Soon Enough, Work And Love Will Make A Man Out Of You.

Two hours ago I finished the last road hours of the only hard week I've been able to complete in months. I'd forgotten how hard it was, to be lying on the couch, totally slammed by your efforts the day before (or even that morning), and having to convince yourself to get up, put on the lycra, pump up your tyres, get back on the bike and start hurting yourself even more. The efforts on the program aren't impossible, of course, but from that comfortable position they sure as how feel like it. Added to the physical suffering is the all encompassing grumpy moodiness that accompanies a hard week on the bike - a side effect of any stressful situation, even the ones you choose to inflict on yourself - which only adds to the unwillingness to get the hell off the couch.

But still, this week I did every effort on the list. I got up off the freaking super-comfortable couch, which is the best place to lay in the entire universe, and did them. Training is like money in the bank, and it's the first time in months I've been able to make a decent deposit.

Story Of My Life.

There's a party going on a couple of streets over, and the dull bass thud coupled with the heat is keeping me from sleeping. Interestingly enough, I'm not appalled by the taste in music - they seem to be giving the Wu-Tang a good thumping, with some Cypress Hill mixed in, and I'm ok with that. I wonder, though, if there are a bunch of kids lurking in the corner of that party, with strange haircuts, annoyed expressions and Millencolin tapes in their pockets. Because if that DJ steps away from the stereo for more than five minutes, that tape is going straight into the deck and some kids are going to skank their asses off - until, of course, the DJ comes back, says "What the fuck is this shit?", hits the eject button and flips it back to Beyonce.

I mean, does this still happen? This still happens, right? I'd go look, but I'm not wearing any pants.

The Lighting's Bad.

As I mentioned here, I went up and raced in Bendigo a couple of weeks back. I was mostly heading up there for the club Madison, but was pretty psyched to be racing up there in general. First up was a twelve lap scratch race. The pace was, as per usual, pretty hot from the outset. A couple of laps in the pace went up another notch and someone in front of me dropped the wheel. I put the power down and spun my way back up to the bunch. It felt pretty good. We rolled around some more.

When the bell went I was at the front, which isn't the best place to be when a lap is more than 400 metres long. I wasn't too keen just to lead out Sean Finning, who was somewhere behind me, or Jarrod Maroni, who was probably immediately behind him. So I hit it. The wind was up and I figured they'd look at each other a bit, daring each other to do spend their bikkies chasing me down.

It seems that this was exactly how it panned out. I gapped the field, and held the gap until the final straight. Once they got to me I hit it again, and held off until the final breath, when Finning took the win by a wheel.

I wasn't disappointed. I threw all I had into the race and was only beaten by a Commonwealth Games Gold Medalist. It'd been a long time since I'd shown that kind of form, and I was relieved that finally it was beginning to come back.

For training today my coach had scheduled a Madison Skills session with Leigh Howard and Scott McGrory. After the session was done I got chatting to Scott. Apparently he had been in Bendigo that night, and had seen me taking it up to Finning. "It was a good ride," he said, "You made the right move."

I don't know if you've noticed - I may have mentioned it once or twice - but this year I've been pretty sick. After a while being sick starts to get into your head. You start to wonder if you're ever going to reach that same level of performance that you once had. Your confidence starts to be shaken, and you start to doubt. But right now, with some wins under my belt and a compliment from an Olympic Gold Medalist in my head, I feel like I'm ready to take on the world.

Deep In The Country. Deep In The Country.

Like everybody's memory, mine sometimes is unreliable. I can't help but wonder, therefore, if some of my totally rad memories haven't been blown out of proportion, if they become more and more awesome as the days go by. Was that Nine Inch Nails show in 1996 really as mind-blowing as I remember? Were Milko bars really that delicious? Was that Alison girl I made out with in year 8 really such an amazing kisser, or am I just saying that to excuse the fact that I was making out with someone who looked a bit like my friend Evan?

When I haven't raced up in Bendigo for a while the same doubt appears. I always remember the speed, the big wide track, the space and the aggression. But after a few months of just racing at DISC, with the roll-around-and-sprint, bring-back-the-break-immediately mentality that seems to be its defining characteristic, I start to forget that track racing can be any other way.

