We started in downtown
Breckenridge on this cool and crispy bright sunny fall morning. There were splashes of fluorescent yellow and
gold dotting the mountains above us. It
is in that late summer/early fall stage here in the mountains at 9600ft, where
the rainstorms, hail, snow, and sun are all as unpredictable as my day. Before starting, Josh asked me “What do you
want to ride today?” I replied that I
didn’t care, as he more or less owned the trails in and around Breck, and knew
them all by heart. I did mention my
somewhat failed attempt at riding the Gold Dust trail the day before, when a
rainstorm, turned hailstorm at 11,400ft Boreas Pass, numbed my extremities and
sent me back down the mountain. He said
Gold Dust was one of his favorites, and so we were off. We hopped on sweet dirt
singletrack not more than 40 feet from our cars, and wouldn’t encounter
pavement for the next 4 ½ hours.
We made our way through the
rich piney forest on soft loamy soil, moistened by the previous day’s rain;
trail conditions that mountain bikers dream of.
Already I could tell it was going to be a good day of riding.
You will be hard-pressed to
find a champion of sport like the one I got the pleasure of riding with this
past week. He didn’t hesitate in
agreeing to a ride with me, only days after winning the Vapor Trail 125; nor
showed up with any pre-determined riding regiment. In fact, regimented training isn’t what has
made Josh Tostado into a 24-hour solo National Champion, and winner of the
Breckenridge 100 7 times. Rides like we
would do are. In the
technologically-driven numbers game that has become cycling, where professional
riders act more like objects of a computer program than real people, counting
every mile, minute, calorie, gram, and watt, it is refreshing to meet a
champion whose training consists of going on long bike rides in the woods. He doesn’t go on road rides to get “distance
miles” or do “interval training” for power.
He packs his Camelback full of essentials, and hits the trail.
On our climb up to Boreas Pass, where the
Gold Dust trail begins, he would show me some incredible trails, huge climbs,
and epic high-mountain views. At one
point we were riding up doubletrack in a 100-year old burn zone that still hadn’t
recovered, bare and sun-drenched, before stopping at a high point where you
could see 50 or so miles in every direction.
During the climb I was able to keep up with Josh’s “I’m taking it easy
today” pace, but once we hit the secret unforeseen moto trail that only someone
who has been up here 100 times would know about, one that jumped off the side
of the mountain in a downhill fury, twisting and snaking its way back into the
thick pines, I quickly watched him disappear in joyful descending exuberance.
In an ego-driven sport so
rife with ultra-competitive racers who flock to the most popular events for
their chance at glory, meeting a champion who says “I only do the races I want
to do, the ones that are most fun” is inspiring. He says he isn’t doing the 24-hour National
Championships in Colorado Springs this year, an event he won last year, because
he didn’t like the “vibe” last year. For
a defending national champion not to defend his title is unheard of, but
respectable. When asked why he isn’t
interested in marathon nationals, in Bend, Oregon, or other “shorter” distance
races, he readily admits that he doesn’t have the power, or speed for these
races. He even went as far to say that
100-mile races sometimes seem too short and fast for him; that he really finds
his groove in 12- and 24-hour races.
We finally made our way up to
Boreas Pass, chatting as we ascended to 11,400ft. At this point the chatting would end, and the
Gold Dust singletrack would begin. This
is a rock-and-roll descent, with short sections of climbing, that makes its way
almost all of the way down to Como. When
I finally did catch up with him at the end of our fun-run I commented at how
incredible that descent is, but how much I miss my full-suspension. He responded, “A bike’s a bike,” and
continues living out this sentiment day-to-day, race-to-race, on his 26-inch Santa Cruz Blur XC full-suspension, in a sport that has largely turned to 29-inch
hardtails. You’d be hard-pressed to even
spot another 26-inch bike at any of the races Josh attends, but he says “It’s
just what I like to ride.”
Here is a guy who waves
competitiveness and ego to the wind in order to replace them with love and joy
for the sport. He doesn’t track his
mileage or subscribe to the virtual racing world of Strava. He simply wears a wristwatch to keep track of
his time on the bike. This isn’t to say
that Josh isn’t competitive, as anyone who endures 24-hours in the saddle must
be, but that he is more interested in feeling like he is “getting somewhere”
when he rides or races, as opposed to simply competing against the man beside
him. When I asked him how hard he pushes
during a race to keep up with the front runners, he responded, “If I see them
go I’ll try to keep up, not let them get away.
And if I blow up, well, I blow up.
Not that big of a deal.” And what he takes away from his performance at
races? “If I felt good, and feel good about how I raced, I don’t care whether I
win or come in 15th place.”
An unconventional champion.
We descended back down from
Boreas Pass, after a tough (I was bonking at this point) climb back up the Gold
Dust trail, hitting some old washed-out steep moto trails and other sweet
singletrack on the way. The odorous
pines never get old this time of year, when any day now a blanket of snow might
show up and trap this treasure of trails for the next 9 months. But on this 60-degree sunny September day in
Breckenridge the treasure was all ours for the taking.
