Santa Monica Youth Cycling

Mission
Provide a supportive environment for students of all skill levels to ride and compete on their bikes.

Vision
Create a program with the best possible student support, through coaching, training and sponsorship, that promotes student achievement at all levels.

Overview
Like other SoCal League teams, our program seeks to strike a balance between being a competitive individual and team sport while retaining recreational club qualities. For athletes new to cycling, immediate immersion into training, racing, and the pressure to perform may be intimidating. This is the reason the League has carefully designed individual racing classes so beginners, intermediate and advanced riders are pitted only against peers of similar ability and experience. Each school’s coach does their best to carefully place riders in the following categories for both genders:

Middle School: Grades 6-8, Levels 1, 2* and 3

High School: Freshmen, Junior Varsity 1, Junior Varsity 2 and Varsity*.

*Requires qualification

Why cycling?
Cycling is a family-friendly fitness activity that can be done lifelong, with great social qualities. Groups of cyclists (except when climbing difficult hills) can talk, joke, and some even sing as they ride. Enthusiasm for cycling as an alternative sport and healthy lifestyle is at an all-time high, especially here in the East Bay with so many good places to ride.

Training and racing with a team provides life lessons in self-discipline, teamwork and sportsmanship, along with the fitness and camaraderie. Some sports tend to favor certain body types. Cycling is different. The bicycle is an equalizer, showing little favor to any particular body type by adapting to each rider with correct frame sizing, adjustment of seat height and stem length. Since good “bike-fit” is important, be sure to consult with me before purchasing a new or used bike!

Is Participating Dangerous?
Are you new to mountain biking? Forget what you have seen on TV with the X-Games or soft drink commercials. In cross-country bike races, the average speed is usually around ten to twelve miles per hour. This is an endurance sport where the fittest athletes win. Each year, the League collects data on injuries from every team. Typically, for the whole League combined, there will be one or two broken bones, some sprains, a few cuts, some bruises, lots of nicks and scrapes, but little else. Statistically, we suffer fewer serious injuries than most other mainstream sports, especially contact sports.

We do our best to minimize the risks to your athlete. Certain risky behaviors are discouraged or forbidden, the League helmet rule is strictly enforced and we teach each athlete bike-control skills early in the season to minimize the risk of crashing. After all, if you crash you not only risk injury but also lose valuable time during races. Even with our best efforts, crashes and injuries can occur. The team also purchases an additional high-deductible policy that supplements your personal policy and policies the school may carry.

Each coach is required to have current First Aid and CPR, as well as passing the league risk management and skills courses. Additionally the team has several high power two-way radios for communicating in the back-country and at races.

Team Leadership

All of our leaders and coaches are volunteers. While there is no obligation to join leadership or become a coach, we encourage all of the parents and adults in our organization to become involved to what ever level they are comfortable.