Reflect on Everything to Improve

Another winter CX season has drawn to a close for me and as all racers do I look back at the races and compare with previous seasons.

Whilst looking through my notes and recollections I have decided to share some of my methodology with regard to reflection.

Mindfulness when training or racing

I have read much on this topic and am a real believer in improving my own mindfulness in as many aspects of my life as I can control.  I find that if I train/race in a mindful state of relaxation/enjoyment then I will perform at my best.  Likewise if I perform well it definitely improves my own state of mindfulness, bringing about a cycle of mental improvement which when allied with good physical training plans really brings about rapid improvements.

In opposition to this if I ride in a highly stressed (physically or mentally) state I often underperform.  This can bring about a downward cycle of mindfulness which increases stress and further lowers physical performance.  It is since I have increased my knowledge of mindfulness that I can recognise this situation quickly and acknowledge what is happening. 

It is the act of acknowledgment that allows me to break a negative cycle before it has a real grip and move myself back to the positive training cycle next session.

How do I acknowledge a problem?

Most people can recognise when there is a problem with their riding.  The difficult part is acknowledging the problem and doing something to improve the situation.

I thought it may be of use to some to share my holistic approach to race reporting and training feedback that I provide myself and my coach, Tom.  I think and hope that some of the extra information that I give will help improve both my future performances and training programmes.

Firstly I do not dwell on bad rides, I simply consider the reasons behind the bad ride and what I can do, if anything to improve next time. I do not ever expect to have a bad ride, but they do happen.

Training feedback

Using power meters, HR etc. means that I do not have to talk about the physical results from a session as these are already recorded.  What I want to get down are my feelings about the session. 

Did I find it hard?  Did I enjoy it?  Was I able to push a bit harder than prescribed?

If it was a tough session, why was that?  Riders usually know why things are not right on the bike.  My common problems have been:

• Incorrect FTP setting, meaning power targets are too easy/too hard.
• Illness.
• Mental fatigue.

I find that stress from work really effects my performance, it can and does quickly transform from a mental condition into physical fatigue when training at the limit.

Race feedback

I really enjoy reflecting on race day.  Sometimes I think I go too far and too detailed, but it is an important clearing process to improve my state of mindfulness.  I write down (type up) most of the following information each race:
How was I feeling mentally on the day - stressed, calm, happy?
Weather conditions
How was the warm up and recce laps?  Did I focus on any particular sections?  What tactics did I decide pre-race?
The start - was I controlled, technically good.
General comments on the race - did I overtake well?  Corners?  Muddy sections?
Key moments in the race?  Falling off, power lap, sprint finish
Lap times- were they consistent?  Was I riding stronger than near competitors as the race went on?

Regardless of performance I always reflect and write down positives from the race before any weaknesses.  A typical example might be

Positives:  Strong start, dismount and remounts good, better in corners than last race

Weaknesses:  Struggled on long muddy climb.  Nothing left for sprint finish.

The last statement that I record always answers the question

"Did I enjoy the race?" 

This is the absolute key question I ask each time that I get on the bike. 

After all it is the only reason that I ride, train and race. 

There is no financial gain, little praise or kudos outside of my cycling friends, it is purely a selfish personal enjoyment. 

If I answer "Yes" then I know that I will strive to improve.

I hope this is of some use to somebody.  Enjoy your ride.

Remember "This is not a Race" Part 2 - The Dirty Reiver

The Dirty Reiver Gravel Ride (NOT a RACE)

I have signed up for some silly things in the past, but this one really takes the biscuit.

200km off-road, on a drop barred bike.  Sounds OK.  Oh, and near 4000m climbing as well.  Still sounds OK.  I know, I will enter.


Time has passed and the event is here.  I have looked at finishing times for last year, it's gonna be a long day in the saddle as 10+ hours does not seem unusual.





I drive up Friday, All the gear I think I may possibly need arranged perfectly in the back of the car.
















get my tent and chair set up at the campsite.  Eat a big tea of rice and chilli.  Yum, yum.  Off to the Anglers Arms then for a quick pint.











