Prizes from the Leadville Trail 100 MTB race – big belt buckle and full zip jacket. Mt Massive is annotated in the background. (click to enlarge)

Prizes from the Rapha Rising climbing competition on Strava – circle of death jersey and rapha bib shorts. The Shades Crest ridge line is annotated in the background. (click to enlarge)

Close-up of the collar of the circle of death jersey … embroidered on it are the four climbs and their height in meters. Awesome! (click to enlarge)

Nothing like a trip somewhere else to make you see your own backyard in a whole new light. I recently returned from Leadville, Colorado and have been drawing comparisons between the climbing in the high mountains of Colorado vs the climbing in the really low mountains of Alabama. I came back to Alabama to find the prizes I won on the queen stage of the Rapha Rising competition (Read my ride report here – Rapha Rising Wednesday Mega-ride). I’ve been thinking about this topic for quite a while – so I’m going to let my annotated screenshots illustrate some conclusions I’ve reached from a quantitative perspective, but from a qualitative perspective I have to conclude that neither is better than the other. Climbing big mountains is just so radically different than climbing smaller hills that it really is like comparing apples to oranges. Fortunately for me, I like them both.