Bagging the Mountains in Colorado

The last two days that I have spent in Colorado have been really cool.

Lots of driving on Jeep roads in the mountains to get high and then a fair bit of hiking and running up above 11,000 ft...most of it higher than the peak of Mt Hood in Oregon!

On July 3rd, we climbed up part of the Hardrock 100 course to around 13,300 feet. This is the highest I had been in my life and you really do have to work harder with that missing oxygen. This is to help get me ready to pace the last 57 miles with my friend Ronda.

After the hike/run we did a quick clothes change and head for Telluride. Neat little mountain town that has really good flat crust pizza!

On July 4th we started the day off right doing a local 5k / 10k called the Blue Ribbon run. The course was obviously short but at any distance pushin' it at 9321 ft a some good honest work. My time was 41:51.
After a quick change and refuel we heading for the hills...or rather mountains to bag a 14er: Handies Peak.
The weather was perfect and after a tough but very scenic climb I peaked out at 14,048 ft! I spent some time at the top and snapped several pictures as Micheal and Ronda. I started to get cold so it was time to head back down. Nice casual run back to the car. While I waited for the others I was able to snap some pictures of the wild flowers that are waking up the valley from its winter sleep...BEAUTIFUL!