Next morning the bike is ready, big tyres are on.  The ground is dry.  Loads of food and compulsory safety bits are in the frame bag, time to go.

7:00 is the start time.

Off you go then.  This is strange. I am quite used to cx starts, chaos, pushing, grunting and HRs to max very quickly.  This gentle clipping in and rolling through a neutral zone to the start timing gate seems odd, HR just ticking over.

What follows is hard to describe.  Time seemed to both stand still and fly by at the same time.  The day became chunks of effort.

Initially it was all about punctures.  I don't think I have ever seen as many people changing tubes in a single km.  Why were they not tubeless?  Why were people trying to overtake through the sharp middle section of gravel?  They soon learnt.

As far as I was concerned, I was going to start easy, getting my head around the different type of gravel here compared to Dalby or the moors.  Much sharper with good race lines following wheel tracks. 

Aims for the day:  Do not fall off.  Do not puncture.  Do not break anything on the bike.

As I got used to the conditions my descending speed picked up, 40mph was approached several times.  As feed stop 1 came into view I was happy, going well and looking good for 8:30 finish - top banana (which is what I ate at the stop).

The distance ticking off strategy

I have my own mental strategy for coping with chunks of time or distance.  I will use it for interval training or any set distance ride.  It is really simple, yet seems to alleviate lots of pain when riding.

As I progress through my allotted distance I break it down into easy fractions, then as I complete each fraction I say to myself "Only (something) times that I have done to go"

For example, after 10km of this ride I said to myself "Only got to do that 19 more times" and after 50km I said "do that another 3 times"

Bringing the future pain into relation with past efforts really makes daunting tasks much less daunting for me.



On to Section 2, I remember some great rocky farm tracks and feed 2 suddenly appeared.  Still on for 8:30, this ain't too bad.  More banana and away we go.

Straight into a hill.  The course took us along a valley one side of a stream, crossed and went back along the other side, climbing and into a headwind for ages.  Then there were some massive climbs, like really massive that seemed to just go on and on.  I was no longer very happy.  It all seemed to start to hurt and my distance ticking off strategy seemed to stop as I was not travelling fast enough.  8:30 was now looking unlikely. On I slogged, it seems that I was running low on fuel as well.  Time for some emergency gels and stuff.  Fuelling strategy down the pan!

Fuelling for a mega ride

I have never ridden past about 6hrs so what I thought a good fuel strategy probably was not.  With hindsight something like this happened:

Each time I ate I topped up my fuel resources, but continued to deplete these resources until I was running on vapours.

The problem is, eating whilst riding on gravel, either crawling up a climb eating my stem or hurtling downhill clinging on to the drops and brakes, eating is quite a challenge.  But accept that challenge we must.

On we go again.  Up another hill and there I see a sign.  The most evil sign I think I have ever seen.  It has 2 arrows, each pointing a different direction and asks the question "200km or 130km?"  Things were hard right there and looking at that sign as I dragged myself up the hill to the choice seemed to take ages.  My body was saying "turn right you fool" whilst my donkey brain was saying "Do not stop now, you can do this"

Without being over-dramatic, I decided to go for the full 200km, turned left and very soon regretted that choice as the hills got bigger and bigger.  8:30 as a target had long gone, 10:00 was the new target. 

Mind over body

I have become a great believer in mental strength strategies, but this one was new to me.  Cramp hit my quad quickly and it hurt.  My reaction was to clear my mind and simply tell the pain to "go away".  Strangely, yes very strangely, the pain did go and not return.



Suddenly feed 3 came into view, and what a view.  This was a real posh affair.  At one end of the row of tables was standard bananas, gels etc.  But as you moved along the row you came across fresh coffee, potatoes and even cheese.  More cultured riders than me were making mini raclettes as they supped very nice coffee.  I scoffed potatoes, butter, bananas and washed down with a great coffee.  There was hope for me.  Onto that saddle we go.

This joy was short lived, more hills combined with coffee vision to make descending tough as well.

Coffee vision

Something I suffer from when tired and over-caffeinated.  My vision blurs a little, although my contact lenses have fallen out.  Each eye is perfect alone, but both open seems to not work very well. To compensate I have to alternately close each eye for a while.


