Sports & Recreation

In three seasons as a Rockie, ace Pedro Astacio has never pitched a shutout, but he came within one teammate’s error of doing it June 3 in Milwaukee. After scattering three hits and striking out seven over the first eight innings, the Dominican righty gave up a leadoff single to Geoff Jenkins in the ninth, threw a wild pitch and then saw the runner advance to third on a throwing error by Colorado catcher Scott Servais. Ex-Rockie Charlie Hayes then singled Jenkins home to tie the game 1-1. Alas, Rockies reliever Stan Belinda lost the game in the 12th, 2-1. Hard luck for Pete, but a splendid start nonetheless. Five hits, one unearned run, no decision.

Former National League MVP and two-time batting champ Larry Walker gives way to the 26-year-old Tennessean Todd Helton, a rugged third-year man who led the league for most of the spring in four major offensive categories — batting average, runs scored, runs batted in and hits. The oft-injured Walker, now 33, may still be the Rockies’ greatest talent, but the level-headed, slick-fielding Helton is a natural for the 2000 All-Star Team — and the young star who’s helped Coors Field fans forget popular first-sacker Andres Galarraga’s departure to Atlanta.

Now in its fourth year, the U.S. Vertical Kilometer will present you with possibly your worst time ever. The course begins at the base of the Vail ski resort and ends at the top, rocketing nearly straight up 1,000 meters in anywhere from three to three and a half miles. (Although the best route is marked by flags, runners can more or less select their own path — usually at their peril.) In fact, even to call the U.S. Vertical Kilometer, held in mid-June, a running race is something of a misnomer. This year the men’s winning time was just over 40 minutes — an average of about 13 minutes per mile. The top woman finished in about 49 minutes — or a bit over 16 minutes per mile.

This is not advanced human kinetics here. The easiest way to run an extremely fast race is to make sure you are always heading downhill — not a sheer drop, but a nice, steady decline in elevation. And the nicest place to do that in the Denver area, by far, is the Evergreen Town Race, this year to be held on Sunday, August 6. Both the five-kilometer and ten-kilometer courses wind — downhill, natch — along the highly scenic Upper Bear Creek Road, past some of the most sumptuous mountain mansions you are ever likely to lay eyes on. Of course, they’ll all be a blur because of the high velocity with which you will be passing them.

Readers’ choice: Bolder Boulder

Sometimes it’s nice to run a race in which the running plays second fiddle and you can just trot along and enjoy the sights — like the Bolder Boulder would be if there weren’t 40,000 other people trying to do the same thing. So instead go north, to the Colorado Run (September 2 this year), a five- or ten-kilometer run through Old Town Fort Collins. The route is crammed with entertainment, like the Jewels of the Nile belly dancers and Scottish bagpipers. Many observers simply blast music from their front lawns. The race ends at the oval at Colorado State University, so as you near the finish you feel like you’re entering the Olympic Stadium. There, you can forget your pain by watching the Frisbee-jumping dogs and the live band. Best of all is the recovery food: Ben and Jerry’s Ice Cream hosts a booth.

The hills west of Denver are crisscrossed with trails aplenty, but they aren’t all wonderful. Some are poorly maintained (or mangled by mountain-bike tracks); others are too exposed to the harsh summer sun, which at 8,000 feet can fry you before you’ve hit the two-mile mark. Alderfer Three Sisters, on the west side of Evergreen, offers the best of all worlds: scenic vistas (Mt. Evans looms to the west), nicely maintained trails, steep climbs and thrilling roller-coaster cruises, and protective groves of pine and aspen that are close-enough-together to save your hide, but open enough so that the trails are among the first in the area to dry after a drenching rain.

Reginald Joules has transformed the trauma of learning how to ride a bike into a source of excitement, pride and joy. Joules, a management scientist, first came up with his system in 1984, when he had to teach the sport to his five- and seven-year-old children. In 1996, after he taught a group of kids to ride, one mother suggested that he market his ideas — and Pedal Magic was born. Joules teaches his patented method in a $20 video, and says it only takes two to five minutes and eliminates the need for training wheels. And adults who never learned to ride — that’s approximately one out of every nine grownups — can practice the techniques in the basement or garage so others won’t see their humiliating attempts. But here’s a warning: Students weighing more than 200 pounds should complete the remedial lessons first.

Lynn Dexter and Patrick Gibbons are living proof that two heads — and pairs of legs — are better than one: Bike enthusiasts who decided the only way to ride together effectively was to go tandem, the couple opened their shop in reaction to the blank looks they were getting from folks selling what they call “half” bikes at other places. Tandem Cycle Works, one of the largest shops of its kind in the country, not only sells bicycles built for two exclusively, but also offers free adjustments on all bikes sold there, as well as a motherlode of friendly advice for tandem novices. It’s double the fun.

How to get out-of-town guests out of the house: Put ’em on a bike and let ’em go. They’ll be in good hands at Blazing Saddles, which is centrally located and close to the bike paths and offers an entire stable of new, state-of-the-art wheeled steeds, from trusty, serviceable mountain bikes to high-tech, full-suspension Stumpjumpers for hardened trail riders. Once your friends have chosen a mount, they can pick one of five planned itineraries, from an easy cycle along the Platte to Confluence Park to the much tougher and higher White Ranch ride; the outfit’s Computrak system, a computerized map that’s mounted right on the handlebars, will keep them from getting lost even as it recommends restaurants and attractions along the way. Ah. Now you can have the house to yourselves.

Serious road bikers ride a fine line between simple masochism and insanity. Colorado hosts several full-day rides for the certifiable (the Triple Bypass, or Denver to Aspen), but if you are simply looking for a three-hour (or so) ride that will cause you acute pain, this one can’t be beat. Begin at Chatfield State Park on South Wadsworth Boulevard. Head west into the foothills on Deer Creek Canyon Road. Turn left at Phillipsburg (which consists of an abandoned gas station). The road starts out easy enough, but soon turns into a series of killer switchbacks, climbing up what will seem to you like a sheer cliff. When you reach the top of this, you’re not even close to done. Stay straight as the road turns into Pleasant Park Road. This climbs steadily (and, apparently, forever) into Conifer. From there it’s finally all downhill: Barrel down Route 73, fly down North Turkey Creek Road to South Turkey Creek Road, and complete the vicious circle with a left turn back onto Deer Creek Canyon Road.

Some “rides” on the Front Range are so grueling that they are little more than paths for you to walk your bike on. We’re talking rides that, with enough skill, sweat and stupidity, are still possible to navigate. Dakota Ridge begins on the east side of Route 26 outside of Morrison, and traces the hogback separating Rt. 470 from Red Rocks. Climb the path on the north side of the ridge, a challenging but technically simple ride. About halfway along the ridge, though, you’ll hit plenty of rocks and enough technical terrain to threaten your equilibrium and dome. Wear a helmet and prepare to rip your shoes out of their clips.

Readers’ choice: Apex

What tribulations hath the post-Elway era wrought? Unceremoniously demoted in the 1999 pre-season by coach Mike Shanahan, former Bronco starting quarterback Bubby Brister fussed and fumed, then considered his options, then decided to stay on as young Brian Griese’s backup out of loyalty to his teammates. But the fiery Louisianan’s animus for Shanahan was evident: Said Bubby: “When I had a level head and thought about it, I said I can’t walk out on [Bill Romanowski], [Ed] McCaffrey and Brian. But I know if it was a one-on-one card game and Mike dealt me that hand, I would probably do like they did back in the day.” Fortunately for all concerned, Brister kept his Colt in the holster.

Climbing walls have become a hip form of exercise, and there are a growing number of them in Denver on which you can test your perpendicular prowess. (Not included in this list: the wall at the new downtown REI store, more display than challenge.) Yet there’s something about scaling an indoor face that violates the spirit of rock climbing. So save your money and head west to the sheer walls off of Route 8 just a few yards east of downtown Morrison. The rocks face south, so handholds are warm most of the year. The routes are short enough that you don’t need to haul around ropes and protection (an alert spotter will do), and there are an infinite number of moves to try, from simple to ridiculous. Best of all, you’ll get a tan at the same time.

Recent breakthroughs in swimming-pool technologies almost dictate that the best swimming pool be the newest. Standing at the recently opened Wheat Ridge Community Center pool, surrounded by so much aquatic flash and dazzle, it’s hard to imagine what people did in the six-lane cement ponds of yesteryear. But this is a fitness center, and quite a workout can be had by running from one aquatic attraction to the next. First hit the inner tubes by the lazy river for some paddling exercises, then try a cool-down on the water-fountain spray features, followed by a brisk wallowing in the baby pool and a series of reps in the Jacuzzi. And just off the interior sunbathing courtyard, a curious six-lane cement pond has been built where old-timers and history buffs can try their hands at “swimming.”

With amateur tennis, any player can beat another of similar ability on a given day. But Loehr has shown amazing consistency on the Denver club tennis scene. Last year he won both the Denver Open Tournament and the Colorado State Open, an unusual enough accomplishment on its own. But he also won the state tournament in 1998, as well. That means that this July, Loehr will be aiming for his third consecutive state championship — a feat that, according to the Colorado Tennis Association, has never before been accomplished.

This well-appointed club south of Denver has five outdoor courts that are open year-round, but the real draw is the seven scrupulously maintained indoor clay courts. Naturally, such luxury doesn’t come cheap; initiation is $300 ($350 for a couple), with additional monthly dues of $107 ($161). That’s more than $1,500 per year to swat around a tennis ball, but if you love the high bounces and sliding style of clay, it’s well worth the cost.

The city of Denver owns dozens of park tennis courts that you can play on for free, but if you have a couple bucks burning a hole in your pocket it’s more than worth the price of admission to stop by the Gates Tennis Center in the Cherry Creek neighborhood. For $4 an hour per court (that’s $1.25 each for a doubles match), you get your choice of twenty hard-surface courts (resurfaced this year), seven of which are well-lit for night play. Gates’s center court, sunken for better viewing, is one of the best venues in the city, public or private. The tennis center also has six teaching pros on staff, and can string rackets on site.

Shreveport, Louisiana’s David Toms, one of the best-kept secrets on the PGA Tour, led last summer’s Sprint International at Castle Pines the entire way — until the sixteenth hole of the final round. There, Toms scored an egregious triple bogey and gave up the lead to hard-charging David Duval. But Toms wasn’t done. On seventeen, the long-hitting pro pulled himself together, rolled a delicate chip shot down a nerve-shattering greenside hill and left his ball within a few feet of the cup. Toms coolly sank his birdie putt and put the tournament in his pocket right there, joining such better-known international winners as Greg Norman, Davis Love III, Phil Mickelson and Vijay Singh.

