I choose life

I have had my fair share of crashes on the bike, both while training and in races. At the end of a race, it can get pretty chaotic at the pointy end of the field so over the years, I have developed a bit of respect for the crazy sprinters that are brave enough to try their luck each time. The same way that you have respect for the clown at the rodeo whose job it is to distract/confuse/enrage the bull.

Today I received a sobering reminder that cycling can be a dangerous sport and when you crash at 50+kph, it can hurt. A friend of my managed to hit the deck hard in the final sprint of a club race and landed on his face, knocking himself out and breaking his nose. He slid along the bitumen for a while before coming to a stop in the middle of the track and leaving a pool of blood.

(Please note: I did not take this photo while he was laying there in pain. Someone else did!)

Many other cyclists stood around and were reminded that sometimes taking the risk is just not worth it. In the past, if a final sprint is a bit hectic, I would simply sit up and let others contest in the craziness. I would remind myself that it wasn’t worth the risk and that I had other responsibilities to worry about such as work and family. If I broke something, I could be up for thousands of dollars to replace it. After all, it’s not like I was doing it for a living.

Today, as we stood around and waited for the ambulance, something occurred to me. Now, I DO do it for a living. Does that mean I can no longer take the safe option and think of my other responsibilities? What excuse do I have now? Can I still choose life at the end of a race when people are touching handlebars at 50+kph?

Regardless of this, one thing still remains the same. There is nothing worse than the searing pain that you feel when you have to take a shower with road rash all over your body. Nobody needs to experience that pain and I don’t think there is ever really a time when it is worth the risk.

Eat to Ride or Ride to Eat

The way I see it, there are two kinds of people that cycle: Those that ‘eat to ride’ and those that ‘ride to eat’.  Generally, I have always been the latter, using cycling to allow myself to eat pretty much whatever I want without the associated guilt trip. Doing a 6hr ride meant that I would burn enough calories to be able to eat the equivalent of enough food for two average people. During this time, I have maintained a steady weight without any problems for a number of years.

More recently, I have had to change my ways in an endeavor to lose the last couple of kilograms to get down to my optimum racing weight. This has meant that I have had to ‘eat to ride’ and consciously think about everything I eat and how it will affect my performance on the bike. To help this process, I decided to give calorie counting a go, to see exactly what my bad habits are and where I can make improvements. With calorie counting, I have come to a few conclusions….

1. When I stop cycling, I am going to get HUGE. On day one of calorie counting, even after a 4hr ride, I had to hold back on snacks and food. Riding my bike for extended periods of time is all that’s preventing me from consuming 500% of my recommended daily energy intake and ballooning out.

2. I eat a lot of food and I mean a LOT. It’s not until I see it all in a list in front of me that I realize just how much food I consume. If I could donate just half of it, there would be a few less starving third world villages.

3. A lot of food that I thought was relatively good, is surprisingly high in calories. For example, bananas, which I generally eat by the truck load, are high in calories. Almonds and other nuts are also high as is the average full cream, flat white coffee. As a general rule of thumb, if it’s green and leafy, it will be low in calories. If it’s white or yellow, it’s going to be high in calories!

4. Even the smallest treat will blow the calorie budget. A single muffin, chocolate bar, pastry or other treat can have as many calories in it as an entire low calorie meal. The problem is, temptations are everywhere. From the chocolate bars next to the register at the supermarket to the single extra piece of toast with butter at breakfast to a bottle of juice or flavoured milk, empty calories are EVERYWHERE.

5. Most products are way bigger than they need to be. No one really needs a ‘King Size’ Snickers or a ‘Venti’ cup of milk. It is just a heap of extra calories. Delicious, extra calories. Apparently, over the last couple of decades, servings sizes have grown exponentially...

6. I can understand just how easy it is for someone to put weight on. Riding a bike gives me a rather large calorie deficit that I get to fill with whatever I want, however, what does the average person do?? Those that commute to work in a car to sit at a desk all day, then drive home again in the evening do not get the opportunity to do any exercise and burn any excess calories that are so easily consumed.

None of this has really come as a surprise and I suspect that deep down, it is something that most people know anyway but just choose to ignore. It is just a lot more alarming when it is sitting in front of you all the time and you are constantly thinking about it. Despite this, I will keep counting for the next few weeks and ‘eat to ride’. Maybe it will make me appreciate those small treats a little bit more. Maybe.

Busted

I enjoy Fridays. It is the day when I get to enjoy a leisurely recovery ride with friends, followed by coffee at the local café and then followed by more coffee at the local café. Most of my friends must then head off to work while a select few get to stay and have more coffee at the local café.

