TRIA Orthopaedic Center Your Cycling Blog

Carson Miller is a professional for the Land Rover-Orbea team, which benefits the Lance Armstrong Foundation. He’ll be blogging daily during this week’s Nature Valley Grand Prix, so keep tuned to the TRIA Orthopaedic Center blog for some more PRO insight during the race. Enjoy!

With the team having completed a successful first year induction to the TD Bank Philadelphia International Championship, we were all on the road again. I was flying from our team base in Portland, Oregon to St. Paul, Minnesota, and the rest of the team was flying from Philadelphia to St. Paul, MN where we would all meet up to prepare for the Nature Valley Grand Prix.

After spending nine hours in planes, airports, lines, and public transportation systems, I finally connected with the team which had come into St. Paul on a different flight. With the Rovers loaded up, it was off to find our host families for the week. Despite having a GPS enabled LR3, as well as 2 iPhone’s, and 2 BlackBerry’s, I have learned that we almost routinely make several u-turns. And it is definitely easier to pull u-turns when you are not driving an SUV that is towing a 16-foot trailer. Turns out that our “3 u-turn policy,” was almost fulfilled. After some stumbling around, and 2 u-turns, we finally found our way here.

We got things rolling today with a hospital visit in St. Paul. The team was founded and came about as a way to “pay forward” the generosity of the Lance Armstrong Foundation as well as the cancer community that was so terrific in supporting David and Norrene, our team managers, while Norrene’s mom fought her battle with cancer. Part of that mission, is to visit approximately 1 children’s hospital per NRC event that we race in. During these visits, we get to share the joys of cycling with the children while handing out LiveSTRONG wrist bands and telling how they too can LiveSTRONG.

After returning from the hospital, we made ourselves some lunch and prepared the bikes for an afternoon training session. The team rolled out for a couple hours to get the legs moving again. Our evening was simple and low-key; shower, eat dinner, team meeting, and then some time in front of the TV before bed.

With all of the final preparations made for the coming 5 days of racing here at the Nature Valley Grand Prix, my eyes are getting a bit heavy, and tomorrow will get off to an early 9:45 start as we all take a crack at the challenging 7km TT.

Thanks for reading. As a side note, I am going to be keeping daily updates coming here. As part of this week’s racing, I have agreed to keep some daily updates, and you can all find them right here. Until tomorrow…

Keep the Rubber Side Down,

C-

Carson Miller,LAF,Land Rover,LiveStrong,MBF,Minnesota Bike Festival,Nature Valley Grand Prix,NVGP,ORBEA     Comments Off  

PORTLAND, Oregon; May 6, 2009 – Roman van Uden, 20 year old youngster from Auckland, New Zealand wins the 23rd Annual SRAM Tour of the Gila Silver City Downtown Criterium. “This is a huge win for the young Land Rover-ORBEA squad,” said co founder Norrene Godfrey “especially in our first year as a professional cycling team.” Land Rover-ORBEA has two core missions, raise funds and awareness for the Lance Armstrong Foundation and help develop young cycling athletes into the next generation professional athlete.

A big field, strong winds and tricky corners made it difficult for the men’s race around the 1.04-mile course that had 80 feet of climbing per lap. “I got into a good position, guys were riding pretty fast at the front, crashes took out Levi and a few other guys and I snuck through, so we had gaps forming behind. A rider shot through the front trying to get away a bit with half mile to go and then sat up and I snuck around him outside on the very last corner, he sort of opened a gap and it gave me enough room to take the win.” commented van Uden.

After the race, Lance Armstrong himself complimented the Land Rover-ORBEA squad on their professionalism both on and off the bike – as the team handed out LIVESTRONG wristbands to the crowd and to all the kids who participated in the kid’s event, further spreading the word and mission of the Lance Armstrong Foundation.

Positive results today inspire confidence for tomorrow. “Along with the stage win, the team continued to show aggressive racing by being represented in the major breaks and by learning to work cohesively as a team,” continued Godfrey, “and it’s great confidence boost as we go into the next races.”

Next on the team’s schedule race schedule is the Joe Martin Stage Race in Fayetteville, Arkansas -May 7-10th where the young team will be looking to keep the winning streak alive. After Joe Martin, the team will be leading a LIVESTRONG ride in Portland, Oregon on May 24th, racing TD Bank Philadelphia International Championship in Philadelphia June 7th and the Nature Valley Grand Prix in Minneapolis, Minnesota June 11th – 14th.

To learn more about the Land Rover-ORBEA cycling team please visit www.landrover-orbea.com or follow the team on Facebook.

Each year the team raises funds for the Lance Armstrong Foundation and each year the team gives away it’s spot in the Seattle LIVESTRONG Challenge to a cancer survivor. For more information, visit http://www.landrover-orbea.org.

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