Looking back, moving forward Part 2 - Moving forward into a new epoch

Looking back, moving forward: Part 2 - Moving forward into a new epoch

I am nothing if not determined.

Determination is ‘having a strong desire for success or achievement.’ A facet of my determination is persistence and over the past years I have continued racing, even under deep difficulty, and for this persistence I have been rewarded with a second place at Silk Road Mountain Race in 2022.

Photo: Kel-Su, Kyrgyzstan, SRMR 2019. Arriving at CP3 at 04:00 in -15 C. I went on to finish 4th.
Credit: Nadia Moro

Determination can be a good quality as long as you respect it’s limits. Now, I am now older and wiser and I can see beyond simply bashing my head against the wall, expecting to get the dream outcome. In life, I want to grow as an athlete, to improve, to develop and not to degrade.

I remember, when I was perhaps twenty, I was on my bike touring in France. One night I stayed at a hostel where I met two Polish guys and I asked them about their trip. They were riding “P2P”, Portugal to Poland, doing around 200 kilometers a day. Out of curiosity, I asked them their ages, they were 60 and 65. I hadn’t put them a day over 50 years old. I was in awe of their health and strength, and since that day I knew one of my highest priorities in life would be to maintain my health and fitness as I got older, to look after my body. As we ended our conversation I said to them that, if I were half as fit as them when I hit 65, I would be more than content.

Photo: TCR no6 2018, pushing up the gravel Parcours in Bjelašnica, Bosnia.
Credit: Camille McMillan

Over this past year, it’s become clear to me that I am stagnant. Racing ultra endurance cycling events is not easy and for the past ten years it’s all I’ve done. Get up, ride my bike hard to train and then sleep. Then, a few times a year I would race for eight days straight and throw all that hard earnt fitness at the wall, in pursuit of ‘a result’. Having gained my result, satisfied or not, I would then spend four to eight weeks sitting on the sofa recovering. After 2023 I have woken up and decided I need change from this rhythm. It’s clear to me that my body and my athleticism are stagnant or diminishing, event on event, year on year.

For me, to grow as a person, as an athlete, I need to step back from racing and let my body breathe, to give it the space it needs. This decision became all too clear to me when I returned from Kyrgyzstan this year in late August. I spent September moping about the house, recovering from bronchitis and fatigue while we experienced incredible weather here at home in the Pyrenees; yet I had neither the fitness nor health to simply enjoy my true love, being outside, moving.

Photo: Aiguastortes National Park, one hour by bicycle from my front door.

Five years ago now, I set off on a journey to try to master off-road racing. In 2017 I had successfully managed to win The Transcontinental Race (TCR) for the second time, back-to-back; such a feat that even to this day it seems to surpass everything else I’ve done because it’s how I am often introduced in public. Having won it for a second time, I had felt closure on that chapter in my life, racing full tilt across Europe on tarmac. I’d achieved my goal and reached the end of the journey racing on the road. The success with consecutive first places that I tasted, on my third and fourth attempts at the race, took me a long time to digest. Naively, I was wrong to think success - which back then I measured by winning - would continue to come easily for me. Instead, in the years ahead I would endure many disappointments. Disappointments which would serve to humble me and form the foundations for the person, the man, I would become. Disappointments that I am eternally grateful for.

Returning home in 2018 from the finish of my second TCR win in Meteora, Greece, it took me some months to find the hunger for something else. Ultimately, it turned out to be not far from where I already stood. The goal would be to master ultra-endurance cycling, off-road. At this point I’d never really ridden a mountain bike, nor spent much time in the mountains so I had a lot to learn!

Over the past five years, I feel I have truly accomplished this goal and now it seems I have reached the end of this journey too. It’s not been easy, with many setbacks and difficulties. However, that is what has allowed (and forced) me to grow as a person. An unintended journey that’s been far more fruitful than the initial desire.

I might not have finished in first place in the Silk Road Mountain Race, which is perhaps unknowingly the project I had set out on five years ago; if we measure success by winning. Looking back, I don’t feel this was due to not ‘mastering’ off-road racing. Instead, put simply, racing is racing; things do not always turn out the way you wish. The reality is that having not met such lofty dreams means nothing to me, I am my best and I am humbled as a result of ‘failure’. This humility only serves to make me stronger as a result, teaching me lessons one cannot buy.

The journey, and it’s really the journey by which we measure success, has been fulfilling and fruitful, having been there or thereabouts in some of the world’s toughest races, against the best competitors, I’ve found that my best has been very good indeed. I could keep banging my head against the wall, trying to finish first but I don’t wake up with a hunger to do so anymore. I’ve truly experienced my absolute best and pushed my body to what it is capable of and this experience has been amazing. As an athlete, there is nothing greater than being in top physical shape and using it with intent.

Photo: Descending the Transfăgărășan Highway in Romania during TCR No5 in 2017.
Credit: Camille McMillan

There is no doubt, if things had been easier for me the past years and my body had complied, I wouldn’t be writing this. The hunger would perhaps still be there. If the racing were easier, I might not even be writing this because riding and racing bikes is a pretty good way to earn a living. However, the racing is hard, beyond imagination. There is a serious difference between just trying to finish an ultra-endurance event and really racing it at a full 100%.

I won’t call this a retirement, nor is it a sabbatical. I am not sure what to call it, beyond simply following my heart and letting my body breathe. There’s no doubt that walking away from my profession is going to be painful. Yes, for the past six years I have made a living and put food on the table, racing as a professional bike rider; thanks to my amazing sponsors. However one should not shy away from a hard decision just because it will cause some pain.

So I am going to let my body and mind breathe. I won’t wake up every day with an obligation to train hard, so hard that I have no energy left to live. Nor to put my health and athleticism on the line in order to feed myself and my family. Instead I am going to reclaim my athleticism for myself, to move with freedom in the mountains in Catalonia where I now live, to explore, to learn, to journey.

Photo: Backcountry skiing in Pallars Sobira with Montse - Pyrenees style.

I am not sure what the next journey of mastery will be. Suffice it to say that I am sampling different options and seeing what bites, from trail running, to paragliding to mixed climbing. I am following the Catalan way of being multi-dimensional. There is no doubt cycling is my true love but sometimes we need some distance to let the heart grow fond again.

I am going to use some of the energy I have put into training these years to put back from the other side and make some great routes and events. For 2024, L’Esperit del Bikepacking – the organisation I run with my wife Isabelle, will have two off-road events. I will continue to use bikes to go on adventures, at a slower pace and really see what’s out there, not just rush through it to see how good I am.

Beyond this I am working on launching a service to share all the knowledge I have with you, so that you can benefit and strive to achieve your goals and best. Also, if you want to learn the skills you need with me in person, I’ll be running a few ‘knowledge camps’ in 2024, 3-4 day on-bike trips to show you the ropes and build your confidence.

I will continue to work with Fairlight, Ride with GPS, Tailfin and Chris Ward. While I might not bring them exposure by racing, the knowledge I have built over the past decade chasing being my best is deep and valuable. Their much appreciated support will help me to help others on their own journeys to achieve their goals.

I look back at what I’ve accomplished with satisfaction and gratitude for the person it’s made me. Now I am looking forward eagerly to exploring the journey into the unknown, where success will be measured not by the outcome but the enjoyment of the journey.