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Steamboat Springs — The race was grueling, Marla Bailey said, even before she fell several times while descending toward the finish line of Wednesday night's Emerald Cross Country Town Challenge mountain bike race.

She was scratched and winded as she reached the end of the race, but full of conviction once she began to recover and catch her breath.

"That was a great course," she said. "There was plenty of fun downhill singletrack to keep it interesting. It was great out there."

The Town Challenge race series moved from the secluded rolling meadows of Marabou, where the series opened its summer run two weeks ago, to the familiar and not-always-friendly confines of Howelsen Hill and Emerald Mountain on Wednesday.

The result was another race bristling with competitors of all ages, series director Gretchen Sehler said. In all, 199 competitors showed up to take on a challenging course that sent riders climbing and descending several times throughout the race.

Sehler said part of the attraction was Larry's Trail, just completed last fall. It was added to the route for this year's bike race, offering Wednesday's competitors the first crack at racing it.

"Everything went awesome," Sehler said. "No one got hurt, and we had great weather. I was a little surprised at how many people came out, but everyone loves this course."

Brad Bingham certainly loved his trip up Emerald. Bingham won the men's pro division with a time of 55 minutes, 55 seconds, a blistering mark that left him well ahead of the entire field.

Peter Kalmes was second, according to Wednesday night's unofficial results, beating a pair of racers to the finish line with a time of 59:20. Jamie Morgan was 11 seconds behind at 59:31, and Adam Spector placed fourth with a time of 59:37.

Kelly Boniface, meanwhile, won her second consecutive Town Challenge in the women's expert division. Boniface won the division with a time of 1:08:52, ahead of Karen Tremaine at 1:14:12 and Amy Lawton at 1:18:17.

Bailey didn't come close to matching any of those times, and it wasn't just because of the few slips she took heading down the mountain. She won the women's single speed division, a competitive category added this summer for the first time.

The variation of the course left racers expressing all sorts of emotions. Some gritted their teeth as they slowly made their way up the early inclines, while others shouted as they tore down the steep rocky path that led to the finish.

Bailey did plenty of both. She had to work harder going up because of her single speed bike - her trusty "pink pony" that she's proud to show off, sure to point out the bright bike chain that loops around her one gear. In coming down, she fell so hard that her race number was jarred loose from the bike frame and lost in the bushes.

The experienced rider is halfway through her first summer since moving to Steamboat and found everything she wanted Wednesday in the formidable challenges of Emerald Mountain.

"I raced (at Marabou), but this was more fun. It felt like a more hometown trail," Bailey said. "The downhill was just outstanding, and the people are just great. I just moved here and the entire Town Challenge series has been a wonderful way for me to meet people in town."

- To reach Joel Reichenberger, call 871-4253

or e-mail jreichenberger@steamboatpilot.com