Centennials Summited (8): Jones Peak Half Peak Handies Peak Redcloud Peak Sunshine Peak UN 13832 UN 13811 Vermilion Peak Total Mileage: By foot: 63.2 miles, 21,631′ elevation gained By bike: 72.2 miles, 7,636′ elevation gain
Centennials Summited (11): Mt. Adams Kit Carson Peak Challenger Peak Columbia Point Humboldt Peak Crestone Needle Crestone Peak Phoenix Peak San Luis Peak Stewart Peak Rio Grande Pyramid Total Mileage: By foot: 85.4 miles, 29,916′ elevation gained By bike: 276.3 miles, 12,298′ elevation gained
Centennials Summited (9): Pikes Peak Culebra Peak Red Mountain Ellingwood Point Little Bear Blanca Peak “Huefrano Peak” Mt. Lindsey California Peak Total Mileage: By foot: 62.4 miles, 23,625′ elevation gained By bike: 362 miles, 21,242′ elevation gained
My “Thank You!” list for the Tour of the Highest Hundred is competing with the list of mountains I have to summit for length, distance, and height – in other words, there’s a whole lot of people that are coming together to help me make this really amazing trip happen. I’m besides myself in appreciation Continue reading…
The GDMBR in yellow; alternative in red View/Download this Route on Strava View this Route on Google Maps Time again to revisit the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route! As the Tour Divide race rolls along and the top riders are flying through Colorado, I’m once again reminded on how much fun this route is, and Continue reading…
To my surprise, people seem curious in the gear I use that comprises my sleep system. I’ll be describing my current setup that I’ll be using for the Tour of the Highest Hundred, a two-month bikepacking and peak bagging adventure. Like everything, it’s a constantly evolving kit, that changes depending on weather, seasons, geographic location/environment, Continue reading…
http://mountainandprairie.com/justin-simoni/ I joined Ed Roberson earlier this week after we bumped into each other running in Chautauqua. Ed runs an interesting and diverse podcast called Mountain & Prairie and invited me to do an episode which I agreed to. Ed loved how our interview went and I hope you do, too. Give it a listen Continue reading…
My time in Salida on tour soon came to an end, after a little time at the hostel with an honest to goodness shower. Time for me to travel north! Out of Salida, there’s some pretty awful highway riding to get directly to the next town, Buena Vista, and the day I set off saw Continue reading…
Visit the Ultimate Direction Blog to read my Long Form Essay: The Everest Out My Back Door, about the getting older, lofty goals, and the village of support around the trail running community here in Boulder, CO. I can’t thank everyone, enough.
I took a ride out from Salida to Poncha Springs then onto Chaffee County 210 to the rarely visited (by 14er standards) Little Cochetopa Trailhead, which gives you access to Mt. Ouray, a Centennial peak @ 13,971′. The last few miles of the well-maintained road turned into a legitimate 4WD track, and it was a Continue reading…
I’m presently in the Salida area, enjoying the incredible weather, tough training, and reconning potential routes. Salida and its people are incredibly friendly, bike shops and bike people are everywhere, and the mountains are crazy-accessible. I rode here from Colorado Springs, having taken the bus from Boulder -> Denver -> Colorado Springs to save some Continue reading…
Check out this article/product breakdown covered on the Outside Magazine site!
Part One 5:00pm on Friday. Time to set off towards Estes Park. Although I would have like to take a more dirt route off the bat, the day was getting long, and I had some exploratory tracks to travel, so I took the express-way down Highway 36; it’s traffic known somewhat for its rep of Continue reading…
Imagine my delight, when an enormous box from Surly was delivered to my door, with instructions to do something cool with the contents: A medium Surly ECR, and a 24-Pack Rack! I was planning a trip to Breckenridge to say hello to my Brother who was becoming a year older, and I wanted to climb Continue reading…
Whoo boy, do I like me some optimizations of my routes! Being not the fastest, strongest, or most, uh, endurance-est person in the world, I’ve gotta rely on my brain fat a lot of the times to figure out the most efficient way top get from point A to point B. I love working on Continue reading…
One of the main attributes that differentiates The Highest Hundred from other ultra-endurance FKTs is the technical nature of some parts of the route. For example, the Appalachian Trail is indeed longer, and has more elevation gain than The Highest Hundred (many of the stats of the AT may surprise you), but I think it’s Continue reading…
No rest for the weary! My buddy David perhaps jokingly asked me if I wanted to go for Longs, via the Trough on Sunday (“Those Centennials ain’t gonna climb themselves!”) and I naturally went for the bait, on the condition that I’d probably be lagging behind given the climbing on my legs already for week, Continue reading…
More details to come, but please check out http://highesthundred.com for details on my next big summer adventure! http://highesthundred.com THE BIG REVEAL! Check out my summer adventure project I’ve been hinting at the URL above! In about three months I’ll be setting out by bike to summit the highest 100 peaks in Colorado (The Centennials), self-powered, Continue reading…
Fair enough question, and I’ve wondered myself. Physically, there may not be a “best” training plan to guarantee great results, like you could with a marathon. Strange things happen in ultra endurance distances and this challenge makes a Hard Rock, or a UTMB look quaint. But mentally: yeah, you can get yourself pretty ready. One Continue reading…
One of the things that makes this project so amazing to work on (and eventually complete!) is the dual (at least!) nature of the adventure: you have to ride some challenging terrain, and once you’re in that rhythm you’ll have to stop as it’s time to change things up and go for a backpack. Mapping Continue reading…
The San Juans hold almost a third of the entire Centennials to be visited on the Tour of the Highest Hundred. The mountain range itself is spread out in a massive area, where roads are few, and approach is time-consuming. Going into the San Juans with a plan will help ensure success in this range. Continue reading…
For me, the Weminuche Centennials will be the crux of the entire route, The statistics give me some pause: 9 peaks, 52 miles, 28,000 of elevation gain: https://www.strava.com/routes/4479280 Starting at Highway 550 on top of Molas Pass, follow the Colorado Trail for a few miles east, before turning south into Elk Creek Drainage to climb Continue reading…
https://www.strava.com/routes/8026802 Route development is a huge part of this project, and optimizing the route to work well with getting to the trailheads of the peaks, for resupply, to be an interesting route to ride, while also being safe to ride are all important considerations. I’ve started mapping out a logical route. Some highlights (the entire Continue reading…
