Cycling: CTS Athlete Cameron Chambers Wins 24 Hour Race

The 22 year-old mountain bike phenom wins 24-hour solo race against the odds

Cameron Chambers is well on his way to solo racing stardom. The CTS-trained athlete, also a pro racer on Subaru Gary Fisher’s team, came out on top against veteran racers like Tinker Juarez at Tucson’s 24 Hour race at the Old Pueblo on February 14/15. This Kansas native is strong, steady, and stoked for the next intense race ahead.

After a narrow loss in October to the 5-time NORBA National champion, 2-time U.S. Olympian and Mountain Bike Hall-of-Famer Juarez at Utah’s 24 Hour Moab race, Chambers, a relatively unknown racer, was not expected to win. To compare the two, Tinker Juarez has been an icon in mountain biking for a good decade, with fans cheering him from the moment his trademark dreadlocks come into view. Chambers, on the other hand, was 12 years old a decade ago and is a newbie to this endurance discipline: he’d only raced two 24-hour races last season before this astonishing win at Pueblo.

But he was ready for it. “I had tapered my training slightly for this weekend in the hopes that I’d peak for an early season win.” How did he get there? “Lots of aerobic base training,” explained CTS elite coach Jason Tullous, who has worked with Chambers since the Moab race and continues to prep Cameron for his real peak in May at the National Championships. “It’s all about steadiness; twenty-four hour racing doesn’t just depend on speed, it really comes down to who can stay steady the longest.” To that end, Tullous prescribed SteadyState Intervalsä to build Chambers’ power for the Old Pueblo race, training him in such a way to make sure that for most of the 24 hour race, Chambers would not go above his lactate threshold.

Tullous also mentions that Chambers is all there: “Mentally, I think he’s probably a lot stronger than most athletes—and for a 24 hour event, like when you’re still riding at 2 am in the dark, it’s not just your physical capacity for the sport, but your mental capacity to endure.” So besides being a stickler for proper training, Cameron Chambers, for all his youth, is quite savvy. He’s got the steely drive, his hardtail 29er and Sugar 292 to ride on, and the stamina to stay extreme in this world of solo racing. Keep an eye out for him in races ahead.

About Carmichael Training Systems
Carmichael Training Systems, founded in 1999, is a community of athletes and coaches dedicated to improving the performance and lives of athletes of all levels and disciplines. Led by Chris Carmichael, CTS brings coaching expertise, product advice and endurance sports information to the athletic community via the Internet (www.trainright.com ) and through personal training camps and clinics. CTS works with a wide variety of athletes including five-time Tour de France Champion Lance Armstrong, 2000 Triathlon Olympic Gold Medalist Simon Whitfield, Montreal Canadiens Captain Saku Koivu, 2001 Mountain Bike World Champion Alison Dunlap, World Record Swimmer Ed Moses and Indy Car racer Eliseo Salazar. CTS is also the official coaching authority of the US Postal Service Cycling Team and the Trek/VW Mountain bike team. CTS also serves as the official coaching service for the US Paralympic cycling team. Contact us at www.trainright.com for more information.