It's that time of year when most of the cycling I do is on the muddy stuff. I usually commute to work by bicycle so I do put in 15 miles a day going into Central London and back, but in terms of the club cycling I do, it's mainly about off-road riding, and in particular the London Cyclo Cross league.
When I first started taking part in the league I really enjoyed it. It was not so sharp end like the road races. It was relatively low key, but alot of people took part as it was seen as being accessible. The range of abilities was wide, and people who weren't that fit could have a go. The fact that it was laps of an off-road course meant that spectators couldn't tell where you were in the race compared with others. So you didn't have to suffer the embarrassment of everyone watching you come last! Also people could ride any off-road bike they had. Most people rode cyclo cross bikes, but many had mountain bikes and even there were a few people on bmx bikes! It didn't matter.
In short, cyclo cross league was a chance to play around in the mud at speed on your bike, but it didn't really matter where you finished in the field. You had a chinwag with your fellow competitors and then you went home, looking forward to the next one.
I have never been particularly strong at cyclo cross, but a couple of times I have finished 4th in the league. One year I even finished 2nd.
Nowadays it's all different. Among the women, cyclo cross is just seen as an extension of the road racing season - except that we are off-road. Everyone shows up on a cross bike. More and more are using tubular tyres with their racing wheels, and they are bringing spares for the pits. A few even have spare bikes. That was something you only really saw at National Trophy races rather than at local league races.
What is really striking is people are doing specific training sessions to prepare for this - turbo trainer intervals, off-road training rides, some have even taken up running!
So now, when I race a London Cyclo cross league race I am lucky to get in the top 5 out of 10 women. More often than not I am one of the last finishers. Yet I'm riding faster now than I did back then. Someone has changed the game. It's like in musical chairs when they go from taking away one chair when the music stops, to taking away three! It's quite disheartening at times and I almost why I should bother with this anymore. Thing is I enjoy doing cyclo cross races and I shouldn't be put off by the arrival of a number of really fast women. Ultimately I will continue to do the races as long as I enjoy them, but to be honest it is a shame that the romance of just taking part in the hour-long challenge is not enough. People have to put up Twitter entries about their power outputs, analyse their techniques on a video, check the British Cycling rankings and have a distinct race plan when the whistle goes.
Admittedly, this serious training paid off for the London team. At the recent Inter-Area Cyclos cross champs London had more women present than any of the areas in the country. Our A team finised in second position out of 11 teams in a 40-strong field of women. One of the members of our London B team also finished in the top 10.
It shouldn't be a surprise that the competive girls where the ones who ended up with the medals, I wasn't one of them! That was great for London and I'm really plesed for the girls. However, I can't help thinking that we are losing the salt of the earth end of local cyclo cross racing as this is all getting put aside in order to use the 'cross races as a warm-up to National Trophy races, which are in turn the foundation of the roa racing season. Then I really will feel under pressure to "make the cut" - which I invariably don't.
The men have a hard edge competitive end to the sport, but they have a laughing group end as well. The women don't seem to have that. Hopefully this is issue is just a phase that will fizzle out, and some of the women will go back to plain old playing in the mud, with our British Cycling points tally being the last thing on our minds!
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