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This Student-Athlete Aims to Rule Mountain Biking
Full-time Stanford student Kate Courtney has already been victorious on the UCI World Cup circuit — and the prospect of a lot more winning is on the horizon.
At 21 years old, Kate Courtney is one of the top up-and-coming female XC mountain bike racers in the world. In 2016, she notched her first UCI World Cup win in the Women's U23 category and only finished outside of the top five at two rounds, a pretty solid stat for the American among a field typically dominated by Europeans.
What’s more? Courtney is simultaneously studying human biology at Stanford University. Getting into the school is a feat in itself for most and the amount of work that goes into getting a degree at the school is a great challenge for any student. Courtney manages to juggle being a student with intense training to compete at the top of her sport and traveling the world to race it.
My tire actually hit a rock and exploded, which caused me to crash at around 25 mph on gravel.
Gearing up for another season on the UCI World Cup circuit with a new trainer in her corner, Courtney showed up to the US Cup #2 and lined up in the Women’s Elite category against two Olympians from the most recent games. Check out how Courtney did in the video above and hear what she has to say about juggling education and competition at a high level in the interview below.
Kate Courtney
© Lucas Gilman/Red Bull Content Pool
Kate Courtney
© Lucas Gilman/Red Bull Content Pool
Kate Courtney
© Lucas Gilman/Red Bull Content Pool
RedBull.com: You’ve had a solid month of racing, how are you feeling?
Kate Courtney: Good! A little tired, it’s like middle of the night in Europe and I forgot that jet lag exists. But overall, feeling really excited about the beginning of the season. I changed a lot of things this season, in particular with my training. I was working pretty hard all winter and didn’t know how this spring was going to go so it was really exciting to find some form early. As my dad says, "It’s always good to be playing with a lead." So it’s always good to have things go well early and then be able to take that confidence and positivity forward in the season and keep trying to improve on that. Having things go wrong early can really change the perspective and put you under a lot of pressure. So being able to take confidence and be relaxed and focus on the next set of goals has been really helpful.
Kate Courtney
© Jan Kasl / Red Bull Content Pool
You mention in the video (above) that your trainer thought you needed to be mentally tougher. With two World Cup rounds down, what have you gained mentally?
A lot. The last World Cup, after the start lap and the first lap, I was leading by 30 seconds riding down the last downhill and my tire actually hit a rock and exploded, which caused me to crash at around 25 miles per hour on gravel. I got a little banged up and had to ride to get my tire fixed, so that was pretty much as bad as it gets in terms of mental situations in a race. That was definitely a huge challenge but I was able to stay calm, get back on the bike, get my tire changed. I lost about two minutes and by the end of the race had fought to second. So now I’m tied for the overall lead in points, where if I had quit that race I’d be out of the running to win the overall essentially. So I think it’s moments like that where having that extra reserve of resilience and knowing that you can push yourself and keep going really helps. I think honestly that comes from the four-hour training days I did in the fall, in the rain, where at times I didn’t want to be there but we made a lot of progress.
Kate Courtney
© Jan Kasl / Red Bull Content Pool
What do you think it'll take to make the next step, to succeed in the elite class in the next few years?
I think just continuing to chase improvements in a lot of different ways. I’ve found coaches that work for me — I have a good nutritionist, good sports psychologist and a good physical therapist; so I really have this amazing team behind me and I think I’m being pushed in all the right ways. It’s just a matter of layering that effort year after year and consistently paying attention to things that I think will help get to that next level in the next few years.
Kate Courtney
© Jan Kasl / Red Bull Content Pool
What are you studying at Stanford?
Human biology.
Has that had any impact on how you prepare and train or anything you think about in terms of racing?
I would say I think it does. Maybe not directly, but I think it enables me to be more critical of things that I hear in the performance world. There’s a lot of competing perspectives out there, different articles that disagree with each other especially around nutrition, training and mental training. So it gives me the ability to be critical and look at the research and try it out and see how I feel about it. To be able to be confident in that is really helpful. I think also just being a little bit of a science nerd is an advantage in endurance sports.
Kate Courtney
© Jan Kasl/Red Bull Content Pool
Kate Courtney
© Lucas Gilman/Red Bull Content Pool
Kate Courtney
© Lucas Gilman/Red Bull Content Pool
What’s the biggest challenge juggling school and racing?
The biggest challenge? Well, time is a big challenge. I would say more than that; striking the balance between pushing yourself and making sure you’re taking care of yourself. At the end of the day, your job as a professional athlete is to be in the best shape possible and I think it’s really easy to expect that that means training your absolute hardest every second of every day. But in particular with school, when my recovery is limited, it’s almost more important to get sleep, make sure that I’m eating well, and pay attention to those other areas of wellness that can sometimes fall by the wayside when you are limited in terms of time.
Kate Courtney
© Jan Kasl / Red Bull Content Pool
Any advantage juggling both? Both for racing and for you as a person.
Yeah, I think there’s a lot of benefit particularly at my age. I’m very young in the sport relatively speaking and hopefully have a lot of years of World Cup racing ahead of me. So I think to keep perspective that there is a life outside of bike racing and being able to have something else that keeps me a little more grounded and balanced I think has been really good for me overall. Yeah I think that provides an advantage in racing, especially when things don’t go as well, being able to keep perspective and move forward it’s really helpful to have other things going on in your life.
