The sixth running of the Cocodona 250 launched at 5 a.m. local time on Monday from Deep Canyon Ranch in Black Canyon City, Arizona, sending a sold-out field of 404 runners on a 253-mile point-to-point to Heritage Square in Flagstaff. By 7 a.m. the lead pack had cleared the first major aid station at Cottonwood Gulch, and overnight rain on the high country had given way to a calm, clear desert morning that race directors said would shave hours from the projected slowest finish times.
Pre-race favourite Courtney Dauwalter, who started Sunday's pre-race briefing dressed in her familiar baggy shorts and aviator shades, settled into a relaxed running rhythm at the back of the women's lead trio inside the first ten kilometres. Two-time defending men's champion Andrew McKnight rolled out alongside Heath Versteeg, Karel Sabbe and Jeff Garmire, all running comfortably under projected course-record splits as the leaders climbed up out of the Agua Fria drainage and into the saguaro fields above New River.
Aravaipa Running and Mountain Outpost are hosting 125 hours of unbroken livestream coverage on YouTube starting at 4:30 a.m. PT and running through to the cut-off at 10 a.m. on Saturday. The stream is split into 16 production blocks with a daily highlights package, GPS dot tracking and a permanent split-screen showing both the men's and women's leaders. Aid station 7 at Crown King has been turned into a daytime broadcast hub for the first time in the race's history, with live interviews scheduled every two hours.
The 2026 course holds at 253.3 miles and 38,791 feet of elevation gain, but race director Jamil Coury confirmed two route tweaks on Sunday: a re-route of the Mingus Mountain descent onto a graded forest road following storm damage, and a fresh single-track segment between Munds Park and Walnut Canyon designed by local trail crews over the winter. Both changes have been verified by an independent surveyor and certified by the race's UTMB World Series Major listing for points purposes.
Field depth is the headline storyline of this edition: 12 of the 25 fastest men in the race's history are on the start line, alongside an unusually deep women's roster anchored by Dauwalter, Sabrina Stanley, Riley Brady and last-year's runner-up Lindsey Knast. Live commentary on the YouTube stream will be led by Corrine Malcolm and Dylan Bowman, with iRunFar's Bryon Powell providing day-to-day written reporting. The first finishers are expected to reach Heritage Square late on Wednesday afternoon.