Lance Armstrong Leadville 100

12:00 noon Pacific

Hotness: Mild

Related searches:
leadville 100, leadville 100 live, leadville 100 mountain bike race, leadville 100 webcast, leadville 100 updates

Peak:
3 hours ago

Location:
12% - Pocatello, ID
5% - Raleigh, NC

The Leadville 100 is a mountain bike race taking place today in, of all places, Leadville, CO, but these are not in the little hills behind your house. It is a 100 mile race that starts at 10,500 feet and climbs to 12,600 feet, with 14,000 feet of climbing along the way. Good lord. The profile of the race has been raised the last few years as American road racing studs Lance Armstrong and Floyd Landis have showed up.

Showed up, but not won. That honor belongs to 44 year old, six-time defending champion Dave Wiens, who rode both the road racing greats into the ground over the last couple of years. Yes, that's right: 44. He makes Armstrong look like a young whippersnapper. Gotta love it. Armstrong is favored, but Wiens is The Man in this race. We'll see how it plays out.

It may not be all about the bike, but this is the bike Armstrong will use in today's attempt to dethrone Wiens.

UPDATE: Armstrong beat Wiens' course record by 17 minutes to win the 2009 event.

My Take: a lot of people don't realize that Armstrong races off road as well as on. And anyone who has even walked around at 10,000 feet has got to wonder how the hell these guys can race at that altitude. I'm a runner, not a cyclist, but this kind of event always impresses me. That the race is expected to be dominated by guys on the north side of 35 is pretty cool to see. Gen Xers are soft (prove me wrong).

I think it's odd that even though the race is in Colorado, the two leading search areas are Pocatello, ID and Raleigh, NC.