Pacific Northwest - Who's doin the tour de Pierce next Sunday

June 27th Tour de Pierce county washington. Start from the Puyallup fairgrounds. 13, 30 and 50 mile loops. Nice leisurely ride fun for the whole family. Look for me on my Windsor Tourist. I'll probably be in a killer green jersey or my Washington state jersey with Mt. Rainier on the front.

Kpug and me are planning to hit the 50 mile loop. Lake Tapps Pkwy E looks challenging though. Which loop are you doing?

Probably gonna do the 30 mile since it will be me the wife and my kid and the kids boyfriend

Kpug and me rode the 50 this morning. It was a pleasant ride. There wasn't a lot of riders which was kind of nice. Riders were pretty friendly too. The 12 and 30 mile loops were family oriented. The first half of the 50 was very hilly. Lake Tapps Pkwy has a 1 mile long climb and 17-18% grade at the end was quite challenging. We did stay on our bikes the whole way up and passed a few riders walking their bikes. To the female rider riding the vintage Trek, you passed us like we were standing still.....you are awesome! Second challenging climb was from McCutcheon Rd. to Rhode Lake. A 1.5 miles long rolling hills with two 18-20% grade sections. After that the ride was like a walk in the park. Nice ride and probably will do this again next year.

Hey we missed that one! How was the ride? How about posting a route map.

Route map:

http://www.piercecountywa.org/pc/services/recreate/tourdprcmaps.htm

Hey we missed that one! How was the ride? How about posting a route map.

I rode the 50 mile route. Weather was about perfect. The descent from Lake Tapps was a blast at 40 mph, and a reasonable reward for climbing the 10% grade up out of the valley to get there. Pretty nice scenery along parts of the southern loop, including nice river crossings. The end of the route got a little long, but I think I was just tired. The last 15 miles are a long, flat route along the Foothills Trail (MUP).
I used gmap-ped to see the elevation profile of the route before I rode it. This isn't exact, but it's reasonably close:
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=3830888

I mapped the 30 and 12 mile routes on Gmap-Ped as well.
30 mi: http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=3830915
12 mi: http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=3830924
I was planning all along to ride the 50, but wasn't sure how I'd do. I'm a bike commuter (14 mi RT), and this was by far the longest ride I've ever made. I chose this ride for my first because I knew there were lots of opportunities to bail and take a shortcut back to the start. I'd do it again, but I'd probably recruit some friends to go along. And it's not the kind of ride I'd "travel" for unless it were to be with friends. In my case, the starting point is only 13 miles from my house. Got a ride to the fairgrounds and rode the bus and my bike home.

Talked to a couple of non-tour roadies near the end of the route. One of them bad-mouthed the ride a bit with regard to support and cost. Heck, it's a $12 registration (unless you want to buy a T-shirt), and it runs a circuit such that one of the two rest stops serves both out and back. For a community ride, I thought it was just fine. Reasonable snacks and plenty of fluids available. Don't know about mobile support, but there was a BikeTech repair unit set up at the rest stop.