Megan Hottman's Blog
CRASH! Panorama/Dr Rowland to the rescue!
July 20 -- day 2 of the Cascade Cycling classic, a 6-day stage race, 5 miles into the race, a race moto swerved in front of our 109-women peleton causing riders to swerve and brake. At the same time, the other half of the field was trying to swerve to avoid bottles and debris left by a crash in the men's field before us. The culmination: I was in the sweet spot of the peleton where the swerving combined and as we descended at high speed downhill, a rider to my left came into me and down I went -- HARD.
I landed on my left shoulder, elbow, hip knee and somehow smashed in the back of my helmet. Immediately I knew something was wrong in my shoulder. I tried to get back on my bike to race, but my race director gently pushed on my collarbone to wake me up and let me know that -no - I wouldn't be racing anymore that day. I agreed to the ambulance ride to the ER where I was told I had broken my clavicle, 2 ribs, and had a pneumothorax and was kept overnight for observation.
I was released the next day and lived with the broken clavicle until July 28, when I was able to get back to Denver and to get surgery scheduled with Dr Rowland.
This was my first broken bone ever-and therefore my first surgery ever. Needless to say I was apprehensive and nervous. Nervous the surgery could go poorly, nervous I might not be able to ride my bike right away, nervous the scars would look bad. All my fears dissipated when I met with dr rowland at panorama. He explained EVERYTHING to me and even shared his own broken collarbone experience with me.
When I arrived at OC the staff was so friendly and helped me get my nerves settled and prepared me for what to expect. Michele was superb at getting my IV started and answering my questions. My anesthesia doctor (wally hyasaka) came in and assured me he would take good care of me, which made me feel better since I was going to be put asleep with no control over my own breathing, etc. He also addressed potential nausea by giving me a drug that would ensure I wasn't sick post-op.
Then surgery was underway - of course I don't remember a thing, but dr rowland worked so hard to get all of my collarbone pieces collected and screwed to the plate- in the xray I can see my bone looks perfect, as though it was never broken! I can also see that the bone is now very strong thanks to the plate he installed, so I didn't have to baby it I could just get right back to cycling!! The area was bandaged well so that I could return to exercise right away.
The post op crew was also amazing, so friendly and patient with me. Jenna dressed me and helped me get sorted, and then time to go home!! Just 5 hours after I arrived I was all finished. I was able to ride my bike on the trainer the NEXT DAY. And 2 days post op I was riding my bike outside! 3 days postop I rode 50 miles outside with my husband. AMAZING. My recovery has been smooth sailing ever since.
This was a major surgery but was made so easy and tolerable for me by dr rowland and the entire staff- I can't say enough positive things about my experience and will recommend dr rowland/panorama/oc to everyone I know!!Racing update...
A quick email update to let you know where I've been and what's coming up next!
Last weekend I met up with our team's 3 sprinters, Liza Nicky and Tiffany, for the final 3 crits of speedweek. I was given the job of working as team domestique to chase down attacks and moves that threatened to get away in order to keep the field together for a field sprint for our top sprinter, Nicky. The plan worked! When you serve as a worker like this for your team, you often are dead last or out the back from all the early efforts, but that's ok - it's easy to throw my race away (and my own personal result) for a teammate who is capable of delivering the results! And she did -- Nicky ended up on the podium Sat and Sun, which bumped her to 3rd overall for Speedweek and our TEAM finished 3rd overall so we all got to take the podium!:
When I returned from Speedweek, I returned for my 2nd cortisone shot in my lower back. I really hope it does the trick! If nothing else if gave me the chance to visit my sponsor, Panorama Orthopedics again. I LOVE PANORAMA!!!!!! everyone there is so friendly and fun. Dr. Brown is fantastic, I highly recommend him!
