Bike Bliss: Sea Otter Classic

It's a mondo two-wheeled whoop-di-do, in and around Monterey.

IF DAZZLING WHEELS STARTED SPINNING... in your dreams when winter nights were at their very darkest, and spokes punctuated your waking reveries, and handlebar visions made you happy in periods of boredom or the blues, you're likely the sort of person who has counted the days — make that hours — to springtime. For spring is when all of the cycling festivals and cycling tours and cycling weekends start up in exerciseful earnest, with fans lining roads to admire expert riding and the cyclists who make it all look easy. But long before summer arrives, and even a month, or nearly, before the AMGEN Tour of California spins into towns down the Golden State, there is the Sea Otter Classic. You know this mondo Monterey affair, surely, as it is billed as the "World's Premier Cycling Festival!" How you spends your days in and around the area, whether you're watching the Gran Fondo Carmel Valley or the Gravel Grinder Tour, is up to you and your wheel-based fancies. The dates? 

APRIL 20 THROUGH 23, and there are loads of events to choose from, so picking one or two (or more) before you pull into the peninsula should make things a bit more smooth. Also? Vendors aplenty will be out, catering to all sorts of cycling, healthful needs, from The Pickle Juice Company to Hi-Power Cycles Revolution M e-bikes to Dude Girl apparel (so, yes, the stuff to look at and learn about absolutely runs the cycle-centered gamut). It's wheels-to-the-road time for the huge bike bashes of April, May, June, and onward, starting with the celebrated Sea Otter.

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