{"id":32671,"date":"2023-07-25T22:10:41","date_gmt":"2023-07-26T04:10:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/family-coaches-rapt-by-sepp-kuss-12th-place-finish-in-tour-de-france\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T02:01:25","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T08:01:25","slug":"family-coaches-rapt-by-sepp-kuss-12th-place-finish-in-tour-de-france","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/family-coaches-rapt-by-sepp-kuss-12th-place-finish-in-tour-de-france\/","title":{"rendered":"Family, coaches rapt by Sepp Kuss 12th place finish in Tour de France"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Durango's
Durango's Sepp Kuss will turn down a potential, and likely, selection to the 2021 Summer Olympic Games in Tokyo this summer, as he will focus on Team Jumbo-Visma duties at the Tour de France and Spanish Vuelta. (Courtesy of Team Jumbo-Visma)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

On Sunday, Durangoan Sepp Kuss rolled into Paris completing his fourth Tour de France with a time of 82 hours 43 minutes and 14 seconds, placing 12th in the General Classification. His finish was both a personal record as well as a source of pride for the Durango community.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just amazing how many community members follow the tour, now that Sepp is in it,\u201d said Chad Cheeney, who coached Sepp in middle and high school on the Durango Devo team. \u201cHe\u2019s one of the greatest athletes Durango has ever produced.\u201d<\/p>\n

While a 12th place finish is nothing short of phenomenal, Kuss spent much of the tour in the top 10 General Classification rankings.<\/p>\n

As Kuss entered Stage 20 of the race, in ninth place in the GC, he was only 16:32 behind GC leader and fellow Jumbo-Visma teammate Jonas Vingegaard (Denmark). About 25 kilometers into the 133.5 km stage, Kuss and Carlos Rodriguez of INEOS Grenadiers crashed on the descent of Ballon d\u2019Alsace.<\/p>\n

As the racers rounded a steep curve, their bikes slid out, leaving them with facial and bodily abrasions. Both racers were treated by official race doctors and permitted to continue the tour.<\/p>\n

For Kuss, the crash meant slipping out of the top 10 GC riders. He finished the stage 83rd, putting him in the 12th overall GC ranking.<\/p>\n

Despite the setback, he appeared to remain in good spirits.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s how it goes, I\u2019m just happy I could finish the stage and that we have the yellow jersey,\u201d Kuss said. \u201cThat\u2019s what got me through the day.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kuss has been a member of team Jumbo-Visma since 2018. He has competed in the Tour de France with the team for four consecutive years, serving in the helping role of super domestique.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s the last man standing for his leader,\u201d said Sabina Kuss, Sepp\u2019s mother. \u201cHe\u2019s the last man standing to bring his leader in for the win.\u201d<\/p>\n

Much of Sepp\u2019s strength as a racer lies in his performances in climbing stages, making him additionally valuable as a climbing domestique.<\/p>\n

Sepp sets the pace for this leader as well letting his leader stay in his draft, said Cheeney.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s basically just like a right hand man to the main leader on the team to prevent others from attacking the them,\u201d Cheeney said.<\/p>\n

As a domestique, Sepp\u2019s primary goal is to get his team leader, in this case Vingegaard, in the coveted yellow GC leader jersey.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven if Sepp could go faster and get a (Stage) win, he won\u2019t leave his leader behind,\u201d Sabina said. \u201cHis dedication is to his leader, once his leader is ready to attack, Sepp\u2019s job is more or less done.\u201d<\/p>\n

By the time he has served his job aiding his leader, Sabina says Sepp has expended so much energy that he often lacks the ability to secure his own placing. This does not seem to bother the \u201cDurango Kid.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s super content being a super domestique,\u201d Sabina said.<\/p>\n

The efforts of team Jumbo-Visma proved fruitful. Vingegaard won the Tour de France for the second consecutive year, leading second place Slovenian Tadej Pogacar of the UAE Team Emirates by 07:29. Jumbo-Visma also won the team race with a collective time of 247:19:41, leading second place UAE Team Emirates by 13:49.<\/p>\n

Despite the immense success Sepp has achieved in the cycling world, Sabina says he has maintained his signature \u201cSepp personality.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIn a race, Sepp would be the first person to stop and help somebody,\u201d Sabina said. \u201cIf we\u2019re on the sideline, he\u2019ll stop and blow a kiss or grab our hand.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sepp adopted his fun first, win second mentality early in his cycling career. His experience with competitive cycling began in about fourth grade when he got involved with the Durango Devo team.<\/p>\n

\u201c(Devo) didn\u2019t try to produce competitors, they were just sharing the pure joy of \u2018this is what we love to do,\u2019 and Sepp captured that always,\u201d Sabina said. \u201cHe\u2019s not intent on himself and trying to be the first across the line.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cheeney said it was Sepp\u2019s father, Dolph, who inspired him to adopt the fun-centric training style Sabina spoke so highly of.<\/p>\n

\u201cBack then (cycling) was all about training the engine in these juniors all over the country. I was more about having fun and playing and not much structure,\u201d Cheeney said. \u201cEven though we\u2019re highly competitive, all that was in disguise. So even though (the kids) didn\u2019t think they were training, they were but it was just playing games and stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cheeney also attributed Sepp\u2019s racing mentality to his parents.<\/p>\n

\u201cHis family was very good about just inspiring passions, through outdoor sports. Whatever it was, if it was Nordic or cycling \u2013 those are Sepp\u2019s main sports \u2013 they just never pushed him,\u201d Cheeney said. \u201cThey\u2019re just like, \u2018Do what you want, have fun with it.\u2019 So competition was never first and foremost in his family.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sepp first rose to the international spotlight after dominating the 2018 Tour of Utah.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s when everybody was like \u2018holy crap, this kid\u2019s amazing,\u2019\u201d Cheeney said. \u201cHe attacked the climbing stages way before people would normally attack in a road race. And he was just smiling up the whole climb and everybody on TV was like, \u2018You know, he\u2019s having so much fun.\u2019 He\u2019s just up there smiling with his tongue out. And right after that he got noticed big time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now, Sepp has 10 grand tours under his belt, and is considering adding his 11th next month with the Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a. Sepp has already completed both the Giro d\u2019Italia and Tour de France this year.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat would be three Grand Tours in a year. It sounds like he\u2019s up for it, but oh boy, that\u2019s a lot,\u201d said Dave Hagen, former Fort Lewis College Cycling director. \u201cThere are very few riders who\u2019ve ever done it, and it\u2019s for a reason.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sabina plans on visiting Sepp at both the race\u2019s start and finish, should he choose to compete.<\/p>\n

While she worries about Sepp, she trusts him to do what\u2019s right for him.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe pushes himself hard, he\u2019s always been self-motivated,\u201d she said. \u201cHe\u2019s always made really solid, good decisions. I don\u2019t remember him ever saying, \u2018Mom, what do you think I should do?\u2019 He would just tell us what he decided. But he gives thought and figures it out on his own.\u201d<\/p>\n

lveress@duarngoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Durango rider had two falls, but helped teammate to first-place finish<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":32672,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,2180,346],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-32671","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-road-cycling","tag-sports"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32671","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=32671"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32671\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":81884,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32671\/revisions\/81884"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32672"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32671"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32671"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32671"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=32671"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}