This is a different post to those I would normally do, This is the story of a pro athlete who on the verge of possibly his best world championship performance nearly had everything taken away from him.
The film is around 25 minutes, but trust me it is worth the watch, if you feel you need some inspiration then this might just provide it or it might make you realise what you have
Enjoy it, share it
Click on this link to watch it The Man With The Halo
This year I have really struggled to find the same level of motivation that I have had previous years for training. For much of this year I have pondered what the reason is for this, and I haven’t yet figured out.
When I consider what the causes could be, I have been able to eliminated certain things, firstly my training plan supplied by “Iron” Mike as he is tailoring it to the feedback I give him, and to be fair the sessions on paper are fine. Secondly, support from the wife, she is as ever very supportive and offering help whenever possible.
To compound things, we recently lost a family member and rather than making me realise ho lucky I am to be in a position to not only be alive but also fit enough to train etc it has had almost the opposite impact..
With the help, of Mike, I have been trying to find activities that rekindle the fire, I think that is why singlespeed mountain biking has helped, it’s something new, a challenge that doesn’t really make any sense. I have been doing some trail running which is easier on the mind than road running and that is helping, I think.
I was supposed to have raced a couple of time already this year, the first one I missed due to being simply too tired, and the second was postponed due to snow. The next one I doubt I will do as I just don’t feel mentally in the right place, physically I am not too far off.
The one overriding thing I have lost is the sense of fun, I am not a pro athlete, I do all this for fun, something to provide a level of challenge but ultimately because I enjoy it and so to be in this position of not really enjoying it is hard. I am not defined by my results, and as a person I am not defined by exercise and so perhaps I just need to find the fun again.
I do realise that I am in a good position in life, and that to some people the fact that I am not enjoying training is probably seen as a “so what”, but when you stop enjoying something you have loved for years it is an issue to me.
The “what next” question is still there, but I think that if I keep on the mountain bike and throw in some trail running I will eventually find the right path.
Will I race again? I honestly don’t know at the moment, racing takes a lot out of you both physically and mentally and the thought of it currently is something that does not excite me.
I hope that something will provide the spark, it might just take a ParkRun with other people where I don’t worry about the time and just run and enjoy it, or perhaps a good bike ride, who knows. The one thing is though I really don’t want to quit and don’t intend to quit I just need to re-find the fun!
Today I did something that I thought I would never do, as it always seemed like making a tough situation even harder, I went singlespeed mountain biking. Yep that’s right one gear off road in the mud etc
The history behind this is all really down to an old friend of mine, Neil Dingle, yes I will name and shame!! He has been into this odd pursuit for years and keep extolling it’s virtues to the point where he is a successful racer in it. I often said yeah I would try it, never really meaning it, but then over christmas I was offered a very heavily discounted single speed frame, and I couldn’t resist the opportunity to build another bike sI decided to go in,
The bike building has been fun, and I have built it using parts that if I decide the one cog stuff isn’t for me I can remove all the parts and put them onto a frame accepting of gears, I like to think that is almost like planning.
So, how was the one gear experience? Well it was interesting, I am currently running a 32 x 18 set up, which might be slightly over geared for thick mud, but I reckon will be ok in the dry, dusty summer months, however, it was different to what I expected.
I had really thought it was going to be purgatory as I was never going to be in the correct gear, and whilst that it true, what you discover is that if you try and smooth out your peddling style you can actually make reasonable progress.
I did a couple of hills, not super steep, but ones that I know I normally have to change down the gears on, and got up them, I did some descending, which with a fully rigid set up was just like riding the cross bike but with a bit more give in the tyres.
The downsides, well I had two punctures, it might be time to go to the tubeless set up as I’m sure those little thorn punctures would have been avoided, but punctures are not the fault of the bike, and so other than that it was actually ok.
Now, I am a realist and so one ride doesn’t make me an expert or a convert, but it means I have the door slightly ajar into a new world, and one which I understand is populated by a variety of characters who are all slightly barmy (well I might have made the last bit up but it wouldn’t surprise me)
Will I do it again, oh yes, will this become my offroaf bike of choice, not sure as I love riding my cross bike, but I did find something very satisfying in plodding around never having to change gear even if I did try to change them a few times.
So, thank you to Nev for introducing me to this world and offering me a lot of good advice and I will be back for me, I might even write about it.
As the title suggests, it has been a very slow start to 2018, and the cause of that is entirely down to my own stupidity.
What did I do then? Well I broke a toe on my right foot. Ok so now you are starting to feel some sympathy for me, I can sense it, well if I was you I would surpress that feeling and prepare to laugh and think why!
