How to Analyze a Cyclocross Course

Video Transcript

"MICKEY DENONCOURT: When you get to the venue, if there are other races going on, you're not going be able to get out and ride the course. So a good thing to do is, you know, when you get there, you know, grab, you know, a water bottle and go walk the course. Check out what's going on, maybe see how the other racers are handling sections or trails, stuff like that. Think about what your strengths and weaknesses are as an athlete, as a rider, as a bike handler and then think about how you can, you know, take what the course gives you and, you know, use it to your strengths. So if you're somebody who, you know, maybe have a strong mountain bike background, you're good at cornering. You know, you can handle steep downhills and stuff like that pretty well, you know, use that to your advantage, you know? Say, "Oh, well," you know, "I can make up time here. I can, you know, I can rest on these sections, where somebody who's not as skilled as me in this area is going to have to struggle." You know, if you are really fast on the open road sections and you can really accelerate out at corners, you know that, you know, you can use that stuff to your advantage. I mean, the thing that--the main thing you need to keep in mind when you're looking at a course and walking it is, you know, even if you can ride some steep, old climb or, you know, you could--you're really good at getting off your bike and running and you could just blaze up some run up, you know, that's a sort of thing, maybe, or you could hop a thing--you can bunny hop something that somebody else has to get off over. That's the sort of thing that you want to save. You know, it uses a lot of energy to make those big, exciting moves. And doing them every lap just to show off for the guy who's, you know, in the back of you battling for 15th place maybe might not be the most effective way to spend your energy. You know, have those good skills and, you know, develop them, work on them, but, you know, just ride a smooth, clean race until you really need to move up. You know, look for places to pass when you're walking the course, look for things that, you know, holes and stuff that might be hidden and try to watch the other classes and see how they're handling stuff."