stage 7

I spent Sunday afternoon walking around Crown Center (home of Hallmark), Penn Valley Park, Liberty Memorial and Washington Square Park taking pictures of the 7th and final stage of the 2009 Tour of Missouri. I was able to see a lot of my favorite riders and take lots of pictures. My favorite part of the afternoon might have been before the race even started.

No, not the LiquiGas girls.
It was seeing Paul Sherwen up close, visiting with the fans and posing for a few pictures.

Watching the riders ride up and down the avenue, warming up prior to the start of the race.

Here, George and a couple teammates from Columbia HTC have an impromptu team meeting.

The course was a little over 10 miles, and they did the loop 7 times. I walked down to where they would be at the end of each loop, which were taking about 25 minutes, and took some pictures with the Western Auto Building in the background.

I hooked around behind Union Station to the west side of Penn Valley Park and saw the race head toward the north end of downtown, Riverfront Park, Sprint Center, and the Power & Light District before heading back to Crown Center.

I then hiked up the hill into the park to wait for them to complete the loop and come through the park for the 3rd time. You can see the peloton in the foreground and Liberty Memorial and Union Station in the background.

I made my way back to the finish line with most of the other spectators. Unable to get close the barricade to have a shot at a good picture, I settled for ringing my cowbell and cheering the riders across the line.

Zabriske held on for the overall victory and made his way back to the podium. He pulled in to this area, thinking it led to the podium. When informed he still had a short way to go he looked right at me with a sheepish grin on his face before re-mounting his bike and heading off to his prize.

individual time-trial

I drove about an hour and a half to Sedalia, MO on Friday for the time-trial stage of the Tour of Missouri. The start and finish lines were on the state fairgrounds with lots of great vantage points for seeing the riders up close. It might seem obvious, but these guys are good. These are only about a quarter of the pictures I snapped. Many were blurs, or shots of the road where a rider just was. The first four are of riders coming out of the starting blocks and preparing for a 90 degree left turn.

I'm not sure if he's adjusting his helmet, or saying to himself, "what the hell was I thinking?"

I took several pictures as riders rounded the last corner of the 19 mile+ course and raced for the finish line. Then I moved down to, and eventually around the last corner and got shots of riders coming to the last turn. Again, these guys are fast! I love my Canon PowerShot camera. It's small enough to carry on the bike, and it takes pretty good pictures of scenery. But, I could have used a camera that would let me snap several frames in rapid succession to capture the action here. Still, I was able to come away with some shots of a few of my favorite riders.

Here's one of Floyd Landis, riding for Ouch Presented By Maxxis. He was quoted as saying it's good to just be racing again. On his bike is where he's happy.

David Zabriske of Garmin Slipstream claimed the yellow jersey by winning the time-trial with a time of 36:30. He was 30 seconds faster than the 2nd place time posted by Gustav Larsson of Team Saxo Bank. Zabriskie put enough time between himself and the sprinters who had dominated the early stages of the race that he will wear the yellow jersey as the tour comes to Kansas City for the 7th and final stage on Sunday.

As I sat near the last turn, I got these shots of Levi Leipheimer coming and going.

And finally, after he had crossed the finish line, I got this picture of George Hincapie.

what's happening in missouri

If you're interested in pro racing, Gene from Biking Bis, has added some links and info. on where to check in on the Tour of Missouri.
http://www.bikingbis.com/blog/_archives/2009/9/6/4312518.html
You can also click on the Tour of Missouri Stage 7 map to the right to see the last couple hours of each days action streaming live, plus a bunch of other stuff on the tour. I'll add my pictures later in the week.

tour of missouri

The Tour of Missouri 2009 starts on Monday, Labor Day, with a 75 mile circuit ride in St. Louis. On Tuesday the race moves to a route from Ste. Genevieve to Cape Girardeau in the southeastern part of the state. On Wednesday, stage 3 runs from Farmington to Rolla. Thursday's stage 4 starts in St. James and ends in Missouri's capital, Jefferson City. Then on Friday it really gets interesting. For me, anyway. The last two years I haven't been able to see any of this race, even though Kansas City has hosted a stage. This year things will be different.

For the first time Kansas City will host the finish of the Tour of Missouri, and I plan on being there. But why stop at one stage? I always believed that if a little is good, a lot is better. So, with that in mind I looked at the last 3 stages, and they are all within a couple hours of where I reside. On Friday, September 11, stage 5 is an individual time-trial, held at the home of the Missouri State Fair, Sedalia. If I leave work a little early I'll be able to see more than half the riders cross the finish line. That's just the kind of sacrifice I'm willing to make. I don't collect autographs, and I've always hated the idea of bugging famous people when I'm near them. But, I've got to take my old Discovery Team jersey, and a sharpie, and try to get it signed by one of my favorite riders, George Hincapie.

Saturday's stage 6 is a route from Chillicothe to St. Joseph. Again, the end of the stage is less than a couple hours away, and I'm planning on being there to take pictures. Maybe I can catch the blur that is Mark Cavendish as he sprints toward the finish line. Then on Sunday, the 7th and final stage is close to home in Kansas City, MO. The route will start at the Power and Light District downtown and take riders past the Sprint Center, along the Missouri River in Riverfront Park, past Westport and Union Station, and finish at Crown Center. Promoters promise "countless technical corners and short steep hills" await the riders on this final stage.

