An 18-year-old from Augusta, Georgia, Jonas Walton, set a new Hour Record for junior riders on Monday at the Aguascalientes Velodrome in Mexico, riding 50.792 kilometres on the high-altitude track.
The distance is 1,608 metres more than the previous record of 49.184 kilometres set in March by Welsh rider Fred Meredith.
“I want to thank everyone who helped make this possible. I went out there with a plan and I definitely left it all out there today," Walton said in a press release sent by his parents' coaching business Walton Endurance.
The performance - when ratified - will also have netted Walton the USA Cycling Hour Record for junior men, beating Luke Mullis' 47.595-kilometre record from 2016.
Walton is the son of Canadian former pro rider Brian Walton, a Olympic silver medalist in the points race in 1996, and Track Master’s World Champion Dana Walton.
The record-setting effort is far short of Filippo Ganna's spectacular 56.792-kilometre ride from earlier this month, but it is remarkable considering Walton competed in his first bike race in 2020, having been forced to stop running because of a common bone issue called Osgood-Schlatter disease.
He went on to join the local Hot Tubes Cycling Team, noted for talent development but had only ridden on a velodrome three times before attempting to break the Hour Record.
According to the press release, Walton rode an Argon 18 carbon track bike which was loaned to him by Master’s World Champion Russ Murphy including double disc wheels with Vittoria Speed Concepts tires.
His cockpit set up was by Aerocoach, the same company that worked with Alex Dowsett on his 2021 attempt, and he used Speedplay Aero, a custom speedsuit by Verge, a POC Tempor helmet and Shimano RC9 shoes.
"Walton is now resetting his focus for the upcoming road season while attending Belmont Abbey College in North Carolina as a freshman where he received a cycling and academic scholarship," the press release stated.
