Team Leadville Feature: One Team, One Finish Line

Team Leadville Founder, Tony Hofmann

There’s a moment in every long race when it stops being about running. It’s no longer about pace or splits or whether your legs will hold. It becomes something quieter. Harder. More honest. A conversation with yourself you can’t outrun. For Tony Hofmann, that’s the point. Not just of the race, but of everything around it.

Tony didn’t set out to build something like Team Leadville. In many ways, it started the same way a lot of things in his life did: with a challenge, a little curiosity, and a willingness to see how far he could go. Raised in Brooten, Minnesota (population 720), Tony grew up surrounded by grit. His father, a veteran, built a business from the ground up that still exists today. His mother came to the United States from Germany with little English and later built a small business of her own. Work ethic wasn’t something that needed to be explained. It was visible every day. Tony carried that with him into the Army, enlisting as a teenager and eventually earning his way to West Point. He served as an engineer officer and spent decades in leadership roles across the military, including leading soldiers in combat, numerous command positions, and answering the call to lead no-notice, large-scale disaster relief efforts. His career included responding to major national crises, as well as leading complex recovery operations following events like the Joplin, Missouri tornado and historic flooding along the Missouri River. That work required coordination, endurance, exceptional communication skills and the ability to lead people through uncertainty. Over time, running became a steady thread alongside it.

He ran his first marathon in 1990. Years later, he is still running them. “I’ve always believed a marathon can be transformational,” Tony said. “Most people can do it. It changes you if you do.” That belief deepened in 2013, when Tony attempted his first 100-mile race in Leadville, Colorado, the highest incorporated city in the United States at 10,152 feet. He had built a life defined by discipline and follow-through. A West Point graduate, he was eventually promoted to the rank of Colonel, and completed the iconic Boston Marathon multiple times. Finishing what he started and leading from the front was part of who he was. Leadville challenged that in a way nothing else had. He did not finish the race, getting pulled after 60 grueling miles for not meeting a time cut. An unceremonious end in the dark and cold of Leadville. Game over. The first time he had ever come up short like that. The experience stuck with him, not just physically, but mentally. For someone so used to completing the mission, it did not sit right. So he went back.

The following year, he returned to Leadville and crossed the finish line of the “Race Across the Sky”, turning a moment of disappointment into something that would shape what came next. In 2015, Tony invited a small group of fellow service members to run a marathon together. The idea was simple. Start together. Finish together. He didn’t tell them the location would be Leadville until they were already committed. Seven runners showed up. Some had never run a marathon before. All of them crossed the finish line. That was the beginning of Team Leadville.

Leadville itself is part of the reason the team exists. The area is deeply tied to military history, including nearby Camp Hale, chosen by the U.S. Army to prepare soldiers for the rigors of mountainous operations during World War II. A harsh landscape by design. For Tony, that connection matters. The environment, the history, and the difficulty of the race course create a setting that reflects the kind of challenge and shared experience the team is built around.

But Team Leadville didn’t grow through runners alone. It grew through family. Tony’s sister, Anita, and her husband, Tom, have become a steady presence year after year, opening their home to the team for pre-race dinners and post-race gatherings. It’s a part of the experience that doesn’t always get attention, but it brings people together in ways that last far beyond the race. It’s the secret spice to Team Leadville. Team Leadville and developing a mentality of grit have also become something Tony shares with his own family. His wife, Susan, and children (Nate, Abby and Kate) have all participated, each experiencing Leadville in their own way. The Hofmann family is all in. This year, he’ll run the Boston Marathon for the sixteenth time alongside Abby, passing the family torch he and Susan began there in 2009 and bringing that journey full circle.

Over the next decade, Team Leadville expanded. The growth came through word of mouth and ad-hoc recruiting at every location imaginable as runners returned, invited others in, and helped build a reputation that strengthened year after year. Since 2015, nearly 200 runners have taken part in Team Leadville — almost all have crossed the finish line, and many have returned year after year. Together, they’ve raised more than $730,000, impacting the lives of over 400 veterans. “It’s a team event,” Tony said. “We start together. We finish together. It’s bigger than any one person.” Each runner commits to more than the race. They raise funds in support of efforts to prevent veteran suicide, a cause that remains at the center of Team Leadville’s mission. Now, that mission continues through a partnership with Boulder Crest Foundation.

For Tony, the decision came down to impact. “We were looking for an organization with energy, with growth, with a national reach,” he said. “Something that matched what we’re trying to do. Boulder Crest checked every box.” After years of building Team Leadville into a grassroots effort that has raised significant funding, the goal is clear: expand that impact and reach more veterans and first responders who need support. And save more veteran lives. Ask him what drives Team Leadville, and he immediately points to the runners. “The runners are the engine,” he said. “Without them, we’ve got nothing.” They come from all walks of life. Veterans and non-veterans. Experienced endurance athletes. First-time marathoners. Each one stepping into a challenge together.

Tony describes the race as a reflection of something deeper. A way to experience challenge, rely on others, and move forward together through something difficult. “We’re trying to replicate the hero’s journey of recovery,” he said. “Putting ourselves in a tough environment, leaning on each other, pushing through something that doesn’t feel possible and ultimately persevering.” Topping out at Mosquito Pass  — at 13,185 feet — Leadville demands something from everyone who shows up.

This year, a new group of runners will step onto that course. Some for the first time. Others returning. The largest group in Team Leadville’s history. In the weeks ahead, we’ll share their stories. Why they said yes. What they’re carrying with them. What they discover along the way. Because the distance between here and there isn’t only measured in miles. Sometimes, it’s measured in the decision to take the first step, together. Team Leadville is helping expand that path for others, raising critical funds to prevent veteran suicide and support those who have served. Those efforts directly support Boulder Crest Foundation’s work with veterans, service members, and first responders through peer-led training programs grounded in the science and practice of Posttraumatic Growth, offered at no cost to participants. To learn more or support the foundation, visit bouldercrest.org.