Browse: July 2007

Softball season lasts for several months, but it seems like just as the teams start to hit their stride, the tournament determines the winners and losers and trophies get handed out. This year was no different.

There is a lot more to rec league softball than the game, the batting averages, the great plays; softball is also about camaraderie and fun. The heckling is almost as entertaining as the game itself, and some of the teams dress up in costumes and wigs to attract spectators and keep the mood festive during the games. This year, the TW Green team even had a "Daisy Duke" dress-up day, with men in unforgivably short jean cut-offs and cowboy boots. It may not have been the ideal wear for playing softball, but it did make for a fun spectacle and drew lots of fans.

This year's b-league champions are Smugglers, who defeated Plum to take home the trophy. The women's b-league championship went to Las Montanas. The ladies a-league title gets awarded Thursday, after the winner of the Mountain Limo/ASAP Slammers game meets the Darkside. The men's a-league championship will be decided Wednesday when Fat Alley plays the Junkyard Dogs. Fat Alley, the league leader, could have taken home the trophy on Monday night, but lost to the Dogs; the double elimination tournament means that both teams will have one last shot at the title.

This year some of the teams were awarded for their spirit — the Bubble Loungers (women's b-league), Spank (women's a-league), and TW Green (men's b-league) were recognized for their commitment to keeping the game fun, and the cans of beer flowing.

There was art to sit on, art to drink from, art to wear, to drive, to ride—and all of it was meant to gaze at. The Ah Haa Art Auction again put up for bid locally produced art to fund the community’s nonprofit art school, and it was done in pure retro fashion.

Dislocated shoulders. Broken ribs. Fractured wrists. Concussions. Downhill racers wear their wounds like charms on a bracelet, and with just as much pride; and the heavy rains this weekend left a muddy, slippery course on which riders could collect a few more jewels.

There wasn't much complaining from the cross-country racers, for whom the rain made for a just-tacky-enough course to gain some purchase. But for downhillers, it was sloppy landings and lots of crashes.

Some local riders fared well this weekend, including Daniel Murray, who recently started racing in the pro/semi-pro category. He took tenth in the hill climb, and 17th in the cross-country race in the elite field of racers. Lee Roufa took fourth in the expert men division of the hill climb, and Matt Beaudin took first in the sport division of the hill climb and the cross-country events. Stash Wislocki also took first in his age division in the cross-country event.

For complete race results, check out the Full Tilt site.

The plants here in the mountains are not just for looks. Did you know that arnica helps heal injuries? Or that osha root aids in breathing and can ease flu symptoms? Or that red clover flowers are edible — and tasty?

You can learn all of this and more on the Herb Walker tours hosted by long-time local John Sir Jesse. Sir Jesse conducts the tours from the St. Sophia Nature Center, showing people how to identify edible and medicinal herbs that grow in the region.

Sir Jesse talks about the leaf structure and other characteristics that differentiate each plant. He picks seeds, flowers, and leaves and gives students a taste of the feast that exists naturally in our forests. The nature center is open daily from 9 a.m. until 4 p.m.; to learn more about the programs, visit the nature center web page.

“I scare myself every day…it’s fun,” said a Telluride Full Tilt competitor, then added he likened all his armored gear—head to toe—to health insurance.

In its sixth mountain town stop, the Mountain States Cup Series is proving it’s not afraid of steeps—ski area-like steeps. This weekend MSC hosts Full Tilt in Telluride, a weekend of downhill, cross-country, hill climb and Super-D mountain bike racing, all on the Telluride Ski Area.

Riders make laps on Lift 4 to the top of the course, and bikes ride separately on special event hooks. Practice day, Friday, however cleared the course as heavy rain and hail socked in the course. But riders say rain, sleet, hail or snow, they'll keep racing. Races will only be cancelled due to the more obvious danger of lightning.

The Full Tilt stop is part of a series of racing in the Colorado Rocky Mountains, Nederland to Crested Butte, Keystone to Nathrop, Snowmass to just outside the state, at Angel Fire, N.M. The event is sponsored by Telluride and Mountain Village, the Golden-based Yeti Cycles, and the Telluride Ski Resort.

Full Tilt first came to Mountain Village and Telluride three summers ago and gathered a stout crowd lining the gates of the course. This type of racing needs nearly no introduction and easily finds spectators; the speed of the bikes downhill (and up), and the tricky, rutted, drop-dotted, spiraling single track course snaking down the Lift 4 area draws lots of attention.

Most art auctions are stuffy affairs, crowded rooms with expensive artwork and big money bidding. Not the Ah Haa Art Auction — it is as colorful and eccentric as the art itself. This year’s theme is Laugh-In, after the television comedy from the psychedelic era of the 60s and 70s.

The auction is the biggest fundraising event of the year for the Ah Haa School for the Arts, so they really pull back the curtains and put on a show, with skits and costumes and irreverent humor.

This year’s auction items include a weekend trip to San Francisco, a 1978 Scout “Flower Power” car (painted to match this year’s groovy theme), a mixed media piece by Ret. General Norman Schwarzkopf, a motor scooter decorated to look like a Valley Cow (it really moo-oves), a “Hippie Dippy Hot Springs Tour” around Colorado and other locally-created artwork.

The auction kicks off at 5 p.m. and runs until 11 p.m., at the school’s new digs at 300 South Townsend (the old depot). Admission is $15, and there is a cash bar.

Leave no trace, take photos not flowers, don’t feed the bears...These are just a few of the lessons learned by little Bear Creek rangers. The town’s Bear Creek Junior Ranger Program brings kids as young as 4 into the wilds of Telluride.