You may get distracted stroking your three-footer for par, so spectacular are the red-rock vistas at Arrowhead Golf Club. But that’s the price you pay for playing this gorgeous and challenging Littleton layout designed in 1972 by the estimable Robert Trent Jones Jr. The wildlife at large among the traps and lakes includes foxes, bear and deer, and unless you’re pretty accurate with the sticks, a high percentage of your shots may go wild, too. One of the finest, most beautiful public golf courses in the nation — with hefty greens fees to match.

Bus to the slopes — and back again in a day? What a novel idea! You won’t be hitting the powder at Aspen or Vail, but funky Eldora still offers plenty of great snow for skiing and boarding, and a nordic center maintaining a plethora of marked cross-country trails. And you can take the bus: RTD’s Route N makes frequent trips from Boulder to Eldora during ski season for only three bucks each way; you can also use a transfer if you’re traveling to Boulder from Denver (take route B from Market Street Station to Boulder Station) or other surrounding communities. Even if you were driving, you’d avoid the kind of traffic that slows down I-70 and other routes into ski country — but this way, you don’t even have to think about it. It’s schuss the thing.

This is a matter not of comparative ogling, but of mathematics and economics. After all these years, Loveland still has a higher percentage of shred-everymans than any other hill within driving distance of Denver, so it follows that a comparative percentage of them are female. Furthermore, if you are a nineteen-year-old shredder of either sex, you’re broke unless you have a sponsor — and the odds against that have been clearly demonstrated. Therefore Loveland’s lift ticket prices will be the only ones that make fiscal sense. Finally, why go to any mountain to look at a snowboarder? Isn’t it time you became one?

Readers’ choice: Copper Mountain Resort

When San Francisco’s concussion-plagued star Steve Young wisely decided to retire rather than risk further injury in Denver, he left the Broncos with the same problem they’ve faced since May 1999 — how to replace a legendary quarterback and team leader with a mere mortal. In the absence of John Elway, head coach Mike Shanahan will turn to third-year man Brian Griese, who’s had growing pains on the field and in the dressing room. Can he throw long? Maybe: Bronco mini-campers say Bob Griese’s boy is now ready for prime time. Failing that, Gus Frerotte, late of Washington and Detroit, will get the call. Can anyone here say Bubby Brister?

Prospects for elk hunters in Colorado for the past several years have been dismal. On average, only about 16 percent of the people who have headed into the woods aiming to bag an animal have successfully managed to fill their freezers. That’s not the case in Game Management Unit 20, however, where the accessibility of the backcountry has resulted in a whopping success rate of just under 60 percent.

There are better places to hunt elk if the only thing you’re after is surrounding yourself with the big animals. Game Management Unit 24, for instance, in central Colorado, is ground zero for the White River National Forest herd, a swarming mass of nearly 48,000 elk. Yet the ratio of bulls to cows there is only nineteen to 100 — less than two bulls for every ten elk. So if it’s a major rack you’re after, head north and west to GMU 201. The herd — the Cold Springs herd — is small, only 1,000 or so strong. But the ratio of bulls to cows there is forty to 100; out of every ten elk, four will be males.

Tangaray Farms’ promising Colorado-bred, Moonlight Maverick, has done almost everything right since he began racing last year. As a two-year-old, he won the $100,000 Gold Rush Futurity at Arapahoe Park, then kicked off his three-year-old campaign June 3 with a win in the six-furlong Inaugural, under rider Don Frazier. In six career starts, the dark bay son of Seattle Sleet and Hempen Cutie has won five times and finished second once, earning more than $95,000. Trainer Ken Gleason means to keep him on the grounds at Arapahoe, so fellow sprinters better look out. Alas, the Mav is a gelding, so he’s likely to do more racing than dating in future seasons.

The top-ranked Karen Legg Kennel has produced many champions, but few are as thrilling to watch as Shootyz Groove, a two-and-a-half-year-old sprinter with a dazzling burst of early speed. In the winter meet at Wembley Park (aka Mile High Kennel Club), Groove hit the wire first in fourteen of his twenty-three starts, including the Winter Sprint Championship, and he won seventeen of 21 this spring at Cloverleaf, in Loveland. Upon returning to the Big Store June 9, the brindle son of P’s Raising Cain out of MJ’s Shadow promptly won the Inaugural by more than seven lengths. His next big test will come July 8, when he’ll likely go off as the favorite in the Colorado Classic.

Red & Jerry’s is a cozy little nook containing fourteen pool tables, two huge bars, several acres of explosive video games and enough dining tables to seat the U.S. Marine Corps. It is also the best public off-track betting establishment in the state — mostly because the food and drink are so good. Start your exacta off with a big burger, great fish and chips, a nice rack of ribs or a sublime club sandwich. Four bucks buys you a closed-circuit TV monitor right there at your table. So even if your nine-to-one shot gives it up in the stretch at Gulfstream, at least you’ll have the comforts of a good meal.

Women’s Quest’s motto is a quote by Helen Keller: “Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all” — and that’s pretty much the point of these rejuvenating multi-sport retreats for women of all skill levels and ages organized by Boulderite Colleen Cannon, a leading female triathlete in the ’80s and still a mighty tough cookie. Kind of a support group in fitness wear, a Women’s Quest adventure is designed to be a working vacation for every part of your body, as well as your mind and spirit. Go, girls!

Denver’s homegrown (now-ex) boxing champ, WBC lightweight title-holder Stevie “Li’l But Bad” Johnston, wasted no time on March 17 reducing his opponent to rubble. Cut over the left eye in the first round, Johnston pelted the gape-jawed challenger, Mexico’s Julion Alvarez, with a furious barrage in the second and was soon aloft on the shoulders of his corner men. That meant the 8,000 Johnston fans in Magness Arena — this was the champ’s first Denver fight in four years — had plenty of time to celebrate the victory over cocktails and relatively early dinners out — and for the male halves of couples to tell their wives and dates how tough they used to be.

Visitors to City Park in recent years may have noticed the Box Canyon ruins meandering behind the Denver Museum of Nature and Science and wondered what the heck it was all about. Well, it was once quite something — designed in 1953 by noted landscape architect S.R. DeBoer, the miniature canyon waterway ambled through the park before emptying into a lily pond and Ferril Lake, evoking the kind of scenery we’re used to seeing up in the Rockies. But over the years it fell into disrepair — until this spring, when volunteers from Denver Urban Gardens and the Garden Club of Denver joined hands with Denver Parks and Recreation to restore the little gorge by solidifying its rock walls, landscaping it with river alders, ginnala maple, river birch, mountain mahogany, squaw currant, apache plume shrub and other native plantings and building two trails. DUG co-director Michael Buchenau deems that unique partnership a success, which bodes well for the future of similar large-scale restoration projects in public places.

We’ve all got a contrary little guy sitting on our brains, telling us to do things we know we shouldn’t. But most of us have the willpower to keep him in check. Well, this was one event where folks could just let it all go: When their little guys saw a big, round pumpkin and wanted to smash it to smithereens, the ten teams participating last fall — including the green-wigged youth division winners the Punkcelerators and recreation division winners It’s a Bird, It’s Plane, It’s a…Splat! — created catapults and let ’em fly, all for the benefit of Denver Urban Gardens and the DeLaney Urban Farm. And guess what? Next fall’s gourds, though barely out of the ground, are already quaking in their vines: Heave-ho-ho! You can always say the devil made you do it.

What kid isn’t hardwired to dig in the dirt? Unfortunately, today’s canned urban society doesn’t always allow for an available plot — so what’s a babe with a shovel to do? The Denver Botanic Gardens’ Mr. McGregor’s Garden is open — free — to little diggers and worm-hunters every Saturday from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., throughout the summer. The pastoral gent himself is on hand then to help them pick and plant vegetables or flowers, providing your wee beasties with a growth experience they’ll never forget.

Prior to this year’s Super Bowl, which didn’t include the Broncos (the combatants were the St. Louis Rams and the Tennessee Titans), the Fan replayed last year’s Super Bowl, which did. The main difference between this broadcast and Orson Welles’s panic-inducing radio production of War of the Worlds was that Broncos fans didn’t start rioting in Larimer Square after it was over.

Kids will go head over heels for this one: For $65, you get one hour in the Meadowood gym for up to eight rowdy little gymnasts ($5 per additional child), followed by a half-hour in the party room indulging in bring-your-own cake and refreshments — and this is one birthday party where they’ll need some excess sugar to burn. Available Friday evenings or Saturday and Sunday afternoons, the parties are open to kids of all ages — from just-walking to teens.

Forget all of those overpriced, underwhelming entertainment warehouses and theme parks that cater mostly to the teenage crowd. The owners of Funtastic Fun know what kids — and their parents — like, and it shows. Just about everything here sets FF apart from most other play places in town. The indoor amusement park comes complete with a Ferris wheel, carousel and train — and that’s just the beginning of the fun. There are more than twenty different rides and attractions (including a giant air castle for bouncing, a roller-racing area, side-by-side slides, a shadow-making room and a slew of silly funhouse mirrors), and moms and dads are encouraged to join in the fun. (Bonus for parents: No blaring music, strobe lights or other sensory-overloading gimmicks included.) FF provides all of this for an incredibly reasonable rate (with free parking, to boot): The cash-only admission price of $7.99 per child (just $4.99 on Tuesdays and Wednesdays; adults pay $2.99 every day) gives you unlimited rides and play for unlimited time. The family-friendly game machines take 25-cent tokens, but there is so much more to do here that kids hardly notice them.

When you start with a state-of-the-art facility, the rest simply falls into place. The brand-new Ritchie Center for Sports and Wellness more than qualifies, offering just about every sport under the sun beneath its shiny copper skin: youth hockey leagues, figure skating, basketball, gymnastics, lacrosse, swimming, climbing for kids and more. There are also various summer camps, including overnight and day soccer camps, tennis and volleyball camps and all-inclusive sessions divided up by age groups. Plus, if it’s a little R&R you’re seeking for yourself, you can pack off the young ones at the center’s Little Pioneer Place, which offers drop-off child care for up to two hours.

These are programs with meat on their bones — whether it’s a daylong school field trip or a two-week summer camp, the kids involved are truly there, participating and learning as they go. One of the best and most novel is Women Afield, a series of daylong workshops designed to encourage an interest in science among girls ages twelve through eighteen — a group that traditionally shuns such studies. But there’s also a three-hour Bird Studies Extreme birdwatching trek for kids in grades four and up, as well extended camps for teens, featuring classroom instruction and hands-on field training right alongside the pros.

