“I thought: Hell, Jersey’s got some mountains, and I had business investments in Atlantic City, so I know that the casinos would possibly be a sponsor,” the 76-year-old says of his original concept, which he planned to call “Tour de Jersey.” But when Tesh gave him the idea, he was intrigued. I don’t even know how to put air in the tires,” admits Packer, who announced every NCAA Final Four from 1975 to 2008. “I’ve never been to a cycling event in my life. Protesters at the finish line of Stage 1 of the Tour de Trump at New Paltz, New York | Kevin Hogan The young reporter was John Tesh-yes, the pop piano musician and eventual co-host of Entertainment Tonight, who in 1987 covered the Tour de France for CBS and wrote the background music for the event. The story of the biking extravaganza that became the Tour de Trump begins in 1987, when a young CBS Sports reporter just back from that year’s Tour de France told then-CBS basketball announcer and entrepreneur Billy Packer that he should consider starting something like it in the United States.

And Trump’s partner in the venture says he admires the businessman so much he plans to vote for him this year. Today’s president of USA Cycling says the event did a lot to raise the sport’s profile in the United States. In the end, the race found a new and more stable corporate sponsor, became sanctioned internationally and rode on for another five years. It wouldn’t be quite fair to chalk the Tour de Trump up as just another Trump failure, though. But despite its high profile, and even with the real estate nabob’s knack for publicity and pageantry, Trump’s namesake race lasted only two years, the short run largely thanks to his empire’s billions of dollars of debt.

And Trump went about making it happen in his unique fashion: Only a bicycle race with Trump’s name could link together a Saudi arms dealer, a Dutch brothel and the prince of New Age Pop piano. It was to be a cycling event the likes of which had never been seen before in the United States-with big-name bikers, international teams and a course that spanned the Eastern seaboard.

The billionaire-turned-politician’s exploits and business dealings may be legendary, but this is the story of one oft-overlooked venture: The Tour de Trump, a cycling event that was supposed to become America’s very own Tour de France.

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