Ride along, and train for your sport
Cycling club offers young athletes from all kinds of activities free access to high-tech program
Pools, arenas and countless other sports facilities are dark, and an increasing concern for younger athletes is the ability to train effectively and with variety.
For some, the answer could lie with the National Cycling Centre Hamilton, the nonprofit entity created as a legacy of the 2003 world road championships.
The Ancaster club has produced a plethora of Canadian champions and for years has been combating a basic accessibility issue: Their outdoor sport must face four months of indoor-training weather.
The NCCH is extending one of its winter at-home programs and opening it up to other noncycling athletes. It’s a seasonal reversal: Road cycling has long been a summer cross-training vehicle for winter-sport athletes, particularly speed skaters.
Under a three-month pilot project, the NCCH offers free access for riders 16 and under to the Zwift multifaceted video platform. It links the bike to a rider’s phone, laptop, or iPad. Any bike can be used, once it’s made stationary by a device hooked to the rear wheel.
But, while Zwift will provide the free platform access, those who don’t have the necessary equipment — including sensors, the back-wheel stationary bike trainer and a smooth rear tire — will need to purchase it (approximately $350) under the club’s CycleFit initiative at ncch.ca.
As part of the overall package, the NCCH provides individualized coaching and training.
“We’re expanding the winter program to this time of year and to other sports,” says NCCH head coach Rick Lee. “Our young riders love it. We think this is good for the competitive kids out there, whether they’re dancers, swimmers, soccer players or whatever. And the maybe-not-so-competitive kids too, to keep them in shape.
“It’s like cross-training but it also gives them some structure, which I think is very important. And they can chat to their buddies while they’re riding, so it has that social aspect.”
The CycleFit program dispatches a local mobile installer to deliver the necessary equipment to the rider’s driveway at home. In social-distancing mode, the installer will tune the rider’s own bike outside, attach a new back tire and attach the sensors and rear-wheel trainer to make it a stationary bike. The rider then takes it inside.
On their video screens, riders can cycle any road course in the world, chat with other riders by text, see where they’re ranking in the group and get readouts of their speed and cadence. Lee and NCCH board member Brent Kinnaird both concede the program is not for everybody, partly because there is some equipment cost.
“The key for us is to grow this in a manageable way,” Kinnaird says. “To ramp it up, we couldn’t accommodate 1,000 kids signing up.
“We’re targeting kids aged 12 to 16 to get involved, so their Zwift platform is free. But, above 16, it’s still very reasonable, and you can ride an unlimited number of times.
“The intent is to provide an opportunity for kids who are part of other organized sports that they can’t play right now to maintain their fitness level and to have some interactivity with other kids. That mental health part is very important, feeling connected when you can’t be connected in the hockey arena or swimming pool or on the soccer field.”
Kinnaird compares it to a cycling video game and Lee laughs that one of the club’s younger riders said, “This esport is a real sport.”