Chris and Phil Switzer may be the state’s foremost alpaca people — they were the first in the region to raise the woolly creatures, and Chris — who has a college degree in weaving — has published a primer on how to spin llama and alpaca wool and runs workshops at the annual Estes Park Wool Market. Phil has credentials, too — he helped form the Estes Park-based Alpaca Owners and Breeders Association, is a certified fleece judge and has run the alpaca tent at the wool market. And when they’re not attending to all those duties, the couple raises and sells the fleecy beasts, keeping a herd of about fifty sweet and cuddly camelids (the babies are especially cute). Visitors should call ahead, and plan to peruse the Switzer’s store for weaving supplies, fiber, books, tools and finished items. It’s nothing to spit at.

They love their Greater Prairie Chickens up in Yuma County, where every spring the citizens like to provide ringside seats to the biggest show in town: The lucky folks who sign up are taken out to the lek (or booming ground) at four in the morning to watch the male prairie chickens do their strange and amazing song and dance for the chicks. You have to go there yourself to truly find out why it’s called a booming ground, but it has something to do with the incredible bassoon-like bellowing that occurs when the randy boy chickens strut, flap and go head to head, all the while inflating and deflating bright red balloon-like air sacs on their necks in a desperate attempt to attract female attention. Sure, you could sit at home and watch Animal Planet instead, but trust us on this one: There’s nothing else like it. Make your reservations early.

Nomadic Mongolians became a horde because they knew how to survive, and you can bet the yurt played a part in their survival: A circular, portable tent that kept them warm while they hoofed it through the frigid wasteland, the yurt is now proving to be a popular alternative for winter campers in Colorado. Colorado State Parks now offers yurt accommodations — skylighted, low-impact canvas tents wrapped around wooden frames and featuring wood-burning, gas or electric heat — by reservation at State Forest and Ridgway state parks, for a reasonable fee (also coming soon to Pearl Lake, Mancos and Golden Gate state parks).

This page is so handy and neat, you’ll never again mail away for another brochure in anticipation of planning your Colorado camping trip. Want to go swimming? Rock climbing? Sailboarding? With a mouse for a muse, you can easily find the park that best suits your interests and specific needs, whether it’s birdwatching, interpretive programs, school programs, wildlife watching, ice fishing or whatever. All you’ve got to do is log on and select from activities, facilities or specific parks — then click, click, click, you’ll be out in the sticks.

While the rest of us toil and sweat to pay off the mortgage, the folks at Swallow Hill Music Hall came up with a better idea: make it fun. So, this summer they organized a pair of leisurely floats down the Gunnison River, with gourmet camp vittles and music to match: The first, which embarked last weekend, featured zen cowboy and songwriter extraordinaire Chuck Pyle at the entertainment helm; the second, scheduled for August, features poetic cowpoke-type Roz Brown. Proceeds go into Swallow Hill’s mortgage kitty. What a great way to stay afloat.

One of Denver’s prime eccentrics, historian Phil Goodstein’s made the city his oyster to mine, and that’s just what he’s done — he’s excavated every nook, cranny and obscurity in the town’s history and turned the dirt into an entertaining series of trivia-heavy tours, loaded with stories about graft and ghosts and grisly murders, including his popular Haunted Halloween rambles offered each fall through Colorado Free University. You think you know this city, but Goodstein’s got you beat.

If the Broncos hope to regain their Super Bowl form after a miserable 6-10 year, the 1998 league MVP must rebound from the leg injury that cost him virtually all of last season. Hard-running Terrell Davis is the best in the game when he’s healthy, consistently rolling up 100-yard totals and taking pressure off Bronco quarterbacks not named Elway. An added bonus: Note Davis’s veteran influence on young Bronco ball carrier (and fellow Georgia grad) Olandis Gary, whose star began to rise in 1999.

Readers’ choice: Terrell Davis

Dee Chandler and Beau Blakemore, guides on the Gunslingers, Ghosts and Gold Walking Tours, strolled into their chosen profession as tourists themselves, so be assured: They’ve done their homework, though they’ve probably worn out more then a few pairs of shoes in the process. But it’s paid off — Chandler and Blakemore work with an arsenal of funny, gory and often creepy yarns from Denver’s rough-and-tumble past. If you’re a native, chances are you’ve heard or read some of the stories, but they’re perfect fare for visitors to modern Denver, which bears little or no resemblance to the one Chandler and Blakemore evoke.

When Ralph Cramden went bowling, he didn’t go to some glitzy joint filled with video games and screaming kids. He went to a place like Sport Bowl, a classic old bowling alley on South Broadway, where the biggest concession to children is the rubber-baby-buggy-bumpers — specifically, two padded alleys, designed for little kids and bigger ones who can’t stand the thought of throwing a gutter ball. The amenities here are sparse, but they’re choice: a decent billiards room, good hours (it’s open twelve to twelve), league specials and midnight bowling — and a bar where you can brag about your game after you’ve thrown that strike.

What a difference a few million bucks can make. Formerly known as FunPlex, this facility is in the midst of a major overhaul — and if the bowling alley is any indication, the completed work will be something to see. The alley’s interior has been remade in kitschy retro-’50s fashion, complete with leopard-print stools and a central bar dubbed the Lucky Strike. Yet there are modern touches as well — namely giant video screens mounted over each lane and a booming sound system, both of which transform the game into a rock-and-roll experience. The price to bowl is a bit steep, particularly on weekends, but people who enjoy a party atmosphere won’t complain. This place has style to spare.

Clement Park remains a beautiful facility, but its proximity to Columbine High School means that it evokes some painful memories for some, and it continues to attract a certain percentage of media types and other assorted voyeurs. Fortunately, the Ridge at West Meadows, a 140-acre facility north of Coal Mine near Dakota Ridge High School, offers many of the accoutrements that mark its more famous cousin: lots of soccer fields, a lake, a huge playground, and so on. Add to that a spectacular view of the foothills and a regular breeze perfect for kite flying, and you’ve got a place that offers recreation sans any unpleasant baggage.

City Park’s two lakes are continuously stocked with fish, generally trout. And the park is nearby, devoid of hazardous mountain roads and the other fishing folk are friendly — parents teach their kids how to fish, and more skilled anglers try out their new rods and reels before heading to the mountain streams. And if you don’t catch anything, there’s a King Soopers not too far away.

All right, maybe Denver International Airport isn’t exactly a nature preserve, but try and tell that to the birds (not the giant steely ones). The airport has had to catch and release intrusive sparrows from Concourse C, halt construction for migrating burrowing owls on several occasions and alter flight paths to protect the sensitive ears of bald eagles at several nearby nesting areas such as Barr Lake — a real birdwatching mecca. Compared to its other problems, though, these glitches aren’t that fowl.

There are plenty of lakes and wetlands around the metro area where you can watch birds, but Chatfield State Park is still the biggest, best place to see the most varied array of feathered friends. Watchers have recorded more than 300 kinds of birds there, from migrating loons, hawks and warblers to rare tanagers and thrashers to the permanent residents like house finches and red-winged blackbirds. “People get real excited about some of these,” says Ann Bonnell, a volunteer with the Audubon Society of Greater Denver, adding that Chatfield has “real diversity because it’s on a migratory crossroads.” And now that the Audubon Society has moved into temporary digs there (before it moves into a more permanent facility later), the baffled birdwatcher can sign up for a walking tour or a class to learn the difference between a sparrow and a swallow.

The sign at the parking lot calls Stevens Grove a “picnic area,” but “paradise” would be more like it — at least as far as dogs are concerned. Below the Chatfield Dam, trails wind lazily beneath groves of grand old cottonwoods around a couple of gentle ponds, with plenty of sandy spots that are perfect for beach romping, kong fetching and dog paddling out to the cattails. A field stretches out to the west of the ponds, its hardy sage, buffalo grass and milkweed unfazed by packs of flying-disc chasers. It’s not a bad place for humans (or, if you’re from Boulder, “pet guardians”), either: The mountain backdrop makes for dramatic sunsets, and nobody minds when a stranger’s wet dog shakes off at their feet — everyone’s friendly in that anonymous way, where you know the names of all the dogs and none of the people. Just don’t wear white.

You don’t bump into a sauropod every day, which makes this monster discovery, made by Denver Museum of Natural History volunteer Billy Kinneer during a 1997 museum-led excavation in the Cedar Mountain Formation near Arches National Monument in Utah, all the more extraordinary. Though the remains sadly lacked a skull, Kinneer found enough bones to establish the 120-million-year-old skeleton as that of a previously undiscovered species with a giraffe-like stature, who apparently palled around the prehistoric canyonlands with such fetching playmates as Utahraptor and Gastonia. Written up officially earlier this year in a French journal, the suspected leaf-eater was named in tribute to late museum volunteer Carol Weiskopf.

Some people walk in and look at the Komodo dragons at the Denver Zoo and shrug, not realizing they may never again see lizards — living dinosaurs with darting tongues and unblinking, beady eyes — like this in a lifetime. It’s the kids who know, though, and they’re fascinated by the four monstrous Monitors, who rarely move but can cause quite a ruckus when they do. Eeek!

Assuming we have to make peace with the fact that we’re going to be whores about this, let’s find us a good john. What better incentive than guilt? The state’s Public Utility Commission will soon consider the proposed merger of Qwest and US West, and there ought to be plenty of complaints about local telephone service. So what about a creative settlement deal? Colorado officials approve the merger, Mile High becomes Qwest, and Qwest ponies up $100 million in taxpayer relief. Everybody goes home happy.

Readers’ choice: John Elway Stadium/Mile High Stadium II

With splashy baseball stadia debuting in Houston, San Francisco and Seattle, Coors Field looks ever more elegantly understated. And so do the Rox, who rolled out several new uniforms this season. The team retired its boring gray road togs for ones with purple pinstripes that are equal parts color and class. An alternate home and road jersey, in deep purple, is as visually powerful as any Larry Walker blast to the upper decks. After last season’s devastatingly ugly “21st century” jerseys, these new threads give hope that even if the Rockies can’t pitch well, they can play with style.

This is partly a process of elimination. Buddy Bell wears, well, a baseball uniform, and really, how fashionable is that? While Bob Hartley, coach of the Colorado Avalanche, cuts a manly figure, his clothes are “eh,” and there’s a reason they call Dan Issel “the Horse.” So the honor goes to Mike Shanahan, who, while generally swaddled in Bronco-wear during games, cuts an extremely dashing figure off the field. “Some men are born to wear a $2,000 suit,” says one bartender where the Broncos coach is a regular. “His players all dress as if they’re trying to look like him, but he puts them to shame.”

Readers’ choice: Bob Hartley

Okay, we know: The Dallas Stars have knocked off the more-talented Colorado Avalanche two years in a row en route to the Stanley Cup Finals. But Avs’ coach Bob Hartley, formerly at the helm in Hershey, Pennsylvania (Colorado’s top farm club), also guided Roy, Sakic, Forsberg and company past detested Detroit in 1999 and 2000, and the continuing confidence general manager Pierre Lacroix shows in him — at least through next season — is not misplaced. A bounce of the puck here and there during that furious game-seven comeback in Dallas, and the Avs would have met eventual winner New Jersey for the Cup this year.

