No More Track Racing
Steve Cummings

As Mark Cavendish announces that he'll never ride the track again another former world track champion Brit says he's turning his back on the boards. Steve Cummings was a big part of British Cycling success story on the track, but for the last couple of years he reckons that his body has been telling him he's really a road racer.

After riding with Discovery Channel and now Barloworld in some of the worlds biggest races, including Classics like Paris-Roubaix and the Giro d'Italia, Cummings found he couldn't adapt to the training with the track squad for the Beijing Olympics and instead rode the time trial, where he did well despite little special preparation.

Cummings is now based full time in Tuscany and Chris recently visited him to do a 'Ride With Steve Cummings' story for Cycle Sport magazine that will be out in the New Year. During the ride Cummings, who won the Italian single day road Classic this year, the Bernocchi Cup, told him that his track career was over and that all his preparation now was geared to racing on the road.

"Over the last year or so I've realised that I am a road rider, my body has all the charactersitics of a road rider and that is where all my ambitions lie now. I'm 100% training for the road now and my ambition next year is to win more road races and at least one big one," Cummings told Chris.

He wouldn't be drawn on how big, but in his spare time he's wading through a stack of DVDs watching the finales of races like Milan-San Remo and Liege-Bastogne-Liege. He's lost weight, done the miles to become a more efficient rider and he's already training in the Tuscan hills and mountains, and he's going well. "I want to start early with the Tour Down Under maybe then have really good form for San Remo and build for a good Giro d'Italia. I also want to ride well at the end of the year and do a good Tour of Lombardy," he says

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Words and pics by Chris Sidwells