Creator Series film 5/10 - It's Just Like Riding A Bike

hey GI today um it's better I can open it it's like somebody punched me in the face what thing you got to do some training well I have to I'm like seven hours behind so I think I'll try this afternoon I'll see how I how I feel or how I can actually see because I need to our contacts and I don't know if I can yet maybe in a few more hours but it's definitely better than it was you want to eat some breakfast when we were up on the whatever you call it the block those were fine but I definitely have to like favor the left leg a little more there's not a lot of like muscular loss when we were measuring so it's good but the thing that we is it's just normal and we were talking about is actually how the right side is definitely way more dominant because stuff pops up in my head all the time - it's like God why am I doing this like this is stupid or maybe you know like I shouldn't be doing this I'm getting older and I have an injury and and the therapist the other day was like oh how was your disability and I was like you know what I have never once in eight years referred to it as a disability but it is that's the reality is it's like sometimes stuck with so but I think that's a frame of mine and I want to actually make sure that that's something that I keep reminding myself would you do it would you do a race like this [Music] my journey actually started about eight years ago I had I had a surgery and during the surgery which took place in my pelvis there was some damage done to one of the nerves or some of the nerves we believe which left me with a significant amount of pain over the course the last eight years that resulted in you know I wasn't able to walk normally I lost a lot of mobility I was limping and couldn't sleep but I still have and still suffer with significant pain can't sit fully on that side so the results from it have been long lasting and I know now are likely permanent as well so it changed my perspective on life and I've realized over the last eight years of having to rebuild my body that also came with rebuilding my life and everything that defined who I was and that meant that you know anytime that I lost I wanted to make sure it is going to replace that with significant things in my life that meant something to me and and that started with you know little things like walking again climbing mountains again and just finding joy and happiness and purpose and more recently diving into things that are probably you know going to cause me more pain but in the long run are going to be you know lasting memories and things that I'm really glad that I did there's been like some low points I think for me for sure in the last in the last like five years just struggling like to get a handle on what it's like to rebuild your life from an injury and not just like physically that's no cool it was every a spectacle is one component you first share your friends you have to rebuild finances you have to rebuild everything you build your outlook on life literally everything absolutely you know when you have lost so much in life regardless of where you're at you really have to look at life and think okay you know what do I have to work with and that's the quote that I was saying right it's the Teddy Roosevelt one right where it's it's do what you can with what you have where you are I will have this for the rest of my life but coming to terms with that was also I think instrumental in how far I was able to get because it was all about looking at what I could do and not what I couldn't do anymore that was a changing point for me wisdom you're not gonna get better but you're not gonna get worse okay well that means what okay and so that becomes very black-and-white so those were some of the biggest moments for me in the last few years yeah where it was like hey fine I can do this then I'm just gonna go climb a mountain it's gonna hurt that's fine okay well then what's next okay and that's the thing is we have used all of those struggles and physical or mental or whatever they are as Cavey it's for not doing all of the things that are on our lists it's time to just be like No I had been living in a really dark place for a really long time after my injury and having had lost everything that just didn't get better and it wasn't until a discussion with one of my doctors and said you know you're you're never gonna really get better but you won't get worse and I think it was in that moment that I realized the light went off that said okay well what can I do with what I actually have and that started the course of the journey that I am at now but it led me into you know instead of just like walking it was the idea of you know running but I ended up climbing mountains and spend some time in the Himalayas and that journey was for lack of a better word incredible because I really had to focus on what I could do not what was holding me back not the pain not any of the things that came along with that not loss or any of the dark stuff but how I was gonna get through every single day as much as it's been an incredibly physical journey for me it has opened my eyes to how much the human spirit really can do when you're focusing on the right things and that means you know what we're good at what we're strong with and and why we want to do things too because you know life is short it's precious and we - really there's there's no time to waste initially when I have seen my doctor back in February it was suggested that riding a bike could be great therapy for me it wasn't going to alleviate pain it wasn't going to change how I was but it was just going to offer another avenue for me to explore what physical limits I had builds and tolerance around pain particularly with sitting on a saddle and balance and all of the things that come with riding a bike which are seemingly insignificant but our I really not though there really is a lot that goes into that especially given that I've only spent two hours on a bike in the last 23 years so BC bike race was sort of like the Himalayas it's my Himalayas in the bike world instead of you know going for