But it can, and it is. For once my memory was perfect, if not a little understated. Nath and I drove up there on Thursday. They were doing a club Madison and I wanted in. It's a long drive - even longer on the way home - and I gotta say, I was pretty wrecked on Friday. But the racing is hard, damn hard, and those country boys know how to ride their bikes. I reckon I was the biggest muppet in the lineup - certainly the accidental hook I threw at Sean Finning in the scratch race did nothing to dispel this notion. In the Madison I got lumped with some young kid I didn't know. After talking to him before the race I casually mentioned to my brother that we were fucked. I was totally, totally wrong. The kid was a gun. I only contested two sprints (of seven, I think), and he took points in each of the others. Sure, I chased down attacks, stopped gaps from opening up, and did my bit, but he was the one who eventually won the bike race for us.

But it wasn't just that we were winning that made the racing so rad. On that big open track you can really play hard, especially when the wind is up, and you know that your hard work is going to be rewarded. There's the typical Madison mess, with riders everywhere, but the track is wide and flat enough for it never to feel unsafe. I've said it once, and I'll say it again: it just feels fast.

Plus, afterwards, if you've won something, they have presentations, and you get to make a speech. I like making speeches.

23 Million Miles.

About a week ago I promised myself that I wouldn't write any more blog entries about my health, partially because I feel like each time I write that I'm getting healthier I jinx myself, but mostly because I'm finally - probably a good three weeks after everyone else - starting to find it a little boring. Six months of feeling like crap and obsessively searching for reasons why I'm feeling like crap may be interesting to me, but this ain't no secret journal, and occasionally I have to give some kind of consideration to you guys - my "audience", as the creative writing teachers call you. This being said, I'm the kind of guy who loves it when movies have that "where they are now" bit at the end; closure is important to me. So here it is. I'm not promising anything, but this will probably be the last blog entry on my health.

Dr Vic has been really good for me. Apparently a couple of days after our first visit he woke at three in the morning, dug my food journal out of his file, did some quick maths and figured I wasn't getting enough protein. I did some similar maths and agreed - some days I was only getting around 30 grams. So I started boosting it up to a minimum of 100 grams a day. Each time I went back to Dr Vic he asked me about it, and seemed really concerned. Eventually it came out - he once had a patient who was protein deficient, and who had ignored his advice, and eventually died.

While I get the impression that the Doctor still isn't convinced about a vegan diet, and that this death in his past has something to do with it. To his credit he isn't questioning me about it, but rather giving me homework. As such, as well as eating more protein, I have to make sure I'm getting a full spectrum of amino acids each day. There are twenty-one of the little fuckers, and it ain't easy, but being a vegan athlete wasn't ever going to be. Like Dr Garnham he has recommended that I go see a sports dietician, in the home of letting someone else figure out the complicated stuff, and I reckon that's probably going to be the next thing on my list.

The big question is, of course, how I'm feeling. Well, I'm feeling pretty damn good. When I told Dr Vic this he smiled and shook my hand. "You just wait, though," he replied, "In six months your brain will be firing and you'll think you couldn't feel any better. And then in a year you'll wonder how you ever survived feeling like you did six months ago. And then in two years, when you're back at your peak, you won't believe you ever felt so bad. You'll be flying."

You Can Call Me Joe.

Some days I like recent Bruce as much as I like classic Bruce.

Situation Gets Rough Then I Start To Panic.

Of course, there are also a few convincing reasons why I don't have Chronic Fatigue, the first and foremost of which are that when I don't train for a few days, I'm back to my normal levels of energy. Wikipedia diagnosis only gets you so far, you know.

Chiropractors, however, don't even seem to believe in Chronic Fatigue, which I guess is part of the reason I finally agreed to go see one. Purely by coincdence I ended up working with the mother of another cyclist who had been burdened by mystery illnesses. That mother suggested I go see Dr Vic. So I did. I took the morning off yesterday and drove all the way over to Keilor, only to walk into his office and be confronted by a picture of Brunswick's own Stuey Grimsey, and a bunch of his mates. Seems Dr Vic isn't confined to just the odd cyclist, but rather that he works with Drapac pretty regularly - I was even introduced to him by his receptionist as "He's a cyclist, but not from Drapac." Which kinda twisted the knife, just a little.

He poked and prodded me, I squirmed and giggled, and after half an hour or so he nonchalantly shrugged his shoulders and said, in a brisk, matter-of-fact tone, "It seems like a nervous system problem. It shouldn't be too complicated. We should be able to sort it out pretty easily."

Which, as you could probably imagine, was pretty good to hear.

