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We discuss how to find the right plan for you, using virtual training platforms in the base season, and the state of U.S. Cyclocross.
Episode Transcript
Intro and Potluck Banter
Trevor Connor 00:04
Hello and welcome to Fast Talk, your source for-
Chris Case 00:09
The science of endurance performance.
Trevor Connor 00:11
You haven’t done in like, three years, and you remember it?
Chris Case 00:13
No, I know it’s a simple line. It’s a simple line.
Trevor Connor 00:16
I don’t get it any. Like, if I don’t read it, I don’t get it.
Chris Case 00:19
Really? You can remember the article that was published in Cell Biology in 1967 volume six, but you can’t remember.
Grant Holicky 00:30
Yeah, exactly. You don’t want to get into my brain. It’s a-
Chris Case 00:33
That’s very true, very true, very true.
Rob Pickels 00:37
Trevor, you said we had to be serious today. So let’s-
Grant Holicky 00:39
Well look, this was new. We came in here, we were talking beforehand, and Grant was like, stop talking.
Rob Pickels 00:46
It’s true. He did. Yeah, he showed-
Grant Holicky 00:48
I just want to go. I’m very busy these days, which is not normal for me.
Rob Pickels 00:54
Are you saying the rest of us aren’t?
Grant Holicky 00:55
I don’t care about the rest of us. The rest of you have no real bearing on my life, but I care. Do you though?
Rob Pickels 01:03
I do.
Grant Holicky 01:05
Do you?
Rob Pickels 01:05
Dude I reached out to you see how you’re doing the other day. You told me you were effing busy, and then you didn’t send anything back. Well, you obviously didn’t want-
Grant Holicky 01:05
Ah whatevs, whatevs.
Trevor Connor 01:12
And with that, there’s a potluck episode.
Grant Holicky 01:19
Yeah.
Rob Pickels 01:19
Thank God.
Trevor Connor 01:20
I’m excited- we don’t have Griffin here. Sad to say, Griffin, unfortunately, is under the weather, so she’s asked Chris to fill in for her.
Chris Case 01:27
Hi.
Rob Pickels 01:27
Did everyone gets sick over the holidays this year? The holidays-
Chris Case 01:31
No, I haven’t been sick in years, actually, because I don’t spend time around human beings.
Trevor Connor 01:40
You’re screwed. You’re gonna get sick.
Chris Case 01:42
No, I know. I’m going into my special chamber after this to detox.
Rob Pickels 01:47
I had a five year old sneeze-
Grant Holicky 01:50
You’re a freaking vampire, man.
Rob Pickels 01:50
I had a five year old sneeze directly into my face, and it was all downhill after that.
Grant Holicky 01:53
So, yeah, will I see you at the pool tonight? Like the pool’s okay, because it’s-
Trevor Connor 01:58
It kills everything.
Chris Case 01:59
My daughter’s birthday, we’re taking her out to dinner.
Grant Holicky 02:01
So she’s not going to swimming tonight?
Chris Case 02:04
No.
Grant Holicky 02:05
Oh, man, I’ll be alone.
Chris Case 02:05
You will.
Grant Holicky 02:05
I’ll just do my Dutch lesson in the stands.
Rob Pickels 02:05
Right.
Trevor Connor 02:05
So now that I know this, I’m going to teach your daughter wet willies.
Chris Case 02:12
No-
Grant Holicky 02:13
My whole cycling career, my nephews loved-
Chris Case 02:15
You’re not going to my house, not going to spend any time near my child. Creep.
Grant Holicky 02:23
The one man without children, we’re not gonna let him near anybody’s-
Chris Case 02:27
First question.
Grant Holicky 02:28
A lot of people did get sick.
Rob Pickels 02:30
Yeah.
Grant Holicky 02:30
Europe was really hard for the- I mean, lot of COVID over in Europe.
Rob Pickels 02:34
Really?
Grant Holicky 02:35
Yeah.
Trevor Connor 02:35
All right, well, Grant you have a question for us.
Individualizing Training Beyond One-Size-Fits-All Plans
Grant Holicky 02:38
I do have a question for you guys. My question is, so there are 1000 ways to skin a cat, right when we come to training, there’s a lot of different ways to do this. Sweet spot polarized, all base, less base. There’s a million different ways to do this. My question is, what I haven’t seen a lot of is people trying to individualize a training plan to what it is that they need. I see people glom onto this idea of training. This is the right idea of training from a science point of view. But I’m not seeing people go, all right, this is the try to type of training I believe in. But I’ve got five different athletes here, what do they each need to do individually.
Rob Pickels 03:21
Right, yeah. And I think that I see this a lot in people, and it’s why I think you can do a bad job of training people in groups, right.
Grant Holicky 03:29
Yeah.
Rob Pickels 03:30
Same workout for same people, relatively. You know, maybe you’re changing the intensity like, oh, Grant you can do this at 400 watts, and Trevor, you can do it at 350 watts, but the programming is relatively the same, right.
Grant Holicky 03:41
Well right, and look at it this way, what really got me thinking about this was an ego brilliant but there’s so much talk about base, base, base we need to train all this base. Everybody needs to do 90% of everything they do is base. Look at what Todd is doing, all these things, but then I look at my life and the limitations of my training time are pretty extreme. So can I do a ultra heavy base training program and be ready for cross? So I think what I’m asking is and this may turn into something much bigger in the future, but how do we do this? How do we find what is best for us?
Rob Pickels 04:23
Before we dive into probably some real recommendations from like Trevor and Chris. I do. I do. Just want to point out-
Chris Case 04:31
Yes, please give us the BS.
Rob Pickels 04:33
No, I mean, what I will say, though, is we’re talking about the recommendations that are coming from influencers. As you’re bringing this up, I’ll call Inigo an influencer. Maybe we’re influencers too, who knows. What I do find difficult at times is properly getting a message out. And sometimes the message is very simplified and the nuances are not described, because you can’t describe all of that. And so it’s easier to just say, do base all the time and then do some intensity. But is that really what it is day in and day out? For Inigo, I personally know him. I know it’s not like that all the time.
Grant Holicky 05:10
No, it’s not.
Rob Pickels 05:11
But you have to say that, because if you say 1% more, it either gets misconstrued or misunderstood or whatever else. So I do just want to say that oftentimes you’re blaming-
Chris Case 05:21
The media.
Rob Pickels 05:21
I’m blaming the media, exactly.
Chris Case 05:22
GCN has oversimplified what Inigo’s message was, because it fits into a sound bite.
Rob Pickels 05:24
Or even, it is, in part that, but it’s also, you know, like, take a fasted training. I would never, I am not publicly stating that I ever use fasted training with people, because I don’t think people should do it, but I might do it with some of my athletes in some situations and whatever else, right, because I understand my nuance and how I want to apply it. But if I just say you should be doing fasted training, somebody goes, you know, off the rails, and that becomes detrimental. So publicly, I don’t like saying stuff like that.
Grant Holicky 06:00
Well, I- UPS, Chris, you have the real answer?
Chris Case 06:03
No I think that that is a very, a very solid point that you make, because we all have worked with Inigo and know that it’s not that simple, but that’s what people keep stressing, that that’s all he’s about, that’s all he’s about. And, yeah, it must drive him a little bit crazy too.