a leisurely stroll on down the seawall I chose to do an extreme mountain bike race for seven straight days I had researched what I thought BC bike race was and I in my head I had looked it you know I had looked at the elevation and I had looked at the distances and for some reason it just didn't click the same way but I was like oh it's a scenic ride through the woods for seven days and I saw race and then I was looking at you know the comments and stuff like that now it's like okay you know this seems like it's gonna be for sure a challenge I was expecting it to be challenging and then after I had committed and registered for the race was when I really started to understand what I just done and it was the comment Terry from you know people like my trainer Courtney two strangers that are starting to get heard of BC bike race race based staffers everybody that was involved in surrounding the race comments that were online that I really realized that this race wasn't just you know a scenic tour through the woods for seven days this was going to challenge me in every physical way and in every way that I had not been challenged before it was is getting scary [Applause] so I'm getting nervous about trading because we have three weeks until race day the interesting thing has been getting it back on a bike and just the placement of like where the seat is sitting where my injury was put so much pressure on my leg so yeah so it's it's um it's been interesting and I have to like I it's sort of the same I guess no the same way that I have to deviate my thought from pain is the same way that I did when I was learning how to walk again or climb mountains but I think the difference here is that it's like literally like right there all the time you're sitting on it well that sucked a lot more than I thought it was going to be yeah yeah it was tough pick a lot my leg is in rough shape [Applause] you're doing good yeah yeah yeah it's done I did it yeah so essentially after you had your surgery from the reports that like multiple doctors had shown you said that there might have been some compromise to some of the nerves that are in the like perennial genital area so this one right here your pudendal nerve which is a little bit hard to see on this but it runs right through here yeah like that's the nerve like right there yeah isolated just with the bone which is pretty close to where you sit on your side yeah just pretty close right yeah yeah so that would be like the irritation like the discomfort that you have but when you start to dis use this area you're not going to be putting as much weight on it the muscles will start to atrophy you'll start to develop some compensations and so what I want to go through is an assessment to kinda see what has this surgery over the past like eight years or so what kind of things has a cause of muscle imbalances cuz that's where I can help identifying what muscles might be tight what muscles might be weak or not working and then how does that replicate to you how like you move and then how you move on your bike with the goal of racing in your event yep around 42 okay and then we're just going to switch these and so the reason why I kind of brought out the scale is because alright I kept on telling me that she kept on falling over to her right like all our crashes were on to her right side and her right so I were just getting absolutely PPI so that's like 28 so that's a pretty big imbalance that's a block that it yeah your pain is I think going to definitely increase more like if you think about an area that's already really irritated and a five out of ten and you're just gonna because this one kind of rubbing over it for five seven hours per day for a week and yeah you can expect that your discomfort will probably go up but like it's been fairly stable for the past eight years and you push yourself hard this is a whole different way to push yourself hard it's not on any pleasant at all is there any way to minimize how unpleasant it can be specifically for somebody like me I guess I think there's a lot of things oh I just got out of physiotherapy with Midori and we were discussing how my injury has caused me a significant pain over the last eight years and how this is gonna contribute to some severe discomfort during the race and how it's causing me some imbalance and she's been able to give me some solutions that will help me over the long term but the reality is is that with the short amount of time period to train for the race it's going to be really important that I have the right gear and equipment which means a well-fitting bike and everything that goes along with that so we're off to see race face hi well we got you this bike lined up for your BC bike race adventure we worked with the wonderful people over at Rocky Mountain bicycles and got you an altitude Carbon 70 which is sort of more in the all-mountain enduro kind of range for them but we want to sort of have the emphasis be on descending and on comfort so having them having a bit of bigger travel 150 millimeters of travel will be will be something you'll probably enjoy around day five when you're just feeling like you can't be nowhere near a bicycle so have fun with it and yeah if you have any issues give us a show but otherwise I think you're gonna be super happy with this and it's gonna this will be the machine to get you through that get you through the BC bike race yeah I'm excited to take it out I'd get it and just get used to it just where everything is and just comfortable using it as I'm riding because I don't have anything on mine right now okay so my plan today is we're gonna we're gonna work on some stability stuff with you I coached from the ground up so we work with tire pressure foot position hand position and having you just overall stable on the bike so that no matter what you come across in this race at least you have a platform to start and stop safely if you want to get on and off the bike a lot of people get tangled up a lot of weird things happen so basically with this small slow start we can handle everything so basically let's let's grab the bike and go over there and