USA Pro Cycling Challenge Photo Round-Up!

What a whirlwind tour of awesomeness.  Ted and Dave’s excellent adventure (I’m Ted) was a dive into the unknown, neither of us were avid followers of the pro racing circuit so we didn’t fully know what to expect as we headed out on the road to follow the 2012 USA Pro Cycling Challenge.  As we do at Strider our task was to get kids on 2 wheels and what better place to do it than during the USAPCC, with over a million spectators in total the odds were in our favor.  Little did we know what we had gotten ourselves into : )

We started in Durango for the opening weekend festival which was on the Fort Lewis College campus.  What a beautiful bike friendly town.  Being my first time in Southwestern Colorado I was in awe of its beauty and how many STRIDER riders there were out and about.  Durango is a dedicated STRIDER town as evidenced by the amount of kids that rode in our Adventure Zone on Saturday and Sunday.  From Durango we were always ahead of the tour, tearing down at night and heading to the next day’s town’s finish line festival.  Our typical day was to get up early, eat, get to the festival and set up, run the Adventure Zone till 6pm, load out, head to the next town (which was often 3 hours or so away), grab some food, get settled into the hotel and sleep hard till the alarm, etc. etc. etc.

I’ll save the poetic imagery for the poets but what a beautiful state to have the race.  Honestly all the stops were fantastic and the kids were tons of fun.  While we were pretty tired at the end of the day working with the kids and the bikes make/made the days a true pleasure.  The kids and the parents both bring a sense of enthusiasm and excitement that meshed perfectly with the USAPCC.  The joy and camaraderie of cycling was always evident.  I never tire of seeing the kids with a big smile on their face as they are going down an Adventure Zone ramp or hearing a success story from a parent of how their child learned balance, independence and how to ride a pedal bike from his/her experiences on a STRIDER.

We at HQ know that Colorado is STRIDER country and from Dave and Ted we’d like to thank you for a wonderful reception and memorable experience.

Oh ya – PS  – Congrats Christian!

We’d love to see photos and hear stories from others they met along the way. If you stopped by the 2 day festival in Durango, rode an adventure zone at one of the finish festivals, or raced in the STRIDER Cup in Denver share your photo or story on our Facebook wall or join the conversation over at Strider Life! Below is a list of our photos from all of the stops.

Photo sets from all the USA Pro Cycling Challenge finish festivals:

1. Durango (Start Festival) – Aug 18-19 – Flickr Set

2. Telluride – August 20 – Flickr Set

3. Crested Butte – August 21 – Flickr Set

4. Aspen – August 22 – Flickr Set

5. Beaver Creek – August 23 – Flickr Set

6. Colorado Springs – August 24 – Flickr Set

7. Boulder – August 25 – Flickr Set

8. Denver (Finish Fest and Strider Cup) – August 26 – Flickr Set

Share your Strider success stories, photos, video and interact with other Strider enthusiasts at our newest centralized social media outlet www.StriderLife.com! Join the Strider conversation on our Facebook wall!