Call of a Life Time Season 2 – Episode 5 | Leadville Trail 100 MTB (Women’s)

Starting at an elevation of over 10,000 feet in the scenic Colorado Rockies, the women of the Grand Prix are gearing up for Stop #4 out of 7: the Stages Cycling Leadville Trail 100 MTB in Leadville, Colorado. Defending champion Hannah Otto is determined to claim the top spot, while series leader Sofia Gomez Villafane aims to strengthen her position.

A film series by Cold Collaborative

Executive Producers: Kimo Seymour & Michelle Duffy Smith

Directed by Shannon Vandivier

Producers:
Zoe Andrikidis
Bowen Parrish
Shannon Vandivier
Rebekah Sands
Ryan Cross

Edited by Blake Campbell

Field Producer: Zoe Andrikidis

Photographer: Wil Matthews

Assistant Editing by Tyler Domingue, Bowen Parrish, Shannon Vandivier

Cinematography by Hayes Baxley, Brian Freeman, Nathan McBride, Bowen Parrish, Benjamin Kraushaar, Connor Witton, Shannon Vandivier, Tyler Domingue, John Mathews, Joey Chapman.

Special Thank You to: 2023 Life Time Grand Prix athletes, the Life Time team and our partners at Mazda.

Learn more about the Life Time Grand Prix:

Website: http://www.lifetimegrandprix.com
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/lifetimegrandprix
Facebook http://www.facebook.com/lifetimegrandprix
X: http://www.twitter.com/LTGrandPrix

Learn more about the Leadville Trail 100 MTB:

Website: http://www.LeadvilleRaceSeries.com
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/LTRaceSeries
Facebook http://www.facebook.com/LeadvilleRaceSeries
X: http://www.twitter.com/LeadvilleRaceSeries

#cycling #gravel #mountainbike #grandprix #lifetimegrandprix #gravelbike

Today where we just we have such an abundance of events back then it was the one and only it was in the highest town in America and it was built on the backbone of the Leadville Trail 100 run and then you pull in athletes like Rebecca rush and Lance Armstrong that

Started to gravitate to the event and it’s you know spot on the map around the globe just sworded go get her mared good morning Lille family welcome to the 29th running of the Race Across the sky we are so honored that you are here with us so dig deep out

There ride safe ride smart ride Le Bell strong we love you we’ll be waiting for you here at the Finish Line I think we are built by our culture in ways we Thrive because we connect and bond in that group take it back to Who Built This Town the most rugged the most

Gritty these trails that people are riding on and running on are built on the backs of Miners and they’re built on the backs of a bunch of strong Women there’s a moment in there when it got really dark and really hard and the demons show up but you start to divert away from all the negative internal talk to begin to recognize that you’re already different you’ve already Changed get it you can show up in hard places for everything that’s come before this and for the moments right now for all the hours you’ve trained how does it become something bigger than myself so we just came off the pavement coming up pagri Pass Road how do I

Translate that into my community into my family into my work and bring it back that’s what I hope so what I did was the so the last week’s number multiplied by 0.0106 okay since it was down6 percent points I was actually a financial journalist in my past life I

Have had races where I’ve gone to and um have had like major deadlines and that can be very hard this is kind of like just not a bad distraction it’s like a good reason to sit down I’ve always been an indurance athlete I was a pretty serious High School Runner actually when

I was a journalist and I was in France a man hired some pros to go with him so he could do every stage of the tour a day ahead of the pros and I showed up to cover the story was going to ride along was the only woman they said like you

Know when you get too tired you can toop in the van I ended up out climbing them and one of the former pros this Belgian guy like just looked at me and he said you’re really good you should do this all right can you want you want to go

Over the macro tracker really quick Sure I was on sta with Money Magazine CNN I was a contributing Editor to Baron’s Wall Street Journal and now I act as a managing editor within a very large Financial organization that I can’t really name without getting their permission so I’m not going to have a good weekend ride doing scary things

With your body all right good luck bye they have no idea when it comes to pressure this is where I feel like I’m kind of lucky because I have a day job I’m not relying on my results or making sponsors super happy to pay my mortgage so any pressure that I have is

Pressure I put on myself you know my first strategy is to just not think my other strategy is to think about people who’ve helped me along the way and wanting to finish the race for them also think about the people who aren’t pros and are doing a race that’s

Going to take hours and hours longer than my race will that is what is so fun about Leadville and all the races that that I do is that anyone can do them it’s not the tour to France we’re sharing an experience but everyone has their own

