Highest Altitude City in America

alma, colorado

This is a list of the highest settlements by country. Only permanent settlements occupied year-round are included.

Leadville, CO

At an elevation of approximately 10,578 feet (3,224 m), it is the second highest incorporated municipality in the United States.[2] Alma, which took the title from Leadville, Colorado,

3rd, Alma CO. There's no real point of living and training there since there's nothing really there. Same goes for Leadville. The folks training in Gunny and Silverton know what's up. Trails, skiing, coeds, solitude.

Leadville, Alma, and Silverton all have substantial alcohol problems. Gunnison less so, but Gunnison is about 3000 feet lower in elevation.

Leadville, once a high school cross country dynasty in Colorado (29 state championships--last one in 1996, Lake County High School) sent one kid to the state track meet this spring. Leadville is now mostly a bedroom community for people working at the ski resorts in the Vail area.

Leadville does host some high-altitude ultra races these days, but most of the top contestants aren't coming from Leadville.

Alma is tiny, a speed trap, and probably nobody lives there during his or her running prime. The high school kids (if there are any) from Alma would go to is South Park High School in Fairplay. Let's just say South Park has no cross country team and has done nothing of consequence in track since time out of memory.

South Park does, however, have pack burro racing in the summer. The "Get Your Ass Up the Pass" race each summer goes between Fairplay and Leadville. I guess that's a legitimate form of distance running. The event--a hearkening back to the mining days for both communities--seems to be a little lubricated by alcohol, though.

Silverton--not close enough to the town to comment. A bustling little center of tourism in the summer, but likely a pretty spartan existence in the winter.

Gunnison is barely higher elevation than Alamosa and these two little college towns are home to Western State and Adams State, the twin scourges of DII distance.

There's something to training at altitude, but there would also appear to be a lot to overcome. At least in Colorado.

Cloudcroft, NM is around 8700 ft. Miles of trails.

El Mastero wrote:

Cloudcroft, NM is around 8700 ft. Miles of trails.

Great spot, plus Alamosa is about 20 minutes away by car and sits around 4000', to drop down for higher turnover.

Monument, CO is essentially as high as either Gunnison or Alamosa yet is far less isolated. Convenient to Colorado Springs and even Denver metro.

Andrew A. wrote:

El Mastero wrote:

Cloudcroft, NM is around 8700 ft. Miles of trails.

Great spot, plus Alamosa is about 20 minutes away by car and sits around 4000', to drop down for higher turnover.

Monument, CO is essentially as high as either Gunnison or Alamosa yet is far less isolated. Convenient to Colorado Springs and even Denver metro.

Actually, Alamosa is about six hours' drive from Cloudcroft. I believe you mean Alamogordo is 20 minutes away by car.

My bad, obviously a town in CO would be nowhere near a town in southern NM. Alamogordo, indeed. Sand dunes near each, though! ;)

Luke Cragg (Adams State) will be happily running at altitude this fall: d2cross.blogspot.com

same problem as wrote:

alma, colorado

This is a list of the highest settlements by country. Only permanent settlements occupied year-round are included.

You can't fool me. That's not a list at all.

Are there any good runners that train in Cloudcroft? How's the weather there? I noticed it is more south than Flagstaff, so was thinking the weather may be nicer.

What is the ideal elevation for base training? 7500?

That's all well in good, but if there is more benefit by training higher then wouldn't it be more beneficial to train there?

New Orleans, LA

o.O wrote:

That's all well in good, but if there is more benefit by training higher then wouldn't it be more beneficial to train there?

I would not purposely choose to live and train in Fairplay, Alma, Leadville, Creede, Silverton or any of several other high-altitude former bustling centers of mining in Colorado unless I was training to run mountain races. If you're training to do things like Hardrock, Imogene Pass, Pikes Peak, etc., these are the ideal places to live and train, I guess.

If you're training to run 10Ks, halfs, marathons or some other such distance and want the benefits of high altitude, I'd be inclined to go to some place with a real running community--Alamosa, Durango, Boulder, Gunnison, or Colorado Springs (Boulder is the lowest elevation of any of these). It's also a lot easier to find a decent place to live in these places than in the old mining towns. You're a substantial drive away from any decent place to even buy groceries in each of these old mining towns (Leadville excepted, well, sort of).

If all you want is easy access to some very high altitude running without all the technical stuff, find some place near to Guanella Pass, Boreas Pass, Mosquito Pass, or Weston Pass and run up and down the pass roads every day. Fairplay is the logical base community if you want to run up the old passes on dirt roads and it's probably a little more than an hour out of Denver. These passes all get up around 12,000 feet, some even higher. But take a look at the town before you commit to living there. The absence of trees in almost every direction should tell you something--the wind blows all the time.

Technically, Winter Park, CO is the highest town in the U.S. since the city annexed the ski resort back in 2006. But the town center is about 9000 feet. The top of the ski resort is about 12,000 feet.

I have ran and lived in Almosa, Gunnison, and Leadville for short periods (a few months) at a time but not in the last five years. If I had to choose only one place it would be Gunnison. Each has some positives, but Gunnison has more of them.

Define "city."