Organisers of the Maryland Cycling Classic have introduced the participation of the ladies’s Benin Nationwide Workforce at their occasion on September 6 in Baltimore. It marks a major second, as it is going to be the primary time an African federation has fielded a feminine group for a serious UCI-sanctioned street occasion within the US.
Race organisers made the announcement at the side of Workforce Africa Rising on June 19, a day that commemorates the tip of slavery in the USA.
“As president of the Benin Biking Federation, I’m blissful to simply accept this invitation for our ladies’s nationwide group to race The Maryland Biking Traditional, just some weeks earlier than the UCI Biking World Championship makes its debut in Africa,” mentioned Romuald Hazoumè, president of the Benin Biking Federation.
“Benin and Maryland have a powerful connection, with a cultural partnership between the 2, and Benin is about to attend the International Soccer 2026 occasion,” he added.
“I thank Mayor Brandon Scott and Governor Wes Moore for his or her variety assist. Our robust Amazone will do all they’ll to organize for this most prestigious biking occasion.”
Maryland Biking Traditional might be held in Baltimore on September 6, and for the first time will feature both men’s and women’s races. The ladies’s occasion is registered as a 1.1 race, whereas the lads’s race is classed as a part of the Professional Sequence.
“The State of Maryland and the Metropolis of Baltimore have rising cultural ties to Benin, and the participation of the Benin Girls’s Nationwide Workforce on the Maryland Biking Traditional will foster additional development,” mentioned Terry Hasseltine, president of the Sport & Leisure Company of Maryland, the occasion producers and house owners.
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The ladies’s and males’s races might be held on the identical day and as a part of a wider neighborhood and competition held between September 2-7. The races will use elements of the identical course.
The ladies’s race is anticipated to draw a high-quality area and to additionally present a chance for Continental groups registered in North America.
The Benin Nationwide Biking Federation is presently underneath the route and steering of Kimberly Coats, the CEO of Workforce Africa Rising, who confirmed that the Maryland Biking Traditional will mark a key preparatory race for the 2025 UCI Road World Championship, which is being held in Kigali, Rwanda, from September 21-28. It’s going to mark a historic second in biking as the primary UCI Street World Championship held in Africa.
Steve Brunner, the race’s Govt Director, mentioned that the participation of the Benin Girls’s Nationwide Workforce on the Maryland Biking Traditional holds a whole lot of significance on and off the bike.
“Because the expertise pool continues to develop on the African continent, it’s essential to offer alternatives in world-class races just like the Maryland Biking Traditional. Kimberly [Coats] and her group have put in a whole lot of nice work with the Benin Biking Federation to develop expertise, particularly figuring out elite-level ladies. So, it’s nice to offer a platform for these ladies to carry out and be acknowledged,” Brunner mentioned.
A complete of 15 groups of six riders are anticipated to comprise the Maryland Biking Traditional ladies’s area. Beforehand introduced ladies’s groups confirmed to take part the 2025 Maryland Biking Traditional embrace Benin Nationwide Workforce, CANYON-SRAM zondacrypto (GER), CCB (USA), Ceratizit (GER), Cynisca (USA), EF Schooling-Oatly (USA), L39ion of Los Angeles (USA), Workforce USA, The Cyclery Racing Workforce (CAN), and Virginia’s Blue Ridge TWENTY28 (USA).
