Psyched

Luckily the cycling team sprung into existence no later than my senior year at F&M. I’m psyched!

Word of mouth caught my ear just in time for me to ride with Rob, Drew, and Charlie in the Cranksgiving benefit race. This was such an awesome day for me; I met these guys for the first time and now consider them my great friends. Clicking right off the bat, we stuck together through the entire ride. We rode, slid and scrambled through grocery stores trying to purchase the kid-friendly food as fast as possible and get back on the road. Once we reached the finish line…or the local coffee shop, we quickly found out that we placed 2nd, 3rd, 4th males and 1st female! This was definitely a starting point for us…we felt great not only after doing what we love (cycling), but also after contributing to a really great cause.

We initially had a bit of trouble getting everyone together religiously for daily rides, however seeing that temperatures were so cold and work gets in the way this is totally expected. Nonetheless I have complete confidence that more and more teammates will be getting out there for rides now that we have the first races under our belts and spring fever will be rushing through our veins.

We all received our helmets a couple of weeks ago. I felt that this really instilled a bit of confidence in us and allowed us to begin to feel like more of a team. I volunteered to host our first pasta party in my apartment a couple nights prior to racing (it’s important to get those carbs in well before the night prior to a race!!) and I was so unbelievably happy with the turn out. The point of the pasta party was not only carb loading; it was also to get everyone’s mind in the game, and best of all, to receive our racing kits! Chips, salsa, guac, 3 boxes of spaghetti and two jars of sauce kept us content watching TV, chatting about tactics for the weekend and just getting some of our first laughs in.

Now for the races. We spent the night at Adric’s and had our second pasta party. Awake at 6:30 we headed out for Rutgers in Piscataway, NJ to take on our first time trial. We then rushed from Piscataway to Princeton to warm up for the second race of the day…the criterium. The next day we had our final race back at Rutgers where we really had to push through the pain and fatigue from the prior day’s races.

The F&M cycling team has copious amounts of potential and I can’t wait for us all to continue training, get stronger, and place better and better in the races coming up. GO DIPS!