Katie Compton (born December 3, 1978) is an American former bicycle racer. She specialized in cyclo-cross racing and is a 15-time national champion.[1] Compton formerly piloted a tandem with a blind partner in Paralympic events.
She has won the USA Cycling Cyclocross National Championships Elite Women's title in an unbroken 15- win streak every season from 2004 to 2018.[2] Since she took part in Paralympic events she can not enter any bicycle races which award UCI points. Since she was unable to take part in major races before the National Championship, her win was a surprise to other racers, fans and journalists, ending her Paralympic career under UCI regulations.
Katie Compton
In 2007, she became the first American woman to podium in the Cyclo-cross World Championships (held in the Cyclo-cross capital of the world that year—Belgium)[3] where she won silver between a French duo composed of Maryline Salvetat (who took the gold) and Laurence Leboucher (who won the bronze). In the 2007–2008 season she began racing professionally in UCI races as she no longer had her Paralympic obligations. In the beginning of the season she routinely has won the elite women's races in the US and on November 11, in only her third ever, she won her first World Cup Race in Pijnacker, Netherlands. Compton won by a margin of 54 seconds ahead of race favorite Daphny van den Brand who had won the previous World Cup race in Kalmthout.
In Paralympic events she rides a tandem with a blind partner Karissa Whitsell. Compton, the sighted team member, pilots and pedals the tandem in the captain position while Whitsell rides in the rear, stoker, position on their tandem. They were dominant in the 2004 Games, winning medals in every event they entered and setting a world record in the 3 km pursuit event.
Compton has amassed twenty three World Cup wins and five medals at the Cyclocross World Championships, and 130+ UCI wins, making Compton the most successful US Cyclocross athlete male or female in the sport.
In 2012, Compton signed a contract with the Trek Cyclocross Collective. Compton has worked closely with Trek testing and developing geometry she designed for the successful Trek Crockett and Boone cyclocross models.
In 2014 Compton rides for the Trek Factory Racing Team.
In 2014 Compton won her 100th UCI race after winning the Valkenburg World Cup in The Netherlands.
In 2016 Trek removed Compton off Trek Factory Racing support. Compton went on to form her own team, "KFC Racing" with sponsors including Trek Bikes, Knight Composites and Panache Clothing. Compton resumed her winning ways for the 2016-17 cyclocross season winning her first race at the Trek CXC Cup in Waterloo, Wisconsin.
In 2018 Compton became the first non-European to win the DVV Trofee overall.
In 2018 Compton won the silver medal at the World Championships in Valkenburg, NL in a thrilling battle with Sanne Cant.[4]
On August 11, 2021, it was announced that Compton had tested positive for an anabolic agent in September 2020 and had accepted a four-year ban as a consequence. The level was non-performance enhancing. Compton was notified five months after the test and was unable to trace the source of the contamination. As a bio-passport athlete, any level whether performance enhancing or not results in a positive test. Compton attempted to rescind her acceptance of the ban a week after accepting the ban due to poor legal advice but USADA refused to allow her to defend herself.[5]
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