The Problem with Women's Cycling: Part 4

Disclaimer: This one’s going to piss a lot of people off

OK, here’s the deal. If you just got your 2 upgrade, that does not legitimize your decision to quit your job and “go pro.”
Previous comments on this blog indicate that at best, “pro” women in the states are making less than $10k a year for racing their bikes (base salary, not including prize money). Maybe I am out in left field, but the way I see it, if you’re good enough to justify quitting your job to pursue cycling, you’ll already be winning races in spite of that job that is holding you back.

I see this all the time – women upgrade to a 2 or a 1 and immediately think that The Big Contract is right there waiting for them, and all they have to do is quit their job and race full time and they’ll be a Pro Cyclist. Guess again – lots of riders can do it while working.

Exhibit A: Maureen Bruno Roy
For those of you who don’t follow cyclocross, let me introduce you to a two time World Championships team member, 3 time national masters champion, and winner of the 2009 national cyclocross racing series here in the States. Mo has been racing cross for eight years. During that time she has worked a full time job continuously. Her husband is a full time PhD student, so you know that he’s not supporting the family financially (although he is her mechanic and I often wonder if he gets any sleep during racing season). Mo is a massage therapist, so if she doesn’t go to work she does not get paid. She does not get sick days, personal days, or paid vacation time. Her job is physical, so it’s not like she gets to sit at a desk all day or work from home writing code after her morning workouts. And yet, despite working 40 hours a week, she manages a full spring and summer racing schedule for mountain bike season and then goes into cross, her specialty, and is consistently among the top 5 riders in the country. Mo was the only member of the US cyclocross national team at the recent world championships who has a full time job. She was also the only one who without some form of full sponsorship for road or mountain bike racing.

Mo is the classic example of why quitting your job before you actually win anything isn’t necessary. Mo has qualified for the World Championships - twice – and won more races than I think I have even entered, and she has done it all while working full time. It’s one thing to win one race in your career or have a decent season of top 10 placings despite working full time. It’s quite another accomplishment to make it to the highest level of the sport in light of that job. She often speculates how she might do if she had a part time job instead. I think for Mo, it would be that final detail that would make her unbeatable. (Note: anyone who at this point is going to say that cross is a fringe sport and that it’s easier to make it to the top because less people do it obviously doesn’t race cross in the States, where we will easily have over 100 women racing every weekend in cross between the Elite and B race, and we’re lucky if we get 15 show up for a big money crit in the summer).

But for every Mo Bruno who scrapes together a full season of racing and travel off of less than $10k a year and pays her bills and shows up for work every day, there are countless Cat 2 wannabes with no talent or ability who refuse to work full time because “they’re trying to make it as a pro cyclist.”

I’ve seen women demand some sort of compensation from a club team with only $5k to spend on everyone, because they think they are good enough to do so. And most of the women who make those demands have a questionable resume at best and barely managed their Cat 2 upgrade. And then they refuse to get a real job and instead resort to working part time at Starbucks because they need the time to train. Then they do something even dumber like move halfway across the country to a warmer climate so they can train all winter…all this before they have even earned a dime as a cyclist or won a race that wasn’t your local industrial park Category 4 criterium. Then they bitch about not having enough money for entry fees or a new bike or airfare to races and expect some non existent multimillion dollar team to swoop in and save the day.

And while we’re on the subject of the whiny prima donnas that are infiltrating the peloton, let’s discuss how they got that way. It used to be that to upgrade from a Category 3 to a Category 2, you had to earn points in 1-2-3 races. On the rare occasion that there were at least 30 Categor 3 riders in a 1-2-3 race, you could include top six placings relative to the other 3s present, even if the podium spots went to Pro1/2 riders. Now, with the disappearance of 1/2 fields for women, we have riders upgrading to Category 2 based on their results in 3/4 races.

I see a problem here. Now this is the point where people are going to say “shut up, Kerry, nobody wants to hear about how when you upgraded it was harder and you had to do it in a snowstorm uphill both ways..”

But the reality is, it was a lot different. When I upgraded to a 3 in 2001 my only options for races were 1/2/3 races or Open 1-4. Here in New England we had two races that featured a women’s Category 3 field. One of them was a Mike Norton promotion (all you people who rip on Mike and claim he is a bad promoter and a misogynist, go screw because to this day he is the only promoter of a one day race to offer a women’s Category 4, Category 3, and a Category 1-2-3 race on the same day, and even offered separate start times for the 3 and 1-2-3 race so a Category 3 woman could realistically enter both events). The other race offering a women’s 3 field was the Fitchburg Longsjo Classic. You’ll notice both of these fields at said races no longer exist.

In a Grumpy Old Man voice

In my day, upgrading to Cat 2 meant basically winning 1-2-3 races, or cleaning up in any and all available Cat 3 races…all two of them. And of course those two results weren’t enough so you basically had to be as good as or better than the Cat 1/2 riders.

These days, there are no Cat 3 only races and very few 1-2-3 racers with enough riders present to even count it for an upgrade. There are a plethora of Cat 3/4 races, however, and so our newly minted Cat 2s got that upgrade by beating a bunch of Cat 4s. And we wonder why the quality of the peloton is dropping. And before you go pointing out that you still have to beat X number of 3s on route to your victory in local 3/4 race, let me point out that beating 30 women, 15 of whom are in their first season of racing, does not make you an elite level rider. Men have fields of over 100 people – if a guy wins a 3/4 race, I’m pretty certain he was the best one there and is well on his way to a successful career as a Category 2. It’s not the same on our end.

At this point someone will argue that it’s not our job to fill the fields, and you’re right. But you cannot delude yourself into thinking you’re worthy of a pro contract and a life of reduced employment and full time training because you were better than the 12 other local women. It’s not the same. If you’re winning every weekend, riding away from the field in the manner of oh, say, an Evelyn Stevens, then yup, you’re good, so go ahead and quit your job and go for it. Otherwise, stay where you are, train a little harder and see how good you can get.

If you honestly think that quitting your job and training full time is going to make that critical difference between getting blown off the back at the one NRC race you enter every year and winning everything in sight, you need to seriously reevaluate things. There are many, many women who can race at the top level while maintaining some form of full time employment. Talent is talent and will emerge regardless of your work status ( again, see Exhibit A – Mo Bruno Roy). Quitting your job and then demanding a team pay you for your non existent results is not helping the sport at all, and it’s not helping you either.