Coast-to-Coast
GPS Motorcycle Rally
Adventure Motorcycle Cannonball
Coast to coast,
checkpoint by checkpoint
An international GPS checkpoint rally, open to any motorcycle. Load the GPX, ride a curated route across a continent, collect checkpoints. No support crews, no chase trucks, no judging.
Entries are open. Gift cards are now available for any rally we run.
A Cannonball built for the GPS era
The ADV Cannonball is a modern evolution of two legendary events, the Scooter Cannonball and the Motorcycle Cannonball. Building on that tradition, it brings an international coast to coast rally into the modern era, with the emphasis on overland GPS navigation, endurance, preparedness, self reliance and rider skill.
Each morning competitors leave the official rally hotel at set times. Navigating by GPX track, they ride paved and optional unpaved roads to GPS checkpoints, earning points along a curated route. Most points at the end of the rally wins. Medals and trophies are handed out at the awards banquet.
Every year the route changes, and coast to coast gets used creatively. Expect 8 to 11 days and somewhere between 3,000 and 5,000 miles. This event is not for everyone, but everyone is welcome, on any motorcycle, scooter, trike, Can-Am or Morgan 3. There is no handicapping.
This is not a race.
Read the regulations
How the scoring works
Gone are the late nights with a highlighter, a calculator and a paper road book. This is a checkpoint adventure rally, not a TSD event. Competitors supply their own rally phone.
Load the GPX
Route and checkpoints go straight onto your GPS or smartphone before the start. Nothing to transcribe, nothing to plot by hand.
Collect checkpoints
Paved, dirt and extreme checkpoints sit along a vetted route. You decide which ones are worth the detour and which ones to leave on the table.
The app keeps score
Our own app logs every checkpoint and your daily start and finish times. No photos to submit, no human judging, and the scoreboard is live.
Strategy, not stopwatch work
Every checkpoint carries a value, and the hard ones carry more. Chasing the dirt and extreme checkpoints costs daylight. Sticking to pavement banks miles. Both approaches have won awards, and both have ended in a hotel bar full of stories.
Self supporting, start to finish
Support crews and chase vehicles are not permitted. Competitors rely on themselves, or on resources anyone along the route could use. Rolling into a motorcycle shop, ordering parts online or calling AAA is perfectly fine. Calling a family member to bring warmer gloves from home is not.
Expect self rescue.
The regs
For glory or for adventure
Riders come to this event for different reasons. Some want the win. Others want a carefully planned and well vetted route they would never piece together on their own. The reward turns out to be about the same.
More than half the field admits it does not expect to win, and most still chase some form of recognition. Plenty are happy to follow the recommended route all day and gather at the finish hotel each night to trade war stories from the road.
Two rallies run. See it for yourself.
The ADV Cannonball has crossed the USA twice, in 2025 and in 2026. Before you sign up, watch the film, read the story and check the results.
Watch
8 Days. 3,500 Miles.
Robert Baldinger rode the 2025 rally and made a film about it. More than a quarter of a million riders have watched it.
Read
108 signed up. 75 started. 64 reached the Pacific.
The whole story of the 2026 rally, told rider by rider.
Check
Every result on the record
Winners, finishers, awards and photographs from both years.
Pick an event
Every ADV Cannonball event is run and entered separately, with its own route, its own grid and its own entry. Points earned at any of them carry forward for life in the worldwide standings.
Two classes are offered at each rally. Pro-Class takes a scheduled start time on the grid and is the only class eligible for the daily first to arrive bonus. Mile-Crusher-Class rides the same road, the same checkpoints, and is eligible for every award.
USA Edition
2027 USA ADV Cannonball Rally
Portland, Maine to Portland, Oregon. June 2027.
Nine days of curated riding across the width of the country, with a checkpoint network that rewards the riders willing to leave the pavement. Entries are open and Pro-Class numbers are already being issued in points order.
Draft 2027 USA route, subject to change. GPX files go to competitors 30 days before check in.
Europe Edition
2027 Europe ADV Cannonball Rally
Tarifa, Spain to Skagen, Denmark. 1 to 8 September 2027.
A separate rally with its own entry, its own route and its own starting grid. Eight days from the bottom of Spain to the top of Denmark, crossing a continent's worth of borders, weather and road surfaces.
Preview route only. Competitors get the full map and the GPX files before the start.
Hotel blocks are small. The discounted rooms on the Europe route go quickly, so book early once your entry is in.
2028 Edition
The EV Cannonball
An electric coast to coast rally, planned for 2028.
The EV Cannonball carries over most of the ADV Cannonball format and regulations and points them at electric vehicles. Every purely electric vehicle is eligible. Routing includes optional off pavement checkpoints, each with a paved alternative, so range strategy is the real puzzle rather than ground clearance.
This one is solo. No teams, no private support, and only the charging and services any member of the public could use. Two categories are recognised, first overall on two wheels and first overall on four. The award set mirrors the ADV Cannonball: Overall Winner, Checkpoint Crusher, Rough Rider and the Finisher Medal.
Still taking shape. Dates, the route and the entry fee are being worked out. If an electric VTOL turns up at check in, we will invent an airborne category.
Volunteers wanted, every event
Every event we hold needs help, and the help is always welcome whether you are entered or not. Route pre-riding is the biggest job on the list right now. We need riders to run the 2027 USA route, both the pavement and the optional off road sections, and report back on what they find. Riders who pre-ride a route are issued a token for that rally.
There is plenty to do beyond pre-riding as well, at check in, on the start line and at the finish. Tell us where you are and what you would like to do.
New in the store
Rally gift cards
An entry to an ADV Cannonball rally is a serious present. Gift cards are available for every rally on the calendar, and the value never expires.
The ADV Cannonball Podcast
Rally news, gear that works, gear that does not, and the riders themselves. We have never been the number one motorcycle podcast, but every once in a while we are number two, and we will take it.
The rally playlist is a community effort. Listen on Spotify or send us a song.
Chasing Legends
Motorcycle Stories from the Podcast Trail. Four years in the making, the first volume is out now in paperback and audiobook. Written by Aaron Pufal.
Rally gear
ADV Cannonball does not make a dime on physical products. The shop exists because riders asked for the gear, so please order carefully. Returns go in the trash and we get the bill.
Help keep this sinking ship afloat
ADV Cannonball is one man, a rally app and a lot of spreadsheets. Sponsorship levels are open to philanthropically minded motorcyclists, small businesses, clubs and anyone else who wants their name on the rally. There are two smaller ways to pitch in as well.
Take a number
Each event is entered on its own page. Pick the one you want, or hand someone a gift card and let them pick.