Dwight and Webber among multiple Boulder 2015 cyclocross champions

Brandon Dwight wins the 2015 men’s 40 – 44 national cyclocross championship

Sometimes they seem inseparable. In local cyclocross races Boulder Cycle Sport teammates Brandon Dwight and Pete Webber will speed through laps with one latched onto the other’s wheel, either as a pair or part of a larger group.

“I like racing with Pete because he’s a great teammate and we work well together,” Dwight said. “We’ve been in many races where we’ve been able to work as teammates to break away from other racers.”

During national championships they would also plan to work together when competing in the same master’s category. However according to Dwight, if that plan panned out, in the last couple of laps the strongest man was free to chase the win.

At the last four editions of cyclocross nationals, they both raced in the 40 to 44 category. Webber won three times and Dwight once. They finished one-two twice.

This year they both had the chance to win because they raced in different categories; while Dwight remained in the 40 to 44 group, Webber had aged into the 45 to 49 category. The two competitions ran back-to-back on day three of nationals; each won his race.

With Kristin Weber’s first place result the day before in the women’s 40 to 44 category, Boulder Cycle Sport netted three championship titles. It was the most ever in a single year for a team that has captured at least one title for the last eight years.

“It feels really good to help lead a team that can put together a string of performances like that,” Webber said after his victory. “We definitely motivated each other. I felt like what Kristin did yesterday set the stage for Brandon and I to drop the hammer today and set the stage for other riders from Boulder.”

Other riders, like Kate Powlison (Evol Racing) for example. She won the women’s 30 to 34 race the morning of Dwight and Webber’s successes. In fact Boulder riders claimed 50% of the masters gold medals on offer that day and others raced to top five results.

Webber attributed Boulder riders’ medal take to a weekly group ride during the cyclocross season that he has led for about 22 years. Powlison, Weber, and Dwight take part in it.

“We all do Wednesday Worlds together every Wednesday in Boulder and have for many years. That makes a huge difference and you can tell by when we crush it like this. How do we get so fast? It’s group training like that. It’s just a good group of friends from beginners to pros and we all hammer and have fun and it produces some really fast racers and countless national champions.”

However, national champion Dwight doesn’t mind racing with strangers from time to time.

“Truth be told,” he said, “these days Pete is a much stronger rider than I am. So I was glad to not have to deal with him this year!”

Pete Webber wins 44 – 49 2015 national cyclocross championship, his fifth national title

Gallery (more to come)