Picture the scene, it’s almost like an Attenborough documentary, the young male (Sam) is challenging the alpha male (me) by means of mock boxing, all flat of the hand stuff. The young male is not doing well and is on the back foot, so he decides that boxing is too old school and the MMA is the way forward. As he moves in the experienced male, steps to the side grabs hold of him and prepares a perfect hip throw to down the young one. At this point the plan is perfect, however, it fails when I don’t move my foot out of the way, life him and as go for the throw he lands heal first with all his weight straight on my second from last toe. There is no pain, and I go for the throw again, this time succeeding and pinning him to the floor, at which point he submits. Triumph for the older, alpha male! I can hear Sir Richard speaking those words!!!
Later in the day I was out for a walk and could feel my toe becoming very hot in my boot, and when I got home and removed my sock, it looked horrible, swollen, bruised (various colours) and it started to hurt.
The pain lasted for a few days meaning certainly no running, and it was a while before I could get my foot into a cycling shoe to get on the turbo.
There you have it, my own fault, why do I feel the need to show I am still stronger than a 6 foot 21 year old? Well, it’s because I am stupid and can’t resist a challenge!
Luckily for me I am now able to run and can get on with training and ready for the coming race season. However, when he challenges me again I certainly won’t be backing down I’m not that old and past it just yet!
It is the time of year when you sit down and write your review of the previous 12 months and then look to the next year with hope and skip in your step!
When I started to think about the year, my initial thoughts were it was a failure, the one thing I wanted to do in the year I didn’t achieve, so a failure.
However, the reality is somewhat different. Whilst it is certainly true I didn’t achieve the triathlon I set my mind on, after getting back into swimming on further reflection the earlier and later parts of the year were actually quite successful.
The early part of the year, was once again dominated by duathlons and I beat my pb twice this year, certainly a decent feat as they never seem to get any easier.
After that I beat my fastest park run times a few times, for anyone who ever does park runs you will know how that going faster is never that easy as for some reason your performance can vary a reasonable amount week on week, well mine does!
Then in the last part of the year, I did better in the cyclocross races I completed, I finished further up the field and also did more laps, again another success.
So, whilst my initial thoughts were that 2017 wasn’t great, it was intact a good year, I achieved more in reflection than I thought.
Finally a couple of thank you’s for those that have helped this year, firstly “Iron” Mike Shaw for the coaching, somehow he keeps the session interesting and also doesn’t mind, well at least doesn’t say anything to me!, when I change my mind about what my focus for the year is! Secondly, as ever to my wife, who not only puts up with me training etc but always comes and watch and supports me at races, as we all know there isn’t anything better than having a friendly face whilst you are suffering!
Farewell to 2017, and lets hope 2018 is at least as good if not better.
Today was meant to mark my first cycle cross race of the season. The sun was shining, the bike was prep’d and the rider was ready, well probably not full race fit but looking forward to it!
I arrived at the venue, signed on, watched a bit of the race that was on at the time and was looking forward to getting gout in a bit to warm up and then race.
Back to the car, pinned on the race number, timing chip on the shoe and all seemed ready to go.
Walking back to the course with the bike chatting to my wife, I suddenly realised I didn’t have my helmet on, and then it struck me like a truck, I hadn’t bought it with me! What an idiot!
We carried on to the start area, as sometimes they have stands selling kit and so my last hope was that there would be one, and I could get a helmet of some sort. However, on this occasion there wasn’t one.
That was that, no helmet no race. The walk back to the car was punctuated with me asking how I could be so stupid, well words to that effect anyhow.
I packed up the car, went back to registration and crossed m name off the start list. The day was done.
In all the years I have raced this is the first time I have ever forgotten anything fundamental to race, the question is how did I forget it?
Well, I think the only answer is I packed my kit bag differently to normal. For a cross race I normally put both my pairs of shoes in the bottom of my bag, clothing on top and finally the helmet on top of that. This time I left my shoes out of my back in their shoe bags and for whatever reason I just never picked up my helmet, I can’t blame anyone but myself and I know that next week I will be writing a kit list and ticking off the items as they go into my bag.
I appreciate this is a first world problem and certainly when put in context isn’t really a big deal, but, when you are looking forward to a race and then not be able to take part due to your own stupidity it is disappointing to say the least. As a punishment I did a long turbo session, that will teach me!
There is a saying about getting back on the horse when you have fallen off, this is often applied to accidents or unfortunate incidents or just when something doesn’t go to plan.
For me, I am not back on the horse but have taken my first step towards it, I am about to take a leg up!
