Category: Sports

Ok, this wasn’t a real hobby or any real attempt to be seriously good at it. It isn’t anywhere an Olympic event either but I did try it, so I guess it qualifies.

I did it on a trip to Australia in 2001. The real reason for going was to watch the Lions rugby tour. My mate Rosie and I had been contemplating going to see the Lions play for years but had never managed it. To be honest our track record of supporting England had been so abismal that it was probably a good job. This time though, one of my University mates, Wyn (or Hoop), was out living in Sydney so we had a good chance to wangle tickets. There was no guarantee we would get any but we decided to take the chance and book flights and make a holiday out of it.

The loose plan was to fly to Sydney to watch the third and final test, then do some travelling around. Hoop was being a trooper and doing his best to get us tickets, so we felt pretty confident we’d be sorted when we got there. Sure enough, we landed on the morning of the test match and Hoop confirmed he’d got us in. Result. The series was tied at one each, so this was a decider. It was perfect. Hoop had actually followed the whole tour and had had an amazing time with the rest of the travelling fans.

We arrived in Sydney around lunchtime after booking in to our hostel in Kings Cross (familiar stomping ground for backpackers). The city was full of Lions supporters wearing the red replica shirts. The atmosphere was fantastic. Everyone wanted to get in to the ground and the fans were in fine voice in all of the pubs. We had a few pints before heading to the Olympic stadium on the train singing all of the home nations anthems on the way.

For the game itself we were right at the back, high up in the gods. The view was great though. It felt like a home game. There were so many Lions fans in the stadium that the Australian rugby football Union handed out yellow scarves to the home supporters to try and even up the crowd. From start to finish there was singing, the Aussies were drowned out.

Even though it was a great game, the Lions lost. Our track record of being unlucky supporters remained intact. After the match, the atmosphere quickly changed as the Aussies turned out to celebrate and gloat. Fair enough. I think we would have done the same if the roles had been reversed.

Completely jet lagged and hammered, Rosie and I skulked back to our hostel around 2am to get some kip. We didn’t wake up until 5pm the next afternoon. Parched, Rosie woke up and headed out of the hostel to get some water and got propositioned by a prostitute. On being offered a blow job, Rosie spluttered ‘I just want some water!’.

We eventually made it out around 8pm and headed off for a curry and some more beers (as you do in Sydney). Thus followed several days of the same routine before we were joined by my partner at the time and caught a plane up to Cairns to see the Great Barrier Reef. Before making the trip I had heard from a friend on a marketing course I was on that their Aunt and Uncle were trip organisers in Cairns. I was reliably informed that they would sort us out with a ‘mates rates’ scuba diving excursion. Sure enough they duly obliged and we got booked up with a company run by an American guy. This was a two day trip involving a series of day dives and an optional night dive. Sounded good to us.

I didn’t actually realise that you weren’t supposed to do this kind of thing unless you are PADI qualified. The crew didn’t seem too bothered about any of that so we weren’t either (it wasn’t until later on that we found out that the ‘American’ was heavily frowned upon by all of the other companies for his lax approach to safety. Useful information in hindsight of course). We got a quick introduction to the basics of using scuba diving gear and ‘equalising’ to relieve the pressure in your ears by holding your nose and blowing. We were also told to give an ‘OK’ single with our fingers and thumbs rather than thumbs up (this would mean we wanted to go back up to the surface). Armed with this paper thin knowledge we embarked on our diving adventure.

It was great. As we were complete novices, we got assigned an instructor who was with us all of the time. This turned out perfect as he was able to show us all of the best things in the reef we were diving on. The sea life was incredible. The water was crystal clear with so many brightly coloured fish to see. The highlight was a well known fish called Sam, who was a Great Maori Wrasse that was about 50 years old and had a peg tooth. It was so tame that you could swim up to it and give it a cuddle. If you put your hand over its nose it would swim upwards in to it. It was like swimming underwater with a pet dog.

We decided to give the night dive a go too. Looking back I’m not sure this was the cleverest move given how inexperienced we were but it felt like too good an opportunity to miss. Our instructor reassured us that it was perfectly safe. All we had to do was follow his lead and we’d be fine. He did forewarn us that our underwater torches would act as food detectors for some fish that would be swimming behind us. What he didn’t mention was how big they were. A few minutes in to the dive my torch shone on some colourful fish and two massive Great Trevallies shot past to chase them. They were about six feet long and looked prehistoric. I didn’t quite mess my swim shorts, but it was close.

The rest of the dive was largely uneventful apart from seeing a whole array of different sea creatures. A completely different set of animals come out at night, including puffer fish, fish that sleep in bubbles and other amazing sights.

After getting out we were getting our gear off when we heard some noise from the side of the boat. We saw some of the crew throwing food in to the water. Taking a closer look we leaned over the side and saw what they were feeding. About half a dozen Bronze Whaler sharks. They were huge. They must have been about eight foot long and they were ripping the food to bits. Think Jaws food frenzy. Safe to swim at night, my ass.

That night we slept on the boat and then got up early for the next dive at sunrise feeling slightly less confident in the safety of our adventure. However, we needn’t have worried. It was just as stunning. It might not have been in accordance with recommended diving etiquette but I’m so glad we did it. It was definitely the highlight of the holiday. To have experienced the reef so close was incredible. I’m sure there are lots of ecological reasons not do it as the amount of tourism can only be damaging to the coral but it’s an experience I’ll never forget.

After that we did a few other trips including a two day stay in Cape Tribulation. We stayed in wooden huts next to a a white sand beach. As with many parts of Australia there were all manner of animals lurking about. We saw a Kimono dragon who lived underneath one of the huts. Perfectly harmless apparently, all ten feet of it. Salt water crocodiles swam in the water and we were told to look out for spiders in our huts. Just an average day in Oz.

The whole holiday was 3 weeks in total. We spent a few more days in Sydney when we flew back from Cairns. We took in the Blue Mountains and Bondai beach before we got back on the plane home. It was a great trip and it was good to do it on the fly by staying in hostels. I never got round to doing a gap year like some of my mates did so it gave me a little flavour of it. I kind of wish I’d done it looking back. I did my year in France for my third year at Uni so I suppose that was my version of it (but with less hostel beds and more showers).

I’ve never done scuba diving since. Not sure I could top the Great Barrier Reef anyway and scuba diving in the UK seems to involve jumping in to zero visibility quarry water. Er, no thanks. I’ll stick to normal open water swimming in zero visibility instead.

