Shanaze Reade Racing for Gold in Beijing
Story posted July 2
By Larry Hickmott
A Great Britain teammate to Shanaze Reade, who has won a world championship or three himself, describes her as a phenomenal rider and anyone who witnessed the World title wins for her in the last two years, on the Track and on a BMX track, would have to agree. All being well, Shanaze is quite simply a favourite to win an Olympic medal, very probably Gold, in Beijing.
In an article for the Mail Online website Chris Hoy, current Olympic champion, is quoted as saying "if I was going to put my mortgage on anyone winning the gold medal, it would be Shanaze". (Read the article)
The 19 year old won the Women’s World title in BMX held in Beijing recently by so much that out of all the possible medal winners in the GB team, she is certainly one of the favourites to win Gold.
British Cycling caught up with Shanaze recently at a media day in Manchester at a new BMX track being constructed in Platts Field Park. There, we got the photos we needed of her in action as she and good friend and former coach Jeremy Hayes did bits and pieces for the BBC and other photographers.
The young four time World senior champion on the Track and in BMX has been competing in BMX for 10 years and says she didn’t so much as choose it but BMX chose her.
“I never knew what track cycling was back then and didn’t know what a Velodrome was until I came to work with British Cycling. Road is boring and so it was BMX that found me. My uncle took me to a local BMX track where I hired a bike and it has been a roller coaster from there on. The last 10 years have gone by so fast!”
BMX is a new sport for the Olympics and in cycling terms, will see a new breed bicycles competing in what is now an Olympic discipline. The bike Shanaze will use in Beijing is certainly different to the bikes used on the Track, Road or even in Mountain Biking. The frame is a standard off the shelf item with the lightest parts she can get and costs around £1,500 plus the cost of a SRM crank set.
New forks are being developed for it which will bump that cost up a lot but it is the closest to an off the shelf bike that the public can get to when compared to the state of the art track bikes the GB team will be using. The wheels are 20 inches in diameter, a lot smaller than the ones she has on her track bike (approx 27 inches) and these smaller wheels have thicker tyres, no gears, and small gear ratios so she can explode out of the start gate as fast as possible.
“All the bikes at the Worlds were all virtually identical” she explained. I have had mine tweaked a lot but it looks identical to what some one could buy. British Cycling will be developing one for BMX which will be spectacular and people won’t be able to buy that but at the moment, people can buy a bike like mine on Redlines’ website.”
Shanaze is sponsored by Redline when not riding for Great Britain and will be using a bike like this at the Olympics. Asked if she found it difficult to swap bikes, from the track to BMX, Shanaze likened the transition going from one bike to another to other forms of training like that in the gym. “It is just something you do and get used to doing” she told us.
Growing Up with GB’s BMX Team
The announcement in 2003 that BMX was being introduced to the Olympic programme was as much a surprise to everyone at the time as it was when the IOC announced that the Kilometre was being dropped from the Olympic Track programme. Both were bombshells at their respective times and both have had an effect on the Great Britain cycling team programme.
Whilst training for the Kilometre ceased to be a focus for the team, they also had to start developing a BMX programme and for Shanaze, only 14 at the time the original announcement was made that her sport was going Olympic, her introduction to Team GB a couple of years later was the start of what she calls an up and down time but one that was always going to be that way given as BMX was a completely new GB Cycling Team programme.
“I’ve had different coaches and managers but that was always going to happen with it being new. Now I have a great coach in Grant White and manager Keith Reynolds who really looks after the BMX programme.” Shanaze also sings the praises of Jeremy Hayes, a former coach who she now describes as a good friend and some one she can use as a sounding board on her training.
Another part of the jigsaw in her support team is National Sprint Coach on the track Iain Dyer. “He’s kind of the magic behind my programme because he puts the phases in the right order and makes sure I’m in the best shape possible.”
