RAGBRAI Community

The RAGBRAI Community has a message board for open discussion about any RAGBRAI topic. There is also a photo gallery for riders to upload and share their photos. All available WITHOUT registration.

So please enjoy the site and let me know if there is a feature you would like added.

Are you are looking for a team, teammates, or transportation? I have added two new forums to try and match riders up with each other.

To find a team or search for additional teammates look here.

To find or offer a ride from the start or end of the ride look here.

The Register has announced the pass through towns that are on the route this year. This is one of the shortest rides on record, with no single day over 78 miles.

More detailed information to come Sunday.

The wait is over, the Des Moines Register annouced the overnight towns for RAGBRAI 2006. While the actual path of the route is still a mystery the overnight towns provide a nearly complete picture of what RAGBRAI 2006 will look like.

After my post a few weeks back about how straight RAGBRAI had become I am excited to see that while this is mostly a central Iowa ride it has a nice diagonal route across the state.

The route is expected to be about 444 miles this year, which will be one of the ten shortest rides ever. However the Register informed us that the ride will not be an easy one. Specifically the ride will begin in the Loess Hills on day one, which should provide for some very hilly terrain. Day 3 will also pass through the Raccoon River Valley which will also add to the level of difficulty.

Below is a quick overview of what to expect on the ride this year.

The jersey for this year has been released. Unfortunatly I am not a fan. There is no particular reason I just dont think that the design is very attractive. If you still want to order one of the new jerseys they are available here.

But I cant wait the new route will be released in 4 days!

There will of course be plenty of discussion over the next few months about the upcoming route.

Just trying to sit still here for the next few days.

I was delightfully humored by the Register the other day. As a joke they published humorous details of what would come in the following months for Iowa.

One of the best was in August, "In another development, thousands of RAGBRAI riders suddenly stop in mid-ride and go home, realizing the futility of riding a bicycle the length of the state during the hottest month of the year." You can read the rest of the Register's article here.

But ahh yes I look forward to that futile ride. I think the fact that it has no purpose, no race, no times and certainly no schedule is what I look forward to so much.

RAGBRAI in the past few years has become a ride east. Each year always includes a day or two with some north or south riding but for the most part the ride ends on the east side of Iowa near the lattitude. However many of the earlier RAGBRAI rides crossed Iowa at a diagonal. Starting with RAGBRAI III which rode almost constant south west the entire week. This trend continued through RAGBRAI VII, RAGBRAI XVI and RAGBRAI XVIII. There are even a few years that actually went northwest on such as RAGBRAI VIII and RAGBRAI XVII.

These rides look fun to me. I would love to have the opportunity to see difference between northern Iowa and southern Iowa on the same ride. Why don't we have more of these routes? My only fear is I remember a day on RAGBRAI 2004 which headed directly south for a day directly into a head wind. That was not one of my favorite rides. However I thought that for the most part the wind blows from the west.

Thats right there is discussion that RAGBRAI may go through Nevada this year. Of course I mean Nevada, Iowa. RAGBRAI officials have sent out packets to some cities that have been overnight towns in the past asking them if they are interested in hosting again. Two of the cities that have received such packets are Ames, and Nevada. Both cities are just north of Des Moines. If RAGBRAI officials are thinking about either of these two cities this would mean a more central route for RAGBRAI this year.

Of course all of this is just speculation. The route is not expected to be annouced until January 28, 2006. However for those of you interested in guessing the route this is a big change from the southern route that was initially predicted a few months ago.

Registration for RAGBRAI XXXIV opened today. If you already know that you want to participate before seeing the course head on over to the RAGBRAI site to register.

RAGBRAI 2006 Registration

The route for this years course is expected to be released January 28, 2006. You can still submit your guesses for the RAGBRAI XXXIV route on the message board.

Guess the RAGBRAI 2006 Route

The logo for RAGBRAI XXXIV was released today.

Personally I am not as excited about this years logo as I have about ones in the past. Although RAGBRAI always seems to incorporate orange.

Anyway the logo is out and of course this means you can begin buying your RAGBRAI 34 merchandise right now, just in time for christmas.

RAGBRAI Store

The RAGBRAI news this month inluded the release of the survey from RAGBRAI 2005. The survey was compiled from 3,000 responses. Some of the more notable results:

 - 81% of riders start between 6am and 7am.
 - Excessive drinking was the 7th worst problem on the ride.
 - Number 1 complaint erratic riding.

The results look typical of the past three years of surveys. Alcohol has always been reported as the 7-8 worst problem and erratic riding is always #1.

On the whole people were very satisfied with the course and safety of the ride this year.

If you would like to see the full reported survey it is available in the November 2005 issue of rag news.

As many of you know hurricane Rita is making its way towards Houston. Unfortunatly the data center for this site is located in Houston. I have been assured by the owner that they are prepared for a category 5 storm with multiple redundancy. However, in order for the site to remain up it will require the infrastructure serving the data center to remain intact. Currently that looks unlikely. Once the outage occurs a determination will be made regarding the length of outage and we will consider if it will be necessary to relocate the site to another data center.

Update: For those who have asked, no I am not in the path of the storm.

So a month and a half after RAGBRAI the guessing about next years route has already begun. Randy Catron, the gentleman who rights the training articles that appear on ragbrai.org, has made his wager for next year. Randy makes a valid point in this months RAGBRAI newsletter that RAGBRAI always does the opposite of the year prior. So in his argument RAGBRAI will be much hillier and farther south than last year.

I don't think he will have a problem meeting either of those criteria. Geography and physics tell you the ride will be more southern and hillier next year.

But Randy got me thinking. What if we could have a little game guessing next years route?

If you are looking for a team you saw on RAGBRAI I have updated my list of RAGBRAI team websites. It is amazing to see how many teams are out there and some of the sites are very entertaining. If you want me to include your site please use the contact form here.

Was it Le Mars or maybe Algona? I have posted a poll on the message board with all of the overnight towns this year.

Come on over a leave your vote for the best town. Or even better leave a comment regarding why it was your favorite town. And if you think one of the stop over towns was outstanding leave us a comment about that as well.

Rate the overnight towns here.