USA Cycling Southeast Regional Development Camp 2009

This year I went back for my third time to the southeast camp in Greenville, SC. We stayed in the dorms at Furman University, just south of the Blue Ridge Mountains with 35 juniors and 11 coaches for the week. This camp is designed to do power testing on the riders so USA Cycling can ID talented riders that can come up through the pipeline. Below is a day by day review of what we did.

Sunday
I arrived at Furman University after lunch to check in and move into my dorm room. There were only 10 out of the 36 of us that were returning from last year, so there were a good amount of new people there. However, there were many good friends that I’ve gotten to know over the past couple of years that were still there. We went for a 2 hour easy social ride in the afternoon to spin the legs. Later we had our first classroom lecture to introduce everyone and set out the schedule for the week.

Monday
We were awaken by Rusty, who is a pro and ride leader, with his famous cowbell at 6:30 am and we headed to breakfast. After that, we left at 9:00 for the power profile test out on Caesar’s Head, a mountain just north of Greenville. There was a short TT of about a mile and a longer TT around 2.7 miles up the mountain. After completing these, we rode to the top of the mountain to eat box lunches. Then it was time to “chill out” on the descent. We got back to campus at 4:00, showered up and then off to dinner at 5:00. After dinner it was time to head to lecture where we talked about things from nutrition, anti-doping, race tactics, racing in Europe and more.

Tuesday
After breakfast we did an easy 2 hour skills and drills ride as we were doing the local Greenville Tuesday night Worlds. In the afternoon we left for about an hour ride to the Donaldson Center race. This isn’t exactly a race, it’s more like an Erroll World’s. However, there were about 180 riders total for the A’s and B’s. Also, there was police support for a ride, how cool is that? I raced the A’s for 43 miles on a 7 mile loop around an old airport. There were many really good racers present, including a former Jittery Joe’s rider (now Myogenesis), Rich Hincapie and more. There even was a Team Columbia-High Road support car present. This was a very aggressive race with many attacks and constantly fast. I was in many moves, however none managed to stick. One did have a good makeup, including Thad (Myogenesis) that eventually broke away on his own to win. However, the field strung out and pulled us back. I finished in the field for the sprint. This was a very exciting race/ride and I’d like to do it again someday. We rode about an hour back to campus, had a late dinner and went to bed.

Wednesday
Now it was time for an easy day. We did an easy skills and drills ride in the morning and afternoon with a lecture and field games at night. Field games consisted of the following activities; the cardboard slide; which involved riding in a field over a piece of cardboard and locking your back wheel on it and sliding, fishtailing down the hill. We also did some bumping and wheel kissing. My favorite has to be “knockdown” or last man standing. We rode in a circle and bumped or cut other people off and track stood to make them put their foot on the ground so they’re out. Then as there are fewer and fewer people, the circle gets smaller. I managed to win one round with my special strategy.

Thursday
We went out for the longest ride of the week, about 85 miles and did four relatively flat time trial repeats that were 1.5 miles each. Then we ate lunch and climbed up the Watershed to the bakery in Saluda, NC. We rode back to campus in the rain when I flatted, but it was changed fast thanks to the mechanic Herman. During all rides we had two ride support vehicles for water and mechanic support. We had the last lecture where my dad, who has been an assistant coach, gave out water bottles, t-shirts, Chipotle cards and signed Hincapie posters.

Friday
Many people weren’t doing the spin around campus so I just packed my bags in the morning before leaving for the North Carolina State Road Race in Salisbury.

Saturday & Sunday
I raced the North Carolina State Road Race on Saturday in Jr. 15-18 and Sunday in Cat. 3. Saturday I worked with and for some friends of mine that are from NC to try and help them win their state title. Sunday I raced cat. 3 where I finished in the field after trying many times to break away.

This was my last year attending camp and it has to be one of my favorite ones, getting in around 300 miles on the bike. Thanks to everyone that worked hard to put it on and help assist: Richard Dunn, John Kelly, Michael Jordan, Rusty, Travis, Leslie, Matt, Ken, Herman, GW, Bob and Keith.

Next, I will be attending the two UCI Junior stage races in North America: the Tour of the Red River Gorge in Kentucky and le Tour de l’Abitibi in Canada. I will be racing for the Florida Velo Devo Team which consists of two, six man teams from the southeast U.S. Red River takes place July 13-17, and l’Abitibi is July 20-26.

Click here for pictures.

Thanks for reading,
Craig Creeden