Mattole Road is a long, hard drive. Cars with lackluster engines and weak drivetrains struggle to clear the steep climbs — drivers who haven’t bothered to replace thinning brake pads could have the opposite problem on the way down. Riding it on a bicycle is hellish, but every fall, during the 100-mile Tour of the Unknown Coast, (once marketed as “California’s Toughest Century) hundreds of people would do it anyway, grinding up hills so steep they look vertical from the bottom, sailing down them at teeth-rattling speeds  — but after several years of struggling with tax issues, the race is no more. 

Founded in the late ‘70s, the TUC, as participants called it, ran until 2024, though some years the event wasn’t held. Racers started in Ferndale, and would ride down to the Avenue of the Giants, over to Petrolia and up Mattole Road back to Ferndale, riding over 9,000 feet of elevation gain in about 100 miles. In many years, there were also shorter events. 

Race organizers sent out an announcement on May 15, informing interested riders that the event wasn’t going to be held in 2026. The TUC wasn’t held in 2025 either, but the notice sent out last month made it clear that the event was gone for good. “At this time we will be closing the affairs of the non-profit and not hosting the Tour of the Unknown Coast event again,” it reads. “We truly hope the legacy lives on by people continuing to ride the legendary course and enjoying time on their bikes all along the North Coast.” 

The TUC was operated by a 501(c)(3) organization, called Tour of the Unknown Coast Inc. Every year, tax-exempt nonprofits have to file IRS Form 990, which details its expenses and revenues. If they don’t, the IRS can revoke its tax-exempt status. The IRS revokes it automatically after three years without filing, which appears to be the case for TUC Inc. The IRS posted a notice on the IRS’ webpage detailing TUC Inc.’s finances — which are public record — in March 2023, saying that the organization had failed to file Form 990 for three straight years and its tax-exempt status was rescinded.

Reached by phone yesterday, Chris Johnson, co-owner of outdoor gear store Adventure’s Edge and a member of TUC Inc.’s board at the time of its demise, confirmed that was the case. Johnson, along with four others, took over the nonprofit’s board of directors early last year. They were unaware of the non-filing issues, he said, and they couldn’t manage to convince the IRS to give them a break. (The last 990 TUC Inc. filed was in 2017.) Johnson declined to say who the other four people were. 

Sean Tetrault, co-owner of Revolution Bicycles, who was on the board for about six years until 2019 or so, told the Outpost the responsibility probably just “fell through the cracks.” TUC Inc. had, at one point, as many as a dozen members responsible for keeping it running. They were paid, and the board’s treasurer was also a CPA. (The TUC stopped filing its 990s around the same time the CPA left the board.) By the late 2010s, there were about half as many board members, all volunteers. They didn’t always have a lot of time to dedicate to the TUC. 

Johnson didn’t place any blame on the previous members of the board, who he said had done a good job of keeping the race running and fun. (“The previous board, and everybody else, did a great job for a long time,” he said. “…I don’t want to put a bad word on anybody here in this situation.”) What really damaged the event’s long-term feasibility was simply a declining number of participants. The tour attracted as many as 3,000 riders every year during its heyday in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, Johnson said, and even as late as 2010 there were often as many as 500 people riding the 100-miler. In 2024, there were only 70. Gravel and mountain biking races have surged in popularity since the Covid pandemic, siphoning riders away from more traditional road races. 

Many riders were from out-of-town, Johnson said, and the growing number of events elsewhere meant people weren’t forced to travel to Humboldt to compete. Many riders come north from the Bay Area, and a closer race in Napa or Mendocino shaves off a few hours of travel. The Grasshopper Adventure Series, a circuit of events around the North Coast, was forced to cancel another event in Humboldt, the Lost Coast Hopper, this year as well. Local interest dwindled too, and at the same time, the price to put on an event of the TUC’s size and complexity increased dramatically. 300 people paying even $100 to ride would barely break even. 

Tetrault also pointed out that when the board members earned a stipend, they could spend time nailing down sponsorships for the race and engaging with the community, something often beyond a volunteer’s capabilities. Less time available for getting sponsors meant less money invested in the event meant fewer riders. 

Tetrault said he’d miss it.

“Not every event can just go on forever, and unfortunately, lots of events fade away,” Johnson said. “People do different things over time, and events change, and, you know, boards can do what they can to try and keep events going, but eventually, those with low interest — they just fade away.”

Various past TUC board members did not respond to requests for comment.