This week I did my first longish run for a long time, a decent 8 miles plus backed this up with a a faster, shorter run in the week plus a couple of weekend runs.
More importantly I went climbing, putting the shoulder under some stress, I didn’t push the climbing and certainly was not climbing near my limits but just doing it and getting the feel again was great, during the climb the shoulder felt ok, not 100% but ok.
My long run did throw up an interesting scenario though, I experienced some stomach issues to the point where for the last 20 minutes I thought I was going mohave to do a Paula Radcliffe, and if not use the street my shorts were certainly under threat. This really did hamper the tail end of the run and meant knocking the pace down but the positive was everything stayed in my stomach!
The other interesting thing from the week was at ParkRun on Saturday I went for a more steady run rather than the usual go for broke, and this meant that I ran a steady pace at a fraction over 5 minutes per km but at no point did I ever feel I was pushing and at the end I still felt fresh. My reasoning for this was simply I didn’t feel as sharp as I have previously so decided to run steady and just enjoy the run.
Back to the shoulder, and this morning it did feel slightly sore, not a surprise after a climb plus running. However, after the run today it wasn’t too bad but as I type it is stiff but hopefully nothing more than the after effects of all the above and some gardening!
I am looking forward to keep on moving forward and hopefully getting back in the saddle, the acid test is likely to come with a return to the pool but that is in the future and when that happens the result will be what it will be.
After injuring my should I have been recovering slowly. The shoulder has been responding to exercises and is feeling better, still not 100% but the movement is back if not with out some discomfort
One of the things I have noticed is that whilst the shoulder provides some discomfort when training it doesn’t make training impossible and funnily enough on the bike I have beaten a few Strava pr’s without really trying and certainly not going out to intentionally do so.
Running has been coming along too, whilst not as sharp as before certainly I haven’t lost all my fitness and this week I would have been able to test it but for Watford’s home game being moved for tv meaning I couldn’t get to do a ParkRun, which I am currently using as a measure.
Regardless of this I feel I am coming along ok, I know I need to do some more speed work and some longer distances but they will come in time but until then I will continue to enjoy the training and have a go at an easy climbing session this week to test the shoulder.
The last few weeks have really turned into a time of frustration, I seem to be slowly coming apart at the seems.
It started with the shoulder problem, now this at the time seemed like a small set back as I was pretty sure it would be easy to get it back to normal with some simple exercises and not doing anything to really antagonise it. The reality on the other hand has been a little different.
I started on the exercises, and initially it felt like it was progressing, then for what appears to be no reason it regressed, and currently it feels worse than when I started feeling the issue.
Add to that, this week I developed a problem in one of my hips, it simply felt like it was locked up and left me limping around like old man who was in need of a hip replacement.
Once more I have no idea what caused this problem, the only good side is that as I type this it has finally relented and isn’t giving any pain, although it doesn’t feel quite as flexible as the other one.
As you can imagine this has left me feeling somewhat hacked off, I just don’t seem to be able to get fully back to fitness,
When you get in these scenarios it leads to start thinking, “is it time to stop?” or “do I need to focus on one sport only?” and to be honest I have considered both questions but don’t feel able to answer them. I know there are still things I want to do and that they involve multi-sport, yes I could just go back to cycling and I would certainly enjoy it, but the multi-sport part adds some interest to the racing and variety to the training as well as additional load on the body.
I am sure this is just a phase and in a few weeks all will be back to normal and I will wonder why I bothered about it, but on the other hand if it doesn’t what then?
Last weekend should have marked my return to triathlon, instead I was left thinking about what might have been.
Unfortunately for me I suffered a shoulder injury that meant I could not get my arm through the recovery part of the swim stroke without a lot of pain, and even just normal arm movements were providing some level of discomfort.
How I actually managed to injure myself is a little bit of a mystery, I think it is simply an over use injury as I have been swimming a lot and also climbing hard routes and so both of these activities seem to have combined to provide the pain.
I am hopeful that a week or so of not stressing the shoulder combined with some gentle exercises will be enough to heal it, if not then a trip to the physio will be required.
I am beginning to wonder if me and triathlon are just not meant to be, first of all I struggled to get to terms with the swimming, then I get on terms with it and even start to enjoy it and then I injure myself, perhaps this is an omen?
Anyhow, I still intend to move forward and if I don’t manage a triathlon this year then I can start the next season early and take it from there.
Simply put it is a case of onwards and upwards, as long as the shoulder holds up to the running, cycling and swimming with some climbing thrown in for good measure!!!
Three Times The Effort 