This week Californians see the best of professional cycling in their own backyard. The Tour of California will take racers from the Bay Area to So-Cal over a 650 mile route. Yesterday I watched the race kick off both in person at the prologue and online via the official Tour Tracker.

Prologue

I picked up Guy at the SFO airport and headed to Palo Alto to watch the prologue up close. We arrived just before 11am for a 1pm race start. Although the temperature never climbed much above 50 degrees, it was sunny and clear. Really, the weather could not have been much better for a bike race.

The course was a 2-mile time trial. The start was in downtown Palo Alto and was setup such that a large block of the area was closed for pedestrians. Mobs of cycling fans mulled around trying to get a glimpse of their favorite riders and gather as much free swag as possible. The course quickly exited downtown through a tunnel and then into the Stanford campus. An arrow-straight route gave riders ample time to build a full head of steam before baking one large loop in front of the Stanford building. The finish line was a brief double-back allowing onlookers a chance to see each racer twice.

The setup was designed quite well for spectators. You could get up close to the racers with almost no barrier. There was plenty of space for everyone to line up and have a great view. This is the first time that Palo Alto starts the Tour. The previous two years, San Francisco hosted the prologue with a time trial starting at the Ferry Building and ending at the top of Telegraph Hill. While possibly not as accessible as the Palo Alto course, I found the SF route to be much more unique. It’s odd that a Tour of Cali bypasses San Francisco entirely.

Prior to the start of the race we found a few famous cyclists and snapped a couple of good photos.

Tyler Hamilton

Guy with Phil Ligget

Guy with Bob Roll

Guy with Paul Sherwen

Guy wants Levi to race in the Tour de France

Tour Tracker

The Adobe Tour Tracker made its return this year. Allan Padgett and his crew dusted off one of the best Flex applications out there to bring live video, maps, play-by-play and chatting. I wrote about how awesome this webapp is last year when it was used for the Tour of Missouri.

This year the Tracker brings better live video, better GPS tracking, fan photos, a fan chat room and sign-in allowing users to track their favorite riders throughout the week. The interface has been overhauled and offers a full-screen mode for a fully immersive experience.

Photos are pulled in from Flickr. Under the photos section you can watch on-demand video clips (should maybe be in a different section?). A possible enhancement for the next race is to allow widget creation of content such as a photo or video clip or the current standings.

Well done team Adobe, keep the Tour Tracker going strong!!