The 2016 Tour de Bowness is on this weekend, and for the first time, I took the kids out to watch the hill climb event. It is a time trial, where the riders start at the bottom of the Canada Olympic Park road and climb the hill as fast as they can. We ride that hill every once in a while with the Bow Cyclists, and it’s a killer. Not too long: only 1.2 km, but it’s a 6 to 10 percent grade. It takes me about seven minutes.
When we walked up the road to get spots at the finish line, the weather was hot and sunny, but a huge thunderstorm was piling up in the north-west.
We got our spots, but the storm kept coming closer.
We managed to watch the category five riders (about 25 or so), but it became obvious that the storm was coming straight for us. Lightning was striking in the valley below us, and I figured it wasn’t going to be safe to stay where we were.
We started walking down the hill, cheering the category four riders as they went by. But the race was suspended and then the rains came. Our timing was good: we made it to the car just as the scattered big drops were turning into a downpour. Driving home was like going through the car wash, it was raining so hard.
Oh well. I did get to cheer on Chris from the club, and talked with Mark Fed (Bow Cyclists El Presidente) before the race.