At the time we spoke to Shanaze, she had just returned from a post World Championship holiday and was in a light training phase before getting her pre-Olympic programme. Talking generally about her programme, Shanaze says she trains twice a day and one of those sessions will either be a BMX or gym session and that she trains six out of the seven days in a week. She still keeps her hand in on the track too as we find out when we pay the team a visit in the track centre from time to time.
True Athletes
It is the prospect of showing the World wide audience from the Olympics that BMXer’s are not just grown up kids on BMX bikes but true athletes that excites Shanaze. “I did Track cycling to prove that BMX cyclists weren’t just people on kids bikes and to show that we are athletes and I think I have done that by setting World records on the track and winning two gold in two years”.
“I think with the media coming on board and taking an interest in my story, and how I am doing, I am sure that is helping to make BMX grow. The big posters of me in London for example is bringing BMX into the public eye and that can only help BMX. And if I am helping BMX grow then that is amazing.”
Shanaze says that with BMX being an Olympic sport, it has given her the opportunity to be portrayed as a good sports person, some one who trains hard and is respected in sport. “BMX is extremely difficult and probably looks easy when people watch the likes of me winning like I do.”
Talking us through a BMX race, Shanaze explained “There are quite a few elements to a BMX race. You need explosive strength out of the start, then be very precise how you take off and land on the jumps, and then you have to always be aware on the berms and not go wide. You have to know where you are on the track while at the same time taking the fastest line possible.”
“It can be quite physical as well which I don’t like which is why I try and get off the front but it can be when you have three or four riders around you.”
Phase Training
Her training is broken up into phases but as she explained, she will still do a bit of everything to maintain her skill levels on the BMX bike. “What ever phase you are in, you still have to tap into the strength or skill phases to make sure everything is okay while maintaining a focus on the main area for that phase, such as strength etc. BMX is such a rounded sport, you always have to make sure you tap into everything and not compromise on anything.”
Asked what for her is the critical part of the BMX event, Shanaze replied “The start is the critical area for me. It’s vital because that is what I do – I go from the start and win my races from there. Other riders though who don’t have a good a start will be very good technically which will help them go from sixth to second.”
Talking about the track she was using to show off her skills for the press, the one being built at Platt Fields in Manchester, Shanaze says the Manchester one is traditional, a very straight forward BMX track. The one in Beijing however has a much higher starting ramp and because of the extra speed generated from that start, a lot bigger jumps. “The one in Beijing is very different and much faster -- Beijing is like Giant land where as the one here is more like toy land!”
Shanaze gets Team GB out of the gate quickly and sets the base for teammate Victoria Pendleton to build on as they race to their second World Team Sprint championship.
Shanaze has been winning World and European titles for so many years it is now expected of her. The girl herself says “I just want to keep winning more and keep re-setting my boundaries and keep pushing myself. The girls (at the BMX Worlds in 2007) started to get close to me because maybe I got a little complacent. Not intentionally but I have now picked it back up again.”
“My coach Grant (White) has helped turn me around and give me the motivation I need. He tells me it is just isn’t about winning but about pushing yourself` as far as you can.”
Going back to Beijing and the World Championships there for 2008, we asked her to describe what was going through her mind as the moment of truth approached. How did she deal with the expectations of not just Team GB but that of her fans all round the World?
“Before I started that race in Beijing, I laughed and said to myself ‘this is mine’ and became like a robot. It is really bizarre how I do it but I just think ‘this is why you’re here, this is what it is about, this is what you are going to do’.
“Then once the race starts and I’m hitting the jumps, I’m thinking ‘stay smooth, stay relaxed and break down the barriers. I just really find it easy to become that robot. I hit the first Moto (an early round in the series of BMX races that go to make up an event) quite hard and then for the next two, I played it smart. I think I am doing things different to other young BMX riders in that I knew it was hot and I knew if you keep pushing at the limit, you could weaken yourself.”
