Winter, especially in the northern hemisphere, can seem never ending this time of year. For athletes, like cyclists, you have limited options and a nagging sense whether your completing enough duration and intensity before spring events. If you are like many “northern hemisphere” athletes, it’s perhaps that time of year your focus is towards more longer duration base like workouts. But often, still the only daylight to complete these workouts are found on the weekends. At the same, weekend weather can be so unpredictable, you find yourself dreading those longer duration indoor trainer workouts when you would so much rather be outside. It’s also that time of year when athletes set lofty goals and objectives while sifting through websites and reserving those spring and summer events before late fees occur.
Winter is also a great time to self-reflect. To remember why it is you compete. Why you’re an athlete; why you like to ride your bike; why you ride that trainer. As I look back at my own time spent competing and coaching, I am always reminded that every individual has their own motivation for putting in the hours it takes to train and compete. For some if not all, its solely to podium and categorize to the next level. For others however, it’s may be sense of self achievement, self-improvement, fitness or hopes of making more progress than the last season.
I have now accepted my middle age and can proudly say I am comfortable with who I am as an athlete and coach. This winter, I have taken the time to look back at my own cycling career and the lessons learned that have helped me, not only be a better cyclist and coach, but a better businessman, father, son, co-worker and husband. I can remember that my first years as an athlete and racing, simply meant competing in every event and aiming for wins. The chance of winning is what drove those arduous interval workouts and long days in the saddle. I quickly learned that to make podium was far and few between and that so many factors in racing were outside my control. I spent countless time and money upgrading my equipment, only to find out that even the best equipment will not make the best athlete. It always has and always will come down to the engine of “the athlete” that ultimately powers the machine. I have spent years and countless hours studying, researching and experimenting with best practice training and racing strategies in hopes to find the silver bullet to training. I soon found out that there is no silver bullet to training. Training is merely knowing the science and applying it to the individual, in what we as coaches call an “art”. Winning, is being mentally and physically prepared to maximize your genetics, talents and skills to be ready for race day. Over the years, I have met my goals of upgrading. However, upgrading also meant even fewer wins and accepting many more losses. With those losses, my focus has changed from the discouragement of attempting to always to place, to focusing on my own self-improvement and lessons I learned. The real competition exists within myself and that is to be the best athlete and coach I can be with the talents I have been given. I now appreciate what competition gives to me and in turn, what I can give back to others. Below I share some of the biggest lessons I have learned and that I have applied to my everyday life.
First, Count Your Blessings
Everybody is a unique individual with their own strengths and weaknesses. Some are blessed genetically with high VO2 maxes and fast-twitch muscle fibers while others are blessed with slow-twitch muscle fibers and aerobic capacity. But overall, the primary strength of all athletes is the intrinsic motivation, drive, fearlessness, courage and ability to train hard and then toe the line in a race. Then to go out, hop on your bike, and do what you love. If that’s not a blessing, I don’t know what is.
Second, Adversity Creates Resiliency
As Gandhi once said, “Strength does not come from winning, your struggles develop your strength”. Competition has taught me the ability to bounce back from adversity whether its losing races or just not finishing races because of mechanicals or crashing. Each individual training session and race has taught me something about myself: how tenacious, how much drive or even just the fact I am willing to push just a little bit harder the next time. As an athlete, I have learned that adversity creates those points of leverage to be clearer, stronger, more open and accepting to who I am and who I want to be.
Third, It Always Comes Down to Priorities
Every athlete I ever met or coached (who is not a professional) has had to juggle the demands of their personal lives with sport. If training and competition has taught me anything, it has taught me how to prioritize. I have learned that every action creates a reaction and every choice comes with a consequence. As an athlete and coach, I have had to learn to fit training into life and ensure life does not fit into my training. I often remind myself that I don’t get paid for cycling, but I do get paid for my office job and investing time with my family (i.e. Relationships). Riding that line is always a challenge for athletes. And by planning your work and working your plan, having discipline, and including structure, training can successfully be the third wheel to the job, family, and home responsibilities. That’s when training smarter and not harder becomes so much more important. And now, with the technology athletes have at their fingertips, you can ensure those priorities are met while making the best use of the little time you must train. To sustain long term training and racing as an athlete, the goal should never be to sacrifice those priorities, but to wisely manage them.
So again, take the remaining time of this winter, to self-reflect as to why it is you’re an athlete and what you’ve gained over the course of your racing career. And as you move into the 2019 year, remember that competition and being an athlete can sometimes give us those “personal wins” we may not always realize.
