Tucson Beta: XC Training Camp

[XtrPickels]

I'll be Tucson next week and I'm looking to get in some good miles. I'll have my XC bike and maybe a gravel bike as well.

I'll be staying in the south-east - real close to Fantasy Island - so I'll get some fun laps in there.

I'd like to get some 2 to 4 hours rides in on the AZT or other in the area. I'd prefer to ride to whichever trail, so a few (non-dangerous) road miles are fine. I will have a car though, so I can certainly drive to anything worth while.

I'm thinking about heading to the 24hrs in the Old Pueblo course as I'm signed up for February this year.

I don't need anything super-smooth, but I am looking for bigger fitness days instead of technical riding. Probably don't want to ride anything that makes me wish I had my bigger bike, so the descents off Lemmon are out.

It'd also be great to get some general beta. Seems like most of the Tucson advice for food etc. is centered on downtown.

[evdog]

Check out the Arizona Endurance Series routes, there are some good ones around Tucson:

Antelope Peak Challenge - gets you 25 miles of awesome but lesser ridden Arizona Trail from Oracle to Antelope Peak in addition to part of the 24HOP course. The only issue with that route is Painter Boy trail can be hard to follow prior to 24HOP race or the AES ride in January. If you don't want to commit to the whole route you can easily get in 20-25mi at 24HOP and then head over to Oracle State Park for more miles.

Kentucky Camp - good XC ride that's a mix of some fire road and lots of nice singletrack.

Tortolita 50 - fun route that has a super chunky descent down WIld Mustang and Javelina which will regret not having the big bike. It's possible to modify this to be a better XC ride by doing a short loop in the Torts around Ridgeline to Wild Burro and connecting through the Honeybee trails over to Catalina State Park and 50 Year trail system. 50 Year is on the chunky side and has some big granite slabs but most have ride arounds.

They also used to have an Arizona Trail fundraiser that went ~40 miles from Box Canyon Rd to Pistol Hill, but that is a point to point.


Two other excellent AES routes are closer to Phoenix but might be worth hitting up on your way in or out of Tucson. Ripsey (awesome desert riding and the best ridge top ride in Arizona) near Kelvin, and Picketpost Punisher near Superior - running this Saturday the 19th, actually. Picketpost has some of my favorite and most scenic singletrack in Arizona.

Some of these rides have different length options in case you can't burn a full day. All of them have a pretty nice backcountry feel. I've got trip reports on all these trails if you search out threads in sprockets started by me.



Couple other ideas -

Staying near Fantasy Island you could put together a pretty good mixed ride that heads south from Fantasy Island to Vail or even south if I-10, pick up AZT, cross over to McKenzie Ranch trails, back on AZT and follow through Seguaro National Park, then back to FI on roads. I'm sure you could find a nice big loop that includes much of that in Trailforks ride logs.

Dragoon Mtns look pretty cool. There is a ~70mi bikepacking route on Bikepacking.com. Not sure if it is too big for a day ride but it could possibly me modified if so.

Arizona Trail loop - Canelos. Haven't ridden it yet but there is some new Arizona Trail recently built near Patagonia that can be used to make a loop with some road and old AZT. Could also loop forest roads from Patagonia to Parker Canyon lake and return via Arizona Trail.


I'm not the right person to ask about other Tucson beta, but one thing to note is State Trust land like Fantasy Island, 50 Year, 24HOP requires a State Trust recreation pass. You don't hear of people getting checked for them very often but a place like 24HOP over Thanksgiving week is the sort of time it's more likely to happen. You don't need it on the AZT itself. If you look at land owners filter on Trailforks most of what shows as blue State land is State Trust land. https://asld.secure.force.com/recreationalpermit/

[XtrPickels]

This is awesome info. I appreciate it!

[Iowagriz]

The cycling house does training tours out of Tucson. Find some of these peeps on Strava and you might also get some route ideas.

https://thecyclinghouse.com/our-staff/


Sent from my SM-S908U using Tapatalk

[cycology1]

I'm years removed from Tucson, but Redington road to Chiva falls....you can keep climbing Redington for a while! If not too late.

[XtrPickels]

Posting for posterity. I got 4 rides in - 2 in Fantasy Island / 1 on the AZ Trail / 1 in Tucson Mountain park.

My goal was getting hours in at base-pace, conveniently, while also hanging with the family.

Fantasy Island was surprisingly good, especially because of how close it was to where we were staying. This would be a great after-work spin type of area and it rode surprisingly well for getting in base miles. Aside from avoiding cactus, it is completely non-technical, which was fine for my purposes. I successfully avoided 99.9% of the cacti... Theypacked in a great amount of trail and I was able to get 2.5hrs in without any trouble.

Arizona Trail-
I rode from south eastern Tucson to Pistol Hill to I-10 Section of the AZ trail, then looped it by riding back through Vail. Word is that most of the AZ trail is pretty unrideable, but this section was quite fast and perfect for cranking out miles.

Tucson Mountain Park.
I planned what I thought was a decent 40 mile day, Starting by Riding from Tucson estates, over Starr pass Trail, Yetman, Gates Pass, A loop around Old Tucson before crossing back over and getting some additional miles south of Ajo. I realized pretty quick that the going in Tucson Mountain Park was much slower than Fantasy Island and the AZ. Descending Golden Gate was impossible for me to onsight, especially on the XC bike and climbing back up it was even slower. I ended up cutting out half my ride and still coming in over-time, despite the lowland trails around Old Tucson being fast.

All in all, it was a fun little camp and I'm looking forward to 24hrs in the Old Pueblo.

[smmokan]

Word is that most of the AZ trail is pretty unrideable, but this section was quite fast and perfect for cranking out miles.

Why is the AZT unrideable?

[XtrPickels]

Why is the AZT unrideable?

Just a lot of Hike a Bike for long stretches.

[evdog]

Up and over Mt Lemmon, lots of HAB. The trail is very rideable aside from that with the exception of a few notable hike a bikes.... Some in Canelo Hills, Gila River to Martinez Saddle has a bunch, as well as Highline Trail up to Mogollon Rim. The trail south of Mt Lemmon is almost all pretty nice.


Glad you had a good time. For any future camps... Honeybee Trails have some decent mileage and are good XC riding. Same with Sweetwater Preserve.