all cyclists are fruits

After a month of base training, whilst squatting in the Mallorca Cycling Ireland house, I’m heading to London for some downtime with a gem. I’ll then head off to France to start my 2015 racing campaign, with Hennebont Cyclisme.

What a jolly life cyclists/holiday makers have: frolicking and jet-setting, pottering across the globe.

This post gives you an insight.

I was never a fan of Shrek, but I would rather quote it than the Bible.

In the first movie, Shrek says to Donkey,

‘Onions have layers, Ogres have layers … You get it? We both have layers.’

Shrek posits the hardened, fearless and ruthless personality of his kind, through a common vegetable.

Cyclists are fruits.

this is an orange

More specifically, cyclists are oranges.

From the outside, they are shiny, colourful, happy people. The naked eye suggests their life is a breeze, they’re always in lovely places having a grand old time. And look at their legs; who can be annoyed when your legs look better than Pixie Lott’s?

However, their inside is mush. Physically and mentally; their innards are soft.

A cyclist going well is a normal human being not going well.

Physiologically, cycling turns your body into a shrivelled, bewildered old man. You walk at snail’s pace, you take regular naps, and you could thoroughly benefit from a stairlift in your home.

It’s a hard graft psychologically. You are always battling your emotions, living out of a suitcase, with no constant income. I now spend about 60% of my life in situations where I don’t have a clue what is going on, because my Spanish/French/German/Dutch is not up to standard.

Sometimes you ask yourself, ‘What am I doing with my life?’

It always helps when you know that others are playing the same quiz.

Jack Bobridge, a recent challenger to the world hour record, is an excellent case study. He was claimed to be the next big thing by many analysts, but never acclaimed his full potential.

Over the past years, he has battled with lack of form, illness and criminal charges.

This year it looked like Jacky Bobby was the original Jacky Bobby again, winning a stage in the tour down under, and securing the mountains classification.

But just when everything seems to be back on track, he misses out on an Hour Record he was expected to obliterate, by 500m.

Imagine how colourful his book would be.

What compels him to keep on riding?

What has troubled him to do the things that he has done in the past?

Jacky Bobby fully lit

Cycling is the cruellest sport known to man.

I have tried a lot of sports in my life time, and the only sport that is close to the cycling pain threshold is marathon running. But even then, cycling still wins the brutality prize because a race more or less always outlasts a marathon.

Cycling is a team sport rewarded individually.

A cycling career’s fate is two-pronged: You are either the individual who wins and gets the car, money and fame; or the individual’s helper who eats porridge every morning, with maybe some honey thrown in on their birthday.

It’s the most dog-eat-dog sport out there.

In a bike race, no one cares who you are.

If your legs aren’t good, no one cares.

If you crash, no one cares.

Nobody needs you to finish a bike race.

It’s only the cyclist’s sheer determination driving them to finish the race.

If a chicken can survive without a head for 6 months, an injury-free cyclist should be able to finish a bike race. Whether they’re number one or 30minutes down, they can always finish.

The time when you finish 30minutes down is when you learn about yourself the most.

After all this, I still find myself eager to get to France to ride bike races.

Is that the only difference between cyclists and oranges?

The juice inside a cyclist-orange is laced with some crazy hallucinogenic stimulant which makes you wholeheartedly dependent on pedalling a two wheeled bicycle?

Who knows.

All I can say is, I can’t wait to start my 2015 holiday in France on the 18^th February.

If you want a holiday yourself go to the Beechlawn Hotel on the 27^th February at 1900.

For more information go to http://on.fb.me/1DPkBJB - Remember to click attend.

Follow @DanBikeStewart and @DaveRaynerFund on Twitter.