Hello!

The Williams Cycling Team is excited to announce that our 2026 kit store is officially open, and we’re thrilled to offer you the opportunity to ride in Ephs colors once again. Ordering from the alumni store is a great way to support the team, as proceeds help fund racing, equipment, and initiatives that make cycling more accessible for students on campus.

This year’s kit design is especially meaningful to us. We drew inspiration from the iconic Veterans War Memorial Tower that sits at the summit of Mount Greylock, Massachusetts’ highest peak at 3,491 feet. Each year on Mountain Day, when the mountains call, the Williams Cycling Team makes the journey up Mount Greylock, finishing together at the summit. The 2026 jersey reflects that tradition, featuring a daytime rendering of the memorial tower on the front and a nighttime version on the back, symbolizing both the physical challenge of the climb and the shared experience that brings our team together. We were also fortunate to receive inspiration and feedback from Williams alum Peter Burghardt ’85, whose involvement helped shape the final design and reminded us how strong and lasting the Williams cycling community truly is.

Kit Order Website Link:
http://teamorder.serviziocorse.com/index.aspx?pc=71E5D486-B69F-479F-90F1-A0A0481B6B15
(If this is your first time ordering, you’ll need to create an account. Please note that the store is only accessible through this link, and it tends to work best on a desktop or laptop rather than a mobile device.)

Quick Castelli size guide from us:
We want to highlight a few important notes about sizing before you place your order. Castelli uses European sizing and generally runs smaller than most American brands, so we strongly recommend sizing up. All items are custom-made to order and unfortunately cannot be returned, so please take extra care when selecting your size. As the saying goes—measure twice, cut once! We highly encourage you to consult Castelli’s official size chart here:
(https://www.castelli-cycling.com/US/en/customer-service/size-chart)

Timeline:
The store is open now and will close on January 11th, so be sure to get your order in before the deadline. Once the store closes, Castelli’s production timeline is approximately 7–8 weeks.

One exciting highlight this year is the Aero Race S Bib Short, which is the same model worn by the UCI WorldTour team Soudal–Quick-Step, making it an excellent, race-quality option.

Thank you so much for continuing to support Williams Cycling—it truly makes a difference for our team and our ability to grow.

Please feel free to share this link with other alumni or friends of the team who may be interested. If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to reach out to me ([email protected]). If you’d like to learn more about our team and what we do, we’d love for you to check out our website at http://sites.williams.edu/cycling or follow us on Instagram at @williams_cycling for more Williams Cycling content.

We are also always happy to accept donations of old cycling gear and accessories to help students who are new to riding—if that’s something you’d like to support, please feel free to get in touch. It’s the strength of the Williams cycling community that keeps our team going, and we’re so proud to be riding together in Ephs colors for 2026.

Happy holidays, and Roll Ephs!

Best regards,
Ramiro Ramirez ’26 and Percy Tonha ’26
Captains, Williams Cycling Team 2025–2026

Just posting to let everyone know that the clothing order has arrived! We will be shipping out orders within the week. If you have any questions about your order, let me know! ([email protected])

As promised, here is the schedule for our current workout block. Feel free to switch around days if you need to!

Monday: Rest day. Spin sooper dooper easily, do some easy cross-training, or take the day off if you’re feeling beat-up.

Tuesday: 6×10 Tempo Intervals. Do six, ten minute intervals at ~80-90% max heart rate with 5 minutes of rest between each interval. Keep your cadence around 90, and feel free to get up out of the saddle every now and then. These intervals should not be that difficult, so are a great time to work on technique. Be sure to keep your upper body as relaxed and motionless as possible, maintain an even pedal stroke, and keep your head up and eyes looking forward.

Wednesday:1×1’s. Do a long warmup with a few short, hard efforts. Then do 6 sets of: 1 minute on at VO2 (HR at about 90-95% of max. This is not an all out sprint, but definitely hard. 1 minute rest (keep spinning!) After 20 minutes at aerobic pace, repeat the 6 sets.

Thursday: Rest Day.