By way of example, Shanaze explained that that the French girls always want, on paper, to be faster than her and don’t pace themselves like she does. They (her rivals) are always gunning for the line just to be faster than her which Shanaze finds quite amusing. When she had too, Shanaze did what she had to do on the track like when she won the third qualifying race which was crucial for the seeding for the quarter final and in her words was still only “ticking over.”
The Olympic Build-up
With the Olympics starting to loom large in the sights of the riders up for selection, Shanaze agrees that her build-up for the big one is better than the preparation she had for the BMX Worlds which followed so soon after the Track Worlds.
“Yes, that will suit me a lot more. I don’t need to race much and I think I’m the only BMXer at the top who hasn’t raced everything. I raced the Switzerland Euro round, the Denmark World Cup and then the Worlds. I raced three times this year which isn’t what other BMXer’s do and winning the Worlds has given me confidence in the ‘phase programme’.
“Before Grant came along, Iain (Dyer) sat down and planned my programme and I thought ‘this won’t work -- this is BMX’. He said ‘go with it, it will work’ and it has but it was just hard to have confidence in something new knowing that BMX was different to Track.”
Aussie Backing
Shanaze Reade’s coach, Grant White, has proved to be a major plus for her as well. “He works with me on a day-to-day basis and mostly one to one. It was what I needed because before I did things on my own and I have never minded that but it did get to a stage when I was getting sick of doing things on my own. Most coaches coming in would say you’re fine, carry on what you doing because you are winning and that would frustrate me and the first thing Grant said to me when he met me was you have a lot of work to do and I was just like thank goodness some one has said that to me.”
In training, everything Shanaze does is analysed using all the high tech resources that the EIS can provide including Video and SRM data analysis and based on that, her coaches can keep her on the right path in her preparation for the biggest race of her young life.
Village Life
Whilst the racing on the BMX track at the Olympics won’t be a lot different to that in other World Championship events, it’s everything that surrounds the racing that can make or break an athlete. Living in the Village is said to be one of the most daunting prospects for an athlete and asked about that, Shanaze explained “I have spoken to a lot of athletes, including Kelly Holmes, and asked their opinions so I am only going in for four days. I did a trial at the Worlds for four or five days and another before that and so will do that in Beijing. I just want to go in there, get the job done and come out.”
After four World senior titles in two years in two different disciplines, there is a lot of pressure on her young shoulders like there is for a lot of the athletes in the Great Britain team. Shanaze though is a seasoned professional and as she explained, has been winning titles she was 11 years old.
“To win an Olympic medal will be amazing but it can be mind blowing if you think about it too much and I am just trying to stay fit and healthy and get faster and go into the games in the best shape possible. I hate losing and am addicted to winning, I can’t just see myself being second – I have got to win”
Asked will she ever consider moving away from BMX to the Track where she has also tasted success, Shanaze replied “I have to win two Gold medals before I change from BMX, the second one in London. At this point in time, I’d like to win two Gold and then put the bike away and move on to something else.” Shanaze goes on to explain that if the 2012 Olympics were not in London, she may have looked at changing from BMX earlier but one thing is for sure, BMX is certainly a major part of her life and like any BMX’er, will probably remain so.
What ever Shanaze does in the future, one thing is for sure, riding a bike and being involved in sport is a major goal because as she admits “I could not do a 9-5 job so I have to keep riding a bike whether I like it or not!”
This despite the pitfalls of a very physical and dangerous sport and one that is sure to be a big spectacle at the Olympics. In her 10 year career, Shanaze explained she has dislocated her shoulder a few times, broken her knee, wrist, and foot twice. “It’s part and parcel of the sport because you’re trying to push yourself. Riders who don’t get hurt in their career are not trying hard enough.”
Not trying is something no-one could accuse Shanaze of as the young lady has a heart the size of the ramp at the Beijing track – huge! We wish her lots of luck in the coming weeks and onto Beijing.
RELATED LINKS
Second Title in BMX for Shanaze
2008 World Track Championships