Next on my race schedule: a criterium in Boulder this Sunday (May 15) at University Hill, a Criterium in Louisville on May 21, and one in Aspen May 22. Then I'll be racing the memorial day weekend events in Superior -a crit and the infamous Morgul Bismark road race. Feel free to come out and watch and cheer, racers love spectators!!!
Moving into June I'll have my first big track race and am hoping my new track team 2011-12 skinsuits from Primal will be finished (with the Panorama logo on them!!)! The race is held at the velodrome in Blaine, MN and is called the Fixed Gear Classic -- 3 days of racing with strong fields and solid prize money. Can't wait!! After that I'll likely stay in MN for part of the "Tour of America's Dairyland" which is a 10-day road racing event in 10 different cities in MN.Follow along on twitter (meghottman) or my blog at: megan2012.com if you'd like to read more.
Thanks for reading!
World class service at Panorama/Golden Ridge!!
Unfortunately, the downside to riding a bike a lot is that back pain results. In my case, it was determined (thanks to an MRI last week at Panorama) that I have a minor protrusion in my lower lumbar spine. This back pain has continued to progress each month -not enough to keep me off my bike or to prevent me from training, but plenty to cause me pain and especially loads of discomfort after my training sessions.
Long story short . . . today I had my cortisone injection with Dr. Brown and his crew. AMAZING customer service provided in pre-and post-op, lots of laughs with Dr. Brown's assistants, and painfree and FAST treatment during the injection. It was fast, easy and painless. I can't say enough good things about my experience with Dr. Brown and the staff at Golden Ridge Surgery Center, located in Panorama.
THANK YOU!!!!!!!
First World cup a success!
A quick note from LA, where i'm spending the 10 days between world cup 1 and 2 ;)
We returned from Melbourne a few days ago, where we raced our first ever world cup. We posted a time of 3:38. The winning team were the aussies, posted a 3:22 smoking fast! To give you perspective, the winning time at us track nationals back in Sept was 3:46, so my team was very pleased with our time! shown here -emy (melb, AUS), me and Jen (seattle, WA)
Check out the link to cycling news, which featured a photo of me from our team sprint - you can see the panorama logo on my side WOOT WOOT!
http://www.cyclingnews.com/races/uci-track-world-cup-i-cdm/session-2/photos/150680
Next -- on to Cali Columbia for our 2nd world cup, Dec 16-18!
Track nationals update
I'm writing from LA, where i've been for the past week for track nationals. I raced 6 events as part of the omnium, then I raced my first-ever team pursuit with two other gals from CO and we took 4th! Yesterday I raced the scratch race and then the 3k pursuit. I qualified 4th fastest in the pursuit so I made it into the finals ride for bronze. Unfortunately my legs were roasted and I just couldn't best my competition so I ended 4th - I was very pleased with this result!
2 more races - points race today (qual and finals) and madison tomorrow!
road season is a wrap -now onto track season!
well, the road season has officially ended for 2010. Hard to believe it! I wrapped up the season that began for me back in March and consisted of over 50 race days, this labor day weekend with a 4-day stage race in Steamboat. I had put in a pretty monster training session at the velo thursday afternoon, followed by Thurs nite velo racing, so I came into the weekend with what coach called a "fatigue handicap." Therefore I had to be very true to my real goals for attending and couldn't vary from them, as hard as it was at times.
Day 1 was the prologue TT with an uphill finish. I took 2nd to Jeannie Longo (who put 40 seconds into me in 10k!). Day 2 was a hilly circuit race with technical descent in Marabou Ranch - SAWEEET course on normally-closed roads. Longo rode away from us mid race. Towards the end we had a very small group of riders left including teammate Kasey. Toni Bradshaw of Vera Bradley attacked up the final climb but began to fade, so I countered and took 2nd and the time bonus.
