For nine days in late September, the pace of life in the city of Richmond quickened precipitously as 1,000 of the world’s best professional cyclists, male and female, pedaled furiously over the cobblestones and careened through the parks and up and down the city’s hills. As the competitors sped past, hundreds of thousands of spectators lined the streets to cheer them on.
If things got a little hectic, blame Chris Aronhalt, R’89. He will thank you. The more people, the more business generated, the bigger the success it was for Aronhalt, co-owner and managing partner of Medalist Sports, the Georgia-based sports marketing firm running this year’s Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) Road World Championships. One of the world’s elite professional racing championships, the Road World Championships were held in the U.S. — thanks in part to Medalist’s efforts — for the first time since 1986.
This wasn’t the firm’s first rodeo, or “peloton,” French for the tight pack of cyclists in such races. Medalist, when it was still located in Richmond, owned and operated the Tour DuPont and Tour of China. Some of the original firm’s executives, Aronhalt included, also worked with Turner Sports to create the Goodwill Games, then taken to New York City.
In July, Aronhalt was in Lewiston, Maine, a mill town Medalist has put on the map with the Dempsey Challenge, a 4,000-participant walking, running, and cycling event started by actor and Lewiston native Patrick Dempsey to honor his mother, a cancer victim. Aronhalt was there, overseeing preparations for this October event. Then he sped back to Richmond for his work on the Road World Championships. Next up: Salt Lake City to work toward the 2016 Tour of Utah, another UCI-sanctioned competition. In between, he hoped to get back to Peachtree City, Ga., where he lives with his wife, Kathryn, W’90, and daughter, Paige.
After obtaining his undergraduate degree and working for Chase Manhattan in his native Wilmington, Del., Aronhalt earned an MBA in international business from Mount St. Mary’s College. “Then I came back to Richmond to work for Medalist — as an intern,” he said. “Working as an intern after I’d gotten my MBA wasn’t exactly meeting my parents’ expectations, but they feel OK with it now.”
Richmonders should be gratified too. Aronhalt was in Copenhagen, Denmark, in August 2011 with city officials and business leaders helping Richmond beat Oman to win the right to host the Road World Championships.
“We knew Richmond could handle a worldwide event when we made our pitch,” he said. “We also wanted the city to benefit from the worldwide exposure.”
Exposure it got. Cyclists speeding through the city were oblivious to the scenery, of course, but 300 million real-time viewers reached by 500 news organizations around the world saw Richmond’s statues, historic homes, churches, and leafy parks, just as during the Tour de France, they glimpse the Eiffel Tower and Champs-Élysées.
