Northern California Loop

Inspiration

During early Spring of 2007 I learned about Adventure Cycling's Great Divide Mountain Bike Route and Great Divide Race or GDR, and I got pretty excited about the route and the race. By May, I decided to compete in the GDR 2007 and I showed up at the start on June, 15th in Roosville, MT. Unfortunaly, my race lasted only for three days, then my left Achilles forced me to give up.

During the 3 day drive home to San Francisco, I conceived the plan for for the Northern California Loop and as I couldn't ride for a few weeks I spent the time in front of the computer to finalize and document the route.

The Northern California Loop is about a third of the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route, similar in its elevation profile, but with more road sections. So being shorter and more miles on pavement, it's (hopefully) less demanding on the body and hence a good test and training for the big event.

I would like to acknowledge Adventure Cycling, Mike Curiak, John Stamstad, Matthew Lee, Peter Basinger and the GDR racer community for getting me here.

Inaugural Race

Start Saturday, June 21st, 2008, 9am
Start / finish: Willows, CA, at the Denny's right by the Hwy 5 exit
(changed it so that you can buy yourself a cup of coffee after crossing the finish line)

Rules

Self-supported: ride the whole route on your own power and get support only by generally available commercial services
o commercial services allowed, including lodging, restaurants, grocery and bike shops, US Postal Service and other commercial shipping, pay and cell phones (spotty coverage, Verizon seems best), GPS, excluding any type of transportation services obviously
o no outside help, e.g. support crew, friends who live along the route, etc.
o no drafting and load/equipment sharing between racers
o respect the traffic rules and the law in general
Do it yourself and be responsible for yourself