Day 3 was a brutal road race. Only 50 miles with some climbs, but we started at 1pm and the wind never died down below 25mph. Early on, Jeannie, Toni and I rolled off the front. Teammate Kasey was just a few bike lengths back so I told Longo I would not pull through until she caught on. Longo proceeded to berate me for my "stupid tactics" and as I sat on her wheel, she "jake braked" meaning she locked it up hoping I'd rear end her. I swung out to her left, at which time she proceeded to push me on my back and told me to get riding. I just sat up and let her ride up with road with Toni. Life's too short to spend 50 miles with someone like her. They proceeded to put minutes into our chase group - mainly because our chase group refused to get organized and I eventually quit trying to form a paceline. With a few miles to go, Kasey rolled off the front of our group and no one chased, allowing her to make up significant time in her GC standings. I finished the stage 6th and was feeling pretty punished for having spent a good deal of time in the wind. It was a really really tough day for as short as the stage was.
Day 4, Monday, was the crit. A rectangle with slight rise through the s/f and a short popper hill on backside, with the descent into a headwind. The race was fairly active but the final 15 minutes was where the action unfolded. Kasey and I each sprinted for $50 primes -yeah! We ended with a group of 5-6 of us and on the final lap Longo attacked me and got just enough of a gap; I couldn't close it before the line. So, 2nd for me. Kasey pulled out a sweet sprint, taking the 3rd place time bonus and with that effort, moved herself up in GC from 6th to 4th overall! So we had 2/3 of the crit podium - super!
final GC: Longo, Bradshaw, Hottman:
It was a nice weekend of training in preparation for track nationals which are in 3 weeks, and it was a positive way to end the road season and my tenure with the team that I've run for the last 5 years.
Well done to all the DFT ladies that raced this weekend, including Roberta (5th-SW3) and Becky, Jennie and Shannon in the SW4 race!more great results to report!!
Here are two stories written in local papers that tell the story of my weekend last weekend ;)
http://www.dailycamera.com/top-sports/ci_15488564?source=email
http://www.timescall.com/sports_story.asp?ID=22691
I am really excited and reassured by the successes i'm enjoying on the local race scene. Next week I will put the legs to work at a national stage race -the Cascade Cycling classic!
Winning streak!!
Since I last posted, I've enjoyed some great successes, winning the Colorado state Time Trial Championship and the next day, taking the win at the Niwot Criterium.
Last weekend I ventured up to Laramie, Wyo, where I managed to pull off the win in each of the 3 stages - RR, crit and TT, taking the overall win.
Over the July 4th weekend my teammates and I journeyed to Lawrence for the Tour of Lawrence - street sprints, circuit and crit. Read here to read the recap and view the photos! http://dftwomen.blogspot.com/2010/07/tour-of-lawrence.html
Thanks for reading!!!!!!!
Fixed Gear Festival!
So this past weekend I embarked on my first multi-day track race event -pretty much ever, other than nationals in 2007. It was held at the velodrome in Blaine, MN. I came into this pretty darn green and inexperienced, mainly going to learn as much as possible and to start wrapping my head around track techniques.
I arrived Thursday night and was treated to dinner with a local track cyclist and his wife and my coach. They returned me to the campus where the velodrome is located, since there is a also an on-site dorm, which was to be my housing for the weekend. Entering my dorm room definitely brought back memories of college a few years back -it was pretty spartan. I actually called around to a few hotels nearby to try and get a room bu they were all booked up due to a hockey tourney in town -so I fell asleep but woke shortly thereafter with mega-stomach problems and ended up being up all night sicker than a dog. Sleepless night + empty belly = no energy and not at my top performance. Friday was spent trying to recover while attending 2 track seminars presented by my coach. Friday night racing began at 6pm and while I was starting to feel physically better I wasn't 100%. I raced really poorly in all of my Friday night events -200m, the 1-mile scratch for 9th place in sprint heats, the miss-n-out (eliminated in the first round due to poor positioning) and the points race taking 7th. I just couldn't get my head on straight and was feeling a bit overwhelmed with all the newness coming at me at once. Still -going into this event I knew that'd be the case and so I just went with it, soaking up lesson after lesson like a sponge.
