It’s fast approaching already; time to get back out on the bike. It’s a pretty long season these days, I started in Feb and didn’t finish until October so as you can imagine I was pretty excited about hanging the bike up for a few weeks. The problem is, those few weeks go far too fast. I usually take around four weeks off the bike after my season. Two weeks of nothing and then I’ll start to do a bit of running to stop me getting too fat! Also, I try to ride on my Powercranks as much as possible. My left hip is still really weak almost four years after my accident so I really need to keep working hard on beefing it up a bit, especially now while I have the time and energy to focus on it.

For those of you that have never seen Powercranks before, they work with a clutch system meaning that each crank acts independently of the other. This makes for some tough pedalling and aching muscles that you didn’t know existed! Pretty hard to explain but I’m sure google will help you out if you’re interested. [Done- ed.] I’ve been doing between 20-30 minutes each day with a bit of focus on my left leg. Sounds pretty easy, but believe me I can just about get up the stairs afterwards!

So, next week and I should start training. Only problem is, I have my surgery planned also and I’m not sure what shape I’ll be in afterwards. It just so happens that my team doctor from HTC is also an orthopaedic surgeon and he does this stuff every day, so I’m entrusting him with butchering me and getting all of this unwanted metal out of my body. He tells me it’s a pretty straightforward operation and should be fine, but there’s just something about somebody cutting into me, undoing some screws and yanking a pole from inside my bone that makes me feel just a slight bit nervous! Another problem is, what am I going to do for four days in hospital? Four days in bed doing nothing! I’m going to crack up.

So once I’m titanium-free and all knitted back together, I can start to think about riding my bike. The first couple of weeks won’t be anything special, just getting back into riding again and enjoying a few weeks on my bike. To be honest I haven’t really got any fixed plan of any amount of kilometres or hours, I’m just going to ride my bike. Something that I never get chance to do so much anymore and something I really value and look forward too. After saying last week that I will stasr in Qatar, it’s already changed. Now I’ll start in the Tour Down Under, which means I’ll have to be in some type of shape a little earlier than expected. So once I’m back feeling like a cyclist again, I’ll sit down with my trainer and make a plan.

A bit out of context I know, but I just read an interesting interview with a Pro rider talking about the UCI’s new ranking system and World Tour points etc. What he’s basically saying is we “workers” or “domestiques” work tirelessly all day for our leaders, all season long and at the end of it we’re left with nothing but a pay cheque and a pat on the back. This is putting it pretty blunt, but in a lot of ways it’s true and needs to change. How is it that a rider who has pulled on the front for three weeks for his leader, who helps him win the Tour de France, the biggest bike race on the planet, has less value in this points ranking than the guy who wins the African tour?

These points are no longer becoming a bonus but a necessity. One thing is for sure, there are going to be plenty of riders in the peloton next year with their own agendas, looking for their own points as a kind of insurance policy to extend their contracts and give them some job security. The first question every director asks a manager these days is “how many points does he have?” It’s not right. Why not give us workers points when our leaders win? Surely this would be an added incentive to pull for our team mates and keep cycling a true team sport like it always has been.

Matt

quickstepcycling.eu

Discuss on the forum