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Hannah Walker Blog: Racing, injury, social media and
commentary |
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October 9th 2015 by
Hannah
Walker |
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When you receive bad
news, which I did after the final Matrix Fitness GP Tour
Series on the 9th June, sometimes in your time of darkness you
wonder if there will be light at the end of the tunnel.
I was involved in a crash and was forced to abandon. I tried
to pick myself up off the ground, but when I tried nothing was
happening. Luckily Jayne from the sports medical service was
on hand to help clean me up! After a check over and x-rays in
A&E, with my team mate Becca there to keep me smiling, it was
a fractured right wrist and elbow and a collarbone and
shoulder separation on my left. Not ideal considering I had
Internationale Thuringen Rundfahrt der Frauen in one month's
time, subsequently I was unable to start.
I'd never broken a bone in my 23 years of living on planet
earth, so recovery wise I wasn't quite sure what was in store.
I quickly learnt. Plenty of turbo training that's what!
Despite my injuries, I'd already previously agreed to work on
The Women's Tour as Social Media Manager. I was lucky that I
had some willing last minute carers to look after me, Pete
Hodges to carry my bags, Dean Downing as my chauffeur, amongst
other people who would cut my food at meal times for me...at
least I could tweet by myself eh?! Working on my first Women's
World Tour race was fantastic. The hype and buzz around the
race from fans and riders was exactly as I'd imagined the
pinnacle of a women's cycling race to be like. Immense.
Monumental. Exhilarating.
28th July, I'm back on the start line, it's the British
National Criterium Championships in Birmingham, despite being
on the turbo every day and sweating buckets to maintain
fitness it didn't go as planned, I finished the race feeling
deflated, wondering is it all worth it? I know I'm not the
first person in the world to crash and break a bone and I
guarantee I won't be the last, but as an athlete these are the
things you feel when you train hard and don't see any rewards,
at least it's how I felt, unmotivated.
29th July, I received a late night phone call from my team
manager Marcus "Hey Hannah, I have some good news for you, we,
Team WNT are applying for a UCI licence in 2017" Well
obviously I was delighted, I felt like it was the light I had
been waiting for in my imaginary tunnel. Training was starting
to go well, I only had one race left of the season, the
National Derny Championships with my pacer George at the
London Olympic Velodrome, we got a silver medal and it sure
lifted my spirits once again. Two days later I would be
jetting off on a plane to Milan on an adventure to Lake Garda
with my best friend, Jessie Walker. No bikes or bike chat
involved, we engrossed ourselves in the Italian lifestyle and
culture, and our host didn't speak one word of English, so we
had no choice but to break the 'British stereotype of Brits
can only speak English' and learn basic words and phrases. We
came home with our minds refreshed, our bodies revitalized,
and I was eager to go 3 days later to the Tour of Britain,
where once again I would be Social Media Manager.
The Tour of Britain proved to be a sunny (most of the time),
wonderful (as always) nine days working with some rather cool
(especially the PR team) people and talented riders. I'm
always learning when I'm working alongside the Sweetspot Group
and its a privilege to get the opportunities to use and expand
my cycling knowledge whilst also developing new skills working
on social media. Naturally, my favourite part was stage 3,
where the peloton weaved its way around my training ground,
the Cheshire lanes. It was quite surreal to see some of the
best professionals in the world race so close to my home,
riding on the climbs where I hold Strava QoM's, yes I can be a
climber every now and then!!
Whilst I sit in my hotel room typing this, I look forward to a
new adventure in my cycling career tomorrow, commentating on
Eurosport for the upcoming Road World Championships in Doha,
Qatar. With mixed emotions of being nervous yet extremely
excited, I kick things off with the women's team time trial
(TTT) followed by the men's TTT, then onto the women's
individual time trial on Tuesday (11th Oct) and lastly the
women's road race on Saturday (15th Oct). So for now with
winter training for 2017 going well, I think I'm getting
closer to that brightly shining light at the end of the
tunnel, with lots to look forward to and lots of hard work to
be done, fingers crossed I'm heading in the right direction.
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