As temperatures rose Friday morning, Boulder residents dressed head to toe in Mad Max costumes and workplace attire hopped in their tubes on their way to work. About 500 participants of the annual commute, otherwise known as Tube to Work Day, celebrated its 16th year while they collectively pushed, paddled, swam and floated their way from Eben G. Fine Park, 101 Arapahoe Ave.
, to Central Park, 900 Canyon Blvd. Co-founder of the event Jeff Kagan started it back in 2008 with friend Andy Gruel. Since then, it has grown to become one of Boulder’s most well-known summer events.
“I don’t think there’s anything like this event anywhere else in the world,” Kagan said. “We’ve got 500 people, all in costume, heading to their various places of employment via inner tube. I feel like this for me, the reason my friend Andy and I started it.
One, we just wanted to see if we could make it happen, but we just wanted to enjoy what we have here in Boulder; the natural beauty, the idea of traveling without fossil fuels and really making that a challenge and just getting weird and wacky and wet with a bunch of strangers who want to do the same thing at 8 a.m. on a Friday.
” This year, tubers were tasked with catching pastries and bacon hanging off bridges while dodging the rocks in their path in Boulder Creek and a line of bystanders with water guns. Kagan awarded 39-year-old Jake Everett with the “best costume award,” for his reenactment of the Doof Warrior in Mad Max: Fury Roa.