Grant Holicky 06:22
Well, I’ll say, from my point of view, even on this show. And then I went on the EVOC podcast, and it was talking about intensity. And I obviously like intensity, I’ll use it year round. And I’m screaming from the rooftops that load is not intensity, and I’m still the intensity guy. I’ll still have conversations with coaches I know incredibly well, and they’ll say, well, you just do all that intensity. I mean, how do you do all that intensity? I’m sitting there going, I do plenty of base, and I have gravel riders that are doing almost all tempo, because that’s more what they do and what they raise. So I mean, I think for me, what’s super important is, and I’ll come back to this a lot, what is the individual’s life like? What are their constraints? What are their openings? Even something as simple as, I train in a five two system a lot of the year, five days on, two days off, my two days off for the weekend.
Rob Pickels 07:22
Yeah, yeah.
Grant Holicky 07:23
Because my kids aren’t in school, and in the spring, we’ve got like 8,000 activities, and I’m all over town. I’m not training on Saturday or Sunday. It’s, it’s, I don’t have a choice. But during the week, I can carve out two, three hours during the day on a couple days. So I have to go to a completely different system than I would like to train anybody with from a schedule standpoint.
When Group Training Helps Newer Athletes Learn
Trevor Connor 07:44
I’m going to give an answer that you’re probably going to find surprising, because I’m actually going to make the argument for group training here. For the person who’s fairly new. Because when, as we all know, when you have a relatively new athlete who’s trying to figure out how to train, they’re at low enough a level that pretty much anything, they’re going to see improvements. They’re not at the point where they need to find the highly individualized, specialized plan, because, frankly, they don’t know themselves well enough to know what really resonates with them. And I think going and training with a group where you’re hopefully with some athletes who are more experienced, you’re going to get more out of that and watching and learning from them, because really, what you need to learn is just good execution. And it doesn’t matter if it’s not the perfect training plan for you, you’re going to see gains from almost any training. So go get those gains, see what other people are doing, learn from them. And then over time, after a year or two of that, and you’ve learned yourself, that’s when you can start saying, how do I find the right plan for me? But I get worried about people who are brand new, and go, oh, I need to find that perfect plan for me. There isn’t one.
Grant Holicky 08:50
I think that’s fair. And so exposure of a lot of different things can start to get you to understand maybe what you need, maybe what you want.
Rob Pickels 08:58
Yeah, I think that when we are discussing what’s the right plan for someone, we need to be taking into account that individual and also the needs of their event, right. And when we think about the individual, I think that we can break that down into like a physiological like, what do they need, you know, so that their muscles and their mitochondria are able to do it. But we also need to think about the individual in terms of what do they need from their mental state, what makes them happy, what keeps them motivated, what keeps them training? And we also, like I said, need to marry that to the event. If we have a cross country mountain biker, probably in general, they’re going to be trained a little bit different than, say, a long gravel racer. And so we can say, oh, maybe the cross country person needs a little bit more chaotic training. They need some higher power output, some shorter work, and rest intervals, and the gravel person, maybe there’s some longer steady just sort of KJ, sort of days. But even within that, I think that we need to train the individual based on what their needs. And I had an athlete that reached out and was like how do you feel about this like muscle fiber typing, like, do you think that we should be fast twitch or slow twitch? And I know Dr. Seiler had actually asked us about that as well, and I don’t know that I’m ready to give opinions on that, but I will say when I do testing with my athletes, I do more of like the Neil Henderson sort of layout, where I’m not looking for the best 20 minute power so that people can get the highest FTP value. I’m more looking to see what’s your five minute power versus your 20 minute power, versus your five second power, and how does that characterize you? And then what levers do we need to pull so that you’re successful in your tour around Iceland or in your crit race, or whatever it is.
Grant Holicky 10:42
Yeah, I think that’s really valuable, that idea of four DP testing, right of what are you, and I don’t want to say naturally, but what are you more ready to do now? Are you kind of a V02 guy now, are you a threshold guy now? It’s funny, because I’ve changed completely over the last few years, whereas I used to be very much a sprinter or a lead out kind of guy, and now I probably could ride tempo all day and be very, very happy about it.
Trevor Connor 11:11
Welcome to my world.
Grant Holicky 11:12
Yeah, it’s a product of my life. It’s a product of who I’m training and who I’m riding with even though those are punchy guys for me to ride with them, I’m riding tempo all the time, and so everything’s closed into this middle ground, and I watch myself as a cross racer, like I have no lap one, absolutely no lap one. And then I get in a rhythm and I just start picking people off, but the front of the race is gone. And I realized that recently, it’s like, whoa, wow. So all right. And then this comes back to kind of, what do you want to do? What do you do? Trying to get done? I need to look at me now again and say, well, do I want to be a really good cross racer again? Because if I do, I need to change how I train, and I probably need to walk away from some of the group coaching that I do, in order to be able to do intervals at a better level, because I’m too tired to do them right now. But I don’t know that I’m ready to step away from that yet. Or I need to get an E bike, because I can’t ride with those guys like that.
Matching Training to Goals, Lifestyle, and Motivation
Rob Pickels 12:15
But that right there, is the first hurdle to individualizing training. Are you willing to do what needs to be done to get to that specific place?
Grant Holicky 12:26
And I’m ready to admit it’s ego, right, like I of course, these guys are 25, 26, 27 they’re some of the better riders in the United States.
Rob Pickels 12:33
Just face it, they’re better than you.
Grant Holicky 12:35
They’re far better. That’s not it that, but that’s not even a question. But I enjoy trying to keep up with them. I enjoy trying to do that. I enjoy those days out on the bike. I just feel throttled at the end of them. It’s awesome.
Trevor Connor 12:48
I’m just excited for the day you realize I’ve turned into Trevor, and then you cry a little.
Grant Holicky 12:55
Oh, no, dude, it’d be more than crying.
Chris Case 12:59
Weaping in a ball of…
Grant Holicky 13:00
Yeah, are we talking as a bike racer, as a bike racer, I could accept that.
Trevor Connor 13:07
I’m not sure if that was a compliment.
Chris Case 13:10
I don’t think it was. It sounds to me the original question was, how do you best find the best approach for the individual.
Grant Holicky 13:20
For your best success.
Chris Case 13:21
for your best success, right? All the best. And everything that you’re saying, in a sense, comes down to a conversation that you have with an athlete about where they are and where they want to get to, and how you- the map that goes between those point A and point B, right?
Grant Holicky 13:37
Yeah, absolutely. And the conversation the athlete needs to have with themselves, too.
Rob Pickels 13:42
But I’ll say I think that there is more to it than that, right? Because every coach should be sitting down talking to their athletes about where they are and where they’re going.
Chris Case 13:51
Should.
Rob Pickels 13:51
But how do you get to where you’re going that isn’t just a standardized sort of plan, right?
Chris Case 13:57
Well, I feel like that comes down to the ability of the coach. And if you’re the athlete and you’re having the interview with the coach, and you don’t really know anything, then you don’t know what they don’t know, and you don’t know what’s right or wrong. And you might go along with it, and it might work, and it might not. If you do know something and they’re unwilling to admit that they don’t think they’re the right coach for you to get you from point A to point B, that’s problematic.
