The vertical kilometre club
12 on the map · 0 more worldwide ·
Checked
A thousand metres of climbing without a break is where a ride stops being a ride and becomes a day. No col to crest, no valley to roll through, no stretch where the pressure comes off your legs for long enough to matter.
Haleakalā is the extreme case anywhere on Earth: three thousand metres from a beach on Maui to the rim of a crater, in one go, with the vegetation changing under you the whole way. Mount Lemmon starts in saguaro forest outside Tucson and finishes in pine. Beartooth spends its last hour on a plateau among alpine lakes, above everything.
Pikes Peak and the Stelvio need no introduction.
The climbs, by metres gained
Haleakalā (sea to summit) +3,087 mWidely billed as the longest paved climb on earth: 58 km from the beach at Paia to 10,023 feet, the shortest ride anywhere from sea level to 10,000.
Pikes Peak Highway +1,957 mSpencer Penrose's 1915 tourist road, made famous by its auto hill climb and fully paved only in 2011, the year bike racing arrived: the Broadmoor Cycle to th…
Mount Lemmon (Catalina Highway) +1,887 mThe reason most riders come to Tucson: 29 miles from saguaro to pine at a metronomic 4 to 6%, built over 17 years by a rotating workforce of nearly 8,000 fed…
Passo dello Stelvio +1,834 mThe Giro's roof: the defining venue of the Cima Coppi, first raced in 1953 when Coppi went over clear and dropped into Bormio to seal his fifth Giro.
Mount Graham (Swift Trail, AZ-366) +1,818 mArizona's hardest road climb by PJAMM's rating, and its state hill-climb championship for more than four decades: 5,689 feet of gain the race bills as the th…
Beartooth Pass (from Red Lodge) +1,736 mThe highest highway point in Montana and Wyoming at 3,337 m, on the Depression-built road Charles Kuralt called the most beautiful drive in America.
Cottonwood Pass (from Buena Vista) +1,262 mThe highest fully paved mountain pass in the United States since the west side was surfaced in 2019: 12,126 feet on the Continental Divide, edging out neighb…
Independence Pass (from Aspen) +1,257 mThe queen-stage pass of American racing: the Coors Classic sent Bernard Hinault's last stage race over it in 1986, and the USA Pro Challenge revived the cros…
Alpe d'Huez +1,111 mThe Tour's mountain: the first summit finish in race history in 1952, won by Coppi, and Dutch property from 1976 on, with eight of the first fourteen wins an…
Kitt Peak +1,079 mThe observatory climb: a highway finished in 1967 to haul a four-metre telescope to a summit the Tohono O'odham hold sacred, gated open only from 9 to 4.
Trail Ridge Road (east side) +1,078 mThe highest continuous paved road in the United States at 12,183 feet, built by the Park Service in the 1930s and listed as an All-American Road.
Mount Blue Sky (from Echo Lake) +1,070 mThe highest paved road in North America, topping out at 14,130 feet, and the American reference test for racing at altitude: the hill climb first run in 1962…