He had another year left on his contract with Orica-BikeExchange but at the age of 31 Christian Meier decided to step away from the peloton and concentrate on his new passion, coffee.
The Canadian, who has ridden for several of the world’s biggest teams, built a career as one of the most dependable domestiques in the bunch, but now, with his wife, he’s starting a new chapter of his life in Girona and concentrating on his coffee empire. At the Saitama Criterium in Japan, Cyclingnews sat down with Meier to talk about his career, his domestique devotion, and his plans for the future.
Cyclingnews: Christian, you had one more year left on your contract at Orica-BikeExchange. You could have carried on in the pro-ranks but instead you decided to hang up your bike and retire. Why was that?
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Christian Meier: It’s true, I had another year but I spoke with the team about stopping. For me, cycling was a great part of my life but I never saw it as a final destination. I always felt that cycling was a passion and that I would do it for as long as I could and it’s been a fantastic experience and allowed my wife and I to live a lifestyle that’s been incredible. We saw a lot of things but at the same time coffee was also a huge passion of mine. It got to the point in cycling where I started to feel like I was doing the same races, and getting too comfortable. I l felt like I was no longer growing and that it was maybe time to change. At the same time, with coffee, everything was so new and so young and there was, or is, huge scope for me to grow and move forward. That’s the next step and I’m going to keep going.
CN: When it came to stopping did you seek the advice of others or was it something you just knew needed to happen?
CM: It was really a personal thing. I had that feeling that things were stalling and even though I love cycling, and will always love cycling, and will always ride my bike, the racing aspect was starting to hold me back from moving forward with coffee. Racing and training, they take up a huge amount of time, and there’s a lot of time on the road. I didn’t want to sacrifice one at the expense of the other while doing both. Sure, I could have continued another year and cashed my pay cheque because it’s quite a good pay check, and maybe I could fluke it for one-more year but that’s not me. Okay so if I’d done that the worst that could have happened would have been the team kicking me off the roster but that’s not what I wanted to do. Like I said, that’s not me. I had to stop so that I could give my future plans 100 per cent commitment. That’s been my philosophy since I was young.
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