USA Pro Challenge in Breckenridge: Didier wins stage, van Garderen leads overall

#Breckenridge, Colorado.

Weather was the story again Friday for Stage 5 of the USA Pro Challenge as Aspen BMC rider Tejay van Garderen was able to maintain his lead on the field in the General Classification.

Luxembourg’s Laurent Didier took the stage win with a late attack on Garmin-Sharp’s Ben King. King held the lead headed into the final climb up Moonstone Road in Breckenridge when Didier made his move.

“I looked back and it was just him on the front, chasing, chasing, chasing,” King said of Didier’s attack. “At one point I really thought I was going to win.”

King had a 15- to 20-second lead coming down from Hoosier Pass into Breckenridge. But Didier had simply bided his time with the final climb still remaining.

“I had to play smart,” Didier told NBC Sports Network after the race. “I let Ben King go.”

“I saw that some of the guys were hurting out there. Man, there were a lot of guys shivering.” 

Tejay van Garderen

In the post-race press conference Didier expanded on his strategy. “I did the race in 2011. I didn’t do the climb but I knew it. I watched last year on television. I knew the last part is quite hard. I went all in.”

He crossed the finish of the 104-mile stage in 3 hours, 50 minutes, 38 seconds with Garmin’s Janier Acevedo and Smartstop’s Rob Britton on his wheel for the final sprint. King finished fourth, 15 seconds back.

Van Garderen and the other top contenders finished 1:33 behind the leaders. No rider in Thursday’s break was within 12 minutes from GC contention leaving the leaders able to finish in the middle of the pack.

A 13-man break that included Friday’s top finishers formed early on in the day before the climb up Hoosier Pass. The large break built a 4½ minute lead over van Garderen and the rest of the peloton as they headed from Woodland Park to Fairplay. The pack gained ground on the break after Fairplay at the start of the climb up Hoosier.

Weather affected rider strategy and also disrupted most of the day’s TV broadcast. Supporting helicopters were unable to take off initially due to conditions, disabling live broadcast from the course. Race coverage was only able to catch portions of the final miles into Breckenridge.

“It was absolutely miserable,” King said of conditions. Riders suffered through dropping temperatures, heavy rain and occasional hail through much of the stage, including the climb up Hoosier Pass.

“I saw that some of the guys were hurting out there,” van Garderen told NBCSN. “Man, there were a lot of guys shivering.”

Van Garderen seized the opportunity and his remaining energy for a late surge that added a few seconds to his lead over some other GC contenders, including rival Tom Danielson.

In addition to van Garderen’s move, Friday’s stage created some disruption in the GC leader board. Van Garderen’s BMC teammate Ben Hermans — who started the day in third — dropped to ninth, 1:49 behind the lead.

“I think he was struggling from the cold,” van Garderen explained.

Danielson lost 5 seconds on his rival but moved to fourth. Jelly Belly UCI continental team member Serghei Tvetcov jumped to third, 37 seconds back, with another strong performance. Jelly Belly team manager Danny Van Haute credited his team’s success so far this week to the week spent training at Keystone prior to the start.

Tinkoff-Saxo Tour de France rider Rafal Majka held on to second, 20 seconds behind van Garderen.

“I was glad I was able to pick up a few seconds on Danielson,” van Garderen said, “ but Majka is still pretty close and making me nervous for the time trial tomorrow.”

Stage 6 will resume in Vail tomorrow with the individual time trial up Vail Pass.

“A bad day tomorrow, that could be the end of it.”

Courtesy of the Summit Daily News.

USA Pro Challenge bolsters Breckenridge’s bike town brand

#Breckenridge, Colorado.

Sebastian Foltz / sfoltz@summitdaily.com | Summit Daily

Holding the USA Pro Challenge costs Breckenridge taxpayers a cool $200,000.

The price is well worth it, according to city officials and organizers as the town prepares to host the event for the fourth straight year.

“The main component to our expenses is lodging,” said Brian Waldes, financial services manager for the town. “To get the race to come here you have to cover the cost to put the racers and their entourages up in lodging.”

Various sponsors also help cover the city’s costs. Other expenses include having extra emergency medical personnel on duty, renting fences and portable toilets as well as putting on a host of ancillary events ranging from the kids Strider Challenge to live stunt demonstrations and concerts.

