We also discuss a lot of things through e-mail, and you’ll learn the finer points of the race.” What the heck, I figured. Garland announced at the HR race in 2003 that I was the newest board member. He gave me a colorful deluxe travel bag with the HR logo and “Race Committee” emblazoned on the side. I felt really good toting around my race supplies and travel wear in the beautiful black, red, and gray bag. Planning for HR starts even before the current year’s run has finished in July. We need to announce a race date for the following year and start putting together an application that will be ready for publication in December. On that application is a strict qualifying standard. HR is 100 miles of mountains, river crossings, and substandard footing. We need to be careful in how we select applicants.

ONLY EXPERIENCED HARD-CORE RUNNERS NEED APPLY

Last July, we discussed this year’s selection procedure and the entry form. There wouldn’t be many changes. Successful applicants had to have completed a mountain 100-mile race such as Leadville, Western States, The Bear, or Wasatch. There was one possible way to get around this requirement. Those applicants with previously demonstrated mountain experience would also be eligible to apply for race entry. After we completed the entry for this year, things seemed to quiet down a little with our e-mail discussions. During October, our ramblings turned to proposed course changes. I have been over the course twice as a racer and several times as a pacer. During most of the discussion among John Cappis, HR board member, and Lance Goss and Arden Anderson, Bureau of Land Management (BLM) employees, I still had no clue where they were proposing racecourse changes. Cappis said, “Our proposal for change of route centered on going up the west side of the Lake Fork of the Gunnison on an old mining road. Once the road ends, we were to pick up a game trail back down to the river and either work our way up the left bank (my preferred way), cross the river, and get on Cinnamon Pass road about 1.5 to two miles below Burrows Park (a route suggested by Gordon Hardman). A concern here is crossing the river at high-water time.” Cappis and board member Blake Wood are scientists, and many times I needed a translator to understand what the heck they were talking about. I mostly steered clear of this discussion. I wondered whether I was being a useful board member. I joined the Hardrock board meeting for my first time on October 12. I drove over Coal Bank Hill and Molas Pass with the big kahuna, race director Dale Garland. It’s an hour’s drive to Silverton, and Dale and I caught up on the good gossip of Durango, the news on a budding romance with my future wife, Cathy Tibbetts, and his upcoming city council election. Dale is a former president of Durango Motorless Transit Running Club, and he has been a mentor and friend for several years.

SOMETIMES SILENCE IS GOLDEN

The board and several other stakeholders met for three hours over breakfast at the Grand Imperial Hotel in Silverton. I met lots of new people and tried to act intelligently. I went by the childhood adage, “Speak only if you’re spoken to.” Hardrock has been going on for 10 years, and I was definitely the new kid on the block. During October, we talked about the notion of team entries. Could a husband and wife or two friends apply to the race together so that both of them or neither of them was selected like Western States? The board tabled this discussion for next year since our entry procedures were already established. In December, there were some rumblings among the ultra community about the potentially unfair selection process for entrants. I myself was confused. We have a modified lottery. First, you need to qualify. Then you are assigned a certain number of “tickets” for finishing Hardrock, starting Hardrock, and service to the race. One question also arose in December about people who start Hardrock and have no intention of finishing. A certain competitor didn’t think it was fair that one of “those” people should take one of the limited entry slots and shut out a possible bona fide finisher. “I’m just planning to go halfway so I can see some scenery and get a workout in,” someone might plan. This issue was far too trite for the board to even take up for more than a one- or two-line discussion. “It’s a free world and you can run as you’d like,” Charlie Thorn opined, like a Supreme Court justice. Thorn, also a scientist, devised an extensive algorithm showing probabilities, standard deviations, and a fair selection procedure. I have trouble figuring the probability of a quarter landing on heads or tails, so once again I remained silent on this discussion. Weather is always a primary concern with the Hardrock race. Hardrock was canceled once because of too much snow and canceled once for lack of snow and too much fire. Thorn tracks snowfall in Silverton and kept everybody informed throughout the continuing drought. The board was trying to set up its next meeting, and this was a trying process too.

THE POLITICS OF PICKING MEETING DATES

Wood wanted to know whether the first weekend in February is January 31-February 1 or February 7-8. Garland wanted to keep February 14 out of the discussion for romantic pursuits. This was probably in Garland’s best interest. He has been in the dog house for 10 years with his wife, Mary-Beth, because Hardrock always falls on or near her birthday. In January, we discussed many of the finer points of the entry procedure. What exactly is “previous mountain experience”? The race selection procedure took place at the Pagosa Lodge in Pagosa Springs on February 8. I like to eat, and the lodge had a wonderful buffet with fruit, cinnamon rolls, and scrambled eggs. Garland had screened all of the applicants and separated them into three piles: qualified and automatically entered into the race based on number of finishes; qualified but must go through the lottery process; not qualified and has little chance of finishing Hardrock anyway. A 5K race run a few years ago was determined not to fall into the category of previous mountain experience. After extensive discussion about qualifications, foreign applicants, and the thought of putting entries on e-Bay for open-market bidding, we cut hundreds of little pieces of paper and put them into the famed “Hopes and Dreams” HR cookie jar. Cappis drew past winner Karl Metzler for the first lottery selection. Around the table of nine members of the board, the cookie jar was passed. My now-wife, Cathy Tibbetts’s name, was among those inside the cookie jar. I thought about her ultimatum last night. “If my name isn’t drawn, you’ll be shut down for a year,” Cathy joked. I hoped it was really a joke, but as the cookie jar made the rounds, I hoped that her name would be drawn anyway. Two more cycles and Cappis drew the magical name: Cathy Tibbetts. “That’s Tibbetts-Witkes,” I said. Wood rushed home to Los Alamos and posted all 115 accepted applicants on the HR Web site. He also posted, in order, those applicants who were on the wait list.

