ST. LOUIS, Mo. (SEPTEMBER 5, 2009) --- The preliminary rosters for the upcoming Tour of Missouri were announced today by race organizers, unveiling a preview for Monday's Tour of Missouri, one of the biggest and most important bike races outside Europe.

The race will feature defending-champion Christian Vande Velde of the Garmin-Slipstream team (Lemont, Ill.), and teammate and current U.S. national time trial champion David Zabriskie; U.S. Professional Champion and 2007 race champion George Hincapie, 10-time Tour de France stage winner Mark Cavendish of Great Britain, three-time world time trial champion Mick Rogers of Australia and former Italian national champion in the time trial Marco Pinotti, all of the Columbia-HTC team.

The race also features Thor Hushovd of Norway, the Tour de France sprint jersey winner and teammate Henrich Haussler of Germany, a Tour de France stage winner, both of the Cervelo Test Team; and Italy's Franco Pellizotti, the best climber's champion, from the Liquigas-Cannondale team.

The world's No. 1-ranked team Astana will feature Levi Leipheimer, the three-time winner of the Amgen Tour of California and Olympic bronze medalist in Beijing and 2007 Tour de Georgia winner Janez Brajkovic, the current national time trial champion of Slovenia. Team Saxo Bank will feature Beijing Olympic silver medalist in the time trial, Gustav Larsson of Sweden and German star Jens Voigt and 2008 Danish national champ Nicki Sorensen.

All the top riders on the domestic circuit are participating, including national series leader Tom Zirbel of team Bissell and 2008 Tour of Utah winner Jeff Louder of BMC.

For the first time ever, an American stage race will host teams of the top-five ranked in the world. In all seven of the top 10 teams have entrants into the Tour of Missouri.

In all, there are three Olympic medalists, 18 current or former national champions, 10 stage winners of the Tour de France, and several podium finishers of at the grand tours of France, Italy and Spain. There are also 24 riders that rode this year's Tour de France and all podium (top three) finishers from this year's U.S. National Championships for road race and time trial.

"This is, without doubt, one of the best fields ever to race on American soil," said race director Jim Birrell. "We have Tour de France heroes, winners of major international races, the top international and nationally ranked teams, and Olympic medalists and national champions. No doubt, this will be a great race."

Added race commentator Paul Sherwen, who will host the TV coverage slated for the worldwide web on Universalsports.com, Versus and Fox Sports Midwest: "This race has grown quite rapidly. The field at Missouri rivals any of the top races in the world outside the Tour de France. Personally, I am very excited about the race and its outcome."

Click HERE to view Preliminary roster