The city helps keep cost down by utilizing a lot of volunteer labor to organize an event that requires months of planning.

“This isn’t really a town event,” Waldes said. “The volunteers put in much more combined hours into this than the staff.”

And the efforts of those volunteers, which for some requires as much time every week as a part-time job, have paid off.

“We are very privileged to get the Friday finish,” said Jennifer McAtamney, an event organizer. “It shows the hard work and professionalism put together by staff and volunteers in organizing the event.”

Breckenridge, along with Aspen and Denver, are the only three cities to be included in the race in each of the four years it’s been in existence.

“For us it’s about building our brand as a biking destination,” McAtamney added. “We encourage all types of biking, whether it’s riding a cruiser down Main Street, mountain biking or road racing.”

Breckenridge conducted a survey last year to find out how local merchants felt about the race. The reviews were mixed. Some appreciated the national and international attention the race drew to the town. Others were concerned the road closures on race day keep some people from getting to work and prevent would-be patrons from getting to some businesses.

“It doesn’t always lead to a lot of extra business on race day for our local businesses,” Waldes said. “And it hurts a lot of our service businesses on race day. The council is very aware of that. But it’s not as much about doing a lot of business on one day as it is about us building a long-term brand … This event is about being outside, cycling, exercise, the mountains and having a good time. Those are all things that really represent our image and our brand.”

And there are local businesses, not just in Breck but throughout the county, that thrive during the event.

“It’s good for the community,” said Jonathan Enns, marketing manager for Pioneer Sports in Frisco. “And I know for us, this week every year we sell out of all of our demos, our high-end road bikes, from people traveling all over the country who want to ride up here and see the race and ride the same course that a lot of the racers are on. It’s an exiting time for us in the community, and it’s good for business and the economy as a whole to show what amazing biking is available up here.”

Scott Wescott, owner of Wilderness Sports in Dillon and Frisco, agreed.

“I think what it does, from a shop standpoint, is people start to get a feeling for what type of gear and brand and equipment that the pros are riding,” Wescott said. “People want to emulate that. Whether a rec rider or a little more competitive, it brings it to the forefront. Everyone wants to be a little faster or make cycling a little easier.”

And for Breckenridge, it’s about building a brand and associating the town with one of the world’s top five professional road races.

“$200,000 is a lot of money,” Waldes said. “But we feel like it’s a smart use of tax dollars for marketing purposes.”

Courtesy of the Summit Daily News.

Breckenridge Nordic Center donates ski lodge to Lakota reservation

#Breckenridge, Colorado.

A piece of Breckenridge history is being preserved to help Lakota people living on a reservation in South Dakota.

The owners of the Breckenridge Nordic Center recently partnered with The Tipi Raisers, a nonprofit working to strengthen the Lakota community and share its culture, to ensure the lodge they used for decades wouldn’t go to the local landfill.

For the last week a handful of Lakota from the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation have worked to disassemble the lodge and transport it home. They hope soon it will be reassembled and used as a multipurpose community center.

“It’ll be a place where people learn, youth learn,” said Ed Iron Cloud, 50, a Pine Ridge resident and board member of the nonprofit. People who go to the center will be able to learn contemporary life skills as well as Lakota culture.

On the reservation, almost everyone knows someone who has committed suicide. Unemployment, alcoholism, cancer and diabetes rates are heartbreakingly high, and the life expectancy for men is in the mid-40s. Elders worry their language, spirituality and traditions are being lost.

For this community, one of the poorest in the U.S., the Breckenridge lodge is a symbol of hope.

“If we can achieve this, we can achieve building log homes for our children and their families with the help of the Western world,” said S. Ramona White Plume, 53, another Tipi Raiser board member. “I have to have that hope, and I do have that hope.”

The lodge, also called a chalet, was built in 1969 as a Breckenridge Ski Resort patrol hut and warming hut, said Gene Dayton, 71, who runs the Breckenridge Nordic Center with his wife, Therese.

The resort used the lodge for 12 years before replacing it with the much larger Vista Haus on Peak 8, and in 1981 Dayton won a bid to remove the lodge for $3,000.

He relocated it to the Nordic Center, which last year finished construction of a new lodge, five times bigger and more energy efficient.

Now, per an agreement with the owners of the land under the old lodge, Dayton must remove the structure by the end of August. He decided it should be repurposed.

