Great News for all of Iowa Bike Racing! The Iowa Bicycle Racing Association (IBRA) and the Iowa Mountain Biking Championship Series (IMBCS) have joined ranks. IBRA is a 501c3 non-profit organization who’s mission is to grow competitive cycling in Iowa and assist our athletes in achieving sustained success in national cycling competition. Starting immediately, Bruce Brown, President of the IMBCS Board, will now serve as an IBRA Board Member. This position will serve as the Mountain Bike Community representative to the IBRA Board.

You can learn more about the IMBCS here: http://imbcs.org/

This move was created to help unify all of the major bicycle racing disciplines here in Iowa – Fondos, gravel racing, road, mountain bike, and cyclocross. There are synergies that will benefit all event directors by managing and maintaining a common calendar, working to reduce the days where multiple discipline events might occur, support juniors and women’s specific racing programs across all disciplines, create a stronger officials corp to assist all events with better results management, combine resources to maximize the efficiency, and open up new opportunities for those who are interested in helping lead the efforts of bike racing in Iowa.

This coming Saturday will be the first joint effort with a USA Cycling Officials Clinic, this will train 6 new USA Cycling MTB Officials and 3 new USAC road Officials. The true benefit is that these officials can work all events and refine the skills needed to support all forms of racing. The IBRA Officials program pays for licenses, pays for apprentice programs, assists is upgrading officials, and mentoring. The 17 current USA Cycling officials in Iowa along with officials in Nebraska and Illinois will work together to support the events and the new members.

Items to consider when signing up for a race:

• One USA Cycling license covers road, mtb, and cyclocross. If you have not tried the other disciplines, give it a shot, there are people at every event that will help you learn the ropes.
• One Day license prices have dropped in price. For road they are $10, for MTB, they can be as low as $5.
• For road/Cyclocross, Category 5 for men and Category 4 for women are where you can race without a USA Cycling Annual License.
• For MTB, Category 3 and Category 3 are where you can race without a USA Cycling Annual License.
• If you have previously held an existing USA Cycling license and want to come back to the sport, a one-day license can be purchased online.
• If you purchase a One-Day license, you can send your copy of the receipt in to offset the cost of an annual license.

A part of your annual license and a part of your race entry fee supports:

• Creating a National Championship event program.
• Supports the Team USA Cycling Efforts for the Olympics.
• Comes back to Iowa to help local events, officials, and racers.
• Contributes to the Junior program that rewards Iowa racers who do 10 races per year with a $100 bike shop gift certificate.
• Contributes to a Women’s Program, new events are being planned now, want to help?
• Helps us manage a State Championship program for all disciplines.
• Creates a unified ranking system.
• Provides the best participant, race director, officials, and volunteer insurance protection program in the industry.

The combines leadership of the IMBCS and IBRA are excited about 2016 and beyond as we work together for all bike racers in Iowa.