Monthly Archives: November 2009

Will Rader is a 17 year old road, mountain, and cyclocross racer with the Metro Volkswagen Cycling Team while attaining the high marks at Highland Park High School. Fresh off a stellar finish to the 2009 road races season with strong performances at the Tour of Austin, the Texas State Road Race Championships, and the Piney Hills Classic as well as a huge solo win at the Downtown Denton Criterium, he’s marching towards Bend, OR for his first trip to CX nationals. If you’re heading up to Bend for the festivities December 11-13, be sure to say hi to Will and the Durata Training crew who will be hoping for sloppy conditions. Here’s Will’s account of the inaugural Mellow Classic-

“Starting on the very last row at the Mellow Johnny’s Classic wasn’t quite how I pictured having a great race in the big boy field. I new that it was gonna take some monster power to get around 50 other people to get a top 5 result like I really was hoping for, and from the start list thought was the goal i needed to shoot for. I had heard that they were calling people to the line for start placing based on the number plate and not just a free for all for the front row,  the latter of which I was hoping for. […]

In the past month or two I have seen a handful of articles written in cycling publications and coaches in the cycling community advocating the use of strength training in the “off season” (off season is a very poor choice of words, you’re either getting better or you’re not, I will use non competitive season hereafter) to combat bone loss. While there is not a body of evidence to suggest that strength training can improve endurance performance, it continues to be debated by cyclists, coaches and physiologists as to whether there is any cross over benefit. In my experience and through the research I have done I feel like the effects of weight training are very individual and must be considered on a case by case basis contingent upon each athletes goals, time commitments, pre-existing conditions, injury history, athletic development and extenuating factors. Additionally many reports suggest that low bone mass density (BMD) is a cause for a greater increase in fractures among cyclists, however this may not all together be true […]

Durata Athletes have not let the shorter days and cooler weather slow them down, if fact they’ve been flying out there in running events,  fat tire races and Ironman Triathlons […]