Now, I'm a pretty cynical individual at the best of times, and I'm not entirely certain that a few adjustments of my spine is going to fix this fatigue problem forever. But I am willing to entertain the idea that it might. And that alone is enough to give me some hope.

This'll Never End This'll Never Ever End This'll Never Stop.

The fatigue has reared its ugly head again. I've got a couple more appointments with specialists lined up. I'm starting to think it's Myalgic Encephalomyelitis, which is a fun way of saying Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.

If one of these specialists tells me that it is Chronic Fatigue, well, that will be the end of competitive cycling for me. I know that sounds a bit sad and all, but really, I'm not that sad about it. At the moment all I want is a definitive answer. If they tell me that it's something that can be solved with a course of antibiotics and a couple of weeks off work, I'll do that, then get back on the bike. If they tell me I need an operation, I'll do that, then get back on the bike. But if they tell me that it's a debilitating illness from which there is no recovery, well, I'll just have to do something else. That's ok, you know. I've got lots of plans and ideas that I've been holding off on because of cycling, and if I have an illness that forces me out of racing for good, well, I'll just start on them a little earlier.

Like The Boss says, "You get used to anything. Sooner or later it just becomes your life."

This Is A Story You Won't Tell The Kids We'll Never Have.

After so long off cycling, I'm kinda surprised to come back and discover some things haven't changed at all. St Kilda crits, while they seem much safer, smoother, and altogether better than last year, are still riven with teams racing and shenanigans, and - perhaps more importantly - are still really, really hard. That shouldn't be too much of a surprise, I guess. A bigger surprise occurred at the state omnium champs, which I swung by on my way to pick up Casey from work. A year had gone by and I thought that Brent Nelson may have moved on to bigger and better things, but it seems after a lighter year on the bike he's keen to take the smaller steps back to greatness. He did this by winning each event, and doing a 10.8 flying 200. That's freaking fast, especially given he's not a sprinter. So yep, surprised to see that nothing has changed there. And all of a sudden a little more nervous about the State Points Race Championships in a couple of weeks.

Just Like A River.

I got some bad news the other day. My brother is getting married. Which isn't bad news in itself, I guess - his fiancee is pretty rad, and I suppose it's nice for them to have the ceremony and all of that jazz. The bad news was the date. March 11. Labour day long weekend. Or, as I like to think of it, Madison weekend.

Ever since I got sick and realized I probably wouldn't be firing on all cylinders by the Christmas Carnivals, I'd been thinking about the Bendigo Madison. I knew that I wouldn't be able to win the damn thing, but I also knew that every year they invite a bunch of locals and other likely suspects to ride it. And I figured I could be one of those blokes. So I set it as my target and asked my coach to build me up to it.

So perhaps you won't be so incredulous when I tell you I asked my brother to consider changing the date. He said no, telling me to wait til next year (and also suggesting I could probably do with the extra 12 months training, indicating that the competitive spirit that drove us both through our childhood years still exists). I then asked my parents to ask him, but they wouldn't, probably because they realized - a good hour before I did - that I was probably a little out of line.

My old man, however, loves a good metaphor, and asked me if, now that I've been forced to miss the Olympics, I could instead aim for the World Championships. I like metaphors too, so I got to thinking. The Austral is the week after the Madison, but I've never been too stoked on the Austral, so didn't want to consider it. However, if the tradition continues, the last race of the evening will be the Victorian 15k Scratch Race Championships - the race I wrote about here. Given the standard of the folks who turn out for the Austral Carnival I probably won't win it, but this year I'd like to finish in the bunch, and at least give some future Olympians a good run for their money.

So consider me refocused. My brother's nuptials may be a blessing in disguise.

Saw Her Standing On Her Front Lawn.

Last night I couldn't sleep because I had too much energy. This morning I got up and did an ergo session in the end room. Tonight I raced at the track. I'm pretty tired. In fact, I'm really tired. But I'm not fatigued. There's a big difference, and right now that difference means the fucking world to me. I didn't win any races tonight, not a single one. But hot damn I'm feeling good.

Pants Of Denim.

I was laying in bed yesterday morning, using a popular online encyclopaedia to come up with new and entertaining theories about why my body continues to let me down, when a text came through from Ollie, asking if I was racing Coburg. Against all better judgement, and the advice of Wikipedia, I said yes. We met up at Bell Street and rolled up Sydney Road to National Boulevard. Half an hour later we were racing, and I was feeling alright. I didn't contest the sprint, but was happy just to have stayed at the front for the whole time.

