COME TO LIFE | Ways to Bike Colorado Ways to Bike Colorado It takes plenty of blacktop, singletrack, gravel, sunshine and friendly people to create a bikers’ paradise like ours. Use Great Mapping Head to local visitor centers to get directions to excellent biking spots. Durango, Telluride, Steamboat Springs, Pagosa Springs, Fruita and Crested Butte are all places with trail networks so vast and varied that a map is a downright necessity. For much more, download the COTREX (Colorado Trail Explorer) app. Explore Town Connects For starters try the Boulder-to-Golden or Boulder-to-Westminster routes, Wolcott to Steamboat Springs, Las Animas to Lamar, Aspen to Glenwood Springs, or Fort Collins to Mishawaka Amphitheatre. Summit County paths connect Dillon, Breck, Copper, Frisco, Keystone and more. There’s also the Grand Junction to Palisade “fruit loop,” which winds through rows of peach trees and grapevines. Then consider tackling the Palisade Plunge, which connects the town with the top of the Grand Mesa along 32 miles of sweet, advanced, backcountry singletrack. Near Carbondale Bike the Byways Consider the 26 long-distance Bike the Byways rides. Start at Denver’s South Platte River Trail and work your way to the Lariat Loop before tackling mountain rides like Top of the Rockies in Leadville and finishing off with the bluffs and buttes of Dinosaur Diamond north of Grand Junction. dtdapps.coloradodot.info/bike Go for the Gold! Colorado has more gold-or platinum-rated bicycle communities than all but one other state, according to the League of American Bicyclists. • Platinum: Boulder, Fort Collins • Gold: Breckenridge, Durango, Crested Butte, Carbondale, Aspen, Steamboat Springs • Silver: Colorado Springs, Denver, Gunnison, Vail, Summit County, Golden, Arvada, Silverthorne, Glenwood Springs, Longmont • Bronze: Castle Rock, Greeley, Fruita, Grand Junction, Pueblo, Lakewood, Montrose. Speaking of gold … The Aspen Snowmass/Roaring Fork Valley Gold-Level IMBA Ride Center, which includes terrain in Basalt, Carbondale and Glenwood Springs, is one of only six in the world. Ride Our Events Look for large events like Ride the Rockies (June), the Leadville Trail 100 MTB (Aug.), the Triple Bypass (Aug.), as well as dozens of smaller events. Longtime races like the Elephant Rock in Castle Rock (June), Emerald Mountain Epic in Steamboat (Aug.), Breck Epic (Aug.), the Fort Collins Tour de Fat (Sept.) and Salida Bike Fest (Sept.) are joined by newer events like the Grand Junction Grand Enduro (May), The Broadmoor Cycle to the Summit (Aug.), Venus de Miles in Lyons (Aug.), SBT GRVL (Aug.) in Steamboat Springs and The Rad Dirt Fest in Trinidad (Oct.). Colorado.com/Events Denver’s RiNo neighborhood 76 1-800-COLORADO
Colorado Official State Vacation Guide 2023: Page 76