Last Friday, I slept in and missed the start of the bunch ride. I woke up in a huff and my wife was wondering what was wrong. I explained that I had slept in as I put on lycra in record time and head out the door. I had missed the ride, so the ONLY option I had was to head directly to the coffee shop and then head out for my ride later in the day.

Coincidently, my wife had a conference in the city on this particular Friday and about 2½ hours after I had left home she came in to join me for a pre-conference coffee. On her arrival, she asked how my ride was. Foolishly, without thinking, I replied, ‘Oh, I haven’t ridden yet, I slept in. I’m going to ride afterwards.’

My wife looked surprised… ‘You mean you have been sitting here this whole time?’
One of my friends kindly replied for me, ‘Oh no. We were at another café just up the road for a while first.’ My wife shook her head.

I knew what was going to happen after this. In an attempt to dull the aftershock, I did an extra-long ride afterwards but I still knew that it was not going to have an effect on what was going to happen when my wife saw me next.

That night, my wife arrived home after her conference and her first words were, ‘So… how was your ‘ride’ today?’

I informed her that I did an extra-long ride and also pointed out all of the other things that I had achieved during the day. It was ineffective. Now, whenever I go for a ride, my wife says, ‘Enjoy your ‘ride’.’ accompanied by the two finger ‘air-quotes’. 

Superhuman

Most of my training rides start and/or finish at a coffee shop. I may have to meet people there or, on most rides, I stop there at the end for some R&R and about 7 coffees. This takes up a bit of time before I pedal the 20-odd minutes home.

During these stops, I don't turn off my bike computer and simply jump back on my bike to go home. Consequently, over a week, there can be rather large differences between training times and actual time spent riding my bike. For me, this is not a problem, as I only ever look at riding time or the distance covered.

A couple of weeks ago, I received an email from my coach that strongly suggested that I take an easy week as I had been training hard for 6 weeks in a row. Happy to oblige, I accepted his advice and took a couple of days off, then limited myself to a handful of short, easy rides. This also meant that I spent a lot more time at the coffee shop after rides, relaxing with my feet up. After this easy week, I went back to normal training.

 

This week, I received another email from my coach even more strongly suggesting that I take an easy week. He said that he has never seen anyone train the number of hours that I have been doing without blowing up. I was puzzled by this but continued to read. The email outlined my last few weeks of training with my recovery week consisting of 30+hrs of riding. I began to put the pieces together...

My coach had been looking at total time rather that just riding time. This meant that my average training each week was around 30 hours and in the week that I took it easy, I spent so much time at the coffee shop after rides, that it looked like I had done more training than ever!

Looking back at total time over the last few months, I can totally understand why my coach was a little concerned. I don't think anyone could put in those kind of hours on the bike without destroying themselves. Perhaps I should spend less time at the coffee shop after rides??? But then again, chamois time is training time, right??

House Husband

My wife used to finish work before me and as I was often trying to clock up extra km's on the bike on my way home from work, she was usually home well before me.

Being the spectacular woman that she is, my wife got started on dinner so that when I arrived home it was ready to go. Afterwards, it was my job to wash the dishes. My wife always said that she would love to swap jobs and that she preferred to clean up than cook.

I'm not gonna lie... I'm a stereotypical male. I don't think about making the bed, I just throw my clothes into the cupboard, I can never find things because I don't look properly and I hate doing chores.

Now that cycling is my job, the tables have turned. I am at home a lot more and arrive well and truly before my wife, so it is now my job to make sure dinner is ready and the chores are done. And some weird things have been happening...

For some reason, I seem to know where everything in the house is and now my wife asks me if I know where things are. I complain about having to think of ideas for what to have for dinner. I get irritated when my wife gets home and just kicks her shoes off and dumps her bag on the floor. I'm checking the weather to see if it would be a good idea to do a load of laundry. I am making a grocery shopping list!

Most disturbing of all, is when I get upset because my wife gets home and turns on her computer or stares at her phone screen instead of talking to me and asking how my day was.

WHAT IS GOING ON!?? The world is turning up side down!

 

Support vehicles

Normally, when packing for a race, especially one that requires some travel, I have to think of a million different things to take with me. Wheels, kit, food, water, bottles, wind trainer, pump, helmet, shoes, bike and anything else I could possibly need. Then there is the tedious task of squeezing it all into the car as well as another person’s gear as I am usually car-pooling. Quite often, I will get to the race without an essential item and have to make do without it.

Most local races require that you bring an extra person as well so that they can drive your car and wait around at feed zones to hand out water bottles and feed bags. Not only do you have to find someone that is willing to stand around in the sun all day waiting but you have to find someone that knows about cycling but isn’t racing in the event themselves.  On top of all this, Cycling QLD will require that you supply a volunteer for the day to help run the event that, ironically, you also have to pay to enter! If you don’t have a volunteer, you don’t get to race!

