The Year of Whitney, Revisited

After the Fort Follies Grand Prix finished up August 24, 2013, I was spent. Emotionally, physically, mentally spent. I vowed for a year focused on what I felt was important in a fulfilled life, what I want to do with my life, and how I was going to accomplish these things This was fondly dubbed by my close friends as the Year of Whitney. I felt that in 2013, I had given too much and sacrificed my own sanity and stability of my relationships. 2013 was great- the Fort Follies began, I got my first pro contract with Colavita, and I led the charge with Fort Follies Grand Prix but none of that was sustainable with a full time job or helped pay the bills. What could I do that would be both exciting to go to work everyday and could create a future for me?

Read more here: http://whitneyschultz.blogspot.com/2014/12/the-year-of-whitney-revisited.html

Off Season Balance

By, Erica Allar

Definition of Balance : noun

1 an even distribution of weight enabling someone or something to remain upright and steady

Having balance is important. It is my opinion that in order for a person to attack the race season with the energy, focus and drive, there is a balance that needs to be maintained and managed. When the race season begins in March and ends in September, it’s all bikes, all the time. Don’t get me wrong, bikes are fun. Racing is fun; however, that success can’t be built on a foundation lacking balance. In order to attack the race season weekend after weekend, a persons focus, energy and drive is dependent on the balance created. I create most of my balance in my off season. 

To remain “upright and steady” in cycling I feel that it’s important during the off season to spend time doing things that can easily be neglected during the months on the road. So naturally after my final race of the year, my off season beings. I see a lot of people tackle their off season with running and cross training. I do these things also but first I take some time away from cycling to enjoy ‘life’. 

After the 2014 race season I committed myself to spending more time cooking in the kitchen. I have a mom and a few close friends who happen to be great cooks. I’m inspired by them and have been spending more time trying out new recipes. I baked my first pumpkin pie from scratch. And while my pie came out a bit too “moist” (least favorite word in the world, by the way), it was edible and my mom was proud. That means a lot coming from the woman who makes fun of the fact that I can burn water. Thanks mom! I explored roasting brussels sprouts in the oven instead of steaming them in chicken broth and made a chickpea green curry chicken dish that I quite liked. My most intricate dish was using the Colavita Rice to make a pumpkin and goat cheese risotto dish. It took a lot of focus and the dish was better without the goat cheese garnish but I was still happy with the end result. 

http://www.teamcolavita.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=page.display&page_id=284

It’s also important during this time to be with friends. We can’t have pets because we travel too much so I spend time with friends who own pets to get my fill. Once training resumes I also run, walk, mountain bike, take kettle bell classes and do all the fun things that get taken out of ‘the program’ once the race season gets close. 

All of these things, while simple every day events- brings balance to my life and gives me the ability to remain motivated and challenged while having fun and working toward my goals along the way. 

Everyone maybe have a different idea of what balance should like. Regardless, I encourage everyone to explore balance in their lives because in the end, everyone is trying to find balance in order to remain upright and steady. And really, without balance we would all fall off our bikes. 

The School of Cycling

By, Lenore Pipes

Riders like Olympic silver medalist Emma Pooley who just received her
geotechnical engineering PhD from ETH Zurich, one of the best
universities in Europe, Elise Delzene who won the French national road
championship race as a full-time engineer, and even full-time
chiropractor Eric Marcotte who won the USA national championships this
year, are constant reminders that many pros are able to both race at
the highest level and still contribute to society. Based on my
experiences this year, I bet they are incredible people to have as
teammates.

I have been a student for most of my life, a cyclist for much less
time, and a professional cyclist for even less.  Because of this, it
was only natural to apply the formula that had gotten me through
academia to sport.  From my earliest memories to today at 28 years
old, my life has been consumed with performing well on homework,
exams, and grade reports.  For cycling, I figured that just as long as
I did the homework (the training), I could ace the exams (the races),
and have a stellar grade report (race resume).  After I finally
started to get results at important races, I thought that if I
continued to improve my race resume I would be asked onto the
appropriate team.  With trying to juggle everything else going on in
my life, I felt that this was the most comfortable way to approach my
new hobby.

When I was invited to ride for Colavita-Fine Cooking this year, I
finally accepted that my initial approach to cycling had been wrong
all along.  Cycling is a team sport!  Cyclists are people not defined
solely by their palmares but by their personalities and character and
relationships and responsibilities.  Teammates have to be able to race
together, travel together, and overall get along well together.

