In The Crosshairs

Jeremy Powers Demonstrates the Dismount at the JBV & Fulcrum Clinic

Last Friday afternoon a group of Mid-Atlantic CX diehards welcomed Cannondale-Cyclcrossworld.com rider Jeremy Powers to the DC-region by hitting the single-track trails at Maryland’s Rosaryville State Park. Normally a favorite destination for the area’s MTB crowd, Rosaryville’s smooth and fast trails turn out to be ideal on the ‘cross bike. 

Powers, in town for the JBV Coaching & Fulcrum Coaching Cyclocross Clinic that went down August 28, was coming off a 30 hour training week and a couple hours of sitting on a plane. Needing a little extra time to get his legs going meant that I was just about able to hang on his wheel for the easy first lap and get a little helmet-cam footage. The other folks in the group were Steve Fife (Bike Doctor), Rusty Williford (Fulcrum Coaching), Bruce Buckley (The Bike Lane), Dan Tille (Fulcrum Coaching) and Kate Graham (BioWheels). 

A couple caveats before we get to the video. First, what you see is more or less a warm-up lap. Sure, seeing JPow ripping through these trails would be sick footage, but by the time he was doing that, I was hanging off the back and running into trees. Next time, I’m giving the camera to Rusty. Second, my filming skills are still in pre-season form and the camera angle is not ideal. Too many treetops and not enough action in the center of the frame. Finally, stick around for the end of the clip to see a little bonus coverage of JPow taking some time out of the ride for a session on one of Rosaryville’s skinny sections. 

Soundtrack by The Hood Internet. 

Thanks for watching.

Coach Mayhew rails the off-cambers at the clinic despite the bad wing.

JBV Coaching and Fulcrum Coaching hosted their second annual cyclocross clinic with Cannondale-Cyclocrossworld.com rider Jeremy Powers at Rosaryville State Park in Maryland, August 28th.

Over fifty participants joined JBV Coaching associate coach Chris Mayhew and Fulcrum Coaching president Dan Tille for a day of drills, instruction, entertaining commentary and friendly competition. Tille, Mayhew and Powers were joined by Fulcrum Coaching’s Rusty Williford and C3-Athlete Serving Athlete’s Marc Vettori.

In the coming days we will have some great posts to share with you from this clinic. Until then, here are some photos to give you an idea of how the day went. Check back every couple days as the set is sure to grow.

The full set of photos will eventually be available here. Below is the appetizer. Thanks for viewing.

Update: My gallery app that should be below doesn’t seem to be working great. You can click here and check out many more shots from the day.

Powers, Mayhew and Tille field your questions Friday night

In conjunction with the 2010 Fulcrum Coaching and JBV Coaching Cyclocross Clinic that takes place this Saturday, top U.S. cyclocrosser, Jeremy Powers, will be answering your questions at the Bike Doctor of Waldorf during a Friday night meet and greet. This free event, made possible by the Bike Doctor, Cannondale Bicycles and Swiftwick, is open to the public. If you live in the DC metro region, take advantage of this opportunity. Jeremy is here to share his knowledge on all things cyclocross. If you are new to the sport or a seasoned veteran this is a great opportunity to pick the brain of a rider at the top of his game. The meet and greet is scheduled to start at 7:00 p.m.

As if you needed another reason to attend this event, Cannondale is upping the ante by giving away a brand new Cannondale cyclocross frame. The only catch is you have to be at the Bike Doctor Friday Night to win.

Jeremy Powers is a professional cyclist with the Cannondale-CycloCrossWorld.com professional cyclocross team and the Jelly Belly professional road team. Last season he raced his way to 20 UCI cyclocross podiums and was ranked number one for the USA Cycling Cyclocross national racing calendar. In addition to racing domestically Jeremy has spent the last six seasons training and racing in Europe. He has represented the U.S. at the cyclocross world championships seven times.

Along with Jeremy, Dan Tille (Fulcrum Coaching) and Chris Mayhew (JBV Coaching) will be on hand to field any training, nutrition and technique questions you may have. Tille and Mayhew are experienced coaches and seasoned racers with the knowledge to set you straight on a plethora of cycling-related issues. For those also attending the clinic, this is a great time to get your questions answered, leave that much more time on Saturday for hands-on instruction.

For directions to the Friday Meet and Greet with Jeremy Powers you can enter into Google or MapQuest: 3200 Leonardtown Road, Waldorf, MD 20601.

As an appetizer to the Friday night gig, we caught up with Jeremy to ask him a couple question about transitioning from road to ‘cross and his goals for the upcoming season.

Have you changed your approach over the years in how you transition from road to ‘cross?

Yes and no. Every year’s approach to the season is different because my schedule with Jelly Belly constantly changes from year to year in August and September. For example, this year I’m not racing the tour of Missouri because it was canceled.