“We recycle plastic bags in this city, but we don’t pay much attention and we turn our heads when whole buildings go into the landfill,” he said.

The Daytons’ relationship with Pine Ridge began when they donated a giant lathe — a piece of machinery that shapes tree trunks into building logs — to the reservation about two years ago. When he visited the reservation, Dayton said, he saw living conditions that resembled a Third World country.

“To me, it appears to be a black hole right now with very little hope for young people,” Dayton said.

This summer, he contacted the Tipi Raisers about relocating the old 2,500-square-foot lodge once again.

Last Thursday, about a dozen Lakota came to Breckenridge to disassemble the structure. They have been sleeping in tipis next to The Church at Agape Post.

From this spot along the Blue River Wednesday, White Plume explained how the organization is driven by a “vision that one day we’re going to build log homes for our children.”

That is the nonprofit’s main goal because the reservation is experiencing an extreme housing crisis. A majority of residents’ houses are infected with black mold, and often three to five families live in a single-family home.

The nonprofit’s executive director, Dave Ventimiglia, said the government has estimated the community of about 30,000 people needs 3,000 homes.

With so many people under one roof, it’s hard for the kids to do their homework, said Iron Cloud, who served as a South Dakota state representative from 2008 to 2012. “Everybody should have the opportunity to have a good home and feel safe and comfortable.”

White Plume lives with five of her children and five grandchildren in a three-bedroom house with a basement. She sleeps on a couch in the living room.

“Everybody’s crammed into one house, and it’s a good thing because we love our children dearly,” she said, “but how come we can’t be like the non-native people with their big homes and the nuclear family?”

Though life is hard, she said, people in the community find happiness and fulfillment in their families, spirituality and knowledge of the Lakota culture.

“We still have our pride intact,” she said. “Our Lakota lifeways and laws are still alive and intact.”

She said the organization wants to construct homes with thousands of beetle-kill logs it obtained through previous efforts, but the nonprofit lacks sufficient funding.

“We’re human beings, and we want to live, too. We want our children to live,” she said. “We’re all involved in helping to reclaim and revitalize our way of life so our young people will live to be old men and old women. That’s our dream.”

The nonprofit barely has the money to bring the lodge back to South Dakota and will have to fundraise to reassemble the structure and turn it into a community center, Ventimiglia said.

The group plans to finish disassembling the old lodge this weekend.

Summit County resident Wayne Walton volunteered with the group Wednesday and talked about the tragic treatment of Lakota and other native people for more than 100 years.

“Obviously we can’t heal those wounds, but it’s a step in that direction,” he said.

White Plume said she hopes the ski-lodge-turned-community-center will be a place young people can go for help,

“We all want our children to heal from this historical intergenerational trauma,” she said. “This is going to help us achieve that goal, so it’s not just an old chalet being moved to Pine Ridge.”

To help the Breckenridge project, call Gene Dayton at (970) 389-3481. For more information about The Tipi Raisers organization or to donate funds, time or supplies, visit thetipiraisers.org or contact executive director Dave Ventimiglia at (720) 412-3335 or dventimiglia@thetipiraisers.org.

Courtesy of the Summit Daily News.

Summit County pets available for adoption

#Breckenridge, Colorado.

Gatsby - Photo by Michael Yearout Photography

Pets available for adoption at the Summit County Animal Shelter.  Contact the shelter at (970) 668-3230.

CATS

PEPPER, 1 year 1 month, Domestic Shorthair mix, gray tab, spayed female

NUTMEG, 1 year 1 month, Domestic Shorthair mix, gray tab and orange, spayed female

