Farewell to the Tour of Alberta

At the Tour of Alberta Prologue, 2013.

When the news came down last week that, after a five-year run, the Tour of Alberta professional bike race was kaput—a victim of Alberta’s economic downturn was the official reason cited—I don’t think anyone who follows the world of bike racing was surprised. Disappointed, sure; sad, maybe. But probably not surprised.

This has been coming—in fact, has seemed inevitable—for a while. Government funding for the event has been dwindling the last couple of years, and Alberta’s struggling economy has meant that other sources of funding—corporate sponsorships, community host fees—have been getting scarcer and scarcer. When the size of the event shrank in 2016 and again in 2017, it was starting to look like the beginning of the end.

T of A 2017

Photo credit: cyclingnews.com

Poor old Tour of Alberta. Canada’s only pro cycling stage race, which wrapped up Monday here in Edmonton, is hurting. 

This year’s edition shrank to a measly four stages (the first two years, 2013-14, it was five stages plus a prologue; in 2015 it was 6 stages, no prologue; and then last year it went down to 5 stages). (The only part of the Tour of Alberta that is growing rather than shrinking is the Velothon, the mass participation event held on the closed course in the morning of the final day. This was a huge hit last year and had even more participants this year.) Then word came out last week that government funding for the event is going to be cut even more. Plus, I get the sense that communities aren’t exactly lining up to pay the hefty stage-host fees that this kind of event counts on.

Tour of Alberta 2016 Preview

The Tour of Alberta professional bicycle race is just a few weeks away, but I have to admit that I’m having trouble getting excited about it. The race route this year is, in my view, the least inspired one in the race’s four-year history. Why? No true mountain stage, very little gravel, and too many urban stages. 

Alberta's Tour de Mud(dle)

All Photos: Casey B. Gibson | www.cbgphoto.com

Last Sunday’s stage 5 of the 2015 Tour of Alberta was a curious combination of farce and epic. Some will see what happened that day as irrefutable proof that the event is doomed; others, me included, will see past a muddled ending to great promise.

For naysayers, those skeptical of the whole Tour of Alberta enterprise, the fiasco near the end of stage 5, when second wheel Sven Erik Bystrom took a wrong turn at Albuquerque and the peloton followed him until a marshall on motorbike informed them all that they had to turn around, will be the defining moment of this year’s race, evidence that Alberta’s attempt at pro cycling is bush league.

Jasper in September

I went downhill skiing in Jasper this past weekend, taking full advantage of the Jasper-in-January discounts. While driving up Marmot Basin Road en route to the ski hill, I kept thinking to myself, man, I’ve got to ride my bike up this mountain someday! The road up to Marmot is a stunning and steep ascent of a full-on mountain road, one of those climbs that just keeps going up and up. Think mountain goats and yetis.  Yet I, somehow, had never cycled up it. I’ve ridden my road bike in the Jasper area, and, in fact, cycled right past the turn off a few times. How is it that I’ve never thought to cycle up to the chalet?

So imagine my surprise when later that day I stopped for coffee on the way back through town and saw this headline in The Jasper Local: “Tour of Alberta creates mountain stage in Jasper.” Seems I’m not the only one who’s been thinking about riding a bike up to Marmot. In the article, Tour Executive Director Duane Vienneau explains that the September 5 stage of the Tour will begin in the Jasper town site and end at the top of Marmot Basin Road.  He wouldn’t reveal any more about the specifics of the route at this point, but that hardly matters to Tour organizers and fans who can finally say that the Tour of Alberta has a true mountain stage. 

Pavé Postscript

Alas, I wasn’t able to attend any of the final stages of the Tour of Alberta because I was in Vancouver riding the Whistler Gran Fondo (more on this another day) the exact weekend that the race passed through Edmonton. I did, however, watch some of it on television and read some of the press coverage of the race, and I’d like to follow up on my earlier post about the inclusion of dirt road and “Canadian Pavé” sections in Stage 4 in Strathcona County.

Canadian Pavé

Real European pavé

With the Tour of Alberta wending its way north in the coming days, I’m looking forward to stage 4 Saturday in Strathcona County. As I mentioned a few weeks back, this area just east of Edmonton features one of the most extensive and scenic networks of rural paved roads in Alberta, so it’s an obvious choice for a stage locale.

However, the Tour organizers have introduced a twist on this stage that, at least in theory, I really like: as the Tour website explains, parts of the stage (three sections for a total of 5 km) will take place on roads consisting of “dirt” and “Canadian Pave.” (Why it’s not “Albertan Pave,” I’m not sure.) This latter, of course, is a nod to the European tradition of racing on cobblestones or “pavé," as in the famous Paris-Roubaix race/mudbath. (Not sure what happened to the accent.)  

Tour of Alberta 2014 Preview

The second edition of the Tour of Alberta bike race runs September 2-7 and the race route includes some notable changes from last year, some of them intriguing and others perplexing. Here are one humble fan’s observations about this year’s route (which can be found on the Tour website):

Prologue Report

“Exquisite.” That’s the word Peter Sagan used to describe how he felt after winning the prologue of the inaugural Tour of Alberta last night. Sagan’s English may be a bit shaky, but his word choice on this occasion was perfect. He pretty much nailed how a lot of us who attended last night’s time trial felt when it was all over.

The weather was about as good as it gets in early September around here, a respectable crowd showed up (at least where my gang was, on the hill going up to the legislature), and there was a kind of electricity in the air, especially as the final riders (Sagan, Evans, and Hesjedal) zoomed past. It was a remarkable evening for Edmonton cycling fans, a rare chance to see these strong-men up close. (I could have touched several of the riders—they came that close to the curb I was standing on.) My sons got into the action too, snapping action photos and holding up a home-made sign (a reference to Cadel Evans's deadpan remark at Monday's press conference: "I notice you've got a few potholes here." The mayor was standing next to him. The crowd cracked up.)

And it was also a special evening for Edmonton. The crowd wasn’t spectacular, but it was spirited, lively, appreciative. I’m not sure how many people on the roadside knew what was really going on, but they clapped and cheered for everyone, in solid Canadian fashion. For a lovely few hours the city felt downright cosmopolitan—the kind of place you’d see on television. It was a promising start, not just to this year’s race, but perhaps to something bigger.