Ivan Stevic
One of the most refreshing things about this year's Tour de Georgia is how the Continental pro cycling teams are getting all the attention and appear to be driving this race.
I know, we've only seen two stages, but the big ProTour cycling teams like Discovery Channel, Team CSC, Predictor-Lotto, QuickStep and Prodir-Saunier have been pretty quiet so far.
All the action has come from cyclists on the smaller budget teams that don't usually compete in the high-prestige bicycle races. This is great recognition for those dedicated guys who train day-after-day for the chance to one day make the big time.
Stage winners
The Stage 1 winner, Daniele Contrini, rides for Tinkoff Credit, a UCI Pro Continental team based in Italy. Stage 2 went to Ivan Stevic of Toyota-United, a UCI American Tour team.
The major breakaways the first two days were populated by riders for Jittery Joe's, Navigators Insurance, Priority Health, Health Net and BMC; not a ProTour team in the bunch.
Overall, Tinkoff cyclist Contrini holds the General Classification and the points competition; Priority Health's Ben Jacques-Maynes leads the King of the Mountains; and the USA National Development Team's John Devine leads the young rider competition.
Haedo
They must all be aware of Juan Jose Haedo, who won two stages of Tour of California and one at Tour de Georgia for Toyota-United last year. This year he's racing at Tour de Georgia for Team CSC.
By this time last year, Lars Michaelson had won the Stage 1 for Team CSC and Yaroslav Popovych had won Stage 2 for Discovery. Now Team CSC and Discovery are sitting behind Tinkoff, Health Net and Navigators in the team competition.
Of course, this could all change on Stage 3. Cyclists like Tom Danielson, or Levi Leipheimer, or Dave Zabriskie, or Gilberto Simoni or any of the other big names could take over the race. But for now, it's fun to watch what these younger guys are up to.
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