Team Discovery Autograph Signing September 10

My boys and I attended a small gathering the night before the Tour of Missouri. Team Discovery cyclist were there signing autographs. All of the Team Discovery Cyclist were really enjoyable to talk to and get autographs from. The boys had a lot of fun.

Yaroslav Popovych was really nice and talked to the boys quite a bit. He his the Russian on the team and placed 8th at the Tour de France. Yaroslav talked about his 7 month old child that he hasn't seen very much. When he isn't racing he is either training or traveling. Yaroslav was incredibly nice to the kids and told them cycling stories.

Eberto Contador, the Tour de France Champion, talked to the boys about cycling. Eberto doesn't speak english real well, so we had a hard time understanding him. His vibrant personality came out. Coach helped interpreted a few things for him. He was really excited to be in KC. It's a new area for him. Cycling gives him the opportunity to travel.

Tour of Missouri

Team Discovery at the first "Tour of Missouri." The race started with 15 professional cycling teams and is a stage race covering 600 miles in Missouri. These are pics from Stage 1 in Kansas City.

Everyone around was very surprised how fast the cyclist were riding. Up the Ward Parkway hill the peleton was going 27 mph. Down the hill, we estimated that the peleton was pedaling around 40-50 mph. 

It was projected that the race would draw around 50,000 fans for the race. Between the plaza and Ward Parkway and down main street, I would guess there was over 100,000 spectators. This doesn't include downtown and the course up to Platte City.

The last 10 miles lead up to a great sprint. For more information, go to: http://www.TourOfMissouri.com