Moving: Boulder/Denver or San Diego or?

Triathlon Forum
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I’ve decided I need to get out of the midwest and am planning on making a move out west in the next month. I’ve been looking extensively at Boulder(/Denver) and San Diego, but am curious to hear some tri-specific commentary from the ST community or any suggestions for cities I haven’t looked at. I’m 24, single, and work for a company flexible enough to let me work anywhere with an internet connection…so the possibilities are pretty endless right now.

Correct me if I’m wrong: Both are tri havens with lots of active/young people and velodromes. Colorado has seasons, San Diego is 70+sunny year-round. San Diego’s probably a little more expensive?

Would love to hear any candid thoughts!

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Cost of living in San Diego is expensive, but, then, Boulder is no picnic either. I think they’re actually pretty close.

Culturally they’re different. San Diego is southern CA, and there is some truth to the stereotypes. But San Diego isn’t as bad in that regard as Orange County or LA. I’ve lived in San Diego for two decades now, and I still don’t think I totally fit in, coming from a small mountain town.

San Diego is unique in that in one ride you can go from a sunny, warm beach, to legitimate pine-forested mountain (Palomar, etc), then to pure desert. On one ride I went from a 75 degree bikini-wearing women beach to riding on ice up Palomar all in about 3 hours. Also variety in open water swims.

The velodrome community in San Diego is great. Really fun Tuesday Night Racing series with everything from very, very fast Cat 1’s, on down to near-recreational riders. The San Diego Tri Club is great.

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San Diego is not quite 70+ and sunny all year round, there is a winter here but it’s laughable compared to the midwest so I would not sweat that detail. It is also not quite so idyllic over the summer, we’ve been over our seasonal averages by a pretty good margin pretty much the entire summer, but again, details, our coastal hot is 80’s and is more temperate than a midwest summer. It rapidly gets hotter as you move inland though.

Depending on where you are coming from, rent will likely seem very high. Varies wildly by neighborhood but expect to pay somewhere around $1500 for an apartment. Of additional consideration is that you will most likely be paying 9.3% state income tax in California, but the largest sticker shock of all will come from if you ever wanted to buy a house. You will very quickly come to have an entirely different perception of what a “million dollar house” looks like.

Additional considerations include traffic and general hassle that comes with having a large population, massive influxes of tourists and the entire state of Arizona fleeing to San Diego to contend with over the summer months. It is nowhere near as bad as LA, and the fact that it sounds like you can work from home means you have a ton more flexibility in choosing your location than most.

All of this said, there are of course many fantastic reasons to live in San Diego. For example, on days where La Jolla Cove is particularly beautiful my brain has difficulty comprehending that swimming there is a free activity and why I’m not there every moment of my life. Or how we all lose our minds if the weather gets above 80 or it has the audacity to rain on a weekend more than a handful of times per year.

If I were in your position and not worried about settling down permanently quite yet, I’d probably just rent a room in Encinitas and enjoy some time on the coast in a heartbeat. I can speak less about Denver/Boulder, but say that I’m actively considering moving to the Denver area now that I’ve spent the second half of my twenties living on the beach in SD and looking for a little more open space (and cheaper housing). If I could rewind and do it all again I would definitely would not change my decision, San Diego is a fantastic place to be young and unattached with most of the major gripes stemming almost universally from housing prices and school districts which would be inconsequential to you at this point.

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I moved from the SD area to Denver last year. Hands down Denver/Boulder is the better place IMO. Cost of living is slightly less in CO, we get four distinct seasons, I think the entire state of CO has less population than San Diego county. SD is a great place to visit.

Tri havens, yes to both places. You can race every weekend during the season if you wanted too without having to travel too far.

We have school age children and mrs. mck414 is a teacher, she really disliked the CA education requirements, they apparently are far less stringent than CO. So that was a big driver for us to return to CO.

And not that I partake, but weed is legal here now, so you got that going for you if it’s your thing.

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Front range Colorado has 3 seasons - perfect days, hot days sprinkled in summer and winter days sprinkled in fall/winter/spring. We get annoyed here too when bad weather happens to collide with your outdoor plans.

You’ll probably be renting in both areas I assume, an unable to afford a house in either. The good news is that once you get out of Boulder, normal people can afford a house. Median price there is +$600K, but half that if you go 10-15 miles away.

Boulder is still a University town. At 24 this may be fun, but I think people tend to want to move beyond that scene after they graduate. Denver has much more of your age group of young professionals.

On the other hand, Boulder does have a software oriented startup scene, with links to Silicon Valley. You didn’t say what line of work you were in, but this might be a bonus. Downside is all these potential companies want to be cool and be located in downtown Boulder, but if they get traction and have to expand they’ll end up in Broomfield.