Version of suffering and that I think it makes it even more Rich It’s a Wonderful expression of humanity I meet a friend at every race that I’ve been at so far this year we’re all doing the same hard thing so I don’t know is it trauma bonding we

All have the same course and so it’s fun to see the pros walking around and being able to ask them anything like back when you were normal tell me you know any tips that you have or whatever and then you realize like they’re just humans man

Just like us like I they’re I think that’s the cool part just people and I think I have a unique perspective CU my sister’s one of them who’s taller I’m half an inch taller than you don’t even look at this we’re both have Burgen stacks on stand I’m taller am I taller who’s

Taller everything we do we’re trying to help people and enable and Empower people to live a healthy way of life not enough fandom around cycling to support especially what we’re doing on the professional side if we couldn’t do it with the everyday athletes that are just trying to accomplish something to live a

Healthy way of life I mean I’m winning that’s all we need to know SMUD he’s like a rectangle oh my God I know this dog I looked right into it too don’t there’s so much poop what is he who are you oh no oh no two of you Dylan’s taking our

Bikes okay I’m going to go get a phone to call these people this R this is the one for me sorry the dogs were a lot thank you it was like a rectangle shaped poodle yeah P bottles bottles whatever I’ve gotten second third and fourth now so this is my fourth time doing

Hopefully I don’t get fish hopefully I get first looks like and this goes into this pocket this goes into this pocket and this is what I’m getting at this Aid the Grand Prix is a long series we have like the race day of Leadville and then there’s also like the standings

Too that definitely like favors consistency which I think I’ve shown I’m pretty consistent but we’re all separated by such a small margin it’s like constant pressure I am stressed two weeks ago I was a hot mess I’m trying to put my best foot forward and know that I have worked

Really hard to get to where I am and um lean into that a little bit more I’m going to actually be really a on just make sure that the bottles are closed it’s like my worst nightmare that and I’ll keep I don’t think it’s a race where pressure helps at

All so I’ve actually spent the last few weeks working on removing that pressure and just going in knowing that anything can happen and I’m ready and excited for that challenge Hannah is coming in as defending champ amazing mountain biker she’s going to be wanting to defend that title for sure

When I came into the Grand Prix I didn’t have any expectations I mean my goal was to do the best I could and I had no idea how I would stack up to these incredible women I mean on paper I don’t think I’m stacking up the best one bad day it

Affects your series there’s three more races left that I’m targeting lville the rad and big sugar and that’s three more opportunities to see if I can make my way up any higher in the Grand Prix standings I feel like I have a lot left to give for this Race season I do feel

The pressure for the rest of the season for sure cuz I already used a drop race and I didn’t do as well as I was hoping to at Crusher I feel like I have somehow always put myself in situations like this it’s not fun but uh it’s a Ating I have a road background I did not sign up for the lifetime series last year because I did not feel like my bik handling off-road skills were in a good enough place to even do a mountain bike race I was afraid actually I was afraid of mountain

Biking I think a l a lot of that stems from my traumatic brain injury in 2016 I suffered a nearly fatal traumatic brain injury at a road race had to be aied to the ICU I spent 2 months at a rehabilitation center in Colorado and that’s where I

Told myself I don’t ever want to see a bike again once I was discharged that feeling didn’t last for very long because I I really love riding my bike over the next two years I used cycling more as like a measuring stick throughout my recovery I really just

Wanted to return to where I was before the crash and I was able to do that and then get even better and better and better justed the Leadville stage race uh to prepare for this race so yeah I did more mountain biking last week weekend that in my entire life combines

One of the main reasons I never like went head first into mountain biking was because of a fear of crashing again but this year we decided to like look at that fear straight in the eye and I I don’t want it to be something that holds me back for the rest of my

Life just I thought it would be a good obstacle to overcome and I really love obstacles the recovery from the traumatic brain injury was like the hardest thing I’ve done in my entire life so now though like on my bike when like it starts to hurt I have to remind

Myself the difference between that which I call suffering versus like the temporary pain that I’m experiencing during an effort if I could go back in time and not be in that crash I don’t know if I would I think it made me the person that I am today

So we just came off the pavement coming up to climb out of turquoise Lake they’ve turned on to Hagerman Pass Road a little over a mile up to the infamous left hand hair pin onto Sugarloaf it looks like we have Sophia vishaan and Alexis scarter they went one two at seot

And they are lead women Sophia Gomez viani is certainly the favorite right now she participated in the Leadville stage race which was essentially a test event for her and she won every stage and was able to preview the course at race bace having done that I think