The final section was around Kielder water itself.  How many hills and sharp turns can you incorporate into a path around a flat surface of water?  Well I know, lots.

Now my distance ticking off strategy had started to work again and I was counting down the hundreds of metres to the castle and finish line.  I had completed the ride, I even rode up the road a little to ensure 200km was completed.  All done in 9:42  which apparently makes me an Outlaw.

But as it is not a race, finishing 82nd in a field of over 450 was still very pleasing.  As was finishing 29th in my age group.

The bike and stuff

I was really pleased with my bike setup.  Tubeless tyres, 40mm wide and 32psi meant my hands had no blisters by the end.  Good quality chamois butter and Miltag shorts kept my rear end comfortable on my Fizik Antares saddle.  No problems with these key contact points.

My new frame bag was really useful, easy to access for food and kept my jersey pockets empty which in turn meant no back ache.

Gravel bike on test ride to Robin Hood's Bay

I made use of 44/34 front chainrings and 11-32 rear cassette giving a great range of gears.  Juintech hydraulic cable brakes were really good as well.

Impressions of the Event

There is nothing I can find wrong with this event.  It was well marshalled, well stocked in terms of food, well signed. 

Kielder is a massive area, I doubt there is anywhere in England that is so remote.  It is stunning in beauty as well (and that from a resident of Yorkshire).  There were times when I said to myself:

             "Do not stack it here, you could be missing for days"

which tempered my riding a little.

Overriding all this was the sheer scale and hardness of the event.  I thought I had done hard stuff - 3 Peaks, Ultra marathon etc. but this was really hard both physically and mentally.

I am proud to have completed it, and completed it well.  It was great, I might be back.

Remember "This is not a race" Part 1

What a month April has been.  It has seen two of my target events for the year come and go, both were fantastic rides and experiences.


First up was the Scotton100, organised by YorkCycleworks.  This is (I think) the ninth time that I have ridden his event and I have been wanting a PB time for the last couple of years.  Last year saw me puncture and sealant failure in my tyres brought about by insufficient topping up.

This year I rode off in the second group as always, working hard in the opening miles.  As the route hit the hills around Burnt Yates I struggled a little to keep with the lead group but got back on when we hit off-road sections.  The group worked well for what seemed ages and then I moved forward on a long off-road section near Dishforth.  Working with a rider dropped from group 1 the going was tough in the winds east of the A1 and we were caught by a few other riders.

The good weather and hard work preparing for this ride ensured that I finished under my target time of 3:30, finishing in 3:28.

This will always be one of my favourite events each year.  I have no idea why, it is just fun.

This is not my limit!

The time has come for me to say goodbye to a year of racing and training, reflect on the good and not so good and look forward to future challenges.

Why this post title?

I heard a fantastic quote from Amber Pierce, a US cyclist who said (roughly)

Cycling is about bringing yourself to the limit,
pushing beyond the limit,
realising it was not the limit.
Your limit is beyond what you thought.
It is a beautiful thing.

This sums up where I am at this moment with cycling, I hope I can stay here as I like it.

Final CX races for the winter season

The Yorkshire winter season ended with some proper winter racing.  Cold, wet and very muddy were the order of the day.  Although these are my favourite conditions, and I performed as well as I could, my results were a little disappointing.  But as I have said before, the performance is what really matters and I left the races happy.

Post Novacross

I have to say that it is races like these that really test drivetrains.  Most races have plenty of broken rear mechs, jammed chainsets, chains falling off.

My 1x setup with a front "keeper-onner" has worked faultlessly all year.  I am amazed how well the gear shifting works regardless of muck, grass, panic and the chain keeps spinning.

The only thing that stops my bike is when there is so much muck between rear wheel and frame that the wheel will not turn at all.

Ilkley Muck and the drivetrain kept working!

Racing Target Met

Although I have said before that results are second iun my priorities for racing I did have a target for the winter season.  I wanted to finish in the top 10 for my age cat.  I am happy to report and reflect that I did succeed in this, coming in 9th.  No idea if this puts me in the money, but I am pleased as it shows good consistency across all races.

