From Your Race Organizers    

It couldn’t have been a better day for the 14th Annual Tour de Tamarack. We had perfect weather, great cyclists and awesome door prizes. First of all, we want to thank our tremendous sponsors for giving us the ability to provide such a phenomenal event: Highmark Blue Cross Blue Shield, Meadville Medical Center Sports Medicine, National City Bank, Innovative Marketing & Public Relations, Emig’s Bicycle Shop and Minuteman Press.
    We also extend a HUGE thank you to all our volunteers - most of whom were from the Girl Scouts of Penn Lakes Council. This is the second year now that we’re giving all the proceeds to the council. We’re glad to have them on board.
We hope all of you - especially those in the citizen races - enjoyed the new awards this year. As we watched the daily stages of the Tour de France, we wondered what each cyclist did with their award - the stuffed Lioness! Steve has already indicated he doesn’t think he’ll ever get to France to win a Lion himself...so in the spirit of the Tour, we brought the Lions to Tamarack! We just may continue the tradition in future years.
    Speaking of future years, we are also contemplating a change in our races. We began spliting the citizens field a few years ago for safety reasons. However, there have been several individuals in the 50+ category along with most of the women who have indicated a desire to ride with their teammates in the first group. So, we are looking at the possibility of having three totally separate races - the Elite 40-mile race; a Citizen Expert 30-mile race; and a Citizen Intermediate 20-mile race. Although NOTHING IS FINALIZED YET, here is what we’re looking to do: The Elite racers’ first, third and last laps will remain the same with the second lap traversing a new hill off of Tamarack Drive called Phelps Road. The Citizen Expert race would take laps 1 and 3 as this year’s 20-mile race did, but their middle lap would traverse up Phelps Road hill. The Citizen Intermediate race will be the same course as the current Citizen Race. All women would ride in the starting pack with their race of choice (20, 30 or 40) - no separate start. We are also considering eliminating the Mountain Bike category of awards. Mountain bikes would be welcome; but there would be no award category.
   Feedback would be greatly appreciated on our ideas. You can email Steve at steve@impr.net or Nina at neeners01@yahoo.com with your comments.

   Again, thanks for another great year and we look forward to doing it all over for the 15th Annual Tour de Tamarack, The Mark Mengel Memorial Bicycle Race.

Nina & Steve Bell