OREO, 1 year 10 months, Japanese Bobtail mix, black and white, spayed female

GRETA, 2 years, Domestic Shorthair mix, dil calico, spayed female

WATSON, 2 years, Russian Blue mix, gray, neutered male

JINX, 3 years, Domestic Shorthair mix, black, spayed female

CLARA, no age, Domestic Longhair mix, black, spayed female

K 1, 2 months, Domestic Longhair mix, brown tabby and red, unaltered female

K 2, 2 months, Domestic Longhair mix, brown tabby and black, unaltered female

K 3, 2 months, Domestic Longhair mix, gray tab and white, unaltered male

K 4, 2 months, Domestic Longhair mix, gray tab, unaltered male

NINJA, 2 years, Domestic Shorthair mix, black, spayed female

SQUEAKERS, 2 years, Siamese mix, lynx point, spayed female

MIDNIGHT, 4 months, Domestic Shorthair mix, black, spayed female

RAVEN, 4 months, Domestic Mediumhair mix, black, spayed female

DIESEL, 4 months, Domestic Mediumhair mix, black, neutered male

GATSBY, 2 years, Domestic Shorthair mix, white and black, neutered male

GENIE, 4 years, Domestic Shorthair, dil calico, spayed female

BIRDIE, 7 years, Domestic Shorthair mix, black and white, spayed female

RINGA, 2 years, Siamese mix, seal point and gray tab, spayed female

SMOKIE, 6 years, Domestic Mediumhair mix, gray, spayed female

LUCY, 3 years, Domestic Shorthair mix, black and white, spayed female

FUJI, 4 months, Domestic Shorthair mix, white and brown, neutered male

MISTY, 4 years, Domestic Shorthair mix, dil calico, spayed female

MR. BUTTONS, 2 years, Domestic Mediumhair mix, orng tabby and white, neutered male

DOGS

MIRABELLA, 2 years, German Shepherd Dog mix, brown and white, spayed female

TRINITY, 1 year 6 months, Labrador Retriever and Pit Bull Terrier mix, black and white, spayed female

TACO, 2 years, Chihuahua - Smooth Coated mix, tan, neutered male

LUCILLE, 5 years, Australian Cattle Dog mix, black and white, spayed female

BLUNTZER, 4 years, Dachshund mix, tan, neutered male

CAESAR, 1 year, Labrador Retriever, black, neutered male

WILLOW, 4 years, Staffordshire Bull Terrier mix, brindle, spayed female

CHEROKEE, 2 years, Labrador Retriever mix, yellow, spayed female

KATIE, 1 year 6 months, Catahoula Leopard Hound mix, blue merle and black, spayed female

TEAGAN, no age, Border Collie mix, black and white, spayed female

LUCY, 2 years, American Staffordshire Terrier, red, spayed female

Courtesy of the Summit Daily News.

Summit County nonprofits connect with USA Pro Challenge fever

#Breckenridge, Colorado.

As the USA Pro Challenge races through the mountains and into Breckenridge this week, it brings with it both national and international spotlights. While local hotels, restaurants and retail businesses are jumping at the chance to expose themselves to a larger audience, several of Summit County’s nonprofit organizations are stepping up to turn some of that attention onto the work they do and hopefully gain some more support in achieving their mission.

BOEC FREEDOM 2 RIDE

Last year, the Breckenridge Outdoor Education Center (BOEC) debuted the Freedom 2 Ride event, where BOEC volunteers and members of the Brain Injury Alliance group made their way down Breckenridge Main Street ahead of the USA Pro Challenge bike riders who were on their way to a Stage 2 finish. This year, that group will grow, joined by wounded warriors from the Denver Veterans Affairs medical center and more who are participating in the BOEC adaptive cycling summer program.

On Friday, Aug. 22, the group will go out for a ride on trails outside of Breckenridge on their adaptive cycles — bicycles with three or four wheels designed to be ridden by people with disabilities. The end of their ride will take them onto Main Street, where they will ride from the Stage 5 finish line down to Park Avenue. Spectators can expect a lot of noise — cheers, whistles, cowbells, etc. — and a lot of smiles.

“It is done BOEC style, where there’s lots of excitement,” said Jodi Flickinger, volunteer and wilderness coordinator at the BOEC. She was part of the ride last year and witnessed the vibe and energy firsthand.

“It was really fun,” she said. “The participants were really excited because they don’t often get to be the center of attention, so they were really stoked to ride down Main Street and … be what everyone came out to see.”

The mission of the BOEC is to allow people with physical and cognitive disabilities the chance to enjoy the outdoors through adaptive programs such as cycling in the summer and skiing and snowboarding in the winter. The organization hopes to bring more awareness to its programs by highlighting Freedom 2 Ride on race day.

For more information about the BOEC and its programs, visit www.boec.org.

DUCKS FOR THE SUMMIT FOUNDATION

Among the many vendors to be found in the Festival Village in Breckenridge during the USA Pro Challenge will be one tent with one very obvious theme — ducks. This is The Summit Foundation, which will be selling rubber ducks for the 27th annual Great Rubber Duck Races. On Aug. 30, thousands of bright yellow ducks will bump, jostle and float their way down the Blue River from Main Street Station to the Riverwalk Center. Prizes await winners of the race, as well as winners of myriad other competitions, including slowest duck.

