Cycling NZ Junior Training Camp

Just to show that BikeNZ hasn't totally forgotten cyclesport outside of Track Endurance and BMX Cycling NZ organised training camps for U17 and U19 Junior Riders in between the TeA and CRI Tours in Waikato BOP. Ken Bewley and Lyndon Cooney ran the men's camp in Rotorua and Eddie Bright and Lynn Murphy ran the women's camp in Cambridge. I helped Ken and Lyndon in Rotorua.

We thought we were pretty damned cleaver splitting the boys from the girls till we arrived at the lodge in Rotorua to find a U18 women's school group of Vollyball Players from Australia including a teacher who had taught Cadel Evans at High School. Nice boy, very polite, back then. Distractions aside we settled in and laid out the plan for the camp which was more about recovery and getting to know other junior riders from around the country than a week of smashing each other on the bike.

Day two started with a nutrition lecture from me where I covered healthy eating, the supplements the NZ Track Team are using thanks to a talk from Glen Kearney at Track Nats and I had groups plan a race days eating for various events including racing in Asia where the biggest challenge was being able to figure out what you are eating. Most NZ teams end up in McDonalds. It was good that most of the people who spoke to me about nutrition wanted to know about healthy eating and race day plans rather than what was the best pill to take.

Riders then had a chance to do a ride or relax having completed TeA the day before. In the evening John Lee gave a lecture on Time Trials and we covered the rules on bike set up for this event as they appear to change quite regularly.

Day three started with a group ride that allowed the riders a chance to get a feel for the 2 circuits used in the CRI Tour. One thing Ken Bewley told me was that him and Sam always viewed any course before racing. In the afternoon we had a lecture from the New Zealand Sports Drug Agency. There are new rules for elite athletes where they must advise WADA of their whereabouts at all times.

Day four we did some ramp tests. Not seeking data but just giving riders who hadn't done one to get a feel for what they are all about. John took the U17s using his Tacx Fortius while the U19s used the Computrainer at the Waiariki Institute of Technology.

In the evening Ken outlined the pathway for U17 and U19 riders with the ambition of a more structured approach to riders entering U23 riders than making their own way to Belgium where most get sucked into a black hole and after 1-3 years of having a ball on Dads Visa are lost to the sport. The aim is to have NZ U23s riding at all major NZ events and then tackling some Aussie events before heading to Europe.

I then spoke on the Junior Selection Process. Number one change over previous years was a change from selecting representative teams (like teams going to Junior Worlds) to picking development teams. Riders that get the opportunity to race overseas are not being rewarded for results, they are being given the opportunity to gain more experience and come back to NZ and lift the standard of local racing benefiting everyone. I also covered the shift from a selection event to a selection period (this time from Wanganui Club Nats to CRI Tour with higher ratings for Nats and TeA Tour). This appreciates that the result sheet gives no indication of what may have happened in the race (case in point was the U19 men at TeA).

On the Friday we spent some time at the Waiariki Institute where Jan Borren covered bike set up and how to use various technologies to assist in the process. Then we headed to the gym to cover strength training and core conditioning. I naturally had to bite my tongue through most of this but the idea of the camp was to expose riders many of the different training methods and sport science support areas that they will encounter as they move up the food chain in cycling.

The camp ended Friday afternoon and we could tell the riders were starting to focus hard on CRI Tour and many had made plans to put into action using information they had gained from the camp. Alex McCrory-Bowick was a prime example. He had written his own eating, warm up, recovery strategy for the weekend and put on a dominating show in the U17s winning the first two stages and then virtually covering any attacks single handedly in the next two stages to take GC.

Thanks to Ken and Sue Bewley for looking after me so well while I was in Rotorua. This camp will be on again in 2010 so make plans to be there and the next big Junior event is Tour of Taranaki for riders we select to Canberra and as one of the last selection events for riders wanting to race the Tour de l'Abitibi in Canada.