Trevor Connor 14:23
And what about the athlete who doesn’t work with a coach? I will tell you the biggest mistake I see, I’ve seen frequently in athletes, is they look for that perfect, amazing plan that’s just going to produce some dramatically different result. And they try one plan. They do it for like, two months, nothing says all right. And then they hear about something else and go, let’s try that. And every couple months, they’re changing plans. You will get nowhere. You have to start with a plan. My recommendation is, start with something basic. Start learning what does and doesn’t work for you. And then you start individualizing. Then you start trying a little bit of this, a little bit of that. But it’s modifications.
Grant Holicky 15:02
Well, one thing I will attach to that is, I used to hear this all the time when I was coaching swimming, that we need to train our weaknesses and rely on our strengths. I’ve almost come full circle. Yes, right? Like I especially if we’re talking about a newer athlete, go lean into what you’re already pretty good at. That’s going to keep your encouragement high, that’s going to keep your motivation high, that’s going to keep your excitement high. If I take Rob, who is very much a high end guy, sprinter type dude, now he’s gotten to, let’s say early Rob. And I say to early Rob, we’re going to do three hour rides every single day. I don’t know that I keep Rob as an athlete. If I give Rob some high end sprints, some 22nd power stuff, some that he’s posting numbers that he thinks the world thinks are pretty impressive, now, maybe I have a better shot to get him to do a three hour ride, right? But if I’m giving him a three hour ride or 20 minute power test, or all these things that aren’t what he leans into very well. You’re not going to come out of it feeling very good about yourself.
Chris Case 16:04
That seems like a commentary on what swimming training used to be like, or maybe it still is, which is just kind of brutal.
Grant Holicky 16:14
It is. But I think that that’s a lot of endurance sports. I think that swimming is trained as if it’s an endurance sport. But I mean running’s like this to a T. I mean running is just bang your head on the wall. I get in trouble when I talk about running, because then people call up and well nor all of it, you’re right, not all of it. Like I got in trouble with it with a friend over stride, when I said, I don’t know what people are using strides like, well, it’s, it’s proven to be really good information. It is really good information. I still don’t know what it means, though, and we went through this with the Nell Rojas episode, but I guess my point is, for so much of this, the people that lean into endurance training and training, not they’re not even necessarily endurance sport, but endurance training, are people that like to bang their head against the wall a little bit.
Rob Pickels 17:04
It’s a prerequisite.
Grant Holicky 17:05
It is right? And so it’s almost too easy to get into this place where, well, tempo is what I need to do, so I’m just gonna do tempo, and I’m gonna do more of it, and I’m gonna do a lot of it, and I’m gonna do this, and it may not serve that person at all to be doing that much tempo. It may not serve me to be doing total high end. If I’m really good at high end, I need to be doing other things. But I do think the entry is to do what you’re good at and then help broaden out from there.
Training Weaknesses Without Losing Strengths
Trevor Connor 17:35
The modification I would offer is train your weaknesses enough that they don’t lose the race for you, but don’t lose your assets. I’ve seen people make that mistake where they’re always trained their their weaknesses and the thing that could win the races for them.
Grant Holicky 17:49
Yeah.
Chris Case 17:50
Their strength becomes the weakness.
Trevor Connor 17:51
So, I mean, I’ll give you an example of me. I don’t have a great one minute power.
Grant Holicky 17:56
No, what, huh?
Trevor Connor 17:58
I have to train it. I’m never going to win a race on a one minute effort, but I need to make sure I don’t lose a race on somebody else, putting down a one minute effort and dropping me. But my strength is always at that 20 minute climb see if I can drop people. And Chris is laughing.
Chris Case 18:15
I’m not laughing, but it’s been a long time since we raced, but I feel, I feel the urge to race you now.
Rob Pickels 18:20
And I will say, Chris is the person in the room that could beat Trevor up a hill.
Grant Holicky 18:28
Both of them, and I’ll get second, Chris will win. But the point is, I got to make sure I don’t lose that asset trying to fix that one minute, because the one minute, it’s never going to win a race, right?
Rob Pickels 18:37
Grant, I want to touch on something that you were kind of talking about there. I think a lot of people think the best coaching is laying out the perfect plan on paper and giving it to the athlete and telling them, here you go, this is your roadmap to success. And that is not the case. I never, ever write the quote, and quote, perfect plan on paper, and it is always fit to that person’s needs, to their life. Maybe they need to be doing four by 20 minute intervals every single day, and that’s going to get them there, but like you’re saying, if they don’t like that, it’s not going to get them anywhere. And so we’ll do that sometimes, but we’ll also do stuff that they like that’s modified, maybe to help them achieve their goals, but to say that we can just blueprint out something, it’s not gonna happen.
Grant Holicky 19:27
No, and even the coaches that are bent towards that angle know that, the good coaches that are bent towards that angle know that that things are gonna alter.
Chris Case 19:35
The phrase bent towards that angle.
Grant Holicky 19:38
Yeah, it is now. Back off, man.
Rob Pickels 19:42
It’s like you’re building something, and the board, it’s not quite right. You just sort of bet it, yeah, and then it’s good.
Chris Case 19:48
All right.
Grant Holicky 19:49
Well, I will make the argument, and I think you’ll agree with this that- I don’t want to make this argument, I want to take Chris out back.
Rob Pickels 19:57
And what, out climb him?
Grant Holicky 20:02
But the argument I will make is I can have more success with an athlete taking a completely generic plan and helping them to execute it really well, and that includes knowing when to break the plan because of how they’re feeling or whatever is going on. I think you’re gonna have more success with that than giving an athlete the perfect plan, but they execute it poorly. Yeah, I think that’s 100% the case. And I think that’s coaching, right? I mean, I’ll continue to come back to I talk about a lot. We talk about a lot. I think coaching is about the relationship before the physiology. In so many ways, the physiology matters, but the relationship drives even the physiology. I’ll have athletes I’ve worked with for five years, and at five year mark, we’re going to a completely different approach to what we’re trying to do with them. I have athletes now that are going to switch discipline so that we are going to take a completely different approach. I’ll even go out and seek out coaches from that discipline and get advice, get information, get input, so that I have all that physiology in my back pocket. But it’s still about the relationship, and it’s still about that understanding back and forth.
Trevor Connor 21:16
With that. I hate to say it guys, because it’s been great conversation. I think it’s time to move to the second question.
Grant Holicky 21:21
It’ll all go downhill from here, but that’s okay.
Using Virtual Training Platforms in the Winter
Trevor Connor 21:23
Training peaks just introduced their new virtual training platform. There are more and more of these platforms, and they are fundamentally changing how we train in the winter. And yes, I am reading my questions.
Grant Holicky 21:34
Yeah, man, God.
Trevor Connor 21:37
What are ways that we can take advantage of them, and how should we not be using them? And you probably already know my biases on this. Who would like to go first?
Rob Pickels 21:47
Base riding in ERG mode? You can put that into whichever bucket you want.
Grant Holicky 21:52
Oh, my God.
Rob Pickels 21:54
That’s it right there.
Grant Holicky 21:55
He does, like three hour base rides, on the trainer, in ERG mode.
Chris Case 22:01
Yeah, so he’s on one side of the spectrum, and I’m on the other, which is, don’t use them at all. Go outside and enjoy the sun.
