Originally Posted by
Hapsmo911
Maybe there's some hope. NICA (
National Interscholastic Cycling Association ) seems to be doing well. In some parts of the country doing very well with yoy growth. Looking around the site it seems they offer plenty of support for those that are 'willing to get involved and start teams. I could see possibilities within this league for cyclocross. I could also see possibilities for indoor practices, training, and racing with Zwift and the like for these kids. Road racing, or crit racing may be an issue with insurance unless you could train them indoors and race closed course on the weekend? The visibility of local crits and the promotion of races seems to be to underground, you either need to be looking for them or already interested in cycling to find them. With programs like NICA you can go directly to the schools and get kids going that may not want to sit the bench for he "standard" school sports. Looks like they also have middle school programs going.. Seems like most kids would prefer starting with MTB and the way I see it that's the start of an interest in cycling.
https://www.nationalmtb.org/nica-leagues/
Collegiate is doing well as far as participation. As a funnel to USAC not so much. USAC is looking for the kids that want to go Tour pro. Those that will, will find a way to do it without USAC help and many USA kids that can - don't want to. USAC putting hopes on its riders doing well as adults on the world stage is a big stretch. Very few can, and fewer want to. Having a domestic semi-pro scene might be a pretty good farm league thing. But if the goal of USAC remains creating world tour pros, they will have little success.
As you point out the NICA schools seem to be doing well. The NCAA schools, esp DI, DII have to fund the NCAA sports, which cycling is not one. Many of the big name academic schools are NCAA DI, so if you go there, cycling is a club. But you get a more prestigious (usually) degree. It can be a difficult choice.