Juniors Saturday ain't just for Kids!

Happy Holidays from the wet and cold streets of Portland,

Building kids' teams requires adults too!

Saturday rides have a bit less volume.
Slower, and easier, they are actually the best place to work on speed and race readiness. On Saturdays we can slow down to a stop and recover before we really go fast.

Sunday rides are tough.

On Saturdays we can stop to organize timed trials of any distance.
Even the adults benefit from that. Going full speed for the first time this season, always reveals bike stuff and body stuff that needs work.

Last Saturday we set up a .7 mile course heading West on Steele. It was surprisingly long to everyone who tried. Flying up over the knoll out of the mist came disgruntled contorted faces.

Time Trial Practice races shocked folks out of their misconceptions before Race Day at Jack Frost.

Vince C. likes easy race training.

Sunday Rocky Rabbit team paceline-style big distance training rides don't always bring the whole message.

Getting ready for racing is hard to do when not training with your race division. Sunday featuring adults, women and men from three or four OBRA/USA Cycling Divisions, give folks a chance to learn how to just hold on.

As Sunday events start at River City, Saturday events start at Backpedal.  Bike shops also require some know-how to navigate in.

Veteran of Cyclisme Lore, Dave Wingard, enjoys helping Kids with their bikes.

Saturday gives the Juniors and adults alike, a chance to focus them selves on getting fast.

Their equipment, and their relationship to this special group that emphasizes benevolence, good form, simplicity and team, becomes a Saturday adventure.

Race of Truth

AEROMAN is aerodynamic.

TT means Time Trial
By Tim White

and that means racing against the watch.

Time trialing is a very specialized cycling discipline. 

Often at the pro level, racers who are battling hard for the GC can either be made or broken with an individual time trial.

In the Individual Time Trial it's about individual effort, no drafting, just what you can do against the clock, and since we are often pushing for a high speed long term "schedule" at the velodrome, the TT is a wonderful way to practice sustained high schedule.

When my son Alex and I got started with racing anything other than cyclocross, the TT was the first discipline we tried because it seemed the safest. Afteral you race alone.

Racers start at staggered intervals often 30 sec or 1 min apart from each other. Courses have minimal local traffic, so on the whole, I think the Individual TT is one of the safest forms of cycling out there.

It doesn't take a fancy TT bike to race successfully either. (though it REALLY helps) 

There is the "Eddy Category" (named after the Belgian Superstar of the 70's, Eddy Merckx) where you use a regular road bike, no aero gear allowed. Or if you can get clip on aero bars, then get a shorter stem with a negative slope and you've just converted your road bike. 

You must get a shorter stem to protect your LATISSIMUS DORSI including the Fascia-Thoracolumbar fascia Pelvic Bone-Iliac crest; Insertion: Humerus- Intertubercular(bicipital) groove, or even more importantly the ERECTOR SPINAE- the three columns of muscle lying in parallel along the spine including SPINALIS-most medial, LONGISSIMUS-intermediate ILIOCOSTALIS-lateral. 

Injuries in these muscle groups are VERY uncomfortable, and can destroy the first part of the race season. Ask Ian Connors how these injuries feel.

By using a 1cm SHORTER stem than your normal road stem, you will protect these muscles as well as create a very drivable aero position.

Racing the 2k TT at Alpenrose Velodrome

After we learn to drive our Aero-Bars in the Individual circumstance, we can apply it to the Team event. Team TT events include the TTT and the Team Pursuit at the velodrome.

I'd like to volunteer my joy, zeal and desire to improve in the TT to The Team as we start working on getting our bikes and bodies prepared for a team time trial capability. All the work we do with pacelines will have served us well when we want to give a TTT practice a shot. But first we need to get comfortable riding aero bars our own.

We can make this a scoring strategy as well as a personal goal set with the annual OBRA series competition just for Time Trialing:

2013 TT Cup Calendar – Subject to Change
Date      Event       Location     
February 24  Jack Frost TT    Vancouver, WA 

APRIL 5th  As the Raven Flies   McMinnville, OR 
April 20th  PIR TT     Portland, OR 

May 25    As the Raven Flies 40k  Corvallis, OR 

June 14   Mary’s Peak Hillclimb   Philomath, OR
July 13    Wildcat Mountain Uphill TT  Estacada, OR 

August 9th  OBRA TT Championship   Peoria, OR 

August 10th  OBRA Hillclimb Championship  Government Camp, OR 

Please contact me (Tim White) either by email (DOPPELGANGER_PRIME@YAHOO.COM) or phone (503-977-2212) if you want to get any advice about gear or fit for TT racing.

