I’ve been riding bikes in Boulder since 2008, when I was an English student at Naropa University and rented my first Boulder bike, a sweet black cruiser with a name tag that read “Zoe.” Slowly, I graduated from biking between Naropa campuses via the Boulder Creek Path to biking down to Denver for Rockies games and, especially, biking from downtown Boulder up Four Mile Canyon and then down Sunshine Canyon — a ride some call Poor Man’s Pass.
A few years ago, after believing I had completed every notable climb in the Boulder area — admittedly climbing them slowly because, well, I’m slow — I discovered a poster made by local artist Zach Lee for Simple Cycling Maps, featuring 25 Boulder-area climbs and elevation and gradient details for each. The poster listed a bunch of climbs I knew well, including Ward and Flagstaff and Magnolia — and a few hidden gems I was stunned to learn about, including Logan Mill, Deer Trail and Raymond.
Lee created the poster, which is for sale online as well as at a few local stores such as Boulder Cycle Sport and Rapha, in 2018. He told me recently, “As local designers and cyclists, we were curious: How do all these iconic Boulder climbs actually stack up against each other? That curiosity turned into a project built on data visualization, clean design, and a bit of masochistic reverence for elevation gain.”
Over the course of a year, I pushed myself — mostly on my 10-year-old Surly Long Haul Trucker, with its “Granny Gear” — to complete every ride on the poster. I hung it in my garage, got a gold Sharpie, and created a grid so that I could track my progress with a “X” marks…