get you working on balance to do seven days on the terrain that you're about to ride the best thing to do is to like to take your time on the climbs there's a lot of sweeps there's a lot of fun people there's a lot of liking stations and stuff and and and taking your time and that's working just don't be afraid to walk there's a lot of stages where you will end up walking and there's a lot of places you're wanting to be your fault there's people all over the place so putting the ego in the pocket and just enjoying a beautiful walk in the woods there might be the solution in a lot of those cases the cool thing with something like the DC bike race is you will be a proper British Columbia bikers if you have patience for yourself in the beginning I'll get your bike grab well dot right there there's a BC bike race move 58 tunes on front of you to climb and everything in your life I'm out of here [Laughter] so Kourtney's asking a couple of questions how much riding and you've done in the past what kind of time can you commit to training we have four weeks so soon how much mountain biking have you done a lot more single track yeah and just more technical days than some other ones that are out there that is physically demanding in a different way than just like pedaling I mean pedaling for six hours is really hard so race face put me in touch with Courtney McFadden a US National Team cyclist who had recovered from two hip surgeries so it has been really great to train with somebody who understands what it's like to work with an injury she is also training for vcpr this summer so we've worked together on nutrition training getting me in the saddle and getting me as ready as I can in last three and a half weeks and B CBR is just around the corner and I have some nerves but I feel like I am as ready as I can be day ones fine day twos fine day three is fine it starts to crunch around eight four five yeah in this case yeah powder is actually a beautiful very different location because it's kind of flat rolling clear these long stretches of unbelievable forest with this tiny ribbon of trail so it's kind of a refresher Game five on the other hand is the used to be the hump day and it's the big day where you cross all the Sunshine Coast's to see show that's kind of a really maybe the first four days here on day seven you're going up but you don't [Music] so finished a prologue date zero today we have 300 kilometers of trails ride for K done stoked to check how I did yeah it's a reminder that these are like 50 K days and I'm like gasps or any of those like man they're gonna just be super long days just have to like constantly remind myself that and we compare myself and I think I'll be okay I get a change out of my ear get comfy and then we are on the theory of couch and ballet we're spending the night there Teresa day one tomorrow [Music] so we are in a couch in for today we start racing tomorrow in two different stages and I'm expecting to take about seven hours tomorrow with clinical leg I'm in the last heat of the day so slow pack which is fine with me so I'm feeling a bit apprehensive about I think just like the level of difficulty just because I know that there's some pretty steep inclines and then also technical skills again it's stuff that I just haven't had a lot of time to work on yeah as long as the weather holds up and it's on to five and not just Super Bowls I think a happy medium like redstone which I rate I'll be pretty awesome enjoy some of the trails they've been amazing people stay back with me let's see how we keep each other going for the next seven days or somebody yesterday like oh when they find been riding for long what my biggest bride was I was like forty point something cooling with her good yesterday was my baguettes riots law considering I've been walking only for like three and a half four years yeah I feel I feel pretty good I feel like now it's a huge feat maybe you know when I ten years ago that would have been nothing but changes I'm gonna butter my biscuit go take care of definitely what should I have more training time for sure take some tiny bales nothing major top rack operate about him right away so good keep running into the same crowd back and forth he's here for the challenge for sure let's go see what you're made of I know they're not gonna all be like this but I'm feeling so good and so confident j4 Powell River these trails are insane they're so amazing they're just like slush pull applause and I think we're almost halfway around like 22 23 fresh and lots of crazy law or fruits but it's amazing out her amazing baby I'm having so much fun so much so that you're not even paying attention to [ __ ] that actually hurt so it's a really rad day we've got another 25 kin ago but I feel good [Music] I'm pretty tired today I didn't get 12:11 and then everybody kind of settles through the day we're sleeping so I'm feeling like I definitely wrote over a hundred hey stuff great oh good okay just go slower forgetting that I found her to be that sad [Music] today we have climbing 58 kilometers a between rest stop 1 & 2 it's 26 kilometers just between the two rest stops on May 3 that was the entire day [Music] [Applause] so this second rest stop on day five I am completely exhausted I was exhausted this morning I'm really struggling today a lot of people are struggling I'm totally struggling I don't know this is tough today it's a big one and I'm just a spot eat from start line and hasn't gone away and I'm eating and there's a bunch of people behind me that are thinking of quitting here and I really hope they don't we've been yelling at each other you're in there so today is definitely a huge struggle so it's already a long day [Music] [Applause] [Music] all right great we also bring it over to [Music] come in great job long day [Music] welcome to day seven [Music] [Laughter] [Music] these people here they inspire me regular humans that's inspiring you know we're not being like athletes we don't train like athletes you gotta dig deep for [ __ ] like this not that athletes do hope Halla doesn't breathe you know as I was expecting to be at the back of the pack