Head Wyoming cross country coach Scott Dahlberg was presented with a very difficult decision at the beginning of this season, one which weighed heavy on his mind in the days leading up to the team’s first meet–that decision being whether or not to redshirt some of his veteran senior runners on the team for the upcoming season.
Ultimately, he decided it was best for those seniors to use their redshirt year this season and develop ahead of a potentially very meritorious 2026-2027 season.
“We decided to redshirt Hailey Uhre, Madelyn Blazo and Eowyn Dalbec,” Dahlberg confirmed. “They’ve been consistently in our top five for a couple of years, all three of them hold marks in our top ten boards in many events. It was not a light decision, but they all have a fifth year academically.
“We like the young group of girls that we have that are growing, and so looking at having those three in uniform next year alongside a group that’s going to get more experience and develop really well, we just kind of like that idea.”
In the here and now, that has allowed a group of young talent to emerge as some of the top scorers for the Cowgirls this season. And for Claire Engelhardt, it will be her first season in a brown and gold jersey after redshirting herself a season ago. After taking that redshirt season to find her footing in the collegiate racing scene, Engelhardt is as confident as she has ever been in her career, and the results are showing that. In her first collegiate competition, she was able to finish as the Cowgirls’ top scorer at the Wyoming Invite in Cheyenne.
“My biggest advice to every freshman is to take a redshirt year, because I feel like it helped me so much. I really struggled with my transition here at Wyoming, and so it took me a while to kind of just get used to running a 6k, get used to being on a D-I team,” Engelhardt said.
Joining Engelhardt out on the course is a group of equally as young–and talented–runners, many of which are also experiencing their first seasons in uniform. The redshirting seniors and even some seniors that will not be redshirting–including the likes of Libby Berryhill, Rozlyn Slichko and Marina Trave–are being leaned upon as elder statesmans on this roster, whose guidance have not gone unappreciated by Engelhardt and the rest of the youth that has been thrust into action this season.
Through their guidance and knowledge of the various courses the Cowgirls will compete on this season, the young team was able to take to the Roy Griak Invitational, hosted by the University of Minnesota, with confidence. The Cowgirls were able to achieve seventh place of ten teams at the meet, with their scoring five including a trio of sophomores, a junior and one senior.
Engelhardt was on pace to finish within the top 15 runners in the entire event and as the top scorer for the Cowgirls at Roy Griak, but a bout with heatstroke struck the redshirt freshman in the final kilometer of the race, causing her to fall outside the scoring five.
That only serves as fuel for Engelhardt, however, as she continues to eye the top scoring position for the Cowgirls in the future.
“I was doing really well, it was going to be a personal best in the 5k alone, it’s just I had a hard time finishing the last 1k,” Engelhardt said. “I’m kind of using it as fuel in the sense that I know my body can do it.”
Sophomore Muriel Jones instead finished as the Cowgirls’ top performer at the meet, crossing the line at 31st with a personal best time in the 6k. Fellow sophomores Gracie Uhre and Hanan Aldelemy alongside Slichko and junior Brionna Holso helped round the scoring finishers at Roy Griak for the Cowgirls.
“Muriel had a really, really good race at Roy Griak, so she had a big step up,” Engelhardt said of Jones.
The Cowgirls most recently took on the Joe Piane Invitational hosted by Notre Dame, where every Cowgirl in the scoring five ran a personal best and the top three runners–which includes Engelhardt, Trave and Jones–ran their way into record books with top-15 program times.
Engelhardt continues to show some of the most promise through the Cowgirls’ opening two meets of the season. For her, it’s now just about putting it all together. If she does that and the team surrounding her continues to improve, the Cowgirls may just work themselves into the position to compete for a Mountain West title, despite their inexperience.
“Going into the conference, it’s just making sure, leading up to it, we’re confident. We know that we deserve to be there just as much as everybody else and we know we can put up a good fight,” Engelhardt said.