“We love that the Pro cycle Challenge comes to Breckenridge and to Summit County in general and think it’s so exciting The Summit Foundation gets to be part of it,” said Elisabeth Lawrence, events and marketing coordinator for the foundation.

Having a presence at the Pro Challenge event allows the foundation to reach even more people for the duck race fundraiser, particularly visitors. Winners of the duck race don’t need to be present to win, so anybody can benefit from a duck, Lawrence said.

Along with ducks, the foundation will be selling mementos and souvenir items such as hats, t-shirts, bags and cups, she added.

Last year, the organization raised more than $3,000 at the Pro Challenge event alone.

Proceeds from the duck race and other fundraisers by The Summit Foundation go toward supporting local nonprofits and high school scholarships. For more information on the foundation and its events, visit www.summitfoundation.org.

HC3 PROMOTES ZERO WASTE

By now, the brown and green domed zero waste tents are a common sight to Summit County locals at any big event. Provided by the High Country Conservation Center (HC3) and manned by volunteers, the tents give three options or “streams” for trash — compost, recycling and landfill.

The compost stream accepts biodegradable items, such as food scraps and manufactured compostable items like paper plates. It is then taken to the local landfill where it will become part of the composting program.

“This compost can, in turn, be purchased at the landfill and be used for garden production, landscaping, even golf courses,” said Jenny Hammock, community programs coordinator for HC3. “We encourage all our community gardeners to use the compost when they’re amending the soil in their pots.”

Before the event, the volunteers will be given a brief orientation so they can help identify which waste needs to go into which tent stream. Events like the Frisco BBQ, Oktoberfest and the Pro Challenge allow HC3 to tell more people about their mission, Hammock said.

“It’s a really good way for us to get involved in the community and get our message out among the community when everybody is in one place at the same time,” she said.

For more information on HC3, visit their website at www.highcountryconservation.org.

Courtesy of the Summit Daily News.

Off and rolling: 2014 USA Pro Challenge gets underway in Aspen

Aspen, Colorado.

Sebastian Foltz / Summit Daily

The fourth running of Colorado’s seven-day USA Pro Challenge cycling stage race kicks off today in Aspen. Following the success of last year’s start, the town will once again host a circuit course stage for the 550-mile race’s opening day.

With a starting elevation of 7,908 feet, riders will have to acclimate early. Last year, 2013 Tour de France winner Chris Froome’s Team Sky struggled from the get-go; he later admitted that the team may have arrived too late to properly acclimate to the altitude. 

Beyond the challenges of racing high above sea level, the Aspen/Snowmass circuit course will be a fast-paced start to the race. The 65-mile course includes three 22-mile laps between Aspen and Snowmass. Each lap will have riders fighting 2,300 feet of elevation gain with little time to recover. 

The steep trek up from Aspen to Snowmass will be a challenge early, and the short laps could see another tight peloton cross the finish line at the end of day one. Among top competitors this year, BMC team rider Tejay van Garderen of Aspen will be looking to set the tone early in hopes of repeating as the race’s overall winner. 

Van Garderen is looking strong once again coming off a fifth-place finish at this year’s Tour de France. After finishing on top of the podium in the Tour of Utah earlier this month, Boulder’s Tom Danielson (Garmin-Sharp) will also be looking to contend. 

Danielson finished last year’s Pro Challenge third in the general classification (GC) standings. While no one is likely to jump too far out in front after day one, it will be interesting to see if any riders show early signs of altitude fatigue. Monday’s race gets rolling at 2 p.m.

 All television coverage of the race will be on NBCSN, including a nightly recap show. Check local listings for details. The race can also be streamed live online, details are available at www.usaprocyclingchallenge.com.

2014 USA Pro Challenge preview: Aspen start, Breckenridge and Vail key

#Breckenridge, Colorado.

Will BMC Racing Team member and Aspen resident Tejay van Garderen, fresh from a fifth-place finish in the Tour de France, repeat as USA Pro Challenge champion? Could Boulder’s Tom Danielson follow up his second consecutive Tour of Utah win with a win at the USA Pro Challenge? He finished last year’s race in third behind van Garderen and Mathias Frank.

