“Dear BBC, Why, Oh Why, Oh Why?”

Get IN!! A late night text from Sergeant Major Curry to say that the fitness test equipment is broken so I can’t meet him at 6am to see how (un) fit I am now. NINE hours of sleep last night and I feel like a new man and with an un-planned whole day of rest before I get back on the bike. What a rare treat! :)

It seems to me, now, that the biggest part of the challenge is not the actual 11 day ride itself, but the effort that goes into preparing for it. Not that I knew that when I signed up for it. And not to say I won’t have a different view once I am actually on the ride! To be clear, in this final phase, we are talking about at least 30 hours a week of cycling. So, allowing for a 40 hour a week job (if only :)!!) and 7 hours sleep (hhmmm :)!!) that leaves a whole 49 hours to do everything else, including preparation for the cycling, working at home and getting ready for bed. Not a lot really is it? Maybe Claire has been a bit neglected after all and I’ll have a lot to make up for (but don’t tell her I said that).

So, let’s step back a bit and take a look at what’s going on here. Why exactly am I putting myself through so much effort and physical pain? What would cause someone of sound mind and judgement to knowingly put themselves through so many hours of monotonous exercise, the lack of social life and such a huge burden on normal family life?

Well, obviously there is the very laudable desire to support the charity and to raise as much money as possible for an incredibly worthwhile cause. But I don’t have any direct experience of a family member with renal issues so I have no real connection there. Although some will have friends and families who have benefitted from the work of the team in the renal unit I am sure this is true for most of the riders taking part too.

Betfair are the title sponsor and we actively look to support the local community but that doesn’t really compel me to do many things, let alone crazy ones like this.

So, I think that for me, and many of the riders, the driver has to largely be the personal challenge involved in completing the training and the ride. I’d be interested in what other riders think about this. It’s about setting yourself a really big goal, way beyond anything you have ever done before, something that will really test you physically, psychologically and emotionally. It’s a mixture of a team event and a personal one, so it’s about working with everyone to complete something special that very few people can say they have done. It’s probably also something through which I can hopefully learn a bit about myself in the process.

That’s all well and good for when you sign up for something like this, and it may motivate you a little when you are actually in that final 11-day stretch. But what is it that makes me keep going day after day, no matter the weather, the physical condition, the workload, the family pressure during the 16 weeks in between? I once met a truly inspirational chap called Marc Woods – a County standard swimmer - he had his leg amputated due to cancer at the age of 17 but within a year of his operation he was swimming faster with one leg than he had previously with two!

He talks and writes about what drove him to perform with great passion. One of the things that stuck in my mind is that it is on the cold, wet training days many months away from the Olympic trials or finals that you need to find a reason within yourself to get up and head to the pool. Actually, you need more than one reason because there will be days when one isn’t enough. Just one will let you hit the snooze button, or say “just one day off won’t hurt.” You need at least three.

Those words have always struck a chord with me because when I was younger I often found myself coming up with comments like that. Combine that with my need for short term visible targets and I needed a change. So now I always have a list of at least Three Reasons Why that I can turn to when I am preparing for anything. For LifeCycle they are:

1. If I do the training as laid out then I will be giving myself as much chance as possible of completing the challenge. (Or at least, not completing it is less likely to be because I didn’t give it everything I could have)

2. I’ve made a commitment and a public statement as to what I am doing – to fail in front of my children, family, friends and team-mates would be terrible

3. I have a training partner waiting for me down the road that did bother, so why shouldn’t I? (and when I’m training alone, I know I have to train so I can ride with them the next time without slowing them down)

These are the things that I think about when I wake up. I start with number 1 and sometimes it works. If not, I move down to number 2 to shift my sorry body out of bed. If that fails, then there’s old faithful, number 3. So far I haven’t needed a fourth, but we have a few weeks left yet so I’ll keep you posted!

Oh, and no ride today so no final iPod song.  BUT how we could we let the news that Robbie has re-joined Take That go un-noticed?  Click here for a trip to the Oh So Tasteful 90's!

Relight My Fire - Take That