Rutgers Highlights

This is a stunning example of how collegiate cycling officially rocks your socks:

With a win in the circuit race and I believe a 2nd place in the TT, Natan apparently did this thing over the winter that I like to think of as "getting fast"...
He's been my man for the 2010 season omnium since last spring's racing ended, so nobody let him slack off! I don't think he stopped grinning, drooling, and absent-mindedly spinning in random patterns around the parking lot for a good twenty minutes after the exciting circuit race win. Full reports from the Men's A and Women's A/B races have been well covered by the fledgling ECCC News Network.

New pre-race, off course Intro clinics also seemed to go extremely well. Here the bulk of the Men's and Women's Intro racers crowd around to listen to some crazy guy talk about cornering:
Double points to Jessica Kutz, one of our A racers and Intro coaches, for sporting the Freeze Thaw vest in the foreground. Started by a handful of PSU riders, Freeze Thaw's either a bike shop in State College focusing on recycled bikes or a mindset, depending on how you look at it.

Speaking of Intro riders, the race report from Shaena Berlin of MIT is well worth reading. If you didn't think there were intense tactics, strategy, and teamwork going on in the Intro categories then you, my friend, are sorely mistaken! I have never put that much thought into a race in my life as the Yale and MIT Intro Women seem to be doing already this season...

A few more photos from the weekend are available in the Flickr gallery.

Focus

Day 1 of the 2010 ECCC Road Season is in the bag, Day 2 to follow shortly.

I will say that steering the conference over the winter is extremely difficult. It's an awful lot of email, a lot of problems more or less out of your control, a lot of realizing things would be so much better if you just made time to take care of one left-behind task or another. There's no immediate pay off behind all that, and it's difficult to stay focused for months on all the many issues and tasks that need to be addressed without actually seeing what you're working toward.

But, of course, anybody who's ever really thought about training and what it means already knows that. Guiding the conference, promoting a race, training for the season, the most difficult challenge is focus---maintaining discipline and progress even in the face of... Nothing. No reward, no pay back, no return on that investment for extended periods of time. The challenge in training is not spending a few mind numbing hours on the trainer or slogging home in the freezing rain. The challenge is going out and doing it again, and again, and repeating until the season finally hits, and only then possibly being rewarded. The triumph is going out and doing it again.


Jeffrey Hansen asked me a while ago why I think the ECCC comes up with so many initiatives and ideas that generally then spread out nationally. What makes us so successful at continually moving forward?

There are a lot of reasons for that. We have a good base of riders and teams; we have many excellent volunteers, promoters, and team captains; we stress inclusion and improvement above all else; we've built a culture of analysis and innovation; we hold firmly to sheer tenacious perseverence and zealous belief in our own true path. But, I think the main reason we keep moving forward is focus.

We could do more. I could put more time into the conference than I do. We could have more people staffing any number of roles. But we do all right. Most importantly, we never shut down. From season to off season, throughout the year, across the years, all of our volunteers and leaders continually work away at building, developing, improving the conference. Similarly, none of us ever takes our eyes off the trail ahead. No one good event or excellent season ever slows us down for long, that focus immediately bringing us back to what could still be better, what remains to be done.

Like any good racer with a crystal clear vision of their goals and a plan on how to get there, our focus, our drive, is what makes it happen.

Like any good breakaway, there isn't much choice but for the others to follow.



As for the rewards... For those and what they might be, you only had to watch the ECCC's awesome women for a little bit today and see how much happier almost all of them seemed to be. Sometimes you have a good race. Sometimes a lot of people have a good race.

Late January Updates

Quick updates on things in progress:

• At least one flyer is almost ready to go up shortly.
• Arthur has started collecting host housing information from promoters, so we hope to start taking applicants in the next couple weeks. Spaces will be given out first come, first served.
• John Frey and I ordered this year's number last week; they should be at his house shortly. For the record, this year we ordered some 1100 sets, complementing the one or two hundred or so left over from last year.

Also, the ECCC Winter Planning Meeting is set for February 20th @ Yale in Connecticut! Details to come, but we'll be checking in on road promoters, and having some serious discussions about MTB and CX. Be there!

Race Report: Pickle Run!!!