Readers’ choice: Mike Shanahan

After losing the NCAA Division II basketball final to Kentucky Wesleyan in 1999, Dunlap’s 33-4 Roadrunners dominated the rematch March 25 in Louisville, Kentucky, 97-79, to win their first national title. Stocked with Coloradans and five players recruited in Australia, the Runners gave local hoops fans the touch of March Madness that the state’s major college teams regularly fail to provide. In the wake of the big win, Dunlap turned down a coaching offer from California’s Loyola Marymount University and signed a new five-year contract at Metro. Good for him, and for the school’s 17,100 hard-working students.

Readers’ choice: Sonny Lubick

The Blake Street Bombers have long since flown their last mission. In the new millennium, the Colorado Rockies’ general manager, “Dealin’ Dan” O’Dowd, and field manager, Buddy Bell, have replaced the old power urges with speed, finesse and pitchers who throw strikes — and so far the results have been striking. The nouveaux Rox — seventeen new names graced the Opening Day roster — led by outfielders Tom Goodwin and Larry Walker, third baseman Jeff Cirillo and first-sacker Todd Helton (who’s having a career year) have the best home-field record in the major leagues, remain true contenders for the National League West title and continue to thrill the throngs at Coors Field with an exciting new brand of ball.

Readers’ choice: Colorado Avalanche

Following the gruesome massacre in the school library on April 20, 1999, Columbine High School students had little to feel good about until December 4, when the Columbine Rebels beat favored Cherry Creek 21-14 to take the state 5A football championship. Fittingly, the winning players gave the trophy to Adam Kechter, the thirteen-year-old brother of their late teammate Matt Kechter, one of the students who was slain.

Readers’ choice: CU Buffaloes

As Cherry Creek High School’s number-one singles player, eighteen-year-old Alicia Salas this spring won her fourth Colorado state tennis championship in as many years, equaling a record set by Cheyenne Mountain’s Becky Varnum. The four-time winner, praised by her coach as a respectful opponent and an admirable role model for younger players, will head for Notre Dame University this fall and set her sights on the NCAA women’s tennis title.

After Colorado State’s 41-14 upset win over arch-rival Colorado in the football-season opener at Mile High Stadium, CU players were pelted in the end zone with bottles and taunts from the CSU faithful. This, in turn, prompted a worked-up army of helmeted and shielded Denver police to Mace and teargas every animal, vegetable and mineral in sight — including old people and children. “We didn’t want them on the field,” one police lieutenant explained. But by whose order? “The cops were out of control,” one older fan said. “They showed no regard for anyone.” Look for the CU/CSU series to resume on campus.

It can be easy to forget that outstanding college athletes are also capable of being outstanding college students. Many top university football and basketball players, in particular, never bother to graduate; others attend classes just so they can showcase their talents on the field as a warmup for a lucrative professional career. But it is possible to both study and sweat. This past year, seniors Tyler Church (DU-basketball), Corte McGuffey (UNC-football), Cale Bonds (Air Force-football), Ryan Hollingshead (Adams State-football), Adam Batliner (CU-track and field), Kristina Andersson (DU-skiing), Shelly Borrman (CSU-track and field), Heather O’Brien (Colorado College-track and field) and Heather Burroughs (CU-track and field) were athletic standouts. (McGuffey, a quarterback, earned a tryout with the world-champion St. Louis Rams.) Yet each also was diligent enough in the classroom to earn a prestigious NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship for great grades. And there’s not a “recreation studies” major among them: Church studied biology, McGuffey and Bonds majored in biochemistry, and Andersson mastered mathematics.

An All-American at the University of Colorado, Kara Wheeler won both the 3,000- and 5,000-meter events in early June at the NCAA Track and Field championships at Duke University. Only former CU star Adam Goucher has earned more national track titles (three) for the school, and Wheeler was the first CU runner to win multiple events at the same meet. CU’s female athlete of the year ran the second-fastest 3,000 in the world this year and qualified for the U.S. Olympic trials in July.

The winner, and still the champ.

Readers’ Choice: Mile High Stadium

This year, junior distance runner Shane Rogers of Wilcox, Arizona, was the Mountain West Conference champion in the 3,000-meter steeplechase, and he won the flat 3,000-meter run at the Air Force Classic, against Oklahoma, Colorado State and Stanford. He’s even swifter (and clears higher hurdles) in the classroom: As a physics major at the Air Force Academy, Rogers carries a 3.58 grade-point average and is a member of the U.S. Track Coaches Association’s all-academic team.

A six-three, 240-pound junior, Daniel Graham may well be the fastest tight end in college football, but he sat out three games last year due to injury. Still, he had nineteen receptions for 264 yards and four touchdowns in 1999, and the Football News named him to its All-Big 12 first team. Blessed with soft hands as well as speed and good blocking ability, he should be a mainstay in coach Gary Barnett’s offense this year and a sleeper for national honors.

The University of Denver’s captain last season, tough right-winger Mark Rycroft, would have been the Pioneers’ top returning goal scorer this fall were it not for the two-year contract he signed this spring with the St. Louis Blues of the NHL. Six feet tall and 197 pounds, the 21-year-old led DU in game-winning goals, penalty minutes (87) and hard checks. He leaves school after his junior year because he cannot resist following his dream to play big league pro hockey.

A March acquisition from the Chicago Fire, speedy forward Junior Agogo is quickly becoming a fan favorite at Mile High Stadium, thanks to six goals and six assists in his first ten games for the Rapids and solid play since then. Just twenty, he was born in Ghana and played last season for Sheffield Wednesday of the mighty English Premier League. As the most rapid Rapid, the aptly named Agogo’s proven an ideal complement to fellow forwards Jorge Dely Valdez and Henry Zambrano and a source of joy for coach Glenn “Mooch” Myernick.

Readers’ choice: Marcelo Balboa

So what if he’s a bellowing hometowner, or if his game-night excitations go way over the top. Hockey announcer Mike Haynes, who does Avalanche games for 950 The Fan, gives a dead-accurate, right-on call of a lightning-fast sport, and his enthusiasm is contagious. Many Avs fans watching the game on TV pay him the ultimate compliment by offing the volume on their sets and pumping up the radio. The real measure of Haynes’s energy? He’s detested in every NHL city but Denver; in Red Wings-crazy Detroit, he needs a police escort to and from Joe Louis Arena.

The author of the original “Stick a Bourque in ’em!” banner remains unidentified, but the sentiment rang every fan’s bell at the Pepsi Center as the Colorado Avalanche put the finishing touches on a badly outclassed Phoenix Coyotes team in the first round of the NHL playoffs. The Bourque the Avs stuck in the Coyotes (because they were cooked) was, of course, veteran defenseman Raymond Bourque, newly acquired from Boston and Colorado’s most vivid inspiration. The ticket-buyers weren’t alone: Every sportswriter in town envied such peerless wit.

After dreaming through more than half a season of mediocrity, a listless Colorado Avalanche club was suddenly awakened by the arrival March 6 of two veteran Bostonians, Dave Andreychuk and Ray Bourque, who reminded their new teammates what they had going — a rare shot at the Stanley Cup. Bourque, in particular, set the Avs aflame. In twenty years as a Bruin, he had never won a championship, and his teammates visibly elevated their game after he got inside their heads. The Avs cruised into the NHL playoffs, and defenseman Bourque’s mysterious injury in a game against Detroit (a leg bruise? a knee sprain?) sharpened their focus to the killing point. The best news: Bourque has re-signed with the Avs for next year.

Patrick Roy’s net-minding lapses and Joe Sakic’s vanishing act in the Western Conference finals reminded Colorado Avalanche fans that the master of finesse, Peter Forsberg, is still the best player on a club well-stocked with — excuse the expression, Dallas-haters — stars. Always a great passer and playmaker, the former Swedish Olympic standout showed more willingness to shoot the puck in 1999-2000, and he remains the essential nucleus of a Stanley Cup-contending team that has managed to underachieve two years running. If 2001 is the time, Peter’s the Man.

Readers’ choice: Peter Forsberg

Dan Issel’s largely forgettable Nuggets continue to be anchored by sharpshooting forward Antonio McDyess, who ranked ninth in the NBA last season in field-goal percentage (.507) and sixteenth in rebounds (8.5 per game). The franchise player, Dice averaged 19.1 points per game, but his biggest night probably came in a 115-114 overtime win against the L.A. Clippers on April 15, when he logged 30 points and a career-high 21 rebounds. As McDyess goes, so go the Nuggets.

Readers’ choice: Antonio McDyess

You haven’t really seen softball until you’ve seen it played by athletes in wheelchairs — it’s a whole new ballgame demanding ample space and smooth ground for all the sharp turns and attendant maneuvers required. But the Colorado Rockies Wheelchair Softball League is covered: The Colorado Rockies baseball organization not only provides monetary support, it’s also opened up the north parking lot at Coors Field for league practices, games and clinics. Meanwhile the League, sponsored by Paralyzed Veterans of America Mountain States Chapter, has grown from three members to 500 in only five years, making it the largest such organization in the country.

That drafty old barn where the University of Denver Pioneers pounded the puck for half a century has been replaced by beautiful Magness Arena in the new Ritchie Center for Sports and Wellness, a $70 million Italianate vision in Hansen sandstone, limestone and copper. Seating 6,200 for hockey, 7,200 for hoops and up to 8,000 for concerts, lighting and high style, thanks to architect Cab Childress of Denver’s Davis Partnership. The hallmark of the Ritchie Center for Sports and Wellness, which also houses a second ice arena, a practice gym, a fitness center and a natatorium, is, of course, the soaring Carl B. Williams spire, finished in gold leaf.

Who cares about what’s in a name. What really matters is what’s inside. Which is why the blueprints for the Denver Broncos’ new, still-under-construction stadium make the perfect, if slightly pricey, gift. But then, who’s counting? Certainly not the Metro Football Stadium District, which is selling two kinds of numbered, limited-edition blueprints. The larger framed version (32 inches by 42 inches) shows the stadium’s south and west sides and includes a conceptual color photo of the stadium at night, for only $299.95. The smaller framed version (17 inches by 21 inches) shows the same things, along with a color photo of the actual stadium model, for $199.95. Proceeds go toward the MFSD’s public art and education programs. Oh, and the right to name the stadium is still for sale as well. It’ll cost you a little more, though.

