This past Wednesday (May 18) I joined hundreds (maybe thousands) of others to watch the Tour of California complete the final climb up Sierra Road to a summit finish.
Sierra Road is a tough climb on its own, but by the time the pros reached it they had already summited Mt Hamilton and a series of lesser climbs – a total stage distance of 81m.
Sierra Road itself has an average gradient of 9.1% (2000ft elevation gain in 3.5 miles), with sections at 14%!
Along with a fellow Pen Velo teammate we parked a few miles away to get in a decent warm up before attacking the climb. It was fun to ride up with so many others and scope out a good spot to watch the race come by.
After waiting for around an hour the volume of car and motorbike traffic started to increase, and along with it the anticipation of the fans. With two helicopters clattering overhead, a couple of police cruisers with lights blazing and around 5 motorbikes as escorts buzzing around him, Chris Horner climbed toward our vantage point and quickly flew past looking like the climb was a walk in the park!
A minute or so later the chase group comprising Levi Leipheimer, Andy Schleck, Tom Danielson, Rory Sutherland and Christian Vande Velde came toward us and I decided to run alongside and cheer them on….and sprinting to keep up drove home how amazingly fit these guys are – they were probably climbing at around 14mph!
Greg Henderson enjoying his last day in the Golden jersey.
The Peleton brings up the rear at a fairly sedate pace.
Got some great pics and after the race had passed us by we climbed to the summit to pose under the finish line and then headed off to enjoy our own mini-Tour of the foothills!
