1.Hello you beautiful lordmen and welcome back to another episode of…

Hello you beautiful lordmen and welcome back to another episode of the podcast. Today is a very special episode, it's not the longest episode but in a lot of ways it's the most authentic episode. I took some time earlier this week to record my thoughts and when I started talking a little bit more than I planned came out and yeah I found a tough at times nearly broke down as I went sort of deep and figured out the real reasons why I was in cycling and sort of cast my mind back to a time a couple of years ago when I wasn't as happy and just putting that microscope on myself for once rather than constantly advising and coaching others putting the microscope on myself and just for the first time I suppose, dialling out loud on podcast formats, what the problem was at the time and how I solved it. It was a pretty unique solution to a very common problem. So I'm going to shut up and I'm going to let you listen to that. I hope you enjoy it. Before I jump into that, I just like to give a brief Ward to our Shulk sponsor, which is JUVE. J-O-O-B-V. JUVE is a near and far infrared light source, which is an essential part of my morning routine. It's become even more essential now with the lockdown at the moment. My routine at the moment, it's jumping up on to the wave to get my session done before I even get into the shower. I am 20 minutes on front of the JUVE. Standing there just bading in natural light. A natural light that we can't normally get because of the cloud cover anyway. But the benefits for skin health, for collagen production, for testosterone improvements and anti-depressive properties to this are well documented. The studies are vast and numerous often credible sources. That's why I always promised myself I would never show you on this podcast. I would never recommend anything that I didn't absolutely love and use myself and that's why I've been so long holding off to announce a show sponsor but I loved you, I happily used it every day and I was a customer long before they were a show sponsor. I chased them hard to get this one. Okay, let's jump into this one. Until today I haven't really felt up to sharing this with anyone. I haven't really felt ready to share with you, the audience. But given all the craziness that's going on in the world, I said, you know what, it's time for me to let the guard down and just be a little bit vulnerable. So I'm gonna start, I'm gonna start at the beginning. I was in H-ray, it wasn't a very good H-ray. I was actually quite a bad H-ray. And I had a fork in the road moment. I got a coach, I started to deal with intervals. I got a little bit faster. Started to deal with more intervals. I got a little bit faster. I won a race. I got a little bit faster. I got promoted, got promoted again. Got to A1, got through a Ross. Another Ross. A little bit faster, a little bit better. At this stage, I was finishing my degree. I was finished my Masters and I was into law school and I was getting better and better at cycling. I was dedicating more and more hours each week to cycling and it became my whole life. I became obsessed with the bike. Every minute in my face wasn't in the books studying for law school, it was on the bike. I tried at 11 p.m. at night, one night I fell asleep on the rollers and went through coffee table in my parents house. I was obsessed. I got a contract in France, it was tough out there when a person of yours kept gone. Then I went to Canada, got a contract out there, rolled with Jeff fuel out in Canada, had a great phone. Then I moved on to the United States, got my first paid contract. But when I got to the US, I started seeing the dream wasn't for me that the level of sacrifice that went into the bike, the all-encompassing nature of the bike, I came home, but I was still obsessed.

2.Was still couldn't let it go

I was still couldn't let it go. It's still 20, 25 hours a week. I'm still winning races, podiums every week and I'm still fanatical. Then at the end of 2014, I decided, you know what, it's time to be a grown up. It's time to start launching a career. I was an accidental entrepreneur with A1, but I'd read online that you need multiple sources of income. So I said, you know what, I need to diversify. I need to set up a second company. I need to set up a toured company. So I had some companies that I tried and failed like Pocka Coach, but I had some companies to took off. I bought a cafe. I set up a social media marketing agency. The years were taken past. I was up to 2018, 2019. I was putting on extra weight. And I was still trying like I was before. I was still trying to get in my 15, 20 years a week. But there was something different going on. I just didn't seem to be responding to this training anymore. I couldn't understand what was happening. I was trying to like before but just something wasn't the same. I had low energy every single day. I was waking up and I was just, I was tired and I was stressed all the time and like anyone who knows me that's just, that's not me. I was completely exhausted but looking back I was also completely in denial about the sort of shape that I was in. With the benefit of hindsight and looking back now I heard his part about all that was, I was spending virtually no time with my girlfriend. My folks were getting older and they literally did see my folks and my girlfriend, it was such poor quality time. I was always just distracted and I was flicking around on my phone. I was a shit person. When I started out riding my bike, looking at Tour de France, looking at Stephen Rolch and Sean Kelly, yeah I dreamed the winning bike races like any kid but I'm going to be honest with you right now. That wasn't what it was about for me. It was much more personal than that. My dad had an accident when he was in his 20s. He lost his toe and after he lost his toe he started put on a lot of weight and he went through a big part of his life this shit to start to talk about. And he went through a big part of his life carrying that extra weight. So I grew up seeing the limitations of extra weight, the lifestyle limitations, the stuff he couldn't do. And when I started cycling, I made a promise to myself that that had never happened to me. me that I would never put on waste and I would never let waste, limit my lifestyle. Maybe that's why I was so unhappy around that period of my life because I was breaking that promise, you know, that promise that I made to myself, the one I said I'd never break. I can remember the tipping points so clearly, you know, I completely fueled myself. I fueled myself and I'd avoided anything that was going to give me a reality check. I just didn't step on on weighing scales, are you voided parameters, lactate tests, threshold tests, and actually I avoided training partners and group rides, anything that was going to give me a reality check. I showed up for a tour of Ulster, I can remember everything vividly about that day. I was late getting to the race, I was in a fluster, I didn't have pins from my numbers, I even had to call the organizer and ask them to hold the start of the race for me because I was running late. It was just so uncharacteristic for me. I was absolutely fat as a fool showing up to this, an elite boy craze with some of the best boy colliders in the country and from the UK. I'm gonna fast forward five kilometers. I actually went with, I remember an attack gone early and thinking I need to go with that, that could be the move.

