In cycling, the word “beauty” is often used in the context of racing, a particular product, or the environments in which we ride. It’s a word applied to epic battles on the slopes of some Alpine mountain or across cobbled farm roads of Belgium. Perhaps it’s used for the paint job on a custom bike or the industrial design of a newly released widget. Or, the term is employed to describe the landscape that serves as the background to a riding adventure.
Rarely is beauty used to describe cycling fans or the community around racing. But that is the most fitting word to describe what I experienced on a recent Sunday afternoon in Hartford, Connecticut.
Unless you are tuned in to bicycle racing, and particularly to cyclocross, you might not know the context as to why the showing of support and solidarity with trans athletes at a race was so notable. But living in America at a time when the rights and safety of transgender and LGBTQ people are under relentless attack, this really should not come as a surprise.
At last year’s Cyclocross National Championships in Chicago, Illinois, members of an anti-transgender hate group entered the event with banners, waved signs, and hurled insults at Austin Killips, a trans athlete in the women’s elite category. Despite having numerous staff on-site for the event, USA Cycling (the national governing body for bicycle racing and the event’s organizer) did not prevent the group from using the race to spew hate speech. Killips finished tenth in the race. Protesters did not physically harm her, but the outcome could have been far worse.
Following this 2021 episode were weeks of social media hate speech against trans cyclists and coverage of the “debate” by racing news outlets. Prominent racers and high-profile clubs responded with criticism of USA Cycling for its inaction and unpreparedness. The organization promised to do better in the future. But trans athletes and allies weren’t holding their breath that USAC would follow through on its promises.
Chicago native Austin Killips started racing in 2019, progressing into the elite domestic cyclocross ranks last season with the Pratt Racing program (since renamed Nice Bikes). The 2022 cross season saw Killips up her game, gaining consistency with podium finishes and netting her first career UCI race win on day one of the Northampton International.
After Killip’s November 12 win at Northampton, online rhetoric and attacks against the twenty-six-year-old racer escalated. The following weekend in Colorado Springs, Colorado, a shooter killed five at an LGBTQ club, including two trans people. The murders occurred after months of ongoing physical harassment and threats against trans and queer people, events, and establishments across the country. Then days before the start of the 2022 National Championship event, in a Cyclingnews piece, an anonymously referenced elite cyclocross racer noted a planned protest against trans athletes at the upcoming race.
The threat against Killips and other athletes was very real. And the tension was palpable in the days leading up to the December 11 race.
“People can be mean, and you have to have a thick skin when you exist in public,” Killips told me in a conversation at the 2022 National Championships race. But her main concern about possible protesters was—as she expressed to USA Cycling and others leading up to the race—the well-being of her fellow racers and LGBTQ fans and athletes. “My competitors don’t deserve to have people on the sidelines chanting rhetoric that is effectively belittling them,” she explained. “I don’t want people here that are going to make somebody in the closet or somebody out to feel unwelcome.”
Allies from the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic cyclocross community sensed the urgency of the moment, organizing quickly to protect Killips and the LGBTQ community attending the event. Some planned group outings to the race to show visible support. Local artist and racer Alex Carlson offered up free print-at-home posters for fans. Dozens of fans turned out with an assortment of pride flags and hand-written signs. And members of the John Brown Gun Club attended to counter-protest the anti-trans group and protect athletes and spectators if needed.
Others, like Adam Myerson—a longtime racer, coach, and cyclocross promoter—spent the days and weeks leading up to the race in near-constant communication with USA Cycling officials and event staff on safety protocols to protect the athletes. He is a vocal ally for inclusive sport and coaches transgender racers. The toll of the stress was visibly apparent on him when we sat down to chat on Thursday afternoon before the race. You could feel Myerson’s care for Killips (and other athletes he coaches) as he choked up while walking me through the details of the previous week.
Come Sunday afternoon, the rumored anti-trans protest never materialized. The fifty minutes of racing in snowy conditions over the muddy and rutted course were beautiful. Austin Killips finished in third place, two seconds up on fourth-place racer Hannah Aresman. Raylyn Nuss took second, and defending National Champion Clara Honsinger claimed her third consecutive stars and stripes jersey.
Perhaps the inclement weather conditions kept the group away. Maybe, its threats were only bluster? Or did the protesters read USA Cycling’s revised Code of Conduct for the event? Regardless, their hate speech remained online. In the real world at Riverside Park, the overwhelming love, support, and kindness shown by the cyclocross community wildly outnumbered the hate. That also was beautiful.
After Sunday’s race, Myerson and I discussed what transpired. “I know for visibility’s sake, it’s going to be very important for people trying to make their way into a sport that can sometimes be hard to break into,” reflected Myerson on Killip’s third-place finish in the race. “What the scene really is on the ground is very different than what you read online. When you come out to the bike race…it feels real supportive to be here”
Max Pratt, the owner of Nice Bikes, echoed Myerson’s thoughts. “To see that every single person here was showing support and care just means that what we’re doing matters,” said Pratt. He added, “The fact that the industry [the sponsors, racers, and fans] is responding with overwhelming love and support; you couldn’t ask for a better outcome.”
The happenings of the past few weeks resonated with me on a personal level. Though I did not attend the 2021 National Championships, images and accounts of the demonstration against Killips rattled me deeply. With violent attacks against LGBTQ people being commonplace over the past year, I feared that this would occur in a community in which I am active.
Witnessing a similarly transphobic protest at a downhill race in Whistler, British Columbia, in 2006 pushed a cyclist struggling with her gender identity deep into the closet. That woman was me. At the time, I was on the cusp of coming out. But it would be another decade until I worked up the courage to do so publicly.
After coming out, I took up racing cyclocross because I saw a welcoming, inclusive, and supportive community in cycling. I felt accepted in ‘cross and that my participation was valued. The mishandling of last year’s incident made me fearful that perhaps cyclocross wasn’t the inclusive space I thought.
The outpouring of love and support for transgender and LGBTQ athletes by the fans, spectators, other racers, and even USA Cycling last Sunday in Hartford left me speechless on multiple occasions. I had ribbons of tears down my cheeks several times. And I know others had similar reactions.
Throughout the race, I encountered many fans loudly showing support and pushing back against hate. Some have trans friends or family. Others were trans or queer folks who attended to cheer for someone like themselves. I also talked with parents who saw a supportive place and future for their trans kids in cycling. It was an overwhelming and positive sensory experience.
Simply put, the 2022 Cyclocross National Championships was one of the most beautiful things I have experienced in my thirty years of cycling.
As Deputy Editor, Tara Seplavy leads Bicycling’s product test team; after having previously led product development and sourcing for multiple bike brands, run World Championship winning mountain bike teams, wrenched at renowned bicycle shops in Brooklyn, raced everything from criteriums to downhill, and ridden bikes on six different continents (landing herself in hospital emergency rooms in four countries and counting). Based in Easton, Pennsylvania, Tara spends tons of time on the road and trail testing products. A familiar face at cyclocross races, crits, and bike parks in the Mid Atlantic and New England, on weekends she can often be found racing for the New York City-based CRCA/KruisCX team. When not riding a bike, or talking about them, Tara listens to a lot of ska, punk, and emo music, and consumes too much social media.
