Each summer, a select number of riders racing ages 15-22 get to attend the Montana Cross Camp summer camp in Helena led by head coach Geoff Proctor. The camp provides a chance to learn new skills and make new friends while essentially doing three workouts a day and learning during the evening classroom sessions.
For those of us with real "jobs," the thought of going to cyclocross summer camp like sounds a-a-a-mazing, even if we do not necessarily have the talent to allow us to set our eyes on racing in Europe, as Proctor's Montana Cross Camp prepares young athletes to do.
Fortunately, as we start to look to the coming cyclocross season, there are drills and skills from Proctor's camp we can incorporate into our own training.
Proctor brings a background in skiing to his training regimen, and as I saw when I attended the Women's camp two weeks ago, the workouts and drills the young athletes do are varied and challenging. Running, agility, on the bike, off the bike, yoga, Proctor gives athletes a lot to think about and work on when they head back to their respective homes across the country.
There was never a dull moment at camp with a variety of drills on and off the bike. 2019 Women's MontanaCrossCamp, Friday. © Z. Schuster / Cyclocross Magazine
For today's Training Tuesday, I declare #crossiscoming to be officially here as I share some ideas for mixing up your cyclocross training with some ideas from Montana Cross Camp. All the usual caveats apply—not a coach, not a complete list, etc.
Scroll through using the next button to read about each workout idea.
Running
If you have followed any of our Montana Cross Camp coverage from the last several years, you knew the running was coming. You knew it!
What was interesting about Proctor’s approach was his drills were not really about long group runs, but rather short bursts up stairs and hills. His approach is similar to what Coach Chris Mayhew has told us in the past.
Running drills featured short bursts rather than long group runs. 2019 Women’s MontanaCrossCamp, Wednesday AM. © Z. Schuster / Cyclocross Magazine
The primary drills Proctor used at Montana Cross Camp were stadium stairs and sprints up a steep hill near the football stadium. For each drill, riders were on foot with no bike, but during one of the evening classroom sessions, Proctor shared some advice that ran counter to how campers trained earlier in the day.
Several years ago at one of the Euro Cross Camp blocks, Sven Nys met with the U.S. athletes racing the Euro World Cups. He shared a comparison with his training partner Sven Vanthourenhout. The other Sven could crush a 10k much faster than Nys when they were racing, but Nys was faster when shouldering his bike.
Proctor’s point in sharing that video was your running training can be specific, including a focus on running with the bike. If stairs are available, use them. Otherwise, maybe find a steep hill—or use your Sven Hill. Make sure to incorporate some reps with the bike to get smoother and more efficient with the awkward running style.
Sven Nys’ advice is to learn to get fast running while shouldering your bike. 2019 Women’s MontanaCrossCamp, Thursday. © Z. Schuster / Cyclocross Magazine
Sven is not the only athlete to make use of a hill in training. Chicago readers of a certain age can likely remember “Walter Payton’s Hill” that Sweetness obsessively ran when he was a Hall of Fame running back for the Bears.
One thing we are likely to do differently than Sweetness is run the hill when shouldering the bike. As Sven pointed out, prepare for the specific demands of the sport and if you do it right, you can get faster than competitors who are better runners over long distances.
