RADelaide*

Lance Armstrong is currently in Adelaide for The Tour Down Under (TDU). This yearly event, which was first held in 1999, is the first stop in the world cycling calendar.  Each January top cycling teams come to Southern Australia to participate in the week-long competition that takes the cyclists through the streets of Adelaide and the surrounding rural countryside.

Australians take this event seriously. In the weeks leading up to the tour, Adelaide becomes a mecca for lycra dressed men and women on bikes--they fill the local streets, bike paths and cafes.  During the week of the race crowds turn out in the thousands to watch the various stages of the tour.  So it was no surprise that after a tweet by Lance Armstrong, inviting the masses to ride with him in a public peloton, over 5,000 cyclists joined him yesterday morning for a pre-TDU ride.

Riders were to meet at Wriggley Reserve, which is conviniently located a couple of blocks from our flat.  The large crowd gathered early and patiently waited for Lance, who showed up a little past the scheduled 9:00 a.m. departure.  He took a few minutes to shake hands, sign autographs, and greet the crowd before leading the cyclists, of all ages and walks of life, on the hour long jaunt.

My lycra donned husband, a regular bicycle rider, wasn't about to miss this once in a lifetime opportunity.  He said over all the roundtrip ride from Glenelg to West Lakes went smoothly and he was thrilled to have participated in the event.

*in German Rad means bicycle