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I’m not going to even pretend I can play cricket. I really can’t. I think I’ve probably played it twice and I was terrible. The only time I remember playing at school was during a PE class. I was fielding and someone hit a ball high in the air. Where I was standing, I was perfectly positioned to catch it. I watched it all the way and readied myself as it came down. I completely bottled it. I jumped out of the way and watched it thud on the ground. The PE teacher went nuts, quite rightly.

My Grandma played cricket and loved watching the test matches on TV. When my brother and I were over there when she was looking after us whilst my mum was at work, we would quite often have the cricket on in the background. My brother got quite in to it, and is still a fan but I had limited interest.

I’ve been to see two live matches. The first was England v Sri Lanka at Edgbaston. I went with my mates from school (Rob, Meadie, Rosie, Nige and Jace) with the sole intention of having a fun day out. We decided to dress up as grannies. I’m not entirely sure why, but it made the day more memorable. We met up at my mate Rob’s house who lived fairly close to the ground. The day started off with some dodgy cocktail drinks and descended from there. We took a stack of cans to the ground but had to neck a few each before going in as we weren’t allowed to take them in. This was a bad start. I’m not the best drinker anyway but drinking at 10 o’clock in the morning was a recipe for disaster.

It was a really sunny day, so it was perfect for sitting in the stands. We took it in turns to go to the bar and steadily drank all day. The cricket was very much secondary to the day. To be honest I can’t remember much about the game and have no idea what the result was. A couple of the lads fell asleep later on in the afternoon. This was like a red rag to a bull. We drew all over them with lipstick. Jace in particular got covered with writing and rude pictures. he wasn’t impressed when he woke up but it was pretty standard for any one of us that fell asleep. It was a good day out. On the way home Meadie and I had a handbag fight and were told to pack it in by a Police officer who was clearly unimpressed by our drunken antics. It must have looked ridiculous.

The second time was a similar day out but this time with my Uni mates, Simeon and Closet. We also went to Edgbaston, but this time to watch England v Pakistan in a one day international. We hadn’t seen each other for a while so rather predictably we made the most of it and got fairly drunk. Each time any of us we went to the bar we got a different type of round in. I don’t know how much we drank but it was a fair amount. The atmosphere was great, and like the last match everyone that was there was in good spirits. We didn’t get dressed up this time but the were plenty of others that were. I also have no idea how that match ended either. At the end of the day we got on separate trains and headed back to our respective homes.

So, in summary, I have no interest in playing cricket as I’m no good at it, but watching it live is a great social activity. Just don’t expect to remember any of it.

The best time I got in a canoe was undoubtedly when I went to Sweden. As mentioned earlier on I met some friends whilst I was on my foreign exchange year in Lille, France. I ended up spending quite a lot of time with Kat, Kirsty and Emma who were all from Hull University. I got on with them all really well, we shared a very similar sense of humour.

Kat was Swedish although you would never have known from her accent. She had grown up in England and she had no hint of a Swedish twang when she spoke. We got to know each other pretty well so she knew the kinds of things I was interested in and knew I was looking for things to do when we broke up for summer at the end of the year. She suggested one day that I might like to apply to work in a summer camp she had been to a few times when she was growing up. It was called Brevik, and was a confirmation camp for children. I was clueless as to what that meant, but learnt from Kat that it’s an important coming of age event to many Swedish families. This was only one part of the camp experience. The rest involved a lot of activities designed for children to experience outdoor life, with the main attraction being an eight day canoe hike around the Swedish archipelago. Sold. It sounded amazing.

I got the details from Kat and sent a letter to the camp organiser asking if I could be one of the supervisors. I attached my CV and outlined my hobbies and relevant work experience to that point. The most appropriate one was my time working as a pool lifeguard in England. I’d worked at Wyndley Leisure Centre in Sutton Coldfield during the term breaks, and during the summer they had children’s clubs. These were designed to give kids something to do while their parents were at work during the summer holidays. There were four activity areas which the kids went to in rotation and included various sports such as rounders, basketball, badminton or whatever looked like being popular. I volunteered for the extra work because I needed the money and because it sounded like fun. It was, to a degree.

I discovered I’m not the most patient, particularly with children that didn’t want to get involved. As these clubs were sometimes seen as something to ship your kids off to whilst parents were at work, there were always some kids that didn’t want to be there. I couldn’t blame them for feeling that way. I’m sure I would have felt the same if I was dropped off to do something I didn’t enjoy every day. For me though it was hard work trying to motivate those who were clearly disinterested. I was clearly never going to follow in my brothers footsteps and become a teacher. I just wouldn’t have been able to cope.

The experience sounded perfect on paper for my application to Brevik and it clearly did the trick as the manager wrote back a few weeks later to confirm he was happy for me to join the supervisor team. It was a voluntary thing, so I had no expectation of getting paid but a three week trip to Sweden sounded good to me. Kat helped me out with the logistics of it all and I flew out to Stockholm in July. From the capital I booked a fast train down to Soderkoping where someone was waiting for me to take me to the camp.

As soon as I got there I knew I was going to love it. It was set right on the archipelago surrounded by woods. The camp was a mini village with wooden huts for dormitories and a food hall which acted as the central point. There was also a relaxation hut full of sofas that the supervisors could chill about in at the end of the day. The piece de resistance though was the sauna. This was a few hundred metres away from the main site in a wood. It was right next to the water where there was a mini pontoon with a diving board. It was so good. We ended up there most evenings to relax with a couple of beers and a dip in the water.

I was sharing a bunk bed with a younger lad. He was a really nice guy and we got on well. He’d lived in the US for a few years with his parents and so had a think American accent. He’d been to Brevik a few times so helped me get to know the rhythm of the camp. It was well organised. The meal times were set and there was a schedule to follow every day which outlined the activities. These covered all sorts of things, mainly designed to give children life skills. There was a whole range of things planned including a first aid course, raft building, outdoor cooking, furniture making…you get the idea. As a supervisor my job was to look after one of the groups along with another senior person. It was a lot of fun and it was great being outside. The weather was good for the majority of the time, with most days being sunny and warm.

