Ready to suffer

“Coach, I am ready to suffer!”

I had a rider once who was preparing for a race. He asked me to train him hard, and that he is ready to suffer. Racing is already hard. There is no need to suffer more. 

Often, when we lack confidence we feel the need to push ourselves, to train harder and to suffer so we progress faster. Trust the training and above all, trust yourself. Progress takes time. There are no shortcuts to your peak performance. In fact, from my experience, the longer it takes to build your fitness, the easier it will be to maintain.

Training hard can be fun. Pushing ourselves to the limit creates a surge of hormones that feels great, but over time this can cause hormonal fatigue, something that you may not realise until it’s too late. Training causes stress on the body. On top of this, many committed athletes also restrict their diet to lose weight which adds to the problem. 

For women, one of the first signs are missed periods. If you feel this is happening due to your training, you must scale back your training and eat more healthily and eat enough. This problem is very common in the women’s pro peloton and it is something that teams are only beginning to address. I have even heard that some riders are worried when they don’t miss their periods and think they are not training hard enough! For men it is harder to notice, so watch for other signs of fatigue and loss of motivation or changes in your mood. 

Don’t leave it until you don’t want to ride anymore to adjust your training! Talk to your coach, and reset your goals. Remember why you are riding, training is a way to get fitter, to make your ride easier, and more fun. Don’t get lost training just to make your rides harder. That is surely the path to suffering.