In the world of revenue varsity sports, competitions such as cycling often go unheard. Football and basketball generate tremendous revenue and thus, tremendous media coverage and attention.
Members of the Virginia Club Cycling Team are often spotted riding around grounds wearing training kits and training vigorously. In other words, apart from the occasional appearance of the cyclist on the road, the Cycling Team goes unnoticed in the college sports scene.
On May 15, the final day of the Collegiate National Competition, the combined men and women's Virginia squad finished ninth out of 43 teams.
The Virginia Cycling Team consists of 45 members of the student body, who outside of class, devote time and work to training hard and having fun.
Virginia competes in the Atlantic Coast Collegiate Cycling Conference which is governed by USA Cycling.
"Collegiate cycling has been around for at least 20 years," coach and trainer Ruth Stornetta said. "It has only really been organized for the last ten years. U.Va. has definitely moved up in the ranking nationally. Last year, they were ranked the highest they have ever been ranked nationally."
With more organization and interest due to Lance Armstrong's well-documented success in the Tour de France, cycling in the U.S. at the collegiate level is expanding. As a result, the competition is increasing as well.
"It is getting stiffer and stiffer every year,"recent graduate and former team member Christof Herby said. "More and more riders are coming out the collegiate ranks and going into the professional ranks. They are spending time in college before their pro careers.That means there are more than a handful of riders at the elite level."
With difficult training on the hills and flat plains around Charlottesville, Virginia has risen to meet the challenge of the competition posed by conference foes such as George Mason, James Madison, North Carolina State, the Naval Academy, Maryland, North Carolina, Virginia Tech and West Virginia.
"We ranked ninth in 2004," Herby said. "Last year we had a couple of standouts but this year we had all four guys and all four girls stand out."
In conference meets this year, Virginia finished second as a team scoring 994 points, just behind first place Navy. Individually, Virginia racers Andrea Dvorak and Christof Herby finished first overall in the individual conference rankings with an average 90-point margin between their next closest ranked opponent.
Within the players at the top of the ACCC rankings, some cyclists are considering the possibility of pursuing cycling as a future option, hoping to sign with professional teams.
"In December I signed a contract professionally to race after graduation," Herby said. "The top ten percent are going pro with it and the rest are doing it for fun. The very few top few are doing for a career in the future."
Most cyclists, however, look to cycling as a chance to race and train in a sport they love. The Virginia Cycling Team is setting the pace for further development and expansion of a large cycling program at U.Va. They are showing that even in lesser known sports, competition and hard work help establish consistency and success.
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