THE DREADED MONDAY AFTER

Monday morning brought the usual moaning and groaning. “Why wasn’t I drawn?” “Weren’t my qualifications good enough?” “Take me off the wait list and please return my check.” “Why was my application late in arriving to you?” No one really knew who I was, so all complaints were logged to other board members. Besides the grunts and rumbling from those who were not selected, there was some time for humor and contemplation. Steve Pattillo, a Hardrock veteran and chosen again to compete in this year’s race, wrote this note to the Yahoo group’s Hardrock news forum after the lottery results were posted: “Looks like the roster for some day-out program conducted by a community-based mental health organization.” Thorn, also a multiple Hardrock finisher and board member, replied, “Steve has half-wittingly hit on one of the key features of the selection process. The salient selection criterion used by the Run Committee was, and I quote directly from the minutes, ‘Selection shall be inversely proportional to mental stability.’ “The combination day care and marmot herding activities will be based from my house in Silverton.” After the selection process was completed, the Hardrock board of directors, race participants, sponsors, pacers, volunteers, and wannabes settled down for a while. While the annual Memorial Day meeting came into focus, only a few loose ends remained. Scholarships from the proceeds of last year’s race were given to several Silverton High School students headed to college in the fall. Some trail work on the Nute Chute was performed, and retaining walls were built to help keep the trail in good shape after last year’s rock slides. Cappis rallied the troops around this project. “It is almost like putting in a bridge, so bring trail-building knowledge and a strong back. In addition, there are some rockslides that need to be cleared, and if we have enough people to do it, small retaining walls to be built. The walls that were built in previous years are doing a good job of keeping the trail useable. Would appreciate all the help we can get,” Cappis said.

WHERE THE FUNDS GO

On May 9, Andi Kron, Thorn’s wife, and the rest of the Joel Zucker scholarship committee got together in Silverton to choose next year’s Silverton High School senior recipients. Joel Zucker participated in Hardrock for several years, and this fund was started in Zucker’s name after he died of a brain aneurysm following the race in 1998. While all the dust and dirt settled around the 2004 race start, many would-be participants were already wondering about next year. What weekend will the race be in 2005—the first weekend after July 4 or the second weekend in July? I hadn’t checked my calendar yet, but apparently there was some sort of fluke in the 2005 calendar. “We start on Friday so we can finish on Sunday, due to our long 48-hour cutoff,” Wood said. “As to which weekend, we choose the weekend after the Fourth of July. This year that was cut and dried, since July 4 is on a weekend. In years where the fourth falls in the middle of the week, we play it by ear. For instance, in 2000 the fourth was on a Tuesday and we held it the next weekend, July 7, but in 2001 the fourth was on a Wednesday and we held it the weekend after the next weekend, July 13. This is sometimes dictated by when we can get the facilities we need in town.” I missed the Memorial Day weekend meeting and felt even a little further behind the curve. I wondered whether I would soon be kicked off the board.

THE PERSONAL MARKING QUESTION

May’s Internet discussions involved completing and getting approval for the Green Mountain course changes. One would-be participant realized that her navigational skills were not quite up to par even though the course is well marked. This woman wanted to go through and mark the course with her own markers. The board discussed this issue at length. Cappis wrote, “We need to adhere to the ‘leave no trace’ philosophy. Ad hoc cairns tend to lead to what are called social trails through the high grasses and tundra. Social trails often become erosion paths and then need to be recovered.” Thorn added some more relevant information to our discussion. “There is also a Hardrock historical note relevant to this. Some of you remember that for several years before, about 2001, we came down the Handies southwest ridge, aka Upchuck Ridge. One of the pacers for a runner perceived that we were tearing up the grassy slope on the steep section just above tree line [with course markers].” Gordon Hardman, another board member, said, “To protect our permit, I would support applying the same sanctions to unofficial course markers as to those who place unofficial aid stations [stashes]. Same would apply to anyone who moves the markers already placed by Charlie [Thorn] and the other official markers—they might move them in such a way as to be noncompliant with the approved course. John [Cappis] does an incredible job of keeping BLM happy with our route. We cannot risk getting crosswise with them by having a lot of ad hoc course markings.” Eventually a note was put up on the Hardrock Web site asking individuals not to assist in the trail marking with unapproved markers such as cairns and walls. After a year of planning, Hardrock finally came together on July 9. One hundred twenty-five started the race and 80 finished. This was a 64 percent finishing rate. By all accounts, the 2004 edition of Hardrock was a tremendous success. September 26 in Lake City was set for the first meeting for the 2005 race. I have one year’s experience behind me, and I haven’t been kicked off the board yet. I’m getting a little bolder with my suggestions and comments. With a dozen people showing up in Silverton on race day last year hoping for last-minute race entrance, I encouraged the board to stop this practice. “Our final selection should be completed, by the absolute latest, on the Thursday before race day,” I said. “And maybe we can use some rolling averages like Western States does to satisfy the Forest Service’s race entry limits.” Here we go again.