Grant Holicky 22:09
I think the trainer is incredibly valuable. And I think there’s, there’s places to use it. I don’t know that a three hour base ride on ERG is the place to use it. That would make you strong as hell, though.
Rob Pickels 22:19
You guys look at my Strava recently? It’s like 30 minutes-
Grant Holicky 22:22
I don’t look at your Strava.
Rob Pickels 22:25
Why not, man, don’t you love me?
Grant Holicky 22:29
I don’t look at anybody’s Strava. I don’t even know why I post on my Strava. I think it’s just attached.
Trevor Connor 22:34
I look at yours.
Grant Holicky 22:35
Do you?
Trevor Connor 22:36
Yeah.
Chris Case 22:36
I don’t follow you.
Grant Holicky 22:37
It’s probably better for you, right? Where in the world did grant do a 20 minute run today? Wow, back in Belgium, again.
Chris Case 22:49
Your heat map might be-
Grant Holicky 22:50
We have not answered my question in any way, shape, or form. No, no, yeah, okay, what was your question again? I tuned out-
Chris Case 22:58
How to use them well.
Grant Holicky 23:00
He started reading it-
Chris Case 23:01
Best practices, best practices of virtual training.
ERG Mode, Indoor Intervals, and Better Workout Execution
Grant Holicky 23:04
I do love ERG mode, for certain things. One of the things that I really love ERG mode for on an indoor trainer is, this will be a shock to nobody, intensity. I love the fact that ERG mode forces you to be consistent, so you can’t stand and hammer the front end of something and then fade like crazy.
Rob Pickels 23:28
Yeah, and then average, like, yeah.
Grant Holicky 23:30
Yeah and so, because a lot of the stuff, if I’m writing a minute on minute on session, the classic revolver meals, classic, I love minute on minute off, but what I don’t want out of minute on minute off is start at 480 and fade to 380. I want somebody to just peg it at 420 watts. I love ERG mode because you have big resistance and you have a really, really high cadence, and those two things don’t always come together well in training for most people. I see people with really, really good power that they often have a low cadence, and I see people with really, really high cadence that aren’t really good at finding the right gear, right so I love that about indoor training. I love that type of session on an indoor trainer. I love the ERG mode.
Chris Case 24:20
For the for those who don’t know what ERG mode is, describe it.
Rob Pickels 24:23
Oh, look at you, bringing us back to basics. Thank god you’re here.
Grant Holicky 24:27
Yeah, no kidding. It’s the mode that forces you to a power. You’re not self selecting, the trainer drives you to a power.
Rob Pickels 24:35
And if you increase your cadence, it lowers the load. If you lower your cadence, it increases the load, right.
Grant Holicky 24:41
And the way to do ERG mode, the best tends to be at a pretty high cadence. It’s hard to do to-
Rob Pickels 24:47
And stay steady-
Grant Holicky 24:48
And to be really steady. If you start to move one way or the other, it’ll unload or load. And the load spiral on ERG mode, on a trainer, is hell on earth.
Rob Pickels 24:59
It just makes you strong.
Grant Holicky 25:00
It’s a toilet bowl.
Rob Pickels 25:01
I think we’re going in the wrong direction.
Grant Holicky 25:02
Part of my question here is, though, it used to be in the winter, it was kind of a solitary time, right? Most of your training by yourself. It was also a good time to just go, I’ve got a plan, I’m going to follow the plan, do what’s on my plan. And ERG mode on a trainer, it could be part of that. Yeah, it forces you to that plan.
The Social and Competitive Sides of Zwift
Trevor Connor 25:21
So now we have, actually, a huge social component throughout the winter. And I, one thing that I think we lose is I remember when I was solo all through the winter, I got so excited for March, when the group ride started, when you could go to races like finally, I can ride with other people. Chris doesn’t do that because-
Chris Case 25:40
They’re humans, because humans are involved in group rides.
Grant Holicky 25:43
Yeah, and God knows we don’t want that.
Rob Pickels 25:46
So I’ll ask the three of you, I know my answer. Do you find these apps, Zwift, Training Peaks, Virtual, to be social?
Trevor Connor 25:55
I do.
Grant Holicky 25:56
I was about to say that I don’t feel a social component at all with Zwift. What I feel with Zwift, though-
Chris Case 26:03
You’re not on Discord while you’re doing it with a group of other people, for instance.
Grant Holicky 26:07
I am not, but what I do find on Zwift is competitive, and not because that may be a social component, and that’s a little bit of what you’re talking about is there’s always, unless you’re doing a workout there, feels like there’s always a competitive component to Zwift or Training Peaks, virtual, or any of the platforms.
Rob Pickels 26:29
Trevor, when you say social, are you doing the discord thing Chris is talking about, or feeling the competitiveness that-
Grant Holicky 26:35
It’s both. And so, yeah, I’ll address both. When I’m doing the Discord thing, like, there’s some group rides that I love, that it fits with the purpose of what I’m trying to do. We all get on Discord, and it makes a group ride really enjoyable, and I get effective training.
Chris Case 26:49
One thing that somebody meant- I have never done a group ride like that with Discord, but one thing somebody said to me that had never struck me was the fact that if you’re on a group ride, you talk to one person that’s next to you. If you’re on a group ride in Zwift and you’re on Discord, you’re talking to everybody, all the time, at the same time, if you want to, you know, like, so it is a very social environment in that way.
Grant Holicky 27:11
Almost more so.
Chris Case 27:12
Right, exactly.
Grant Holicky 27:14
The competitive side, you know, I’ve seen pros and cons to it. That’s, that’s part of what I bring up the con obviously, is you’re supposed to be going easy, ergo, or you have a set of intervals, and suddenly there’s a group ride, and you jump in, and the next thing you know, you just did two hours of racing on the day when you were supposed to be just doing base space.
Chris Case 27:36
People need discipline, yeah.
Grant Holicky 27:37
There is a positive side to it, and this is where I like to use it. Yeah, I can tell you I will do my intervals on ERG mode and frequently. So I do them often on Zwift. I’m going up out to Zwift doing my threshold intervals. They’re five minutes long, and a minute in, I’m going, oh my god, I have four minutes left. Yeah.
Trevor Connor 27:56
Every once in a while, there’s another rider going about the same pace as me, and I can watch them, and I want to catch them. Competitive side kicks in. And then instead of going, oh my god, I have three minutes of this suffering to go. I’m like, I only have three minutes. I’m not sure I’m going to catch them. And the intervals become easier.
Grant Holicky 28:16
Absolutely, totally different. And I think the other components with Zwift that I use a lot in the off- I’ll use it during cross season, when it’s beautiful outside, is I’ll get in a race, Zwift racing. I’ve said this before, I’ll say it till the cows come home, if you can eliminate the big picture competitiveness, which is to sit there and go, how are these people kicking my butt? How are this many people really that good that you start questioning other people’s weight and all that, don’t worry about that. Think about them as as game players. If you can go in those Zwift races are brutal. They peg you at a heart rate, and a respiration rate, and an effort level that you’re not going to replicate. I don’t think in any capacity outside.
Chris Case 29:03
Especially if you forget your fan.
Grant Holicky 29:05
Yes, okay, because Zwift levels everything out, right? So it becomes a competitive, responsive, 20 minute, 25 minute, hour long time trial. Which is just not something you get very much outside, you know, time trials outside are, you’re with yourself, and group racing outside, you’re on or off. A lot more Zwift is on, you are on. So it creates something that I like for cross racing, which is, I’m 20 minutes into this thing, and I’m breathing out of my eyeballs, and I gotta continue to function.
