Lauren Puretz, 41, from Colorado Springs, Colorado, finished third at the 2024 Javelina Jundred, running 100 miles in 15:00:50, the ninth-fastest time by a woman on the course. Puretz also won the 2024 World Masters Mountain Running Championship, cementing herself as a dominant athlete in trail and ultrarunning. 

Puretz started running to get in shape for soccer. Unwilling to sit on the bench for her high school soccer team, she decided that dedicating herself to getting as fast and fit as possible would guarantee her a position on the starting team. She joined the cross-country team and started running regularly, eventually falling in love with the sport that had started as cross-training. 

“I thought, well, this is way better,” said Puretz. “Nobody elbows me in the face the whole time.”

After finding her way through cross country, Puretz went on to run in college but briefly put her hobby on hold to finish medical school and complete her residency. After completing her residency to become a practicing gynecologist, Puretz moved to Colorado, where she fell in love with the trails. 

She started venturing off-road, competing in Colorado Springs’ Brewers Cup series of trail races and started trail running with friends. She enjoyed the fun and competitive atmosphere and thought she was content to stick with shorter distances. 

“It didn’t hurt as much as road marathons,” said Puretz. “The recovery isn’t as bad. But I always thought, why would anyone run longer than a marathon?”. 

Still, the idea of going longer than 26.2 miles simmered in the back of Puretz’s mind. She wondered if the same skillset she had been cultivating since medical school – of patience, persistence, and the ability to suffer– might make her an excellent ultrarunner. 

“My entire life had trained me,” said Puretz. “Medical school, residency, basically trained me to suffer for 72 hours straight.  I had been trained to suffer for a long period of time and that I could be really good at longer distances.”

Then, curiosity got the better of Puretz, and she signed up for her first 50K in 2018, the Pikes Peak 50K, which she finished on the podium. 

Medicine as Team Work

Always attracted to a challenge, Lauren fell in love with the surgical field in medical school and decided to specialize as an OB/GYN, a doctor that combines both gynecology (the care of a woman’s reproductive health and organs) with obstetrics (caring for women during pregnancy and childbirth). She was attracted to the field because not only would she get to do surgery, but she would also be able to get to know her patients as people and care for them outside of the operating room too. 

“I get to take care of people and do their surgery,” said Puretz. “I get to build a relationship with my patients. And I get to do surgery. I love that combination.” 

Puretz says while she was born and raised in Michigan, she espouses an East Coast sensibility of straightforwardness and candor that patients appreciate. 

“I’m going to give you the answer, and I’m not going to beat around the bush,” said Puretz. 

According to Puretz’s coach of two years, Megan Roche, she approaches medicine similarly to training. 

“Lauren is fearlessly authentic in everything that she does. I love coaching her because she wears it all on her sleeve (and in her training log) and we can have open, honest discussions about everything–even things beyond training,” said Roche. 

“My sense is that she makes everyone feel that way–that you go for a long run with her and just want to open up about all things in life. She’s also deeply passionate about things she cares about, and I love how she advocates for women’s health and rights. She does so much in life as a physician, mom, and top-level athlete, and I feel like her sense of humor helps her roll with the flow and adjust on the fly.”

She’s passionate about arming her patients with information and trusting them to make the decision that best suits their lives. That frankness can be a breath of fresh air for many patients. 

“I’m so lucky that I can care for women in the full spectrum of what they need,” said Puretz. “My role is to educate, inform, and listen. I feel like that’s really sad that where you live determines your access to healthcare. If nothing else, this is health care, and this is health care between a woman and her physician. And nobody else should be involved in that.”

Going for the Gold

Puretz’s dream was to compete in the Western States Endurance Run. Ever since she started running ultras, the idea of a Golden Ticket that would guarantee her automatic entry to the most prestigious 100-mile race had loomed large in her imagination. Plus, she wanted to run with the high-level of competition that Golden Ticket races attracted. She raced the Bandera 100K in 2021, the Black Canyon 100K, the Canyons Endurance Run 100K, and the Javelina Jundred in 2022. Then, in 2023, Puretz finished fourth at the Javelina Jundred 100M to score her first Golden Ticket.

“I thought I would have to wait 20 years to get into Western States,” said Puretz. “I was pretty surprised when I got the Golden Ticket. I had already signed up for several other races because I assumed I wouldn’t get it– but this felt like a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

Around the time that Puretz began training for the most competitive race of her career to date, her company announced they were closing down her department, shutting down the medical practice she had spent years cultivating. While there was no shortage of work, Puretz didn’t want to go back to being a full-spectrum OB/GYN because of the inflexible and demanding schedule it placed on her and her family. 

“I didn’t like who I was when I was working that much,” said Puretz. “I didn’t want work to take over my life.”

