Beyond Racing
This season I aim to take you behind the scenes of the Clif Pro Team so you can get a sneak peak into what life on this team is like. One word to describe it is FUN. As a professional mountain bike racer competing on the UCI World Cup circuit, we are able to travel to many amazing corners of the globe. It's sometimes not as glorious as it sounds. There's a lot of travel involved, especially for us North Americans, and too much time being squished into a small space on a plane with your favorite coughing stranger (ugh, don't even get me started with the stress that scenario causes). BUT, there's a huge upside of being able to explore new places. This is one of my favorite perks of being a professional cyclist. The travel. Since we ride bikes, our two wheels afford us the opportunity to really experience the landscape. Of course, we spend a lot of our time on the 5 km loops of the world cup courses, but there's always a warm up to the course from the lodging and a cool down after some hot laps. The real exploration starts after the race. We either are traveling to our next world cup the following weekend or we schedule a day to explore. In the case of the recent World Cup Season opener in Stellenbosch, South Africa, we traveled literally halfway around the world so we figured we better schedule a day to experience the country. We got to hike the iconic table mountain, and this was one of the most unique hikes I've ever been on. Before we flew out on Monday evening, we made a pilgrimage to see African penguins. Who even knew that penguins could even survive in the African heat? Videos are worths a thousand words so you can experience the adventure for yourself!
Let's be clear. The reason we really get these experiences is our team manager, Waldek. He makes it so we see stuff around the world. It's awesome that we and everyone else on the team thrive with this approach. I have been racing at the Nove Mesto na Morave, Czech Republic World Cup for almost ten years, and I've been flying in and out of Prague airport every single time to get there. Last year was the first time that I actually got to explore Prague. I told Waldek that I had never been to Prague, and he made it happen. We went on our drive from the Nove Mesto world cup to the next world cup in Albstadt, Germany, and it was awesome. Waldek's motivation for adventure and fun sets a great tone for this team, and it's one of the many reasons why this group is my favorite.
Here's another example of Waldek bringing the fun. Our recent three week team camp saw us driving up and down the coast of California in our Clif team vans a lot. This is what that looks like. Subscribe to my youtube channel and my website to experience the 2018 through my eyes and get a taste of what life is like!