Strategy: We have several months to get ready still, but lets start thinking about it and working on it. Junior entries are usually pretty slim at Raven so it would be a good race for them to target along with Jack Frost to get any kinks out.

Tim White

Redundant, Redolent, Rad!

Gaining some real stories to tell, Gillian is.

East Moreland Park has produced two fast new sprint stars in John Hilde and Fergus Kinnell.  Both have emerged to take a win each in the last two weeks.

Fergus is getting ready.

Rolling up and out on Pine Street runs the team through Belmont and Hawthorne districts.

Turning back down toward the city on Clinton sends you to Brooklyn and Ladd's.

Social columns out.

A paceline is called through the industrial area by Reed College to set up the sprint for Eastmorland Park.


Climbing up Rex through Flavel Drive takes it all out of you.


Sunday may have been read from a script lately, but Rocky Rabbit looks easier for the whole team now.

Willy just catches back.

Fall Pacelines getting faster in the wind!

Pacelines in the wind are making folks strong.

Pace - Line!

Summer is over and the fall leaves are on the ground.
With most of the NW Peloton consumed by cyclocross, Word-RCB is rolling easy on the road.

Gillian is the new star of a motley crew.

Juniors Willy Campbell and Gillian Bergmann are getting to roll with the elder men and getting very strong as a result.

Willy C fits in.

Training rides to Portland outskirts allow the team to groom the training to their weakest skill. By adjusting the paceline to best defeat the wind, echelons form and valuable experience is gained in a part of the year when we can afford to roll slow.

Discerning minds work better with hot drinks.

Entry level teams rarely get to practice cross wind echelons.

Gillian Bergmann is doing some big rolling this year.

People had to get used to the new way of moving into the wind. I wish I got some photos of their effort to run echelons. But it was a real accomplishment. Spread across the road they finally made cross wind echelons Euro-style.

Magic and Measure of the Lore!

A team called WORD-RCB

Elders have helped the Juniors understand what it takes.

A little sunshine on dry leaf lined roads make Fall magical in the hearts of bicyclists training to be racers.
Anyone else on the street needed a coat to be out, while  Cyclisme racers were peeling off layers. In the Sunday afternoon warmth they buzzed across around town.

The fifth week of sprinting to the East Moreland Park sign is changing people.

With wind out of the west by north west, it was easy to roll up the soft climb of Pine Street east to Laurelhurst Park. Softly downhill into the wind across the Belmont, Hawthorn, and Division boulavards with all their shopping bustle.

People turned to look to see the diverse pack so well organized breezing bye. It seemed our effort made their day a bit more exciting.

Wise and Funny Ken Legros.

 Certainly the group was heading for something more exciting.  East Moreland Park has become a testing ground for this winter training sprinter's team.

After death defying counter traffic insurgence on the part of our most innocent babes and their responsible elders, the paceline set up to become cagey, then tactically pointed.

Brilliant and Fast Gillian Bergmann.

The run up to the sign is both the pretense of maintaining the paceline and looking for the attacker coming any moment. Waiting and going combine and become one in the moments leading up to the full speed run uphill to the finish.

Lore & the Salad Days of Spring

Brothers in the Lore, Ken Legros and Tyrone Miles.

Nothing feels better than when a plan comes together.

Foresight to Spring's success began in the Fall before the Winter this year. (early)

Bypassing the Cyclocross Season
may mean missing
the Halloween social dates,
but at least legspeed is in attendance at our rides.
Also in attendance were two
of Cyclisme's famous members of the Lore.

Already working our winter "Rocky Rabbit" operational tempo, but at a greatly abbreviated rate and duration (short slow rides) our team is ready to entertain guests, and sprint for the East Moreland Park Sign.

Ken Legros, Gillian Bergmann and Tim Bergmann.

Week after week, elders have helped the Juniors understand what it takes to compete for the finish line in the bunched up, chaotic world of pack sprints.

Tyrone checks in on Willy.

Hands in the air like he just don't care.

Thanks to the familiarity of the route, week to week, everyone is picking up on the tricks. But right when many thought they had it all figured out, here come two savvy dogs who got it figured out on a whole other level.