Saturday I got to the track in the morning and got in an hour warmup and a few races began before the rain hit. And the rain continued - all day. So the track was closed and we got a day off. This made for a challenging Sunday, having 2 schedules combined into one day! However by Sunday I was starting to get my wits about me.
Sunday started off with my first-ever madison kilo, which is a team event. I haven't done exchanges before so we did a quasi-madison - it was a good opener for the legs. Next we did handicap qualifiers -I took 2nd in my heat. Moving into the final heat i was still trying to get a sense of how best to race this event. Well - I learned how not to race it, coming in 6th, whoops. Immediately after we lined up for the tempo which offers points every lap for 12 laps. I sat in and waited till the last 3 laps to grab my points, taking a 2 lap flyer for 4 points, giving me 3rd in the event. After these I was feeling pretty toasted, so was relieved for a short break. Somewhere in here was a scratch race, which went well with me, Cari Higgins and Kacey Manderfield all getting off the front and lapping the field twice, I ended up 3rd.
My last race of the weekend was a 2nd points race. I sat in for the first half of the race and then jumped to try and lap the field. I got about 75% of the way there and just . . .kept . . .trying . . .and then slowly the gap started to grow again and then the field surged and I just couldn't close it . . . darn darn darn!!!! People were screaming for me and the announcer was trying to give me a boost - I so wanted to take a lap and enjoy those 20points but it didn't make it. So I stayed away long enough to scoop some points and then dropped back into the field and then punched it in the final sprint for another couple points. This gave me 3rd. In the overall for the weekend, I finished 4th in the endurance omnium. I had hoped for a top 3 placing but well - next time!
All in all I went home very satisfied with the results in light of everything going on, and I learned so much I am now brimming with information that I can't wait to apply in my next track race!
Results and recap here: http://www.naturevalleybicyclefestival.com/Festival/Fixed-Gear-Classic/June-13th-Results.aspx
Memorial day weekend blog update
Read here to see how we're doing at the 3-day event taking place in Superior, Colorado!!!
http://dftwomen.blogspot.com/2010/05/superior-morgul-omnium-update-after.html
Wow busy two weeks!
My last blog posting was from stage one of the gila. Our team went on to race days 2-5 of the event, which concluded Sunday May 2nd. My crash on day 1 really set me back in time and I spent the rest of the race trying to claw my way up in GC. I took a 13th place on stage 2 and stage 5 and did well in the TT and crit - eventually ending up in 17th GC when all was said and done. I went to the Gila for a top 10 result, but the crash in the first stage was a setback I just couldn't overcome. Nevertheless, the race was a huge success for our team - we survived 60-80mph winds, snow on the final stage, and the brutal stages the event offers.
After Sunday's "Gila monster" stage concluded, Rob and I loaded up the tahoe and drove back to denver, arriving around 1am on Monday morning. I spent Monday and Tuesday unpacking, doing laundry, paying bills and just trying to get organized, before hitting the road again on Wednesday morning. This time it was a 12 hour drive in the opposite direction - Fayetteville, Arkansas. My teammate Kat and I were able to borrow the Treads van and we took off for the humid south. We arrived there very late Wednesday night. This race was a 4-day stage race called Joe Martin Stage Race - also an NRC (national race calendar) event.
Unlike the Gila, which features tough climbs at altitude that really separate out the racers, JMSR has rolling courses at just above sea level, which means fitness isn't the issue -tactics and willingness to duke it out at the final sprint become the focus.
Stage 1: short and sweet uphill time trial - 10 minute effort.
Stage 2: 61 mile road race (ended in field sprint)
Stage 3: 69 mile road race (ended in field sprint)
Stage 4: technical 12-corner, hour-long criterium.
Our guest rider, Laura Van Gilder, took 2nd place on stage 3 and Kat also took 5th that day - which was excellent! Laura also went on to take 6th place in the criterium. There were 10 crashes in our women's crit so our team was luckily and blessed to avoid the wipeouts!
