LEADVILLE, Colo. - Levi Leipheimer didn't get the chance to race against defending champ Lance Armstrong in the Life Time Fitness Leadville Trail 100 mountain bike race Saturday.
So, he did the next best thing - he broke Armstrong's record.
With his RadioShack teammate Armstrong sitting this one out because of a sore hip from his crash-filled Tour de France finale, Leipheimer won the nation's highest-altitude endurance test in a lung-searing six hours, 16 minutes, 37 seconds.
Armstrong's old mark of 6:28:50 also was bested Saturday by runner-up Jeremy "JHK" Horgan-Kobelski, of Boulder, a 2008 Olympic mountain biker who finished in 6:25:21.
"This is ridiculously hard," Leipheimer, of Santa Rosa, Calif., said after crossing the finish line and getting a silver medal placed around his neck to go with the silver-and-gold belt buckle he'll receive today.
There is no prize money here, just pride.
And exhaustion.
"It's hard to describe the pain and torture that you go through on a ride like that," Leipheimer said. "It's not what I'm used to. It's like a six-hour time trial. There's no sitting in. There's no draft. ... I just couldn't wait for it to be over."
The race started at 10,500 feet and climbed another 2,000.
Leipheimer was torn about wishing Armstrong had been here.
"It would have been great to have him here because he would have been in the mix," Leipheimer said. "It would have hurt that much more, though."
Armstrong spokesman Mark Higgins said Tuesday that the cyclist was skipping this year's "Race Across the Sky" because he's still feeling lingering effects of a hip injury suffered in a crash early in the Tour de France and wanted to spend time with his family before his children start school.
Armstrong also has been dealing with renewed questions about drug use during his career since ex-teammate Floyd Landis made allegations against him and other riders this spring. Federal investigators have been looking at lawsuits containing old accusations against Armstrong and have reached out to question his sponsors.
Leipheimer, who is among at least 16 people besides Armstrong whom Landis has implicated in various doping acts, declined to discuss the investigation Saturday.
You know it is funny how I search out this particular AP thread and all the other AP threads had no mention of Landis, Doping or Cyclings negatives at all. Yet Tucson, the Outside Magazines Best City for Road Biking managed to add that and removal all the actual cycling information from the article.
AZ daily star