Tyrone Miles pictured to the right of this article in the picture of the black and white jersey'd team featuring Frost, Doctor's Gerwing, Ohotto and Bob and others, was a big roller lead out man and sprinter for a team refered to as "The Men" just when Dey Shaun was bringing up "the Fixies" in 2009.
Meanwhile for over a decade, Ken Legros was a master of child rearing and pancake flipping in the hay day of the Cobb Sisters and the Love Brothers. He raced the Lake Oswego crit with teammate Joey Dengel. (for those of you who know your lore)

Having these two best pals show up on the same day was coincidence of the first order. While neither knew the other was coming, both checked in with their old team captain, 2008 Cat 4 BAR Winner Micheal "Frost" Risner to see if he wanted to go. While he couldn't come, he marveled at the coincidence.



Having them on the ride, jumping right into the Cyclisme groove, just put the sharper edge on the blade. Tim Bergmann was thrilled to see his old friends, and to show off his brilliant and fast daughter, Gillian.


The Campbells were again thrilled by the magic and measure of Cyclisme Lore, and improved in it's rich environment of sport.

Ghetto yoga on concrete.

Tyrone has such a nice way of checking to make sure everyone is okay. Patting you on the back and saying "good job" Tyrone knows how to talk the tired right out of your legs.

Wet Pushing!

Aubery Edwards on a Mt. Bike rode like he had a lot of LORE.

Alex and his dad Tim were flyin fast on Saturday!

Cooling down after the East Moreland Park sign, Sunday.

Tired of pushing with one hand...  switch.

Sarah Thomas rode all weekend!

Benevolence on Burnside Bridge.

Fairmont loop.

Johnathan Hilde knows what's up.

Senior Track Champs 2013!

Cat 4/5 Points Race Podium

Proud Cat 5 Sprinters

With the exception of Ian Connors, and Tim Bergmann,
most of the Cyclisme athletes had very little experience in
Senior State Champ caliber racing.
And without exception, they rose to shine in the final results.

Ian Connors put's his back into his attack.

Cyclisme Lore was throughout

Powerful players
defended Cyclisme Lore
in the 2013 Senior Track Championships.

Scholar Athlete.

Scheduled as a make-up
from the rained out date
just a week before,
the docket included

War wounds on display.

Sprints,
Keirin,
and
Points racing.

Captain Connors exudes star power.

Gillian Bergmann brought her new status as Junior Omnium Champ to the Senior Women's Champ competition, and her leisure reading to the infield.
Fergus and Tim White raced in Senior Sprints, and made it's podium for the first time.

Ian Connors led the team in the toughest competitions rolling at speeds over 36 miles per hour.

Connor's speed was also on display
in the legs of his first lieutenant
Tim Bergmann.
Bergmann won the Cat 4
Points Race Championship.

Love's Lessons!

Speed, agility, rythm, and timing are just some of the building blocks of a great team.

Dey'Shaun "Daddy" Lee returned to Alpenrose as our SECRET WEAPON!

Senior Track Champs 2013
reflected a very special strategy.

Felony Flats feet forward.

By merely being the coolest
team on the infield,
Cyclisme was able to revolutionize
the sport of cycling,

Hat coture.

and maybe,  
just maybe,

Prayers for the fallen.

      change the world. 

Two men of Cyclisme Lore.

Reunited, and it feels so good.

Gillian won a Bronze medal in the Cat 4 500m.

 When others were afraid 
 to go  out,
 Cyclisme capitalized 
         by
 COMING   OUT!





















Unafraid to stand
 for what is good,
 Cyclisme took
 to the infield
 and gave everything
 she had.

Practice Makes Perfect!

Training Machine de Cyclisme.

Tim Bergmann, Cyclisme's 20 yr. vet, glues us together.

Fergus fashions himself
a sprinter.

Beginners like to play "follow the leader.

Only in a practice may folks just be themselves, and train at their own pace.

The Game is what it is.

Ian leads on Tim B, Fergus and Mr. Sicocan.

 The Cycling Community shapes a standard of speed.

Folks might seek the BAR. We can go there by any path we choose. It's our cycle-ism - our Cyclisme.

Our's is the playful, forgiving environment of familial inclusion and even outreach to
all still missing from our sport of cycling.

Cyclisme means to Portland, a team called WORD-RCB presenting the Kids of b.i.k.e.

Celebrities stop in from Italy to teach folks the Madison.

To us,
Cyclisme 
means 
benevolence, 

good form, 

simplicity, 
and 
team.

Robin watches wistfully while waiting for her clavicle to heal.