Sitting picturesquely in the foothills of the hiking and skiing mecca of the Rocky Mountains, Boulder isn’t known as America’s fittest city for nothing.
Intimidatingly hale and hearty, it’s a place where bars and restaurants are dead by 9pm so locals can fit in an early morning ski or mountain-bike climb before work.
It sits at 5,430ft above sea level so endurance athletes from all over the world come to train here. Boulder’s social calendar is packed with a daunting series of strenuous events including an annual 10km road race that attracts 50,000 runners, a plunge into an iced-over lake and a ‘Tube To Work Day’ in which commuters hurtle down the rapids of a river clinging to car tyre inner tubes.
And then there’s the annual Halloween Dash, when residents run naked down the city’s main street in front of cheering crowds wearing nothing but a hollowed-out pumpkin on their head. Anywhere else the locals might be just a little self-conscious but not Boulder, where many people are only too happy to show off their athletic physique.
Which makes it so extraordinary that Colorado, America’s slimmest state, where Boulder is situated, is set to become the first state in the US for 50 years to ban ‘fat phobia’ by law. And it is not alone in its aims to legislate in this way. Across America, politicians have been planning laws to add a person’s weight to the list of characteristics such as race, age, religion and sexual orientation that are protected from discrimination.
Hellbound and Down 