Discovering myself - personality & team work.
It has now been two months since I arrived in the Netherlands to take on the next step in women's cycling. Two months down the track and I am still as excited as I was walking off the plane and stepping onto European soil. I am here in the Netherlands with one ultimate goal in mind, to be a professional cyclist.
As my first european season of racing I came to the Netherlands knowing that I would be learning A LOT about everything cycling; racing, training, skills, nutrition, my competition etc. Not only did I expect to learn a great deal about riding my bike, I also knew that I would be learning a lot about myself. Two months away from home and being a full time bike rider has made me realise many important aspects about myself and my personality that were not so obvious to me beforehand. Being more aware of myself and my personality has had such a positive influence on my life and how I look at things. Not only has it helped me work harder and more effectively towards my goals, it has been a big learning experience for me personally and has helped me stay true to myself and focus more on what is best for me.
One of the biggest things I have learnt about myself from this journey has been my personality. I know that is a very broad term however I have never been so in tune or aware of my personality until this point. Living with four other Australian bike riders has been a big part of me discovering my personality which has been a very positive experience for me. I now know that I am very much someone that needs to be in an organised, structured and systematic environment for me to be able to work to the best of my ability. This has been a huge help in my training and preparation for races. As I am still very young and relatively new to cycling I am still discovering what works best and what types of training routines I respond best to. After sitting down and chatting to my housemates and realising that I work best with a very structured routine I now make an extra effort to plan out my day the night before. This includes where I will do my training out on the road and what I will eat throughout the day. I will also make a list of other things that needed to get done the next day and figure out when it would be best to do those things and so on. This may seem a bit extreme and way too systematic for some, but it is what I have discovered works best for me. What I am also finding by doing this is that I now have much more time in the day for all the training and exercises off the bike that will make a big difference in the long run.
Living with four of my Aussie teammates has been a lot of fun. A big part of this experience has been getting to know my Aussie housemates. There is a never ending stream of jokes and laughing in our team house which has been loads of fun. It has also proven to be very important in our training and racing to know each others personalities and what works best for each individual and what they value the most. Having an understanding of this and taking this information over into a race makes a huge difference in being able to work as a team and trust each other when it comes to racing and carrying out team tactics. Teamwork is one of the things that drew me to cycling in the first place and is one of the things I love most about this sport.
I am constantly learning about myself and learning new things about this wonderful sport. So far since being in Europe following my dream the biggest lesson I have learnt is that it is not just about training hard on your bike, it really is everything you do both on the bike and off the bike that will make the difference and a big part of that also involves knowing yourself and your teammates.
