(Life) Lessons from ultra-endurance racing #1

Rewarded with breaking dawn as I grind up Mont Ventoux

#1 The things we worry about, and which we allow to hold us back, don’t happen. (And if they do, we can sort them out.)

This probably needs a bit of context.

I recently finished a 2800km self-supported bike race from Italy to Northern Spain called the Transiberican. It took me 13 days and I climbed 45,000m via 10 stunning checkpoints. Each rider carries a tracker, visible to the world at large as a numbered dot moving across a map. This is both comforting and (for me) a source of neurosis. More on that later.

It was a big deal for me, and beyond anything I thought I could acheive. So I am sharing some of the highs and lows with the hope that it may inspire you or give you that tiny bit of extra courage needed to have a go at something you have been afraid to try.

4am. Christ. The alarm sends my adrenalin surging. I throw out an arm to shut it up, sending devices on charge clattering to the floor.

Put the light on. One more minute? PUT THE LIGHT ON. Click. Argh. Click. Sit up. Click. Blink. What am I doing?

Check forecast. Hot. Again. Force down a banana and a limp leftover sandwich. At least it’s soft. Something before I ride. Neck some water. 

Hyper conscious of other sleeping guests. Wriggle back into damp lycra. The morning shimmy. Repack my kit. Everything in its place. Suncream. Chamois cream. Preemptive paracetamol. 

Unpack to stash a forgotten charging cable. Repack. 

Double the effort to be mouse-like. The door slams behind me, narrowly missing my derailleur, not a euphemism, but catching my back wheel. It whirs loudly – a spinning fishing reel fighting a running tuna. I’m too tired to lift it. They’ll go back to sleep. 

My kit for 13 days on the road

4.30am. It’s dark. I know when sunrise will be but I check again. Two bleak black hours ahead. Is someone watching my dot? Are they already in wait? Somewhere quiet. Remote. Unseen. I focus on the stillness. The hooting owl. The tranquility of travelling through the night. 

Riding through the tunnel after Canelles Reservoir - credit @jordirullo

This is my choice. 

A car creeps up. I pull my cap down and stare at my bars. Please don’t stop. Don’t reverse, or wait, or wind down your window. Silent prayers heeded. Its rear lights fade, so too the tightness in my chest. This is the pattern until dawn breaks. It is tiring. I try hard to exist in the moment.  

My senses are bombarded with a sweet smell and the clatter of metal trays. An early bakery. I stop, brightened by lights and perceived safety. Something for now. Something for later. Daylight soon, they chirp. Early birds. Night owls even. No fear of the dark for the bakers. I am boosted.

A boost for both morale and carbs.

Need to pee. Finding the right spot distracts me for a while. It’s getting lighter. Murders only happen in the dark. Don’t they? I weigh up the odds of someone executing such a convoluted plan.  It’s more likely to be opportunistic. So low chance then. But possible. 

Dawn. A child’s drawing of mountains reveals itself, layer by layer. Each peak a lighter shade than the one before it. 

A tension shifts. I know this place.

I am free again. 

The Confidence/Courage Conundrum

The Confidence/Courage Conundrum

Have you ever told anyone that they should “have more confidence”? If so, I’m sure you meant well. But what did you actually want that person to do differently? What effect did you want your words to have on that person?

Most people are clear on what constitutes courage. If we shift the narrative from “confidence” to “courage”, more risk (of the healthy kind) will be taken, more innovation will happen, and more people will better understand what they need to do to keep learning and progressing.

Life and Leadership: why prioritise one at the expense of the other?

Life and Leadership: why prioritise one at the expense of the other?

I wanted to kick off this year with a quick blog on my favourite topic: how can we sustain high performance at work, without continually de-prioritising other aspects of our lives?

Most of my clients come to me for coaching because one of these elements (usually work) is hampering their ability to feel fulfilled, or even partly-sated, in other aspects (often exercise or simply getting outdoors).

Obviously there is no clear answer to this conundrum. But I keep seeing that if we look to our leadership approach, have the courage to analyse it, and reflect a bit on what we find, we can start to build a sustainable leadership model. And by that, I mean we can find a way of leading which can flex when needed, without prolonged sacrifice of those very things - sleep, diet, exercise, relationships - that actually help us to perform at our best in the first place.

I'm so convinced that this is possible, that I have gathered together a group of experts to deliver a nine-month Leadership Development Programme which helps people to achieve this. I'll share more information about this soon, but here is a sneak preview.

Why do leaders neglect their own needs?

Why do leaders neglect their own needs?

There are all sorts of reasons why we de-prioritise ourselves at work, but there are two particular factors which can set us on a path to chronic self-neglect.

The first of these is that people are notoriously bad at projecting themselves into the future, so it is hard to see the long-term downsides to working unsustainably.

There is a clear basis in neuroscience for this. The brain is better at processing information that is concrete and immediate (generally, what is happening now, or what has already happened). This is because we have evolved to prioritise information which is most likely to help us to survive. To think about our future self, the brain needs to use abstract information and create predictions - influenced by our experiences, biases and emotional responses. This also takes more cognitive effort, which is the last thing you need when you’re already shattered.

We also tend to prioritise short term reward over long term gain. ‘Temporal discounting’ is the idea that the value of an object does not remain constant over time. So why would we go to the effort of thinking about the damage we may be doing to our future self, when it is far less work to maintain what we are already doing?

The second factor which causes chronic self-neglect is that when you are already in a state of stress, it can often be difficult to recognise it and gain the perspective needed to break the cycle. So we just plough on until we tip over.

I know these factors make it sound like there is no chance of creating a sustainable leadership model. It’s as if the very circumstances in which leaders operate are designed to make us neglect ourselves. But if you bring about the right circumstances, you can break both cycles. I’ve written about the first here, so the rest of this article will focus on the second.

Emotional Regulation: three steps to stress reduction (when chocolate doesn’t work.)

Emotional Regulation: three steps to stress reduction (when chocolate doesn’t work.)

What can we do about stress? It may help here to distinguish between types of stress. The acute and temporary stress upon seeing yet another supermarket shelf stripped of Easter eggs in March is what sends you dashing from shop to shop until you bag that Crunchie Classic. The body then returns to its pre-stress level through a cascade of hormonal and neural systems. This is a healthy kind of stress and the same mechanism that helps us to respond to perceived threats in daily life.

Chronic stress, on the other hand, can negatively affect health when left untreated, potentially leading to high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, and many other issues.

The Space between Stimulus and Response

The Space between Stimulus and Response

The theme of this week’s Mental Health Awareness Week is nature. I celebrate this. First, because it raises awareness of the many benefits nature brings to our mental health. Secondly because nature is my passion, and the thing I turn to when my own metaphorical chips are down. And thirdly, because it gives me a just-about-legitimate reason to share my very best 30 seconds of 2021 to date.

My clients