That’s a that’s a power move it’s a statement Sophia’s obviously crushing it I mean she’s won all the points that she could have in the Grand Prix right now knowing Sophia that’s Han the Nash she wants to win all of them of course she does I don’t know if she will maybe

Maybe not Alexis is the rider who has the best chance of beating Sophia I think they will both be motivated to ride as hard as they can as they approach the power line desent Alexis scarta is definitely going to give her a run she’s calm cool and collected and

The woman can just climb like an Animal we’ve been pretty good for this race about trying to balance focusing on the race and all the other stuff that can be distracting these two women came down power line together and the women’s field uh not far behind Sarah Sturm she’s been on the podium at this race a couple times I

Know last year it really stressed her out she really wanted to win this thing she worked through a lot of those stressors and she figured out how to make this work and how to make it fun Sophia is doing exactly what she should she needs to keep the pace as high as

Possible so that the women who are chasing they are making up time I definitely have that like rebellious like the lifetime Grand Prix sort of feels like that teacher in school like assigning reading and you’re like well I was going to read those books anyway but now I don’t want to do

Them this is the women’s Chase group you know what’s unique with this group I think this is all women which is pretty cool to see a group of them get together and uh duke it out together work together obviously they’re working together well every race is a new and

Different opportunity we have all kinds of people from the gravel scene from the road scene that have come in and made a big name for themselves we have eyes right now on haly Smith who just returned from racing the mountain bike marathon world championships in Glasgow my season is

Not defined by a leaderboard and how I feel about my racing is not defined by the leaderboard I’m a competitor and I want to be in the race but I have so much respect for the altitude here and for the event that I can’t have any sort of placing

Goals we are over the single track descent we got our lead women just coming out of the trees here I think that I’ve actually gotten the best out of myself that I can on each of my race days but I have not yet arrived at a lifetime race ready I not

Arrived feeling like how I know I can feel and and being ready to perform so um that’s just frustrating I guess our fourth place women Haley Smith is in this group descending the single track Haley I think is Miss consistency and only getting stronger the most significant part of Leadville is the

Coline climb and the two of them can now relax a little bit hydrate eat stay with this group save some energy and put themselves into a physiological position to have their best Coline clim possible [Applause] So those are the two lead women we’ve had three women come through we just saw Ruth wer come through she’s in third she’s about couple minutes off of Sophia and Alexis who are in first and second so it just got very exciting H and SC me

We’re only at Mile 40 and so much can happen and who’s going to get up Coline and really like who’s going to descend Coline well because some of the girls that have passed are really good mountain bikers some of them are like yeah newer mountain [Applause] bikers when the women went through the Twin Lakes a station they were 9 minutes ahead of last year’s time check at that point so going a little bit faster than last year’s pce in Leadville or in these long events every single person wants to quit at

Some point including the person at the Front and I’ll even think oh my gosh I don’t know if I’m going to make it and then I’ll think oh gosh if I’m winning I can’t stop our women’s leader on Columbine this is Sophia Gomez vishaan just a little bit back Alexis scarta and then Ruth Winder they look to be pretty

Equally spaced but Sophia looks to be riding and climbing very strong you know imagine what the person hundreds of people back feel like a be like 10 11 minutes ahead of last year’s Pace right now whether you’re out there for 7 8 hours or you’re out there for 12 13 14

Plus whatever it is I mean everyone’s going through the same exact thing and that’s very unusual in most sports as you turn around at the top of Coline mind you start this descent it’s a screaming descent you see the uphill Riders she has to stay right you have to

Hope that all those uphill Riders are staying right the people that are out there for 16 17 hours that’s a way harder day than the athletes who are finishing in under 8 hours as we’re working our way back down the column by descent on the road following

Sophia it’s pretty pretty cool to see you know we’ve got I think 1,600 age group writers out here today you know this is a Monumental challenge for some people and the experience these people are having out here they may hate us at the moment on this climb but very few of

Them will go away and say this didn’t change their life in some positive Way Kenny let’s go Sophia nice work nice work I love Leadville because it’s an out and back some people think it’s boring but for me community and cycling is really special and important and lville you get to see literally everybody that’s out there racing their bike and I really

Really enjoy that and then you go through all the feed zones and there’s just like so many people cheering and having a good time whether you’re racing or just hanging out to me there’s a lot of reasons why it seems a special so in the splits we’ve got

Sophia Gomez via in first a minute and a half back was Ruth winter in third last year second place finisher Alexis Scara fourth is Haley Smith and in fifth is Hannah Otto I think it would be really easy to have the fact that I am the defending Champion be a lot of pressure