With this sentiment in mind, Puretz decided her only option was to open her own practice, which is considered immensely risky and difficult even when one is not training for one of the world’s most competitive 100-mile races. 

“It was the worst timing imaginable,” said Puretz. “But, I knew I had to do this. For my patients, for my family, and for myself.”

“Lauren doesn’t give up,” said Chantalle Blundell, one of Puretz’s running and training partners. “This past year, she was building her own business while training for the Western States. It wasn’t easy, as she had to balance her career and family, but she was determined to see what she could achieve at WSER. Watching her manage everything with such grit and determination was incredibly inspiring.”

The relationships Puretz had formed with her patients provided a sense of urgency behind getting her clinic started. The combination of starting her own business in concert with training for Western States was the hardest thing Puretz had ever done, putting to good use the resilience and endurance she had pulled on in medical school and in all of her ultras. It was a delicate balance between training enough to compete to her potential at Western States and being careful not to overdo it. 

Her clinic, Mountain View OB/GYN, opened on August 19th. 

Team Hooha Tackles Western States

Puretz knew that to do her best at Western States, she’d need to be surrounded by the women she looked up to and trained with on the trails. After a race leading up to Western States, one of her training partners congratulated Puretz by telling her, “You’re the fastest gynecologist out there.” That accolade turned into an inside joke, and that joke turned into a name for her trail friends’ group chat, which eventually became Team Hooha. 

Team Hooha’s name reflects the fun, joy, and levity that Puretz channels in her competition, even when she’s deep in the pain cave. One of Puretz’s favorite ways to pass the time while racing is to listen to audiobooks, specifically, romance novels. 

“It really helps me pass the time,” said Puretz. “When you’re in a tough headspace and you want to walk but you know you shouldn’t, I can just pay attention to a dumb story. It prevents negative self-talk, and it keeps my brain from going to places like You can’t do this, this hurts really bad.” 

After 18 hours and 52 minutes of listening to romance novels and running, Puretz finished the Western States Endurance run in 13th place. 

“I’m really hard on myself when I don’t meet my goals,” said Puretz. “But that I even finished is huge, because that part of my life was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. And I know I’ll be back.”

She paused. 

“And I was still probably the fastest gynecologist.”

A Hot Mess Mom

Jamie Adkins, one of Puretz’s frequent training partners, first met Puretz via a text invite to a group run. 

“She sent what I thought at the time was a strange text back (as I didn’t know she was an OBGYN), something along the lines of, she had a delivery but would meet me along the trail,” said Adkins. 

Sure enough, Adkins soon spotted Puretz blazing down the trail, running 7-minute miles while taking a call from someone at the hospital where she worked. 

Her efficiency in the operating room and trust in the exam room inform how she approaches balancing professional obligations with family and training. In addition to competing at the elite level and operating her own practice, Puretz is also a mother of two children, a son, and a daughter. She says that being able to fit in training around family and work is all about teamwork and communication with her partner. 

“I can’t do it alone, and I have a partner who works with me to make it happen,” said Puretz. 

Her coach agrees that Puretz has an impressive ability to manage multiple things. 

“I knew right away that Lauren was talented and could handle an impressively large quantity of training even with the work schedule and time demands that she had as a physician and mom,” said Roche. 

“I think a lot of Lauren’s unique ultra skills come from the flexibility that she has to have in training. She’ll spend all morning on the soccer fields in the heat and then head out at noon for a long run. Or she’ll spend long hours doing surgery or in clinic and still get out for her workout,” said Roche. “My role as a coach is to remind Lauren that we don’t need perfection. That her life is enough endurance training as is that even if workouts don’t always feel 100%, that it’s not a sign of fitness, but a sign of doing all things in life”

“She will crush you on skis and then crush you at Apres Ski,” said Adkins. 

She wakes up early to get her runs in before heading to work, often squeezing in doubles after dropping her kids at soccer practice. Puretz has a detailed paper calendar, covered in neat writing and color-coded to indicate different tasks, to-do’s, and events that she’s responsible for. 

“I’m very intentional with my time, and I can’t afford to dilly-dally,” says Puretz. “It’s not balanced, and I am the hot mess mom.”

Just like her day job as an OB/GYN, that illusion of balance requires careful teamwork from everyone in the family. “My kids are very tolerant and independent,” said Puretz. “They tolerate my hot mess-ness as well,” she said with a laugh. 

“Hot mess” or not, it’s clear that Puretz presence in the sport leaves an impact far beyond the operating room. 

“It’s been really cool to see how female athletes, especially working moms, are inspired by all that Lauren does,” said Roche. “I get a number of messages from athletes looking up to Lauren and I love that Lauren is a model that there are many different ways to compete at the top level.”