That gave me the opportunity to relax a little bit in July andAugust, and come into the season more relaxed. In turn, this will keep me more on task for doing well in December through February.

In years past I’ve come out of the blocks with great form, fresh off Missouri and as the season and miles in the air add up, my form slips little by little as we make our way to February. So this little shift in timing and schedule is a huge change for me this year.

It’s a positive change and I’m constantly trying to figure out the formula to racing competitively here in the U.S. all season and still racing at 100 percent in Europe in January and February.

How have your ‘cross goals evolved over the years and how does this affect where and when you race?

Back in the day … I definitely did whatever races could to garner a sponsor’s attention to my results!  When I came back to the U.S. from racing in Europe in 2006, my number one goal was to find a good sponsor. I cherry-picked some races I could win and that worked out for me.

A couple years later, with the help of Cannondale and Cyclocrossworld.com, I’m trying harder and harder to bring my best form to the biggest races of the season! Vegas, Ohio, USGP, Nationals, Europe, Worlds.

I think once you get towards the top of any sport, you have to think about goals and what your weaknesses are so you can be the best you and get the most out of yourself.

I set a lot of personal goals, some that aren’t even related to racing, like drinking more water throughout the day or getting in bed at 10pm!

Looking at the scheduling stuff, the team and I try to build my schedule around what makes the most sense logistically and for our sponsors. There’s a lot of racing out there.

Sometimes a weekend on the east coast with some racing is a nice break from being away from home and living out of a bag.

Thanks for reading and see you on Friday.

“@CXHairs what, no love for Jones on the AToC cx rider GC?”

-Tweet from @cjonez

It’s embarrassing enough that we left out some of the United States’ best ‘crossers from our Amgen Tour of California CX Classification. But what is even more embarrassing is when one of the guys we omitted calls us on it.* After posting yesterday’s update we received the Tweet at the top of the page from Christopher Jones (Team Type 1). You may know Chris from, among others, his 2009 cyclocross podium appearances at Cross Vegas, NACT Gloucester and both days of the Providence Cyclocross Festival.

Frattini Leads The CX Mountains Classification

In fact, Chris ended 2009 with 10 top 10 finishes in UCI cyclocross races clearly making him eligible for the AToC ‘Cross classification. What makes our omission even worse is that Mr. Jonez is killing it on the roads of Cali currently sitting 17th, 2:05 off the lead.

We also overlooked the brothers Jacques-Maynes in our haste. Ben and Andy both have exceptional CX results and easily meet the JPows “podiumed in a UCI event” criteria. Ben Jacques-Maynes (Bissell) currently sits 41st and Andy Jacques-Maynes (Bissell) is 78th at this year’s AToC.

With the recent hubbub over USA Cycling’s proposal to use a time trial to determine starting positions at Cyclocross Nationals, today’s stage will be a good look at how the ‘cross specialists do in the discipline. Maybe these guys will give us some insight on how to shoulder our bikes whilst wearing those funny looking helmets.

And now for the updated and corrected standings. No change at the top as Sagan continues flying the flag for the cyclocross troops by winning stages and the points jersey. Dude has some power in those legs, no doubt. We’ve also included the climbers and young guns in our round up to drive home the fact that the CX guys can do it all.

CX Classification

1. Peter Sagan  0:09

2. Chris Jones  2:05

3. Tejay Van Garderen  37:56

4. Ben Jacques-Maynes  45:46

5. Lars Boom  59:37

6. Davide Frattini 1:18:16

7. Jeremy Powers  1:30:42

8. Andy Jacques-Maynes 1:31:46

Points

1. Sagan 49

2. Boom 20

3. Powers 6

Mountains

1. Frattini 20

2. Andy Jacques-Maynes 9

3. Boom 8

4. Powers 5

Young Rider

1. Sagan

2. Van Garderen

*It’s actually pretty freakin’ cool that Chris saw the post. And like a child, we are learning the wrong lesson from this. Screw up and you get attention!

After posting yesterday’s Amgen Tour of California CX Classification standings, Jeremy Powers got in touch to help lay down some guidelines for the competition. First, to better define the field, only riders that podiumed in a UCI cyclocross race are eligible for the CX classification jersey. This makes it easy to eliminate the occasional ‘cross dabbler (read: Lance) and concentrate the jersey race on the cyclocross professionals. Powers also suggested classifications for “most time spent off the front, most awesome, most foreign, funniest …”

JPows (aka Bernard Van Ulden) running for cover

Not sure what we can come up for some of those, but for funniest, I believe Tom Boonen (Quick Step) may be leading that race despite not being a CX guy. When asked about Lars Boom’s Stage 4 performance, Boonen said “Lars Boom should get a medal for today, a medal that says, go back to cyclocross.”