Rob Pickels 29:39
Gotta keep going. Yeah, it’s almost kind of like motor pacing, right in some regard, yeah, holding that effort. Can’t let that motor go, yeah, yeah.
Grant Holicky 29:47
And to me, that’s a really good component of it. But to your point, Trevor, it is very easy on Zwift, without direction and without a plan, to go hard every single time you get on that platform. I remember during COVID, when I first got on that platform, I was going hard every day on Zwift because it’s a game, and it’s set up to compete against yourself too. And it’s hard to, when you’re a competitive natured person, it’s really hard to back out of that.
When Virtual Racing Helps and When It Becomes Too Much
Rob Pickels 30:19
And so Trevor, I think when you’re talking about, how do we use these effectively? What we have to be is mindful that we’re not letting the negative influences of these platforms affect training in a negative manner.
Trevor Connor 30:32
But here’s my question, then, is it okay to do a little bit of that? So I’ll give you an example. I have an athlete I’m working with. He just got back on the bike a few weeks ago. So end of December, we were doing a decent sized week. It was snowing outside, so he was stuck on the trainer all week, and he got to Saturday, and like, I’m kind of getting tired of just doing steady on the trainer or doing intervals on the trainer. And I said, you know what, go do a race. Wasn’t really in the plan, it didn’t fit with what we were trying to do that time of season, but it’s like, it’s a little motivating, it’s a little bit fun. He’s gonna enjoy it. Was that the right choice, or is that something that you should avoid?
Grant Holicky 31:08
To go back to what we were talking about earlier, I don’t think I ever do things based on the perfect plan, right? So so much of it comes back to that athlete. When that athlete’s saying, I can’t do this anymore, then, yeah, I think it’s the absolute right thing to do. Where I think it gets dangerous then is once you bend toward that place, you stay in that place, and you keep doing races, and you keep doing efforts, and the base goes away and you’re losing what the inherent goal of the plan was. That’s where it can get dangerous with the game setup in these systems, because it is set up as a game, which is motivating. Even when Zwift is loading the things that it says, like, easy day, yeah, right, or stuff like that, go get a towel. So much of what the industry is set up on is, well, we’re here to suffer, and at the same time, so much of our good endurance training is actually not about suffering. So it’s a real contradiction in some ways.
Rob Pickels 32:11
You know, it’s funny the other day, I’m gonna bring this to a different example, but the other day, I had bottle of Coke. I haven’t had a bottle of Coke in years, and it was pretty good. No, I know. Dude, I don’t, I don’t drink soda.
Grant Holicky 32:23
Where are you going with?
Rob Pickels 32:24
I’m going with. I’m going exactly this place, you know what? The next day, I was like, should get another bottle of Coke. And the day after that, I was like, you know what? Maybe another bottle of Coke sounds pretty- and we get this one thing right, and it gets and for me, it was the sugar in this situation. Trevor, you know, sugar can be kind of addictive, right? But it’s the same thing here. Oh, that race yesterday was fun. I don’t think I need to do my base ride today. I think I can probably do another race. And then you did a week and you’re like, holy crap, all I’ve done is drink Coke and do Zwift races.
Grant Holicky 32:54
It is wild-
Chris Case 32:55
Those go hand in hand.
Grant Holicky 32:57
Yeah, it is wild how much habit and habitual behavior starts with just-
Chris Case 33:04
That first sip.
Rob Pickels 33:06
The first sip, man, it’s the gateway.
Grant Holicky 33:08
I have these little rules for myself with beer or with desserts or just stuff like that, because it just makes it easier to make my choices. And so if the kids have school the next day I usually don’t have a beer. We get into Christmas holiday, right. I’ll have beer, and it’s not a lot. I’ll just have one beer at night, and then here we are going back to school, and the next thing that goes through my head is exactly like that. Well, I want a beer. One beer is not doing anything for me one way or the other. It’s habitual, more than addictive, which I think is a really interesting distinction to make.
Trevor Connor 33:43
So I’m gonna to give an example of exactly what you guys are talking about, and that’s actually what motivated this question, because I’ve talked about the fact that last year, my numbers were really bad compared to where they’re normally at. And the winter, I’ve changed up what I do during the season, but the winter, my go to interval has always been the five by five minute threshold intervals, and I’ve always seen big improvements in my numbers through the winter. But I was like, I did them all last year. Why didn’t it work? And I went back and looked at the winter and I would say 80% of my threshold workouts I would do like one interval, and then go, well, this hurts and this isn’t fun, and then jump into a Zwift race. And honest to God, was always going through my head, was what you said, Grant, which is Zwift races are all just threshold workouts. So I just got in my head of just going doing a Zwift race, it’s the same thing, but as I demonstrated, it is not the same it is not the same thing. And I really didn’t, I think I completed those intervals twice last year.
Rob Pickels 34:41
For what it’s worth, when Trevor talks about five by five, it’s five by five minutes at about FTP with one minute of recovery in between. So it’s a 25 minute sort of set block with short recoveries.
Grant Holicky 34:53
But to that point, exactly, there’s shorter recoveries in there. It’s not a straight 25 minute period. There’s no surges. I mean, it’s very different. Ultimately, in the end, I mean, even the way you start off as Zwift race, like the first minute of a Zwift race, oh my good god.
Trevor Connor 35:09
Yeah, I’ll average the same wattage. But it’s not at all the same thing.
Rob Pickels 35:13
And the other thing too, right? I mean, Trevor, with your workout scheme, you’re five by five minutes there. It’s something you’re able to progress, right? It’s in my own quantity, right. Next week I’m going to do 10 watts more, so on and so forth. You don’t necessarily get that in Zwift racing.
Grant Holicky 35:26
No, it sounds awful, by the way, what you do in the winter.
Rob Pickels 35:28
I don’t find them that bad.
Grant Holicky 35:30
I don’t no, no, I don’t, I don’t mind five by five at all. Like, that’s a great workout. I don’t like the repetitive nature of how Trevor will do them.
Trevor Connor 35:40
I- yeah, that’s where you and I are different, I am a pick an interval- so I very I have during the summer, I will bury it up more. But I used to be a pick one intervals, and you do that for 6 to 10 weeks.
Grant Holicky 35:55
You’ve changed me too, Trevor, occasionally now, before I do intervals, I just get angry. Go down in the basement. I play a little Black Sabbath. I just get angry, breaking stuff, and then I put pictures. I’ll find pictures of Chris. I’ll put it up on the wall.
Rob Pickels 36:12
I knew, I knew that was coming, you need that motivation of hatred.
Grant Holicky 36:18
It’s easy to hate. It’s easy to hate Chris when I’ve never beat him in my ever-
Rob Pickels 36:22
I know, I don’t think I’ve ever beat Chris at anything. Oh, did I beat you in the big wheel race?
Chris Case 36:27
Uh, no.
Trevor Connor 36:31
You had it won.
Rob Pickels 36:32
I think I did, right.
Trevor Connor 36:33
And then you let him catch you.
Chris Case 36:36
Should we play a game of cards or something?
