Cycling French Pass

A good hilly ride near near cambridge.  Makes a loop of about 70km from Hamilton. If you're from Hamilton, Cambridge, Morrinsville or Matamata this makes a brilliant training ride. There are plenty of hills and there are some good side trips to add if you still want more hills. You can go up Maungakawa Rd this is one of the biggest hills in the Waikato and certainly the hardest I know of.

Starting from Hamilton, the first 35km of this ride are the same as the Rev 120 ride.  Go here to see a map of the whole ride.  If you do this loop anticlockwise the first climb is on Te Miro road, this is quite an undulating and gradual ascent which rises about 150m. Then after passing through the small town of Te Miro the undulations remain gentle until turning onto Brunskill Rd which has about four steep gullies to pass through. The last gully before coming into Whitehall has a very steep climb, even though you come into it with a fair amount of speed from the previous descent when you hit the slope you'll feel as if you've hit the brakes. Just after Whitehall you turn right onto French Pass Rd and following a moderately fast descent you start on the ascent to French Pass.  This is a really good climb that starts out quite gradual an gets pretty steep towards the end.  Going down the other side of French pass is a fast descent with a fair amount of corners but nothing too sharp, very enjoyable. After this there is one more gully before getting back onto the flats. There is some pretty good scenery around the hilly section with some interesting rock formations.