St. Louis, MO: Discovery Channel Pro Cycling Team’s George Hincapie won the inaugural Tour of Missouri stage race on Sunday, completing the six-day, 562-mile race 1:38 ahead of second place Will Friskhorn. For Hincapie, Tour of Missouri victory was a particularly high point in a season tinged with its share of bad luck, including an early spring accident that forced Hincapie to miss the Spring Classics, including his beloved Paris-Roubaix. And for Hincapie, victory in Missouri meant going out on top:
"We brought a great team here because it is the last race we do as a team here in the U.S. and so it was very important for us to bring a strong team and try to get the win," said Hincapie. "Fortunately I got in a great breakaway on the second stage and was able to hold on to that.”
Despite being his last domestic race for the ephemeral Discovery Channel—the team he’s ridden with for nearly a decade and the team he’s helped win a remarkable eight Tours de France—Hincapie remains focused on the positive aspects of his time with the team:
"It is sad to see such a great team, in my opinion one of the best sporting franchises in any sport in history, end," said Hincapie. "But I like to focus on the fact that we created this mainstream sport and that we made this sport a lot bigger now here in the U.S. and we've done more than any other team in cycling. It has been an amazing run for me personally. So I'd rather focus on how big it was to be a part of it."
Even though the team won’t race in the U.S. ever again, for George the season's not over. In two weeks he’ll head to the World Championships in Stuttgart, Germany, racing his all-new Madone in pursuit of World Championship stripes.
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