MvdH CX: The ups and the downs of the North American World Cup block
From solid races to mishaps and bad races, at the end of the day getting to the 'cross course well prepared has the most value to your overall performance
by Michael van den Ham
It was Saturday night after the Iowa World Cup, I was sitting and trying not to feel bad for myself. Three races into the season and, by all accounts, not a lot to show for it. Sick in Reno, bent hanger off the start in Waterloo, rolled tubular on lap one in Iowa City. Sure, the results weren’t terrible by any stretch: a fourth, 29th and 28th respectively is actually ahead of where I was on the same schedule last year, but it wasn’t what I wanted by any stretch. Going into the block my goal was to walk away with a win and two top-20s and, even more than that, feel like I had put my best effort out on course. As of Saturday night that simply hadn’t happened yet.
I was frustrated, but in the C1 on Sunday I finally found that clean race and pulled out a seventh against a Euro-heavy field. It may have been the best ride I’ve had since the continental championships last season. More than that, the race left me wanting more as most of the European riders headed home and the domestic scene moved to Baltimore for Charm City CX for it’s C1/C2 weekend.
I had a solid race at Saturday’s more important C1 race at Charm City and was battling for the win until the last lap ultimately settling for fourth. It wasn’t what I wanted and I was hungry for more on day two. As determined as I may have been, it didn’t happen. In fact, I had what was probably my worst race in a couple of years. Maybe it was the heat, maybe it was the effort I had put in the day before or maybe it was just poor pacing, but I went from the lead group to watching my heart rate plummet, legs leaden, and after losing more than two minutes in a single lap, a DNF.
This string of mishaps, of good races and bad, is just par for the course with ‘cross. Every season is full of ups and downs. Countless hours of preparation can be lost with a single crash with a lot more consequence than that fairly minor setbacks I had. You don’t need to look very far this season to see that; Steven Hyde is out with a broken sternum, Spencer Petrov with a concussion and Jeremy Powers with illness.
It’s easy to get down after the bad races and, to be honest, I dropped the ball in my preparation leading up to Waterloo. Between coaching at a ‘cross camp, working at Interbike, fighting sickness, and travelling back and forth across the country my daily routine leading into the World Cup was a little bit of a mess. It was affecting my mental state on a day to day basis and, as a result, my racing. Once I took the time to get back on top of my regular routine of meditation and yoga, it made all the difference. The change might not be immediately apparent on the results sheet, but it was and is significant in how I’m able to handle the unrelenting up and down nature of a sport like ‘cross.
It took me a long time, but after years of buying into that old idea that you are “only as good as your last race,” I finally figured out that that’s a load of crap and, for me anyway, the process of getting to the race is more important than the race itself. Rather, the race is the reward for all the other work that you’ve put in. It’s about arriving to the start line feeling as if I’m as prepared as I could be. That doesn’t necessarily lead to racing success every time, but it does mean that I have set myself up for success. As they say, you have to be good to be lucky.
Michael van den Ham will be writing a bi-weekly blog throughout the cyclocross season covering everything from the nitty gritty at the races, to what it’s like travelling all over chasing UCI points, to the dynamics of running a team, to how to manage working a full-time job and racing. If there is anything in particular you want to hear more about, please feel free to drop van den Ham a line on Twitter, Instagram or Facebook where you can also follow his day-to-day stuff.
