That time I felt just a little total panic

It just hit me, there are less than three months until BC Bike Race 2016!

Panic sets in as a timid racer contemplates his readiness to ride up 2,000m of roots and then turn around to launch off endless BC gnar. Repeat for seven days. If i had a dedicated photographer the way everyone on Instagram seems to you’d see me flying off here in style and grace, almost mythically capable. Trust me… that’s what you’d see…

Looking at the calendar I realized next Tuesday I start some training classes that I’m signed up for. This 12 week program runs up until race week so that means… there are 12 weeks to go! After 10 months of slowly and surely getting everything on track, this is the first milestone that makes it all feel very really and soon.

To deal constructively with what would be way easier (and probably more fun, if less effective) as panic-mode I’m going to settle in to a few patterns and methods:

1. Trust your preparation. You have a plan, you have lists, review them and use them.
2. Make sure you do the things on your lists, starting today, right now. One of my favourite sayings is ‘a year from now you’ll wish you started today’ and then it is easy to picture future-me scolding lazy today-me. Having a plan is a good first step to bringing focus, but taking that first step (and then keeping going) is kinda important too. My (non-training) items this week were (1) install new 1x11 drivetrain myself and (2) book appointment to get brakes bled by someone more trustworthy than myself with DOT fluid, and (3) book my BCBR meal plan.
3. Get creative overcoming problems. There are going to be things that just aren’t going to work, you can’t fix, you’re too broke to do anything about, you don’t know what to do about, you can’t schedule around, could cause familial discord, or will chronically ache no matter how much money you throw at an RMT (registered massage therapist). Now is the time you need to get creative about how you will overcome these inevitable challenges and make shit happen.
4. Shift your mindset into every day is get-ready-to-race-day. You now need to be in race mode, all the time. Actually, day-by-day might not be enough. You need to be taking every moment you can during every day to move steadily towards your goal — workouts and logistics. This last point might be overkill but I won’t know until I complete my seven days and look back on whether I failed, barely scraped by, or finished comfortably.

Eighty-two days to go. We’ve got this one.