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training & skills

• Sneak Peek: Issue 20′s National Champion Training Secrets

  19 May 13 • 0 comment

  

  We asked each and every Nationals medalist just how he or she does it. What’s the training like? What kind of cross training do you do? What workouts do you love to hate? How do you plan nutrition? Responses were varied, so once we narrowed down to some of our favorite answers, we asked Cycle-Smart [...]

• Coaching Corner: Four Best Ways to Spend Money on Training

  17 May 13 • 0 comment

  

  by Jacob Fetty Unless you are a full-fledged sponsored ’cross racer, racing ’cross can be costly. Heck, even if you are sponsored, racing is expensive and we are often forced to be mindful of our expenditures. At the same time, our inner-consumer is being pulled in a variety of directions as to what we need [...]

• The Benefits of a Cyclocross Race-Specific Bike Fit

  12 May 13 • 0 comment

  

  by Molly Hurford Ask any cyclist about bike fits and there will be a different response. As one pro racer uttered under his breath when we started talking about bike fit over dinner in a group last month, “Everyone is an expert.” We’ve talked about bike fit a bit over the years, but it’s always [...]

• Training for Cyclocross – An Off-Season Plan for a Strong Next Season

  26 April 13 • 1 comment

  

  Done for the season? Put on a few extra pounds? Want to race better next year? While some of you may be hitting the trails and mountain biking, and others are beginning their road seasons, for some of you, cyclocross is the main focus, so it’s still (thankfully) the off-season. From our archives, we’ve brought [...]

• Coaching Corner: Don’t Dismiss the Off-Season

  6 April 13 • 0 comment

  

  by Jacob Fetty ’Cross season is over and you find yourself with a little extra time on your hands. Now is a splendid opportunity to do some things that you typically don’t have time to do. Additionally, it is the appropriate time to work in some different training disciplines and life hobbies. Here are five [...]

• Cyclocross Season is Over … Now What?

  15 March 13 • 0 comment

  

  by Jacob Fetty ’Cross is over. Now what? You have watched the World Championship replay 17 times on YouTube. You are lost. It feels like your partner has moved on and wants a six-month break. Oh, the drama. Here are three things to help you through the break-up: See Other People Over the previous several [...]

• Cyclocross for Newbs: Lessons Learned Looking Back on My First Season

  10 March 13 • 0 comment

  

  by Seth Lincoln Going into the 2012 cyclocross season, I had exactly zero racing experience and searched high and low for information that might help me to prepare to race ’cross. While there are some good articles out there, I found that in general, the articles are oriented to someone with a higher level of [...]

• Considering Coaching? Nationals Winners Weigh in on Their Coaches—Or Lack Thereof

  9 March 13 • 0 comment

  

  Now that the season is over and you’ve most likely taken some time to think about your results from the fall and winter, and evaluated if you met your goals or not, you might be thinking about hiring a coach. We recently asked our National Champions a bevy of questions about their training, and one [...]

• Coaching Corner: Driving Your Bike by Working on Your Relationship Skills

  15 February 13 • 3 comments

  

  by Jacob Fetty So many things happen in a ’cross race – physically, mentally, metaphorically and existentially. It’s an action packed several minutes. Racing well in ’cross races depends on more than fitness. In the algebraic race equation it takes combining fitness with technique, multiplied by bike driving divided by transition skills to equal a top [...]

• Mical Dyck’s Garmin Data File from the Women’s Race at Cyclocross World Championships

  8 February 13 • 1 comment

  

  “I don’t know how much I can eat, I need to see how many calories I burned,” Canadian racer and SSCXWC winner Mical Dyck laughed at the end of her race in the Elite Women’s World Championships of Cyclocross. We asked how she’d know how many calories she’d burned in the 45 minutes of racing, [...]

• Number Crunching: Analyzing Lap Times from the World Championships

  6 February 13 • 3 comments

  

  by Robbie Carver As with the 2013 National Championships, we here at Cyclocross Magazine can’t help but geek out on the lap times from the World Championship races this past Saturday in Louisville, Kentucky. With the benefit of electronic timing, we can pick apart each race to see where the moves were made or the races [...]

• Coaching Corner: The Guilt of Training When You Have Kids, Being OK with Having Your Own Time.

  18 January 13 • 0 comment

  

  by Jacob Fetty Kids grow up too quickly. We all know the cliche: you even think about blinking and you miss something … or multiple things. Blink once and your child is talking, blink twice and your little one is borrowing the keys to your car. As engaged parents and motivated athletes, we don’t want [...]

• Number Crunching: Looking at Women’s Race Lap Times from the 2013 Cyclocross National Championships

  15 January 13 • 1 comment

  

  Yesterday we took a look at the lap times from six of the seven laps the Elite Men completed at the 2013 USA Cyclocross National Championships.  Today we’ll look at the four laps the Elite Women completed in the race won by Katie Compton. Thankfully for this race, the lap time data is complete, and [...]

• Number Crunching: Looking at Elite Men’s Race Lap Times from the 2013 Cyclocross National Championships

  14 January 13 • 5 comments

  

  By now, we all know the results of the 2013 Cyclocross National Championships, but what cyclocross dorks like us like to do is look at the race within the race: Lap times and split times. Being able to analyze the performance, consistency and speed of a rider is one of the awesome benefits of electronic [...]

• Coaching Corner: How Much Time is “Enough Time”? How Can I Fit It In?

  4 January 13 • 0 comment

  

  Today, our coach-in-residence, Jacob Fetty, talks about being reasonable about training. And if you want to read even more about recovery, check out our Issue 19 article on the Six Secrets of Rider Recovery. by Jacob Fetty Most cyclists training tend to be motivated to a fault. This deep-seeded motivation, combined with real world responsibilities, [...]