Unleash the Monkey Army

Being a little bit geeky I have a whiteboard and markers at home. I have used it to keep track of my numbers - which has been especially important as the year has gone on! (I am pretty certain that by the end of the year my dreams will be decorated with tally charts and punctuated by the beep of the timer.) I have tended to make some incidental notes on the whiteboards as the mental juices start to flow but these incidental notes have been wiped off almost daily, otherwise I have kept a running view of up to three weeks. Last Sunday (when I first journalled this piece), the day signalled the end of week 37 and coincided with the end of space on the whiteboard. As I wiped it off the thought occurred to me that maybe there ought to be a hint of sadness at the ease with which that much works is cleared away. But actually I found it quite satisfying, having done the work, to set up a clean sheet for the next phase. The sweeping away of a footprint doesn't remove the fact of the...

End of November. Eight months done. It's quite satisfying to write that. I know I have been going for a while, certainly it feels like ages. Counting down the days as I have been keeps the journey ticking along but they are just numbers and, if I'm honest, it feels like measuring a long road-trip by the lamp-posts you drive past. But to write 8 months is like being given a gift that you weren't expecting! It is only two-thirds done but four months to go seems within arm's reach. OK, maybe for a gibbon rather than a T-Rex but nonetheless it is within sight. One of the things that I had not expected on this voyage was the down-times. Given my constant fight to keep the darkness pushed to the back corners of my mind, it shouldn't have come as a surprise, but it did. There are many things that contribute to its exacerbation - sleep and nutrition are two crucial components in keeping the hormones in check. Recovery, mobility and tissue work would not hurt ei...

People are great. They are a source of inspiration that can provide fuel for your endeavours and a boost when your motivation flags. They can provide feedback to help you learn, a shoulder to lean on when you are tired and a sense of validation of your efforts. People are crap. They leech the energy out of you. They snipe and bitch at you, belittling your efforts, desperate to suck you down into the mire of their woeful, dismal, Stygian existence. Uh oh, looks like your correspondent is full of the joys of the season. It might just be festive blues but there is also something on which I have been reflecting for a while. In sport, we recognise the effects of a good team. Even our individual sports "stars" are swift to acknowledge the work of the team of people it takes to get them there. Indeed, that has been one of the salient points of the crises that have beset cycling in recent years - the scale of the cheating and the number of people involved to make it happen. A...