There’s nothing like a nasty, lingering cold to help finish long-term projects. Since last year, I’ve been working on revamping the Climbs section to something a little more detailed and pleasing to read. I’m pleased and relieved to say that this project is done as of today. From now on, it’ll be a work in progress as I continue to explore this lovely planet.

Here is what is new:

Boone Climbs: Thanks to this past weekend’s Boone Gran Fondo, I was able to add many new climbs to the existing Boone list. It is now looking to be a pretty comprehensive list. There are a couple notable omissions, like Reynolds Parkway that will be climbed on this weekend’s The Ascent, but I’m unfortunately going to have to miss that one.

Colorado Climbs: There are all from last year’s trip. Most are up in elevation around Vail, Leadville, Breckenridge, with a couple near Denver, and of course, the highest paved road in the United States.

Georgia Climbs: At this point, these are mostly the gaps in the north Georgia mountains. There are some great climbing areas that I’ve had on my list to check out, such as Ellijay and Clayton, that I hope to one day visit. That said, the gaps are some of the best places to climb in the southeast, so I’m pleased with this list.

Tennessee Climbs: This is a fledgling page with a mere two climbs listed, one of which is the highest in the state. I have no plans yet this year to visit the state, but I have a couple rides in mind next year.

Virginia Climbs: This is another fledgling page, with only this past weekend’s foray into Grayson Highlands listed. I expect I’ll add a number of new climbs in a couple months when I ride the parkway.

Caesar’s Head Mountain

The sick bug continues to plague me. After a week of relatively heavy training, it became much worse, developing into a painfully uncomfortable cough this weekend. Rather than continuing to train and possibly making it worse, I decided to take it easy for a few days.

That gave me some time to do some catching up with the website and various other things.

The Climbs section has been updated yet again. This time I completed with the transition of the South Carolina Climbs to the new and improved format. There are now two new sections:

Columbia Climbs: I was surprised to come up with such an extensive list for Columbia. It isn’t thought of as a climbing city, but with a couple lakes and several rivers in the area, there are plenty of hills around town. Many of these hills have proven useful training for climbing in the mountains.

Greenville Climbs: The majority of these hills are in the North Greenville area up to the state line. These are more traditional, lengthy climbs that are either in, or lead up to the mountains.

There are some notable omissions. The most glaring is that Spartanburg is not mentioned. I’ve ridden plenty in the area, and know of some good hills, but the majority of the climbing near Spartanburg is shared with North Greenville, or just across the state line in the Tryon and Saluda area. At some point if I get to ride more in the city, I may make a Spartanburg section, although I expect there will be a lot of overlap.

Another omission is the far northwest corner of the state, beyond Greenville, around Clemson and Anderson. I have a few Walhalla climbs that I know from Issaqueena’s Last Ride, but the remainder of the area has not been explored. There are a couple of friends and readers in the area who have invited me up to ride. Hopefully at some point I can take them up on the offer.

Waterrock Knob

Next month I’ll be participating in the Blue Ridge Breakaway ride. It was my favorite ride in 2011, and is among my favorite events that I’ve ever attended. The organizers have offered me a handful of $10 discounts off registration through Active.com. Those interested can use the code steepclimbs at checkout to get the discount. There are only about 3-4 codes remaining, and they expire in a few days. Please either comment below or on Facebook if you use a code.

The response to the Blue Ridge Parkway trip has been tremendous. A number of you have expressed interest, and I think we are nearing a full group. If you are interested in taking one of the last couple spots, please let us know soon.

I cannot give details yet, but I’ve been asked by a couple publications to do some writing. One of them is a paid gig and feature article. I wish I could say more, but all will be revealed in time. I love to write about my hobby, so I’m pretty excited about both projects.

The weekend rest has done me good. Still probably a couple days away from resuming my training, but I should be okay for next week’s Roan Moan and the busy August schedule.

 
The winter project was to clean up the Climbs sections. Many of the pages had grown uncontrollably, had become unwieldy, and made the information disorganized. The NC Climbs page was the worst culprit, as it was just a long, scrolling page with climb after climb.

My first goal was to chop up that page and make it easier to read. To be honest, I finished NC a couple months ago, and simply forgot to tell everyone. So I am telling you about it now.

The new and improved North Carolina Climbs section is up and running. Several geographic areas have been given their own page, with detailed descriptions of the climbs, with Strava and content links. Since this is an autobiographical project, some areas are more comprehensive than others.

You can view the new section here, or explore the specific areas below, ranked from the sections that I think are the best:

1. Tryon/Saluda – this is the closest thing to my backyard in NC, and measures up against anywhere when it comes to cycling climbs. While I don’t have all of the ones in the area, the signature climbs and some hidden gems are all included.

2. Boone Climbs – I’ve encountered quite a few of the climbs in the area due to the sheer amount of organized rides in which I’ve participated. There are a quite a few I’ve missed, notably Beech Mountain, Reynolds Parkway and others, all of which will be crossed off the list someday.

3. Brevard Climbs – Nestled between North Greenville and Asheville, Brevard has some terrific climbing, either at higher elevations as you approach the Blue Ridge Parkway, or lower elevations near the SC border.

4. Asheville Climbs – It feels like I haven’t been to Asheville much, so I was surprised to find so many great climbs in the area that I’d conquered. Since that’s where my coach lives, I expect to get back there plenty more as I begin training again.

5. Sylva Climbs – If the climbs were measured based on epicness (epicity?), then this area could go head to head with anywhere. Down here I’ve found there are a lot of long, not quite as steep climbs, although I still have a lot of ground to explore in the area.

6. Cashiers Climbs – This area overlaps some with Sylva, but I know there are so many unexplored climbs in the Franklin and Highlands area that at some point it’ll be a more comprehensive list.

I’m currently working on the South Carolina Climbs area, which I hope to have finished soon. The other, smaller pages, will be finished shortly after that. I’ll keep all of these sections updated as I discover new playgrounds.