There’s no shortage of training grounds in Boulder area. But other front range areas are just as good, and sometimes less crowded. The downside to Denver would be that it’s further from open and hillier terrain, so more likely to have to ride a bit or hop in the car.

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Thanks for the commentary everyone - super helpful. I’ve found rooms in both places in the $600-$700 range, really just trying to get a feel for which I’d enjoy more. I’m confident I’d love either, which is making things complicated!

Living in, say, Pacific Beach or Ocean Beach, how hard is it to get out of the city to ride? Same for Denver, if anyone has any knowledge there. If I’m not mistaken Boulder wins in this regard by far?

Also, how overwhelming is the navy/military presence in SD?

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Getting out of Denver is very easy and takes almost no time at all. Getting out of SD is a crap shoot, could be quick or could take over an hour.

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Unless you like to party, i would NOT consider PB. OB is the hippy area, but still parties. You can get out of OB easier than PB. The San Diego “river” trail ends at OB, you can take that to Fiesta or straight up rose canyon. Getting out of PB will be considerable more traffic, doable, but way more traffic.

Unless your dying to live at the beach, I would consider other areas. Just my 2 cents.

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Thanks for the commentary everyone - super helpful. I’ve found rooms in both places in the $600-$700 range, really just trying to get a feel for which I’d enjoy more. I’m confident I’d love either, which is making things complicated!

Living in, say, Pacific Beach or Ocean Beach, how hard is it to get out of the city to ride? Same for Denver, if anyone has any knowledge there. If I’m not mistaken Boulder wins in this regard by far?

Also, how overwhelming is the navy/military presence in SD?

I live in Denver and drive to Boulder to ride. Riding in Denver is a pain in the ass. However, Louisville, Superior, and Longmont are inexpensive and have great access to Boulder and have great roads.

I lived in Santa Monica and the weather cannot be beaten in Southern California unless you love to ski/snowboard. Riding in LA is a bigger pain in the ass then Denver. Traffic is worse in Southern California and people in general are less genuine then Colorado.

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Unless you like to party, i would NOT consider PB. OB is the hippy area, but still parties. You can get out of OB easier than PB. The San Diego “river” trail ends at OB, you can take that to Fiesta or straight up rose canyon. Getting out of PB will be considerable more traffic, doable, but way more traffic.

Unless your dying to live at the beach, I would consider other areas. Just my 2 cents.
What other areas would you recommend? My college days are behind me but I still plan on going out on the weekends.

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It really depends on your budget. There are a lot of apartments in Mission Valley and you can take Friars Rd straight out to Fiesta and Rose Canyon to get north to PCH. Linda Vista/Clairemont are older areas and will be cheaper. UTC is more college like (UCSD is close), but that means you would also be close to JCC and UCSD which both have pools and masters programs.

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I had a similar decision recently. My fiance and I decided on moving to Boulder on October 1st from New York City. We wanted to be in the mountains, so San Diego was not on our list, but I am really looking forward to arriving in Boulder.

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I much prefer UTC to Mission Valley. Much better riding and running from there and the pools you mentioned. Plus it’s just a nicer place to love IMO.

I haven’t read the whole thread, so apologies if this is a repeat, but it I were in my 20s looking to move to SD county, I’d look really hard at Encinitas. I just really like the vibe there and I think it has a great balance of location/social/outdoorsy…

If you want a more urban feel, I’d also check out the Hillcrest area. Yes, it’s “the gay neighborhood” so some people don’t consider it. My wife and I lived there for about 6 months and LOVED it. Awesome central location and very easy to get lots of places by car. Cycling and swimming access from there is a bit tough though.

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Unless you like to party, i would NOT consider PB. OB is the hippy area, but still parties. You can get out of OB easier than PB. The San Diego “river” trail ends at OB, you can take that to Fiesta or straight up rose canyon. Getting out of PB will be considerable more traffic, doable, but way more traffic.

Unless your dying to live at the beach, I would consider other areas. Just my 2 cents.
What other areas would you recommend? My college days are behind me but I still plan on going out on the weekends.

I disagree entirely about the PB vs OB commentary. I find OB to be heavily congested unless you start heading south towards Point Loma. The comments about PB being only for partying are from people whose singular perception of PB is Garnet and Crystal Pier. North PB on the other hand (closer to Turquoise street) is an entirely different atmosphere, closer to La Jolla but more affordable and less pretentious.

In my opinion riding out of PB is also vastly preferable than out of OB. Out of OB you can cross over to mission bay and fiesta island sure, but you have just as easy access to those same places from PB. What you don’t have in OB is near instant access to Mt. Soledad where you can chain together 5 or 6 different combinations to clime that result in one of the best ~90 min workouts I can think of in SD, it’s perfect for weekday/night rides.