In the second week the build up to the canoe hike started. I was going to be looking after a group of eight children along with another supervisor called Lotta. The premise was simple. We had to organise rations and camping equipment for eight days out in the archipelago. We could go anywhere, the route was entirely up to us. We were given a map so we could figure out the manageable distance over the eight days and each day’s intended journey to the next suitable camping area. I couldn’t wait to go, I was like a kid in a sweet shop.

Luckily Lotta had done it before so she had a vague idea of the route we should take and where to head for. It was a good job she did because on the hike I discovered that my map reading skills are not up to much. I managed to get us lost on the first day after making a wrong turn in to a dead end stretch of water. To be fair it was pretty difficult to distinguish one island from another and match the landscape to the map.

I should have known better though as I had previous. During an end of term activity day at school I’d got a group of us lost during an orienteering exercise. On that occasion we had been dropped off in Cannock Chase in Staffordshire with a map and compass and were told to find our way to various meeting points to get back to the school minibus. It had a competitive element to it as we were up against some other teams from the school. The objective was to be first back so being the competitive soul I am, I grabbed the map and set everyone off in completely the wrong direction. We didn’t make one of the meeting points and got completely lost. Well done me.

So it wasn’t a huge surprise that Lotta took control of the map from that point on. The first night was a bit unusual in that it started to rain. We selected our location to pitch up for the night and dragged the canoes out of the water. As it was raining we decided to use the canoes as walls and dragged a tarpaulin over the top as a shelter. This was fine in principle until the mosquitoes figured out our plan. The night was spent swatting them away as they did that irritating things that mozzies do of buzzing right next to your ear just as you are about to go to sleep. It wasn’t the best night’s sleep I’d ever had and I got bitten to pieces, but it didn’t matter, I was out and about on my Swedish adventure.

Once we were up the daily ritual began of making breakfast and hot drinks with the camp stove, packing our stuff up and heading back out on to the water for that day’s journey. Every day was an experience. I’m sure it wasn’t true but every time we found a new island to stop at for a rest or spend the night it felt like we were the first ones to have ever set foot on it. Everything was so unspoilt we all felt like explorers finding new habitats.

To avoid the mosquitos we took to sleeping in the open air on rocks, even if it was drizzling a little bit. It was such a nice feeling waking up at sunrise and looking out over the water, it was so peaceful. Throughout the whole eight days we hardly ever saw any other people. It was so strange to have that feeling of detachment from the rest of the world. We had no phones or anything electronic, we were completely cut off from everyone. The days rolled into one another and far too soon we were making our way back to camp.

The canoeing itself was very leisurely due to the size of the group as well as the varying ages and abilities of everyone. It was only on the last day when we ran out of food that we needed to put on a bit of extra pace to ensure we could get to a shop on one of the islands before it shut. Apart from that it was a gentle paddle.

It was very odd making it back to camp and back to civilisation. We hadn’t had any luxuries whilst we were away, so simple things like sitting on a chair felt weird. Having not had a shower or a shave the whole time, most of us made a beeline for the shower block. I managed to get in to the largest shower room I could find, stripped myself naked and got myself ready for the best shave of my life. Just as I was lathering up my patchy ginger beard the door of the shower room opened and one of the female supervisors started to walk in. We both froze as we realised I was standing there starkers and I’d accidentally forgotten to lock the door. She made a hasty retreat and I quickly slammed the door shut, locking it behind her. Liberal as the Swedes are, I’m sure she really didn’t want to see a pasty naked English bloke with a dodgy ginger beard standing in front of her. I would say I was mortally embarrassed but to be honest I was more interested in getting in to the shower. We muttered apologies to each other when we bumped into one another later on that day as the rest of the camp took the mick out of me relentlessly.

It took a few days to adjust to being back at the camp, but after a couple of great night’s sleep in a proper bed everything returned to normal. I didn’t always sleep brilliantly whilst I was there. Nice as my roommate was, he tended to need music to fall asleep. Every night he would put his Walkman on to drift off. Being used to living in the country side at my parent’s house in Whittington, I struggled to get to sleep if it wasn’t quiet. It was particularly bad in this case as his choice of music was the soundtrack to Pocahontas, the Disney movie. Much as I like films, having power ballads played to you on loop night after night was a bit annoying. It was either get to sleep before him, or stick the pillows over my head to block out Pocahontas’s dramatic warbling.

I’d also made good friends with Kat’s sister, A-C, who was also staying at the camp. She had a very similar sense of humour, so we got on like a house on fire. She was also game for a laugh which came in useful for the camp talent show that was planned for one of the nights. I introduced her to ‘The Dribble Twins’.

This was something that my school mate Meadie and I had come up with on a school camping holiday to Guernsey. These were annual summer trips organised by our school art teacher after the term had finished. It was ten days away with school mates and was very cheap. Ideal for skint teenagers growing up. Although it was a school organised trip, it was fairly relaxed. The teachers who went also wanted to enjoy themselves so there weren’t too many rules, particularly when you were in sixth form or if you had actually left school. Most evenings we would join the responsible adults in the teacher’s tent for drinks and stories. It was a good laugh.

The Dribble Twins arose from Meadie and I mucking about one day whilst in the beer tent. I can’t exactly remember how it started but it probably stemmed from having a mouth full of beer and laughing. That soon progressed to having a big swill of beer and then having your arm pumped to spit the beer out, showering the other person. Not that dissimilar to Scott Mills’ Innuendo Bingo game on Radio One. Expanding this concept in to some kind of routine, we did it at the camp’s talent show to music. There were lots of variations on the dribbling, from leg pumps, nose twists and ear prodding. It seemed to go down well, which was a bit of a surprise because we thought we were the only ones who found it funny.

So with no other discernible talent to lean on, A-C and I decided to do the same at the Brevik talent show. It went down like a lead balloon. I don’t think the joke translated to a bunch of Swedish kids. But A-C and I had fun.

The rest of the time at Brevik went far too quickly and before I knew it I was back in Stockholm getting ready for the flight home. Kat’s brother, Patrik, lived in the capital, and he kindly offered to put me up in his flat for the night as I had an early flight home the next day. I turned up on his doorstep and within minutes we were going out for drinks. As with his sisters, he was a good laugh. He introduced me to a few of his mates and we sunk a few beers before going to the local theme park. I can’t remember how many rides we went on but there were rollercoasters involved. Not the best of rides after a few drinks. If I wasn’t drunk before going on them, I definitely was when I got off. We got back to the flat very late. I probably managed 2 hours sleep before stumbling down to the taxi taking me to the airport the next morning. The flight home was a blur and I must have stank of beer. I felt sorry for the lady and her daughter who were sat next to me, but they got their own back by eating my food whilst I was fast asleep.
It was the end of a great few weeks in Sweden.