For all that missed it, the first Pickle Run of 2010 was amazing! Some of you may see this in the January issue of Runner's World and some other mags, but the Pickle Run is an up and coming Greater Philadelphia-area running race phenomenon started by a Drexel Cycling alum and friends. There are usually several events, but the core one is a prediction race---wherein you guess your time beforehand and are effectively scored on the accuracy of that wildly fabricated time rather than your actual finish---but with a few extras:

• A giant pickle roaming around that may or may not give you a hug:
• Pickles hidden on course (there are road or trail routes) that give you time bonuses, special prizes, and/or more hugs from the chief pickle.
• Hundreds of runners having a great time at a low cost race with solid production values (chip timing, etc).
• Prizes consisting entirely of things found languishing in dark basement corners, and, of course, handmade pickle superstars, such as 2008's Pickle Bandit:

To find out how I won that sweet baby, you are strongly encouraged to read the true tale of my 2008 Pickle Run experience. It's effectively the story of my life, in one long race report. In 2009 I couldn't go because Caitlin pushed me into a tree mountain biking and broke my rib. I also miss the February and March races due to ECCC events.

But, on January 16, 2010, I could go! Fantastic!

The weather was super lucky, and hundreds and hundreds of people showed up. I haven't seen a tally yet, but I could believe there were 400 people there; that's as big as the top tier of ECCC races. The start was crazytimes (in a good way), with runners everywhere of all sorts of abilities; it took some definite ducking and diving to get through the crowd! Good showing from the DFTC (Drexel Fat Tire Club---old school Drexel Cycling) as well---seven people from several generations of the team running (plus a friend from work), plus Frank Durso, one of the two Drexel Cycling founders, as the big pickle himself (and co-organizer).

The trail section used this time was great, and a good bit harder than the previous Pickle Run I'd made it to. Fairly tough vertically with a bunch of rollers, and just technical enough, more so than before. Mostly twisty single track, seemed like really good MTB trails. Doug and I definitely dropped a person or two who were not following us technically as quickly but could have held fitness-wise, a good indicator of how interesting the trail was. A few sections actually took real focus, especially a slightly off camber very narrow section along a hillside, and some tight turns with roots on little up and downs. Very doable on sneakers, but actually the first time I've ever found myself wanting dedicated trail running shoes, as I slipped out just ever so slightly on a tight, loose trail kink. Good stuff.

Doug and I in turn also got dusted by a good number of people who straight up outlasted us on the climbs, but otherwise did ok. I think us and my buddy Duc finished right around 30:15 for the (ostensibly) 4.3--4.5 mile course. When we turned into the trail a mile or two in I thought I was *done* as Doug started hotfooting it up the hill in his Vibram 5-Fingers, but fortunately I reeled him right back in over the next section. Confirming Blake's theories though, there was definitely a point near there where I was thinking "Man, maybe I'm running too hard, it would be nice to be able to focus and see the trail better before I fall into this creek..." I also have to say, I was originally going to sandbag and register 36 or 37min as my prediction but then an older gentleman behind me in line said he was putting down 29---game on! Well, game on for maybe 200 meters, before he proceeded to leave my ass behind...

Tim put in a good time in the 5k, coming in around 21min, despite possibly not having run in years... Shrey hung tough on the 4.3m road course for his first running event ever, and seemed stoked even with the pretty mammoth finishing climb---it was big; I was mentally preparing myself in case the trail dumped out at the bottom of it, but it did not (sadly!). Lou, Dom, and Dan also all did well on the trail run, though Lou seemed way more excited by the hot popcorn he got in the finishing chute...

All in all, awesomesauce! There are two more Pickle Runs coming up, in February and March. I'm not sure I'll make them because of ECCC events, but everybody else should be there if not at ECCC shenanigans!

Definite credit to Frank and crew. They've really built up an awesome thing out there. Run the Day's races are some of the most fun sporting events I've ever been to, and I go to an awful lot of really fun events every year (20+ weekends a year). They're exactly how sports should be---totally ridiculous, fun, and hard, with lots of good people.

Projects, Early 2009/12

When we introduced the ECCC Blogosphere, many prescient commentators (e.g., Ninja Don from Rutgers) obviously but no less astutely noted that a whole lot of blogs would be started up, then quickly fizzle out. That's been true, but I think it also spawned a good number of blogs with real longevity and activity. Mine is not one of them.

However, I've recently decided to put more effort into putting my blog to good use. With the increasing number of people contributing to running the ECCC, we need to do more to direct, organize, and keep track of those contributions. On many levels it would be good to have all that out there where other people can follow along, so I'm going to combine the two and post more up here about what's happening "behind the scenes" in the ECCC.


