Born and raised and still live in Sacramento, CA. It has its pros and cons…
Generally good weather year round but does get hot in summer. Mostly low humidity but avg several days each year of 102F+ with fairly bad air quality.
Cost of living is substantially lower than the Bay Area and you can access the foothills for MTB or whatever else you want to do and generally get away from crowded areas. Still more expensive than most places outside of CA obviously.
Road riding is both excellent and horrible depending on where you are and what time of day you ride, but if you know where to be there is pretty much any type of riding nearby. Flat in the valley and on the river bike path, rolling and/or steep short climbs in the foothills and long climbs further into the foothills and the Sierra Nevadas. Lots of group ride options, with varying levels of speed (and attitude) but for the most part it’s a good cycling community.
You guys are not kidding about Boise. I probably know at least 25 people who have moved there from Sacramento in the last 2 years including a lot of close family.
Tucson, AZ here. Pretty good mix of road and MTB. Weather permits year around riding, 5-10 degrees cooler than Phoenix in the summer time. Most of my road rides are in the 40-80 mile range with 2,000 to 4,000’ of gain. Plenty of roads/paths to ride centuries without issue. Mt. Lemmon, on the north east of town, allows you to go from 2,700 to about 9,000’ in a little over 20 miles. Lots of people/teams come to train here in the winter. As far as MTB goes there are trails surrounding most of the valley. Pretty easy to get a decent MTB ride in with 20-30 miles and 2,000’+ of gain.
I’ve lived in Vermont my whole life – from Burlington area to currently in the Upper Valley between VT/NH. Amazing riding here, but winter is long and brutal. Lots of trainer time in the offseason. Summer helps make up for it with great rides and good hill climbing.
I live in Chicago, but to answer to the OP’s question - if you like road and MTB equally, I have never found a place better than Tucson, AZ. And if you like gravel, you’re about an hour away from a full-on gravel preserve in Patagonia (see: The Cyclist’s Menu)
We went to The Gravel House in Patagonia a few weeks ago. EVERYthing you’ve been hearing about gravel biking there is true! I blogged about it and posted a few pictures.
-Hugh
You may have already decided, OP, but Spokane, WA (Coach Chad’s new home) is a gem.
Good rural road riding both North and South of town. A great 1+ hour long HC climb up MT Spokane. Riverside State Park, The Bluff (located on the SW boarder of town), and Beacon Hill are all great places to mountain bike and don’t get super busy. Gravel is good enough here that Chad/TR are considering putting on a gravel event.
And cost of living is less ridiculous than the others on your list. The thing I wasn’t a huge fan of is some of the roads in town (particularly the lower south hill) are in badly need of repair.
Portlander here. The hardest part is it rains like 9 months a year so you’ve got to take advantage of the opportunities you get.
There’s some good road and gravel cycling not too far from town, but MTB is lacking. The most popular spot is Rocky point which has its quirks cause it’s forrest land so trails can come and go depending on where they’re logging. The best MTB around is either in Bend (3ish hours SE), or Eugene (90 minutes if you drive fast)
Since picking up cycling I’ve lived and cycled in Tampa, Florida; southeast Connecticut; northern Virginia; Boston, Massachusetts; and western Maine. I don’t MTB and have done a little gravel riding.
Tampa - great road riding. Few / no hills within about 50 miles but plenty of wind for “Florida hills.” Year-round outdoor riding. Generally aware and courteous drivers but my only collision with a car was in Tampa, in a bike lane.
Southeast Connecticut - most of my rides were indoors before work. I was on the coast so we tended to get ice instead of snow during the winter. Roads are narrow with little / no shoulder. When I did get outside drivers were fairly courteous to cyclists, especially in recent years as cycling has become more popular. Definitely recommend a Varia radar. I wasn’t too far from @ambermalika, as it turns out, and she’s much more qualified to discuss outdoor riding in CT.
Northern Virginia - lots of well-maintained, wide roads in Prince William and Loudon counties. Still good cycling closer toward DC such as Fairfax County, but more traffic. Loudon has extensive, well mapped gravel roads; not so much in PWC. Blue Ridge mountains to the west, including Skyline Drive. Can cycle outdoors year round but need some cold weather gear.
Boston - already discussed above. Minuteman Trail is great. Many hills for VO2 and threshold repeats. Time trial loop for longer threshold and sweet spot work.
Western Maine - winters probably aren’t conducive to outside riding but summers are great. Many gravel options on old logging roads. Not many side roads have shoulders but there are generally few cars. Again, strongly recommend a Varia radar.
Have you looked at the twin cities? We have tons of decent MTB trails in the metro, a lot of great trails 2 to 3 hours north and the road riding can be spectacular (I ride on the NE side the the metro), we’ve got gravel covered too!
The major down fall is climate, but if you don’t mind fat biking or XC skiing we got you covered.
Northwest Arkansas (Springdale, Bentonville, Fayetteville), I don’t live there, but own a business there so I am very familiar with it. The road riding is good, the roads are in good shape and there is some elevation if you are looking for it. But it is a mountain biking meca, few places in the U.S. compare.
Walmart’s headquarters are in Bentonville and they build and maintain world class mountaing bike trails to support the area and bring in potential employees.
I’d put Asheville/SW NC on the list. You’d get seasons but the winters wouldn’t be too crazy. Great roads, mountains to climb, etc. Also lots of MTB if that’s your thing.
SW VA is awesome too. Not too many cities though so you’d be looking at small towns/cities like Roanoke or Blacksburg. Though Harrisonburg is bigger and would also be great