From OB you can head north and get to the same stuff with a bunch of more admin filler in between, or you can head out east and have to cut through the joys of mission valley mall and lost tourist traffic. For disclosure, I used to live in PB and now live in University Heights which is far more central and I have to deal with the aforementioned mission valley mess. While I enjoy being close to Balboa Park and the Velodrome now, living in PB was way better for riding in general. I could be out my door and to the top of Mt. Soledad in 15 minutes, from there I could be up in Torrey Pines or Encinitas in < 1hr.

All that said, I don’t disagree with the comments that PB traffic sucks over the summer (MB is the worst) and you don’t absolutely have to live at the beach. North Park / University Heights and downtown are all trendy urban areas but none are particularly great for cycling, though we do have good access to Balboa park for trail running / quick MTB sessions and the velodrome.

East county is cheaper, hot and a traffic nightmare if you are trying to head into the city or back east any times near rush hour. North county is still probably the best if you weren’t constrained by work, more open riding options when you head east from there and more cool very active beach communities like Solana, Encinitas and Leucadia. To your comment earlier about the navy / military presence, it depends on where you live. There are obviously a ton of Marines around Carlsbad and Oceanside (Camp Pendleton). There are a lot of Navy around Point Loma, MB and PB, and the seals are based out of Coronado. For the most part though it’s not an issue, there’s not too much of a “shore leave” mentality with young enlisteds going wild, or if there is, they are certainly no worse than the entitled civilian college kids who overrun large swathes of town.

tl;dr live in North PB / Mt. Soledad, Solana or Encinitas.

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You want to live in north county San Diego. But I guess its depending on where you are working. North County has the best riding, trails, some great surf. I moved here in 07, settled in PB, left that scene and now live in Del Mar. It was the best decision I have ever made to leave NYC for san diego. Good luck in the move, its totally worth it.

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IMO you would be nuts to choose somewhere that doesn’t have a beach and ocean right there. Plus the food is better in San Diego. I’ve lived in Denver and Boulder most of the last 15 years and I’ve only been to SD sporadically but in my mind the beach and ocean thing trumps all. Then again if I had a job that would allow me to live anywhere there was an internet connection I would probably live in Hawaii.
Boulder has fantastic and easy access to the outdoors for cycling, trail running, hiking, etc… You can pretty much bike or run from your front door and get in everything to epic rides or awesome trail runs. Denver, and its environs, are deceptively gigantic. The riding out your door thing is vastly different depending on whether you’re in Denver proper or in one of the southern or western burbs. In the burbs it’s possible to ride out your door and into some kick ass climbs. From Denver proper you need to negotiate your way through multi-use paths and a lot more roads to get to those same climbs or pack your bike in your car and drive to your ride.
No matter where you end up if those are your two options you’ll love it I would think.

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Seriously everyone, thank you so so much!

You want to live in north county San Diego. But I guess its depending on where you are working. North County has the best riding, trails, some great surf. I moved here in 07, settled in PB, left that scene and now live in Del Mar. It was the best decision I have ever made to leave NYC for san diego. Good luck in the move, its totally worth it.
How’s the social scene in north county though? Again, I’m 24 and don’t really know anybody out in San Diego, so if I go that route I need to be able to meet people.

From Denver proper you need to negotiate your way through multi-use paths and a lot more roads to get to those same climbs or pack your bike in your car and drive to your ride.
One of the key reasons I’m moving is no longer having to drive to ride, so I think at this point it’s very much Boulder vs. San Diego.

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I’m guessing you’re making the move for the training-North county wins out over south everyday on that front. As for the social scene, North is a little older but there are still a bunch of young people. Fire up tinder and drive south if you need to. If not driving to ride is a priority you want to live north of the 805/5 merge. Someone else recommend Encinitas-great call. Again it depends where you find work and if you’re traveling at normal rush hrs.

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Seriously everyone, thank you so so much!

How’s the social scene in north county though? Again, I’m 24 and don’t really know anybody out in San Diego, so if I go that route I need to be able to meet people.

Yeah… Given what you just wrote: Encinitas, Encinitas, Solana beach, Cardiff, leucadia.

I wouldn’t go any further south than UTC. Be warned, these places aren’t cheap.

I lived in SD for 5.5 years and have lived in boulder for the past 7. I love boulder but if I were still in my 20s I’d prefer SD.

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Training in Boulder is great but its a college town. Half the town goes to CU.

It really comes down to what your plans/goals/personal preferences are.
also really depends on where you are working.