We have to be willing to commit to a unified race strategy yet
individually endure an unbelievable amount of suffering if that is
what is required.  We pretend that we are well (olive) oiled machines
set out to execute a well devised strategy based on thousands of input
variables.  Unlike in science, we can't control all the inputs.
Instead, we are emotional beings reacting to each other and the
physical stresses that come with the controlled chaos of each race,
making split-second decisions to accomplish as many of the team’s
goals as possible.  This is the beauty of the sport and why it is
important to have just as much mental toughness as we have physical
strength.  Whether the race unfolds favorably for us or not, I
remember that we need to keep doing our homework, cultivating our
relationships, and reevaluating our strategies.

In 2-3 years I will graduate and won't be a student anymore and
sometime in the future I won't be a professional cyclist any more.
Until then, I'll be focused on being as valuable a team member as
possible and a person that both academics and bike racers love to work

with.

Tucson Training/Racing Camp!

The Colavita gals headed down to the sun and warmth in Tucson March 6-17th, 2014, for some bonding, training, and racing! People sometimes ask how can teams race so well together but live so far apart… well, these camps serve as a great opportunity to spend a lot of time together on and off the bike! In attendance were Erica Allar, Lindsey Bayer, Olivia Dillon, Whitney Schultz, and Mary Zider.  WIth so many new people this year, it was nice we had extra bonding time with this camp! Here are some of the highlights of training camp:

Friday, March 7th, 2014: after pre-riding the circuit race course for Day 3 of the Tucson Bicycle Classic (March 14-16th) we checked out the crit course for the Old Pueblo Grand Prix (March 8th), followed by a ride with the El Grupo gals. El Grupo is a great club in Tucson geared for getting juniors on bikes! We loved how they had so many gals too. We enjoyed a bit of skills practice with them and followed up with a Q&A session. Some raced with us at the Old Pueblo Grand Prix- good job gals!

 

Saturday, March 8th we had our first race! This crit was was a solid L shape with a few narrow roads and some pretty quality wind for so late in the evening! About 40 women started the race with Optum p/b Kelly Benefits being the other squad in attendance with large numbers. They launched attack after attack until Lauren Hall got away and stayed away for the win. A large group broke off the main field with quite a few of the Optum ladies, plus Olivia, Erica, Mary, and Whitney, and a few other ladies. It was a very active race and the we clicked quickly and were able to help deliver Erica for the field sprint win for second.  

 

Whatever you do, don’t ask about the tiny chairs

 

Sunday the Colavita women participated in the Grand FUNdo, a fun community group ride to bring the racers from the night before and community members together. After downing some delicious coffee at Stella Java, we were ready to roll. We rode a nice 40 miles on the extensive bike path system. Thanks for having us Grand FUNdo!  

 

 

That afternoon we checked out and analyzed the very roller coaster-like time trial course for the Tucson Bicycle Classic. Many people go into any time trial with the same tactic: go as hard as possible...but sometimes, especially on courses like this where there are rollers and a few significant kickers, it’s better to choose your battles and rest in other areas in order to have an overall faster time.

Monday, after an extensive photo shoot with Jonathan Devich at Canyon Ranch, we rode up Mount Lemmon. The climb was amazing: a consistent and decent grade. The quality training going up was only doubled by the awesome tactical training then descending the 25 miles to the base! Tuesday was much of the same, minus the photo shoot!

Wednesday we checked out the road race course for Tucson Bicycle Classic which had some big rollers, a long gradual decent, and a long windy false flat section. It was easy to see the course could dramatically change based on the wind situation on race day!

The Tucson Bicycle Classic kicked off at high noon Friday with a big head wind! Our awesome staff- Alex our mechanic and Jame our director- had rigged our road set ups to be as aero as possible. We did the best we could and Olivia finished 9th, the first road bike finisher and everyone else piled in just behind her. Shortly after we experienced a very rare Tucson rain. I hear it’s a thing of fairy tales.

Saturday had a 6:43AM start. Yep, you heard that right. So much for not needing warmers for Tucson. Shortly after sunrise we were off. Optum was full assault after the first lap and they were the better team on the day. Sunday was similar but we had learned our lessons from the day before and operated more cohesively. 

Overall we had a great camp in Tucson logging over 21 hours on the bike, lots of quality time getting to know each other, and meshing together on the bike. Although the results may not show it, we did accomplish a lot of what we set out to do with the team camp. It’s only upwards from here! A huge thanks to all our sponsors- Colavita, Fine Cooking, Stradalli, Selle Italia, Clif Bar, Rudy Project, Castelli, Bont, Headsweats, Vittoria, Speedplay, Blindfold Magazine, Patagonia, and Park Tool. Our staff and friends really made our camp smooth and fantastic- thanks Jame Carney, Amanda Rose Shission, Alex Strickland, Tom, and Pam.