17 year old son wants to race, NEED HELP!!!!!!!!!

stormer94 said:

I have been riding, going to a few races, and having fun for many years now. Not pushing my children in the LEAST (or at all, they just don't ride). Finally last week, my son says he would like to try and race this small upcoming event, "sounds fun" to him. 🙂 🙂 🙂 <insert a small tear in the corner of my eye>.

Long story short. I don't want to crush his will, or beat him so badly with training that it ruins it for him. He has very little athletic training, as in, is not involved in any sports, but keeps himself lean. about 180# at 6'1", and 17 years old. I want to approach this carefully and enjoy the father/son thing. I REALLLLY don't want to blow this chance for some bonding, and to teach him to enjoy the sport.

The particulars. There is a small 10 mile local event that he would like to ride, on June 17th, about 10 days from now. It's an annual thing, and I own the course record, and really wanted to shatter it this year. We did a little "orientation" ride tonight, where I showed him how to get clipped in, when to clip out, how to get a drink while moving, how to follow, watch for traffic, etc. Learned to work the gears up and down, and we put on a nice little 13 miles (I'd already put in 50 this morning, but the extra 13 might have been the funnest miles I've ever had, because it was with my son, enjoying my hobby, I always ride and train alone, just how it works out in a small town).

To the point. with only 2 weeks to ride, all he can hope for is to be comfortable on the bike, and have fun. Put in some seat time, and not feel out of place. There is not going to be a lot of improvement can happen in 10 days. NOR, do I want to push him that hard so as to ruin what could be a good family thing. He learned how to use a HRM and to adjust everything and understand what the numbers mean and about cadence, etc. I'm going to spend some time in the garage tomorrow night, working on the bike setup a bit more for him, on a trainer. He had enough fun tonight that he said he would also like to ride tomorrow night. 😄 works for me!!! 😄

I need advice on finding his HR zones without killing him and working him so hard that he thinks this is an awful idea. PLUS, he might be a bit unfit, and you hate to push and unfit person to hard. I had him wear my 720i on the ride, and the data was not all that bad, considering.

On flat ground with heavy training tires and wheels, he was able to pull
14.5mph @ 163HR avg at 88 rpm, (nice tempo pace)
17mph at 175HR avg at 88rpm
Never been on a bike before, or much on excercising. I had him do those for about 2 minutes, after about a 40 minute warmup. I estimated the first one to be a mid zone 3 for him and the second a lower zone 4. He wasn't breathing hard at all, so I think the zones were pretty accurate.

Problems,
1)How to test him to know where he should ride and train, without killing his spirit. And to give him a guide while out on the course. Just something like (keep it under 180hr and watch your cadence, would help a lot). Needs to be tought not to "blow up", etc.
2)Should I bag my thoughts of going for the record to instead ride the course with him? At first I think it shows that you should "give up" on your dreams, he knows I've been working my ass off for that record, and it would be a fun ride, I was REALLY looking forward to the great suffering of it all (seriously, I was). but then I think it shows that what is more important is "family". I'm ready to throw the race, and am happy with that conclusion.

Thoughts?

Many thanks as always,
-Bob

Wow Bob, that's a difficult one and I don't mean that from the training angle.
I'll leave that to others with more experience.
If it were me I would say, "son would you like me to ride along with you?" He must know you hold the record and I'm sure you've mentioned you want to go for it again. So he might say, "hey Dad you've trained hard for this - go for it."
Problem solved! 🙂 (after of course you have said, "are you sure, I don't mind riding with you?"
Now, if he says, "that would be great Dad, are you sure?", what have you got to lose, you already hold the course record and by riding with him you will enhance the father-son bonding and perhaps have many great rides together in the future.
And so, someone takes your record - so what? That's an added incentive to train hard for next year.😄
One more thing, by leaving him to the mercy of the pack, he might just (assuming he doesn't perform well) decide to quit cycling there and then.
You've then lost a potential cycling partner. TYSON

I am dumping this thread in the too hard basket for now! good luck btw :p

stormer94 said:

There is a small 10 mile local event that he would like to ride, on June 17th, about 10 days from now.

TT or mass start? Age groups?

stormer94 said:

1)How to test him to know where he should ride and train, without killing his spirit. And to give him a guide while out on the course. Just something like (keep it under 180hr and watch your cadence, would help a lot). Needs to be tought not to "blow up", etc.

