Skip to main content

Tour of America Coming in 2008?

By
Do you have some sea salt on hand? Okay, pop a grain into your hand.

Now that we've gotten that out of the way, we can report that there is talk of a country-spanning Tour of America being planned for 2008. This web site has preliminary information about the race. The race is said to have 27 stages that will be contested over 30days. It would start in New York and finish up on the west coast, winding through as many as 22 states. They seem to be tying it into 9/11 as they are trying to start close to that date and the first stage is said to complete at Ground Zero. 

They are offering $11 million in prize money, with $1 million going to the overall winner. They expect to invite the top teams in the world to come to the race. 

I'm all for this. I'm ready to sign up and volunteer, as it looks like a stage will be passing right through my area. 

Joe Lindsey, writer of the Boulder Report blog at Bicycling.com is thinking "What the... ?"

There are some things that cast more than a little doubt in my mind:
  • As mentioned by Velonews , the proposed dates would put it directly into conflict with the Vuelta, the Tour of Missouri and the Worlds. I find it hard to believe that teams will give up their "A" teams to go to an unknown race in the States. 
  • From their front page: ".... Some of the very best of this elite group in the world today hail from the United States. The most famous cyclist in the world is still Lance Armstrong an American. Unfortunately there is not a large enough cycling event in this country worthy of assembling the worlds best talents most of whom are Americans. Isn't it time to bring such an event to this vast country so Americans in this country can experience and admire close up the amazing talents and achievements of our own." There are enough mistatements and grammatical errors in these 4 sentences to cast some doubt on their professionalism.
  •  No mention whatsoever of a presenting sponsor, or who will be ponying up the prize money.
  • No "official" web site yet under aqusports.com
  • No one listed under their race staff seems to have any large scale stage race experience. 
  • Aqu Sports is headquartered in NC. The current web site is run out of Illinois. The race director is based out of San Francisco.
I'm excited about the possibilities. Stay posted for updates. 
Labels:

Popular posts from this blog

Specialized Rolls Out 2008 Products In Advance Of Interbike

By
Specialized has already rolled out much of their new products for 2008 in advance of Interbike.  Saddles: Specialized found that, because of its comfort and light weight, many of their mountain bike riders were using the Toupe road saddle off road. They saw that they could use the same technology to make an MTB saddle that is as light and comfortable, but more durable and off road specific. The result is the new Phenom saddle. They also are rolling out a new time trial/tri saddle called the Tri-Tip. This is very similar to the Toupe, but with a longer and wider, slighty more padded nose. Tires: Specialized grew their tire team this year and worked with long time advisor Ned Overend on a new line of mountain bike tires. This year sees the introduction of the Control line, with S-Works, Captain, Armadillo and S-Carve models. The S-Works tire was designed to be lighter while increasing cut resistance.  The Captain is an all around tire, while the Armadillo is focused on overall d...
Read more

Racing News - Friday September 21st

By
Stage 18 : Luis Perez Rodriguez goes out with a bang, closing out his 13 year career with a stage win in his home country.  4 riders dropped out before the start of Thursday's, the most notable of which was World Chamion Paolo Bettini. 24 riders tried to make an early escape today, but were captured by the peloton at 40km. Soon after, another group of 19 riders broke away. Even that group splintered, and we ended up with a group of 12, consisting of chasers and breakers at the 56km mark. Some of the notable names in the break were Menchov, Sastre, Evans, Sanchez and Mosquera. Chasing closely behind (38 seconds back at 76km) was a 10 man group containing Efimkin and others.  At 93km, the second group was caught be the peloton, while the leaders extended their advantage to 2 minutes and 45 seconds. The leaders cooperated well over the final climb and kept their lead. With 13km to go, Rodriguez put the hammer down and quickly pulled out to a 26 second lead. He managed to keep ahead al...
Read more