Tour de Gila Time

Tour de Gila in Silver City, New Mexico
Johan Bruyneel is staning on the door step of Lance's Motor Home, while lance pleases the crowd by signing autographs. this all took place about 20 minutes before the 40+ mile criterion races started in Silver City New Mexico this past Saturday. I heard that Johan coached his unofficial "Mellow Johnny" team to be especially cautious for crashes.
It was some good advice because there were some really gnarly spills on this up and down, windy course through downtown.
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Our spectator view was just past the last corner into the final strait away toward the finish line. It can't be seen that the street before the turn was a steep downhill. See the flags blowing horizontally? The wind added speed to the down hill, these riders were making the corner at about 50 mph. Most of the photos I took were blurry and I even had it set to fast sports. Those riders were hauling.


I have this idea that Lance was experimenting in this race. one time he would come around in second place. Next time he would be back in the middle of the peleton. I know he was helping his mate Levi Leipheimer, but it was hard for me to tell just how he was doing that. I heard that the part of the route parallel to us a few blocks away was steep and hard on the riders.
Today the Tour de Gila finished up. Lance Twittered saying he is on his way to Italy now .


My two grandchildren Kayla and David went with me to this event. The weather was very nice, but I didn't think of getting sunscreen. We came upon this group with their yellow bikes. I demanded to know who was in charge. I had only seen the "Yellow Bike Project" in one other place; Austin, TX. Turns out the guy in charge lived in Austin for 13 years and was one of the key helpers in getting that program going there. Small world, hey?


And what respectable event wouldn't have the clowns? This dog is purportedly a hospital psychologist. The two legged animal is some kind of attorney. All I have to say is, TOTALLY AWESOME!!!!