Rob Pickels 36:39
I’m terrible at-
Grant Holicky 36:40
We’ll go swimming, Chris.
Chris Case 36:42
Okay, okay, yes. Can I just say one thing for people that don’t, that don’t actually like virtual riding, that they don’t have to get sucked into it. If you don’t like it, just don’t do it. There’s no peer pressure here. No. nobody has to do this.
Rob Pickels 37:00
Chris, just, just-
Chris Case 37:00
There’s other things you can do in the winter to stay in shape and-
Trevor Connor 37:04
Be like Chris, antisocial.
Grant Holicky 37:07
Well, I will, I will say this, and I to your point, Chris, I have an athlete who is a master cyclocross national champion. He was fifth at Worlds this year from like, a ninth row start, and he takes 90 days completely off the bike every time.
Chris Case 37:22
Wow, does he ski?
Grant Holicky 37:23
He skis, he uphill, skis, he runs, he does a lot of endurance training, but-
Chris Case 37:29
That’s what I’m talking about.
Grant Holicky 37:31
Full 90 days.
Chris Case 37:32
That’s what I’m talking about, yes.
Grant Holicky 37:33
And he’s really good every year. And I think there’s a lot to that.
Chris Case 37:39
I’m not saying it’s, it’s what everybody should do, obviously, I’m just saying that certain people don’t benefit from banging their head against the wall in a virtual setting like that, or they, or maybe they actually do get sucked into the racing thing too much, and so they can just set it aside, and you can go outside and wherever you live, figure out what it is that you like to do that is endurance based, and do that for a period of time and get away from the bike.
Rob Pickels 38:05
Bro, listen, I know you haven’t been on this podcast in a while-
Trevor Connor 38:08
Bro.
Rob Pickels 38:08
This is not a show where we inject our personal biases, right?
Trevor Connor 38:15
Not at all.
Chris Case 38:16
We don’t talk about our beer drinking habits or our addictions or anything.
Grant Holicky 38:22
Who said anything about addictions?
Trevor Connor 38:23
I think he’s-
Chris Case 38:24
He’s addicted to ERG mode, isn’t he? And Coca Cola.
Rob Pickels 38:28
I’m addicted to ERG mode and Coca Cola. I use them appropriately.
Chris Case 38:33
Next question.
Trevor Connor 38:34
I did love your analogy. We’ll move on to the next question. I did love your analogy because I just spent-
Rob Pickels 38:40
Oh, it’s true.
Trevor Connor 38:40
Two weeks with my parents, yeah, and my mom always has bags of chips and popcorn everything. For a week and a half, I avoided it, yeah, but finally, one night, he had one chip handful done popcorn. Next night-
Chris Case 38:53
He’s supposed to admit to this?
Trevor Connor 38:54
Multiple hand- handfuls.
Rob Pickels 38:56
But he but he’s admitting to popcorn.
Trevor Connor 38:57
Yes.
Rob Pickels 38:57
You know, let’s just be honest.
Trevor Connor 38:59
It just shockingly went downhill, but two days ago, after five weeks-
Rob Pickels 39:05
Wheat Thins, moved on to Wheat Thins.
Trevor Connor 39:07
I am at the airport.
Chris Case 39:08
Triscuits, it’s just downhill.
Trevor Connor 39:14
Yeah, no, it was worse. It was your- it was worse I was at the airport, I grabbed a bag of Doritos.
Rob Pickels 39:22
Cool ranch?
Trevor Connor 39:24
Trevor, what are you doing?
Rob Pickels 39:26
Cool ranch or original?
Trevor Connor 39:28
I don’t know.
Rob Pickels 39:29
Or the nacho cheese?
Trevor Connor 39:30
Cheetos.
Grant Holicky 39:31
Oh, no, no.
Trevor Connor 39:32
Cheetos are worse.
Grant Holicky 39:33
There’s nothing wrong with Cheetos. There’s nothing wrong, Cheetos are fantastic food.
Rob Pickels 39:42
Wow. On that bang.
Grant Holicky 39:44
I love Cheetos.
Trevor Connor 39:46
All right.
Grant Holicky 39:47
I love Cheetos.
Trevor Connor 39:48
I haven’t Cheetos in like seven years.
Grant Holicky 39:50
They are horrendous for you, but they’re, I love them. Jalapeno Cheetos,
Rob Pickels 39:55
Yeah. You know, hey, you’ve been spending a lot of time in Europe Grant. Can you get Cheetos over there?
Grant Holicky 40:00
No, no. It’s disconcerting.
Chris Case 40:02
Segue.
Rob Pickels 40:02
Segue.
Trevor Connor 40:03
Segue.
Grant’s Role with USA Cycling and the State of American Cyclocross
Rob Pickels 40:06
For people that don’t know, and I don’t know that you’ve been, you haven’t been vocal about this on the podcast, people, people follow you socially. I’m gonna out you. You’re like, the high performance director for cyclocross, or some fancy, fancy title, like that?
Grant Holicky 40:20
I am, I am the US cyclocross coordinator.
Rob Pickels 40:23
I mean, you do have a USA Cycling bottle next to you, a USA tshirt on. You’re laying into this leaning into this position.
Chris Case 40:31
Coordinator.
Grant Holicky 40:32
So, so my job is to help facilitate the highest levels of cyclocross for everybody in US cyclocross. So how we set up and select riders for World Cups. How we then help the teams coordinate their presence at World Cups, and how we get kids without big teams to World Cups and then-
Chris Case 40:57
I never knew you were such an organized guy, Grant, I would have never guessed it.
Grant Holicky 41:02
I’m like a duck on a pond, baby. There’s so much going on beneath the surface.
Rob Pickels 41:05
Those little legs are just going, going crazy.
Grant Holicky 41:10
And then I will run the World’s trip, be the head coach for that, and then also just the lead organizer for all that. So I’m not the discipline director. I don’t know the cyclocross will have a discipline director. It’s not quite big enough. If you look at track, there’s 18,000 events, and there’s coaches and swannies and physios and all those things. We don’t have that, necessarily. So if you have questions regarding USA cyclocross on the high performance level, which is any of the UCI categories under 19, you 23 and elite? Yes, I’m who you call.
Rob Pickels 41:47
Well, what I want to know, because cyclocross is near and dear to my heart, right? It might not be the biggest sport on the world stage, but for me, it’s my preferred discipline. And I know my wife, my daughter and I are family. We love watching cyclocross. And you know, I’m just wondering from you and your point of view, because obviously you have this amazing coaching background, you’re now heavily integrated into USA Cycling here. You know how, how is the USA cyclocross program doing? And ultimately, what I would love to know is, how do we get better? I feel like it’s been years since we have had riders kind of on the world stage, and that’s not to knock any of the riders that are over there doing their absolute best right now, but we’re not necessarily seeing things like podiums or anything else. Where do we go, and what are we doing well. and what isn’t working, and what’s your view on that?
Grant Holicky 42:37
We don’t have enough time for this, but I-
Trevor Connor 42:41
I’m gonna make this really simple, how long has it been since we’ve done well, since we were behind that, since we’ve been on the podium?
Grant Holicky 42:46
At a World Cup, an American on a World Cup? We’ve never had an American World Cup, World’s highest American finish at the World Cup is fourth by Eric Brunner and Fayetteville.
