The Queen's Cycling team, like many this school year, have had to adjust their course of action amid the challenges of the global pandemic.
Out of this transition has come some unique opportunities and the berth of a national organization led by the Queen's Cycling varsity club.
Perennially a top contender in their Fall season chasing the University Cup in their mountain bike series, the Gaels also compete in a road race season in the Spring but have had to give up both in the face of the pandemic. Despite this, an opportunity for a virtual series connecting schools that never compete with one another arose.
"Currently, there isn't any national organization for collegiate cycling teams," said
Ben Ernewein, president of the Queen's Cycling Varsity Club. "There is an Ontario mountain bike series, but otherwise, Canadian teams head to the U.S. for competition. The Canadian Collegiate Cycling Association (CCCA) idea goes back a few years to a previous captain of the team, Chris Hatton. The idea was to start something to help build the Canadian collegiate cycling scene and provide support to schools or students who want to create their own teams. After meeting with the other schools, we thought that this series would be the perfect time to launch the CCCA, and so far, it's been a success. We've had several students reach out and compete from schools that don't currently have a team, so the demand for a larger Canadian cycling scene is present. The long-term possibilities for the CCCA are endless, and hopefully, this series is the start of more racing right here in Canada."
A virtual competition was born, allowing schools from all over Canada to compete. Events were created on RGT cycling, a free platform that allows users to upload .GPX files to map a virtual course. Turns and elevation profiles of the routes are mapped onto a generic-looking country road, which mimics the route of the .GPX file.
"Like all Varsity clubs and teams, our season was completely cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. For us, this meant no University Cup mountain bike series in the fall and no Eastern Canadian Collegiate Cycling road season in the Spring. Thankfully with the virtual race series, we've been able to connect with and compete against teams from all across the country, which is something we usually aren't able to do. So even though there's no in-person racing, it's still been a fun and unique season."
The season ran with four virtual races starting with a course in Montreal, followed by Toronto, Vancouver and concluding in Kingston this past weekend. The Gaels finished the virtual championships in first place with 895 points, while Toronto was second with 766 points.
Individually, Queen's led the way with Ryan Rudderham coming in first place and Mitchell Robinson in third in the Men's Cat 1 while on the women's side Chloe DesRoche was first overall with and Kaitlyn Shikaze was third in the women's open.
The first, of what could be many national competitions for the Canadian Collegiate Cycling Association is in the books.
8.7.1