3.Then we're gonna fast forward five kilometers and I'm in the last…

Then we're gonna fast forward five kilometers and I'm in the last group on the road and I'm getting smart comments from guys in the group gone, oh my God, I've never been in the group you before and I remember just thinking I wish a hole would open up in the ground and just swallow me. I felt like this big. It's one of the worst feelings I've ever had in cycling. I finished that stage one of a four stage race. I was last man on the road. I was cramping all the way in trying to hold on to that last group. I was humiliated. Across the line to see one of my teammates had won the stage. I paused for a quick photo on my teammates, I faked a smile and then I got into the car and I abandoned the race and I drove home. It was one of the loneliest and most soullest drawings, soulls, searching drives in my life, the trieur drive home. I have to be honest, driving home. I thought that was it. I was quitting cycling for good. But more than that, I was actually very close to quitting. I was very close to quitting on the vision I had for myself, the vision I had for the type of life that I wanted. I'd never envisaged myself as an overweight guy heading towards middle-edge, stuffed into Loykra who rode his bike at the weekend, but that's what I was slipping towards. I remember at the time I used to look at some of my friends, my older friends, they'd come home in the evening, they'd sit on front of the TV, barely say hello to their wife, distracted on their phone, no energy, no libido and they tease me in response and they say yeah we'll see how much energy you have when you're in the real world, when you're working full time, we'll see how much energy you have for trying to then. I'm not driving home, I thought you know well maybe they're right, maybe I just need to stop this fantasy life, I need to grow up, get a real job. Now I was becoming just like them, was this my fate. I have a friend, a good friend who's mentored me for the last number of years. I met him the week after the tour of Ulster and I told him what was happening. If I named up this guy you'd know who he was, he mentored some of the top performers in the world and he's built some huge businesses, mad-scale businesses. He told me a story about the power of focusing on just one thing. So it was pretty radical, but on his advice, I sold the cafe, I sold the media company and I put a one on indefinite pause. I focused on just one thing. he called this the big domino. The one thing that if I could topple this big domino, it would start a chain reaction and every other problem in my life would become inconsequential. So I put my mind to figuring out what the domino problem was and after much soul-searching and evaluation I came up with my big domino. How could I use cycling as a tool to improve my health, happiness and longevity? That was it. That was my big domino. Day and night I put all my energy into it. I traveled the world. I visited China to buy America all over Europe. I read thousands of books. I attended seminars, workshops. I talked to the best mentors, top performers. I devoted my entire life to this one question. My big domino. Reading through a scientific journal one day, I found one study that would go on to unlock it all for me. This study was about cortisol. Cortisol is the stress hormone. So we produce cortisol in response to training, in response to nutrition, in response to environmental stimulus, in response to light, sound, toxins, in response to a bunch of different things. This one study set me on a part to unlocking this whole big domino and it changed my life. I built a system for myself.

4.Was using processes like meditation, cold therapy, photobiole…

I was using processes like meditation, cold therapy, photobiole modulation units, starting my training philosophy. I built a series of morning routines and evening routines. When I finally crafted this system, I trialled around myself and I actually couldn't believe what happened. I went from around 97 kilograms to about 70 age kilograms. My trash hole power went up from 300 watts to 390 watts. I was more productive, I was happier, I was energized, libido went up, it was ridiculous. So I set myself the ambitious goal of getting back into cycling after a two year break and I wanted to qualify for the Olympics on the tandem with my buddy Peter Ryan. So I taught at Holland, this can't be real. Like, hell, there was nobody talking about this stuff. Why is nobody using these techniques? I got to get what I called a beta group, my bio-hacked beta group, and I tested this stuff on the guys. I talked them through morning routines, evening routines, cold therapy, light therapy, meditation practices and it had the exact same exact same effect. It was at that point I said I have to get back into A1. I have to launch this YouTube channel. This is the real reason I'm back doing YouTube videos. This is the reason I launched the podcast. I want to share this message with you. It's too powerful not to be shared. So my journey has been halted with the coronavirus. The Olympics it might even be on now. I've got Tokyo, might it be my primary journey on this it might have been my primary goal. But you know, along the way, I figured out something. I figured out that, you know what, it was never about that. It was never about the destination. It's been about the journey. It's been about the learnings I've had along the way. And now my real mission is to teach this stuff to you. Like, I wake up every single morning now with energy, with a focus, productivity. I get more done in a day now than I used to get done in a week. And I'm saying this stuff not to impress you, will to impress upon you that this is possible. I wake every single morning feeling like a million dollars. Oh, is it a bad way even listening back to that? It's tough. It's real. It's tough. Let me know. Pop me an email. I'm on info.a1coaching.net. Pop me an email if any user gone through something similar. I'd love to hear it because I know as I said at the start, at the outset. This is an uncommon solution I had but I feel like it's a very common problem. I feel like a lot of people are stuck in a row. I feel like people aren't exactly where they need to be and that's what I want this podcast and the vlog on YouTube. That's what I want them to be is your little nudge in the right direction. So I really hope that helped. I'm hoping you enjoyed today's show. It was a difficult one to bring you guys but it was honest, It was real and it was me and I promised you that's what I would always be. Big shout out to Juve, our show sponsor. I'm using them every single morning for their amazing light healing properties. I have a link in the description down below and I strongly advise you to check it out and if you do check it out, they're hooking everyone up that buys the Juve unit with with a free gift of your choice. That on its own is even more checking out. I can't recommend it highly enough and I can't thank you deeply enough for devoting me your attention. I will be back again shortly. Love all you out there. Thanks for listening.