Danielson’s Garmin Shrap teammate Christian Vande Velde — now retired — also won in 2012. Or will someone else emerge from the peloton? What about 42-year-old fan favorite Jens Voigt — how will he do in his farewell tour’s final race?

The countdown is on. The 2014 USA Pro Challenge kicks off Monday, Aug. 18, in Aspen.

Now in its fourth year, the race is widely considered to be one of the most popular and most challenging stage races in North America, and this year looks to be no different.

Back in May when the race route was released, van Garderen said that this year “looks to be the most challenging route yet.”

Over the course of the seven-day race, riders will cover more than 550 miles and nearly 40,000 feet of elevation gain, with a number of stage starts and finishes higher than the highest point in the Tour de France.

Speaking of this year’s course, Pro Challenge CEO Shawn Hunter said, “Every year we strive to create a route that will challenge the riders in new ways, give spectators more opportunities to see some of the toughest athletes in the world and highlight new parts of Colorado.”

Among the highlights of this year’s route, the race will feature its first mountaintop finish at Monarch Pass (11,300 feet), as well as late stages in Breckenridge and Vail that will likely be key to the general classification (GC) standings.

This year’s course will top out during Day Five as riders reach the top of 11,542-foot Hoosier Pass, on their way to a finish in Breckenridge.

With the race just a day away, here’s a look ahead the week ahead.

Stage 1: Aspen

Following the success of last year’s start, Aspen will once again host a circuit race for the opening stage. With a starting elevation of 7,908 feet, riders will have to acclimate early. Last year 2013 Tour de France winner Chris Froome’s Team Sky struggled from the get-go; he later admitted that they arrived too late to properly acclimate to the altitude. Beyond the challenges of racing at altitude, the Aspen/Snowmass circuit course will be a fast-paced start to the race. The 65-mile course includes three 22-mile laps between Aspen and Snowmass. Each lap will have riders fighting 2,300 feet of elevation gain with little time to recover. The steep trek up from Aspen to Snowmass will be a challenge early, and the short laps could see another tight peloton for Day One.

Stage 2: Aspen to Crested Butte

From Aspen riders will head to Crested Butte, through Basalt and Carbondale and up over both McClure (8,763 feet) and Keebler (9,980 feet) passes. In addition to the two passes, uphill will be the theme for the day with a difference of 2,000 feet in elevation between Aspen and Crested Butte (9,090 feet). Following a sprint section in Carbondale and the climb over McClure Pass, riders will face a 20-mile roller coaster on Gunnison County Road 12. Alternating between pavement and dirt, this could make for an unpleasant stretch depending on conditions. After Keebler Pass the stage will finish with a sprint through downtown Crested Butte and a steep climb to Mount Crested Butte. Tuesday’s stage also features three King of the Mountain (KOM) competitions.

Stage 4: Colorado Springs Circuit Race

Stage 4 jumps to Colorado Springs for another circuit course stage. But it certainly won’t be a walk in the park. Starting at the Broadmore the peloton will enter a 16-mile circuit that will be raced four times. Riders will be challenged by tough climbs and descents on each lap through the Garden of the Gods and on Ridge Road, which includes a 17 percent grade. Expect to see riders create some separation in this stage.

Stage 5: Woodland Park to Breckenridge

The Stage 5 finish in Breckenridge could be key to the overall race with only two stages remaining after its conclusion. The day starts in Woodland Park. Riders will pass through Pike National Forest on newly paved Tarryall Road. This will be another day for climbers with a steady gain from start to finish. The stage’s conclusion will be especially difficult as the race passes through Fairplay and riders prepare to reach the race’s highest point at Hoosier Pass (11,500 feet). The steep grade on Moonstone Road could once gain be a deciding factor in the stage’s final miles.

Stage 6: Vail Individual Time Trial

For the second consecutive year the race will hold a time trial on Vail Pass. Only a few seconds separated GC winner Tejay van Garderen and third-place overall finisher Tom Danielson for the stage win there last year. As the second-to-last stage, Vail could once again be key. With origins in the Coors Classic, the time trial is a popular stage that attracts a lot of fanfare. Riders will start in Vail and climb most of the way up Vail Pass to the stage finish. While it may be short, it will be punishing. The gentle start leads to a steep 3-mile climb all to familiar to any cyclist from Summit or Eagle counties. Strategy will win the day on this challenging stage.

