Emily Coggin has non-negotiables. One is moving her body in nature every day. Another is 10 minutes of core exercise. Every day. Even after a particularly demanding night shift in the emergency room (ER) at Vail Health, the 38-year-old nurse, ultra-marathoner, ski patroller and mountain athlete will spend mornings running, mountain biking or hiking with her dogs.
It’s a beautiful balance she’s nourishing. One built around a carefully curated life of high-stakes emergency medicine and the physical and mental demands of endurance racing. Some call it intense. Coggin calls it durability.
“I love to suffer more than the average bear,” she says. “I think I’ve just always described myself as durable. Growing up and seeing my mom — who’s a physician and a tough, capable woman, and a runner — my desire to do more is from seeing her model that growing up.” (At 75, Coggin’s mother completed her first sprint race this spring.)
Originally from Annapolis, Maryland, Coggin grew up taking ski trips to Colorado and wasn’t surprised when the mountains called to her after college. She tried living in NYC and hated it. “So, I did the cliché come for one winter and stay for the summer. And, 17 years later, here I am,” she says.
Coggin worked full time as a Vail ski patroller for almost 10 years before COVID-19 nudged her to attend nursing school at Montana State University. She met her husband — a Vail native and former Vail mayor, Travis Coggin — on Vail Ski Patrol in 2013, and she says it’s still an important part of her life.
“I’ve always loved the medical side of ski patrol,” she says. “I still patrol there now. I try to do one day a week. You get paid to ski with your friends, throw bombs and help people. I love it.”
Coggin ski patrols alongside her husband, Travis, at Vail Mountain.
Where Medicine Meets the Mountain
For Coggin, the fast pace, critical care and camaraderie weave together from the emergency room to ski patrol to endurance race culture. Being part of a night shift team of three nurses, one doctor and one EMT in the ER is very similar to ski patrol, she says.
“The nursing and racing lines cross, too,” Coggin adds. “There are shifts where you have no choice, you just have to do and go and take care of people. There’s no other way forward.”
The common denominators? Strength and suffering.
“Being someone who manages other people’s suffering, I appreciate the value of suffering myself,” she says. “I think all of these roles I’ve created in my life point to wanting to be a tough person and wanting to be able to handle tough things for myself and for other people.”
Being active and being outside serve as a mental release valve for the challenging and rewarding jobs that can be physically and emotionally taxing. This drive to go further and see more has taken Coggin up and over 13,114-foot Imogene Pass from Ouray to Telluride on a grueling 17.1-mile race (her 2014 “gateway drug into longer distance races”). It’s taken her on a 6,000-foot climb in 2017 as a Leadville Marathon first-timer and has propelled her through 40 ultra races (anything over marathon distance) since 2016.
From Finisher to Competitor
No stranger to the podium — Coggin placed second at last year’s Run Rabbit Run 100-mile race up Mount Werner and Rabbit Ears Pass — she modestly recognizes the personal shift from running an ultramarathon to racing an ultramarathon.
“I’m not a professional athlete. I’m an unprofessional athlete,” she says. “I pay to run and race. It feels scary putting myself out there, pushing myself now. I’m not just the person who’s doing a race to finish it.”
She’s most recently been preparing for The Western States 100-Mile Endurance Run in summer 2026, alongside a full slate of ultra races. Coggin credits her running partner, Corrie, and running coach, Rich, for her miles, mantras and mindset on the trail. Working night shift is her secret ultramarathon weapon. “When you’re running 100 miles, you’re a lot of times running overnight,” she says. “This is easy for me, 7 p.m. to 7 a.m., just like clocking in at the hospital.”
Trail running above Chamonix, France with views of Mont Blanc.
In 2020, Coggin stopped eating meat and three years ago she cut out alcohol completely. “I think not drinking is one of the best things for recovery time,” she says. “I started getting a lot faster in ultras when I quit drinking.”
She lifts relatively heavy weights two days a week and has a serious Pilates practice to maintain a strong core. While she’s a sucker for a plate of French fries, she tends to live on salads, tofu and lentils.
“It’s not always the easiest trail to be on, but it is the most rewarding,” Coggin says. “The lessons from being on this path are ones that resonate in all areas of my life. I know that I’m a better person for it.”
