Review: Bay Area Women's Cycling Clinic

I signed up for this Bay Area Women's Cycling clinic last weekend (schedule here), and I'll say it was a bit of fun, and a good workout.

It definitely made me try a lot of things outside my comfort zone, like being comfortable in a pack, taking corners tighter, trying to ride no hands, and just building confidence.

The first day was more useful in terms of building skills, I felt more confident about certain aspects of being on a bike after the first day (the first day was a bit of bike handling, cornering, pack riding, being around people, pacelines). The first day I think ~50 people showed up (this included some people in racing teams...)

The second day felt more "hard core" for me, around ~30 people signed up, and most of them were the folks in team kits or were signed up to do the death ride this year. We did hill climbing drills (standing on hills, sag climbing, finding your rhythm, ...), and we climbed this hill off of page mill like 7-8 times. After that we went up on page mill (~8 mins of it) for a "real climb"... Then after the climbing we did a mock race. The interesting about this is I realized that I really don't have the desire to beat out other people to get to the front. I just, enjoy riding for the sake of being outside and such.

The best part of the second day was the session talking about exercises that stretch and strength - I learned a bit about which of my muscles were weak, tight, and also some ways to maybe improve on it. I'm looking forward to mixing up my workout routine.

That said, I thought the clinic was extremely useful and also really well organized. Everyone was extremely helpful and cheerful. Nicole has way more energy than anyone I've met. I was impressed by how the organizers managed to block traffic and let the whole group through. There was also lots of swag - I got pink water bottles! Lastly, it was just fun being around a group of upbeat women for the weekend.