Tour of Unknown Coast 2011

Another successful Tour of the Unknown Coast has came and went with hundreds of riders from all over the nation. An unfortunate hectic semester had tremendous impacts on my ability to train/ride so I opted out of a shorter ride for photographing the hammerheads on the century. At first I was feeling a touch sentimental when all the riders started lining up before 7am last Saturday, but by the time I hit "The Wall" and watched those who had been training suffer, I knew I was having just as much fun enjoying the beautiful day and documenting the masochism in front of me. It was much easier chasing them on the KLR.

It was a sea of green Adventure's Edge jerseys at the starting line for the 2001 TUC.

It was mostly tight packs of riders for the first 10 miles or so coming out of the start and heading into Rio Dell.

The Avenue of the Giants was still dark (as usual) at 8:26 am. I had to bust out the strobe to catch the quickly moving front pack. Unfortunately the flash mount I had on the KLR came off somewhere on the endless hills scaring a rider coming around a blind corner. Luckily Bruce of Ferndale was nice enough to find its owner (me), and my sincere apologies to the rider getting a scare. A free photo for you two if you hunt me down.

#326 from Bellingham, Washington was the speed demon for the day. He broke away from the lead group early on. Here he was starting the climb up Panther Gap solo.

This threesome road strong and consistent all day. Although they never caught the solo lead guy, they would all finish very strong at the end of the day.

Matt Deshazo was also riding strong all day. An unfortunate chain issue at the top of the endless hills determined his higher place finish. "It's unfortunate, but I know how I would have finished," was Matt's response. Very true.

Trying to change up the typical TUC photos (many people hang out all day at The Wall), I headed over the windy, twisting roads of the infamous Endless Hills. I was reminded of how it almost drove me to hysteria last year as it really did seem to be endless.

The sinuous roads climb endlessly away from the still visible coast.

A rider pedals along a ridge where a section of the route can be seen in the background.

Beyond the endless hills the fog rolled in thick as a rider squeezes out his last reserves of energy for the last 5 miles.

Select photographs of the event can be seen here at jmbarnesphoto.com. To purchase photos please visit my events gallery at jmbarnesphoto.com/events.