In three seasons as a Rockie, ace Pedro Astacio has never pitched a shutout, but he came within one teammate’s error of doing it June 3 in Milwaukee. After scattering three hits and striking out seven over the first eight innings, the Dominican righty gave up a leadoff single to Geoff Jenkins in the ninth, threw a wild pitch and then saw the runner advance to third on a throwing error by Colorado catcher Scott Servais. Ex-Rockie Charlie Hayes then singled Jenkins home to tie the game 1-1. Alas, Rockies reliever Stan Belinda lost the game in the 12th, 2-1. Hard luck for Pete, but a splendid start nonetheless. Five hits, one unearned run, no decision.

Former National League MVP and two-time batting champ Larry Walker gives way to the 26-year-old Tennessean Todd Helton, a rugged third-year man who led the league for most of the spring in four major offensive categories — batting average, runs scored, runs batted in and hits. The oft-injured Walker, now 33, may still be the Rockies’ greatest talent, but the level-headed, slick-fielding Helton is a natural for the 2000 All-Star Team — and the young star who’s helped Coors Field fans forget popular first-sacker Andres Galarraga’s departure to Atlanta.

Now in its fourth year, the U.S. Vertical Kilometer will present you with possibly your worst time ever. The course begins at the base of the Vail ski resort and ends at the top, rocketing nearly straight up 1,000 meters in anywhere from three to three and a half miles. (Although the best route is marked by flags, runners can more or less select their own path — usually at their peril.) In fact, even to call the U.S. Vertical Kilometer, held in mid-June, a running race is something of a misnomer. This year the men’s winning time was just over 40 minutes — an average of about 13 minutes per mile. The top woman finished in about 49 minutes — or a bit over 16 minutes per mile.

This is not advanced human kinetics here. The easiest way to run an extremely fast race is to make sure you are always heading downhill — not a sheer drop, but a nice, steady decline in elevation. And the nicest place to do that in the Denver area, by far, is the Evergreen Town Race, this year to be held on Sunday, August 6. Both the five-kilometer and ten-kilometer courses wind — downhill, natch — along the highly scenic Upper Bear Creek Road, past some of the most sumptuous mountain mansions you are ever likely to lay eyes on. Of course, they’ll all be a blur because of the high velocity with which you will be passing them.

Readers’ choice: Bolder Boulder

Sometimes it’s nice to run a race in which the running plays second fiddle and you can just trot along and enjoy the sights — like the Bolder Boulder would be if there weren’t 40,000 other people trying to do the same thing. So instead go north, to the Colorado Run (September 2 this year), a five- or ten-kilometer run through Old Town Fort Collins. The route is crammed with entertainment, like the Jewels of the Nile belly dancers and Scottish bagpipers. Many observers simply blast music from their front lawns. The race ends at the oval at Colorado State University, so as you near the finish you feel like you’re entering the Olympic Stadium. There, you can forget your pain by watching the Frisbee-jumping dogs and the live band. Best of all is the recovery food: Ben and Jerry’s Ice Cream hosts a booth.

The hills west of Denver are crisscrossed with trails aplenty, but they aren’t all wonderful. Some are poorly maintained (or mangled by mountain-bike tracks); others are too exposed to the harsh summer sun, which at 8,000 feet can fry you before you’ve hit the two-mile mark. Alderfer Three Sisters, on the west side of Evergreen, offers the best of all worlds: scenic vistas (Mt. Evans looms to the west), nicely maintained trails, steep climbs and thrilling roller-coaster cruises, and protective groves of pine and aspen that are close-enough-together to save your hide, but open enough so that the trails are among the first in the area to dry after a drenching rain.

Reginald Joules has transformed the trauma of learning how to ride a bike into a source of excitement, pride and joy. Joules, a management scientist, first came up with his system in 1984, when he had to teach the sport to his five- and seven-year-old children. In 1996, after he taught a group of kids to ride, one mother suggested that he market his ideas — and Pedal Magic was born. Joules teaches his patented method in a $20 video, and says it only takes two to five minutes and eliminates the need for training wheels. And adults who never learned to ride — that’s approximately one out of every nine grownups — can practice the techniques in the basement or garage so others won’t see their humiliating attempts. But here’s a warning: Students weighing more than 200 pounds should complete the remedial lessons first.

Lynn Dexter and Patrick Gibbons are living proof that two heads — and pairs of legs — are better than one: Bike enthusiasts who decided the only way to ride together effectively was to go tandem, the couple opened their shop in reaction to the blank looks they were getting from folks selling what they call “half” bikes at other places. Tandem Cycle Works, one of the largest shops of its kind in the country, not only sells bicycles built for two exclusively, but also offers free adjustments on all bikes sold there, as well as a motherlode of friendly advice for tandem novices. It’s double the fun.

How to get out-of-town guests out of the house: Put ’em on a bike and let ’em go. They’ll be in good hands at Blazing Saddles, which is centrally located and close to the bike paths and offers an entire stable of new, state-of-the-art wheeled steeds, from trusty, serviceable mountain bikes to high-tech, full-suspension Stumpjumpers for hardened trail riders. Once your friends have chosen a mount, they can pick one of five planned itineraries, from an easy cycle along the Platte to Confluence Park to the much tougher and higher White Ranch ride; the outfit’s Computrak system, a computerized map that’s mounted right on the handlebars, will keep them from getting lost even as it recommends restaurants and attractions along the way. Ah. Now you can have the house to yourselves.

Serious road bikers ride a fine line between simple masochism and insanity. Colorado hosts several full-day rides for the certifiable (the Triple Bypass, or Denver to Aspen), but if you are simply looking for a three-hour (or so) ride that will cause you acute pain, this one can’t be beat. Begin at Chatfield State Park on South Wadsworth Boulevard. Head west into the foothills on Deer Creek Canyon Road. Turn left at Phillipsburg (which consists of an abandoned gas station). The road starts out easy enough, but soon turns into a series of killer switchbacks, climbing up what will seem to you like a sheer cliff. When you reach the top of this, you’re not even close to done. Stay straight as the road turns into Pleasant Park Road. This climbs steadily (and, apparently, forever) into Conifer. From there it’s finally all downhill: Barrel down Route 73, fly down North Turkey Creek Road to South Turkey Creek Road, and complete the vicious circle with a left turn back onto Deer Creek Canyon Road.

Some “rides” on the Front Range are so grueling that they are little more than paths for you to walk your bike on. We’re talking rides that, with enough skill, sweat and stupidity, are still possible to navigate. Dakota Ridge begins on the east side of Route 26 outside of Morrison, and traces the hogback separating Rt. 470 from Red Rocks. Climb the path on the north side of the ridge, a challenging but technically simple ride. About halfway along the ridge, though, you’ll hit plenty of rocks and enough technical terrain to threaten your equilibrium and dome. Wear a helmet and prepare to rip your shoes out of their clips.

Readers’ choice: Apex

What tribulations hath the post-Elway era wrought? Unceremoniously demoted in the 1999 pre-season by coach Mike Shanahan, former Bronco starting quarterback Bubby Brister fussed and fumed, then considered his options, then decided to stay on as young Brian Griese’s backup out of loyalty to his teammates. But the fiery Louisianan’s animus for Shanahan was evident: Said Bubby: “When I had a level head and thought about it, I said I can’t walk out on [Bill Romanowski], [Ed] McCaffrey and Brian. But I know if it was a one-on-one card game and Mike dealt me that hand, I would probably do like they did back in the day.” Fortunately for all concerned, Brister kept his Colt in the holster.

Climbing walls have become a hip form of exercise, and there are a growing number of them in Denver on which you can test your perpendicular prowess. (Not included in this list: the wall at the new downtown REI store, more display than challenge.) Yet there’s something about scaling an indoor face that violates the spirit of rock climbing. So save your money and head west to the sheer walls off of Route 8 just a few yards east of downtown Morrison. The rocks face south, so handholds are warm most of the year. The routes are short enough that you don’t need to haul around ropes and protection (an alert spotter will do), and there are an infinite number of moves to try, from simple to ridiculous. Best of all, you’ll get a tan at the same time.

Recent breakthroughs in swimming-pool technologies almost dictate that the best swimming pool be the newest. Standing at the recently opened Wheat Ridge Community Center pool, surrounded by so much aquatic flash and dazzle, it’s hard to imagine what people did in the six-lane cement ponds of yesteryear. But this is a fitness center, and quite a workout can be had by running from one aquatic attraction to the next. First hit the inner tubes by the lazy river for some paddling exercises, then try a cool-down on the water-fountain spray features, followed by a brisk wallowing in the baby pool and a series of reps in the Jacuzzi. And just off the interior sunbathing courtyard, a curious six-lane cement pond has been built where old-timers and history buffs can try their hands at “swimming.”

With amateur tennis, any player can beat another of similar ability on a given day. But Loehr has shown amazing consistency on the Denver club tennis scene. Last year he won both the Denver Open Tournament and the Colorado State Open, an unusual enough accomplishment on its own. But he also won the state tournament in 1998, as well. That means that this July, Loehr will be aiming for his third consecutive state championship — a feat that, according to the Colorado Tennis Association, has never before been accomplished.

This well-appointed club south of Denver has five outdoor courts that are open year-round, but the real draw is the seven scrupulously maintained indoor clay courts. Naturally, such luxury doesn’t come cheap; initiation is $300 ($350 for a couple), with additional monthly dues of $107 ($161). That’s more than $1,500 per year to swat around a tennis ball, but if you love the high bounces and sliding style of clay, it’s well worth the cost.

The city of Denver owns dozens of park tennis courts that you can play on for free, but if you have a couple bucks burning a hole in your pocket it’s more than worth the price of admission to stop by the Gates Tennis Center in the Cherry Creek neighborhood. For $4 an hour per court (that’s $1.25 each for a doubles match), you get your choice of twenty hard-surface courts (resurfaced this year), seven of which are well-lit for night play. Gates’s center court, sunken for better viewing, is one of the best venues in the city, public or private. The tennis center also has six teaching pros on staff, and can string rackets on site.

Shreveport, Louisiana’s David Toms, one of the best-kept secrets on the PGA Tour, led last summer’s Sprint International at Castle Pines the entire way — until the sixteenth hole of the final round. There, Toms scored an egregious triple bogey and gave up the lead to hard-charging David Duval. But Toms wasn’t done. On seventeen, the long-hitting pro pulled himself together, rolled a delicate chip shot down a nerve-shattering greenside hill and left his ball within a few feet of the cup. Toms coolly sank his birdie putt and put the tournament in his pocket right there, joining such better-known international winners as Greg Norman, Davis Love III, Phil Mickelson and Vijay Singh.

You may get distracted stroking your three-footer for par, so spectacular are the red-rock vistas at Arrowhead Golf Club. But that’s the price you pay for playing this gorgeous and challenging Littleton layout designed in 1972 by the estimable Robert Trent Jones Jr. The wildlife at large among the traps and lakes includes foxes, bear and deer, and unless you’re pretty accurate with the sticks, a high percentage of your shots may go wild, too. One of the finest, most beautiful public golf courses in the nation — with hefty greens fees to match.

