Tour of California organizers announce 2012 host cities

The 2012 Amgen Tour of California will feature a new time trial in Bakersfield, a longer route for the already-grueling Mount Baldy stage, and forays into new parts of the Golden State.

• The race will start in Levi Leipheimer’s hometown of Santa Rosa, although race organizers have not specified the route or the finish community for that stage.
• Stage 2 will start in San Francisco and finish in Santa Cruz County.
• Stage 3 will go from San José to Livermore. Race organizers say the stage will pass through “an entirely new part of the state not showcased in previous editions of the race.”
• Stage 4 will start in Sonora and finish in Clovis. Sonora is a first-time host city and the route will include several new climbs before a predicted sprint finish in Clovis.
• Stage 5 is the individual time trial in Bakersfield. Organizers did not announce the race’s distance.
• Stage 6 will go from Palmdale to Big Bear Lake, in a variation of a similar stage that was used in 2010.
• Stage 7 will start in Ontario and finish at Mount Baldy. The stage will be ten miles longer than the 2011 stage that ended at Baldy. Organizers did not say if the stage will include more climbing than the brutal 2011 edition.
• The final stage will be run in Los Angeles, with the finish at the LA Live complex.

The complete route will be more than 750 miles long.