Rob Pickels 42:56
What about Katie?
Grant Holicky 42:58
For men. For men. And this is, this was the distinction I was about to make for both of you guys on the men’s side, on the elites, we’ve had one world championship podium, which was Jonathan Page.
Chris Case 43:09
Way back.
Grant Holicky 43:10
Way back. We’ve always been pretty good on the junior side. And this is something I’ll speak to. Our women have recently been very, very good, with Claire Hon Singer being on podiums post COVID, and before that, Katie Compton was among the best in the world. Caitlin Keo, fantastic. Amanda Miller was sixth in the World Cup one year. We’ve been very, very good on the women’s side, and I think that’s continued. We’re a little shallow on the women’s elite side right now, but there’s some amazing women coming up. Vita Lopez de San Roman won the elite women’s race at Nationals this year as the first year U 23.
Chris Case 43:53
Yeah, yeah. She’s 19.
Grant Holicky 43:56
She might be 18.
Chris Case 43:56
She might- I think she might be 18.
Grant Holicky 43:58
Yeah. So on the women’s side were quite good, though, I will say that you’re starting to see this sport develop in Europe on the women’s side in a way that it hadn’t prior. I think if we look at 10 years ago, what we were doing in the United States for equity between women and men in cyclocross was way beyond what was being done in Europe. We still see some of that with the women, a lot of that with the women’s Junior races in the United States. We all have women’s Junior races, the UCI races in the States. That is not true in Europe. It’s quite a shame, in fact. But that may be why you see some of the European women develop very much faster. We’re seeing U 23’s and juniors in the elite ranks in the women’s races in Europe, and performing at a high level. They don’t have a choice. They have to.
Rob Pickels 44:50
There’s no other opportunity.
Grant Holicky 44:51
Yeah, there’s no other opportunity. We are performing incredibly well in the junior levels. We had Lydia Cusack won the Dublin World Cup earlier this year in the junior ranks, her and Alyssa Sarkisoff have put top 10 finishes into World Cups this year. One of the things that to me, is a really big piece of this puzzle. There’s two that I’d like to start with. One is money.
Funding, European Racing, and Why U.S. Cyclocross Needs Support
Chris Case 45:18
Lead fund.
Grant Holicky 45:20
Exactly, exactly where I was-
Rob Pickels 45:22
But it stinks that you can say it in one word, right?
Grant Holicky 45:25
This is exactly where I was going to go with this, because it’s not an Olympic sport, because there’s no available money or available medals. A USOPC does not support USA cyclocross with funds. Hopefully there’s a time where that changes. The rumors are that that is going to change, but.
Rob Pickels 45:45
On the Olympic side, or on the USOPC side?
Grant Holicky 45:48
On the Olympic side, yes. And as soon as the changes on the Olympic side it has to change on the USOPC side, and then it becomes a battle for medals. If we get medals, we get money. If we don’t win medals, we get less money. I mean, that’s so much of USA Cycling is driven by metal count, yeah. And I think it’s really important that the general rider understands that the high performance side of USA Cycling has to the way that it is structured the US. The high performance side has to drive the sport in the States, because it hasn’t been built from the bottom up with participation, the way something like swimming has, with a million kids swimming on teams. So we just don’t have that for bikes. So cyclocross has always been a little hamstrung by money, and the main source of money is the Mud Fund. And the Mud Fund is a private donation fund that basically it funds my job. It funds- we handed out $66,000 in stipends this year to riders to go race in Europe, travel stipends and that all came from the Mud Fund.
Rob Pickels 46:58
And correct me if I’m wrong, Mud Fund was started by Tim Johnson, former US national champion. I’m sure other people were involved.
Grant Holicky 47:04
Yeah.
Rob Pickels 47:05
A big name attached to it.
Grant Holicky 47:06
Yeah. And right now, it is run by a man named Russell Adams, who just loves cyclocross, and he has given so much time and so much effort to revitalizing the mud fund in the last year, and that stipend program that we’ve done this year has been so much because of Russell.
Rob Pickels 47:24
So, let’s say Grant, we find a benefactor, and they’re pumping millions into the program a year. Life would be grand. Are we instantly better?
Grant Holicky 47:34
No, and there’s a couple things that have that change. The second piece that I was going to say is that cyclocross in the United States does not necessarily prepare riders for cyclocross in Europe. And it’s not that, oh, the conditions are so much harder in Europe, that can be true. It’s not just that the courses are so much harder in Europe that can be true. It’s a combination of everything, if you’re riding, and I won’t name a specific course, that only get myself in trouble, but if you’re riding the general UCI course in the United States, and you riding in Europe, and you’re riding Namore, which is an incredibly difficult course, like, go watch it, or go look at it. Or, if you want a really good example, this year, Dendermond, which happened last weekend, which was just mud bath.
Rob Pickels 48:24
It was wet.
Grant Holicky 48:25
It was nuts, right? And September cyclocross race, where it’s dry and fast in the United States, is not going to prepare you for Dendermond. So what we watch is Junior riders over there aren’t riding Dendermond. They’re not riding Namore. They’re riding field cross. They’re riding a local race that’s put together that’s not epically technical, it’s not epically difficult. It’s probably not that much different than a race we race in the States. So our junior riders are on a fairly level playing field. So our junior riders go over to Europe. They’re competitive, they’re very competitive. Like, do you want a World Cup? This is a great example of that we’ve had. Maddie Monroe was on the podium for the UCI Junior race in Switzerland. We’ve had a good number of those junior races. What starts to happen then is, in Europe, the U 23 start to race those courses, that next level of course, a cockside that’s all sand, no more, that is a mountain bike course. In some ways-
Chris Case 49:20
It’s frightening to someone with a lack of familiarity with that type of stuff. Frightening.
Grant Holicky 49:25
Yeah, Holst. Holst is the best example.
Chris Case 49:27
Frightening, yeah.
Grant Holicky 49:28
Two downhills and holster terrifying. I mean, they-
Rob Pickels 49:31
Even on a mountain bike?
Grant Holicky 49:33
Yeah. When I was going down them on pre ride on Friday before they were muddy, I was terrified. And I’m a fairly good masters cyclocross racer. And so now you take the U 23 in Europe, and that’s the course they’re racing. You take the U 23’s in the States, and they’re continuing to race the same course as they were racing before. So you see this divergence in skill. You see this divergence in power. Zolder is a wonderful example, we had a girl on one of the junior U 23 trips in Europe a few years back in Zolder, and she was saying, oh, and the technical stuff, I had these girls in front of me, and they were driving me crazy. It was just slow, I couldn’t get around him. It was brutal. And then we hit the pavement section. The Zolder pavement section is flat as a pancake. And she said, I was getting dropped off their wheels. Yeah, on the flats. On the flats, they were just riding away from me. Because one of the things that we do not have in American cyclocross courses is peddling. You do not pedal. In American cyclocross courses, you turn, you turn. And American cyclocross race directors and course designers are trying to make the courses harder and harder and harder and harder, and if Fayetteville is still my favorite example, Fayetteville happened. Every American cyclocross fan said what about Fayetteville? That course? This course sucks. It’s boring. There’s nothing to it. It should be embarrassed. This is the course we put forth on the world stage. Guess what every European rider said about that course? Oh, it’s a good course. It’s great, because it was hard. It was hard. It was nothing to think hard. The best course we’ve ever had, in my opinion, in the United States, is Jingle Cross. It was technically demanding. It was incredibly hard uphill. But it is harder and harder and harder to find those venues that allow you to do that.
