Number 57 is Special for Maghalie Rochette with Memorable Silver at World Cup Besançon
“It took me 56 tries to finally get it. 56 times of failing my goal and trying again."
Back in the day, Nike and Michael Jordan made a cool-as-heck commercial called “Failure.” In it, Jordan recounted how all of his failures as an athlete ultimately led him to be (arguably) the greatest basketball player of all time.
“I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.”
After her 2nd-place finish at Besançon on Sunday, Maghalie Rochette harkened back to that commercial when writing about her journey to a European World Cup podium in her excellent Fever Alert Newsletter.
“It took me 56 tries to finally get it. 56 times of failing my goal and trying again. On those 56 races in Europe, over the past 5 years, I did have a few good ones where I felt like I had raced to my full potential (maybe 10-15 of those), but mostly I had sub-par races that left me feeling disappointed in myself.”
As Rochette crossed the line after 50 minutes of racing and celebrated with her hands held skyward, all the failures, all the frustration had finally paid off as Rochette turned in her finest European performance since her 5th-place ride at the 2017 World Championships in Bieles.
“It took 56 tries, but I wouldn't change a thing,” she wrote. “I'm proud we kept trying, and it feels good to have had a good one. It was worth all the tries.”
A Long Euro Trip
The name Maghalie Rochette started to ring out in the cyclocross world after she finished 5th on a challenging course at the 2017 World Championships in Bieles. That race was Rochette’s second-ever European cyclocross race—Hoogerheide, the week before, was her first. At just 23 years of age, it seemed success in Europe was around the corner for the Quebec native.
And yet, that success did not come right away. After rolling the Rochester weekend and finishing 2nd to Katerina Nash at the Jingle Cross C1 in 2018, Rochette was in the process of establishing herself as the top North American woman rider. Her early-season success was validated when she headed to Switzerland that October and finished 6th at the Bern World Cup. At the time, it seemed things were definitely coming together. This was going to be the season of Rochette’s Euro breakthrough.
That 6th-place finish, unfortunately, would stand as her best European World Cup finish until Sunday. Her best World Cup finish the rest of that season was a 20th at Namur. A similar story repeated itself in 2019/20, where Rochette was the class of North American ‘cross while winning a memorable Jingle Cross World Cup. She finished 10th at Namur in December 2019, but it was still a far cry from a top 3 in Europe.
Of all the cruel pitfalls along Rochette’s path, 2020/21 was probably the cruelest of them all. Rochette headed to Europe in early October and started her season with a win and a 2nd at two races in Switzerland. She continued to race well and really seemed to be putting things together in Europe when she finished 11th at World Cup Tabor and 7th at Superprestige Boom. Then she missed a pedal at the start of Scheldecross and injured her ankle the next day at Gavere in an unlucky start incident and boom! all of that success and progress were gone, all the while watching Clara Honsinger achieve her European success.
One would have forgiven Rochette for sulking and brooding and even resenting Honsinger’s success after her brutal winter last year, but Rochette is an innately positive person and thus decided to draw motivation and reassurance from the success her American counterpart has had.
After talking about her day on Sunday, her first instinct was to give thanks to her American peers for showing that World Cup podiums are a thing North American women can achieve. “In the recent years, some of my compatriots have shown me it was possible. Clara Honsigner and Kaitie Keough both podiumed in European World Cups before. They showed me it was possible.”
Un Jour Pour Se Souvenir
Rochette’s memorable day at Besançon was one that really was not supposed to be. If you check the UCI calendar, the 2021 Canadian Cyclocross Championships were supposed to be this weekend in Langford, British Columbia. Rochette was planning on racing there and then one would assume Pan-Ams this coming weekend in Garland.
However, due to the extreme flooding in southern B.C., the Championships were postponed until January, and Rochette decided to come up with a different plan. It may have included Rochette’s partner David Gagnon driving 30+ hours to drop their van in Fayetteville for the World Championships, but in the end, Rochette and Gagnon made it back to Belgium to race cyclocross.
Rochette started her weekend at a fast but muddy Urban Cross Kortrijk, where she raced against a strong X2O Trofee field. “I had a good race in Kortrijk finishing 8th, but I felt like my legs were a bit sleepy,” Rochette wrote. “To be honest, it was to be expected after the whirlwind of the previous days, but I was hoping that the Saturday race would help my body to wake up for the World Cup.”
