Imperial Challenge

The Imperial Challenge is a race held at Breckenridge every year. It is kind of a skiing triathalon where participants ride a bike from town to the base of Peak 8, hike, snowshoe, ski 3,000 vertical feet to the top of Imperial Bowl and ski or snowboard down. The winning times are incredible. The winner does it in about an hour and a half (It takes me a little under 30 minutes to do the last 900 vertical feet of the entire route when I hike peak 8 alone). One of my coworkers did it in about two hours and placed in the 30s. I think a lot of the top competitiors are ironman triatheletes and professional adventure racers. These are all of the participants hiking up the T-Bar line (still about 1200' from the top of Peak 8).