By Dan Marries - email
TUCSON, AZ (KOLD) - By now you've probably heard that cycling legend Lance Armstrong is in Tucson training with his new team.
Sponsored by RadioShack, this elite group of riders is already making headlines in the world of professional cycling and they're using Tucson as the springboard to launch the new season.
Seven time Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong gets ready for an early morning ride on Tucson's east side. It's day two of Team RadioShack's training camp. 26 riders from 16 different countries make up the team.
For Armstrong, riding in Tucson is familiar territory, "in 2001 or '02 I spent about two weeks on top of Mt. Lemmon which we had weather similar to today and couldn't hardly get down some of the days."
Armstrong also rode in El Tour de Tucson in 1997. He likes training here, "Tucson is a real cycling mecca. You have good infrastructure for roads, good climbs, nice flats, you also have a lot of bike lanes which is helpful for any cyclist but even for us when you're rolling down the road with 23-24 guys."
It's quite a sight seeing this elite group of cyclists ride down the road, "we're a big posse rolling down the road," Armstrong said today at his first press conference, "and the interaction with the traffic and the local people has been wonderful."
Team RadioShack is a brand new team with quite a few younger cyclists but it also has some very experienced riders including two of the top six overall riders from the 2009 Tour de France.
And the man behind it all, Team Manager Johan Bruyneel, is coming up with other ways - besides cycling - to bring the team together, "(we'll be doing) a game of paintball, maybe a soccer game or something and then we're going to do some mountain biking."
So keep your eyes open. Bruyneel says you just might catch a glimpse of a cycling legend, "the fans can see us pass on the road, or if some of them want to ride with us, that's fine." That is, if they can keep up.
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