Eagle runner Kim Dobson climbs to fifth-place finish at Pikes Peak Ascent

Kim Dobson, the “queen of the uphill” as she is affectionately known in trail running circles, placed fifth overall at the Pikes Peak Ascent on Saturday. Dobson, who set the course record of 2 hours, 24 minutes and 58 seconds in 2012, completed the 13.32-mile uphill-only climb of Pikes Peak — starting in Manitou Springs at 6,300 feet and finishing at the summit of America’s mountain (14,115 feet) — in 2:40:45.

A pair of Swiss athletes, 2:22 road marathoner Nienke Frederiek Brinkman (2:27:26) and Maude Mathys (2:28:40) went first and second and 2022 Olympic Nordic skier Sophia Laukli (2:34:30), a professional trail runner for Salomon, rounded out the podium. Fifteen women broke three hours; well above the standard three or four.

“That’s just insane,” said Dobson.

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“That’s such a high level of running.”

Dobson, a seven-time Ascent champion (2011-2013, 2015, 2016, 2018, 2019) — who only missed 2014 and 2017 to give birth to her two kids — felt the weight of “self-induced pressure” was overbearing after her 2019 win.

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“I just wasn’t enjoying it the way that I had wanted to,” she stated.

“I just didn’t have fun at the race and I thought, ‘this might be my last year here.'”

After COVID and a year focusing on the Leadville 100, America’s mountain started to beckon.

“I was really starting to miss that race because I loved the mountain,” she said. “It was just the race was becoming too stressful because I had done it so many times and I had expectations on myself.”

This year, the Ascent joined Salomon’s Golden Trail Series calendar the weekend before the Flagstaff Sky Peaks event.

“I think the back-to-back American races in the Golden Trail Series really brought a lot of the European competition over,” Dobson inferred, adding that the superstar presence was a key catalyst to recommitting to the race she’s owned for the last decade.

“When I knew that so many amazing runners were going to be there and the field would be so deep, I was like, ‘Why not? This is the year to go,'” she said.

“I have nothing to lose.”

Dobson figured four girls — the eventual top-three plus Colorado Springs runner Allie McLaughlin — would go out hard. Even though Dobson’s season has included numerous record-setting climbs, a foot issue after her Mt. Washington victory limited her weekly volume to 40-45 miles per week through June and July.

“At that point I was just trying to stay fit and enjoy myself in whatever way I could,” she said of the pool running and spin class cross-training supplementation. Most of her summer races were in the 60-70-minute range; Pikes Peak is closer to three hours.

“Coming into the race, I wanted to respect that and knowing that these ladies are so fast,” she said. Her strategy: stay within herself, maintain a “good headspace” and “maximize what was possible on that day.”

The top four indeed went out hot, and the experienced 38-year-old Eagle runner made a conscious decision to let them go.

“I’ve seen people blow up on that mountain and I didn’t want to do that, and I knew they were going to go so fast,” Dobson said.

“Especially since I really didn’t do much speed work over the summer. I knew if I went too hard those first few miles that I’d pay for it.”

She figured Barr Camp — the unofficial halfway point of the course — would be her chance to reassess and move up.

“That’s where some people will start to unfold if they went out too fast,” Dobson explained.

“I could pick it up a notch and pass a couple of the top ladies.” 

Running alone for the five miles prior, she reached Barr Camp in 1:17:19. Brinkman arrived in 1:12:38, ahead of Dobson’s record pace. Laukli was just 15-seconds back and McLaughlin was in third, trailed closely by Mathys. Dobson “tried to step it up a notch effort-wise,” passing a few of the male runners in her vicinity, but admitted she spotted the top women too much distance.

“My strategy was successful in that it was smart pacing, I gave it a good effort and I really thought to stay positive. But it was not successful in the sense that I just went out too conservatively to Barr Camp,” she introspectively analyzed.

“I wasn’t really in the race when I got there, and I wasn’t close enough to have that moment of flipping the switch, going into race mode and finding the level that you didn’t know you had.”

At the top, her time of 2:40:45 — the sixth time in her career that she’s finished between 2:40-2:41 — brought mixed feelings.

“I did the best I could with what I was given this year and I’m really grateful for everything that happened, but it left me hungry for sure,” she said, noting she had a desire for 2:30s and workout data suggesting that was possible.

“My fitness was good and the other two shorter races went so well that I thought it was realistic,” she said. Amazingly — for a champion of Dobson’s status — the runner is humbly moving forward with a few takeaways: more sustained, fast long runs, increasing mileage and racing aggressively.

“And that’s what keeps me coming back to Pikes Peak; just the training analysis and the data … trying to find this perfect blend of the endurance-speed of the roads and the strength for the mountains and you blend them perfectly to where you can nail that race,” she said.

She’s also ardently looking for the next carrot to chase.

“I’ll pick some goals,” she said enthusiastically.

“Because I still have that passion for training hard and trying to reach goals.” 

Reflecting on her reconciliation of 2019’s stressors and 2022’s outcome, Dobson believes the two have added fuel to the fire.

“It definitely did,” she said.

“I feel like I got the monkey off my back and now I can go back and run a little bit more reckless. I think I’ll take more risks if I go back.” 

After concluding the year with the speedy and fairly competitive HRCA Backcountry Wilderness Trail Half-Marathon in November and the McDowell Mountain Frenzy 50k in Arizona in December, she’s hoping to “mix new things with old favorites” for 2023 — perhaps even injecting the Mt. Evans hill climb after learning to love the bike this summer.

“The Mt. Washington full-course record is kind of always on the back of my mind,” she hinted. As for Pikes Peak?

“I think I’m going to have to think about it. I’m going to have to see how my body handles the next few months, have some thinking, some prayer time and just see where my heart and body leads me,” she said.

“It was a really awesome summer and I’m super thankful for everything. I think sometimes leaving feeling like it was a ‘B’ race keeps you really hungry for the next season.”