Stage 7: Boulder to Denver

The race heads to the Front Range for its final stage. Sunday’s conclusion to the race will start in Boulder, home to the Garmin-Sharp team and a number of riders, and end in Denver. While last year’s final stage was a fairly tame — albeit at high speed — circuit through downtown Denver, this year looks to present one final challenge. From Boulder riders will head to Golden, then up and around Lookout Mountain (7,320 feet) before coming back through to Golden. From there the riders charge toward Denver for a shortened version of last year’s circuit course. The race’s final miles will take place on a three-and-a-half-lap route through portions of downtown.

Note: The Pro Challenge will once again be featured daily on NBC Sports Network, starting with a preview show Sunday, Aug. 17, at 5 p.m. Check local listings for other days. The full race can also be streamed online. Additional information is available at www.usaprocyclingchallenge.com.

Courtesy of the Summit Daily News.

Montezuma sues itself over controversial municipal election

#Breckenridge, Colorado.

This week, the town of Montezuma filed a lawsuit in Summit County District Court … against itself.

Newly elected Mayor Lesley Davis said the lawsuit was filed Tuesday in hopes of bringing a resolution to its controversial municipal electionlast April. The suit was filed by interim town attorney Kendra Carberry, of Denver, on behalf of town clerk Helen Moorman and the town of Montezuma.

The respondents listed in the suit include all of the town’s 61 registered voters.

“The town is definitely not suing its residents,” Davis said. “We’re just seeking the court’s assistance to help us with a controversial election and to let us know what we should be doing.”

According to the complaint, the town alleges that ballots from April’s election contained inaccurate verbiage and did not feature numbered stubs and duplicate stubs to be recorded in the poll books and that the final tally for at least one board of trustees candidate was inaccurate, among other claims. As town clerk and the election official, Moorman was responsible for overseeing all facets of the election.

“You have to understand the culture of Montezuma, and I’m not a ‘Zuman,’ so I don’t.”
Sheriff John Minor

The complaint also references a 5th Judicial District Attorney’s Office investigation into alleged voter fraud. After the April election, several Montezuma residents filed petitions challenging the residency of 14 registered voters. Thirteen of those voters participated in the election. The DA found enough evidence that five of those 13 voters were not Montezuma or Summit County residents at the time of the election.

Striking those five ballots was enough to alter the results of at least one board seat, Davis said. However, the town has no recourse under Colorado election law to legally change the makeup of the board this far removed from the election.

Due to the DA’s investigation, town officials failed to contest the election within 10 days, as required under Colorado Revised Statutes, and conducted a recount, but not within the guidelines of Colorado law, the complaint states.

Although Davis and six trustees were sworn into office after April 1, the mistakes that have since come to light also are calling into question whether the election was properly certified.

Filing a lawsuit is the only available option to the town in its last-ditch effort to verify its election results, Davis said. The board of trustees voted in favor of filing the lawsuit last month. The town is paying for the legal expenses, Davis said.

“With five invalid ballots, we felt it was a pretty significant amount and that the best thing to do would be to have a judge review it (the election results),” Davis said. “We need to have a judge review these errors and tell us what the next steps should be.”

Summit County District Judge Karen Romeo is presiding over the case. As Davis understands it, Romeo will have three options at her disposal.

The first is to throw out the election and order the town to hold a new election in November.

Romeo could also determine that the errors had no significant effect on the election results and order it to stand as is. She also has the option of subpoenaing every elector into court to testify and then make a determination.

Luke Danielson, a Gunnison attorney who so far is representing three of Montezuma’s registered voters, called the lawsuit improper, saying the town is trying to get the courts to bail them out because officials failed to meet the deadline to contest the election.

“There is a law that sets rules about how to challenge an election and it outlines really tight deadlines for really good reasons,” Danielson said. “You can’t force residents to stand by for months to determine who is in charge of the town. If they wanted to contest the election, they should have done it appropriately in April.”

Danielson, a Colorado native who was accepted by the state’s Bar Association in 1975, said he has never seen a case like this in his almost 40 years in practice. When reached for comment Wednesday, Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler also said he’d never heard of such a case, which would make this an unprecedented event in Colorado politics.