On my back but instead I’m turning that into confidence because I know that I have what it takes to win cuz I’ve done it already You know Sophia Gomez visha has dominated the the scene this year you know a first place at seot a first place at Crusher and the tasher a second place at Unbound but you know first in the GP she’s just had such a great season and look at this Ruth wer coming

To challenge my goals for leful have always been to race well here I live in Colorado and I have always heard about this race ever since I really started bike racing it’s kind of a big iconic thing and definitely when I stopped wilto racing was It was kind of on my calendar of

Things I wanted to do if we could think of another Rider that was really going to give Sophia and Alexis scarta run for their money I expect it would be Ruth but we haven’t really seen that Pinnacle performance out of her she’s hungry for a big win at a big

Event we just got our eyes on Sophia and uh but we can see Ruth here coming in this is an incredible race for her today she had a bad day and did not finish cat she was actually on a great day at Unbound but ultimately had to pull out

Of the race my season has been getting I think a little bit better it definitely started out Rocky I had an injury before seat I’ve been racing my bike for 15 years and luckily had a pretty good career up until this point it looks like she’s with with two men she is driving

Hard on the pace and sometimes you have really good years in bike racing and sometimes you just kind of feel like you’re hitting your head against a brick wall Sophia right now in the lead solo and she’s got quite the racer chasing her down just going to have to ride with

It and Trust the process they crossed the railroad tracks and headed towards the Boulevard on the pavement Ruth is about 42 seconds down on Sophia they’re both motoring but we’ll see what happens when they hit that rough stuff at the bottom of the boulevard I’m an athlete I

Like to compete I like to be really good at the sport it’s what makes me go out and train really hard all the time just to perform well at a high altitude race in the mountains would be really special oh Ru is right here I think she’s down to about 20 some seconds

Sophia just trying to do everything she can’t but they just took the left hand turn onto the boulevard oh she right there there oh my Goodness Sophia just looked over her left hand shoulder she sees Ruth coming suddenly we have a solid race for first place here’s a little irony we hit the smooth part and Sophia just stomped on the gas pedal and is gone Ruth has had great performances on the front end of

The event but from what we’ve seen Sophia’s a bit stronger over the longer distances Sophia look at her Cadence I mean she’s just cruising right now this is just really impressive to see her at the end like this I just don’t see it coming back together Sophia hit the pavement out of

The saddle this is a big one especially after coming off the last year and not finishing this race she’s got to be stoked let’s some noise for your Le the women’s champion and look like it’s going to be the woman in red for specializ sop last year Hannah won in

725 Sophia just did that in 709 I’m really happy with how I did today and that’s not just the result I had this Macho going in that was smile through the suffering Ruth you’re number so close to a win for Ruth Wier we got to take our hats off for making

This such a thrilling finish in the way that I got second I think a lot of people were cheering for me and came up to me afterwards and like that was so [Applause] [Applause] exciting and I think it like I said a little bit ago about community and bikes and cycling can be so many things for so many different people people and that’s one of the reasons this vault is so cool and beautiful while we were watching the

Race for first and second we did not realize that this was unfolding behind we’ve got Hannah Auto with Alexis scarda on her wheel it looks like we’re going to have a Sprint in third Alexis putting in a little bit of a move here I just saw Hannah’s head drop

Dropped her head Alexis scarta is going to take the final Podium spot today what is the moment for you when you feel like it was all oh every time somebody comes across the line there’s no question about it you know it’s about the people there’s your top four for the women Alexis and Hannah congratulations proud Ken Merle have been encouraging every single one of us for years and to watch them and to see the people come across in that whole piece so both their finish and getting to see Ken Mar Lee have that joy as well of kind of their

Hope that they’ll get as many people across as possible that whole thing is Magic years ago years ago like I never ever thought i’ even to a mountain bike Grace let alone the lead VT 100 yeah 11 of 100 105 miles of some of the craziest terrain out there and the people

Finishing just look so hagged but you know they’re doing it and it’s special to them in their own right that’s why there’s like so much ecstasy when you cross that Finish Line you know the mass participation athletes the you know they they’re amazed that these Pros can finish

Leadville in 6 hours and a few minutes yet those Pros that finish in 6 hours are just as blown away that there are athletes that can stay out there till 12 hours and ride their bike that long there’s a absolutely a mutual respect along with Keegan Sophia continues her Reign despite the amazing

Efforts of Ruth Winder today Alexis scarta has consistently been right there with Sophia in the races and I’m guessing she’s looking for these last three races as an opportunity to take the win it all unfolds with schaman fat tire Festival the rad dirt Fest and the finale at Big Sugar gravel stay tuned

And see you out there