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Steamboat Springs — Kelly Boniface insisted the glittering tiara that stuck from her bike helmet wasn't an attempt to show off or flaunt her victory in Wednesday night's Town Challenge mountain bike race at Steamboat Ski Area.

There was no better evidence to support her than the fact that her chief rival, Karen Tremaine, was the one who lodged the plastic jewelry there in the first place.

The tiara actually crowned Boniface the birthday girl, but she won the race anyway to back it up. Boniface finished the challenging Sunshine Loop event in 1 hour, 16 minutes and 33 seconds.

Tremaine, tackling the race on a singlespeed bike, finished at 1:20:29.

Boniface may be a regular atop the Town Challenge podium, but Wednesday's victory was no sure thing. Tremaine won the Thunderhead Hill Climb last month, and Wednesday's course bore some similarities. It cut up the slopes of Mount Werner, and instead of stopping at the top of the gondola, it continued on a steep and challenging section in the Sunshine area.

Tremaine's dominating climbing ability again put her in front early.

"She's so fast climbing, I don't even try to get ahead of her going up," Boniface said. "I just tried to keep her in sight."

Boniface said Tremaine slipped from view at one point, but it wasn't enough. The course leveled out, then turned back to head down toward the start/finish line near the base of the Thunderhead chairlift. The change gave Boniface and her geared Moots bike an edge, and she went on to celebrate her birthday in style.

"There were a few flatter spots where it really helped," Boniface said. "This trail was a lot longer (than the Thunderhead climb). It was a long climb, then a long descent. Once I got to the top, I just pointed on the way down."

Boniface said once she started down and got ahead of Tremaine, she was confident.

The men's pro champion, Brad Bingham, had a similar feeling.

He finished behind Barkley Robinson in the Thunderhead climb but fought to gain a short lead early in the race and was thinking victory once he reached the top of the long course.

"About 500 yards into the race, I got past (Barkley) and I tried to keep the gap the remainder of the time," said Bingham, who finished in 1 hour, 1 minute and 59 seconds. Robinson was second in 1:02.57.

Still, he said he never got comfortable as the course - as challenging in a sharp descent as it was in a steep climb - cut through the aspen and pine groves that line ski runs.

"I was taking it pretty conservatively," he said. "I kept telling myself to 'finish first, you first have to finish.'

"It was a beautiful night. I liked this course a lot. It's one of my favorites. It's a tough hill climb and a downhill race, which is great."

The Town Challenge circuit returns on Aug. 5 for the fifth race in the seven-race summer series.