To get a quick idea of the hill challenges for 2021 Ragbrai I calculated the feet of climb per mile and compared that to 2019.
This is what I found:

………..2021……2019
Sunday……33.5……45
Monday……15.0……30
Tuesday…..18.3……39.4
Wednesday…23.8……38.6
Thursday….32.7……35.3
Friday……28.0……24.7
Saturday….36.3. . . . 27.6

So, just looking at these statistics this year’s ride will be easier than 2019.
Of course, the weather could always make it tougher. I’d rather have hills than strong headwinds!

Day 5’s calculation did not include the Karras Loop. I plotted what I think is the loop using Ride with GPS to get 30.2 miles with 1440 feet of climb. That equates to 47.7 feet of climb per mile.
By the way, the loop seems to contain the steepest hill for the week. At Stone City, we start a climb of 7% or better. We won’t be able to maintain much momentum from the preceding downhill because there is a left turn at the bottom. Google Maps did not show street view for this area, so I couldn’t get a visual of the hills. The 7%is from Ride with GPS.

Another hill to note is one coming out of Cherokee. It looks like 5% for about half a mile. Looks like a shorter but similar hill as we get into Fort Dodge. This was a cursory scan of the week’s challenge, so I may have missed something. Please let me know.