Right after the crit, my teammate Kat and I loaded up the van and drove back to Denver, arriving late Sunday night.
JMSR wraps up 6 weeks of 4 major stage races for me. I have successfully "raced myself into shape" for track racing! My first track race is in 2 weeks in Frisco, TX -I can't wait!!!
Gila stage 1 is in the books . . .
read how the race unfolded on our team blog: http://dftwomen.blogspot.com/2010/04/gila-day-1-good-bad-and-ugly.html
Sea Otter Recap
4-19-10: back home in Denver after my trip to Monterey and Santa Cruz, CA for Sea Otter and the Santa Cruz crit. If I had to rate the weekend solely on my results, I'd give it an F. But I'm rating it on fun, gaining fitness, bonding with teammates and host family and other cyclists and generally having a blast the entire time - it therefore receives an A+.
I flew in Thursday morning and was racing the Sea Otter crit just a few hours later on Liza's bike (she lent me her spare so I didn't have to fly my race bike out). I had some mechanical problems and kept dropping my chain so after chasing back on a few times, I was officially OTB. Rather than quitting I decided to maximize the chamois time by TT-ing the rest of the race. Liza made the front group and took 7th -which was great!
Friday was the Sea Otter road race. It is only 47 miles so it's raced hard and fast, more like a circuit race. On the second-to-last time through the feed zone, a small group got off the front and I wasn't where I should have been when it happened. Still got plenty of racing in though, as the main field I was in still wanted to race hard -so there were plenty of attacks and accelerations before we hit the final 2 or 3 mile climb to the finish. I ended up 14th. Tiffany suffered a mechanical and had to stop racing. Friday night our host family had a grill party at their place which was an absolute riot.
Saturday was the circuit race. This year we were to race for 2 hours so I wasn't sure how many times that meant we'd have to climb the hill on Leguna Seca. It was a lot. The first 45 minutes were very mellow. At around 1:15 to go, teammate Liza launched a solo attack and got up the road. She was joined by a Touchstone rider and they soon had 40 seconds on the field it was great! With about 50 minutes left some of the teams decided enough was enough and launched an attack in the feedzone. 11 women quickly got off the front. I was in the main field, which closed in on them but never could reel them in. They finally got out of sight and we all got serious about racing for 12th place. The last 3 times up the climb I wasn't sure I'd make it, so on the final lap it was all I could do to remain in the field for the sprint. Liza did great, sticking out 15th place. I was 30th in the same field. I'd be curious to know how many we lost during the race, it was pretty freakin hard. Tiff and I were stoked with the hill repeats we accomplished.
Saturday afternoon was magical because Jono proposed to Liza and we all got to share in their celebration and excitement. It made an already awesome weekend absolutely memorable!
Sunday morning we rolled out of Monterey and made for Santa Cruz. There was a local norcal crit there and we'd decided to make this a 4-day training block, so we kitted-up and warmed up along the beach. The crit course had a couple technical spots and a nice climb in it -the race was 30 laps. So I figure that gave me 50 hill repeats in 2 days ;) I tried to follow the moves and get into a break during the first 10-12 laps of the race but nothing stuck. 2 girls rolled off the front and no one reacted, I thought for sure it would come back. then a 3rd bridged up and they were gone. DOH!!!!! Missed it again!! I tried to bridge up and spent a lap off the front but didn't make any progress and came back to the group. Worked hard on good position with 3 and then 2 laps to go. On the final lap I slid back a bit too far and didn't finish as well as I'd hoped.
All in all, great QT with teammates tiff and liza, great excitement with the engagement, fantastic host family fun and great training in the races. I'm very pleased.