Sunday’s course in Besançon was a grassy track whose technical features were amplified by snow that turned into moisture that turned into mud. Watching from afar, it appeared to be more of a slick mud than a Fayetteville or Dendermonde-like bog, which made for some challenging sections on the course.
Now, sometimes athletes have this feeling that they are going to do something special on a given day. One might think Rochette had good feelings on the drive to France or she was really vibing with the new Taylor Swift album, but no, before the start, World Cup Besançon felt like the previous 56 European races she had driven to.
“So what changed on try #57 today? Well, absolutely nothing. And I think this is good news—I did not feel particularly stronger than usual, I didn't feel like I was in an alien-like mindset, or that my skills suddenly got much better.”
Rochette has always been a pretty strong starter and is typically in the mix at the front after the holeshot. She got off to great starts at the Waterloo and Fayetteville World Cups, so if she was finishing well at Besançon, she must have gotten off to a good start and ridden Lucinda Brand’s wheel to an advantageous position, right?
Not quite. Rochette got off to probably her worst start since those dreadful races in Antwerp and Gavere last winter. Starting on the second row, she missed her pedal and dropped way back after the holeshot. With the Clauzel sisters and then Brand setting a fast pace on the slick course, it was not a good spot to be in.
And yet after the long prologue lap, Rochette was in 6th place, just a few seconds off the chase group of Denise Betsema, Puck Pieterse, Fem van Empel, and Inge van der Heijden. She described the key to surviving her poor start.
“I simply rode my bike in a focused and consistent way throughout the race. I was able to stay calm and composed and not get too wrapped up in how I was doing. I didn't make many mistakes. And that's it.”
In the first full lap, Rochette caught the chase group. Midway through the race, she was leading the chase along with Betsema. Inside two to go, she was dropping Betsema and riding alone in 2nd.
In a way that really only Rochette can, she shared her thought process during the race in her newsletter.
"Oh, this is the podium Magh. That would be amazing"
"Stop thinking about it, just pedal"
"Okay, let's just try to hold on to 3rd"
"Wait a second. Don't settle for this, keep riding."
"Oh I'm catching Denise? Hmm. Stay behind"
"Stay focused. Ohh she's not riding better than me actually'
"Okay pass."
"Ahhhh they are probably going to pass me back"
"Just ride. Focus, breathe"
1 lap to go.
"Are they catching up? I should look behind"
"Oh I have a gap."
"Omg"
"Focus Magh: Pedal, turn, next section, breathe"
1/2 lap to go.
"OMG, I might get it"
"FOCUS FOR F**K SAKE"
"Just get to the line"
OMG, We did it. 2nd place.
While no one was going to catch Brand at the front on Sunday, Rochette was near flawless in her pursuit of 2nd once the race started. In a way she has not yet been able to do, she outrode Denise Betsema, who has been one of the strongest women in the world this year. Looking back a few hours after the race, Rochette had competing thoughts about her achievement.
“I had been dreaming of this for a long time, and I really knew I was capable of a good result at that level, but I still had to make it happen and I'm very happy we did today,” she wrote.
“I could possibly do it again. Normal can sometimes be good enough, and normal is much more attainable than extraordinary.”
Now, here at the Bulletin, we are looking for specious connections to good storylines. As a Quebecois, Rochette’s first language is French, so after her success at Besancon, it was hard to not note that her previous standout European ride, her 5th at 2017 Worlds, was also in a French-speaking locale.
As it turns out, however, that connection is not as specious as we thought!
“Merci to all the French fans in Besançon who knew I was speaking French and cheered me on like crazy. It was amazing,” Rochette wrote.
Who knew, sometimes we get things right.
Last season, we saw Clara Honsinger ride her breakthrough successes to even more success on the European circuit. As Rochette mentioned, the path is there, and there is no reason why the Bulletin cannot be transformed into the Canadian News Network the rest of this winter.
However, if there are any more struggles, for Rochette, it seems they will make the next World Cup podium that much sweeter.
“As Will Smith said in his book: "While our ignorance would rain down a deluge of pain and suffering, when I look back, I see clearly it could have been no other way. The universe only teaches you through experience."”