Why don't you let him figure it out for himself. Just tell him to go out and ride 10 miles at whatever pace he thinks he can manage. Then, you can look at the post-ride file and help him understand what was going on. In all likelihood, he'll take it out too hard and will have to slow down. That's the main thing he needs to learn if it is a TT. If it's a mass-start race, he needs to learn to draft, but it's not clear from your original post what type of event it is.

stormer94 said:

2)Should I bag my thoughts of going for the record to instead ride the course with him? At first I think it shows that you should "give up" on your dreams, he knows I've been working my ass off for that record, and it would be a fun ride, I was REALLY looking forward to the great suffering of it all (seriously, I was). but then I think it shows that what is more important is "family". I'm ready to throw the race, and am happy with that conclusion.

Why don't you just ask him if he wants you to ride along with him. He might actually prefer to ride the course alone. Who knows, he might want to beat you. My oldest son gets his biggest thrill out of beating me on the golf course and I think if he was a cyclist he would want to ride me off his wheel. Good thing he's a hockey player.

To stop killing his spirit, get him out with some other groups the same ability as he.

Restrict his gears to the regulated roll out.

Find a coach. Have fun first. If you were serious about development, take one YEAR with each of the below:

1) Learn to Train
2) Train to Train
3) Train to Race

Spunout said:

1) Learn to Train
2) Train to Train
3) Train to Race

In the next 10 days?

Find a dad with a 17 year old daughter who has the same problem.

Seriously, your son needs to develop an independent competency so that he feels he is contributing something to your relationship. Maybe enourage him to join the club as a beginner and then spend time with him when he trains. You need to carefully manage the transition from adult-child to adult-adult. You may have a need to nurture: he may have a need to be respected. Sorry to be so heavy. I was touched by your situation and wish you the best of luck.

Stormer94,

As a parent and a teacher I have spent a lot of my time thinking about how to share great things like a love for physical engagement with the world or biology with my children and students. However, anything that I have to say on this comes from a position of great professional and personal humbleness. As a parent you know first-hand how the development of young people is shaped by subtle, powerful complexities frequently and properly (IMHO) beyond our control. So I know you won't feel like you have let down cycling, your son, or yourself if riding doesn't grip him the way it has grabbed you. However, I sure do understand the feeling that you have that there is a window of opportunity here and you want to give it your best shot.

Here's what I would think about. What moved my 14 year old son to become a committed rider was the thrill of riding in a pack and a sense of being welcomed into a community of accomplished riders. I went with my son on weekend group rides of 50 – 100 riders. The older riders at the rest stops where fantastic. They chatted with him, encouraged him, told him they hoped to seem him future rides. They learned his name and greeted him on future rides. One even told him, "Hey, if you keep riding like this, you are going to be on the podium one day." At that point my son didn't know what a podium was, but all of words of encouragement from accomplished riders were powerful.

When I was taking my son on these group rides I knew there was another boy, a friend of my son, about my sons age, in our neighborhood who had a father that was a regular rider. I talked with this dad to see if he would be willing to make the purchase of a road bike so that his son and my son could try out the sport together. Those two boys got their first road bikes about the same time and went on their first group rides, time trials and mass start races together. Having a friend to anticipate and debrief rides with and get each other out of the house for training was an important factor.

The other thing that helped my son move into the cycling community were the mass start races. Initially, we went to watch but soon we were going to race. Of course my son didn't do well in these initial races but he ended up feeling challenged and not frustrated. What was most important, I think, was the encouragement that he received from adults and meeting and getting to know some racers his age. Also, I suspect all communities have a saintly rider who organizes a racing team for the Junior riders. At the end of last season, a wonderful man who coaches a group of Junior riders asked my son if he would like to join their team.

So, all winter long the team had weekly training rides. It was an easy "active recovery" ride for the older riders and a more challenging ride for new riders like my son. They learned pace lines and echeloning but most importantly, by riding regularly with this experienced group of riders they led my son to discover that glowing world that lies beyond the wind, sweat, and tiredness. Everytime the phone rings and it is one of my son's team mates calling to organize a team training ride, I stop and feel indebted to this coach and so many others.

