Ride The Rockies announced its 2006 route Sunday. An annual tour that leads 2,000 cyclists through Colorado’s Rocky Mountains, Ride The Rockies has revealed the state’s mountain majesty and small-town charm to thousands of cycling enthusiasts from around the world since 1986.
Along for the ride — every single one of them, in fact — has been Paul Balaguer, who served on the inaugural ride as an intern, and has been Tour Director since 1989. Balaguer runs the show with boundless alacrity and a pointillist’s precision, as I witnessed as .
With the registration deadline for this year’s RTR just two weeks away, Balaguer recently took some questions concerning one of Colorado’s signature summer events.
Boyle: Can you provide a brief overview of Ride The Rockies for those readers who might not be overly familiar with the annual bicycle tour?
Balaguer: Happy to. In fact, I’ll quote from the home page of : The Denver Post Ride The Rockies is an annual bicycle tour that takes 2,000 cyclists on a six- to seven-day ride on paved roads through Colorado’s Rocky Mountains each June. The ride is an annual event since 1986, now in its 21st year. The Ride The Rockies route is different each year, but always climbs a few challenging mountain passes and showcases Colorado’s spectacular scenery. Daily rides can be as short as 35 miles or as long as 100 miles, but generally average 60-65 miles.
Ride The Rockies registration is conducted on a lottery basis. We usually get about 3,500 to 4,000 applications for the 2,000 spots.
Boyle: What is the history of your involvement with Ride The Rockies, and how and when did you become the tour’s director?
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2006 RIDE THE ROCKIES
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Balaguer: My parole officer dreamed it up — his idea of community service. OK, I made that up. You don’t have to print that.
The truth is: I was fresh out of school in 1986, with no idea what to do now that I was grown up — fat chance. I landed an opportunity to serve as an intern for the first Ride The Rockies. The next year, I moved up to Technical Director. A year later, I was the Associate Director of the ride, and, by 1989, I was running the show. Seems hard to believe that we’re now working on our 21st ride!
Boyle: What is it like to direct 2,000 cyclists from all over the world on a weeklong tour of Colorado?
Balaguer: It really is a dream job. I know it sounds corny, but I think it’s a privilege to do this job. I feel honored and extremely lucky to be the director of Ride The Rockies. Cycling is obviously something that I’m very passionate about, so, though doing this job is very often a huge amount of very hard work, it’s never drudgery. I don’t think one can overestimate the value of having a profession about which you are passionate.
I’ve also been blessed with an outstanding staff over the years. We have a brand new staff this year, and they’re very excited about putting the ride together. That’s really great to be a part of.
Boyle: What are some of your favorite memories of Ride The Rockies?
Balaguer: There’s a tough question to answer.
Certainly the first thing that comes to mind is the incredible camaraderie of the Ride The Rockies staff. We travel with a truly remarkable group of 75 volunteers who make the event happen. These are all people who take their vacation to work on Ride The Rockies. They travel from as far away as Florida to do so. Many of the jobs entail starting work by 5 a.m. or before. Many entail working until we get all of the cyclists in, which, on long days, can be well into the evening. Over a third of the group has been volunteering for more than 10 years. This year, we’ll acknowledge four volunteers with 20 years of Ride The Rockies service!
I am truly humbled by how remarkably committed our volunteers are to the ride. In 20 years of forest fires, road closures from snow, cattle drives on the highway, stolen Porta Potties, etc., I’ve never, never not seen them rise to any occasion to get the job done, no matter how difficult the challenge. I can actually get teary-eyed just thinking about it. My debt and gratitude to them are far, far beyond my means to express. Serving with them is the highest honor I’ve had.
Beyond that, the obvious joy that Ride The Rockies brings to so many of the riders participating is a lasting and outstanding memory.
At the other end of the scale, Bryan, the ugliest memory in 21 years of coordinating the ride might just be the sight of you last year, as you rode into Delta — having just ridden over Grand Mesa — looking like something that not even the nastiest cat would deign to drag in. Kidding. Really, Bryan, just kidding.
Boyle: Fiddlesticks! I’d been suppressing that ugly memory. Did you know that I found just enough wind and gumption at the end of that day to inflate my sleeping pad to something nearing al dente? Dark times, Paul. Moving on. … What is the highest compliment ever paid Ride The Rockies by a participating cyclist?
Balaguer: We’ve had numerous folks who’ve told us that it’s the best vacation they’ve ever had. I always love to hear that! We’ve also been told on more than one occasion that Ride The Rockies has changed a person’s life dramatically for the better. That’s extremely rewarding to hear. Again, I feel truly lucky to have a job that can have such an enormous impact on people’s lives.
Boyle: The route is different each year. For cyclists and volunteers who are veterans of Ride The Rockies, the route announcement must seem like Christmas morning. How do you keep the route details under your hat until the unveiling, and how exactly does that 2,000-limit lottery work?
Balaguer: That can be pretty darn tough. We’re very careful. We tell no one. How much so? Well, put it this way: I make two trips to the host towns prior to route announcement. During those trips, my family has no idea where I am. I leave them a sealed envelope in the event of an emergency. My daughter’s now 8 (years old) and getting pretty cagey. I don’t think she’s more than a year or two away from steaming an envelope open!
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HACK IN THE SADDLE
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That said, people willing to spend a chunk of time doing research with towns around the entire state can sometimes piece together a pretty good picture of the route.
The lottery? It’s a highly technical procedure in which we combine an enormous pile of mail on a conference-room floor with a group of volunteers foolhardy enough to join us for the day to bask in the glory of the event. Deadline for entry this year is Feb. 24. Lottery day is the following Monday.
Boyle: . The 21st annual tour follows 419 miles from Cortez to Canon City, June 18-23. And for the first time in the history of the tour, the route stretches beyond the Colorado state line. What about Chama, N.M, attracted your attention?