Rob Pickels 51:23
Rest in peace Jingle cross man.
Grant Holicky 51:25
Yeah, Devout park at King’s Cross in Cincinnati was another one of the examples of that. Incredibly difficult, technically incredibly difficult from a peddling point of view. There is elevation. So we watch this divergence, and we watch American riders stay in these in the States and ride that type of course, and you watch Europeans ride this type of course. So then we send our riders over, and they have mud and they have technicality, and they have pedaling, and they have elevation, and they just haven’t progressed at the same pace that those other riders have progressed. The riders that have had success in Europe, whether that be Paige, whether that be Powers, whether that be Trevorn and Johnson, back in the day on the men’s side, have moved there and lived there for an extended period of time.
Rob Pickels 52:11
Jonathan Paige essentially immigrated to Europe and lived there with his family for a decade.
Grant Holicky 52:18
Yep. Katie Compton spent an incredible amount of time in Europe, to the point where she would skip Pan American championships because she was too busy at World Cups in Europe. We don’t have very many American riders moving over to Europe and doing that these days. When you look at our success on the mountain bike level, driven by Blevins, and Riley Amos, and Bjorn Riley, and Maddie Monroe, and Kay Courtney. And take your pick of eight women on the on the mountain bike side. They’re based in Europe. They’re racing in Europe. They’re doing those things. I will always say this about what North Americans and Americans do to sport. We make it harder and we make it longer, and then the Europeans find a way to take that sport and make it presentable to a watching public, entertaining, shorter, faster and more fun. Mountain Bike, what did we do with mountain bike? We went to Leadville with mountain bike. What did the Europeans do with mountain bike? XCO it’s in the Olympics. Triathlon. What did we do with triathlon? We took it to Iron Man. What did Europeans do with triathlon? They made it sprint distance. They made it Olympic distance, and they made it Olympic sport. We’re gonna watch it with gravel. What do we do with gravel? We make it unbound. What are they doing with gravel? They’re making-
Chris Case 53:36
We have more space than them.
Grant Holicky 53:38
We do that- they do that world championship that everybody watched that was freaking cool this year, and it’s going to become an Olympic discipline, and we’re going to be terrible at it because we’re trying to go long.
Rob Pickels 53:49
Sorry, Chris.
Grant Holicky 53:52
Sorry, Chris, to the guy who’s best guy in the room at cross.
Rob Pickels 53:56
Yeah, yeah, and the best guy riding around Iceland.
Grant Holicky 53:59
Yeah, he’s just better than us at everything. Yes, I so I think that that divergence is one of the biggest pieces, right? We live in the States, and we raised in the States, and it’s such a divergence from where the sport is, we have to move over there. So that million dollars, if it funded people to go live in Europe, race in Europe, and let them feel at home in Europe. That would make a big difference.
The Future of Team USA Cyclocross
Rob Pickels 54:24
To wrap this up, are we going to be status quo for a while, or in the next two, three years? Are we going to be seeing an uptick? What’s the future look like?
Grant Holicky 54:30
I feel like we’re going to see an uptick. I feel like, keeping people to your point, keeping people like Henry Coot, who’s a first year U 23 male in cyclocross. I feel like keeping Vita in cyclocross. I feel like it’s something we can do if we continue to work for it. I think the possibility of Olympic medal will make a big difference. I think we have conversations among people like and Andrew Strohmeyer and Eric Brunner about moving to Europe and doing the full World Cup. That’s going to make a huge difference as well. And if you’re out there and you love cross, watch it. Give to the Mud Fund. Please give to the Mud Fund. I cannot tell you what a big difference $20 from 100 people makes. You cannot imagine what that does to what we’re able to do. The last thing I’ll say about cross that makes it difficult and why that money is so important. It is a labor and equipment intensive sport.
Rob Pickels 55:27
Yes, it is.
Grant Holicky 55:28
If I go to, when we go to Worlds, we’re planning worlds right now. We will take eight mechanics to worlds for a team of 20. The road you would take two for a team of 20.
Rob Pickels 55:37
Yeah. How many, how many bikes? How many sets of wheels?
Chris Case 55:40
Too many.
Rob Pickels 55:40
The logistics of mo-
Grant Holicky 55:43
20 riders plus coaches, there will be 50 bikes plus there. Sets of wheels? Hundreds of sets of wheels. So what we’re doing to try to move that around logistically over there is a dance, you know, watch the relay on Friday at Worlds, that’s a big deal. Our women for that relay are going to drive us to a good finish. That relay is among the most important things to me at that World Championships. And I think lastly, my goal with this position is to bring the team idea back to Team USA for cyclocross. I want that relay to do really, really well, and I want us out there helping each other and pushing each other what Andrew, and Eric, and Scott Funston did at Nationals this year, and then got off the bike and get along. That’s going to push them to higher levels in Europe.
Rob Pickels 56:37
It was great race.
Grant Holicky 56:38
And if you haven’t watched USA nationals. Go watch that race. The men’s USA nationals was incredible. The Women’s was incredible. Almost every category was incredible. It’s on flow. Go watch it. There’s a lot of talent, and we can change it if we have the funding and if we have the desire from the public to continue to push the sport and as the sport in general, if you don’t watch cross, watch it, you’ll be blown away by it’s like watching NASCAR. It’s super fun.
Chris Case 57:05
It’s way better than NASCAR.
Grant Holicky 57:06
And if you don’t race it, try it. Short track gravel man, it’s super cool.
Rob Pickels 57:10
That’s what we should call it. Short Track gravel. From now on, nice.
Chris Case 57:14
You’re off the back. It’s been called that for years, especially in Colorado. That or dirt crits.
Grant Holicky 57:19
Dirt crits in Colorado.
Outro and Final Thoughts
Trevor Connor 57:21
With that, Chris, you want to do the outro? Your first potluck.
Rob Pickels 57:24
He’s been on a potluck before.
Trevor Connor 57:26
Have you been to a potluck before?
Chris Case 57:27
Yeah.
Grant Holicky 57:27
But thank you, Rob for giving me that soapbox, and I’m sorry for all of you who turned that off midrant.
Rob Pickels 57:34
I hope nobody did.
Trevor Connor 57:35
It was interesting. It was good to hear.
Chris Case 57:37
That was another episode of Fast Talk. Subscribe to Fast Talk wherever you prefer to find your favorite podcast. Be sure to leave us a rating and a review. The thoughts and opinions expressed on Fast Talk are those of the individual.
Trevor Connor 57:49
Very seriouc outro-
Chris Case 57:49
For as always, we love your mother****. Join the conversation at forums.fasttalklabs.com, or tweet us.
Rob Pickels 57:59
Is that even tweeting anymore?
Grant Holicky 58:01
X us.
Chris Case 58:02
X us. X us out. Head to fast talklabs.com to get access to our endurance sports knowledge base, coach continuing education, as well as our in person and remote athlete services. For Trevor Connor, Rob Pickels and Grant Holicky, and that microphone that just fell. I’m Chris Case. Thanks for listening.
Grant Holicky 58:21
It was a literal microphone drop.
