Today is the start of the Tour of Missouri in St. Louis with a ~75 mile circuit race. I spend most of the midday baking in the sun waiting around the buses to meet some of the racers and meet them I did. I figured Columbia HTC would give me the most 'bang for my buck' in terms of seeing my cycling heroes, so I spent a lot of time hanging around their trailer. There was a mob of people who descended upon each racer as they arrived from the hotel but once they went into the trailer most people left. I stuck around and as the guys came out to get saddled up, I was able to greet George Hincapie, Mark Cavendish and Bernie Eisel. They also let me hold Thor Hushovd's bike (the same bike he rode in the TDF when he wasn't on the green bike).

Everyone around was really approachable-- the mechanics, the racers, the coaches. The Astana mechanic told me that each biker gets at least 5 different bikes per season. Lance had 8 different bike for the TDF alone

Me holding Thor's bike! (all 6.2 kg of it!)


The Cav!


George! (the best picture I could manage)


The race was exciting, but I'm not going to lie. It was more exciting to shake the hands of these guys!

Additionally, I got a sweet Columbia Omni-Shade hat for ten bucks and a warm up fleece for $30 too 8') They're selling last year's stuff apparently.