I'm really looking forward to seeing these guys in action. It won't be the Pyrenees, but being there live will be a thrill. I promise not to run alongside the riders while wearing a thong, waving a flag, and screaming at the top of my lungs. At least not all at once. Finally, this year's Colorado Rocky Mountain Bike jersey, modeled here by my brother-in-law, Bruce, is covered in red C's with yellow centers, like the state flag. And one day riding up a mountain behind another rider I realized that from far enough back they make it look like the polka-dot jersey that the king-of-the-mountains leader wears in the Tour de France. For a fleeting moment I caught a glimpse of what it might be like to ride in the Alps and Pyrenees. And, as I never caught the polka-dot jersey, it was probably achingly realistic.

crmbt - ouray to montrose

We were up by 5:30am on Saturday, the last day of CRMBT. The route for the day was a 38 mile, slightly downhill run from Ouray back to Montrose, where we'd begun one week ago. To make it more interesting, there was a left turn when you reached Ridgway, taking you off of highway 550 and onto 62 toward Dallas Divide. Instead of "coming on down the other side", we would come back down the way we came. Back on 550 we would have 28 miles to Montrose.

I snapped a few pictures of the moon in the sky over the Ouray skyline and some of the Victorian homes on the neighborhood. We had breakfast, got our bags to the luggage truck, pumped up our tires and were ready to roll. Pat was still dealing with contacts, and sunscreen, but he and Rick had decided to ride straight to Montrose, get cleaned up and get on the road to California. I told him that Alison was catering the BBQ lunch at the finish line and if they timed it right they could eat first. Rick would ride with the rest of us as far as Ridgway where the aid station would be the first and third of the day. The second would be at the summit of Dallas Divide.

We stopped and snapped some pictures as we neared Ridgway of the moon still in the sky, and the hot air balloon rising into the clear, blue sky. I couldn't help but think how unbelievable it would be to see this area from a balloon! We made good time to Ridgway due to the mountains that threw us into Ouray on Friday continuing their work and rolling us out of town and well down the road before we had to work too hard. We filled our bottles, ate part of a bagel and a banana, said our goodbyes to Rick and headed up. Teri wanted to ride Dallas Divide so she set off with Bruce and me through town and toward the peaks in the distance. We were away from the aid station by 8:00am and hopeful to make it to Montrose by 1:00 or 2:00 to get in on lunch before our long drive.

There was some finishing touches in the works on road repair, including uneven lanes and shoulder drop-offs in a few places. But, for the most part, it was smooth, new blacktop which made for a pleasant climb, and promised a more than pleasant descent! The balloon was still in the air, riders going both directions on the road, and not too much traffic to contend with.

The climb was about 11 miles from Ridgway to the top of Dallas Divide, but never too steep. Even stopping for pictures we were all making good time, and enjoying another gorgeous morning. We were told that it had rained much of the week before, and we expected rain in the mountains in the afternoon, but had made it through this week without any bad weather, and very little rain.

We all made it to the summit by 9:20am feeling great! A little sad that this was the last climb, but proud to have done all the miles we had done in the last 8 days. And we still had a good descent ahead of us and a ride to Montrose. Having just come this way, we knew that the turns on our descent were wide, sweeping curves, with terrific visibility and smooth pavement. Conditions were perfect for a fast run into Ridgway. We spent a little time taking pictures and visiting with other riders at the summit including Sean, a guy I met from Grand Junction. He was out riding Dallas Divide by himself just for fun. I love Colorado! He had some questions about the tour and the Copper Triangle. He had done RAGBRAI and could only get away for one week-long tour each year, but was interested in CRMBT for next year. He had tried to enter the Copper Triangle late the week before, but it was already filled. Teri and Bruce were ready to head down and she called out, in Rick's honor, "we're touring".

I couldn't help but smile as we screamed down the mountain. Tucked down as aerodynamically as it's possible for me to get, I was flying without working at all. When I realized I wasn't making up any ground on Bruce and Teri I stood up for a while and pushed to try to get more speed. I got a little closer but couldn't catch them until we were almost in Ridgway. I checked my max speed and it was 47.5mph. When Teri checked hers it was 50! Bruce had really been moving too, but couldn't stay with Teri when she got going downhill. We had just been at the aid station a few minutes before, so we decided to skip the third one and head for Montrose.

We were rolling slightly downhill again making good time and enjoying everything about the ride, except for the headwind. But Bruce was back in his element. He hammered away like he was back in South Dakota. I had stopped for a picture and worked as hard as I could to catch back up. I got to Teri, and the two of us worked to catch Bruce. I don't think we ever would have if he hadn't slowed, but eventually the three of us rode together in to Montrose. We rolled into the school parking lot to hootin' and hollerin' at 11:30. What a feeling of accomplishment! We loaded bikes in the van, grabbed a shower, and sat down to lunch, Alison and her team had brisket, chili dogs, beans, pasta salad, potato salad, and watermelon, and as usual, everything was great.

We said goodbye and thanks to Peter and Hillary. We thanked Kevin and Hugh, the guys from Denver Spoke, Theo the Sherpa Packer, Alison and her team from Cyprus Cafe. We said goodbye to Teri and other riders we had met along the way; Dave from Omaha, Norm, the 70 something years young guy who has done all 3 years of CRMBT after several Ride the Rockies before that. We were glad to be heading toward home, pumped to have completed some hard rides throughout the week, and ready to come back next year. I would highly recommend that cyclists experience a multi-day tour. There's nothing like waking up and knowing all you have to worry about today is "where do I ride?" and "what do I eat?" And, if you can make it to Colorado in August, ride the CRMBT! RIDE THE CRMBT!!!!!