Suits for the win: Brompton World Championship

PRESS RELEASE: It’s not every day that a cyclist in a suit jacket and tie takes to the World Road Race championship course – and wins. But that’s exactly what happened this past weekend in Richmond, Virginia, host of the 2015 UCI World Road Race Championships. Brompton owners from across the country went head to head in the United States leg of the Brompton World Championship series.

Now in its tenth year of global competition, the Brompton World Championship is contested all over the world. Competitors dress in suit jackets and ties and, on the gun, must run to unfold their Bromptons before racing wheel-to-wheel to the line. Winners from each country win flights to London and entered the final race in 2016. For real drama this year the U.S. event took place on the same UCI World Road Race Championship course that before and after saw hundreds of the world’s best professionals compete for cycling’s coveted rainbow jerseys.

“This was definitely a banner year for our event,” said Katharine Horsman, Brompton, general manager, North America. “It’s our tenth anniversary and to mark it we competed on the same stage as the leading professional cyclists in the world. We had Brompton owners fly in from as far afield as Boston and Los Angeles to show us exactly what they can do when folding bike meets world-class course.”

The top three riders of the Brompton World Championship USA were transplanted New York-area racers: men’s 2015 US champion David Mackay, originally of South Africa but now residing in Brooklyn, and runners-up Richard Spencer of Brooklyn (a U.K. native) and Peter Yuskauskas of Manhattan, by way of Boston. The women’s title was taken by Elspeth Huyett of Pennsylvania, with second and third places going to Julie Secor of Brooklyn (a former women’s title winner) and Ana Zhao of Manhattan.

Other prizes went to Thori Wolfe for top men’s veteran rider and Carol Lee Davis for top women’s veteran, as well as best-dressed awards to Chris Craig of Ashville, North Carolina, and Deborah Lane-Pope of Boston.

“It’s fantastic to see so many Brompton owners from around the country converge for a weekend of good-natured but high stakes competition,” said Horsman. “And all the more fun to see it go down on one of the most dramatic professional cycling stages in the world.”