This ends up being a lot of organization and hassle. At the start line, there is normally someone running around desperately trying to find someone to hand out their water bottles or be their volunteer.  I have found myself in this situation on many occasions.

At Team Novo Nordisk, they are prepared for ANYTHING. Transport and equipment is not an issue with a team truck, bus and 4 team cars at the ready. 

The truck has anything that the mechanics could possibly need including a full workshop and laundry for washing kit after the race! There are enough wind trainers on board for the entire team to warm up and enough nutrition products to feed a small army.

 

The team bus allows us to travel in comfort and style and could also double as a luxury camper if needed. It has a kitchen, shower, toilet and laundry so it can be a house on wheels. As well as these essentials, it also comes with a few luxuries including wi-fi, televisions, a drinks fridge and my favourite, a coffee machine. It puts the jam-packed rental van that we normally get back home to shame.

Each team car is fitted with a roof rack designed to hold an entire bike shop. There are hooks for endless wheels and quick release holders for easy access to spare bikes. A car follows us around during each ride so that you don't have to have your jersey pockets filled with everything you could possibly need.

There is a downside for all of these support vehicles…. As they are predominantly white and drive huge distances to get to races, they always need to be washed. The mechanics are constantly having to keep them clean and looking pristine and there has not been a day where I have not seen them washing a vehicle. Personally, I think that they should save it for riders wanting a favour from them. ‘You want your bike cleaned and a new tire?.. I’ll do it once you have washed the bus.’

The Full Monty

Before joining a cycling team in 2011, I had only ever had 1 massage in my life. It was from a female natural therapy student and cost $20 for an hour and a half. I never really knew what the procedure was for getting on the table. To get naked or not to get naked? There are no signs. There are no guidelines. How is a newcomer supposed to know what is kosher? TV shows always had that episode where someone has an awkward moment getting naked for a massage but what do you do when the person doing the massage is female??? At the time, I decided to keep the underwear on.

When I started on the cycling team, we had a male soigneur but I was still not 100% sure on the whole naked/underwear massage rules so I played it safe and kept them on. After laying on my stomach and getting a wedgie because they were getting in the way, I soon discovered that the standard was to get on the table nude.

The problem was, after a handful of massages with underwear on, how can I just suddenly start going in nude? I had set the standard, can I just suddenly go and switch it around? Needless to say, I spent the rest of the year getting massages with underwear on.

At the Team Novo Notdisk training camp, I knew that I had to set the standard and go the full Monty from the start. I was a bit worried that it would back fire and there was some sort of no-naked massages policy in the team. Luckily, there wasn't.

So to all the other massage places out there... put a sign up. Tell people what they are supposed to do so they don't have to guess. I'm sure there are a lot of people out there that rely on Seinfield episodes for massage table etiquette.

A Tribute

A friend of mine (he knows who I'm talking about but let's just call him MrX), has been fishing for some praise lately as he claims to be the original stimulus for me getting into cycling. MrX believes that he is responsible for where I am today and that I owe him some thanks.

Well, he is correct, in some ways.

I will admit that MrX was the one that made me realize that I had let myself go by 'permitting' me to go for a run with him after many requests and watching me struggle for air in the gutter 3km down the road.

I will admit that MrX was the one watching a triathlon on TV that fateful day that my wife saw the handsome Courtney Atkinson exit the water and laugh at the thought of me finishing a race.

I will admit that MrX made me want to ride my bike and get fitter but it was indirectly. He made me want to ride my bike in the same way a teenage kid wants to prove their parents wrong or in the same way falling off a horse is supposed to make you want to get back on again.

When I sold my car and purchased my first road bike, I asked, nay, begged MrX to allow me to go for a ride with him but he came up with so many excuses...

'Tomorrow's ride will be a bit too fast for you. Next time though.'

'I have to sprints off the bike tomorrow.'

I'm just riding into work tomorrow.'

It is only now that I realize that it was for my own good. That MrX was putting me through the school of Hard Knocks. What doesn't kill me only makes me stronger.

I used the rejection to ride my bike every day. To train harder and harder so that one day, I may come back and hand MrX's ass to him on a silver platter.

So, MrX, I thank you! I wouldn't be where I am today without you!!

Cut throat shave

Last week I had the opportunity to tick off the first thing on my 2013 'to do' list. I ventured into Jimmy Rod's Barber Shop for a cut-throat razor shave.

Some guys need to shave everyday and do it themselves very quickly and easily because it is something that just needs to be done. Consequently, it does seem a bit odd to pay a lot of money and wait a long time to get someone else to do it for you. Despite this, I wanted to tick it off the list and assumed that it is like someone getting a manicure: you don't need it but its a special treat.