I haven’t been in a canoe since, but to be honest I’m not sure I could have topped that experience anyway, so it’s probably for the best.

I’d had a niggling injury that had prevented me from running. It was a flare up of my tendonitis that I’d had at the back of my right knee following the saddle height adjustment on my bike. I was struggling to get it right even after numerous trips to the physiotherapist.

The guy that I had seen about it had tried a number of different approaches including massage, ultrasound and acupuncture. The trips to see him in his little clinic in Lichfield were always quite amusing (in spite of the pain he was often inflicting on me). He was clearly one of those guys that was in competition with his older brother. He was obviously successful in his own way but his brother had a huge private physiotherapy clinic in Birmingham, clients that included Olympic athletes and had competed for Great Britain athletics at the Moscow Olympics. Quite a large thing to try and emulate, but difficult to live up to. He had me in stitches most of the time as he went through his life story. Really nice guy and a great story teller.

As I was at a bit of a loss as to what to do fitness wise, my mate Rosie suggested I give Crossfit a go. I must admit I’d never heard of it but Rosie seemed to think it would be right up my street as it incorporated a number of different sports and involved quite intensive physical exercise. Sounded good to me so I looked online to find more about it. It turned out that there was a Crossfit Centre very close to my office on Loughborough, and also not far from I was now living in the nearby village of Quorn. I found the contact details of the guy running it and he suggested I come down to have a look at the facilties. So I did.

The centre was set up on an industrial site in a warehouse unit. I met up with the owner and he explained a bit about what Crossfit was all about as well as showing me around the facility. He explained that Crossfit was about high intensity fitness using a variety of different sports and workouts. He used the term WODs which were ‘Workouts of the Day’. These were a set of exercises which changed regularly and incorporated a number of elements which were a combination of aerobic, anaerobic and weight training.

The equipment that he had in the facility covered this wide variety of exercise including free weights, pull up bars, medicine balls, kettle bells and a rowing machine as well as other stuff. He also explained that Crossfit had its own tournaments, so there was a heavy competition element to it as well. This was all new to me, and made it more appealing than just getting fit for the sake of it.

I’ve been a member of a number of gyms through the years but I struggle with the concept of just doing weights or indoor exercise with no goal. That just doesn’t motivate me. I need something to aim at so the exercise has some kind of purpose, whether it’s a 10k running race or something else.

While I was at school a few of us in the rugby team used to go down to the gym at the local leisure centre to do some extra fitness work as well as some weights. Mainly it was low weights but high reps, just to help with conditioning and in line with our training programme, so it made sense.

Whilst we were in there we used to see three older guys come in to do their own weights session. They strolled in in their gym vests and long hair, and made a beeline for the bench press. Before getting started they would walk around the gym slapping their arms and psyching themselves up. Then one of them would jump on to the bench press whilst the other two would stand at either end to help if they were struggling with the weight. After much puffing and panting from the guy about to start lifting the weights, the real performance would begin. The guy lifting would start wailing like a banshee as he pushed the weight up off his chest whilst the other two screamed encouragement like some possessed chimps. It was hilarious. Once one was done, they swapped over and the next one would go through the same routine after high fiving each other and telling each other how awesome they were. We christened them the ‘Pump it up brothers’ and it became a bit of a highlight to our sessions.

Back to Crossfit. After the introductory session I decided to give it a go so I signed up to the induction programme. Any newcomers weren’t allowed to use the equipment or join in the workout sessions without doing this. It involved four separate lessons which the centre owner ran. He was quite a character. He was very sociable and was really friendly to everyone down there. He was also clearly a full on Crossfit ambassador and very thorough in his induction programme. I was in a group with five other newbies and we went through an introduction to all of the various bits of equipment and exercises before we finished with a thirty minute WOD.

It was actually useful to get some proper coaching on weight lifting techniques as I’d never really had any up until that point. I’d done some basic weight stuff at rowing, but here we were learning about dead lifts, clean and jerks etc where good technique was important to avoid injury. I’d also never used kettle bells before and these seemed to feature quite prominently in the WODs along with pull ups. The facility had a metal frame at the back that you could do various exercises on including pull up work with rubber bands. These seemed to be a particular favourite of the owner who seemed to be able to do endless reps of these, he was on it all the time. He was a very strong guy which wasn’t surprising given his devotion to it. I think he did two or three workouts a day which was clearly paying off for him.

The bit I enjoyed the most though was the WOD at the end. This could be a combination of anything but generally involved kettle bells, pull ups and weights as a core element plus a variety of other things. Apparently this mirrored the format of the Crossfit tournaments. The combination of exercise was different each time so the outcome was dependent on the strengths and preferences of those taking part. The WODs were pretty exhausting due to the high intensity nature of them and rep element. The winner of the WOD was the one that completed it in the fastest time, so a pretty simple format. I definitely felt I was getting a good workout each time.

Once you’d completed the induction programme you were then free to sign up to the classes to join in on the WOD session or could also come down and use the equipment. I went down a few times after completing the classes and did enjoy it. However, I couldn’t really get in to the whole philosophy of it the way the hardcore members did. You could see there was good banter between them and they really had a competitive thing around winning the WODs. They would talk about some of the Crossfit stars and point the rest of us to You Tube clips of them in competition. But for me it just didn’t hit the mark. I had no interest in competing in a tournament, possibly because it was so niche and a bit random. I think you had to really buy in to the concept of this as a sport, and I didn’t. It definitely wasn’t in ‘the pump it up brothers’ league but it had that gym bunny feel to it that I couldn’t relate to.

So worth a try and served a purpose for a very short time but I needed to get back to racing in more conventional sports that had a wider appeal.

I started to go out on my bike regularly in preparation for the Triathlon events I was entering. Some of the Lichfield Triathlon lads I had got to know were and still are very strong cyclists. I started to be part of conversations that were going way over my head. Things like cadence, power output, functional threshold levels and similar performance measures were all completely new to me. I avoid technical things at the best of times (I never read instructions, easier to make it up as you go) but I was beginning to realise I had entered a completely different world.

