Forest City Velodrome

I spent the weekend at The Forest City Vélodrome, in London Ontario.  Rob Good was leading the Canadian National Team Junior Camp, and I jumped in on the track...when I could.  I looked like a bit of a dufus at times, but I took it all in stride and had an excellent time.  I was vocal.  First it was positive self talk : ''youcandoit youcandoit youcandoit'' as I was spinning around the track the first few laps.  Then it was ''blackline blackline blackline'' or ''blueline blueline blueline'' ...just to remind myself where I was supposed to ride.  Haha.  It was either that or sit around on a plastic chair all day long.  So, let's be honest, which one is more stupid?  I made the right choice.

Rob had a lot of tricks and drills up his sleeve to teach me as much as possible over the weekend that I was there.  The juniors were nice to me, and were also pretty darn impressive.  They've got some incredible piston power!

Claude Pinard

Check out how steep the track is.  When I first saw it, a group of masters were flying around.  Some were on the apron (the blue strip around the base of the track) others were on the bottom black line (the line that you're supposed to try to stick to in races because it's the shortest and fastest way around the track) others on the stayer (the blue line in the middle of the track) and sometimes guys would go up to the top yellow line (holy shit was that ever high on the steep, steep track).

One thing that I was really surprised about was how easy it is for anybody to start track riding.  At the Forest City Velodrome there are beginner courses (Track 1 and Track 2) that teach the basics of track riding at a really fair price.  There are bikes for rent, and a lot of very friendly people with a lot of patience and passion for cycling ready to help anybody learn.  Check it out at www.forestcityvelodrome.ca

I had a lot of fun at the track.  I learned a lot...and I've got to say that I'm proud of myself that I had the guts to try it out, and dare myself to ride on what my teammate Anne Guzman lovingly refers to as the ''Toilet Bowl'', because it's so darn steep. Hopefully some of what I learned will be carried out onto the road next year!  I'm going to keep it up...