Reflections of a racing year

Overall I have raced really well over the last year, both in Summer cross and Winter.  I have become more powerful, faster and technically better.

Where I think I went a little wrong is the amount of racing that I did.  I seemed to go through patches of race, rest, train hard, rest, race.  Start again.  There seemed to be missing some of the fun of being on a bike and doing crazy things.  My mtb sessions have reawakened this love again, as have events such as Aggregate100 which is to be repeated this year.

Next Challenges

This year I will:

• race a little less, become better at targeting races to maximise my performance.
• enjoy training as much as I enjoy just riding
• make sure that I make time to just ride
• ride coast to coast in a day for the fun of it
• ride the Dirty Reiver 200km gravel race in Kielder Forest
• ride The Struggle sportive in Yorkshire
• SMASH the Scotton 100
• SMASH 3 Peaks (Marshalling = guaranteed place!)

The Time that I Overtook a World Champion

A couple of great CX races to reflect on, fantastic considering the time of year which always throws up its own challenges.

Can I keep going?

This has been a long year of cx racing for me.  I started way back in May and have been racing pretty much non-stop throughout the summer, autumn and winter.  Whilst I really enjoy racing there are times when I really just want to ride my bike for a few hours at the kind of intensity that I feel up to at that moment.  This is in opposition to cx training sessions which tend to be 1 hour or so in length and very much interval based (no surprises there!). 

I think the quality of my training has started to decline a little and perhaps my maximum power output has declined as well.  Coach Tom has spotted this and adapted training plans accordingly.  He has incorporated some more fartleck type activities, fewer really hard sessions and creeping some more club style rides in as well. 

Only 2 or 3 more races this winter to go at, then next year's challenges need some attention.

Shibden Hall Yorkshire Points race

What a fantastic course!  I have been there before for a Rapha race (I think), but big kudos to the organisers who designed a really testing, yet fun course.  The weather was proper wet and muddy which made the going really tough.  There were lots of falls in the races before us old gaffers got on the course.

My target for this race was to not fall off and ride within myself to ensure that I did not burn all my matches too soon in the deep mud.

Off we went, things started well.  I played to my strengths and struggled on the long, long climb where I lost places each lap.  On the long downhill with added corners I made lots of these back.  As previous races I knew where I wanted to dismount and stuck to the plan.  As before it worked well as there is nothing worse than an emergency jump off the bike.

There was a long slight uphill section that was sooooooo muddy that I had to run the majority of it.  This is where I lost most places as lighter riders did not sink as deeply as me and managed to ride through.

Proper muddy bike

I stayed on the bike, managed to clear mud each lap and finished with a good result that definitely will help me in the overall league.

This race really brought home to me that the difference that power/weight ratio makes in cx is different to road riding.  I was passed by riders that I will usually beat on a dry day.  These riders are lighter than me and (I presume) less powerful.  In deep mud if you are light you float over the top far more and can keep momentum.  Larger and (once again I presume) more powerful riders who often beat me in the dry were passed by me on this day as they struggled even more in the mud than I did.

Target for next winter:  LOOSE SOME MORE TIMBER!

Great Skills Session with coach Tom

Tom put on a cx coaching session at Yorksport which was realy enjoyable for several reasons:

• It is great to train in a group
• He set up a proper mini course with proper taped corners
• We focussed on key areas - Start, corners, dismount and remount
• I could push the limits without compromising a race which I did and fell off quite a few times

North of England CX Championship

York Cycleworks and Yorksport hosted the championship race.  I was lucky enough to pre-ride the course on the day before the race, after helping a little to set it up.  The course seemed quite big, a lovely design with lots and lots of corners that could be taken at speed.  A long slog up a hill would sort the real fast riders from the rest.

Some things will always make me giggle and this number is one of them

Race day was damp under wheel but not proper wet.  Should I go mud tyre or intermediate?  I went mud tyre to ensure that I could keep speed in the many grassy corners.


My race came around so soon, gridded riders to the front, I was mid pack in the "also there" group behind. And they are off!


The start at Yorksport makes use of the tarmac cycle circuit meaning it is a faster start than usual for Yorkshire cx races.  25mph in a close bunch, each looking to gain advantage, is a nervous place to be.