Red Rubber Ball
When you bite off a big goal like I have -trying to make it to the Olympics - it is easy some days to get discouraged or to feel like the goal is almost too big or too far away. So -I tend to find inspiration any place I possibly can -whether it's watching old Tour DVDs or reading former Olympians' stories or just scanning feel good motivational books, I am always working hard to inject optimism and hope and fire for my dreams into my mind. Years ago a friend gave me this little book called Rules of the Red Rubber Ball. I thought I'd share its rules with you:
Steps to pursuing your life's purpose:
1. Commit to it: the desire to follow your red rubberball must come from deep within you. The urge should feel irresitible, as if it's percolating up from your soul.
2. Seek out encouragers: Sustaining your life's work cannot be done alone and you must build relationships with people who have a genuine interest in you and appreciate your commitment to your red rubber ball.
3. Work out your creative muscle: Pursuing your life's work requires constant creativity because the paths will not always be obvious or easy to follow.
4. Prepare to shine: each day is an opportunity to live out your life's work. There will be quiet moments as well as defining moments, which -- if you shine --will propel you further than you ever imagined.
5. Speak up: never accept the boundaries imposed upon you. To truly honor your red rubber ball, you must alter the course when necessary.
6. Expect the unexpected: for all your planning, events will sometimes unfold in ways you could never have predicted. But if you expect the unexpected and embrace it, you will still stay true to your red rubber ball.
7. Maximize the day: each day contains 86,400 seconds --that's 86,400 opportunities --to chase, kick, catch and run after your red rubber ball.
-excerpts, "Rules of the Red Rubber Ball" by Kevin Carroll
Redlands was a success!
... our first big NRC race of the season is now in the books. Our 8-woman Redlands squad just finished a grueling 4-day event yesterday. It consisted of a TT, road race, crit and circuit. The race began with about 120 women and ended with less than 90! We took a 9th place in the road race and 14th place in the crit, which were fantastic results. I was our top-placed rider in GC results, coming in 45th overall. You can view all results at www.redlandsclassic.com.
3 of our girls had little or no NRC racing experience, so one of our goals was to expose them to that level of competition and teach them the ropes. The other goal was to use Redlands for training as a spring board into the rest of the season. Most of us came from snowy cold places so we knew we'd face tough competition from the warmer states. We were up against world and national champions from several countries, former olympians and teams that absolutely dominate the national and world circuit. Of the 17 teams that began, we finished 12th overall in team GC.
More importantly, our women had fun, they got along, they represented our sponsors well in their conduct on and off the bikes. I couldn't be happier with how things went! You can read more and see photos at our team blog:
redlands bicycle classic!!
I am with my road team (sponsored by panorama!) Out in redlands, ca for a 4 day bike race called the redlands bicycle classic. Today was the prologue, a 3.1 mile uphill time trial. It was tough going all out for 12 minutes! The weather is fantastic here, unlike that of denver on wednesday. 4 of us had flights cancelled due to denver snow and didn't even think we'd make it, so I am very grateful just to be here! Tomorrow we have a gnarly and technical road race in beaumont, ca. You can read about the race and view results at www.cyclingnews.com or velonews.com. Thanks for reading!!
How I became a bike racer . . .
I've been asked a lot lately by various folks, how it was that I got into cycling. I thought a lot about this question and looking back, I think it was the convergence of 3 different factors, that resulted in me becoming a road cyclist. For me, it was an evolutionary process, it certainly did not happen overnight.
The first was the gym where I taught Kickboxing in Omaha Ne. I was big into martial arts, TaeKwonDo, JuJitsu, yes even the Billy Blanks videos. I loved teaching kickboxing and in fact was teaching about 6 classes/week. My supervisor said they needed more Spinning instructors at the gym and asked me to attend the Spin certification. This was 1999 and I thought it was nuts that people would want to sit on a stationary bike and workout. Nevertheless, I wanted to help out so I got certified and began teaching a spin class there. I used words like "criterium" as though I knew what they meant. We did things like "jumps" in class because that's what I'd been taught to do. I bought a pair of "clip in" shoes to use on the spin bikes. The whole things seemed silly to me, but the class members were fun and patient with me as I adjusted to lycra.
