Scorecard
Leadville vs High Lonesome: Worth 2 versus Worth 5
Same state, different Worth. Leadville is a famous buckle on jeep road at altitude. High Lonesome is the mountain 100 in the same neighborhood. If you can fly to Leadville, you can fly to a better course.
Fly for High Lonesome if you want a Colorado mountain 100; skip Leadville unless the famous buckle on jeep road is the only thing you came for.
No blended index. Low Worth is the take.
Leadville Trail 100
Leadville, Colorado · 100M
Demand
4 out of 5
How much it asks
Worth
2 out of 5
Worth the flight + fee
Leadville is the race people name when they mean 'I did something hard in Colorado' and the course mountain runners name when they mean 'that is not what we meant.' We score it because the question arrives every season, and because skip is a score, not a silence.
High Lonesome 100
Mount Princeton / Salida, Colorado · 100M
Demand
5 out of 5
How much it asks
Worth
5 out of 5
Worth the flight + fee
High Lonesome is the race we would tell a friend to fly for if the friend wanted Colorado mountains and did not have a Hardrock ticket. That is a worth score of 5, and it is the point of this site. The loop starts at the base of Mount Princeton, runs the southern Sawatch, uses 27 miles of the Continental Divide Trail and 35 miles of the Colorado Trail, crosses five alpine passes, and threads two ghost towns. Published demand: 100 miles, 23,500 feet of gain, high point 13,150 feet, about 15 percent above treeline, 37 hours. That is a mountain 100. It is not Ouray's vertical prank and it is not Leadville's dirt-road myth.
| Dimension | Leadville Trail 100 | High Lonesome 100 |
|---|---|---|
Distance & format | 4 A 100-mile out-and-back with a 30-hour cutoff. The format is classic; the surface is the issue. | 4 A 100-mile loop with a 37-hour cutoff: tighter than Ouray, kinder than a 30-hour road 100. |
Vertical | 3 Hope Pass is the mountain. The rest is rolling high-altitude dirt and jeep road, not a vert race. | 4 23,500 ft of gain. Enough to be a mountain race, not a 42k-ft suffering contest. |
Technicality | 2 Mostly runnable dirt road and jeep track. Power-hike the pass, run the boulevard. | 4 Alpine passes, CDT and Colorado Trail, basins and ridges. Trail, not jeep boulevard. |
Climate | 3 August in the high Rockies: sun, storms, cold nights. Real, not Diagonale or Hardrock weather. | 4 Sawatch summer: storms, cold nights, sun. Fifteen percent above treeline. |
Altitude | 5 Start at 10,200 ft, Hope Pass at 12,600. The air is the honest hard part. | 4 High point 13,150 ft, average around 10,600. The air is part of the course. |
Logistics | 3 Leadville is straightforward by Colorado standards. Life Time packaging is the logistics personality. | 3 Salida / Mount Princeton is easier than Silverton, still a mountain-town weekend. Lottery plus qualifiers. |
Prestige & field | 3 A famous name with a thinner mountain-running field than the mythology. History is not the current start list. | 3 Respected Colorado mountain 100, not a global final. Community is the prestige. |
Organization | 3 Large, commercial, practiced. Public materials exist; the soul of the event is a Life Time product. | 5 Veteran-captained aid, unusually public course docs, qualifier rules that refuse UTMB-owned races. |
Value | 2 You fly to Colorado and pay a premium to race jeep roads at altitude. Better mountains are in the same state. | 5 Hard to name a better flight-to-trail ratio in the U.S. if you can get through the lottery. |
Adventure & scenery | 3 Two Rivers and Hope Pass are real. The boulevard is a long dirt road with a view. | 5 Five alpine passes, two ghost towns, CDT and CT. This is the postcard without the circus. |
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Leadville Trail 100
Leadville, Colorado · 100M
Demand
4 out of 5
How much it asks
Worth
2 out of 5
Worth the flight + fee
High Lonesome 100
Mount Princeton / Salida, Colorado · 100M
Demand
5 out of 5
How much it asks
Worth
5 out of 5
Worth the flight + fee
Elevation overlay
- Leadville Trail 100100 mi
- High Lonesome 10099 mi
Miles from each startft
Official GPX. Shared mile scale; each line stops at its own finish. Ranking-only. Not a live tracker.
| Dimension | Leadville Trail 100 | High Lonesome 100 |
|---|---|---|
Distance & format | 4 A 100-mile out-and-back with a 30-hour cutoff. The format is classic; the surface is the issue. | 4 A 100-mile loop with a 37-hour cutoff: tighter than Ouray, kinder than a 30-hour road 100. |
Vertical | 3 Hope Pass is the mountain. The rest is rolling high-altitude dirt and jeep road, not a vert race. | 4 23,500 ft of gain. Enough to be a mountain race, not a 42k-ft suffering contest. |
Technicality | 2 Mostly runnable dirt road and jeep track. Power-hike the pass, run the boulevard. | 4 Alpine passes, CDT and Colorado Trail, basins and ridges. Trail, not jeep boulevard. |
Climate | 3 August in the high Rockies: sun, storms, cold nights. Real, not Diagonale or Hardrock weather. | 4 Sawatch summer: storms, cold nights, sun. Fifteen percent above treeline. |
Altitude | 5 Start at 10,200 ft, Hope Pass at 12,600. The air is the honest hard part. | 4 High point 13,150 ft, average around 10,600. The air is part of the course. |
Logistics | 3 Leadville is straightforward by Colorado standards. Life Time packaging is the logistics personality. | 3 Salida / Mount Princeton is easier than Silverton, still a mountain-town weekend. Lottery plus qualifiers. |
Prestige & field | 3 A famous name with a thinner mountain-running field than the mythology. History is not the current start list. | 3 Respected Colorado mountain 100, not a global final. Community is the prestige. |
Organization | 3 Large, commercial, practiced. Public materials exist; the soul of the event is a Life Time product. | 5 Veteran-captained aid, unusually public course docs, qualifier rules that refuse UTMB-owned races. |
Value | 2 You fly to Colorado and pay a premium to race jeep roads at altitude. Better mountains are in the same state. | 5 Hard to name a better flight-to-trail ratio in the U.S. if you can get through the lottery. |
Adventure & scenery | 3 Two Rivers and Hope Pass are real. The boulevard is a long dirt road with a view. | 5 Five alpine passes, two ghost towns, CDT and CT. This is the postcard without the circus. |