So Stormer94, when I look back on all of this, I feel like I was the least important factor in a long complicated causal chain of events that got my son into cycling. This realization is both liberating (To pass on my love of riding I don't have to do it all by myself) and frustrating (I can't do it by myself). When I watch young people grow up and form their attachments, there is a lawfulness to it, but all of the interacting factors produces a complexity that is so immense that it is still a great mystery. One of the rewards of being a parent and teacher is to see the surprising ways young people develop. And because we shared our passions with them in a supportive, encouraging way, they want to come back, spend time and share the things that animate their lives with us.

One thing I would think about doing this summer is taking your son to an IMAX movie called "Wired to Win." The IMAX camera follows a group of riders through the Tour. It sounds amazing.

Good luck!

Thanks for all the insight, folks. 🙂 I do appreciate it.

I'll ask him if he wants me to ride with him, but most people know the answer from a 17 year old kid will be, " I don't care, whatever..."... 😉

His butt was killing him today, and he said the back of his neck was a bit sore. He actually made a quick look around the web for bike fitment questions, all on his own, so that's a good start.

Gonna get him on the trainer, and setup the bike properly. I also told him we have 7 other saddles we could try on that thing, no sense riding one you don't like. He thought that was a great idea. So we are going to pursue that tomorrow night. I pointed him to eBay to look at mens jerseys in size XL, and he kind of got into it. Picked out some he thought were cool, and I ordered them up. Courtesy of the movie "Nacho Libre", he's excited about "wearing stretchy pants, just for fun..." ....lol...

He said he wanted to take tonight off because his butt hurt, and I agreed that maybe a day of rest would help and be a good idea.

I'm tossing around the idea of letting him and one of his buddies take my wife and my good mtn bikes out for a peel. Riding is riding, pedaling is pedaling when you're this green. He'd be getting excercise and not even care. :p I'm having trouble with the idea from a "trash it" perspective though.

RapDaddyo said:

In the next 10 days?

Nope. 3 years.

Development=patience.

Spunout said:

Nope. 3 years.

Development=patience.

Yeah, but the OP's question is what he should do in the next 10 days. If his son doesn't have a good experience in the upcoming race, there may be no 3 year development plan to even talk about.

RapDaddyo said:

Yeah, but the OP's question is what he should do in the next 10 days. If his son doesn't have a good experience in the upcoming race, there may be no 3 year development plan to even talk about.

Then ensure a good experience!

Sorry, I missed the OP's qualifier. Don't race, or go as a fun event with no goals.

I am with most here. I believe ensuring a positive experience, beats killing yourself for a moderate improvement in position. I'm also of the mind (although have not asked yet, but will) that he might want to simply ride on his own, not be embarassed by the old man, or feel he needs to live up to anything particular. Really and simply enjoy the ride. I tend to believe we are talking a pretty small affair. 20-30 riders, mostly local. Mass start.

The weather here is 20-30mph winds for the NEXT 4 FREAKING DAYS, with gusts to 40mph........... It actually sucks to simply stand around outside, much less ride in it. This isn't helping anything. At the very least, I need to ride tomorrow. Usually in a 30mph headwind, I'm irritated by the fact that I can't even get up to 90 cadence on a 27t rear without being in zone 4, going a whopping 5-7mph. I HATE WIND. But MAN, I like the return trip!!!! (maxed out in the big ring!!)

The wind pushes the cars around on the roads more, and myself, and I feel I'm actually putting myself in risk by riding in extreme winds on the roads. At least here anyway.

stormer94 said:

20-30 riders, mostly local. Mass start.

That changes everything. How does he like physics? Get him to understand the benefits of drafting and teach him to draft.

stormer94 said:

The weather here is 20-30mph winds for the NEXT 4 FREAKING DAYS, with gusts to 40mph

I realize I may be in the minority, but I love high winds. We get such winds here all the time. My dream is that one day I will be able to do a 20 min L4 interval and travel only 1 block.😄

stormer94 said:

His butt was killing him today, and he said the back of his neck was a bit sore. He actually made a quick look around the web for bike fitment questions, all on his own, so that's a good start.

The soreness is probably due to having to adjust his fitness to cycling fitness - the muscles are use to doing something else. Send a fit cyclist out running and they'll be sore too.

The most important thing is that he enjoys the ride.

