Dean Lampe: In training for the Leadville 100 MTB, the ‘regular guy off the couch’ discovers a much greater reward than finishing
After a severe mountain bike crash left the 56-year-old with a traumatic brain injury, his training regimen transformed into a plan for living his best life and not taking anything — especially health — for granted
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Dean Lampe wouldn’t necessarily object to the dictionary placing his picture next to the “average joe” entry.
“I have no DNA for sports,” he admitted. “I don’t jump, I don’t dribble. I don’t catch … (I’m) just really not an athlete.”
If his abilities are just “normal,” his approach to maximizing them certainly isn’t.
In the lead-up to the 56-year-old’s Leadville 100 MTB debut attempt on Aug. 10, Lampe checked every physiological and psychological box — from VO2 max tests and measured macronutrient fueling strategies to periodized training, race pace plans and course recon.
Aviv Clinics played a central role in Lampe’s couch-to-Leadville 100 story. The Florida clinic “delivers a highly effective personalized protocol to enhance performance in the aging brain and body” through evidence-based methods. The comprehensive 12-week medical program optimizes wellness through Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy and cognitive training as well as nutrition and physiological coaching.
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Lampe did it all, and he got fit and fast as a result. But his story didn’t start and end with simply becoming a better mountain biker.
A big crash and an unexpected discovery
Lampe picked up mountain biking in college, but his toys spent the next three decades in storage as he ran a wealth management firm in the St. Louis area where he’s originally from.
“I worked my butt off in a career for 30 years — we just didn’t find the time to exercise,” he said. After moving to Florida a couple years ago to be closer to his parents, Lampe took the bike out again and befriended a serious local time trial rider named Joe Frost. Last February, the now inseparable friends were pre-riding a course when Lampe missed a feature and went head-over-heels.
Lampe’s head took the brunt of the 6-foot fall. He wound up breaking thoracic vertebrae one, two, three and four along with seven ribs. He also dislocated both shoulders and ended up in the ICU overnight.
“I was pretty jacked up,” he recalled. “I mean, it was a bad one.”
During his recovery, Lampe’s dad experienced a massive brain bleed. He lost his speech and some of his balance.
“I picked him up one weekend to go to a cycling expo and Aviv was handing out pens and things and I was filling my bag with all the free stuff,” Lampe said before chronicling how his father proceeded to chat with the clinic’s representatives.
“Which was hard to understand, because he wasn’t speaking very well. So suddenly, they zoned right in on him,” Lampe continued. “They said, ‘we can help you and we can legit fix this.'”
Lampe’s father went through the 12-week medical program, which consisted of a series of “dives” — 20-minute Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy (HBOT) sessions designed to stimulate stem cell growth through fluctuating levels of oxygen. Aviv’s website states, “The intermittent increase of oxygen concentration induces many of the mediators and cellular mechanisms that are usually induced during hypoxia but without the hazardous hypoxia, termed the Hyperoxic-Hypoxic Paradox.”
Pre and post-assessments showed a dramatic increase in blood flow to the areas of the brain where Lampe’s father had lost speech.
“They gave my dad his speech back,” Lampe said. “I was a believer in Aviv after that.”
Last summer, Lampe came to Colorado as a Breck Epic volunteer. He left inspired — not by the winners of the race — but by “the tenacity of the bottom 10%.”
“By the guy that’s been out there for 10 hours, just slogging it out,” he said. “So I went back to Aviv, and I pitched them on the idea: What if I went through your program and set a giant goal, physically, and let’s see if we can reach it.”
Racing the Leadville 100 was the target — at least to start. Then, Lampe went in for his own pre-assessment. After three days of running through the testing gauntlet — from MRI and CAT scans to cognitive testing, physical therapy, VO2 max testing and more — Lampe learned of a motivation-altering discovery.
“I had a traumatic brain injury I didn’t know about,” he said. “And they found it.” During his crash, the impact of the brain against the inside of the scull had caused significant damage, drastically reducing blood flow to the area controlling memory.
His goals for the program shifted.
“It’s no longer, ‘can I be a better mountain biker?'” he said. “It’s, ‘what the hell does my future look like?'”
Training — for life
For the next three months, Lampe went in to Aviv five days a week at 6 a.m. for his four dives in the hyperbaric chamber. At home, he continued his daily bike training. His bike coach, based out of Denver, collaborated with Aviv’s team of nutritionists, physiologists and physical therapists to maximize each step of the journey. After completing his program in February, he retested.
While he only made it 10 minutes and 39 seconds in his VO2 max pre-assessment, he was still pedaling when the machine shut down after 14 minutes in his second try.
“It was nuts, because this was not made up, ‘oh I feel 10% better,'” he said regarding his 40% increase in anaerobic threshold. “I was on the same machine, doing the same thing and the gains are phenomenal.”
There were quantitative memory improvements, too. His single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) scan showed a 15% increase in blood flow to the part of the brain controlling memory, Lampe said.
“It’s fantastic to say, at 56, I’m better than I’ve ever been,” Lampe said. “I think my clients see it, my family sees it, and I hope somehow they recognize the strength in themselves that they might see in me.”
Lampe’s motivation has evolved at every step of his training and recovery journey. His perspective has, too.
“In my career as a wealth manager, I see so many families or couples that save their whole life and have this picture of what their retirement should be, and somewhere — very early in their retirement — something happens to one of them that changes the course,” he said.
“When you get to my age, you look at this and you see that your body is starting to slow down. It’s harder to do everything. It tears me up — it’s emotional obviously. It’s how do you be the best you can be and just not take life for granted anymore.”
Lampe is striving for balance, albeit by way of extreme goals. The Leadville 100 was a perfect carrot, at least in part because he knew the race — which climbs over 12,000 feet in 104 miles — was genuinely going to be a big ask.
“It’s a legit challenge. And I fully expect to be fighting those cut-offs all day,” he said beforehand.
Last Saturday, he crossed the finish line on Harrison Avenue after 12 hours, 57 minutes and 55 seconds of pedaling. But earning the coveted sub-12 hour belt buckle wasn’t the real prize anyway.
“It’s everything else I’ve gotten along the way that’s really the value,” he said. “It’s not about an arbitrary mountain bike race — it’s so much bigger than that,” he said. “It’s just trying to live your best life, and I’m really trying to embrace that.”