For today, we are going to feature “Best Cyclocross Dismount or Remount” at this year’s Tour of California. So far, we have two nominees for the award. The aforementioned Jeremy Powers (Jelly Belly), who managed to jettison his bike in the pile-up that bloodied Armstrong, and hop over bodies and bikes without going down.

Sagan remounts on Stage 3

The second nominee is Peter Sagan (Liquigas-Doimo), who went down on Stage Three. Sagan hit the deck, rolled once, got up, grabbed his bike and executed a beautiful running remount. Sagan did this on a climb and did not lose his spot at the front of the field.

Those are your nominees. Tell us via comment or Tweet to @CXHairs who should take the prize.

As for the GC standings, Tejay Van Garderen had a good day moving up to third in the CX race. Sagan, by winning the stage, moved into a big lead on points. Powers picked up some second place sprint points as well.

CX Classification

1. Peter Sagan  0:15

2. Lars Boom  31:32

3. Tejay Van Garderen 36:29

4. Davide Frattini 46:59

5. Jeremy Powers 59:25

Points:

Sagan 34

Boom 20

Powers 6

JPow demonstrates proper remount technique or something ...

Yesterday’s Tour of California stage featured top-notch cyclocrossers in a long break that made it within 10 kilometers of the finish before being caught by the pack. Former Cyclocross World Champion Lars Boom (Rabobank) and Jeremy Powers (Jelly Belly), the U.S. top-ranked CX racer, were joined by Canadian Rob Britton (Bissell), who has toed the line at many CX events. Midway through the stage, a three-man chase group featured Davide Frattini (Team Type 1), the winner of the 2009 Charm City Cyclocross.

Frattini Leading The Field At the 2009 Charm City Cyclocross

Before the stage started, Powers commented on his Twitter feed that Boom was putting everybody to shame in the cyclocross classification. Of course, having somebody with the palmarès of Boom near the top of the general classification made it easy to overlook another cyclocross phenom that was putting it to everybody including Boom. Namely, Peter Sagan, the Slovakian rider who is currently in fourth place and winning the Young Rider Classification. Sagan is the 2008 World Junior Cyclocross silver medalist. If you saw the Tour of California highlights from stage 3, you may remember Sagan showing off his smooth CX skills after going down on the climb and performing a flawless running remount to stay with the front group.

The involvement of the CX boys in the break produced a lot of chatter on the interwebs. We here at CXHairs even attempted a little live Twitter coverage (@CXHairs) of the ATOC CX Classification during yesterday’s stage. In that vein, we are proud to present the first CX Classification Jersey in a Road Stage Race Competition.

Before unveiling today’s ranking, there are a couple matters that need clarification. Namely, Horner and Armstrong. Both raced CX last year. Armstrong did Cross Vegas and Horner did a handful of races. Does this qualify them for the CX Jersey? Let us know what you think. For now, they will not appear on the list. Also, let us know if there are any ‘crossers racing in California that have been left off the list. The standings as of now are based on GC time. Also included is the Points race totals, but for the official tally it is probably best to stick with GC. 

CX Classification 

1. Peter Sagan  0:21

2. Lars Boom  3:54

3. Rob Britton  18:13

4. Davide Frattini 19:21

5. Jeremy Powers 31:49

6. Tejay Van Garderen 35:53

 Points: 

Boom 20

Sagan 19

Powers 3

Britton 1 

Check back tomorrow for updates.

Before we get knee deep into the season, let’s take a look back at the August 21 cyclocross clinic with Jeremy Powers hosted by JBV Coaching and Fulcrum Coaching.

Chris Mayhew Addressing The 'Campers'

I had the opportunity to track down the coaches and a handful of the attendees from the clinic to get their thoughts on what they expected to get from the day and how it panned out. If you are new to cyclocross or even if you have been racing for a year or two, take a look at the responses and consider making a clinic part of your preseason routine. Here’s what the ‘campers’ had to say about their day:  Continue reading »

Dan Tille of Fulcrum Coaching and Chris Mayhew of JBV Coaching organized an outstanding cyclocross clinic this past weekend featuring Cannondale/Cyclocrossworld.com rider Jeremy Powers. It was an incredible way to get focused and motivated for the upcoming season. I will be posting some interviews and lessons learned from the event in the next day or so. In the meantime, check out this article at GamJams.net. You can also take a gander at all the knowledge being passed along on our photo page. Thanks for reading.

New carbon frame, deep-dish tubular wheelset, maybe a top-secret embrocation from a Belgian alchemist. There is no guarantee that any of these “upgrades” will make you faster, although they definitely will make your wallet a whole lot lighter. But what if I told you that for $125 you could shave up to 30 seconds  off your finishing time, and you wouldn’t have to swap out anything on your race rig? You would do that in a heartbeat, right? Of course you would. And to get this advantage you don’t need to take some sketchy new supplement or apply space-age polymers to your skinsuit. What you do need to do is make a commitment. More specifically, a two-part commitment. Continue reading »