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Columbia Falls Mountain Biker Wins Leadville 100

Rose Grant finished 100-mile course 18 minutes ahead of any other woman

By Andy Viano
Rose Grant, pictured near her Columbia Falls home on March 28, 2017. Greg Lindstrom | Flathead Beacon

Rose Grant bested a field of 147 women to take first place at the famed Leadville 100 Mountain Bike Race in Leadville, Colorado on Aug. 10.

Grant, 36, completed the 100-mile course in seven hours, 36 minutes and nine seconds, an average pace of 13.16 miles per hour. She crossed the finish line 18 minutes ahead of the next woman in the field, 29-year-old Sarah Sturm of Durango, Colorado. Grant finished 41st overall in a field of more than 1,400 racers.

The Leadville 100 has been held annually since 1994 and routinely attracts the most talented bikers in the world. Seven-time Tour de France champion Lance Armstrong won the 100-mile race in 2009 and Butte native Levi Leipheimer, a former Olympic medalist, won the race the following year.

Grant herself is no stranger to the upper echelon of professional bike racing. The Bitterroot Valley native won four consecutive USA Cycling Marathon Mountain Bike National Championships from 2014-17 despite beginning her professional career only two years earlier, in 2012. Grant now makes her home in Columbia Falls.