It started to make more sense when I attended my first watt bike session at Lichfield Friary leisure centre. I had been encouraged to go along as the guy that ran the class did tests to figure out your average watt output which was then used to figure out threshold levels for the class sessions. These were intense and as with most of these type of things I enjoyed smashing myself to bits. Using the power as a benchmark was great for developing fitness so I went along as often as I could.

It wasn’t until recently that I took this a step further and invested in a power meter for my road bike. As I started to build my training up for the Ironman, I realised that any predictor of fatigue or over exertion was going to be critical for my chances of completing the event. Having deliberated for months about it I finally got one. Has it changed my world? Not really, but at least I have an additional guide that helps avoid the dreaded ‘bonk’. Destroying my legs on a 112 mile bike record ahead of a marathon would not be a good idea.

I never had any interest in cycling when I was younger but now I’m doing it regularly I feel as though I might have missed out. I’ve really no idea whether I could have been any good at it. Arguably my physique suits the sport and I have often been told that I have good leg strength. But I can’t honestly say whether that would have translated to being anything amazing.

I’ve only done one time trial. This was when I went along to a regular weekly club TT that Burntwood triathlon club held in Yoxall village. Only a handful of people turned up on the night I did it and since I didn’t do it again I have no idea whether I progressed or not. Not the way to do these kind of things I know. The training for these seems pretty brutal, with hours on turbo trainers to develop consistent power output over time. I know some people swear by them and they are great training for Ironman or sportives but it just looks massively painful to me.

I have had a go at track cycling recently. I got a voucher for an introduction session at Derby velodrome along with a few other family members. We went along and got the induction talk from one of the professional coaches. He clearly had some standard jokes and phrases that he used as part of his talk. Most of them went along the lines of ‘road bike users are lazy so listen up because this is completely different’. To be fair it was. I’d never been on a track bike before i.e. no gears and no normal brakes. It took a few minutes to get used to the fact that you need to keep pedalling otherwise you’d be braking, which potentially meant you could fall off. We went around the track on the flat section a few times to get used to the feel of the bike before he introduced us to the slopes of the velodrome. He placed markers on the track to push us higher up the slope. It was a bit daunting at first but you soon get used to the incline and get more confident as you cycle round. It was only an hour session so I only got a very small taste of what the top track cyclists do but you can see the appeal. Going as fast as you can in a race environment must be some feeling.

It is only recently that I’ve completed my second long cycling event. I entered the Rutland Sportive as a build up to the Ironman. The course is 105 miles long but you have to cycle 2 miles to get to the start from the official car park, so I’m rounding that up to 109 (that’s crazy maths). I selected that one as the route looked very hilly and would be good training for the Ironman course. I’d competed in other events around Rutland so I knew that it would be lumpy, the locals refer to the hilly countryside in that area as the Rutland ripple. I figured doing some hill work over a long distance couldn’t be a bad thing.

Aiming to avoid a bonk I decided to test my nutrition strategy. I’d just been on holiday and read a book by Vassos Alexander, radio sports presenter and self-confessed running addict. He mentioned making his own super food cake which had worked successfully for him over various long distance races, so I decided to follow suit. I’m not sure what his exact recipe was as it wasn’t in the book, but I ploughed on regardless by buying the essential ingredients of bananas, blueberries, eggs, peanut butter and avocado. I then made up the rest myself to add extra flavour. I was quite surprised when I made it that it actually tasted good so decided to take it along on the Sportive. It worked like a dream. I ate a couple of mouthfuls every 30 minutes, plus anything else I managed to pick up at the food stations dotted along the way. Bonk avoided.

The course itself lived up to expectations. It was very undulating. A few days before the race a fellow Leicester Tri club member posted on the club forum that he had also entered the event and wanted to know if anyone else was going along. More than happy to have a riding mate I said I’d meet him at the start. I’d never met Lewis, or Coops as he’s known, before the race but it didn’t take long to realise that we were both coming at it from the same angle i.e. nothing too serious, but great to have some company on the way. I think he may have regretted meeting up at one point as he’d only signed up for the 75 mile version. I convinced him to go for the full distance after a couple of hours. I’d found out that he worked for the RAF and that he doing a charity bike ride from London to Paris later in the year to raise money for war veterans. The extra miles were not going to him any harm in preparing for that.

It was a great day out. The weather was pretty kind to us, sunny with very little wind. I felt pretty good throughout and went well up the (multiple) hills. Apart from the obligatory sore backside from hours sat on a saddle, I had no ill effects from the ride or my cobbled together cake. The nutrition side went smoothly and my legs weren’t demolished. I don’t know whether I could have run a marathon straight after but I didn’t think it was an impossible task either. Job done. Coops and I went on our separate ways and it was another box ticked in my Ironman preparation.

I bought my first road bike whilst I was in the rowing club. Quite a few of the squad members owned one, and often went riding out at the weekend. I decided it was time I joined in so got a recommendation on what to buy. I opted for a Giant OCR, for no other reason than it was fairly reasonably priced and was considered by the rowing lads as a good first bike. I was reliably informed that I needed proper bike shoes with cleats to clip in to, so I bought those too. The bike arrived by mail order and I assembled it myself. I didn’t read the instructions of course, like many guys I never do. It wasn’t until I was on the way to the rowing club on my new steed that I realised I couldn’t change gears. I also realised that cycling with cleats was a new experience. I proudly turned up at the club for training to show off my new purchase, and promptly fell off, much to everyone’s amusement.

On the same day I also got my first experience of a ‘bonk’. This occurs when your body has used up all of its reserves of energy, so you are basically running on empty. It was hardly surprising really. I’d cycled to the club, done a full rowing session, cycled with the lads after the session and then cycled home. It’s a strange sensation when you ‘bonk’, you feel completely drained. I’d run out of fluid, had no snacks and no money to buy anything. I was about five miles from home, cycling in to a headwind and just couldn’t ride any more. I fell of my bike again and sat by the side of the road wondering exactly how I was going to make it the last few miles. I eventually made it back of course and raided the entire contents of the fridge.

It’s fair to say then that I was a novice cyclist. I only really got interested after I’d finished rowing and started seriously considering triathlon. I had no idea about technique, riding position or any of that technical stuff. I just got on my bike and rode. A friend of mine was also starting to get in to triathlon and had entered a charity bike ride from Wolverhampton to Aberdovey. This seemed ideal given that my parents have a holiday home there, as previously mentioned. This was a 100 mile ride and was by far the longest distance I’d ever thought about riding. Up until that point I reckon I’d clocked thirty miles as my longest outing.

