Hello, my friends. Welcome back to another episode of King of the Ride podcast. Gosh, it feels great to be back at it. This episode first comes to you here in mid-March. It is just days after my first gravel race of the year, Mid-South. Often called the season

opener for many. It feels like the entire gravel world descends on Stillwater, Oklahoma, for this

event, Mid-South. Our guest today, you guessed it, Bobby Wintel, founder of Mid-South.

Bobby and his team, they have made this event feel like the epicenter of the entire cycling world for the weekend festival that is their event.

Bobby wears many hats. He is a business owner with district cycles.

People come from all over the country to visit his shop.

I don't know how many times I've used the term pied piper in relation to Bobby, but he is

something of the pied piper for gravel.

At his recommendation, I followed him to the Arkansas High Country Race, my first self-supported

thousand-mile bike packing race that was in the fall of 2020.

Why? Sure I was interested,

but largely it was because Bobby said it was awesome and you know what, he was right. More to the

point. Like I said, Mid-South is a festival. Bobby is the lead singer of this festival. He is the

driver of the bus. He is the lyman tamer of this circus.

As such, when we had made it all the way through the weekend, starting with the beer

release party Thursday night, to the festivities taking place Friday, the running race that

takes place Friday, we got through the race itself on Saturday late into the night.

Bobby and I were then able to catch up amid a flurry of activity on Sunday morning on my way to

the airport. He had already that morning wrapped up a group ride, a brunch, a bike giveaway.

I caught him at this brunch. He had just previously had about three hours of sleep overnight.

So please beg his pardon because his voice is quite frankly gone. Regardless, Bobby is not one to say no.

So we podcasted. As a result, please excuse the handful of terruptions. This guy, Bobby, is a magnet.

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