Frank and Andy Schleck as well as Kim Kirchen go to the start of “La Vuelta”, or the Tour de Spain today at the 4.8 km prologue in ……………….. Assen, The Netherlands! The Vuelta will go over 21 stages and a total of 3,292.3 km from August 29 to September 20, with the final stage arriving in Spain’s capital Madrid. Unfortunately, there will be no good coverage of the event in the US. Versus will not carry it. Some local over the air channels though might do it. For most of us, a good bet seems to be:
and
with live streaming video.
Another source of information is the official website:
http://www.lavuelta.com/
It gives detail about the various stages as follows:
1 - Assen - Assen (ITT) 4,8 km
21 - Rivas-Vaciamadrid - Madrid 110,2 km
With the Giro d’Italia, La Vuelta is one of the two grand nieces of the mother of all Tours, the Tour de France. This year’s start in the Netherlands is not only following the trend in which Tours more and more cross the national borders. In this case it starts in a country that has no contiguous border with Spain. This makes those tours interesting beyond the sports event or even the touristic interest. In this case there is an obvious reference to history, when the Low Lands, which comprise today’s Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg were under Spanish rule from 1579 – 1713.
Below are links to two maps, showing La Vuelta 2009 and a historic map of the Spanish Netherlands.
With the Giro d’Italia, La Vuelta is one of the two grand nieces of the mother of all Tours, the Tour de France. This year’s start in the Netherlands is not only following the trend in which Tours more and more cross the national borders. In this case it starts in a country that has no contiguous border with Spain. This makes those tours interesting beyond the sports event or even the touristic interest. In this case there is an obvious reference to history, when the Low Lands, which comprise today’s Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg were under Spanish rule from 1579 – 1713.
Below are links to two maps, showing La Vuelta 2009 and a historic map of the Spanish Netherlands.
La Vuelta 2009 map: http://www.lavuelta.com/09/ingles/recorrido/mapa.html?e=p
Historic Spanish Netherlands: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d5/Netherlands_1559-1608.jpg/250px-Netherlands_1559-1608.jpg
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