Things were looking up, so I decided to back up the morning's racing with some track in the afternoon. The first Evening Enduro was starting at 2 (irony!), so I shoveled in some food and headed down to the Harrison Street Velodrome. I wasn't the freshest of daisies, but still managed to bring home some silverware, and - more importantly - team Bundy managed to snare the top two steps on the podium in two out of the three events. That's a solid victory for Columbus Max, Peter Bundy's framebuilding prowess and anti-carbon Luddites everywhere.

Walking!

Also, you should download this, and only keep the Tight Bros From Way Back side. Apparently the guy who organized these records ripped a whole bunch of people off, so you shouldn't feel too bad about downloading it instead of buying it. The song is a contender for best cover ever, and also best song to play when you're leaving the house on your way to a party.

The Big Time, Baby.

I've had my ranty pants on quite a bit lately, but for some reason I've woken up in a decent mood, and as such will spare you the vein-popping details. Instead I'll write about my new track bike. I've only ridden it up and down my street so far, so this won't be a particularly well informed review. Mostly it'll be about my new bike angst.

My former bike - a Teschner Track Pro - didn't ever fit me quite right. It was a 57cm square, and I really need a 58 or even a 59. It also, like most modern track bikes, had a really short head tube, which meant that I needed a stack of spacers and a stem with a heap of rise. This in turn meant more flex through the stem. So I went looking for a bigger track bike with a bit more head tube. Eventually I settled on one of these and started saving.

I'm a notoriously bad saver, however, and it took a fair bit of time. In that time Sean the Man got in my ear, suggesting that the Pinarello wasn't so great, and that instead I should think outside the square. Better to get a bike that fits you, rather than get you to fit a bike, he reckoned.
"Plus," he continued, "Pete Bundy has just got in some Columbus Max."
"Steel?" I replied, "I'm sorry, did I fall asleep and wake up in the 90s?"
"Nah, listen. When BT first started making their bikes, their #1 specification was that they be as stiff as a bike made with Max. And Max isn't that heavy. Besides, weight doesn't matter so much on the track. You ever lifted a BT? They're fucking heavy."

I knew he was right. So I spoke to Pete, who told me he could make a bike a stiff as my Teschner, if not stiffer, and as a bonus it would fit me better. I was convinced, and put some money down.

A good two months later the bike arrived at the office. Carrying over to my car I was surprised by how light the box felt. Arriving home and unpacking the frame this surprise didn't fade - it was a lot lighter than I expected. The colour, which Dan Shifter later referred to as "Australian Flag" blue, fairly popped out of the box. It looked hot, and it felt hot.

Dan built it up for me, made it work. I was supposed to have track training at Coburg yesterday, and thus have a chance to ride around on it before racing, but the rolled in and cancelled the session. I haven't taken it out yet, and so my concerns about having a steel frame are yet to be put to rest. It is stiff, sure - true to his word, Pete probably has made it stiffer than the Teschner. But is it going to be as fast? Surely a fast track bike is stiff, light and aerodynamic - the Bundy scores a 5/5 for stiff, but what about light and aerodynamic? Furthermore, I'm not as fit right now as I was this time last season - am I going to blame my shitty performances on the bike? How will I know if it's the bike or me?

Of course, I can only really answer these questions by getting out and riding on the bloody thing, which I'll do on Tuesday night. Until then it'll just sit in the end room, asking questions.

Sleepwalking.

Facebook has just informed me that racing in Bendigo has started early this year, in the light of coming repairs to their track. This is most excellent news indeed. I'm a big fan of racing in Bendigo, for a number of reasons. First of all, the track is really big - 412 metres, I'm unreliably informed. This lends itself to harder racing, a leaning that is pushed further by the locals, who are reliably strong and capable cyclists. With little banking and some resistance in the track surface, it's a track suited to endurance track riders, especially when the wind is up.

Furthermore, there's the crowd. That's right, a crowd. At Bendigo on a Thursday night people go to watch track racing - people who don't even know the racers! That's unheard of down here, where entertainment options are plentiful. Throw in a coffee cart and occasionally a baked potato van and you're sorted for atmosphere.

But there's something more to it. I don't know if it's because I'm a bit country myself, but it's pretty satisfying to be out there in the open, the coolness of the evening coming in after a long day's heat, riding your bike and talking shit with the other blokes, sticking around for the presentations afterwards, then that long drive home, the car stinking of sweat and bikes and tired. Yep. It's a good feeling.