What teaching teaches me

I think a lot. Triathlon gives you a lot of time to go over things in your head whilst training. I go over what my day included, how to do it better and how to do the next day best.

I really strive to avoid being hypocritical too. So for all the things I preach to my students I don't dare to fail to practice. Here is a list of the 5 most important things I observe from my students at the moment that I carry across and practice in my life:

1. The difference between those achieving and those that aren't is a willingness to accept responsibility for achieving.

2. Trying and getting it wrong is as important as trying and getting it right. Sure, if you are so omnipotent that you can get the whole picture every time, then you might never need to get it wrong. But for those "young souls" among us, failure just means you're trying to get better. Just work out what you did wrong and don't make that mistake again.

3. Check that what you are doing is right! Don't just slam through a block of work and assume that you are correct. Check you answers, do time trials, do whatever it takes to assess your objective. Otherwise by the time the test/race rolls around you're going to look like a fool.

4. Just follow simple instructions and you will get far. If you think that for some reason you are exempt from things everyone else must follow and not paying attention as a result, chances are you will fail on your test too or at least just make life harder for yourself.

5. Don't revise the hard questions on exams if you can't even do the easy ones. I've literally taught over a thousand students and I've only once seen this work (and I think it was a fluke). If you can't yet run 32mins off the bike for 10k, don't try to run 31mins. You'll blow up. If you're not hitting your times in races but you're doing more than enough work on it, maybe you're working too hard or on the wrong stuff. Number one symptom of this is blaming everyone else other than yourself, even though you weren't listening to the people you blame in the first place. Yeah, I have a year 11 kid who drives me mental on this - I am now at the point where I try to politely ignore him or else I'll stress myself sick!

I make these mistakes with my training all the time. I was never the perfect student either. They are what I've seen lead to disappointment though. In fact, if you see me doing any of them, remind me and put me in my place!

Alicante, Spain

One really cool thing about teaching in London is that there are three terms and each one has a half term break. During the "Easter" holidays, we're going to my two favourite cycling races, Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix. During the recent half term break, we went to Alicante.

It was really good to get out of London's weather and into the Spanish sun. It was good to get some consistent running going too, in particular in a beautiful location.

End result: it was a great experience and I'm looking forward to the chance to race and or train in the country on another occasion.  Did I mention four days cost $800AUD including flights, accomodation and eating out for every meal.

A bit of pre travel humour. I laughed out aloud at this poster of Cook smiling about bringing home the Ashes!

GF shopping at the airport. Has an expensive addiction...

Given the car dooring in Melbourne recently, how good are these reminders to cyclists?

Apologies for the camera flipping midway.: I had to dodge some ppl and things

"F.r.i.e.n.d.s night club" Yup, they based a night club off an American sitcom

Giant lolly shop. No wonder Team Novo Nordisk (all diabetic cycling team) does training camps here

A school for learning English. The sign says "No English, No  future". 

Might spend the bulk of November, December, January and February in this country. Something of a paradise :D

London Bike and Tri Show

This event happened over a month ago and was really cool. It's all a bit out of date to be talking about it too much, so I'll show all the photos I've got with briefs about why we took them.

Yes, I said we. I took my girlfriend. You'd some who has competed in three world championships (2x Cross Country, 1 x Triathlon) and will spend 8 hours the weekend prior shopping would enjoy being at a sports based expo. No. Put it this way, I'm glad there was some sort of travel expo going on at the same time or I'd have had to leave incredibly early!

I'm not sure why there is a triathlon show in February, but I can tell why this one is on. There is another, earlier established one a few weeks later. Still, I don't understand why it's not held closer to the start of the season.

This leads me to also wonder when the season kicks off officially in England. Australia has Noosa, but what is it here? For me, I'm aiming to be right to go from June 1. I have set minimum standards to meet each month between now and then before I'm happy with my form to race. All I can hope is that my run of illness and injury subsides so that I can actually do some training!

Sample Gels from High 5 - so valuable given the hardest thing for a lot of people is choosing a flavour they can handle

Local British Brand. Funny how we don't get bikes in Aus unless they are ridden by a World Tour team.

The club I'm in back in Aus would love this and would surely pay a fair bit for it.

Hipster central

Neil Pryde had some cool looking frames

Our Expos normally have the regular 3x3 or 6x3 spaces. Seeing open air lots were great. Seeing a couch and armchairs was amazing, one of the best stands from Chapeau

Hardnutz. You'd think they made cricket boxes, but their helmets looked quality too.

Back at Chapeau

Still at Chapeau

Hope had a fairly cool casing for their lot. Makes sense since they makes bearing casings etc.

My girlfriend was signed to Sky while I had my back turned

Literally my favourite paint/decals job in the world. I can't believe he is considering riding a bike that looks like Ronald McDonald threw up on it this year.

Contintenal has a MASSIVE display box that has to be a permanent fixture of their Euro shows. No wonder they don't bother with Australia anymore

These guys make a 4.9kg bike (with group set) that looked just amazing. Will cost $20,000AUD. 

When the sun comes up at 8am and goes down at 4pm, fluoro yellow is big here

These seat stays look identical to my Cannondale Evo's. The Cannondale guy found it amusing too

Bikes for my mum :P

Yep, a classic tv on top of a stand holding satchels you can wear whilst riding. And styling.