I am in SoCal next month for a wedding and I am in the middle of training for IMLP. I have a 90 mile ride scheduled on the Saturday that I am there and would like some advice/suggestions for a good 90 mile loop or variation. I will be starting from Newport. Want to keep it fairly tame as it is an aerobic ride, maybe NPB to Santiago Cyn? Suggestions and help is appreciated.
Thanks!
There are several ways to do it. I can’t give exact directions but I’m sure someone can. If not PM me and I will try to help you out.
What date R U looking to ride…My Tri team goes on a 45-55 mile ride on Saturdays starting in Newport through the canyon with some good hills and finishes back in Newport if you do this ride and then turn around and do it again backwards this will be a very hard ride with some good hills…Let me know when you will be out and maybe you can hook up with our team…We have 1 or 2 people on the team that is doing IMLP too…
From Newport - down PCH to Laguna Canyon Rd to Sand Canyon over to and up Bake Pkwy to Santiago Canyon via Oakley hill thru Santiago Canyon down Jamboree and back to Newport is roughly 3:30-4:00 depending on your fitness. You could always add more time by doing Santiago Canyon a couple of times.
Saturday 4/18. That sounds good, what time do you start and from where?
Thanks!
7:45 am at Bonita Creek Park. It is on University Drive and Jamboree Road in Newport Beach, CA …We usual meet at 7:30am and leave by 8:00am. Everyone is welcomed!!!
Plan on seeing you out there tomorrow. Weather should be great.
Thanks again.
I don’t remember the mileage, but if you head north out of Newport Beach to the Santa Ana River trail (or whatever that trail in Huntington Beach just south of Brookhurst and PCH is called), then take the river trail up to Yorba Linda - that’s something like 24 miles. Exit the trail at Imperial Hwy and turn right (south). That turns into Canon Drive. You get a nice hill going up and over Canon, when you get to the bottom you are at Katella (or you can continue straight to Chapman). If you turn left on Katella, it will eventually curve to the right and intersect with Chapman (where it turns into Jamboree, and Chapman turns into Santiago Canyon Rd.). I think that is 4-5 miles? Then you turn left on Santiago Canyon, ride it all the way through (13 miles), take it to Glenn Ranch Rd and turn right. You get another good hill here, you go up and over (by the Oakley building) and at the bottom turn right on Portola. Take it to Bake and turn left. I’d follow Bake until Trabuco Rd and turn right, although I’m not sure what the construction is like on the back side of the El Toro base these days (I live only a few miles from there but never drive that back route). If you take Trabuco to Jamboree and turn right, it will bring you back to the beginning of Santiago Canyon, and then you can simply reverse your route to go home.
This will give you flat with the wind at your back in the beginning, plenty of hills early middle, flat downhill grade late middle, and then a few hills and flat into the wind heading home. My best guess is with the river trail being around 24-25 miles (50 or so if you go back that route), and Santiago Canyon being 13 miles (and add about 15 for the way back on Trabuco), then 4-5 miles each way on Imperial Hwy./Canon…that should get you to around 90 miles.
I never went quite that far on the river trail when I was training for IM’s (I lived in Laguna Beach at the time), and would just head south on PCH and ride through Camp Pendleton and back for my long rides (extremely long rides went down to Pacific Beach in San Diego and back), but I have a few friends who would regularly ride a similar loop (a few times per year for their own century rides, but they actually started north on PCH by Long Beach and so had to ride the 15 miles to and from the river trail.
Have fun, temps are supposed to be upper 50’s/low 60’s early in the morning and upper 70’s/low 80’s later in the day. Whatever you do, wear lots of sunscreen, there isn’t anything that is going to provide shade along the way 
I was wondering. How are you guys getting to the canyon from Jam & Un?
Thanks in advance
Bob, Jamboree intersects Santiago Canyon Road in Orange.
Yea, I start my Canyon ride on Jamboree to Santiago cy Rd. I was wondering how they did it. Parts of Jamboree kinda suck for riding.
BTW: I’m riding Newport coast area tomorrow.
Bob, I posted the route from Newport to Santiago for you about a year ago. Start at Back Bay Drive. Take that inland and stay on the bike trail (San Diego Creek Bike Trail) all the way until you reach Barranca and Harvard. Get off the bike trail there and follow Harvard. After about 2-3 miles, you cross train tracks and you’ll see the entrance to the Hick’s Canyon Bike Trail on the left side of the road. Get on that and follow that all the way to Portola where it ends. Left on Portola and about 1/2 mile you’ll hit Jamboree. Take that to Santiago Canyon Road. Pretty safe ride with minimal road riding.
I hope you made it out there this morning. You can not get much better weather…anywhere, ever!..another route ender would be to exit the canyon on the southern end and go up Santa Margarita to Antonio all the way to Ortega. Jump on the tril that dumps out at PCH/Dana Point then up PCH back to Newport…I really can’t think of a better way to earn your wedding boozes.
Wookie,
I did…absolutely perfect weather. I would have to download my Garmin to give you the exact route but basically I started in Newport, on the Peninsula, did a quick warmup, headed through the back bay and hooked up with a tri group at Jamboree/University ( American Interbanc?). They were nice enough to let me tag along. We went a route that I have never done, basically up University, somehow over to Alton to Bake into the canyon to Jamboree and then back to University/Jamboree. I think this was the route as I was busy trying not to get dropped because I wasn’t sure where I was… I had never done the canyon that way before, I usually go up Jamboree to start and turn right into the canyon which is the opposite way of the way we went today. I headed back to NPB through the back bay, saw them setting up the transition area for a tri there tomorrow and then I headed up to Long Beach on PCH, a bit crazy withthe traffic, then back to NPB for just under 90 miles.
Thanks to everyone who posted here, I look forward to trying some of these other routes in the future. With weather and views like the ones here it sure makes those burning quads a bit more bearable.
SD