Training can be a lot like drinking: to have a great time you need to know when to stop. In the taper week leading up to a race or event, athletes can do more to undermine their training than they can to enhance it. Yet, just like that “one more” drink, it’s the prospect …
There are a lot of Murphy’s Law moments in gravel racing, so we need to talk about crisis management, or what to do when things go wrong. Anticipating and planning solutions for what could go wrong creates the greatest chance of success. Particularly in long races, athletes who can adapt to adversity are typically …
Amateur criterium racing is not dead, it’s just moved from weekends to weeknights. Based on the activities and feedback we’re seeing from CTS Athletes, the after-work criterium scene may be stronger than it’s been in a decade or more! And it’s no wonder. There are three new elite-level criterium series – the American Criterium …
Back-to-back long rides can be massively beneficial for all cyclists, and especially Time-Crunched Cyclists. However, they must be executed correctly. Too many riders ruin their back-to-back rides by going too hard, under-fueling, and making other silly mistakes. Everything you do before, during, and after a long ride today affects performance tomorrow. And these mistakes amplify …
Balancing a career, home life, and training can be difficult. Adding children to the mix further increases the degree of difficulty (and joy). For Time-Crunched Cyclist Parents, creativity and flexibility are essential for success – defined as the ability to continue achieving your competitive or non-competitive sporting goals. CTS has coached Time-Crunched Cyclist Parents …
How many miles do you need to ride in training to be ready for your event? We get asked some variation of that question all the time from cyclists getting ready for their first century, or for a gran fondo, gravel race, or endurance mountain bike event. Do you need to ride 60 or 75 …
Car enthusiasts long derided American muscle cars for being great in a straight line and useless in corners. European performance cars, they argued, were designed for drivers. They had power for speed but also advanced suspension, steering, and weight distribution for superior handling. Well, cyclists can sometimes be thought of in the same way. Having …
Cyclists who ride year-round sometimes get lulled into a routine that long ago stopped being challenging enough or engaging enough to improve performance. It’s not that you’re out of shape or that you’re not training, it’s that you haven’t changed anything is so long that there’s no reason for your body to adapt and improve …
When Alison Jackson decided to make the 2023 Paris-Roubaix Femmes her “A race” for the spring, I was all for it. The Olympian who rides for EF-Education-TIBCO-SVB is well suited to the “Hell of the North”. She has a big aerobic engine and great tactical savvy from 8 years racing as a professional, plus a …
As sports fans we are accustomed to witnessing extraordinary performances, like CTS Athlete Alison Jackson’s victory in last weekend’s Paris-Roubaix Femmes. (Stay tuned for Coach Adam Pulford’s analysis of her training and race data on Tuesday!) Huge wins are inspirational. Many cyclists go out after watching an amazing cycling race like Paris-Roubaix and have storming …