{"id":31035,"date":"2023-10-20T02:47:19","date_gmt":"2023-10-20T08:47:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-celebrates-hometown-pro-cyclist-sepp-kuss\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T01:33:20","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T07:33:20","slug":"durango-celebrates-hometown-pro-cyclist-sepp-kuss","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-celebrates-hometown-pro-cyclist-sepp-kuss\/","title":{"rendered":"Durango celebrates hometown pro cyclist Sepp Kuss"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Sepp
Sepp Kuss, with team Jumbo Visma, high-fives Durango Devo riders at the start of homecoming celebration parade for the world champion cyclist at Buckley Park on Thursday (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>Jerry McBride<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Famed cyclist and Durango native Sepp Kuss came home Thursday as the city\u2019s guest of honor for his latest accomplishments.<\/p>\n

Durango Devo hosted a homecoming celebration at Buckley Park, honoring Kuss for becoming the first American since 2013 to win a Grand Tour cycling event, when he won the Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a in Spain on Sept. 17. He also won a stage in the Tour de France in 2021.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s definitely surreal,\u201d Kuss said about his victory while speaking to reporters at the Durango Cyclery. \u201cFirst off, I never expected to be in this position. But at the same time it\u2019s not a dream come true because its something I never dreamed of, never expected. During the race, it became more real, the prospect of winning the Vuelta, but I always tried to keep myself distanced from that thought because so much can happen.\u201d<\/p>\n

He has been part of the highly decorated Team Jumbo-Visma since 2018. Jumbo Visma won all three of the Grand Tour events this season, the first team to ever do so.<\/p>\n

\"Sepp
Sepp Kuss, with team Jumbo Visma, waves to the crowd of more than 2,000 people at Buckley Park on Thursday during Durango\u2019s homecoming celebration for the world cycling champion. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>Jerry McBride<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The celebration began at 3:30 p.m. with Durango Mayor Melissa Youssef, Durango Devo Director Levi Kurlander and Durango Devo founders Chad Cheeney and Sarah Tescher speaking about Kuss\u2019 successes. Kuss then spoke at a Q&A session.<\/p>\n

Hundreds of fans traveled from various states to see Kuss and get some gear signed by the homegrown legend.<\/p>\n

The bike parade began at 4:30 p.m. on Main Avenue with Kuss, Durango Devo youth cyclists and then the general public. Hundreds of cyclists, including the Durango Devo junior team, rode behind Kuss around the route through downtown Durango.<\/p>\n

\"Sepp
Sepp Kuss signs autographs during the Sepp Kuss homecoming celebration on Thursday on Main Avenue in Durango. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>Jerry McBride<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cI think if I was in the same position as those Devo junior kids on the front line I would\u2019ve been like, \u2018oh yeah that\u2019s the local guy,\u2019\u201d Kuss said. \u201cIt was really special and I hope to be a good role model for the community and try and be as much of a part of the community as possible while I live overseas. I have my life over there, but I always feel a part of the Durango community.\u201d<\/p>\n

After the parade, Kuss was supposed to sign autographs for 20 to 30 minutes at Buckley Park. However, the line was so massive Kuss ended up signing autographs for close to two hours.<\/p>\n

The line of fans stretched out of Buckley Park, down Main Avenue and toward the AutoZone parking lot. Fans had Kuss sign numerous types of memorabilia, pictures and even some cycling shirts fans were wearing.<\/p>\n

\"Sepp
Sepp Kuss autographs the jersey of Mason Kleinsmith, 8, during the Sepp Kuss homecoming celebration on Thursday on Main Avenue in downtown Durango. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>Jerry McBride<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cWhen I learned about all the banners and signs they were putting up in town, it was really moving for me,\u201d Kuss said. \u201cI never expected that level of pride that everyone was showing in Durango. For me, that was really moving, especially today was more emotional than crossing the finish line in Madrid because it\u2019s just a bunch of people but here are the people that I care about.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite the long line, the atmosphere was very lively with the Durango band Elder Grown playing on the stage just to the left of where Kuss was signing autographs.<\/p>\n

After the autograph signing, Kuss was very gracious with his time with media members, speaking for about 30 minutes, answering various questions ranging from Durango to his plans for the next season, the Olympics and changes at Jumbo-Visma.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of people think Durango is a small town far from any big cities in the mountains, but they don\u2019t really know what Durango is,\u201d Kuss said. \u201cYou can\u2019t really explain in one speech or you need to write a book about it. I\u2019m always grateful for Durango and what it brought me through the fact of living here.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust by virtue of living in Durango, you already start at an advantage because you have so many outdoor opportunities. The community is so ingrained in outdoors and it\u2019s all really good people. It\u2019s a wholesome way to grow up.\u201d<\/p>\n

bkelly@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

\"Sepp
Sepp Kuss, with team Jumbo Visma, gets ready to lead the homecoming celebration parade for the world champion cyclist at Buckley Park on Thursday.<\/span>Jerry McBride<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Durango native won the Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a this year; city honors him at downtown parade<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":31036,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[657,950,28,346],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-31035","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-cycling","tag-durango","tag-headlines","tag-sports"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31035","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31035"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31035\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":81293,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31035\/revisions\/81293"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31036"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31035"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31035"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31035"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=31035"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}