The name says it all. Much of Telluride’s ski mountain is dauntingly “steep and deep,” but its signature run — ominously named the Plunge — transports lionhearted experts from 12,000-foot heights almost straight down to the picturesque village below — and very quickly, too. Take your pick, hotshots: Half of this harrowing run is carefully groomed, the other half infested with knee-twisting moguls. For the daring, this matchless winter challenge is well worth an eight-hour drive from downtown Denver. Why? Because it’s there.

Bus to the slopes — and back again in a day? What a novel idea! You won’t be hitting the powder at Aspen or Vail, but funky Eldora still offers plenty of great snow for skiing and boarding, and a nordic center maintaining a plethora of marked cross-country trails. And you can take the bus: RTD’s Route N makes frequent trips from Boulder to Eldora during ski season for only three bucks each way; you can also use a transfer if you’re traveling to Boulder from Denver (take route B from Market Street Station to Boulder Station) or other surrounding communities. Even if you were driving, you’d avoid the kind of traffic that slows down I-70 and other routes into ski country — but this way, you don’t even have to think about it. It’s schuss the thing.

This is a matter not of comparative ogling, but of mathematics and economics. After all these years, Loveland still has a higher percentage of shred-everymans than any other hill within driving distance of Denver, so it follows that a comparative percentage of them are female. Furthermore, if you are a nineteen-year-old shredder of either sex, you’re broke unless you have a sponsor — and the odds against that have been clearly demonstrated. Therefore Loveland’s lift ticket prices will be the only ones that make fiscal sense. Finally, why go to any mountain to look at a snowboarder? Isn’t it time you became one?

Readers’ choice: Copper Mountain Resort

When San Francisco’s concussion-plagued star Steve Young wisely decided to retire rather than risk further injury in Denver, he left the Broncos with the same problem they’ve faced since May 1999 — how to replace a legendary quarterback and team leader with a mere mortal. In the absence of John Elway, head coach Mike Shanahan will turn to third-year man Brian Griese, who’s had growing pains on the field and in the dressing room. Can he throw long? Maybe: Bronco mini-campers say Bob Griese’s boy is now ready for prime time. Failing that, Gus Frerotte, late of Washington and Detroit, will get the call. Can anyone here say Bubby Brister?

Prospects for elk hunters in Colorado for the past several years have been dismal. On average, only about 16 percent of the people who have headed into the woods aiming to bag an animal have successfully managed to fill their freezers. That’s not the case in Game Management Unit 20, however, where the accessibility of the backcountry has resulted in a whopping success rate of just under 60 percent.

There are better places to hunt elk if the only thing you’re after is surrounding yourself with the big animals. Game Management Unit 24, for instance, in central Colorado, is ground zero for the White River National Forest herd, a swarming mass of nearly 48,000 elk. Yet the ratio of bulls to cows there is only nineteen to 100 — less than two bulls for every ten elk. So if it’s a major rack you’re after, head north and west to GMU 201. The herd — the Cold Springs herd — is small, only 1,000 or so strong. But the ratio of bulls to cows there is forty to 100; out of every ten elk, four will be males.

Tangaray Farms’ promising Colorado-bred, Moonlight Maverick, has done almost everything right since he began racing last year. As a two-year-old, he won the $100,000 Gold Rush Futurity at Arapahoe Park, then kicked off his three-year-old campaign June 3 with a win in the six-furlong Inaugural, under rider Don Frazier. In six career starts, the dark bay son of Seattle Sleet and Hempen Cutie has won five times and finished second once, earning more than $95,000. Trainer Ken Gleason means to keep him on the grounds at Arapahoe, so fellow sprinters better look out. Alas, the Mav is a gelding, so he’s likely to do more racing than dating in future seasons.

The top-ranked Karen Legg Kennel has produced many champions, but few are as thrilling to watch as Shootyz Groove, a two-and-a-half-year-old sprinter with a dazzling burst of early speed. In the winter meet at Wembley Park (aka Mile High Kennel Club), Groove hit the wire first in fourteen of his twenty-three starts, including the Winter Sprint Championship, and he won seventeen of 21 this spring at Cloverleaf, in Loveland. Upon returning to the Big Store June 9, the brindle son of P’s Raising Cain out of MJ’s Shadow promptly won the Inaugural by more than seven lengths. His next big test will come July 8, when he’ll likely go off as the favorite in the Colorado Classic.

Red & Jerry’s is a cozy little nook containing fourteen pool tables, two huge bars, several acres of explosive video games and enough dining tables to seat the U.S. Marine Corps. It is also the best public off-track betting establishment in the state — mostly because the food and drink are so good. Start your exacta off with a big burger, great fish and chips, a nice rack of ribs or a sublime club sandwich. Four bucks buys you a closed-circuit TV monitor right there at your table. So even if your nine-to-one shot gives it up in the stretch at Gulfstream, at least you’ll have the comforts of a good meal.

Women’s Quest’s motto is a quote by Helen Keller: “Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all” — and that’s pretty much the point of these rejuvenating multi-sport retreats for women of all skill levels and ages organized by Boulderite Colleen Cannon, a leading female triathlete in the ’80s and still a mighty tough cookie. Kind of a support group in fitness wear, a Women’s Quest adventure is designed to be a working vacation for every part of your body, as well as your mind and spirit. Go, girls!

Denver’s homegrown (now-ex) boxing champ, WBC lightweight title-holder Stevie “Li’l But Bad” Johnston, wasted no time on March 17 reducing his opponent to rubble. Cut over the left eye in the first round, Johnston pelted the gape-jawed challenger, Mexico’s Julion Alvarez, with a furious barrage in the second and was soon aloft on the shoulders of his corner men. That meant the 8,000 Johnston fans in Magness Arena — this was the champ’s first Denver fight in four years — had plenty of time to celebrate the victory over cocktails and relatively early dinners out — and for the male halves of couples to tell their wives and dates how tough they used to be.

Visitors to City Park in recent years may have noticed the Box Canyon ruins meandering behind the Denver Museum of Nature and Science and wondered what the heck it was all about. Well, it was once quite something — designed in 1953 by noted landscape architect S.R. DeBoer, the miniature canyon waterway ambled through the park before emptying into a lily pond and Ferril Lake, evoking the kind of scenery we’re used to seeing up in the Rockies. But over the years it fell into disrepair — until this spring, when volunteers from Denver Urban Gardens and the Garden Club of Denver joined hands with Denver Parks and Recreation to restore the little gorge by solidifying its rock walls, landscaping it with river alders, ginnala maple, river birch, mountain mahogany, squaw currant, apache plume shrub and other native plantings and building two trails. DUG co-director Michael Buchenau deems that unique partnership a success, which bodes well for the future of similar large-scale restoration projects in public places.

We’ve all got a contrary little guy sitting on our brains, telling us to do things we know we shouldn’t. But most of us have the willpower to keep him in check. Well, this was one event where folks could just let it all go: When their little guys saw a big, round pumpkin and wanted to smash it to smithereens, the ten teams participating last fall — including the green-wigged youth division winners the Punkcelerators and recreation division winners It’s a Bird, It’s Plane, It’s a…Splat! — created catapults and let ’em fly, all for the benefit of Denver Urban Gardens and the DeLaney Urban Farm. And guess what? Next fall’s gourds, though barely out of the ground, are already quaking in their vines: Heave-ho-ho! You can always say the devil made you do it.

What kid isn’t hardwired to dig in the dirt? Unfortunately, today’s canned urban society doesn’t always allow for an available plot — so what’s a babe with a shovel to do? The Denver Botanic Gardens’ Mr. McGregor’s Garden is open — free — to little diggers and worm-hunters every Saturday from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., throughout the summer. The pastoral gent himself is on hand then to help them pick and plant vegetables or flowers, providing your wee beasties with a growth experience they’ll never forget.

Prior to this year’s Super Bowl, which didn’t include the Broncos (the combatants were the St. Louis Rams and the Tennessee Titans), the Fan replayed last year’s Super Bowl, which did. The main difference between this broadcast and Orson Welles’s panic-inducing radio production of War of the Worlds was that Broncos fans didn’t start rioting in Larimer Square after it was over.

Kids will go head over heels for this one: For $65, you get one hour in the Meadowood gym for up to eight rowdy little gymnasts ($5 per additional child), followed by a half-hour in the party room indulging in bring-your-own cake and refreshments — and this is one birthday party where they’ll need some excess sugar to burn. Available Friday evenings or Saturday and Sunday afternoons, the parties are open to kids of all ages — from just-walking to teens.

Forget all of those overpriced, underwhelming entertainment warehouses and theme parks that cater mostly to the teenage crowd. The owners of Funtastic Fun know what kids — and their parents — like, and it shows. Just about everything here sets FF apart from most other play places in town. The indoor amusement park comes complete with a Ferris wheel, carousel and train — and that’s just the beginning of the fun. There are more than twenty different rides and attractions (including a giant air castle for bouncing, a roller-racing area, side-by-side slides, a shadow-making room and a slew of silly funhouse mirrors), and moms and dads are encouraged to join in the fun. (Bonus for parents: No blaring music, strobe lights or other sensory-overloading gimmicks included.) FF provides all of this for an incredibly reasonable rate (with free parking, to boot): The cash-only admission price of $7.99 per child (just $4.99 on Tuesdays and Wednesdays; adults pay $2.99 every day) gives you unlimited rides and play for unlimited time. The family-friendly game machines take 25-cent tokens, but there is so much more to do here that kids hardly notice them.

When you start with a state-of-the-art facility, the rest simply falls into place. The brand-new Ritchie Center for Sports and Wellness more than qualifies, offering just about every sport under the sun beneath its shiny copper skin: youth hockey leagues, figure skating, basketball, gymnastics, lacrosse, swimming, climbing for kids and more. There are also various summer camps, including overnight and day soccer camps, tennis and volleyball camps and all-inclusive sessions divided up by age groups. Plus, if it’s a little R&R you’re seeking for yourself, you can pack off the young ones at the center’s Little Pioneer Place, which offers drop-off child care for up to two hours.

These are programs with meat on their bones — whether it’s a daylong school field trip or a two-week summer camp, the kids involved are truly there, participating and learning as they go. One of the best and most novel is Women Afield, a series of daylong workshops designed to encourage an interest in science among girls ages twelve through eighteen — a group that traditionally shuns such studies. But there’s also a three-hour Bird Studies Extreme birdwatching trek for kids in grades four and up, as well extended camps for teens, featuring classroom instruction and hands-on field training right alongside the pros.

