Tour de Todd

Alexi Ramirez is from Trinidad & Tobago. She is one of their top cyclist. Recently she raced in the Indy Crit weekend races. She finished 12th on Friday and 13th on Saturday. Ramirez has a bit of down time and then she heads to the Gateway Cup in St. Louis. 

This year has been a banner year for Ramirez. She won both the national road race and time trial championships for Trinidad & Tobago. She also came in second in the omnium in the Pan American Championships. That omnium was one of her top goals of the year. Now she's beginning her preps for the Pan American Games in Chile at the end of October. 

After three years of racing with the CWA Racing Team Ramirez moved over the Miami Blazers team. They always look super dope in their kits. 

Alexi got into cycling through her dad. He was on the national team back in the day. She started at 21 years old for fun. Her first race was a team pursuit on the track. Now years later she's traveling the world racing Nations Cups, international stage races and big time criteriums here in the U.S.

Kaia Clemente is a household name in MTB racing here in the Sunshine State. She's always loved riding her bike with friends to the beach. But when her dad, Raphael Clemente, took her and a cousin mountain biking at 12 years old she was hooked. 

When she started getting serious about racing it wasn't fitness that was the biggest challenge but rather the racing itself. Her first race at Dyer Park here in Palm Beach County, Florida in the junior women's class she won. 

Going into high school Kaia began racing NICA or the National Interscholastic Cycling Association. Then she began racing the Florida State Championships Series. In 2022 she won the entire series as the youngest competitor for women. 

This season she's focusing on specific events instead of the entire series. This season she's going to target on college admissions. 

Some day this young lady would like to race the MTB World Cup Series. But at the moment she's got to finish high school. 

Rene Wenzel has a long history in the sport of cycling. He started out as a junior rider in Denmark. He was quite successful as a junior by winning Danish and Scandinavian Junior Road Championships. Once he moved up to the senior ranks he eventually moved to Belgium and France to race. By the end of 1980 Wenzel says he had mono. He says that was a tough 12 to 14 months. 

Wenzel would recover and eventually come over to the states with a friend and race. He would race track and criteriums quite successfully. By the late 80's he was back in Denmark and he would eventually retire with over 300 plus wins to his credit. 

Coaching would take over for Wenzel. In the 90's he would work with the U.S. Junior National Team, work with the Saturn team twice, and own and run the Subway team.

Wenzel would eventually walk away from cycling. He says it was disappointing to see the drug situation in Europe when he would bring his team over for some early season racing. Wenzel and Angus Fraser would later be accused and sued for allegedly giving illegal substances to Greg Strock and Erich Kaiter when they were juniors. Wenzel denies the accusations. 

He recently left a position with the Indian Cycling Federation. 

Ashton Lambie is a busy man. He recently completed a 1,000 mile gravel race and is now preparing to be a cyclor on one of the worlds most prestigious Sailing teams. 

Lambie grew up in Nebraska. He began racing gravel and even ventured into road racing. He quickly realized road racing wasn't his thing. While living in Lawrence, Kansas he was introduced to grass track racing. And he quickly realized he was good on a track bike. A chance meeting with former Olympian Carl Sundquist sparked an interest in Lambie racing in T-town. 

In 2017 Lambie's debut at Track Mats he got first in the pursuit and second in the omnium and points race. That same year he got third in a World Cup in Santiago, Chile in the team pursuit. Along the way he picked up more national titles and wins at the Pan Am Championships.

In 2021 he was pursuit  World Champion beating the likes of Jonathan Milan and Filippo Ganna. Soon after his world title Lambie walked away from the track. 

Currently Lambie is living in Houston. He's riding a bike and sailing while his wife is working towards being an astronaut. 

Raphael Clemente is a Florida legend. In high school he was a swimmer but got burned out. So, he bought a bike. His first race was an open race in either 88-89. He won. From then on Raphael progressed quickly through the ranks. Olympian Carl Sundquist would help him out with training. 

In 1991 Raphael hit the national circuit. He got picked up by a great team called "Bicycle Sport" out of Vero Beach, Florida. He ended up doing big races against the likes of Mike McCarthy, Thomas Craven, to the New England legends and brothers Mark and Frank McCormack. 

Eventually Raphael would race in Europe. He raced for a team in the Netherlands for a year called ASC Olympia. 

Raphael eventually turned pro in 1995. His goals was to make it to the Olympics. Even though he didn't make it on the team his time as a top athlete has served him well in life. 

He eventually left the sport in 1996 to pursue a different career. He's currently working in West Palm Beach, Florida. He has a daughter who's also a beast on the bike like her dad. 

Steve Brunner is the man behind the Maryland Cycling Classic. Brunner grew up in Kenosha, Wisconsin. This midwest guy has worked with some of the biggest bike races in the world. He's worked with the Tour de Georgia, Olympics, Amgen Tour of California to the Tour of China just to name a few. 

Brunner started King of the Mountain Sports based out of Colorado in 2006. He's got over 30 years experience putting on world class events. 

The Maryland Cycling Classic is his new project. The road race is one day, 120 miles long, with World Tour and Pro Tour teams participating. The first race was won by Sep Vanmarcke in 2022. 

In this episode Brunner and I talk about getting the race off the ground, why Baltimore, and will the race ever be more than a one day event. 

TW Carbon started in 2014. They do carbon repair and custom paint. Most of their business is in the bike industry but they will venture out and do work on a boat or car. 

The Kirkwood, Missouri company gets business from across the country. They do ultrasonic scans to check for damage. Owner Nick Hand says it's not the crack that's going to get you but the delamination of the carbon fiber. 

When it comes to custom paint jobs creativity with TW Carbon is job one. Hand told me carbon is easy to paint. He says a paint project involves the customers vision and their painters skills.

In this episode Dave and I talk about his racing career, getting his start in race promoting and starting "Winning" magazine with Jack Simes. What I can say about Dave is that he's one hell of a story teller. 

I'm gong to let you know up front that this interview with Dave Chauner is going to be in two parts. Dave is an icon in the sport of cycling. He not only participated in two Olympics, 68 and 72. But he also won a bronze medal in the Pan Am games in the team pursuit.  

Once he retired from racing in 1975 Dave eventually found his way into promoting bike races. Promoting bike races is something he continues to do with his new venture "TeamTrak Cycling League." The league is about promoting track racing in a new team style league format on an indoor velodrome in arenas across the nation. 

We also continue the conversation about road racing in America. Who would be better to speak with than Dave as he's put on such big races as Philadelphia, the San Francisco Grand Prix to the Million Dollar Triple Crown. 

The debate continues on whether road racing is dead in America. In this episode a roundtable discussion is had with Sean Wilson, the registrar with Redlands, Bruce Dunn, who puts on the Joe Martin stage race, and Michael Engleman with the Tour of Gila. 

Each one of them comes with their own insight into road racing and stage races. We touch on topics like sustainability, community involvement , funding to future plans for their races.