It is spring in Athens, Georgia and meaning one factor for bicycle racing within the US: the Athens Twilight Criterium.
Huge crowds and deafening cheers are often relegated to varsity soccer or basketball within the modest city of the College of Georgia. However 45 years in the past, the yr the Bulldogs received their first NCAA title in soccer, going 12-0 and profitable the Sugar Bowl, the Athens Twilight was born, too.
Gene Dixon launched the one-day bike race in downtown Athens close to his bike store, Dixon’s Bicycling Middle on West Broad Avenue, on the north facet of campus a few mile away from the soccer stadium. To make his race totally different than others, he held the professional races within the night beneath the road lights of the four-corner race.
The ‘Twilight’ was born and have become a spring phenomenon for spectators and athletes alike. The race attracted the highest stars of biking for many years, however Dixon continued to construct on its sucess, launching the USA CRITS collection in 2007.
This yr’s professional races for the Athens Orthopedic Clinic Twilight serves because the fourth cease in USA CRITS, with the ladies’s races beginning at 7:00 p.m. EDT and the boys’s race at 8:30 p.m. EDT. Stay streaming begins at 6:40 p.m. native time.
Alexis Magner (Cynisca Biking) goes for her third win in a row, which might match Tina Pic for most ladies’s wins in Athens.
Frank Travieso, a Cuban-born rider who lives in Athens, has probably the most victories for elite males with 4, and counting, as he continues to compete at age 45 on Crew Flicker. He’ll face defending champion Thomas Gibbons of Automated Racing, and four-time runner-up Danny Summerhill, who now races for L39ION of Los Angeles.
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Summerhill’s teammate Ty Magner is a Georgia-born veteran of the peloton and he has a handful of runner-up finishes as properly, however has by no means received Athens Twilight. Now 34, and having received virtually each different US race in his 15 yr profession – together with a US Professional Criterium title – he has a brand new outlook on the evasive victory in Athens.
“Athens Twilight is why I race bikes. It was the primary actual bike race I ever noticed in particular person after doing the MTB occasion in 2004, and I used to be hooked. Rising up as a child I solely knew of the Tour de France, and Athens Twilight. Everybody on the town is aware of of ‘twilight’, and It actually is the most effective week of the yr in Athens,” Magner instructed Cyclingnews.
“The race itself has actually modified for me through the years. I used to be as soon as actually obsessive about making an attempt to win it – I used to be many instances second, third, fourth – whereas now I see it’s because the one time of yr my family and friends can truly see what I do, after which I can get pleasure from beers after regardless of the outcome.”
Laborious to win
The Athens race has attracted a who’s-who of biking over the a long time, together with Olympic pace skating gold medalist Eric Heiden, who received 5 particular person gold medals on the Winter Video games in 1980. His 1981 victory on the Athens Twilight Criterium was considered one of his first wins as a professional bicycle owner.
Steve Hegg made historical past on the 1984 Olympic Video games as the primary US athlete to win gold within the Particular person Pursuit, so it was no shock when he got here to Athens in 1985 and received the race.
Australian Danny Clark received the primary two males’s races, 1980-1981, with Steve Bauer taking the win in 1982. Different notable males’s winners included Davis Phinney in 1984, Jeff Pierce in 1987 and Chris Horner in 1996. Pierce went on to win a stage within the Tour de France stage win later that very same yr, whereas Horner would win the GC on the Vuelta a España in 2013.
A notable declare to fame goes to retired professional Jonas Carney, who completed on the rostrum six instances and by no means received.
“Jonas Carney crying on stage as he retired from racing, having by no means received the Twilight—it sticks with you,” Dixon recalled.
Tina (Mayolo) Pic, who attended graduate faculty on the College of Georgia and adopted Athens as her hometown, has probably the most victories for ladies, profitable in 2004, 2014 and 2015.
“It was one of many hardest races to win. Athens positively holds a particular place in my coronary heart as a result of I used to be going to UGA once I first bought into biking and means again then, 1994, 1995, the Twilight was already a legend. I’d heard a lot about it however had no thought how superb and enjoyable it was to race with the huge crowds and the deafening cheers,” Pic instructed Cyclingnews.
“One yr they narrowed the course to slot in extra crowds and there have been 200 guys entered [to race]. The entrance finish of the race was catching the again finish of the race leaving some guys making an attempt to scramble off the course with the crowds pushing them again in. Such an epic superb expertise.”
Stadium efffect
Dixon drew inspiration from different one-day races on the calendar, notably the Tour of Somerville in New Jersey, which began in 1940 and continues to be a fixture on the home calendar. However Dixon wished one thing totally different, one thing to draw new followers to the game and create a purpose for these followers to additionally function a wave of financial influence for native companies. The elite races had been moved to early night so individuals may linger on the native eating places and bars.
“Transferring it to nighttime is what added the engagement of the novice spectator,” Dixon stated. “Nighttime creates a extra intimate setting and will increase the sense of pace, coloration.”
The four-corner course was constructed on Washington, Clayton, Lumpkin and Thomas streets, and people streets are nonetheless used right this moment, with Clayton Avenue getting a contemporary layer of tarmac for 2025. It was primary, with no barricades the primary yr, simply flags lining the course to separate individuals on the sidewalks from the high-speed racers, in accordance with studies from the native Crimson & Black native newspaper.
The downtown streets remodel annually right into a stadium of kinds, 1000’s of followers hanging out with makeshift events with folding chairs. Music and race commentators announcers blares from loudspeakers, and riders can virtually style the grilled burgers from the meals distributors as they race. The Athens Twilight will not be all about uproarious races and rambunctious spectators, as Dixon incorporates household actions like youth races and enjoyable runs, too.
“Final yr we had been like, ‘oh shit, that is legit’. This bike race will not be solely a motorcycle race but it surely’s greater than a motorcycle race, it is an occasion,” Lucas Bourgoyne instructed Cyclingnews in his first look in Athens, Georgia in 2024.
“I might say there’s about 5 to 10 races that draw large crowds, and there is a few amongst people who have the most important – Athens is clearly considered one of them. There’s one thing significantly particular when you recognize the limitations appear to be lined all the best way across the course three or 4 deep, and it is individuals 18 19, 20, 21. It is all these college-aged children that turned our heads.
“You have nonetheless bought your older followers of biking popping out as a result of they know it is an enormous present. However you then even have that youthful era of people who possibly aren’t even followers of motorbike racing however for one evening they assume it is the good factor they’ve ever seen.”
Over time, Dixon has seen know-how change the best way athletes compete, from the 10-speed metal frames and caliper brakes to carbon bikes loaded with digital shifting, however know-how now additionally permits spectators to hitch the crowds in particular person or by way of dwell streaming.
It is the know-how out there to race organizers in addition to good quaint advertising and marketing and creativity that Dixon stated is a key to holding the game of biking participating for followers and sponsors within the US.
“The game wants group and funding. We have to inform [the athletes’] tales—who they’re, why they do that, the acute nature of the game. No different sport asks rivals to depend on 100 individuals inches aside at 30 miles per hour, via 300 corners, with virtually no protecting gear,” he stated.
“I’m simply now understanding the worth of the Twilight and methods to promote it. For years, I used to be extra targeted on the bike store. However after working greater than 200 criteriums from San Francisco to Manhattan, we’ve realized what works and what doesn’t. We’ve constructed multi-year sponsorships, skilled volunteers effectively, and located methods to maintain Twilight rising with out reinventing the wheel yearly.”
