BECOME A MORE POWERFUL CYCLIST? IT’S TIME FOR CYCLOCROSS…

From Rouler.cc

WORDS: JAMES WITTS

‘Tis the season for cherubs, cheese, Christmas cake, and cyclocross. Yes, up and down Great Britain and beyond, once passive fields are churned up into a quagmire by the knobbly tyres of (visually) beefed-up road bikes. It’s wonderful and exhausting in equal measure. “I’ve never tried it,” you ponder. Well, make this the winter that you do as you’ll enjoy a competitive boost to your 2024 season.

“But I haven’t a clue about the technical, psychological and physical benefits of this historic discipline of cycling that, legend has it, stretches back to the early 1900s and beyond as European road racers would race each other through tut farmer’s fields and over tut fences,” you ponder further in a rather laborious fashion. “Please tell me more with the help of current UCI World under-23 cyclocross champion Shirin van Anrooij, plus explain the transferable benefits to my 2024 road season.”

As you’ve pondered so nicely, we’re on it…

SCIENCE OF SPEED

Cyclocross dominates the cycling calendar in autumn and wintertime, and commonly plays out over a course that’s one to three kilometres long in races lasting between 40 and 60 minutes. The off-road parcours include sharp turns, steep banks, tree roots, sandpits and hurdles. Those latter two obstacles mean dismounting and running with a bike nestled on either shoulder is a much-needed skill. You also need the lungs, heart and legs of a thoroughbred as though the racing ‘only’ consumes an hour compared to a road race or sportive that can roll on for five or six hours, the intensity is all out.

How intense is highlighted by a 2017 study in the journal Sports and Exercise Medicine. A team led by Ryanne Carmichael, associate professor of exercise and sports physiology at Plymouth State University, USA, had eight experienced crossers take part in both a lab test and a cyclocross race.

In the lab, they pedalled to exhaustion on a cycle ergometer, the researchers measuring a number of metrics including lactate production at the increasing intensities. Broadly, the fitter you are, the higher your power output while keeping lactate levels low. In Carmichael’s study, heart-rate intensities were categorised as low, medium and high where low equated to lactate levels of 2mmol/litre or under up to high at 4mmol/l or over.

 

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CicLAvia—South LA (Leimert Park <—> Historic South Central)

Join us for the last event of the 2023 season, CicLAvia—South LA (Leimert Park <—> Historic South Central) on Sunday, December 3rd, from 9am – 3pm as we transform the streets of Leimert Park, King Estates, Exposition Park, and Historic South Central into a public park for the day.

The South LA area is rich with African American culture, especially in its food, art, and architecture. Here are some of the MANY local gems that will be along the route.

And our friends at Los Angeles Conservancy have designed an interactive scavenger hunt for CicLAvia participants to explore the history surrounding your ride through historic South L.A. neighborhoods. Stop by any CicLAvia info booth for more information on how to participate. Local Gems marked with an asterisk (*) are part of the challenge and are also open to all visitors throughout the day.

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What exactly is hookless technology, and what are its pros and cons?

Hookless rims divide opinions… We’re here to dispel all the myths. Alex believes hookless rims are not only safe but a performance-enhancing upgrade for most riders. In this video we talk aerodynamics, tyre pressures and safety! Strap in and get ready to take notes.

 

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How cargo bikes are changing the way people work

From Road.cc

by SIMON_MACMICHAEL

From electricians to plumbers and gardeners, more and more people are using pedal power for work

One of the more common objections you will hear about efforts to promote active travel or restrict motor traffic, whether through the implementation of low traffic neighbourhoods, or congestion charging schemes or those based on vehicle emissions, is the impact they might have on tradespeople who rely on their vans to get to their jobs, and who cannot be expected to do so by bicycle.

But increasingly, electricians, plumbers, gardeners and others, as well as major businesses are taking to two (or sometimes three or four) wheels to carry out their work, and as this image posted to X, the platform formerly known as Twitter by Richmond Cycling Campaign makes clear, you can shift a lot more by bike than many people might imagine.

Ferrying big loads around by bike – something we are big fans of here at road.cc, and which was featured in a blog post by the author of this article earlier today – is becoming an increasingly common way for companies to get goods around our cities, often using specialist companies such as Pedal Me, which has even used its cargo bikes to perform office moves such as for Fusion Media, owned and run by Adam Tranter, the active travel commissioner for the West Midlands.

As part of its Transport Decarbonisation Plan (link is external)published in 2021 under then Prime Minister Boris Johnson, the UK Government encouraged the use of electric cargo bikes for last mile deliveries, and from florists to online grocers, many businesses are increasingly turning to them as a way of quickly getting purchases to customers in our congested cities.

Photo by Mark Stosberg on Unsplash

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How the Pacific Northwest became the nation’s cyclocross capital

From SeattleTimes.com

By

November is the worst month to get outside in the Pacific Northwest.

Hiking and mountain biking trails are rain-saturated messes. There isn’t enough snow to ski or snowboard. Howling winds threaten to tip your kayak or SUP as soon as you shove off the beach. Roads slick with wet leaves are just waiting to cause a cyclist to wipe out. Oh, and it gets dark before 5 p.m.

Don’t tell any of that to cyclocross racers, who will be lined up by the hundreds on Sunday for the Woodland Park GP, the grand finale of Western Washington cyclocross races. Last year, the North Seattle park hosted the largest cyclocross race in the country with 900 racers.

This year, organizers at MFG Cyclocross hope to crack the 1,000-person mark — in both racers and spectators — as a joyous celebration in our region’s most unpleasant month, bringing a party atmosphere with costumed racers, food trucks and plenty of bikes swooping through the muddy woods.

“It’s a great way to make crappy weather not so crappy, have a good time with friends and enjoy your community,” said Russell Stevenson, president of Off Camber Productions, which puts on the MFG Cyclocross series as well as the Wednesday Night World Championships mountain bike races at North SeaTac Park and the GRiT Adventure Gravel Ride near Cle Elum, Kittitas County.

Photo by Angel Santos on Unsplash

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