I think I can blame Win.

I've known about the Leadville 100 for a few years now and have always though, "Why?" Why would someone want to race a mountain bike for 100 miles starting at +9,000 feet of elevation? Crazy.

Leadville is an old mining town in the Colorado Rocky Mountains. It was once the second most populous town in CO, but today there are fewer than 3,000 residents and mining is a history rather than an industry. Now supported by tourism, one of their major events is this Leadville 100 race. They also host running events and shorter distance races, but the 100 has become the most popular. In 2008 a retired bike racer named Lance sign on and took second. He began racing again and returned in 2009 with a camera crew who made a film titled, "Race to the Sky."

Last fall my friend Win, of Win's Wheels, called with extra tickets to the movie and asked if I wanted to see the movie with him and the usual crowd. "Sure." It wasn't a great night for me because it was a week night and I lived over an hour away from the screening, but I'll be damned if something didn't click. Finish in under 12 hours and you get a belt buckle. Do it under 9 hours and you get a gold belt buckle. I didn't say anything to anyone, but I wanted to earn that belt buckle. I could buy one, but it just won't be the same as if I suffer my way through months of training and earn the damned thing. And the movie wasn't even that good!

More people register for the 100 than can be safely put on the trail so come selection time the organizers host a lottery to see which 1400 people get to race. A couple of months after the movie, the urge was still there so without a word to anyone I put my name it the hat. I think it's my one-third life crisis. At 35, I feel I'm beyond my prime and it's either now or never. Well? As the selection date neared I kept going back and forth between hoping I would get to race and hoping I wouldn't have to go through all the training and suffering. I'd already spilled my secret and Patsy saw me flip flop like John Kerry. The week came, the email arrived titled, "Congratulations from Leadville Trail 100‏." How special is this? Of the ten people I know signed up, two got in including myself.

"Crap. I'm in." So starting February 8th about six months of training began. Since then almost every aspect of my life has become focused on training. Right now I am riding 4 days a week including lunch rides during the week. I've rented a cabin in Colorado for the race and bought a GPS-heart rate tracking cycling computer (Garmin Edge 500) so I can record every mile and heartbeat. I have a nutrition plan. I have a relationship to my bathroom scale! All for a damned belt buckle.

-PW