Given this I thought I’d better get my bike serviced to make sure it would last the distance. I took it to a bike shop in one of the local villages in Barton-Under-Needwood. It was clear as soon as I entered that I was out of place. The bikes on show were Pinarellos and the shop owner was an ex-tour rider. He looked me up and down when I walked in, clearly disapproving of me and my bike. I left the bike with him and returned later in the day. He then spent half an hour telling me that my position was all wrong and that I should consider myself lucky I wasn’t injured. To be honest I wasn’t really interested in the lecture, I just wanted to know my bike was fit enough to handle the ride. Clearly annoyed he insisted on adjusting my seat height to better suit me and then let me go.

It may well have been a better height, but the radical adjustment was too much for my legs and I strained my knee ligaments almost immediately the first ride out. Great. Not only subjected to a load of abuse, I was now injured. It took months and multiple trips to the physio to sort out. Lesson learnt; don’t listen to arrogant ex pros and make incremental adjustments with a proper bike fit in future.

The day of the charity bike ride eventually came round and I’d managed a few longish rides in preparation. It was great to do, but the weather on the day was atrocious. It started drizzling when we left Wolverhampton Wanderers Football Stadium and got steadily worse as we cycled toward Wales. We didn’t treat it as a race but even so, it was a long day and pretty tiring for a non-cyclist. We stopped every twenty miles or so to get snacks and drinks but the mileage was definitely something I wasn’t used to. I had many moments later on where my legs just felt like lead. The dreaded bonk was never very far away.

At around sixty miles the weather was at its worst, strong headwinds and pouring rain. After a few hours of riding, this was pretty depressing but we ploughed on nonetheless. The weather finally got better with about fifteen miles to go and the ride into Aberdovey was actually quite nice. My first experience of long distance cycling was exactly that, an experience.

Having a bike when you’re a kid is pretty special. What kid doesn’t want to have a new bike as a Christmas or birthday present? The first bike I remember getting was a Boxer. These were all the rage when I was at primary school so I was massively excited when I got mine for my birthday. I also remember my dad teaching me how to ride my bike in the back garden. It was the usual technique of him letting go of the saddle as I was pedalling and shouting encouragement to keep going. I did exactly the same thing with my daughters and it’s a great feeling seeing them pedal away, growing in confidence as they get used to balancing the bike on their own.

For me, it was freedom to get about in the village I grew up in, Stonnall. Racing around the village with my friends was a regular thing, no different I’m sure from every other kid that age.

At that time it seemed easy to go anywhere and everywhere on my bike. As long as I got back for tea time, I was free to go out and meet up with my mates. Maybe it was because I was a boy, but I never felt any nervousness from my parents about being off doing my own thing. However, this must have been put to the test by my brother. He also had a bike and being a few years older he would be hanging around with his friends or my cousins, Chris and Steve, who also lived in the village. One day Dave didn’t come home at the normal time for tea.

Understandably my parents became concerned and ended up calling the police when there was still no sign of him in the evening. Going through their usual protocol, the police first checked the house to ensure he wasn’t hiding anywhere. I was most upset when they came in to my bedroom to look under my bed and woke me up. The police later found my brother and my cousin cycling up the M54 motorway past Telford. It turns out they’d had the bright idea of cycling to Wales, not realising it was a 200 mile round trip. I later found out that my dad had done something similar when he was a lad although his hadn’t involved the police. Long bike rides were obviously a family tradition.

Throughout the summer I would be down the park with my mates or just riding around the village having fun. There was nothing serious or competitive about any of it. I often ventured out of the village to go to nearby Aldridge or even Lichfield to buy records, books or toys. It was just part of growing up.

One day I went on a longer bike ride with Dave and Chris to Sutton Coldfield, where my other cousins Shelley and Zoe lived with my Aunt and Uncle. I’m sure my brother and Chris didn’t really want me tagging along, but they couldn’t really leave me alone at home. We cycled to Sutton Park on the way and ended up getting confronted by a group of lads. I got my baseball cap taken by one of them which predictably led to me bawling my eyes out (I was quite a cry baby to be fair), much to Dave and Chris’ embarrassment. We managed to get away and cycled off to the safety of my Aunt and Uncle’s house. The incident was never mentioned again.

Over the years I got bigger and better bikes. The BMX Chrome Burner was a particular favourite, just because it was silver and shiny. I wasn’t interested in doing tricks or jumps like some of the lads, having a cool looking bike was good enough for me.

At secondary school, mountain bikes became the in-thing. My mates Jonny and Grizzly (Nick Adams…Grizzly Adams of 80s TV show fame? No?) were avid mountain bikers and I would often accompany them and others to Cannock Chase which was the place to go near us for off road cycling. Again, I was never interested in going down steep banks or off jumps, I was far too much of a wimp for that. I liked going out cycling and getting knackered though.

Years later properly designed mountain bike trails were developed on the Chase. These became known as ‘The Dog’ and ‘The Monkey’. I’ve done them a few times when I lived that way. They’re great fun, but not quite my thing.

I took my mountain bike with me to Loughborough University. Like most students it was my main mode of transport to and from lectures. I didn’t use it for anything other than that during my time there, other than maybe the odd cycle out in the countryside. I managed to get two bikes stolen while I was there. The first was my own, which got taken from the hall of residence. I had locked it to a drainpipe, and when I came to collect it the next day all that was left was the front wheel. Mental note: lock the frame as well next time.

The second time was when I borrowed a bike from a fellow student in the hall, because I’d had mine stolen. I borrowed it to check my results for my second year exams. These were posted on the wall of the Economics faculty. When I got there I realised I hadn’t brought a lock with me. Thinking it was ok because I’d only be gone for a matter of minutes I just left it against the wall outside. Sure enough it was gone by the time I got back. Clearly bike theft was a lucrative business in Loughborough at the time. The guy I borrowed it off was less than impressed, but took it very well. He got another one from insurance like I did later anyway. He actually saw his being ridden around Loughborough a few weeks later on his way back from lunch. Him and a few others gave chase but couldn’t catch the dastardly fiend. High drama for us student types.

