Northern California - favorite century ride in nor cal?

what is your favorite century ride you guys/girls done in nor cal?

my favorite so far has been the santa cruz mountain challenge, my next one should be the ebbettes pass century, im hoping thatll be really pretty too. im planning on doing tour of the unknown coast next year, that seems like itll be a good one

Santa Cruz Mountains Challenge

Sierra Fall Century

i was thinking about doing the sierra fall century, but it looks kinda flat and boring to me. is it worth doing?

Marin. Excellent food, support and roads.

Mile High Hundred, Chester/Lake Almanor, (east slope of Mt. Lassen). Well supported. Pretty good food. Beautiful scenery!

Cheers,
Geary

I did the metric century route on the Tierra Bella this spring. I liked it a lot. The part up in the hills was beautiful.

I always like the Lighthouse in San Luis Obispo. It's my "home course" so I'm kind of prejudiced. The SLO bike club always puts on a good, well-organized ride.

Mt. Shasta Summit Century...good support with fantastic scenery on VERY lightly traveled roads!!

Death Ride is a close second - again, good scenery (not as good as Shasta), and probably the best ride for support and organization.

Tour of the Unknown Coast was my favorite so far, with the Death Ride and the Grizzly Century close behind.

JB

All of the centuries that I've done thus far (save for the Delta one) have been self-supported. I enjoy that quite a bit more than the organized ones that I've ridden in the past.

I always welcome the wine Country Century as a fun and relaxing ride. It's early in the season and makes a fun training ride. Its a great ride to back off on and invite friends who haven't ridden much to do their first century at.

Wine Country :thumb:

One of my favorite weekends was to do Wine Country Double Metric on Saturday, and Grizzly Peak Metric on Sunday.

Another epic century is the Auburn Century.

Tour of the Unknown Coast was my favorite so far, with the Death Ride and the Grizzly Century close behind.


JB

Ditto on the TUC..... the perfect mix or Epic, Fun & Friendly...... And of course the DeathRide is the focus of my season, trainingwise.....Also really like the Death Valley rides put on by AdventureCorps....



"Mt. Shasta Summit Century...good support with fantastic scenery on VERY lightly traveled roads!!
Death Ride is a close second - again, good scenery (not as good as Shasta), and probably the best ride for support and organization"

Just got back from Shasta...... 2nd year in a row that I spent 5 days riding up there, culminating in the Super Century..... rode about ~380 miles..... rode all of the climbs except the Ski area Wed - Sat., then did 'em all again on Sunday...

It's a great place to ride, and I'll be back next year but, I find the comparisons to the DeathRide silly..... Better scenery ???? What's the point ??? You gonna force me to choose and I gotta say that Markleeville's gonna get the nod ( but don't make me choose, please....) They're both great.... Tougher ???? hey, either can be tough on any given day depending on how you're feelin' but Monitor and Ebbetts are definitely steeper.....

Better Support ???? Let me just share that Yesterday I saw a number of riders (I was told 15 were behind me) left high and dry, literally, on the climb up to the Ski resort..... yep, apparently the rest area staff wanted to go.... so they packed up the water stops and left..... the 2nd last stop was gone when I went by, but I didn't notice..... I had plenty of "juice" left..... until I passed a stopped rider who had been counting on filling up..... I offered some of mine..... I reached the top as the a pick-up with the water coolers was beginning to leave (it was the driver who told me the number of drivers behind me.....) the driver also made some critical comments regarding riders wasting too much time during the day because the weather was so nice.... yep, those lazy riders... riding 135+ miles, climbing 16,000+ feet.... I wondered to myself how long he thought it would take him to do the ride.... but I got the feeling he didn't ride a bicycle....

Anyway, I had a good day.... didn't suffer at all..... definitely an easier day than July 11..... but I bet for the riders behind me it was definitely tougher.....

Oh yeah, I couldn't help but make one comment...... The Death Ride would never do that......

Oh yeah, no food left at the bottom either..... for the riders that is...... the couple of tables occupied by the staff had plenty.....

P.S. One last Shasta/Markleeville contrast...... Monitor and Ebbetts are closed to traffic (yeah, there ARE ALOT of bikes though)..... At Shasta, for the 2nd year I observed disturbing incidents on the Mumbo summit climb..... both involving motorists... last year an impatient driver (lincoln towncar, handicap plates) brushed a rider in front of me on her elbow with his mirror..... (I saw the same guy this year, too, only on Friday)...... this year it was couple of pick-up trucks barrelling down the road just below the fawn creek rest stop, blasting there horns..... and, umm, blasting their shotgun out the window.... I kid you not...... One of the support staff at the top of Mumbo did say that they were taken into custody.....

P.S. 2 There is an awesome vista of the Marble Mountains about 100 yards beyond the top of Mumbo..... if you ever do that climb don't miss it....

Death Ride!!

I did Tierra Bella this year (Spring) and liked it alot. I had done it back in the early '90s and liked it then, but now it's even better. It was really well supported and did some good climbs including the climb to Coe Park in Morgan Hill. The food on the ride was REALLY good, the food at the end, fair.

My fave no longer exists. :( It was the Hekaton Classic, run out of Dublin by the Valley Spokesmen on Labor Day weekend. Not too much climbing, not too little climbing, good support, good food, some pretty scenery, close to home . . . just perfect for me, even with the inevitable 15 miles of headwinds that always ended the ride. Alas, it went the way of the dodo (the bird, bigbossman, not me) after a 25 or 30 year run

Chico Wildflower Century. Great scenery and food, friendly support staff, and I love the town of Chico.

Start in Berkeley and do the Diablo Loop get back to Berkeley and do Walking Miller.

UD