In the world of professional cycling, teams often arrive at races in sleek, branded buses with state-of-the-art amenities. Tired riders sit in leather chairs, energize themselves with espresso machines and clean their kit in a washer and dryer — the buses have everything pros need while traveling between grand tour stages.
Despite not having the budget of its professional counterparts, the Cinzano Little 500 cycling team designed a custom vehicle of its own: a creatively painted ambulance in Cinzano brand and colors.
“Our coach calls it his ‘campulance,’” Cinzano rider Gavin Gorski said.
Though now used as a team vehicle, it’s had many iterations.
First, it was a commissioned ambulance, purchased at a government auction for $3,500. The ambulance was often parked at Michigan State’s tailgating fields before its new life of rolling around Bloomington with Cinzano in tow.
“My son was into watching Michigan State football, so I made it into a tailgating vehicle,” Cinzano coach Mark Dillon said. “But after my son graduated, we stopped going to games. By that time, I was back into bikes, so I said, ‘I’m converting this baby.’”
Dillon, a retired teacher of 31 years, is also an IU alumni and Wissler 5 rider from 1983-1984. Last year, too many riders wanted to join the Cinzano team, so riders were split into two renewed teams: Cinzano and Americana. Dillon coached Cinzano whilst a friend coached Americana.
Dillon also coached the McNutt dorm team prior to its dissolvement in 2022.
He helped Cinzano in its eighth place qualification result in 2023, its first year of racing since 2007.
With the firm establishment of Cinzano and the addition of rookie riders in 2024, the team aims to continue growing its legacy, aided in-part by the new team vehicle.
The ambulance only underwent its renovations recently, during the week of March 10-17, which coincided with IU’s 2024 spring break. A time lapse of the team’s painting process can be found on its Instagram page.
And while painting the ambulance was a team effort, Dillon and Gorski both credit rider Mau Brito as the mastermind.
“I found a blank canvas of an ambulance and I opened up photoshop,” Brito said. “I came up with a few concepts and Coach liked them, so he placed an online order for some vinyl wrap.”
The vinyl, once arrived, didn’t portray what the riders had hoped for, so Brito suggested paint.
“I remember one night during break, Mau was creating the stencils for it,” Gorski said. “Then we painted it the next day.”
The ambulance, once plain, now sits with a diamond of blue and red on either side and white “CINZANO” placed in the middle. On the driver-side door, a smaller “CINZANO CYCLING” in blue.
The painting process, Brito said, took several hours, but the result made the effort worth the time.
“People would send us pictures of the ambulance or comment on our posts,” Brito said. “It’s iconic.”
The team plans to make further renovations to the vehicle — like possible additions of a shower and lockers. Brito mentioned the addition of a Cinzano RV in the coming years.
But for now, the team will be rolling in style to the 2024 race in the Cinzano ambulance, aiming to place better than its previous result of 19th.
“We went into this season thinking, ‘We’re a top-10 team,’” Brito said. “But looking around during Spring Series, there’s clearly some strong teams.”
Cinzano is comprised of veterans Brito, Gorski and Ethan Barrows, and rookies Reid Sprenkle, Nick Tabscott, Jaxon Curtis and Conner Wright.
The team placed eighth in 2024 Spring Series, ahead of contenders like Sigma Nu, Beta Sigma Psi and Lambda Chi Alpha.
With the help of Dillon, the Cinzano veterans and the new addition of Cinzano’s ambulance, the team is sure to be a contender in the years to come.