I held my position well and once off road was a lot happier.  I made good ground first lap or so then settled into a rhythm.  Once again my main strategy was to stay on the bike except for planned dismounts.

Ian Taylor with broken bike

Couple laps in and what is this?  I pass the rainbow banded jersey of Ian Taylor, World Champion in my age group.  Wow

OK, I will have to admit that he was carrying his bike in 2 pieces, but I still officially overtook and hence have a lap recorded where I was faster than the current World Champion.

He made it to the pits, got a new bike and flew past me a couple of minutes later.




This is one of the magical things about cyclocross racing.  Very few riders of any other discipline will get the chance to ride in the same race as a World Champion, National Champion or professional riders from big name teams.  I have raced with all of these, been lapped by them and have nothing but admiration for their skills, strength and regard for other riders.

Its all about the performance

We are well over half way through the winter CX season up here in Yorkshire and I have had little time to reflect on what has happened so far.  I am going to split this blog entry into two main sections - a racing type report and then some bits of thinking and reflection.

Winter CX in Yorkshire

Firstly the weather has not been very seasonal up here.  Mud tyres have not been used often and full finger gloves have only come out of the bag once.  I have raced in colder summer CX races!

Performances in the Yorkshire Points series have been pretty good.  I have developed my start into a major weapon that usually puts me in a good position after the first lap or two.  I have tried to limit the number of mistakes as I race which is a good idea as well and have mainly stayed on the bike.

Highlights include good performances and results at Northallerton, Temple Newsome and Bingley where it really showed that the hard power training prescribed by coach Tom really has made an impact. 







My best race has been Huddersfield New College which is perhaps my favourite course on the circuit.  It has proper steep bits, a fair slog section and some really fast sections.  This year it was muddy - needing mud tyres.  I recced the course well and decided my strategy in terms of "I will get off the bike here and run" for 5 sections of the lap.  The skill, of course, is not deviating from your plan as I am always tempted by the "go on, you can climb that" devil on my shoulder.  If I listen to him I will of course mess up the climb and fall off.  This time I kept to my plan and produces a good performance and also a good result.

So 6 races down in this league, only 2 more to go!

Wednesday nights have seen me racing in the Vive le Cross mini series at Hull.  Four races in near darkness around some excellent courses that make really good use of the limited terrain available.  The thing about these courses are the lack of recovery time, you are always on full gas!  The series is over and I finished in the prize money!  4th in my age category is a nice result for me.  Made even better by some really close racing against good friends in each round.  Some battles I lost and some I won.

Time for a wash

Reflections

Firstly I have been enjoying my Training plan provided by coach Tom.  It is a joint effort, I tell him how I am performing and he tells me what to do to try and improve.  We have been really successful in terms of CX speed and power and I have worked on technique.  I know that my performance in training is not always reflected in race performance, an area that we will be looking at as time goes on.  As I have written before, it is really important that if you have a coach then you need to build a relationship with that person.  Tom understands me pretty well now, he knows my strengths and weaknesses both physically and mentally.  I do not know for sure, but I think that my own specific set of needs probably throw up more challenges to Tom as a coach than "the average" rider.  I like to think that I have helped develop him as a coach in return for his help.

Up to recent weeks I have been in a really good place on my bike.  I have been very positive and realistic in my goals for each training session or race.  I have seen real progress in both as a result.

I am at the moment going through a dark patch again, many of the indicators that I have seen before are rearing up again and I am trying to avoid descending into the state that I was in a couple of years ago.  Stress and anxiety are nasty in the way that they creep up, but more nasty in the way that they change thought patterns.  In good times I will train hard and be able to push well into the red.  At the moment my legs seem to hurt more and my head is yelling at me "Just stop and give up, you are rubbish at this".  Working with Tom right now is vital, I am very good at self reflection and know when I need to rest or simply play on the bike.  Tom is as always good at listening during these times and guiding me correctly from a physical point of view.

