The Journey of PJAMM Cycling and Our New Gravel Section

Twelve years ago, I embarked on a personal quest to conquer the top 100 climbs listed in John Summerson's book, The Complete Guide to Climbing (By Bike). In December 2013, I traveled to Hawaii to tackle the hardest bike climb in the U.S., Mauna Kea. I created the first-ever Strava segment for the climb, and since then, I've returned to ride it four more times. That trip sparked a realization: there was no comprehensive, web-based list of the top U.S. bike climbs. So, I set out to fill that gap, launching a simple, static website on GoDaddy that used the Fiets Index to rank the hardest climbs.

For the next several years, I embarked on annual journeys across the U.S., documenting the top bike climbs in various states. By 2017, PJAMM expanded our horizons to include the toughest climbs worldwide. This led us to explore over 30 countries, where we've documented thousands of climbs, both in the U.S. and abroad.

In recent years, like many in the cycling community, we've been drawn to the adventure of gravel riding, which often offers a more remote and rugged experience. In 2023, this interest prompted us to search for the top gravel bike climbs in the U.S. We quickly realized that there was no resource objectively documenting these climbs or identifying the top gravel climbing states and areas. So, we retooled our ranking formula, introducing the PJAMM Difficulty Index (PDI), which factors in total elevation gain, gradient, altitude, and road surface.

Today, we've added over 600 gravel climbs to our site, selected for their popularity, epic nature, or sheer challenge. Our primary focus this past year has been identifying the hardest gravel climbs in the U.S., and after countless hours of research and over a thousand inquiries to experts and enthusiasts, we're confident in our Top 100 list. However, we know this list will evolve as our community contributes their experiences and discoveries, ensuring we capture the very best gravel climbs.

As with our paved climbs, these gravel climbs can be explored via interactive maps, detailed lists, and comprehensive climb cards. You can filter climbs by difficulty, steepness, altitude, length, and more. Additionally, we've identified top routes that incorporate these climbs, which we'll be adding to the site over the coming months.

In another exciting development, PJAMM has merged with Sherpa Map, and we'll soon be offering tools to create routes that include all of our paved and gravel climbs in addition to Sharpa's existing mapping features.

The journey continues, and we're excited to see where the road—or trail—leads next!

John Johnson
Founder & CEO | PJAMM Cycling