Tour de Georgia and Other Happenings

This is a catch up posting. There have been a lot of rides and now, the Tour de Georgia has come to town. Today was Team Time Trials at Road Atlanta near Braselton. 15 teams, 2 at a time, starting about 2 minutes apart (if I remember correctly) did 4 laps or 10 miles. Best time was slightly under 20 minutes.

This young princess is a Tour de Georgia fan and chooses to go to Tour events for her birthday which was Tuesday. She states that it is her birthday month, not just one week or one day anymore. Last year, Tyler Hamilton seranaded her with Happy Birthday and so do we this year wish her a Happy Birthday. She wants to start a bicycle team at her high school and is searching for a college with a bicycle team.

Not sure which team this is but they are on the steep climb at Road Atlanta. The time trial route is reversed from the auto racing so they got to go up the hill, not swoop down and then have to make a fairly hard right turn.

My favorite car on the Tour.

Jelly Belly riders warming up before their time trial.

View from up on top of the hill looking southeast.

That was about it for the Tour pictures for 04/24. More tomorrow and possibly Saturday if the rain does not scare me away. The scene above is a nice view of a lake up on Skitts Mountain Road from my ride last weekend.

This is from West Georgia State University. The drummer is my son Wes and the band he is in was playing for an Earth Day event. Debbie went there to set up a booth to promote recycling and green living and was given the opportunity to display and discuss Shaklee's Get Clean product line of non-toxic cleaners.

Saturday afternoon of last week, I did the Tour de Gainesville - at least, that is my name for the ride. I did about 17 miles in the northern part of the city - interesting climbs on some of those side streets and hit 18% in one spot. The Big City Cafe has my favorite hamburger and is open for lunch during the week.

Downtown Gainesville square. Old Joe is in the middle and is facing north to warn us of approaching Yankees or so the legend goes.

No ride in Gainesville would be complete without a ride to THE ROCK. The rock is a Gainesville High School billboard so to speak and was saved from destruction several years ago when the Corps of Engineers wanted to make some changes in the area. My thought - You can mess with my bicycle but don't mess with THE ROCK.!