I recently read a fantastic little piece from cxmagazine.com click to read which really summed up how I try to ride and race my bike.  I race as hard as I can, I love the feeling of a good start, overtaking friends and clearing sections that others falter on.  I am not an angel and when going full gas I have been known to question "What are you doing? or "Don't stop there!" to other riders who accidentally get in my way.
My result is not ever going to be at the detriment of other riders.  Recent examples of this that really get on my nerves include:

• Any rider who is racing you on the same lap but makes progress by shouting at you rather than overtaking.  Lapping riders have the right to warn others, racing riders should overtake using skill and strength.
• Riders who push through gridding.  I recently saw a rider who, even not gridded, managed to push through the 3 lines of grid to just behind the front row. 

Is the result so important?
I want to focus on my performance.

Perhaps this is why my training performance does not get the race result?
If I shouted at other riders more often I might gain a couple of places.
I could never take enjoyment from removing somebody else's.

And I want to be the best rider that I can, one that is good enough to overtake properly, so that is what I will try to do.

Summer CX winnings

I have been mixing up some mtb in my riding recently.  This is great training, but also brings some enjoyment back into my riding.  I love riding the road, but nothing puts the smile on my face more than riding off road.  That is where my mojo can always be found

Riding a bike is all about mojo.

Long may it bring smiles.

Summer Cross is dead. Long live #WinterCross and #schwalbeXone

Well that's it then, the end of Summer cx season and what a tough one it has been for me.  The weather has been surprisingly dry and warm which has made the courses vary in speed between fast and faster.

Last race was a couple of weeks ago in Scarborough.  In my opinion a boring course that I had targeted to perform well in and score highly in the league. 

Unfortunately the God of "Poor Preparation" sneered at me as I had not fixed my slow puncture from the gravel race the previous Sunday.  I had pumped up the tyre and it had held for several days-

"It'll be OK" are famous last words uttered by me far too often before racing and of course it was not. 

A combination of 5 years of riding and at least 6 discovered holes/splits/torn off nobbles and really poor sealing ability of the sealant I was using (and will not ever use again) led to the tyre deflating to <10psi after 2 laps. 

I chose to continue the race and use it as training effort. 

To do so I had to leave the course, ride to my car, get my track pump, return with the pump, re-join the course.  Now I was a lap down on where I should have been, but could ride again.  Every 2-3 laps I stopped to re-inflate the tyre.  Result out of the window but a good training effect.

Now I am waiting for the overall results for the league, am I in the prize money?

Preparation Starts

There are 3 weeks between Summer and Winter CX in Yorkshire, I chose to rest completely for the first of these.  I have been feeling a little up and down both physically and mentally with my riding and even lost my mojo for a day or two.  I hope that the days recovering will reignite me perfectly for the coming training and races. 

Instead I had a great week with the family camping - no bikes.  An hour pedalo and a 10k run were all I did with regard exercise.

New term, new boots

As I have binned my very old Vittoria xg pro cx tyre I have the opportunity to choose some new boots for my summer cx wheels.  I like to ride intermediates as my second pair as I just feel more prepared for changeable conditions and have decided to try some Schwalbe X One tyres.  I am really impressed with my Pro One tyres on the road bike which hold air really well and were a doddle to fit.

Where the Pro Ones could be eased on to the rim with just fingers, the X Ones have been a bigger challenge.  I had to reach for a single tyre lever to help finish the job. 

Inflation was instant and with some proper Bonty sealant inside I expect them to work well.  The tight bead will ensure that I can run these happily down to about 20psi if I want to although I usually race at about 25psi. 

The size of the tyre looks big enough for some gravel races as well which is another of my targets in the future.

Hit the Training Hard

First session since holiday was last night.  It went well, I put all I could into it and seem to have produced some good output. 

Power and power sustainability are the game for me this year, it is my main area of weakness.  Whilst I can hit pretty good power output figures, I do struggle to hold these for long enough. 

Hence coach Tom has prescribed me plenty of over/under and high power sessions to address these issues.

Power (w) over time

Guest Blogger

My good friends at  York Cycleworks approached me to write a piece for about cyclo-cross racing for their website.  They are very involved in helping riders try new types of activity and looked to me as an average Joe in the sport.  Read what I produced for them here.