Blog

Latest Posts

Put Some Training In Your Training Races

The start of the season is approaching and the early spring training race series are about to begin. Many riders see these inexpensive crits and road races as the start of the racing season and they approach the training races the same as they would any other event in the calendar. This is fine to…

Crit Racing Tips 102 (Beyond The Basics)

I wanted to write an article about Criterium racing, and give some tips, but looking around, most of the tips like “get in a good warmup,” “line up early,” “stay up front,” etc. have pretty much been covered. So I thought about the advice I give my riders beyond the basics.

What You Gonna Do When It Starts To Hurt?

In every race I have ever done, there comes a point where I get this big surprise when I realize how uncomfortable racing my bike can be. Having to push hard and ride at the pace set by the pack can be painful.  The funny thing is that after over 25 years of racing, I…

10 Simple Things To Remember When Racing As A Team

This past weekend, I was working with a team of riders who where preparing for an important local race. As I was writing a pep-talk e-mail, I decided to remind them of all the things that we have been learning the hard way, that we all really already knew but were not putting into practice.…

Tour Of Washington County Stage Race

The Smithsburg RR course is an exciting circuit with plenty of ups and downs all the way around. For the climbers, this is an opportunity to put the hurt on the rest of the field. For non climbers, conserve everything you can when the going might seem easy so that you have a full tank…

Play In The Dirt To Make Cold Weather Fun And Productive

I was out riding around my usual farm roads a few weeks back. My hands and face were freezing as usual and I was temped to slow down to reduce the wind chill a bit. But slowing down would mean dropping my power since the roads are pretty flat and fast. So I was thinking…

BikeJam / Kelly Cup

Big race for the DC Baltimore area. Pro teams are here for the NRC points and everyone else is there for the festival and fast fast racing. The course:The course for Bike Jam is a big circle with only 2 real turns. The first is just after the start finish after you go around a…

Carl Dolan Memorial Circuit Race

The Carl Dolan Circuit Race at the Columbia Gateway Center has been going on so long it’s become a MABRA classic. We originally raced the other direction on this course, but only for one year and the race was called something else back then. This race is not run on the most selective course around.…

Tyson’s Corner Circuit Race

This article was first published in 2007 It may sound like a broken record, but the warm up for this race is super important. With an uphill start leading into a fast descent before tackling the climb of the finishing stretch, if you are not warm and ready to rock from the gun the gaps…

Training Camps: Camping Out In The Back Yard

If budget or schedules don’t allow you to hold a camp at some great location like the Lost River Barn, or head out of town to a packaged camp in the mountains of Virginia or the sweet early season temps of southern California, you can effectively hold a camp without leaving home. This applies to…

Training Camps: Prepackaged Vs DIY

Prepackaged Camps If you are going to attend a prepackaged training camp and you know when you can go and how much you want to spend, then it’s just a matter of shopping around for the camp that best suite your needs and personality. Choosing a camp in an exotic location may meet some of…

Training Camps: Have A Goal And A Plan

The trick to holding an affective training camp or choosing from the many prepackaged camps is to first have a goal for what you or your team wants to accomplish. That goal may be tons of flat steady miles, or hours of climbing or dozens of team work drills. Or it may be to learn…

Training Camps: Store Bought Or Home Made?

There are lots of ways of doing a training camp. A camp can be as short as a long weekend or as long as a couple of weeks. You can also have a camp that is totally self service or a camp that provides all the services you might need like housing, food, mechanical support…

Training Camps: Not Just For Pros And Big Teams

Why not get your racing season off to a flying start with an individual or team training camp? A week or even a long weekend of dedicated training time can take your fitness to that next level and help your team form the cohesive bonds that can make a big difference in any kind of…

Giro Di Coppi Road Race

Delayed but not forgotten. The Giro road race is a great and selective course. There are enough tough rollers and hard little pitches to ensure a deserving winner. The thing about bike racing is that the strongest and fastest riders are not always the ones that win the races and on this course, the deserving…

Shopping For A Coach

It may seem a bit early to start thinking about next season already, but now is a great time to start looking into working with a personal cycling coach. So why look for a coach now, in the middle of the season? Though getting some help from a coach now may help you finish off…

The Hunny Bop

This is a super easy course. That is good and bad. Good if you are not technically skilled and want to finish. Bad if you hope to reduce the size of the field with some hard riding. There is no hill and the corners are wide open and you can usually pedal through all of…

Hagerstown Challenge Criterium

This is a great neighborhood course with fast front and back stretches and some challenging bits on the ends. The course starts easy enough with a drag race to the first left hand turn which leads into a bit of a rise. The flyer says a slight uphill, but this starts to feel more than…

Reston Town Center Grand Prix

This is one of my favorite events of the calendar, even though I have never done well at this race. The course has always been the story with this race with the six corners and that killer fifth corner that has been the site of more than one crash every year. This year the course…

About Me

Coaching at Velocious’
Majorca Cycling Adventure was an exciting and worth while experience.

%d bloggers like this: