ICCC Crit: March 18, 2006

On a brisk Saturday afternoon, for all categories in Saturday's ICCC Criterium (yes, that's a lot of C's), there were 12 women racing. Hmmm. Well, figure you have a few that are sick (Amy) and some feeling under-trained (Mindy) and fill in the blank with any other reason and the total number of women is still under 20.

I come from a background of running. I grew up around it; Mom was a runner and always doing local races. (She ran Chicago in '85 and I still have yet to beat her time.) It's always blown my mind how many people will show up for a run. Then I look at the cycling scene and it just puzzles me.

Where are all the women riders?

I asked my friend Angela, after winning my race against two other women in the Cat 4 race, "In what running event could you have any expectation of winning that race--even placing in your age group?". We're athletes, and she's a strong runner. But winning? No. We'd go to (running) races for the event, the people, the discipline; not the "winning".

OK, so it's not about the winning. Really. But it'd be nice to have more people [read: women] out there.