By Dillon Thompson
Cycling has taken 18-year-old Julien Ruhe far beyond Euclid Avenue. His next challenge: competing at the sport’s highest level.
Julien Ruhe has lived in the same house, on Euclid Avenue, for his entire life.
His parents moved to Candler Park just before he was born, and now as a freshman at Georgia State, he’s able to commute to classes from home.
But, thanks to cycling, Ruhe has seen more of the world than most people his age. The 18-year-old has ridden in high-level races in Ireland, Canada, and all over the United States. He has even competed as a junior for USA Cycling, the American national team.
Ruhe is deeply aware of how hard it is for someone like him – who, starting next year, will be competing at the top level of American cycling competitions – to explain the world he’s now a part of. In the U.S., cycling is nowhere near as popular as football and basketball, or even hockey and tennis.
“The way football or basketball is here, is the way cycling is in Belgium, Denmark, The Netherlands, even France,” Ruhe said.
It seems possible even that, without some unique circumstances, Ruhe never would’ve picked up the sport to begin with. Candler Park is located just 20 minutes from the Dick Lane Velodrome — a sloped, outdoor cycling track that offers free youth cycling nights for children in the area.
“I would highly recommend that to anyone who has kids, [especially] kids who may not be super active,” Ruhe said.
The velodrome, in East Point, is the only one of its kind for 200 miles. So it was fairly lucky that Ruhe ended up there at age nine, riding around the track and building up his passion. By the time he was 16, he’d gotten good enough that a life of competitive cycling was becoming a real possibility.
These last two years have been filled with success, as Ruhe works his way up higher in the sport. Some of his highlights include a six-day race in Ireland and a competition in Canada, where he represented Team USA.
The biggest challenge, though, is still ahead. His ultimate goal is to compete in Europe, where the races are longer, more competitive and more grueling. Ruhe, putting that leap in terms of American sports, said, “It’s like the gap between the NFL and low-level college football.”
“It’s a pretty big jump,” he added. “And a lot of Americans fail to get over there and compete at a high level.”
The solution? Practice, and lots of it. To ramp up for next season, which starts in spring, Ruhe will be riding 15 to 25 hours per week. It’s quite a lot of time and energy for a full-time college student, especially when you consider that those hours translate to between 300 and 500 miles in total.
“It’s a big time commitment,” Ruhe said. “The races are so long and brutal that you just have to go out and kill yourself for a long time.”
Finding the time, let alone the space, is a challenge. Ruhe notes that while Candler Park is relatively safe for cyclists, most of Atlanta is not, a reality he attributes to unaware drivers and a lack of infrastructure as big barriers.
For years, he’d have to drive out to the Silver Comet Trail, west of the city, to get in enough mileage. Now, he says he’s “manned up” about riding around town, but it’s a decision that requires extreme caution.
“It’s getting better, but it’s still quite dangerous to ride [around Atlanta],” he added.
There is a lot of passion behind all that commitment. Ruhe loves cycling, and his past year – where he pushed himself to a new level of success – gave him new opportunities to take it more seriously. Next year, he’ll be on a new club team, competing at a new level and possibly getting more chances with the junior USA team.
Greg Latham, a cycling team director who’s known Ruhe for nearly a decade, said the 18-year-old is a “perfect example” of hard work paying off.
“The traits that have made Julien successful have remained constant throughout his career,” Latham said. “He was just as determined and focused as a nine-year-old beginner racer as he is now, as one of the top racers in the country.”
But for Ruhe, reaching a new level meant changing some of his priorities. These days, he says that college and cycling are “equally” important to him, but as far as competition goes, he recognizes he has a rare opportunity.
“I think school is still very important,” Ruhe said. “But at some point, you do have to kind of switch priorities.”
Latham added, “we couldn’t be more excited for his success. And [we’re] excited to see what the 2024 racing season in the U.S. and Europe has in store for him.”
Overall, Ruhe calls cycling a “brutal” sport but says it gives him a rush unlike anything else.
He’s a competitive guy, and he gets an immense amount of satisfaction in pushing himself to get better.
“I’m super competitive,” he said. “You know, ‘I got 30th place this time, so I’m gonna go out and get top five, podium [finish] at the next race.’ I love [that aspect], and the adrenaline.”
Dillon Thompson is a one-year resident of Candler Park. He also serves as an editor and writer for the Candler Park Messenger.