Itching to Race Again

The off-season will soon be over. I am wishing the summer to come faster, although when the summer does come I will again be wishing the winter to come even faster. You can never be happy with the weather here in Fresno, it is either cold and wet, or hot and dry. I think this off-season I may have lost a few thousand cells in the parachutes I call my ears, they catch wind like a sail and manage to almost receive frost-bite by the end of all my winter rides. I am ready for the base miles to end, and the hectic year of traveling and racing constantly to begin.

Early Birds will begin shortly. I will be reunited with most of team once again. I do miss them over the off-season, as they are the people I share many of my laughs with. Hopefully I will see all of the infamous Nor-Cal Pro's out at the Early Birds. Maybe we could manage to get Donut Boy (Rand Miller) racing his bike again, an early season comeback where we could constantly heckle each other, like old times. I look forward to finally racing again. Thanks for the read, hopefully I will get in touch with all my competitors soon.

Jack Maddux

A Season to Remember

"What you get by achieving your goals is not as important as what you become by achieving your goals" -Henry David Thoreau

As the New Year approaches, we reflect on the achievements we have reached in the 2012 season. With 100 wins, 220 podium places, and 451 top ten places this season, we have taken the results, good or bad, and learned from each of them. We also did not take our wins for granted either. I realized that each accomplishment the team achieved, it was not about the jersey we won or the Velo Promo t-shirt we received, but it was due to hard work, teamwork, and talents of the riders.

Team Specialized continues to teach their riders how to become the best cyclists they can be.  In addition, we are also being taught to become “men for others” by giving back to the community. I am looking forward to another season with the team.

-Matt Valencia 

Base Training

Late fall and winter mean base training.  Lots and lots of hours where your coach tells you to go relatively slow (but some how it still makes you sore!) This year my coach has me doing 2, 4 week blocks.  I am in the middle of the 2nd one currently; I will not be sad when it's over.

Learning to manage your time to schedule class, studying, big base hours, finals and of course your social life in college is definitely an important skill.  Training and just going out and riding while you are in college, especially when you live on campus, is a great way to get away from everyone and everything; the stresses of everyday life.

I planned on having a strong fall of racing; collegiate track, MTB and cyclocross.  But I got the illness known commonly as mono.  It only put me back for around 2 weeks of off the bike even though I was extremely sick.  I was planning on having an awesome cyclocross season but this illness hit me the first week of November.  So I was only able to race 4 cyclocross races: the Ft. Collins USGP and Boulder Cup UCI weekends.  As fun as these races were, they were some of the hardest races I have done and doing a few races where I had been competitive would have been nice or at least finishing on the lead lap.

Base is a good time to step back from racing and just go out and ride. You can plan your race schedule and contemplate the next year.  Racing season will come soon enough because the first RMCCC race is March 9.

I have found teams for next year.
Mountain Bike team where I will be racing mostly locally along with Nationals in PA and a few Pro XCT races: The Hometeam (New team for 2013 details to be released very soon) we have a factory sponsorship from Spooky Bikes, a custom fabricator in VT.

Road team is soon to be announced but it is very very likely I will be riding a Specialized bike in 2013.

Dean Haas

"Luck is where the crossroads of opportunity and preparation meet." Seneca 

I'm Melting

“Strength does not come solely from physical capacity. It comes from an indomitable will.” – Gandhi

Winter. Rain. Cold. Maybe some snow depending on where you live. All things that “get in the way” of riding.

Be wet. Be cold. Ride the rollers. The options you have to deal with winter weather.

Think about it though, unlike many other sports, bike races are run rain, shine, 30 degrees or 100 degrees.

So why not layer up, grab a Clif Bar or two and go out and ride? What, are you going to melt from a little water? Riding in the rain can be fun; go places you haven’t gone before because when it’s dry you have “better” places to go to train. Don’t want to have to descend in the wet, but still want to climb, do lots of short hills at threshold. Ride the rollers even; throw on a race DVD (this years Vuelta, Roubaix, or one of the many Eddy Merckx films). Or catch up on your favorite TV shows (I like CSI: NY). If it’s cold, layer up; Squadra makes some very warm long sleeve jerseys if you are lucky enough to have them as your clothing sponsor.

So what’s your excuse for not riding today? If you do a truly epic ride in the rain or snow, it’s a great story to brag about to your friends. Same thing if you’re crazy enough to ride the rollers for longer than an hour and a half or two.

Common this is a tough sport; we do what we love rain, shine, sleet or snow.

- Jason S