USA's best cycling event comes to town
By JOANNA ATKISSON

Above left: Neil Shirley for the Jittery Joe's Pro Cycling Team based out of Athens, Ga., (our home-town team) won the best aggressive rider award. Above right: Jason McCartney, who not only won the KOM for Stage 6, but the over-all KOM award for the entire Tour.

Known as the 'Queen Stage' of the Tour de Georgia, the Brasstown Bald leg of this professional cycling event is definitely the most challenging. Stage 6 features the signature climb up Brasstown Bald, the highest peak in Georgia with an elevation of 4783 feet. With an average grade of more than 12% , Brasstown Bald also has an elevation gain of 1890 over the last 3.1 miles. This Stage begins in Blairsville, has three 'King of the Mountain' (KOM) climbs (Hogpen Gap, Unicoi Gap and Brasstown Bald), and is 88.4 miles in length. This succeeds Stage 5, which is the longest stage of the tour (133.4 miles), and also includes three KOM climbs, including Burnt Mtn, Woody Gap and Crown Mtn. The entire Tour de Georgia is a grueling seven day professional cycling road race, with a total mileage of 529 miles. Fifteen teams of eight individuals make up the race. Teams competing this year are from the USA, Denmark, Luxembourg, Germany, Spain, Canada, and China.

Thousands of spectators lined the roads up the 3.7 climb from the GA 180 spur to the top of Brasstown Bald. Rain was in the forecast, but the day brought partly cloudy skies and seasonal temperatures for a perfect race-day event. And what a spectacular finish it was. Initially, it appeared as if the final battle was between Levi Leipheimer (USA) of Team Astana, and Trent Lowe (AUS) of Team Slipstream Chipotle. During the final kilometer, Belarusian rider Kanstantin Sivtsov of Team High Road blasted past Lowe and Leipheimer to take this stage by 10 seconds. This put him in first place in the General Classification and overall leader going into Sundays final stage of the tour. Second place went to Lowe with Leipheimer grabbing third place.

In describing the competition during this last kilometer, Leipheimer quotes "I sat up to see what Trent would do, and when I sat down, he (Sivtsov) went. It's hard to think clearly when you're at your limit. Yesterday, Ekimov (team Director) said, 'watch this guy' (referring to Sivtsov). The strongest man won"

Team CSC's Jason McCartney (USA) won best climber of the day for the two KOM climbs on Hogpen Gap and Unicoi Gap. Regarding Sivtsov's performance, McCartney replied, "He looked good the past couple of days- I think Levi underestimated him"

Kanstantin Sivtsov was the 2004 Under-23 World Champion, and turned professional in 2005. The 2008 Tour de California marked his first race in the USA, and the Brasstown Bald finish was Sivtsov's first stage win in the USA. In very broken English, Sivtsov describes his stage win-"today very important-this stage very hard, very steep" and went on to describe the terrain "up and down, up and down". He states the Tour de Georgia is "good conditioning" for the Tour de France.

Third time Tour de Georgia rider Neil Shirley (USA) of the local Athens, GA based Jittery Joe's Pro Cycling Team, was awarded the most aggressive rider for Stage 6. When asked how it felt to be from the 'home-town team', Shirley replied it was "a fantastic feeling-big honor" and praised the "supportive fans". Shirley states he "felt comfortable (during the ride)-knew I had to keep attacking", which had a positive end result with the most aggressive rider award.

The 2008 Tour de Georgia, presented by AT&T, concluded Sunday, April 27 in Atlanta. The Brasstown Bald Stage 6 winners came in as overall winners for the entire week event, with #1 going to Sivtsov, #2 Trent Lowe and #3 to Leipheimer.

Note: It was very humbling for a local amateur recreational cyclist to have been given the opportunity to not only mingle with international press and professional cyclist's, but to experience such an exhilarating sporting event in our own backyard. Even if you are not a cycling enthusiast, I highly recommend everyone try to experience this event at least once in your lifetime.