Balaguer: It’s a beautiful area, and Chama is a wonderful town. I’d looked at the area before. Then, this past year, longtime RTR rider and volunteer Gerry Porter really pressed me to think harder about northern New Mexico, an area he loves. I spent a couple weeks doing route research down there, and this route is the product of that.
Boyle: What else is extraordinary about this year’s route?
Balaguer: It’s gonna be a great ride! I’m really fond of the entire route. The Cortez and Durango terrain is wonderful. Our route to Pagosa Springs on Day 2 also includes more than 40 miles of new terrain down by Navajo Reservoir. After that, we dip into New Mexico, and I promise the scenery there won’t disappoint.
The last two days are rides we’ve done before, and I like them both. I enjoy the ride up the San Luis Valley to Salida. After all these years, I’m still amazed at the juxtaposition of the pancake-flat valley and 14,000-foot peaks. Plus, you get Jack Dempsey’s boyhood home, the gator farm, alien-viewing towers — it’s a treasure trove!
Our last day is down the Arkansas River Valley, which is Rocky Mountain cycling at its easiest. After 45 miles, we peel away from the valley for the short, but very steep, climb up to the Royal Gorge Bridge. The bridge is more than 1,000 feet high and is truly remarkable to ride across.
Boyle: Any first-timers on this year’s slate of host communities?
Balaguer: The aforementioned Chama, N.M., will be hosting RTR for the first time. I think they’re appropriately awed at the prospect. The town is also very excited.
The day after we announced the tour route, I spent 20 minutes on the air with the local radio station. The news director was obviously excited about the event and said twice, “You guys will own the radio station for the two days you’re in town! We’ll be doing nothing but Ride The Rockies coverage!”
It’s fun to be working with people with that kind of enthusiasm.
Boyle: To what lengths go town officials when vying for a stop on the Ride The Rockies route? Or, do you instead find yourself doing the convincing when in search of host communities?
Balaguer: We typically don’t have to do too much convincing. Ride The Rockies is an outstanding opportunity for communities in a number of ways, including economic impact, media exposure and fundraising opportunities. We also have a community-grant program. All proceeds from the ride go to , a program that provides grants to nonprofit organizations. Each year, a 501c3 nonprofit organization in every host community on the ride receives funding. This year we’ll be distributing $35,000 in grants in the host communities.
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Q&As on DenverPost.com
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Used to be that some towns would lobby pretty hard for the ride — offer to have me picked up in a private airplane and flown to their town for a guided tour. Over the years, people have come to realize that we move the event around the state, and that sooner or later it will make its way to their neighborhood. A lot of towns still do a bit of lobbying, but it’s usually in the form of an occasional phone call reminding me that they’d love to have RTR stay in their town.
All of that said, I must say that this is a symbiotic relationship. Hosting RTR is a huge amount of work. The event is extremely indebted to the communities that act as our hosts. It’s no exaggeration to say Ride The Rockies would not be possible without the outstanding support we receive from the host towns.
Boyle: The logo for this year’s route is an “elementary” departure from last year’s abstract version. What’s the skinny?
Balaguer: There’s a great story behind this!
The art for the graphic was created by my daughter Anna’s third-grade class. I arranged this last year, then, in September, I visited the class for art periods for two successive weeks. During the first class, the kids each created a torn paper collage of a mountain scene. The next week, we put tracing paper over the collages, and the kids drew in bicycles and wrote the words, “Ride The Rockies.”
All of the art was then given to Dina Snow with Azteca Design, who is our very talented graphic designer. We scanned everything into the computer and began parsing things apart and combining them.
We’re trying to use work from as many of the kids as possible.
The logo is a combination of the work of three students. The funky rider is actually from a previous art assignment. The kids had to draw a picture of one of their parents at work. Most kids had a picture of their mom or dad at a computer. That’s Anna’s drawing of me at work!
We recently completed a series of 10 “teaser” ads in The Denver Post leading up to RTR registration and route announcement. We used art from a different child for each of the ads.
I think we’re up to about 14 children whose art has been used, and I have plans for including at least a few more for items we still have to print.
If you’ll permit me, I’d like to acknowledge Mary McConaughey’s third-grade class at Crest View Elementary School in Boulder and their art teacher, Wendy Rochman.
Boyle: What advice do you have for readers who might be knocking around the idea of participating in their first Ride The Rockies?
Balaguer: We’d love to have you! You really don’t have to be a serious athlete to Ride The Rockies. Anybody willing to make a commitment to spend some time training for the ride can do it. We have riders that range in age from about 12 to 75 years old.
I never cease to be moved by how extremely rewarding completing Ride The Rockies for the first time can be.
I love standing at the finish line of the ride and watching people roll in. My favorites are people completing the ride for the first time, especially those who started out with some doubt about their ability to make it.
It’s pretty common to see a family waiting at the finish line with balloons or flowers and a sign that says something like, “CONGRATULATIONS DAD! We knew you could do it!” When Dad arrives, the kids are jumping up and down, screaming and mauling him. It’s not unusual to see tears running down the dad’s cheeks.
Of all the great parts of my job, watching scenes like that is truly the best part.
Boyle: Care to add anything?
Balaguer: Just that after 20 years of doing this, I’m still excited to be getting ready for another tour. It’s going to be a great ride! See you out there!
An online exclusive that runs each Friday, examines the memorable, less visible and lighthearted aspects of Colorado’s sports landscape. DenverPost.com sports producer Bryan Boyle can be reached at bboyle@denverpost.com.
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A look back
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In this photo shot June 16, 1997, Ride the Rockies tour director Paul Balaguer guides cyclists around a corner between Delta and Montrose. |