Quoted post said:

The weather here is 20-30mph winds for the NEXT 4 FREAKING DAYS, with gusts to 40mph........... It actually sucks to simply stand around outside, much less ride in it.

RD reads this and thinks "hmmmm.... maybe I ought to move to Montana" 🙂

curlew said:

RD reads this and thinks "hmmmm.... maybe I ought to move to Montana" 🙂

Or at least go for a visit, along with a visit to FL during hurricane season.😄

Stormer94,

Quoted post said:

The weather here is 20-30mph winds for the NEXT 4 FREAKING DAYS, with gusts to 40mph........... It actually sucks to simply stand around outside, much less ride in it.

What an amazing place. My wife is from Montana (Red Lodge). We met in school in Missoula. Through my wife's stories, family visits to her home town and summer work that I did in the eastern part of the state, I have been fortunate to come to know a little about some of the satisfactions and challenges that go with living in Montana's small towns.

It surprised me, but riding with my son in the same mass start races turned out to be more of a minefield than I anticipated. I didn't think it was going to be that big of a deal. In a group of 40-50 riders I thought my son and I would be aware of the rider in front of us and at our sides and we probably wouldn't even see each other much during the race.

My wife rolled her eyes when she heard this from me and thought I was hugely underestimating the impact my presence in the race would have on my son. Sigh........ I just don't know. So in the early races I stayed out. With the help I had given him he rode safely but of course he struggled. It surprised me though. What I thought he most needed most from me, support and encouragement, he found in the kind supportive comments that came from riders of all ages that made a point of coming up to him, congratulating him and talking with him after the race. We hung around for a long time after each race watching the other categories ride. Riders would come up all afternoon who had ridden with him or watched him and they made him feel welcomed. By the second or third race, he was wanting to get to races early and stay late so he could visit with his growing circle of racing friends.

I think its better that your son's first racing experience is a mass start race. The time trials here tend to be out on an isolated stretch of road and don't have the crowds and festive atmosphere that the mass start races more often do.

I think as parents we are at our best when we put young people in situations where the significance of substantial things can be revealed. A festive community gathering, shining, finely engineered bikes, a real battle with the wind, all under that big and beautiful Montana sky, all of these are powerful things that will address your son and make that day unforgettable. Stormer94, you must be so happy that you can give your son this very special opportunity. What you can count on is that he will respond to these great things in his own individual way.

stormer94 said:

The weather here is 20-30mph winds for the NEXT 4 FREAKING DAYS, with gusts to 40mph

RapDaddyo said:

I realize I may be in the minority, but I love high winds. We get such winds here all the time. My dream is that one day I will be able to do a 20 min L4 interval and travel only 1 block.😄

Welcome to the west gentlemen. I must admit I struggle in the wind. But I don't mind riding in it. My only complaint is that it seems the with the predominate wind here (out of the S) and with all of my rides generally heading N to start, it can be challenging at times.

Good Luck Stormer (with a name like that I'd figure you'd like wind...) and to your son, whatever you decide to do!

L

curlew said:

I think as parents we are at our best when we put young people in situations where the significance of substantial things can be revealed. A festive community gathering, shining, finely engineered bikes, a real battle with the wind, all under that big and beautiful Montana sky, all of these are powerful things that will address your son and make that day unforgettable. Stormer94, you must be so happy that you can give your son this very special opportunity. What you can count on is that he will respond to these great things in his own individual way.

Pretty good advice, curlew. It's amazing how closely this mirrors my child-rearing philosophy. I largely respond to their goals, hopes and dreams and try to provide the sort of support they want from me. This has varied greatly from child to child. One child took up soccer at age 5 and played at the top traveling team level until age 18. She was highly receptive to help from me and I took courses and eventually became a Class "D" soccer coach to be able to give some informed help along the way. Having never played soccer as a youth, it was a great learning experience for me as well -- cool game. Another child (swimmer) wanted nothing from me and wouldn't even allow me to watch her swim for several years ("Dad, it makes me nervous."😉. I obliged and took her to meets but left the rink when her events were announced. Did I peek? No, I figured she'd find out and I didn't want to break the bond of trust. I have five and they have each branched out into their own worlds of interests and are thriving at many different activities. Unfortunately no cyclists, only one golfer (loves to out-drive me off the tee by ~50 yards) and no pilots. Oh, well.