I had no idea what to expect but I had saved up a week's worth of growth just in case. I went in thinking that it was going to be a simple walk-in, walk-out operation but as it turns out, a cut throat shave is something that you need to call ahead for.

It seems that the art of performing a cut throat shave is not taught in many places anymore and it is difficult to find someone that is able to do it.

When I arrived, a young lady introduced herself and said that she would be my barber for the shave. At first, I was a little concerned by this. It would be like me giving bra advice to women. But then again, I could be very good at that.

When I sat in the chair, the first thing she did was trim my facial hair with clippers. Normally, this would be all I need and I thought that the rest was just going to be a waste of time.

The barber then put a hot towel on my face to soften the skin so that the razor blade can glide over it. A special oil was rubbed into my face and this was followed by another hot towel. The final towel was folded and placed over my eyes. I figured it was so that I couldn't see the blood when I got cut.

On television, they always portray cut throat shaves with big, long sweeping strokes so this is what I expected. What actually happens is small, tiny strokes with the barber right up next to your face closely watching each one. I could feel the barber's breath on my face as she concentrated hard. I wanted to ask how she learnt to do a cut throat shave but was too scared to move. I could hear someone in the chair next to me making jokes and talking as he got a hair cut. I wanted to laugh but was afraid that if I did, I would lose an ear or something.

After the shave, the barber rubbed some more oil into my face and I got a bit of a face massage. She then finished it off with a cold towel to close the pores again. Now I have never felt a baby's bottom but my face was what I imagine it would be like.

In the end, the whole experience was pretty much like a facial treatment for men. A few days later and my face was back to where it was beforehand but I'm not lining up to do it again just yet. If you did it every time you needed to shave, it would cost a lot of time and money!

 

The List 2013

Well it's that time of year again. The time when I come up with my New Year's 'to do' list. Life has taught me that resolutions are just too damn hard to follow through on, so I find it easier to come up with things that I would like to do during the year. You may recall 2011's last ditch effort to tick running to work off the list on the 31st of December. It ended in 3 days of pain.

2012 ended in a similar way. 'Get a tattoo' has been on my list of things to do for a number of years and on the 22nd December 2012, I finally followed through on it. After 3 hours in the chair, I finally have a tattoo.

Like last year's running effort, getting a tattoo also ended in a few days of pain. The actual pain of getting the tattoo was relatively small compared to the pain in the butt that ensues afterwards while you wait for it to heal. For the first couple of days after you get the tattoo done, it weeps plasma everywhere and needs to be covered in cling wrap to keep it away from the elements. Then, for at least a week, the tattoo needs to be covered in ointment and kept out of the sun while it heals. Normally, this wouldn't be a problem except for the fact that I need to ride my bike everyday in the sun for hours on end!

Consequently, I was forced to spend a few days off the bike over Christmas. The result: I felt so damn fat and lazy at the end of it that I had to go out to do some exercise. The tattoo has now healed and my routine is back to normal, however, the pain of waiting for the tattoo to heal is almost unbearable!

While sitting around, it gave me the opportunity to come up with 2013's 'to do' list. I had to carry a couple of things over from 2012 that I didn't quite get to but I have a healthy compilation of things to do. So, in no particular order, my list is....

1.   Make a souffle (They always make out on TV that making a souffle is so hard so I will test it).

2.   Go to a Pizza Hut buffet (I used to go to these as a kid and it has been far too long).

3.   Go to a TimeZone lock-in (What could be better than playing computer games all night?).

4.   Get a Manicure (I had a pedicure last year, so this is the next logical step).

5.   Get a cut-throat shave (I will have to save up some facial hair for this one).

6.   Learn to barista (A skill everyone should have).

7.   Take a dancing lesson (Believe it or not, I have no rhythm or flare).

8.   Go surfing (I have previously tried and failed at this).

9.   Jump in a ball pit (Why do kids have all the fun?).

10. Go Zorbing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zorbing).

11. Go to Seaworld (Again, its been too long).

12. Go to Infinity at the Gold Coast (I'm sick of seeing the ads on TV so I better check it out).

13. Go to a Sizzler Breakfast (All you can eat buffet breakfast. Need I say more?).

14. Buy a giant Chupa-Chup (Always wanted one).

15. Take a holiday on a train (Does anyone still do this in Australia).

So that is my list. I probably won't get through all of it but I will have a good go at it. In fact, I already have a gift voucher for a cut-throat shave, so if I don't get killed in the process, I will let you know how it goes. And of course, I reserve the right to change the list at any time!