by myself grinding up this phrase with all of these professional athletes pro riders you know well ahead of me and the reality is I've been surrounded by some amazing people who are actually you know doing the same thing that I'm doing just quite a bit more silently which has been a nice dose of humble pie for me which is you know really allowed me to step back and realize that I'm not alone in my journey and sharing it with a group of people who are very similar is pretty amazing and an unexpected vine steps are steps they might be tiny and they might be irrelevant to somebody else but if their step for you they count for those of us that are at the back of the pack where most of us are overcoming a whole bunch of hurdles just here to the start line then we are working longer and finding it more difficult we're not going as fast but we're working through our own stuff end down there going through all that and then getting up and carrying on going and not just putting the hand up and saying I'm done I mean I said that five or six times but I kept writing and everyone around me is doing the exact same thing and they're guys who had to pull out one day and they're back on the start line the next day I have MS so multiple sclerosis that has diagnosed about 18 months ago it's something I didn't know anything about when I went through the diagnosis process and I absolutely panicked and had this kind of vague vision of myself in a wheelchair as the as the outcome from that but the more I've learned about it the more I realized that you know it's possible to live an entirely healthy and happy life with MS so it's been as I said a bit of a point proving exercise for me as well as kind of going okay I can get past this fear that I've generated myself about what my life is going to be like than ms and show that I I mean this is the hardest thing I've ever done physically before I meant after MS yeah but hands down the hardest thing I have ever done and so to be able to get through that and go to myself okay you've got this that's been mine my main focus is just to prove to myself that this to me and that's been my whole message with this and you know with doing a bit of writing as we know about how the Emerson is there I'm like I'm super normal and not an elite athlete average but enthusiastic would be went slogan for sure and so if I can do it everyone can try I don't always succeed or fail a lot but it's trying I think that we measure ourselves by I want to do well I don't want to I know it sounds bad I don't want to be seen as everyone's going are you doing amazing because you've got one leg up I want to be seen as all you're doing really well because you're up there people always go oh well you're disabled and I say well no I you know mentally I tell my disability what I want to do and I don't live my life to my disability and I probably got some sort of compulsive disorder because whatever I do I want to do it well I I just don't want to do it if I you know I know I won't do it well I just I won't do it but that's you know that that's me with sport I just whatever I do I want to be the best that I can be at it yeah so basically I was in Afghanistan in 2010 I've been there for five and a half months at two weeks left to push jumped in a Danish sort of main battle tank so a flat-bottomed whole vehicle and we were just driving down the road and and I just remember this massive flash of light and then next thing I remember I was about twenty thirty foot away from the vehicle the Sun was in my eyes and I could smell the easel and I knew straight away you know we would hit an ie D of some sort of kind my right leg I tried to lift that the sand around me was basically saturated in blood and that's when I realized you know I was lucky to be alive I don't think people realize how sort of fragile life can be or you know how easy someone could change and you know life is so precious and you don't I think a lot of people don't appreciate that until you've probably nearly lost your life please can I get to the end each day and so just keep going hopefully be able to start each day and go as far as I can yeah you're a long time dead there's lots of fun things to do you better get out there and have a garden I think by crossing the finish line the entire race really I had gone in there fully ready to be challenged in every physical mental emotional way possible and it was going to take me courage to get through things that I was like really terrified to do and I was really focused on that so my my tunnel vision if you will was just like this is gonna be hard I have not ridden a bike for 23 years I have you know I have an existing injury that's gonna be with me lifelong but all of these things were kind of really prevalent in my mind so I went in there thinking you know this is gonna be tough I was ready for it to be tough and then you know into the race things really started to change for me I had discovered that I was surrounded by a group of incredible people that were also you know struggling with challenges that they were faced with but they were doing it really silently they were plugging along and grinding it out harder and then you know people at this race they were doing the exact same thing that I was they were you know maybe they'd been riding longer but a lot of them had you know that they were working through grief injury disease loss some of us become invisible that kind of made me just take a step back and really understand that this entire thing was I mean it's not about me but really is so far removed from me I had had this thing that I've had for a long time and it felt really alone with it and suddenly I've met a group of people who are in the exact same position that I was so crossing the finish line became about obviously pushing my limits and all of those great things and achieving something but I was doing it with a group of people that actually could understand where I was coming from and I could understand where they were coming from it was the most relatable experience I've ever had in my life [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] my tears with state