The strangest thing, Danielson said, is that Moorman, Davis and the rest of the board of trustees participated in the election, which makes them respondents in the lawsuit.

“They really are suing themselves,” Danielson said. “They’re trying a new procedure that no one else has ever invented before all because they missed all of the deadlines.”

Protecting the integrity of an election

The controversy surrounding Montezuma’s election dates to March during the final weeks before April 1 when several town residents announced they would be contesting the ballots of multiple voters they believed were second-home owners and therefore barred from legally participating in the election.

Throughout the process, Davis and others have said their actions were motivated to protect the integrity of the election.

There were, however, undertones of a power struggle between Montezuma’s younger residents and the old guard; the two groups, respectively, also make up the town’s pro- and anti-marijuana factions.

Montezuma is home to a state-licensed medicinal marijuana grow operation and several residents are thought to have personal grow operations in their homes, Davis said.

Regardless of the motivation, there’s no denying the division among Montezuma’s residents considering the election drew the participation of 12 candidates vying for all seven seats on the board of trustees. The election has been called the largest in at least 25 years.

controversial agreement?

Although class warfare and generational perceptions about marijuana might have played a role in Montezuma’s strange saga, town resident Jeni Hinkley said Montezuma’s entire electoral debacle could be traced back to a pending intergovernmental agreement between the previous town board and the Summit County Sheriff’s Office to provide law enforcement services to the town.

The IGA, which was in the works for more than two years, was nearing its final phase of approval before the April 1 election. Of Montezuma’s seven elected board members, six backed the agreement. Davis, who was a trustee at the time, opposed it and rallied 29 other residents to sign a petition against it.

Hinkley’s husband, Paul, who is known as “the welder in town” and has been a Montezuma resident for more than 30 years, was instrumental in drafting the terms of the agreement with the sheriff’s office. Hinkley couldn’t understand why anyone wouldn’t want law enforcement services in the community.

“I just opposed it because I didn’t think it was necessary,” Davis said. “We don’t have any crime and I thought it would take away from some of the historic character of this old mining town. It’s been this way for more than 100 years.”

The future of the IGA is unclear. After Davis and others voiced opposition to the agreement, Summit County Sheriff John Minor decided to table the IGA, citing the closeness of the April election and the possibility of there being a totally new town board. He has not yet presented the proposal to the new board, given the ongoing controversy shrouding the election.

Although there is not an IGA in place, Montezuma has and continues to receive law enforcement services from the sheriff’s office.

The two parties have had a longstanding “handshake” agreement that requires the sheriff’s office to respond to in-progress emergencies. Although Davis cited fears of the sheriff’s office enforcing parking restrictions or responding to dog-at-large calls if the IGA was approved, Minor said the agreement doesn’t include anything beyond the scope of services the sheriff’s office has been providing for decades.

“You have to understand the culture of Montezuma, and I’m not a ‘Zuman,’ so I don’t,” Minor said. “My sense is that they like to be left alone and that there is a lot of skepticism towards government.

“I attended a lot of board meetings when we were trying to put this together and I received one of the best comments I’ve ever heard when one of the old board members told me, ‘We like you, sheriff, but we don’t like cops.’”

Minor said he can understand the skepticism and even the community’s desire to protect the historic integrity of Montezuma, but he also said there is a need to bring the town into the modern era.

Because Montezuma does not have its own police force, the sheriff’s office has an obligation to respond to emergencies.

Should one of Minor’s deputies respond to an emergency and something goes wrong, it’s possible that Davis, the town, the sheriff’s office and Summit County found themselves engaged in a lawsuit. If that scenario plays out and an attorney questions the authority of the sheriff’s office to police the town, “a handshake agreement isn’t going to hold up in a court of law,” Minor said.

Besides wanting to formalize the agreement, Minor said he and county officials were prepared to continue offering the same level of services at a cost to the town of $1 per year.

“We don’t care if they don’t want parking enforcement and we don’t care if they have dogs running around all over the place, but we feel like we need this agreement,” Minor said. “We’ve had a decades-long relationship with the town of Montezuma and we’ve never done anything to violate their independence, but it’s the new millennium and the county is willing to accept all of the liability, all of the responsibility and all of the risk for a buck a year.

“You won’t find a deal like that anywhere. That’s cheaper than the dollar menu at McDonald’s, after taxes, of course.”

Courtesy of the Summit Daily news.