Intense, fast-paced and competitive.

That’s how Trevor McCoy, freshman in pre-journalism and mass communication, described a collegiate cycling race.

“It pushes your physical abilities to their limits,” said Michael Lamb, a 38-year-old non-traditional student who participates in collegiate cycling races. “During the races, riding in a pack of about 30 is fun. It’s like a big train of bicycles moving along. You feel the air rushing by and hear the sounds of the bicycles. It is amazing.”

McCoy and Lamb wouldn’t have had the chance to experience a collegiate race had it not been for Michael Blahut. Blahut, the ISU Cycling Club’s race coordinator, expressed interest in creating a student-only race team to the club leadership.

“We were the only team in the North Central Conference without a collegiate team,” Blahut said.

The North Central Conference includes colleges in North Dakota, South Dakota, Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska and Kansas. The ISU Cycling Club added a new student-only race team this year to its club — the team has five members.

The club features three components — recreational, mountain and road biking. Within the road biking group, there are two teams, the student/non-student team and the new student-only team. The race team, which is open to all members, is named Cyclone Cycling and operates under the U.S. Cycling Federation license. The license allows participants to compete in federation-sanctioned races. The new student race team, named Iowa State University Cycling, uses the National Collegiate Cycling Association license.

This license allows for students to race at college-only races around the country and qualify to compete at nationals, said cycling club president Christopher Johnson.

The cycling club is unique in that it offers both licenses to its members.

“This allows for great flexibility,” Johnson said. “Because our club does not exclude non-students, it allows everyone interested in racing to find their niche. It also gives our non-student members an opportunity to offer their wisdom and support.”

Steve Lauber, manager of Bike World, 126 S. 3rd St., is a non-student member of the club and participates in U.S. Cycling Federation races. He said he sees non-student members as beneficial. “I see the community members as teachers and mentors,” Lauber said. “Without them, the knowledge and history would be lost every time the club racing participation wanes. We know the courses and can help people prepare.”

From a student perspective, Lamb agreed the non-student members were beneficial as a part of the club, although they compete separately.

“I see the non-students as a great asset. I know many of them, and they have many years of racing experience,” Lamb said.

Once the club purchased an National Collegiate Cycling Association license, Blahut began recruiting members of the club to join the race team. Although the team is small, Blahut said he hopes with the location of nationals, the race team’s popularity will increase.

“The next three years of nationals are in Kansas, so I believe this team will grow,” Blahut said.

To qualify for nationals, an NCCA racer must compete in the five conference races during the course of seven weeks. A racer scores a certain amount of points during a race, and after all five races, the points are tallied. The top eight individuals move on to compete at nationals.

The five conference races are usually two-day events, with a road race on the first day and a Criterium ride on the second.

The road race varies in length depending on the category the racer is competing in. For the experienced category, designated A, a road race is anywhere from 50 to 60 miles long. For category B, the road race ranges from 20 to 30 miles long.

A Criterium race is a timed race in which riders are given a set amount of time, usually 30 to 50 minutes, to complete as many laps around a short course as they can. Once the time has expired, each rider has one more lap.

“The person who has the most laps, with the last lap in the shortest time, will win the race,” said Cody Morrow, member of the student race team and junior in aerospace engineering.

As far as practice is concerned, the team usually trains 10 to 15 hours a week biking and three hours a week of lifting, Blahut said.

Since school and work schedules make it hard to train together, a lot of the training is done on an individual basis. The team does have a weekly road ride on Sunday and participates in a spinning class at the Lied Recreation Center in the winter, McCoy said. Iowa State University Cycling has participated in one conference race already, in Manhattan, Kan., on March 19 and 20.

In the A division, Blahut placed 12th in the road race and 17th in the Criterium. For the B division road race, Lamb finished 13th and McCoy 23rd. In the Criterium race for the B division, Morrow placed seventh, Lamb 21st and McCoy 25th. Kim Wahl placed eighth in both the women’s division road race and Criterium race. Lamb said although the race team didn’t do as well as it had hoped and was the smallest team there, he liked being the underdog but hoped for more university support.

“Minnesota, Kansas University, University of Nebraska at Lincoln and Iowa all had school vehicles with snazzy uniforms and what looks like much more support from their respective schools,” Lamb said. “We showed up in a minivan with a bike rack. Seeing those other teams and how their schools support their programs is kind of disheartening.”

The next conference race for the team is April 2 and 3 at North Dakota State University. The collegiate cycling season ends with nationals at the University of Kansas on April 30 and May 1.