The second was in 2002. My parents lived in Chicago and I was out visiting them that August. My mom was an executive for the US Postal Service and this was during the time that Lance and the Postal Team were dominating the cycling scene (not that I knew this, since I paid no attention to bike racing). The USPS had a VIP tent set up at Downers Grove (the US Criterium national championships) where they entertained their biggest postal clients, and my mom had secured VIP passes for my dad and I to sit there and watch the bike racing, while meeting the postal team (Floyd Landis among them), getting their autographs. The whole thing was pretty interesting to me, but the true moment of reckoning came during the women's pro/1/2 event -watching those women tear up that course, and watching Tina Pic win convincingly. It caught my attention. I said "I can do that" and vowed to return next year with a bike. (Which I did in 2003, 2004, and in 2005 raced in the pro/1/2 event as a new CAT 2 . . . but I digress).
The third happened in late 2003. I had done my first criterium in August 2003 and a few other races and was starting to figure things out as a new CAT 4 racer. I raced a 1/2 ironman in the Ozarks and then decided to race the final criterium of the season the next day -as you might imagine, doing anything the day after a 1/2 ironman isn't smart, but something compelled me to drive to Lincoln NE for this race. It was there that I met my now-husband, Rob. On my way to register for the race, I dropped my race license and he picked it up. Weeks later we were doing lots of bike riding together. Rob had a lot more cycling experience than I did, and he began to teach me the sport. I was in my final year of law school and was focused on my professional aspirations after law school. But cycling became a really big part of my life (as did Rob -we were married in 2005 at a bike race!).
Fast forward to 2010 and I've been racing my bike for 7 years now. I upgraded to a CAT 1 in 2008 (something I never thought possible!) and I started a women's team that has become a very successful organization (again - something I never imagined I'd be doing!).
So -that's how I became a bike racer ; ) (and in case you were curious, I've been teaching spin classes for 11 years now!)
Thanks for reading!
First 2 months of 2010 . . .
The last 2 months have been tumultuous to say the least, trying to figure out how to put full time training together with full time working. These 2 things consume just about every moment of my time, which makes building in recovery time and additional sleep quite a challenge (not to mention necessities like buying groceries! Plus there's our team to run!) Needless to say, my house has grown increasingly messier and I've had to ask my husband to handle a lot more of the day to day minutia but I am finding my rhythm.
I have learned that planning ahead is crucial; my days are mapped out with extensive detail to be sure I can fit it all in. Because I usually ride mid-day from work, I leave the house in the morning with about 5 bags of stuff - breakfast, lunch, snacks, clothes, bike, bike stuff . . . with all of those things I have to remember to bring along, there have been days I've forgotten to pack a crucial piece of riding gear, such as a sports bra or jacket . . . those days I've had to improvise or reschedule my ride. There have been small obstacles like people parking in one of the 2 spots in the garage where I can get my bike out of my car ;) There have been weather-related obstacles, like having a 4 hour ride planned only to wake up to snow (like the last 4 sundays!!!). It seems like work stress is usually highest on the days I've done my hard intervals so I am literally mentally and physically beat down by the end of those days and it takes me extra time to hit the reset button.
All of these little setbacks have required me to try new approaches, new ways of minimizing stress, I've learned not to stress over things I can't control because I simply don't have that energy to spare for things I can't change. I've also had to learn to temper my frustrations when something pops up that disrupts my schedule for the day. The bottom line is you simply can't control every variable, but what I can do is try to work my absolute hardest each and every time I am able to train. Luckily for me, these frustrations were happening during the 2010 winter Olympics and I was reminded by those athletes that "everyone faces challenges; what defines you is how you overcome them."
The information on this site is purely informational and may not pertain to your specific ailment. It should not be taken in lieu of a doctor's advice!