Chris and Phil Switzer may be the state’s foremost alpaca people — they were the first in the region to raise the woolly creatures, and Chris — who has a college degree in weaving — has published a primer on how to spin llama and alpaca wool and runs workshops at the annual Estes Park Wool Market. Phil has credentials, too — he helped form the Estes Park-based Alpaca Owners and Breeders Association, is a certified fleece judge and has run the alpaca tent at the wool market. And when they’re not attending to all those duties, the couple raises and sells the fleecy beasts, keeping a herd of about fifty sweet and cuddly camelids (the babies are especially cute). Visitors should call ahead, and plan to peruse the Switzer’s store for weaving supplies, fiber, books, tools and finished items. It’s nothing to spit at.

They love their Greater Prairie Chickens up in Yuma County, where every spring the citizens like to provide ringside seats to the biggest show in town: The lucky folks who sign up are taken out to the lek (or booming ground) at four in the morning to watch the male prairie chickens do their strange and amazing song and dance for the chicks. You have to go there yourself to truly find out why it’s called a booming ground, but it has something to do with the incredible bassoon-like bellowing that occurs when the randy boy chickens strut, flap and go head to head, all the while inflating and deflating bright red balloon-like air sacs on their necks in a desperate attempt to attract female attention. Sure, you could sit at home and watch Animal Planet instead, but trust us on this one: There’s nothing else like it. Make your reservations early.

Nomadic Mongolians became a horde because they knew how to survive, and you can bet the yurt played a part in their survival: A circular, portable tent that kept them warm while they hoofed it through the frigid wasteland, the yurt is now proving to be a popular alternative for winter campers in Colorado. Colorado State Parks now offers yurt accommodations — skylighted, low-impact canvas tents wrapped around wooden frames and featuring wood-burning, gas or electric heat — by reservation at State Forest and Ridgway state parks, for a reasonable fee (also coming soon to Pearl Lake, Mancos and Golden Gate state parks).

This page is so handy and neat, you’ll never again mail away for another brochure in anticipation of planning your Colorado camping trip. Want to go swimming? Rock climbing? Sailboarding? With a mouse for a muse, you can easily find the park that best suits your interests and specific needs, whether it’s birdwatching, interpretive programs, school programs, wildlife watching, ice fishing or whatever. All you’ve got to do is log on and select from activities, facilities or specific parks — then click, click, click, you’ll be out in the sticks.

While the rest of us toil and sweat to pay off the mortgage, the folks at Swallow Hill Music Hall came up with a better idea: make it fun. So, this summer they organized a pair of leisurely floats down the Gunnison River, with gourmet camp vittles and music to match: The first, which embarked last weekend, featured zen cowboy and songwriter extraordinaire Chuck Pyle at the entertainment helm; the second, scheduled for August, features poetic cowpoke-type Roz Brown. Proceeds go into Swallow Hill’s mortgage kitty. What a great way to stay afloat.

One of Denver’s prime eccentrics, historian Phil Goodstein’s made the city his oyster to mine, and that’s just what he’s done — he’s excavated every nook, cranny and obscurity in the town’s history and turned the dirt into an entertaining series of trivia-heavy tours, loaded with stories about graft and ghosts and grisly murders, including his popular Haunted Halloween rambles offered each fall through Colorado Free University. You think you know this city, but Goodstein’s got you beat.

If the Broncos hope to regain their Super Bowl form after a miserable 6-10 year, the 1998 league MVP must rebound from the leg injury that cost him virtually all of last season. Hard-running Terrell Davis is the best in the game when he’s healthy, consistently rolling up 100-yard totals and taking pressure off Bronco quarterbacks not named Elway. An added bonus: Note Davis’s veteran influence on young Bronco ball carrier (and fellow Georgia grad) Olandis Gary, whose star began to rise in 1999.

Readers’ choice: Terrell Davis

Dee Chandler and Beau Blakemore, guides on the Gunslingers, Ghosts and Gold Walking Tours, strolled into their chosen profession as tourists themselves, so be assured: They’ve done their homework, though they’ve probably worn out more then a few pairs of shoes in the process. But it’s paid off — Chandler and Blakemore work with an arsenal of funny, gory and often creepy yarns from Denver’s rough-and-tumble past. If you’re a native, chances are you’ve heard or read some of the stories, but they’re perfect fare for visitors to modern Denver, which bears little or no resemblance to the one Chandler and Blakemore evoke.

When Ralph Cramden went bowling, he didn’t go to some glitzy joint filled with video games and screaming kids. He went to a place like Sport Bowl, a classic old bowling alley on South Broadway, where the biggest concession to children is the rubber-baby-buggy-bumpers — specifically, two padded alleys, designed for little kids and bigger ones who can’t stand the thought of throwing a gutter ball. The amenities here are sparse, but they’re choice: a decent billiards room, good hours (it’s open twelve to twelve), league specials and midnight bowling — and a bar where you can brag about your game after you’ve thrown that strike.

What a difference a few million bucks can make. Formerly known as FunPlex, this facility is in the midst of a major overhaul — and if the bowling alley is any indication, the completed work will be something to see. The alley’s interior has been remade in kitschy retro-’50s fashion, complete with leopard-print stools and a central bar dubbed the Lucky Strike. Yet there are modern touches as well — namely giant video screens mounted over each lane and a booming sound system, both of which transform the game into a rock-and-roll experience. The price to bowl is a bit steep, particularly on weekends, but people who enjoy a party atmosphere won’t complain. This place has style to spare.

Clement Park remains a beautiful facility, but its proximity to Columbine High School means that it evokes some painful memories for some, and it continues to attract a certain percentage of media types and other assorted voyeurs. Fortunately, the Ridge at West Meadows, a 140-acre facility north of Coal Mine near Dakota Ridge High School, offers many of the accoutrements that mark its more famous cousin: lots of soccer fields, a lake, a huge playground, and so on. Add to that a spectacular view of the foothills and a regular breeze perfect for kite flying, and you’ve got a place that offers recreation sans any unpleasant baggage.

City Park’s two lakes are continuously stocked with fish, generally trout. And the park is nearby, devoid of hazardous mountain roads and the other fishing folk are friendly — parents teach their kids how to fish, and more skilled anglers try out their new rods and reels before heading to the mountain streams. And if you don’t catch anything, there’s a King Soopers not too far away.

All right, maybe Denver International Airport isn’t exactly a nature preserve, but try and tell that to the birds (not the giant steely ones). The airport has had to catch and release intrusive sparrows from Concourse C, halt construction for migrating burrowing owls on several occasions and alter flight paths to protect the sensitive ears of bald eagles at several nearby nesting areas such as Barr Lake — a real birdwatching mecca. Compared to its other problems, though, these glitches aren’t that fowl.

There are plenty of lakes and wetlands around the metro area where you can watch birds, but Chatfield State Park is still the biggest, best place to see the most varied array of feathered friends. Watchers have recorded more than 300 kinds of birds there, from migrating loons, hawks and warblers to rare tanagers and thrashers to the permanent residents like house finches and red-winged blackbirds. “People get real excited about some of these,” says Ann Bonnell, a volunteer with the Audubon Society of Greater Denver, adding that Chatfield has “real diversity because it’s on a migratory crossroads.” And now that the Audubon Society has moved into temporary digs there (before it moves into a more permanent facility later), the baffled birdwatcher can sign up for a walking tour or a class to learn the difference between a sparrow and a swallow.

The sign at the parking lot calls Stevens Grove a “picnic area,” but “paradise” would be more like it — at least as far as dogs are concerned. Below the Chatfield Dam, trails wind lazily beneath groves of grand old cottonwoods around a couple of gentle ponds, with plenty of sandy spots that are perfect for beach romping, kong fetching and dog paddling out to the cattails. A field stretches out to the west of the ponds, its hardy sage, buffalo grass and milkweed unfazed by packs of flying-disc chasers. It’s not a bad place for humans (or, if you’re from Boulder, “pet guardians”), either: The mountain backdrop makes for dramatic sunsets, and nobody minds when a stranger’s wet dog shakes off at their feet — everyone’s friendly in that anonymous way, where you know the names of all the dogs and none of the people. Just don’t wear white.

You don’t bump into a sauropod every day, which makes this monster discovery, made by Denver Museum of Natural History volunteer Billy Kinneer during a 1997 museum-led excavation in the Cedar Mountain Formation near Arches National Monument in Utah, all the more extraordinary. Though the remains sadly lacked a skull, Kinneer found enough bones to establish the 120-million-year-old skeleton as that of a previously undiscovered species with a giraffe-like stature, who apparently palled around the prehistoric canyonlands with such fetching playmates as Utahraptor and Gastonia. Written up officially earlier this year in a French journal, the suspected leaf-eater was named in tribute to late museum volunteer Carol Weiskopf.

Some people walk in and look at the Komodo dragons at the Denver Zoo and shrug, not realizing they may never again see lizards — living dinosaurs with darting tongues and unblinking, beady eyes — like this in a lifetime. It’s the kids who know, though, and they’re fascinated by the four monstrous Monitors, who rarely move but can cause quite a ruckus when they do. Eeek!

Assuming we have to make peace with the fact that we’re going to be whores about this, let’s find us a good john. What better incentive than guilt? The state’s Public Utility Commission will soon consider the proposed merger of Qwest and US West, and there ought to be plenty of complaints about local telephone service. So what about a creative settlement deal? Colorado officials approve the merger, Mile High becomes Qwest, and Qwest ponies up $100 million in taxpayer relief. Everybody goes home happy.

Readers’ choice: John Elway Stadium/Mile High Stadium II

With splashy baseball stadia debuting in Houston, San Francisco and Seattle, Coors Field looks ever more elegantly understated. And so do the Rox, who rolled out several new uniforms this season. The team retired its boring gray road togs for ones with purple pinstripes that are equal parts color and class. An alternate home and road jersey, in deep purple, is as visually powerful as any Larry Walker blast to the upper decks. After last season’s devastatingly ugly “21st century” jerseys, these new threads give hope that even if the Rockies can’t pitch well, they can play with style.

This is partly a process of elimination. Buddy Bell wears, well, a baseball uniform, and really, how fashionable is that? While Bob Hartley, coach of the Colorado Avalanche, cuts a manly figure, his clothes are “eh,” and there’s a reason they call Dan Issel “the Horse.” So the honor goes to Mike Shanahan, who, while generally swaddled in Bronco-wear during games, cuts an extremely dashing figure off the field. “Some men are born to wear a $2,000 suit,” says one bartender where the Broncos coach is a regular. “His players all dress as if they’re trying to look like him, but he puts them to shame.”

