C-Ray Introduces Cycling in Secondary Schools

A hundred and three high school students are participating in a string of cycling activities organized by the C-Ray Cycling Club as a precursor to introducing the sport in secondary schools across the country.  This evening the young riders gathered at the Marion Jones Sporting Complex where they took part in a time trial.  The event was being held for male and female athletes, as well as riders in various categories.  Organizer Kaya Cattouse told News Five that it is the aim of the National Sports Council to bring cycling to high school sports by 2017.

Kaya Cattouse, Organizer, High School Cycling Series

“This initiative came about from the C-Ray Cycling Club in an effort to encourage and bring in more female cyclists into the sport of cycling; however, we knew that if we wanted to do that we had to target the high schools by bringing in male and female.  So that is how we got started and today for the first race we have a hundred and three students, thirty-seven of them being females and sixty-six of them being male.”

Isani Cayetano

“What does this all lead up to?  I know you’re mentioning that it’s a series and you have a schedule in terms of the days of events.  But what does this all culminate in?”

Kaya Cattouse

Kaya Cattouse

“The first one is what we would call a trial to see how we can get our kids involved and, as you can see, out here is very packed, we have a lot of high school kids out here and their supporters today.  Next school year we plan to include sports, under the sports council we plan to bring it in as an NSSSA sport.  Each school countrywide has a cycling team at their school and we’ll have regionals and nationals just as they do have football and volleyball and basketball, you know, across the country.”

Isani Cayetano

“The participation of these young riders, how difficult was it for them or how easy was it for them to sign up and become a part of this?”

Kaya Cattouse

“Well, what we did is, I spoke to my cycling colleagues, you know, and I asked them, we have our PE teachers who aren’t that versed in cycling.  They more know about the other, you know, basketball, football, so if they could go in as coaches into the high school.  And, you know, Alicia Thompson, you know, she picked up right away.  She went to Wesley College; Andrew Lewis, at you know, another school.  Quinton Hamilton, Byron Pope, all of these guys they went in as coaches.  So what happened is that they come out here, they train.  In terms of equipment, what we did, the C-Ray Cycling Club we got financial assistance from different business entities and we bought six road bikes and we have the Ordonez Bike Shop out here today who are putting these guys at their correct measurement just before the race is started.  So it was very easy, all these kids had to do was express their interest and sign up and come out and race.”

The High School Cycling series continues through to next week.