I cycled for 4 years before the idea of racing came up. I was happy chasing the occasional QOM, and I admit I enjoyed being first up the climb, overtaking people, etc.
I had strava, intervals, etc and sometimes got into the numbers; sometimes just had a glance. I was on Zwift in the cold months; in 2022, I did 20,000 meters and 2,000km in 28 days. Crazy right? But it wasn’t about speed or racing.
Then fast-forward to 2025.
I had a horrible breakup. I was living in a hotel. We had a bit of early spring, and I went out on my bike to escape. I usually listen to music on rides, but I have a playlist with motivational talks, and I popped that one on. There was one in particular I listened to several times; it really helped me through some dark times.
On a random March day, I was in the forest, warm sun on me and heard these words come through the earpiece:
Now that you have nothing left to lose, do that thing that you always felt was too much of a risk to do….
Well, one of those things was really pushing it on the bike; I was always nervous if my heart rate went too high or stayed high for too long. But now I had nothing to lose.
So I pushed the pedal to the metal, as they say, and guess what? I found out I was stronger than I ever imagined, and each time I have gone back to those words and pushed that limit, I found new depths of my strength
Not psychological strength, real strength, numbers you can measure.
I was never weak, just made to feel I was.
I came back to a sea of PR’s, got more into intervals, and each ride tried to push harder and for longer. The desire to race started and hasn’t left, even though there were obstacles in the way.
Later came Zwift racing; again, same platform, used a very different way! I found I had more endurance than I ever imagined; some of those first Zwift races really did shock me!
I smashed through so many PB’s and my own ideas of what I was capable of.
I w̶a̶s̶ am stronger than I ever believed was possible.