Readers’ choice: Bob Hartley

Okay, we know: The Dallas Stars have knocked off the more-talented Colorado Avalanche two years in a row en route to the Stanley Cup Finals. But Avs’ coach Bob Hartley, formerly at the helm in Hershey, Pennsylvania (Colorado’s top farm club), also guided Roy, Sakic, Forsberg and company past detested Detroit in 1999 and 2000, and the continuing confidence general manager Pierre Lacroix shows in him — at least through next season — is not misplaced. A bounce of the puck here and there during that furious game-seven comeback in Dallas, and the Avs would have met eventual winner New Jersey for the Cup this year.

Readers’ choice: Mike Shanahan

After losing the NCAA Division II basketball final to Kentucky Wesleyan in 1999, Dunlap’s 33-4 Roadrunners dominated the rematch March 25 in Louisville, Kentucky, 97-79, to win their first national title. Stocked with Coloradans and five players recruited in Australia, the Runners gave local hoops fans the touch of March Madness that the state’s major college teams regularly fail to provide. In the wake of the big win, Dunlap turned down a coaching offer from California’s Loyola Marymount University and signed a new five-year contract at Metro. Good for him, and for the school’s 17,100 hard-working students.

Readers’ choice: Sonny Lubick

The Blake Street Bombers have long since flown their last mission. In the new millennium, the Colorado Rockies’ general manager, “Dealin’ Dan” O’Dowd, and field manager, Buddy Bell, have replaced the old power urges with speed, finesse and pitchers who throw strikes — and so far the results have been striking. The nouveaux Rox — seventeen new names graced the Opening Day roster — led by outfielders Tom Goodwin and Larry Walker, third baseman Jeff Cirillo and first-sacker Todd Helton (who’s having a career year) have the best home-field record in the major leagues, remain true contenders for the National League West title and continue to thrill the throngs at Coors Field with an exciting new brand of ball.

Readers’ choice: Colorado Avalanche

Following the gruesome massacre in the school library on April 20, 1999, Columbine High School students had little to feel good about until December 4, when the Columbine Rebels beat favored Cherry Creek 21-14 to take the state 5A football championship. Fittingly, the winning players gave the trophy to Adam Kechter, the thirteen-year-old brother of their late teammate Matt Kechter, one of the students who was slain.

Readers’ choice: CU Buffaloes

As Cherry Creek High School’s number-one singles player, eighteen-year-old Alicia Salas this spring won her fourth Colorado state tennis championship in as many years, equaling a record set by Cheyenne Mountain’s Becky Varnum. The four-time winner, praised by her coach as a respectful opponent and an admirable role model for younger players, will head for Notre Dame University this fall and set her sights on the NCAA women’s tennis title.

After Colorado State’s 41-14 upset win over arch-rival Colorado in the football-season opener at Mile High Stadium, CU players were pelted in the end zone with bottles and taunts from the CSU faithful. This, in turn, prompted a worked-up army of helmeted and shielded Denver police to Mace and teargas every animal, vegetable and mineral in sight — including old people and children. “We didn’t want them on the field,” one police lieutenant explained. But by whose order? “The cops were out of control,” one older fan said. “They showed no regard for anyone.” Look for the CU/CSU series to resume on campus.

It can be easy to forget that outstanding college athletes are also capable of being outstanding college students. Many top university football and basketball players, in particular, never bother to graduate; others attend classes just so they can showcase their talents on the field as a warmup for a lucrative professional career. But it is possible to both study and sweat. This past year, seniors Tyler Church (DU-basketball), Corte McGuffey (UNC-football), Cale Bonds (Air Force-football), Ryan Hollingshead (Adams State-football), Adam Batliner (CU-track and field), Kristina Andersson (DU-skiing), Shelly Borrman (CSU-track and field), Heather O’Brien (Colorado College-track and field) and Heather Burroughs (CU-track and field) were athletic standouts. (McGuffey, a quarterback, earned a tryout with the world-champion St. Louis Rams.) Yet each also was diligent enough in the classroom to earn a prestigious NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship for great grades. And there’s not a “recreation studies” major among them: Church studied biology, McGuffey and Bonds majored in biochemistry, and Andersson mastered mathematics.

An All-American at the University of Colorado, Kara Wheeler won both the 3,000- and 5,000-meter events in early June at the NCAA Track and Field championships at Duke University. Only former CU star Adam Goucher has earned more national track titles (three) for the school, and Wheeler was the first CU runner to win multiple events at the same meet. CU’s female athlete of the year ran the second-fastest 3,000 in the world this year and qualified for the U.S. Olympic trials in July.

The winner, and still the champ.

Readers’ Choice: Mile High Stadium

This year, junior distance runner Shane Rogers of Wilcox, Arizona, was the Mountain West Conference champion in the 3,000-meter steeplechase, and he won the flat 3,000-meter run at the Air Force Classic, against Oklahoma, Colorado State and Stanford. He’s even swifter (and clears higher hurdles) in the classroom: As a physics major at the Air Force Academy, Rogers carries a 3.58 grade-point average and is a member of the U.S. Track Coaches Association’s all-academic team.

A six-three, 240-pound junior, Daniel Graham may well be the fastest tight end in college football, but he sat out three games last year due to injury. Still, he had nineteen receptions for 264 yards and four touchdowns in 1999, and the Football News named him to its All-Big 12 first team. Blessed with soft hands as well as speed and good blocking ability, he should be a mainstay in coach Gary Barnett’s offense this year and a sleeper for national honors.

The University of Denver’s captain last season, tough right-winger Mark Rycroft, would have been the Pioneers’ top returning goal scorer this fall were it not for the two-year contract he signed this spring with the St. Louis Blues of the NHL. Six feet tall and 197 pounds, the 21-year-old led DU in game-winning goals, penalty minutes (87) and hard checks. He leaves school after his junior year because he cannot resist following his dream to play big league pro hockey.

A March acquisition from the Chicago Fire, speedy forward Junior Agogo is quickly becoming a fan favorite at Mile High Stadium, thanks to six goals and six assists in his first ten games for the Rapids and solid play since then. Just twenty, he was born in Ghana and played last season for Sheffield Wednesday of the mighty English Premier League. As the most rapid Rapid, the aptly named Agogo’s proven an ideal complement to fellow forwards Jorge Dely Valdez and Henry Zambrano and a source of joy for coach Glenn “Mooch” Myernick.

Readers’ choice: Marcelo Balboa

So what if he’s a bellowing hometowner, or if his game-night excitations go way over the top. Hockey announcer Mike Haynes, who does Avalanche games for 950 The Fan, gives a dead-accurate, right-on call of a lightning-fast sport, and his enthusiasm is contagious. Many Avs fans watching the game on TV pay him the ultimate compliment by offing the volume on their sets and pumping up the radio. The real measure of Haynes’s energy? He’s detested in every NHL city but Denver; in Red Wings-crazy Detroit, he needs a police escort to and from Joe Louis Arena.

The author of the original “Stick a Bourque in ’em!” banner remains unidentified, but the sentiment rang every fan’s bell at the Pepsi Center as the Colorado Avalanche put the finishing touches on a badly outclassed Phoenix Coyotes team in the first round of the NHL playoffs. The Bourque the Avs stuck in the Coyotes (because they were cooked) was, of course, veteran defenseman Raymond Bourque, newly acquired from Boston and Colorado’s most vivid inspiration. The ticket-buyers weren’t alone: Every sportswriter in town envied such peerless wit.

After dreaming through more than half a season of mediocrity, a listless Colorado Avalanche club was suddenly awakened by the arrival March 6 of two veteran Bostonians, Dave Andreychuk and Ray Bourque, who reminded their new teammates what they had going — a rare shot at the Stanley Cup. Bourque, in particular, set the Avs aflame. In twenty years as a Bruin, he had never won a championship, and his teammates visibly elevated their game after he got inside their heads. The Avs cruised into the NHL playoffs, and defenseman Bourque’s mysterious injury in a game against Detroit (a leg bruise? a knee sprain?) sharpened their focus to the killing point. The best news: Bourque has re-signed with the Avs for next year.

Patrick Roy’s net-minding lapses and Joe Sakic’s vanishing act in the Western Conference finals reminded Colorado Avalanche fans that the master of finesse, Peter Forsberg, is still the best player on a club well-stocked with — excuse the expression, Dallas-haters — stars. Always a great passer and playmaker, the former Swedish Olympic standout showed more willingness to shoot the puck in 1999-2000, and he remains the essential nucleus of a Stanley Cup-contending team that has managed to underachieve two years running. If 2001 is the time, Peter’s the Man.

Readers’ choice: Peter Forsberg

Dan Issel’s largely forgettable Nuggets continue to be anchored by sharpshooting forward Antonio McDyess, who ranked ninth in the NBA last season in field-goal percentage (.507) and sixteenth in rebounds (8.5 per game). The franchise player, Dice averaged 19.1 points per game, but his biggest night probably came in a 115-114 overtime win against the L.A. Clippers on April 15, when he logged 30 points and a career-high 21 rebounds. As McDyess goes, so go the Nuggets.

Readers’ choice: Antonio McDyess

You haven’t really seen softball until you’ve seen it played by athletes in wheelchairs — it’s a whole new ballgame demanding ample space and smooth ground for all the sharp turns and attendant maneuvers required. But the Colorado Rockies Wheelchair Softball League is covered: The Colorado Rockies baseball organization not only provides monetary support, it’s also opened up the north parking lot at Coors Field for league practices, games and clinics. Meanwhile the League, sponsored by Paralyzed Veterans of America Mountain States Chapter, has grown from three members to 500 in only five years, making it the largest such organization in the country.

That drafty old barn where the University of Denver Pioneers pounded the puck for half a century has been replaced by beautiful Magness Arena in the new Ritchie Center for Sports and Wellness, a $70 million Italianate vision in Hansen sandstone, limestone and copper. Seating 6,200 for hockey, 7,200 for hoops and up to 8,000 for concerts, lighting and high style, thanks to architect Cab Childress of Denver’s Davis Partnership. The hallmark of the Ritchie Center for Sports and Wellness, which also houses a second ice arena, a practice gym, a fitness center and a natatorium, is, of course, the soaring Carl B. Williams spire, finished in gold leaf.

Who cares about what’s in a name. What really matters is what’s inside. Which is why the blueprints for the Denver Broncos’ new, still-under-construction stadium make the perfect, if slightly pricey, gift. But then, who’s counting? Certainly not the Metro Football Stadium District, which is selling two kinds of numbered, limited-edition blueprints. The larger framed version (32 inches by 42 inches) shows the stadium’s south and west sides and includes a conceptual color photo of the stadium at night, for only $299.95. The smaller framed version (17 inches by 21 inches) shows the same things, along with a color photo of the actual stadium model, for $199.95. Proceeds go toward the MFSD’s public art and education programs. Oh, and the right to name the stadium is still for sale as well. It’ll cost you a little more, though.