After university myself, Wyn, Closet and Simeon decided to go up to Scotland for a cycling holiday. More accurately, we went to visit Closet, see a bit of Scotland whilst drinking a lot and took our bikes. Closet was living in Edinburgh at the time, so Simeon and I headed up there in Wyn’s bright orange VW Beetle with the bikes loaded up on the back. The plan was to head west from the capital and then spend a week travelling to various places including the Isle of Arran, Loch Ness, Inverness, Aviemore and then back to Edinburgh.

On the Isle of Arran we got our bikes out with the intention of cycling to the nearest pub whilst exploring the island. It wasn’t long before the heavens opened as we headed up our first hill. At the top of the hill we realised we had lost Wyn. Not worrying too much the rest of us carried on. About half an hour later Wyn drove past us in his car and said he’d meet us at the pub. By the time we met up with him we were all drenched, and the weather looked like it was only going to get worse. He’d already had a couple of pints by the time we got there and was clearly happy being nice and dry. That was the last time we used the bikes. Beer was the order of the day after that as we wound our way around Scotland.

Burton Leander had actually had a very strong tradition as a rowing club. Back in the 50s and 60s the club hosted a hugely popular regatta, which was the largest outside of the London area. More significantly the club had also had a crew that had won Henley Royal regatta. This was by far the most prestigious event in the rowing calendar in the UK. Every year thousands of people descended on Henley-On-Thames to enjoy five days of rowing races. For that week the town was taken over by people dressed smartly in blazers and formal attire. It is the Ascot of the rowing world and has a very strong tradition. To qualify for racing at Henley you either had to win or perform strongly at one of the major competitions, or get one of the remaining available slots by having a fast time in a qualifying event the week before Henley regatta.

As Burton Leander had won the Fours event fifty years ago, there was a supposed guaranteed spot at the anniversary year in 2008. With this looming, that season we decided to switch from the quad to a Four in order to claim that available slot if it was indeed available. We shuffled around the order a few times until we settled on the right format. I ended up at stroke, with James Walsh at 3, Rob Jephcote at 2, and Matt Isard at bow. We spent the whole season training hard with the aim of competing at the Royal Regatta. We entered the major events and managed to pre-qualify for the Wyfold Challenge Cup. I don’t think we will ever know whether we qualified outright or were allocated the 50th anniversary place, but it didn’t really matter. We were racing at the event.

This was a major deal for us as a club. We’d had some successes with people like Ashley Prestidge winning national single sculls titles and Liam Rose representing GB, but we hadn’t had a crew boat race at Henley for years. The mood of the club changed. A few of us had wanted to move the club from a social club to one that could compete at the major events and this was a significant stride forward.

The draw was made a week before the event started. We discovered that we were up against Marlow rowing club. They had a very strong reputation so we knew it was going to be tough to get through to the next round. The likelihood was that they were a solid crew and had probably competed at Henley before. However, they were by no means one of the strongest crews so we felt like we had a chance of progressing to the next round. We spent the rest of the time in the build up to the race practicing out on the river at Burton and trying to get ourselves in race mode.

As usual I was driving the minibus and towing the trailer. As I was working the day before the race I went with Matt to the boathouse to collect the boat and blades after work. Double checking we had everything (it wouldn’t have been the first time we had forgotten something) we set off down the motorway to the venue. We got there quite late but it was a relief to get the trailer parked up and head over to Swiss Cottage, the campsite that most competitors used during regatta week.
We woke up early next day to head down to the regatta course so we could do a practice session.

The place was packed with competitors and supporters. It was by far the biggest thing I had been involved in and it was great to get the boat on the water the day of the race to familiarise ourselves with the conditions. We did some drills and practice starts, getting used to the feel of the water. Everything felt good and we were starting to psyche ourselves up for the race itself.

The day couldn’t have been better in terms of the weather. It was calm and sunny. It was perfect for rowing and for the friends and family coming down to support. In the hours before the race we just chilled out as much as we could. I spent most of my time mucking about with Erica, my eldest daughter. It was great to have her there, even though I’m sure she had no idea what was going on.

When our race eventually came around we had our final pep talk which involved a lot of comedy swearing, something about ‘not making up the numbers’ and manly fist pumping before putting the boat on the water. We went through our usual routine of drills as we made our way up to the start. We waited in the queue of boats for our turn to race, getting more nervous as the time approached. It was great to be part of the event.

There were some big names milling about including the likes of Steve Redgrave and Matthew Pinsent. Being members of Leander Rowing club, which was headquartered at Henley, these Olympians often helped out as officials during the event. It all helped to the atmosphere knowing that you were surrounded by the very best in elite rowing.

I remember sitting on the start in silence just waiting for the umpire to appear in the official race boat to get us lined up and ready. The Marlow crew were sat alongside us and I couldn’t help notice that they were big lads. Given that I was the tallest in the boat, that wasn’t much of a shock. We were always one of the smallest crews.

The moment finally arrived. The umpire called us to attention and we sat forward with our blades resting in the water. It felt like we were in that position for a long time but I’m sure it was just a few seconds in reality. It’s always the weirdest sensation waiting for the start. It feels like time stands still, you can hear your heart beating and your adrenaline is firing.

The umpire shouted and we were off. We all pushed down hard on the footplate before spinning the hands to get the rate up high and accelerate away. The tactic was always to rate high for 100 metres before settling in to a rhythm through the first 500m of the race. It wasn’t the greatest start we’d ever had so we found ourselves playing catch up right from the off. When you are sat in the stroke seat it’s difficult to know where you are in the race unless you are pulling away from other crews so you go with the cues from the others in the boat. Everyone tries to not look round to see what’s happening but it’s pretty difficult when you’re in the race itself, especially when it’s a head to head race.

I think we had a pretty good row overall after the dodgy start. The atmosphere was incredible, and the noise of the crowd as we moved up the course grew and grew. As we moved past the half way point and in to the last part of the race the legs really started to burn. The grimace you can see on all of our faces in the photos towards the end is plain to see. During the final section we were physically spent but as we approached the finishing enclosure we gave everything we had. I’m sure they were mainly cheering on the local club of Marlow but it didn’t matter. It was a unique experience and one I’ll never forget. I guess we were disappointed when it was over knowing that we’d been knocked out but it wasn’t to be. Rather predictably we had a large number of celebratory drinks afterwards, joining all the other crews that had been knocked out that day.

