As many of you already know, the final stage and award presentations for the le Tour de France was held yesterday (7/21/2013) which wraps up this year’s race. I watched most of the stages of this year’s race on TV and still love watching. I am disappointed that it is over but it would not be so special if it were on all the time.
le 2013 Tour de France ends
I was glad to see Chris Froom win the yellow jersey this year especially after his sacrifice in taking 2nd place in the overall standings of last year’s race. There were times it looked like he could have even won the 2012 TDF but instead put his support and effort into helping his teammate Bradley Wiggins to take the win. At any rate it’s been a very good 2 years for the Brits in the TDF.
Being from the “left side of the pond” I was hoping to see the Americans take some stages or maybe a jersey but that did not happen this year. TeJay Van Garderan (last year’s white jersey winner) looked like he had stage 18 won, and I was holding my breath at the end until he was over taken by the French rider Christophe Riblon and ended up taking 2nd place for the day. I guess our French hosts needed a win but it would have been nice for a win for us too. We also had a great showing from American rider, Andrew Talansky who took 10th place in the overall standings.
Of course, you can get all the detailed stats on a number of websites including the official www.letour.fr site but I just wanted to mention some of the results and things that I found to be interesting.
As for myself, I really love the high mountain stages, like the last few stages in the Alps this year. The scenery is beautiful, the riders really work hard getting to the top of each mountain and the descents are fast (dangerous) and exciting. The fans can also be entertaining especially towards the tops of the mountains where they all gather (some of them in costumes) and barely give the riders room to pass and often run alongside the riders. Of course, some of the fans can over do it too and I have seen many of the riders pushing fans aside to get through (which looks frustrating).
As I mentioned before “le Tour” began this year, Proform had come out with a new version of their popular indoor cycle ~ the Proform Centennial TDF Bike ~ and I noticed, through my website traffic stats, that this indoor cycle has been very popular this year.
As for the second part of this blog post title above ~ The Tour to Begin Soon ~ you probably noticed the big difference is “le Tour” (i.e. the French version) vs “The Tour” (i.e. the English version) and the Tour that I am referring to is The Tour of Elk Grove, for those of us who live in the Chicagoland area or for those who may be visiting us in the beginning of August.
The Tour of Elk Grove to Begin Soon
The Pro Races at the Tour of Elk Grove (TOEG) are actually major international bike races sponsored by Alexian Brothers Hospital and recognized by the UCI (Union Cycliste Internationale, based in Switzerland) but there are also amateur races and plenty of other activities to keep you entertained (if you get bored with the races… what!).
This event will start on Friday (8/2/2013) and run through Sunday (8/4/2013). You don’t want to miss this and you can check out all the details on the official TOEG website at www.tourofelkgrove.com.
This event is also televised locally on Comcast Sports Network (CSN Chicago) usually about a month after the event is held. I will try to post the dates of the broadcast ahead of time this year as I did last year.
One of the things that I noticed on the TOEG site for this years event is that Bob Roll is scheduled to announce this years races!!! This is the famous “Bobke” (as he is called) who is one of the main Tour de France TV announcers.
I attended this event on all 3 days last year and it was a lot of fun and a great photo op for those of you into photography. You can see our photos of the 2012 TOEG on our 2012 Tour of Elk Grove pages.