Originally Posted by Brillig
TopoUSA (Delorme) has nice mapping features. You graphically plot your course and it gives you all the stats you could want (distance, total elevation, total climb, total descent, miles climbing, miles descending, average grade, etc.). I bought an older version on EBay for next to nothing.
Unfortunately, their base data is so inaccurate that you cannot take some of those numbers seriously. In particular, the total climb on a hilly route will always be way off (up to double the correct value). The program is useful for drawing elevation profiles, but not much else.