2012 Early Birds!!!

2012 is nearly upon us, and here in NorCal this means one thing: Early Birds!

What: The Early Bird Crit Training Series is an awesome way to practice your skills. Participants are split into small groups during the clinics and practice essential skills such as cornering, group riding, sprinting, in short, everything you need to survive a race, especially crits. This is followed by practice criteriums on a nice wide course. Experienced riders will mentor the practice sessions and ride with the racers in the practice races. There are even upgrade points available for cat 5 men and cat 4 women!

I strongly recommend attending the clinic if you haven’t practiced your skills in a while. Whereby I don’t mean just ride around in a group. There are a whole lot of other skills to practice that you normally don’t do in group rides. I myself will be mentoring, cause I learn a lot every time I do that as well, and although I’ve been riding around in circles longer than I care to admit, I think that you can never practice your skills enough.

When: Jan 8, 15, 22, 28 – clinics and training races — and Feb 12 – the real “graduation” race that counts for upgrade points (the other training races don’t count for upgrade points, but the clinics do)

Where: Fremont, CA — details and a map here

Schedule:
8:30 Men Category 4 race (45 min.)
9:15- Men Category 4 post race talk
9:30 Early Bird Mentored Skills Clinic #1 for Juniors, Women Category 4, and Men Under 30 Category 5
10:45 U30 (under age 30) Men Category 5 race (40 min.)
11:25 U30 Men Category 5 post-race talk
11:30 Women Category 4 race, split fields based on experience if attendance warrants (40 min.)
11:30am Juniors ages 8 to 16 skills clinic
12:10 Women Category 4 post-race talk
12:15 Juniors race (30 min.)
12:45 Juniors post-race talk
12:45 Early Bird Mentored Skills Clinic #2 for 30+ Men Category 5
2:00 30-44 year old Men Category 5 race (40 min.)
2:40 30-44 year old Men Category 5 post-race talk
2:45 45+ year old Men Category 5 race (40 min.)
3:25 45+ year old Men Category 5 post-race talk
3:30 Category 1/2/3/Pro race (60 min.)