Gavin Hoover is an American Tokyo Olympian who is racing the new five-event Track Champions League. He is doing a regular column on his experiences, and documenting it with his own photography as well in the gallery below.
The thing no one tells you about coming to cycling paradise is that it might rain. And the thing that they really don’t tell you is that it might rain for a week straight.
Seven of us racing the new UCI Track Champions League have rented a house between competitions here on the Spanish island of Mallorca.
On the fifth day of waking up to rain pounding down on the pool outside, I thought I was going to have a breakdown.
Riding a trainer isn’t great at the best of times, but riding a trainer knowing some of the most iconic roads in cycling are 20km down the road is a special kind of soul crushing.
All of us in the house slowly retreated farther inside each day the skies didn’t clear. Suddenly our biggest social event was gathering at the windows to confirm that there was still no sign of the sun, the pool in our courtyard mocking us a little more every day.
Racing the track, a certain kinship develops between everyone on the circuit.
Unlike the road, there are no teams; we race as individuals representing countries, and there’s not that many of us. Invariably you end up seeing the same people at races, spending time with the same traveling group at random places all around the world.
After the first round of the UCI Track Champions League, those of us that don’t live in Europe have really gotten to know each other. Trying to avoid a third trans-Atlantic roundtrip in the span of three weeks, Kendall Ryan, the Canadian team, Corbin Strong, and I all opted to stay in Mallorca, sharing a house near the velodrome in Palma.
We’ve been here for the last three weeks prepping for the upcoming rounds, trying to soak in some Spanish culture and sneak in some big days on the bike when the weather has allowed.
I don’t know if it’s easier to race someone after you’ve shared a intimate moped ride around the city and a bathroom for a month, but with Corbin currently leading the Track Champions League standing and myself in third it should at least be fun trading blows.
Olympic sprint champion Kelsey Mitchell riding rollers in one of the few spots we could manage to keep dry.
With the rain washing everything into the roads, I managed to pick up a fair number of flats. I’ve had worse spots to work on a bike, though.
Since the rain didn’t let up for most of the first 10 days that we were here, we managed to get some track time in. For big trips abroad, bike bags double as extra space for whatever random things won’t make the weight limit in a suitcase. Occasionally some random things get pulled out during a trip to the track.
Kelsey trying to find a chainring in a very carefully packed collection of random gears.
Doing track sessions with two Olympic medalists seems pretty standard now. Kelsey Mitchell and Lauriane Genest hanging out in between efforts at the Palma velodrome.
We somehow only managed to get one set of rollers between the seven of us sharing the house. On a couple days when the rain was really coming down, it took some careful coordination for all of us to try and get a session in.
When the sun did come out, sitting outside in the courtyard was a nice way to spend the afternoon after a big morning of training.
Our upstairs balcony served a lot of purposes: dining table, bike storage, and the only covered space to dry the laundry.
Without a car here, Kendall Ryan, Maggie Coles-Lyster, and Corbin Strong rented scooters to get out and about in Palma. It ended up being the perfect way to get around and see a bit more of the city. The only problem? We may have been a bit aggressive with some of our lines through the city streets.
The cathedral of Mallorca lit up at night in downtown Palma.
The best part of the scooters was the ability to park up anywhere and wander around until we found somewhere to eat or a nice place for a coffee.