Friday: 6×10’s. (Repeat Tuesday)

Saturday: Tabata Intervals. Take a good, long warm-up (at least 15 min, high cadence, with several harder efforts thrown in to get the big muscles in your legs nice and loose)
-One set of Tabatas/sprints will be comprised of: 20 seconds sprinting, 10 seconds resting. Repeat 8 times for a total of 4min. To be clear, these are zone 5, SMSP, balls-out SPRINTS. If you are monitoring HR, you should be at about 105% of your max HR.
-Complete 6 sets of these sprint intervals for a total of 48 sprints. Take a 3min rest between sets.
A few tips for these intervals. These will feel very easy at first and then get hard quickly. Look to maintain a constant power output in the sprint and alternate between seated and out-of-the-saddle sprints. More importantly, remember that this workout has two purposes. One is to squeeze every drop of power from our legs. More important, at least in my humble opinion, is to improve our pedaling form in a high-output situation. Focus on keeping your upper body stable and your arms your arms relaxed. Keep your pedals strokes round and keep your ankles loose. Use your core to stabilize you and prevent any “side-to-side” rocking on the trainer.

Sunday: LSD. 1.5-2 hours of aerobic riding (i.e. the perfect time to watch a movie!). note: this is not a rest day, so don’t just spin mindlessly. You should be working (just not very hard).

I know it’s feeling like the winter will never end and we’ll be riding inside forever, but it won’t be long before we can take to the roads again! Even this much snow has to melt eventually!

Attention all members, alums, parents, and all around fans of Williams Cycling. The clothing order process for this year is finally underway! Click over to the “clothing” page on the left to see renderings of the artwork and a list of pricing!

We ask that we receive all orders and payment by December 15th.

Congrats to Erik Levinsohn ’12 and Ceci Davis-Hayes ’11, who rode to excellent results in today’s season opener at Stevens Institute of Technology. Erik lit up the Men’s A field with an explosive ride and a 1st place finish, riding to the line a minute and a half ahead of the peloton. In the Women’s A field, Ceci held the wheel of perennial heavyweight Lenore Pipes (Cornell) to finish 2nd. As a team we are incredibly proud of our friends and former classmates, and we can’t wait to ride with them (or, more likely, behind them) during our upcoming ECCC races.

Unfortunately, there will be a slight delay with our sock order. Hincapie did an initial production run and found that the yellow highlights in the sock caused substantial discoloration in the body of the sock. Since a half black/half grey-ish sock looked fairly silly, we have asked the company to do a new production run. This is expected to take 2-3 weeks.

Obviously, we are not happy about this situation and have expressed our dissatisfaction to Hincapie. Please be patient with us as we work to rectify the situation.
-Todd

Exciting news from Hincapie Sportswear – our clothing order has shipped from Bogota, Colombia and should arrive in Williamstown shortly after the boxes are released by U.S. Customs (for some reason they always check these shipments very thoroughly…)

Four technique drills to combat boredom on the indoor trainer. These will help build form by exploring the extreme ends of the pedaling regime.

UNO — Muscle Tension:
Slow cadence (50-60 rpm), pushed back in the saddle or hovering just above. Use a large gear and high resistance (can be done outdoors on a gradual hill). Concentrate on keeping your whole body tensed and immobile, turning the legs in perfect smooth circles. The sound from the trainer should be as even as possible, minimize the dead spots. Hands in the drops or on the hoods. Hold for 2 minutes.

DOS — High Spin:
High to maximum cadence (120+ rpm), right below your bouncing threshold. Concentrate on a smooth, complete pedal stroke, keeping your arms and shoulders very relaxed and your hips loose and fluid. Hands on the tops or hoods. This works great using music where you can “double time” the beat, like during the chorus. Hold for ~30 seconds.

TRES — Power Starts:
Start from a stop or very low cadence, and build to 110 rpm or higher, a maximum sprint-type output. Think speed, not force. Start in a medium-high gear and click up at least twice during the 30-60 second interval. Concentrate on a round pedaling motion and smoothly getting on top of the gear, like a flywheel or electric motor. Stay in the saddle. Hands in the drops or hooks.

QUATRO — One-leg drills:
Unclip one foot and spin at a comfortable cadence for 30 seconds. Work on maintaining a smooth, circular pedaling motion.

These drills will pay off when you get tired on the road by keeping your pedal stroke smooth and efficient. Your competition will be pedaling squares and you will be spinning elegance.

Check out the clothing tab for information about this year’s clothing order! Mockups of all the items are coming soon…

We will open up our 2013 team clothing order as soon as we get details straightened out with our friends at Hincapie Sportswear. Our stylish black/purple/gold design will be back this year and we’ll follow the same order process as last year (see the “Clothing” tab for details). We expect to offer the standard velocity short-sleeve jersey and bibshorts (M)/shorts (W), as well as a wind vest, long-sleeve jersey, arm and leg warmers, and hats. If you’re looking for something that’s not on that list, please e-mail us ASAP and we’ll add it to the list.

**Stay tuned for sample photos and price lists** and e-mail [email protected] with questions or suggestions.