We tried in subsequent years to qualify again for Henley but never quite managed it. We were always a few seconds off the pace at the qualifiers. It was by far the biggest race we were involved and one which we never really quite replicated. After a while the crew went their separate ways. I carried on training and racing in various different boats, including eights, quads and the pair but it never felt quite the same. I think the real turning point came when one of our crew, Matt, passed away. For reasons none of us will ever understand he decided to take his own life. It was a complete shock. He was a genuinely nice guy, very popular and outwardly he seemed so full of life. I guess you never really know what is happening beneath the surface.

Somehow it was difficult to stay motivated knowing that he was gone. Also, things in my own life were changing and dedicating such a large amount of time to a hobby with two young daughters growing up fast just didn’t seem right any more. Inevitably my passion for the sport slowly faded away. I’d had a great time doing it and I will always look on those year with really fond memories but it was definitely time to move on.

In order to get race fit we had fitness sessions as well as water work. The balance of these changed on the time of year. Generally the water sessions were on Saturdays and Sundays all year round, with Tuesdays and Thursday evenings varying. During the winter the evening sessions started with a warm up run called ‘the bridges’ which was a 2 mile loop from the club house over the bridge to the right, through town and back over the other bridge further down the river before heading back. After that was a combination of ergo (rowing machine) sets, weights and circuits. I loved the fitness work.

The worst by far were the indoor rowing tests, the 5km and 2km distances. These were held every couple of months and were dreaded by everyone. The 2k was the standard test that all rowers use to determine how they compare against one another and it was brutal. It only lasts 6-7 minutes but your legs would burn and if you paced it incorrectly it would be agony. It wasn’t uncommon for people to be sick afterwards as everyone just buried themselves. I regularly had ‘white outs’ after doing these. You feel dizzy and get a taste of blood in the mouth. Not pleasant.

Another thing I learnt was that rowers were divided in to heavyweights and lightweights. If you were under 70kg, you were classed as a lightweight. This was the category I fell in to. This makes sense as rowing is all about technique, power and geometry. The longer your arms, the more leverage you have so all things being equal a taller and stronger rower will beat a smaller and lighter rower. At national level there are different minimum ergo times for lightweights and heavyweights required to qualify for trials. Most of the top heavyweights would be doing sub 6 minute 2k ergo tests. Ridiculous.

During the winter the races were called ‘head races’ where you raced on rivers of varying distance depending on the club hosting the event. There were lots of these around the region and we eneded up racing fairly regularly at places like Nottingham, Leicester and Derby as well as at our own stretch of water in Burton. These were winner takes all, and followed a time trial format. Winners of rowing races tend to win ‘pots’. These are pint jugs basically. No idea why you get these, but I’m sure there’s some historical reason.

During the summer the racing turns in to regattas which would be multi lane if they were on a specifically designed rowing lake like Holme Pierrepoint in Nottingham, or side by side racing if there were on a river. The format was knock out, with winners progressing to the next round until the final. As well as winning pots, there were also rowing points on offer. The more points you picked up from winning, the higher the racing category you moved in to. If you were in a crew boat, the combined number of points determined the race category you would be competing in.

The regattas themselves were good fun. During the summer on sunny days, it was great to be part of the club. These were often held over two days with most competitors camping overnight. There were always barbecues, discos and lots drinking involved, so it was a truly social affair.

I got in to a regular rhythm of training and competing and for the first couple of years I was in a quad with Rob Jephcote, Matt Isard and Simon Ludlow. We did pretty well in the local regattas, picking up wins quite regularly. The big event for us at the time was the national championships which always took place at one of the big rowing venues in either England or Scotland. In these, the top three boats won pots and there was also the added incentive of possibly picking up a seat in the national squad. Although in reality, the GB squad was pretty much pre-determined from the trials. However, for us club rowers it was a big deal. We came fourth twice in a row at these, not quite making it on to the podium. The races themselves were tough. The legs burnt the same way they did on the indoor rower, and your lungs were bursting during the last 500 metres. But it was great to be part of a team and push yourself to the limit. It was the closest I got to the team atmosphere I’d had playing rugby.

We entered all kinds of different events during my time there, but without doubt the toughest I took part in was the Boston Marathon. This is a long distance rowing race that takes place annually. It starts at Lincoln and ends up at Boston along a 30.6 mile stretch of river on the River Witham. Apparently it started off as a pub bet in 1946 and has continued ever since.

It has become pretty legendary for the challenging distance and so attracts a lot of entries. I’d heard about it during my time at the club as a couple of the lads I rowed with had done it a few times in small boats but hadn’t experienced it personally. The idea started to develop that we should enter a men’s eight. Not knowing any better I went along with the idea. Yes, it was a long event but by that time I’d done a fair amount of rowing and felt confident that in an eight it was doable so I agreed to take part.

By default, I always ended up as the driver of the minibus as I was only one of a handful of people that was legally allowed to drive a larger vehicle and tow the boat trailer. This was due to my age which meant I automatically held a driving licence which permitted it. Everyone else would have had to have taken a separate test to get permission rather than for any other reason. As usual then I was the driver when we went to the Boston start area.

Knowing that the head race itself was going to take a minimum of three hours I took more drinks and food than I would normally. Avoiding cramp and fatigue was pretty key, particularly in a crew boat. What myself and others had failed to consider was the ‘Rob’ factor. Our captain and stroke man for the day was a very good rower, but also very competitive and head strong. He had got it in to his head that we were going to try and break the course record. A fine idea in principle but it soon became apparent that the reality was going to be much harder.

We started off at a high stroke rate and we were soon overtaking crews. We were going strong for the first half but things started to unravel after our stroke man fell out with the cox for not being aggressive enough with other crews. The intense rate started to impact members of the crew, and the morale in the boat started to go downhill. Not used to rowing for that long, my technique began to fall apart which in turn led to my hands blistering. I wasn’t the only one suffering. There was a lot of groaning going on and at one point the guy in front of me started whimpering. It was turning in to a nightmare. I think the worst part came when we turned a corner in to a headwind with about five miles to go. It felt like we were rowing against a brick wall. When a single sculler overtook us near the finish it was pretty obvious we were pretty much done.

Unsurprisingly we didn’t break the course record which Rob wasn’t very happy about. I was just pleased to get out of the boat with my body not permanently crippled. Driving home with my hands in tatters at the end of a day like that wasn’t the best experience in the world.