De­spite be­ing faced with flight is­sues, the To­ba­go In­ter­na­tion­al Cy­cle Clas­sic will be­gin in earnest to­day with an open­ing cer­e­mo­ny at the Cy­cling Vil­lage Com­pound, Crowne Point Ho­tel and John­ston Apart­ments Grounds.

Sec­re­tary of Sports at the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly Ter­rance Baynes is ex­pect­ed to de­liv­er the fea­ture ad­dress, with Al­lan Stew­art of the To­ba­go Emer­gency Man­age­ment Agency and or­gan­is­er Jef­frey Charles to fol­low him. All teams, man­agers, of­fi­cials, spon­sors, and spe­cial guests are ex­pect­ed to at­tend.

The first day of ac­tion will be to­mor­row morn­ing at 8 am at the Di­vi­sion One In­ter­na­tion­al stage which will be 100 kilo­me­tres.

T&T’s vet­er­an rid­er Emile Abra­ham will join ris­ing tal­ent Liam Trepte, who won the re­cent T&T Cy­cling Fed­er­a­tion held its Road Chal­lenge Se­ries#5 from the Fore­shore to San­gre Grande in the Elite cat­e­go­ry, is ex­pect­ed to be a force to be reck­oned with for T&T.

Al­so in the race will be Os­car Pa­chon, the two-time win­ner of the To­ba­go Clas­sic from Colom­bia, and his coun­try­man Nico­las Cano, along with Joshua Kel­ly, the Bar­ba­di­an cham­pi­on and vet­er­an rid­er Adam Alexan­der among many oth­ers.

In Di­vi­sion Two will be T&T’s women’s cy­clists Alexi Ramirez, Makaira Wal­lace, and sev­er­al top rid­ers from the Unit­ed States and Colom­bia, among oth­er coun­tries.

The event will con­tin­ue on Fri­day with the Di­vi­sion 1 In­ter­na­tion­al Stage Race Two from Mil­ford Road. It will be a ten-lap 90-kilo­me­tre grind start­ing at 8 am.

­­­__­Wal­ter Al­ibey