It was a bit of a sore point with me that until today, I hadn’t attended a single stage of the Tour of Alberta, and it going into its fourth year. I’d taken part in the Tour of Alberta Challenge, which started in the chute for the 2nd stage of the race in 2013, but afterwards I was so tired that I didn’t go watch the final laps of downtown Calgary. Probably my one and only chance to see Peter Sagan in person… Then in 2014, there was a hill climb stage up the Canada Olympic Park that Tom Dumoulin won, but I didn’t get any enthusiasm to go watch it from the family and I only watched it on TV. All the rest of the stages (including all of the 2015 Tour) were Edmonton and north.
So when I found out that the 2nd stage of 2016 would be coming close, I booked it in my calendar. Tammy was working, so it was the kids and I. We drove the 15 km or so to the top of Cochrane hill, and then walked to a point where we had a great view of the hill and the town.
As you can guess, the weather wasn’t cooperating. The wind was blowing, and sprinkles of rain started almost as soon as we set up the chairs.
On the plus side, we’d brought three umbrellas, so we stayed dry, but Ian forgot his jacket at home, so he wore mine, leaving me in a T-shirt. We ran into Mark (Bow Cyclists club prez) and his two boys. He was kind enough to lend me a blanket to cover my shoulders while we waited. There was quite a crowd by the time the riders were climbing the hill. We managed to survive the elements, and then the riders went by, along with lots of police cars, motorcycles and team cars. We cheered them on.
If the weather had been better, we might have gone on to Olds, where the finish line was, but we were cold and damp. So we went home and had hot chocolate and watched the rest of the race on my iPad.
I finally got to see the Tour of Alberta peloton go by.
🌧☔️🌧Brrrrr!!!