My collegiate cycling career is officially over (well, I could pull a Favre and enroll in another grad program — although I just turned down UVA, so don’t hold your breath). This year went substantially better than last year, and I think it came down to a few new riding philosophies. And a little luck avoiding crashes.
Important lessons learned:
1. Learn to love crits. Last year, I dreaded them, loathed them with a passion. This year, my goal was to be a crit monster. Case and point: my three Top 5 finishes this season: all crits. Who knew?
2. Don’t race to hang on, race to attack and attack again. I try to emulate my racing style after my fave runner and American legend, Steve Prefontaine: “A lot of people run a race to see who is fastest. I run to see who has the most guts, who can punish himself into exhausting pace, and then at the end, punish himself even more. Nobody is going to win a 5,000 meter race after running an easy 2 miles. Not with me. If I lose forcing the pace all the way, well, at least I can live with myself.” – Pre
3. Train smarter. Last year I spent a lot of time in spin class at my gym, which was more of an aerobics class than a cycling training session. If you’re gonna work your butt off, do it in the right medium. I didn’t train any longer or harder or more often than last year, but I spent a hella lot more time on the trainer this winter. And I can only imagine how much better training would have gone without my two part-time jobs, overloaded course schedule and job search priorities.
Sooo, normally summertime is when I ramp up my running. But I just qualified for some USA Cycling Development Camps, so I’m not sure what to do now, cause that’s pretty sweet. We’ll see. No idea what I’m doing with my life. No idea where I’m living. Et al.
dpnation: Lawsuit free since 2004!
