If one chooses to become competitively active in the sport of cycling, 10-15 hours of riding is standard work for the week. Also, while this person trains and races they go through immense amounts of pain. One might ask, “why would anyone even do this?”, but freshman Austin Maddux describes cycling as “the greatest sport ever”.

Maddux comes from a family of cyclists, and has ridden for most of his life, but did not begin racing until 2006. His first event was a triathlon which he took third in, and the next year he earned second.

Biking began to intrigue Maddux, and in 2008 he switched from triathlons to cycling. He started out riding in criterium for experience.

“Even though I placed in the triathlon, which was really cool, I didn’t like it enough,” Maddux said. “I’d do great in the running and cycling, but I hated the swimming. When I placed though it made me realize what I can do and that if I work at it I could be good. The triathlon sparked the fire for cycling and now I’m real into it.”

Cyclocross, road biking and mountain biking all inflict exhaustion on the body, but the thrill of accomplishment attracts Maddux to the sport anyway.

“I like it because it’s kind of the same as running, you have to challenge yourself to go hard,” Maddux said. “It’ll hurt, but after you finish it’s such a good feeling that it makes it all worth it. You also realize that you can actually do these races, even though before you think it’s impossible.”

The Homegrown cyclocross series is held in Woodward Park once a year and this is where Maddux began his cycling career. His dad, Dave Maddux was the first to do it in his family, inciting him to try.

“After I saw my dad do it I decided to jump into that and once I did it I loved it,” Maddux said. “Cyclocross is like taking road and mountain biking and smashing them into one. You take road bikes with beefed up tires and stronger frames and you race them on dirt. You have to jump over barriers and ride on grass and dirt. It’s lots of fun, all the energy and also the challenge of getting through the race.”

In mountain biking Maddux needs to have good handling and it also requires upper body strength as one rides through different terrain and drops off of rocks. Though he wants to become more involved in it, his worst crash was while at a trail called 007 at Bass lake .

“I was down hilling and I was almost to the bottom of the third trail when I was turning on some gravel and the bike washed out from under me” Maddux said “I fractured my wrist, got a lot of road rash on my face, arms and legs, and got beat up pretty bad. When you ride you have to know that you’re going to crash. Sometimes it’s just one of those freak things that you can’t really do anything about it though.”

While Maddux thought this was ‘awesome,” his mother Allegra took a different outlook on the situation.

“He came home with his wrist looking very deformed and said what an awesome time he had,” Allegra said. “I didn’t care how awesome of a time he had, I knew he had to go get an xray. All he could talk about was the awesome trails and even at urgent care, he was telling the Dr. that he was going home and riding his bike, broken bone and all.”

Although Allegra often is seen on the sidelines of races with an apprehensive look on her face, frightened for her son’s safety. Dave sees cycling as a great way for their family to bond.

“Cycling is a sport everyone in our family loves,” Dave said. “We have all raced our bikes even Austin’s mom, and we all love to watch professional racing. We’ve been traveling to watch professional races since 2005, when Austin was 9. Cycling is something we all do together, and it’s kept us all very fit. We’re also all very proud of each other’s accomplishments.”

During races, whether it be crits, road biking, mountain or cyclocross, one’s complete and undivided attention is required as so much goes on around.

“The hardest thing is having to push yourself, but also having to be aware of everything,” Maddux said. “You always have to be aware, know what’s around you and what’s happening. When I ride stuff going through my head is like, ‘only this many laps to go’ or ‘it hurts, I wanna stop, but I’ve got to finish and stay focused’.”

Despite this constant attentiveness to the sport, Maddux says the alone time he gets while riding is pleasant.

“When I’m racing I have time all by myself.” Maddux said. “I like to get away from school and what’s going on in life and just ride.”

One style of cycling is slopestyle, where one bikes on narrow wooden bridges and other obstacles, but not timed just judged. Friend and rider, Nick Ferguson, ’12, who attends Clovis West, competes in slopestyle and has numerous medals in cyclocross and slopestyle. Ferguson feels Maddux is a strong rider, capable of someday going professional.

“For his age he is an incredibly skilled rider and an amazing athlete, I will be very surprised if he doesn’t go pro in the future,” Ferguson said. “I feel Austin is best categorized as an ‘Enduro’ rider. Simply meaning that he is able to ride long distances at full power for a long time. He is a good jumper, climber, descender, and technical rider, but his greatest strength is long distance.”

According to Maddux, the stress and pain he goes through in races brings him closer to Christ.

“In both running and cycling when you’re on the line you feel terrible and you don’t want to do it cause it’s going to be hard, but I just ask for God’s help and I get through it,” Maddux said. “As I rely more on him for the races it transfers to my regular life and I begin to trust in him more.”

Maddux races almost every weekend, if you would like to see him race, contact the Maddux family.

Click on the icon to view the Homegrown Cyclocross video by Anna Jacobsen: