No Tickets Required

Get your vacation requests ready, because in 11 months we'll be able to witness something truly cool: the best pro cyclists in the world (think Lance Armstrong) racing through Kansas City. Apparently the committment is made and the dates officially set--September 11 – 16, 2007 will see the first ever professional Tour of Missouri bike race. Teams from Europe should attend and everything. I'm not leaning any closer to moving to Missouri, but I'm officially jealous. Luckily, I live close enough to the state line to also be officially geeked. Awesome.

I found out about it yesterday through cyclingnews:

Missouri State will play host to the inaugural Tour of Missouri, September 11 – 16, 2007. It has been slated as one of only five stage races in the newly-created USA Cycling ProTour, which will highlight the top multi-day races in America. The race, categorized by the UCI, is sanctioned by USA Cycling.

The inaugural tour will play host to up to 16 major professional teams, including some of Europe's top ProTour teams. Fred Rodriguez of the Belgium-based Davitamon-Lotto team was in attendance and commented, "The Tour of Missouri is situated perfectly for American domestic teams as well as top Americans who have raced much of the season in Europe. For an American, having three major stages in the U.S. for the first time is great news. ... The Tour of Missouri will provide a great opportunity for Americans looking to prepare for the world championships at the end of the season."

The mid-September date follows the USA championships in Greenville, South Carolina, and before the world championships.

The six-day race is expected to start in the western part of the state around Kansas City and finish around St. Louis, according to race organizers, who will begin negotiating with potential start and finish cities immediately. The tour is expected to cover about 970 kilometers (or 600 miles) and highlight urban as well as rural parts of the Missouri.

You can also read commentary from Mike Hendricks in today's KC Star:

. . . Bicycling as a spectator sport is on the rise in the United States. And with this week’s announcement, Missouri became only the third state in what is expected to be no more than a five-state circuit of weeklong, Tour de France-style stage races.

According to a Georgia Tech study, the 2005 Tour de Georgia generated $36 million in economic benefit. California’s tour attracts more than a million spectators.

If Missouri does half as well, tourism officials would be thrilled.

Some of the financial windfall comes from racing teams buying supplies. But also, as Georgia and California found out, cycling fans have money and are happy to part with it.

They come to see world-class riders speed by them (that’s free) and then retire to host towns where the party will be on.

“It’s sort of like a rolling festival,” says Steve Brunner, a spokesman for the event organizer, Medalist Sports. . . .

And if you want a little more insight into why this excite's me so, let me refer you back to a previous post I wrote about the Tour de France. Good visuals in the links at the bottom of that report.