The Tour de France starts on Saturday, and like every year I’m excited. So I thought I’d share this throwback photo of Ryder Hesjedal despite the fact he’s sitting out this year’s race. This image was taken at the 2003 NORBA National Championship Series cross-country mountain bike race at Snowshoe Mountain in West Virginia. Hesjedal, a two-time world champion from Canada at the time, dominated the race on that wet, muddy day at Snowshoe. It was an exciting performance to watch. About a year later, he made the full-time switch to road racing. He won the Giro d’Italia in 2012, and finished ninth in last year’s Le Tour. As a former mountain biker and competitive cyclist myself, it was a lot of fun shooting NORBAs at Snowshoe in 2003 and 2004, and I even got to meet some of my childhood idols like John Tomac. I miss mountain biking in West Virginia.
And I miss you mountain biking in West Virginia. ________________________________