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No cycling race can match the finish of the Tour de France, with its celebratory parade past the Arc de Triomphe.
But August's inaugural run of the Larry H. Miller Tour of Utah is designed to give its elite cyclists another memorable finale.
The sixth and final stage of the Aug. 7-12 tour starts in downtown Salt Lake City at the Delta Center, heads up Emigration Canyon, before swinging over to Interstate 80 for the climb over Parleys Summit. After speeding through Park City and Heber City, racers will descend Provo Canyon to Sundance, then head to Salt Lake County for a final furious grind up Little Cottonwood Canyon to Snowbird.
That's a cumulative climb of 17,000 vertical feet over 114 miles.
"This stage will break the majority of racers' backs," said Gardie Jackson, 38, of Park City, and a member of the Logan-based Sienna Development/Goble Knee Clinic team.
And it will make an impression, one that sponsors hope will eventually elevate the Tour of Utah onto the national, perhaps even international, cycling circuit.
"We really feel it has the growth potential to become a national cycling event," said Jeff Robbins, executive director of the Utah Sports Commission, which helped bring together the event's primary corporate sponsors, the Larry H. Miller Group and Zions Bank, with USA Cycling, professional biking teams and officials of the five Utah counties traversed by the stages.
The anticipated $800,000 cost of staging this year's race is being underwritten largely by the Miller Group, which also plans to stage an accompanying fundraiser whose beneficiaries will include children's physical fitness programs, the Utah Bicycle Coalition and the Utah Freedom Festival.
"This race meshes with the values of our organization - hard work, spirited competition and family-friendly," said Greg Miller.
Tour of Utah race director Jason Preston said four top domestic professional teams have committed to compete: Navigators Insurance, Toyota-United, Health Net and TIAA-CREF. Organizers plan to fill out the ranks of roughly 100 riders with 12 teams selected from among hopefuls applying online at http://www
.TourofUtah.com.
Finding qualified cyclists shouldn't be a problem, said Preston, noting that winners will receive a $45,000 prize purse.
"That [final] stage has already put us on the map," he said, predicting its reputation will attract more elite cyclists as the event matures. "You can't find a stage like that anywhere else. But you can do it here because of geography, with the cities so close to the mountains, the same reasoning that made us [ideal] for the Olympics."
Robbins said the "Olympic halo" worn by Salt Lake City since its successful staging of the 2002 Winter Games clearly helped Tour of Utah organizers gain the support of national cycling officials.
"They know that if we can pull off an event of the caliber of the Olympics, we can do this," said Robbins, who discussed the proposal recently with USA Cycling officials while attending the Tour of Georgia. In its third year, that event attracted roughly 800,000 spectators. February's Tour of California drew 1.3 million spectators, he noted.
"There's tremendous economic development potential through these types of events," he said.
And, Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson emphasized, a potential to stimulate people to adopt healthy lifestyles. "This is all about a better quality of life and a healthy community."
For the six-day run in August, the event will take riders through the Wasatch Front's varied scenic terrain.
Day 1, Aug. 7, involves a 105.4-mile race around Utah Lake and downtown Provo. The 102.3-mile second stage heads southwest from Lehi, around the southern end of the Oquirrh Mountains and curls back up into Tooele County, where it concludes with six laps around the new Larry H. Miller Motorsports Park.
A 14.9-mile time trial will cross the Heber Valley, beginning and ending at Soldier Hollow, on Day 3. The fourth stage takes riders from Provo past the southeastern shore of Utah Lake, through Payson and up to the top of Mount Nebo, 100 miles in all.
Racers move to Salt Lake City on Day 5, for an evening ride over an unspecified course. That sets the stage for the Aug. 12 conclusion at Snowbird.
Steve Johnson, USA Cycling's chief executive and a one-time University of Utah official, was thrilled about Tour of Utah plans.
"One of the most important ways to grow our sport in this country is to stage these high-profile events in large population areas," he said. "It's great to have an event in Utah. There's spectacular country and they can really develop some challenging courses. It's going to be great bike racing."
Tour of Utah Cycling Race
When: Aug. 7-12
Where: Salt Lake, Utah, Wasatch, Summit, Tooele counties
Total Length: 467 miles
Purse: $45,000 for winners
Cost to watch: Free