Recent Projects

Early September to mid November is pretty brutal in the ECCC. Between MTB season, the Local Association/Conference Director/Board of Trustees meeting at USAC, and the ECCC November meeting, it's a long drag. I personally have responded to this by not doing much cycling related in the past few weeks since the fall meeting except crashing my MTB into logs...

That said, things have been happening. Most notably, we had great response to the call for a host housing director. A surprising number of people expressed interest in renewing that important role in the ECCC. For 2010, Arthur Wicks from U Delaware will be stepping up to take charge of that project. Beyond immediately jumping on the call, Arthur had already developed several important thoughts and ideas on that effort. I'm very excited about having him in charge of the ECCC's host housing project this coming season. I think this is a long neglected effort that is going to rebound very quickly, with great impact this spring.


Current Projects

So, this is the current to-do list for the near future:

Arthur

• Develop & writeup host housing procedures, forms, timelines

Caitlin

• Road flyer requirements
• 2010 budget
• Women's cycling plans

Jake/Bill

• CX final scoring

Joe

• Road flyer requirements
• ECCC state incorporation paperwork
• Road permitting notes
• ECCC website
• ECCC rulebook
• Officiating & LA notifications

Maggie

• Women's cycling plans
• Women's cycling: Website section outline

Steve/Kyle

• ECCC news blog/main site integration

Sully

• Road flyer requirements
• Road Intro curriculum
• Team recruitment plans

Growth

So, that happened. Nine weekends, twenty seven events, seven thousand two hundred and two individual starts (not including TTTs or USAC Road categories). All in all, the season went well.

Perhaps most importantly, I don't think there were too many serious injuries. That's not to say there weren't tragedies, there certainly were, but I'm not aware of any outrageously bad incidents in competition. A number of collar bones, an elbow, some wrists, a pinkie, a few concussions. I could be wrong, but I don't think there was much more serious than that, which, sad to say, is a positive result in this sport. Collecting incident data and improving course review procedures is definitely on the agenda for next year, however.



Beyond that, participation in 2009 was awesome. The chart here plots growth over the last seven years, the only years for which we really have solid data, as charted by rider starts (i.e., as opposed to unique riders). Note that 2007 featured several weekends canceled due to "weather," hence the sudden dip in participation. That dip probably had large effects on 2008, especially when combined with a general slowing in cycling growth (a dulling of the national Lance Effect). It will be interested to see what kind of growth we see next year. One very reasonable theory is that conference growth has substantial lag effects. For example, dropping five days of racing in 2007 meant that 2008 took a substantial hit right off the bat, and had minimal growth from 2006. On the positive side though, given that so many people raced so much this year, what will next year look like? There was a bumper crop of Women's B, Men's D, and Intro racers this year, which could have positive, long term effects for the next few years.

On that note, women's participation by raw numbers was stellar this year. I don't think any race has been close to the ~110 women that raced at Rutgers/Princeton this year. That said, percentages followed a trend of the last two years and were slightly down compared to a few years ago, averaging 20.47% women each weekend in 2009 with a maximum of 24.92%, as opposed to 25% average in 2006 and a 33% maximum. Given that there was not a decline in women's participation, that means we're not growing women's cycling as quickly as men's cycling, and that's something we need to get back on track.

Overall though, growth seemed solid, and we should all be happy. Our biggest races were not quite as big as the 2007 record-setters, but they were close, and all races this year shifted up a scale. Even our smallest weekends are getting close to what was solidly mid-tier not too long ago.

For those interested, statistics from the past few years have been uploaded to the ECCC website, here.

Post-Season Fun

Obviously a lot happened this weekend, and I have not fully processed anything yet other than ECCC Nationals Qualifications. I will say though that I think it was a fantastic season and this past weekend was a great way to cap it off.

While we're all thinking about how to best express how awesome this season went, two weeks from now several of us from Drexel, Union, and maybe some other schools are planning to race at the Tour of Syracuse. It's pretty low key and we had a good time last year. If anyone is interested in joining the fun, let us know! The weekend is a prologue ITT, road race, and crit for $50. ITT is short and fairly flat. Road race has some solid climbs, but nothing out of hand. Crit is returning to a previously used course (not last year's), which is well known & liked.

For those not going to Nationals, make sure to check out the UMass Orchard Assault going on this weekend!