Conor O’Brien
Biography
Eagle Professional Resources Inc. is pleased to be supporting one of Canada’s young athletes. Conor O’Brien is a seventeen year old, Grade 12 student at Sacred Heart High School in Ottawa. He has recently been selected to represent Canada at the 2010 UCI Junior Cyclo-Cross World Championships.
Conor began racing at the age 11 at local mountain bike races at Camp Fortune. Through his cycling activities, Conor learned about cyclo-cross and first started cyclo-cross racing at the age of 13. Cyclo-cross races typically take place in the fall. In his first few years, the challenge came from making it to the finish line. With years of practice building both on his physical and technical abilities, Conor is now an avid competitor having earned a medal in a number of races.
As hockey is to Canada, cycling and cyclo-cross are to Belgium and Europe. In January, Conor will head to Europe for an 11 day tour to compete in two cyclo-cross races, a World Cup race in Hoogerheide, Netherlands, as well as the World Championships, in Tabor, Czech Republic. This is a huge milestone for Conor. Europe is considered the heart and soul of the cycling universe. All of the top level athletes have come out of Europe, and the opportunity to compete with these top level athletes will contribute to Conor’s growth and skill development in the sport.
This past fall, Conor placed 2nd at the Canadian National Championships in Edmonton. The resulting win at Nationals earned Conor a place on the team that will represent Canada at the 2010 UCI Junior Cyclo-Cross World Championships. He is one of four junior aged riders in all of Canada to compete in the World Championships.
The journey to reach this exciting milestone has been long. The intense training required to reach this specific goal started mid-December of last year. Conor trains 15 hours a week and still manages to balance his training schedule with his school workload with marks that have earned him a place on the honour roll. In addition, he is preparing to attend University next year and hopes to become a Chartered Accountant or a Lawyer.
Cycling has taken Conor across Canada, from New Brunswick, to Vancouver Island, throughout the New England region and now, Europe. During the spring and summer months, Conor competes in Mountain Bike and Road Racing events across Eastern Canada and the U.S. In 2008, Conor competed at the Ontario summer games, and scored a Silver Medal in the team relay.
When not competing, Conor spends most of his spare time training though he does take some time to put his feet up and hang out with friends. He is no stranger to competitive sports – up until two years ago, he played competitive hockey and still enjoys watching the game.
With this latest achievement, Conor is optimistic that this is the beginnings of a long and rewarding career in which he hopes to reach his own personal goals, as well as advance the sport of Cyclo-Cross in Canada.
We wish Conor all the best in his upcoming events and will be anxiously awaiting his results. Good luck Conor!
Update
The following is how Conor describes the outstanding experiences he recently had while racing through Europe in two international cyclo-cross tournaments:
The trip of a lifetime that went by in a whirlwind. It seems like not too long ago all of the preparations were being made in order for this whole thing to come together. After a long time training and planning for these two weeks, it was all becoming a reality, but it took a while for it to hit me. Even after being at our first destination for close to a week, we sat at dinner discussing plans of team photo shoots when it dawned to me – I was sitting at a table with some of the most elite athletes in Canada, as they were about to attempt to take on the world’s most elite riders.
Rewind back a few days: after nearly an entire day’s worth of travel, topped off by a slow GPS leading us to the opposite side of the country, plus a 45 minute detour, we were finally settled into what would be our home for the next five days, a quaint house in the village of Blauberg, Belgium. Without stopping to change, shower or even unpack, I was on the bike. For those who may not understand, Belgium is the centre of the world for cycling and cyclocross – it’s a national sport to them. Little kids look up to you with awe, and the locals are all a buzz about the previous weekend’s race, or the upcoming race in their hometown. To put their love of cycling in perspective, a short five kilometre ride from the house is a groomed training grounds for cyclocross only, as opposed to walking paths at home where I have to battle with dog-walkers, prospective developers attempting to overtake the forest, and hikers yelling at me. I felt better than a kid in a candy shop; I was an emaciated traveller seeing a river in the middle of the Sahara.
After a few days of riding through Belgium, it was time for business and we were off to Hoogerheide, Netherlands for the World Cup, where warming flocks of children ran up to us for autographs, a confidence booster for sure. The race got off to a great start. I was on the start line, ready to tear it apart and the gun went off. I shortly found myself in a group with a Canadian, a few Americans, and a few from Luxembourg. This was great, I was where I wanted to be, battling it out, and then all of a sudden, as if there was some type invisible rubber band tied to my seat, I started sliding back. The result was not what I was looking for, but this trip was all about the journey, pardon the pun.
A short, or supposedly short, flight over to Prague, was elongated after bouncing around over to London then literally back over the same town we had just left, en route to our destination. Not a big deal, spending a few hours in Heathrow airport was a nice experience. Even if it was just airport shuttles, I still saw people driving on the left side of the road, kind of cool. We enjoyed a tourist day in Prague, then off to Tabor where it was back to business. The small, former communist-occupied town was filled with history and ancient architecture, but I was not consumed by it at this point, right now was all about getting the course down before my race. The Czech Republic has a similar winter to Canada, at least Southern Canada, only slightly milder. It was actually quite comical seeing competitors from some of the warmer climate countries, like the Italy and Spain, dressing up for the weather; I guess they don’t see it very often. As opposed to slugging through ten inches of snow, the race organizers decided to plough the entire course. The only issue with this is that it left a few inches of ice on top of the ground. For most this was an issue, but I loved it. The more slippery it gets, the more I enjoy it. It becomes more of a precision game.
By the time Race Day came around, I was all systems go. I knew the course like the back of my hand, and still do to this day. Again, the start of the race went well and I was performing just how I wanted to, holding wheels on the open stuff and going by people on the tricky parts. In cyclocross, since the conditions are pretty gruesome and the courses are pretty harsh on the bikes, there is a designated pit zone where riders can switch bikes and give their old bikes to mechanics for them to clean it up and fix it. The only issue with the pits is that once you pass the pit flags you cannot turn around and go back into the pit. After going around the corner, where the last pit flag was situated, my foot slipped on an icy corner, no big deal I will just pick it up and put it back on the pedal – miss – as I look down, I see my pedal still attached to my shoe and not the bike. Adrenaline pumping, instinct takes over, I get off and run, run like I’ve never ran before. Six minutes of running in cycling shoes on ice with a bike on my back. Needless to say, by this point I was at the back of the race as one by one, the riders flew past. I could have easily shut down once I finally got back on the second bike, but this is the World Championships, and as long as you are still breathing, you keep going. Needless to say, in the end, my actual result was not the greatest, but I had the ride I wanted, always giving my very best to the 5000 fans watching and cheering for me.
This experience lit the flame, and I can honestly say that this would not have come together as smoothly without the help of Eagle. Any time when an athlete can focus his mind on his competition, while the generous people around him can help out with the other things, it’s always for the best. Without the help of Eagle, I would not have been able to focus, train as proficiently or even compete at the level I do. It is said that you are only as good as the people around you… with Eagle, I can only hope I am. There is no doubt I will be back next year!
