Belgium World Cup **RESULTS RESULTS** (2 of 3)- World Cup Round 2 2019

Day 2 dawned dull and grey with less of the trike toppling headwinds for all of the two wheeler action. That doesn't mean some exciting performances didn't go down; they may not be trikes but 2 wheelers are still quite cool ;)- I say 2 wheelers,not the official term of solos, because I'm including the tandemonium tandems.

I'm publishing this on day 3 having raced and travelled straight back to the UK...have seen Crystal has just won gold and will get on it ASAP watch out for the third and last instalment of this!

I did a neat wee tweet so here you go. Fav performance is George Peasgood who should be in Japan right now with Para-Tri but has taken inspiration from the Huub Wattbike cycling boys- Huub infamous triathlon sponsors too. George brings their aero prowess to the Paracycling scene whilst still fully committed to staying for Paratri for his Tokyo 2020 campaign (Twitter is my source here ha). He beat the whole MC4 field- more than 40s clear of silver. I have a feeling he didn't do a run in the morning but wouldn't put it past George to have taken a dip in the North Sea after...which was a mere 100m from the end of the time trial course.

Photos are few and far between my source is here.

Katie Toft is always my favourite really. She's one of those people whose smile takes up her whole face (perfect smile to face ratio imo, other people's smaller and inferior smiles now disappoint me) and now she has a bad-ass golden helmet for Kask. She's always had a badass interior but now her exterior matches. She won gold too, her Aussie competitor Kaitlyn, hot on her heels. Kaitlyn is supported fully by Cycling Australia. Unfun fact about Katie is that she is the only World Champion in the whole of Paracycling not on programme with their National Governing Body.

Our tandem endurance girls had quality competition from NZL and Ireland coming in Bronze and battered after a top effort of going incredibly, incredibly fast. Four legs is better than two every time.

MC3 Ben Watson smashed his two British competitors bringing home bronze and I'm so happy for the TT star who got onto the team through his efforts on this course a year ago.


Fin who is also an MC3 came 9th- vvv impressive. His team mate Matthew Robertson who has come up on the team with him matched his performance with 9th in the MC2 category. MC2 Simon Price, a road only MC2, was unlucky 13th this time but has an impressive history of medalling which bodes well for Sunday's road race. Jaco who used to be an MC4 is now a better fit for MC3 made a nice wee MC3 British sandwich, 6th in his race.

Shoutouts go to MC2 Ryan Taylor with 18th in his (first!?) World Cup race? And Scottish tandem who add yet two more tandem Lauras to the mix. Laura Cx2 hehe. Strong 10th along with MC5 David Murphy.




@BritishCycling athletes: @loraturnham @Corrinehall
@BennyWatson89 @WBjergfelt 5th #mannyrobertson 9th @FinGparacyclist 9th @simonpricey 13th Indies: @KatieToft
@george_peasgood
@jacovangass 6th #ryantaylor 18th @pixielaurac & #lauraclode 10th #davidmurphy 10th

Belgium World Cup **RESULTS RESULTS** (1 of 3)- World Cup Round 2 2019

There's a Belgium World Cup going on but the British Cycling twitter was dead all yesterday and it's Paralympic qualification year. Stop ittttt. Here's where you get the results (blog published 11:52 CEST with the results available on):

http://www.votrecourse.com/resultat-coupe-de-monde-de-paracyclisme-ostend-949.html

Yesterday was the start of the time trials for all three-wheeled riders. The organising committee was panicking because there were 53 MH3 entrants. That's the male, chest-level, spinal cord injury classification who race on recumbent handcycles. In comparison, the most able-bodied male category, MC5 had only 17 entrants! It pushed all the handcycle TTs deep into the evening! Shout out to Ireland's MH3 Declan who was 4th of 53 WOW. Best performance of the comp for me? Maybe.

Today it's the Cs.

Road race for me and all three wheelerz and then the Cs road race the day after!

The trikes raced first and there was a block headwind of 30kmh. Most exciting things that happened was that in the men's trike TT a trike (Aussie, Stuart Jones) spontaneously flipped (no cause- was just the instability of the trike at high speeds)- he had deep dish wheels on and he was going the fastest out of the all the trikes and set to win. He flipped, broke his collarbone, was lifted back on and was so far ahead he finished in 3rd place (in a field of 21). 

The men's podium was like a war zone, Joan Figuerola (silver) had crashed in the last World Cup and his face was black and blue and then Stuart (third) had his arm and knee in a bandage. Ryan Boyle World Champ stayed upright for gold. If you see him race you'll be in disbelief. Hehe trikes.

GBCT boys Craig and David came 5th and 7th respectively.

The other exciting thing is that I got a bronze medal for the first time in a field of Aussies and Americans WITHOUT breaking my collarbone #proud! We don't win any prize money but we do win Belgian Beer (8.8%). I was a bit tired and wobbly (CP not beer) after my effort and whilst chatting away to gold medallist Carol I fell sideways by mistake. I managed not to break the bottle and I think people were more impressed at that than my medal (I agree tbf).

The other week I did a spreadsheet to see just how many WT2 trikes there could be if they all turned up- most stop because of financial reasons or that the classification is unfavourable.  Today there are only around 8 active female WT2s. If I had the power to give all the girls funding to turn up there could be 33! Aka only 15% of women who make it to international level stick around after the first 3 years. For those who don't podium in the first year of trying and have to race independent of support from their national governing body, 90% give up. Frustratingly there are high enough numbers within the drop outs for a potential additional classification of which I could be trike queen of course, ha.

Anyway, I'm f%$*king proud of myself; I had super invasive surgery 3 months prior to racing this race and it's more than a 30kmh headwind pushing me backwards from the podium but sooo many people have been helping me push back. 4mins 21 off gold and 2mins 30 off silver who was 1min 48 off gold herself. That's how it goes with trikes and the verrry wide classification margin. That medal is mine and it is glorious and it's all of ours. For all we know that could be my field in Tokyo...just sayinnnnn let's keep pushing. 

Karen Darke raced after me and she got silver- only 10s off gold! She had a field of six all brand new riders. All of her usual competitors only raced in World Cup in Italy 4 days ago, not World cup round 2. Dangerously strong and powerful that one. 

Then it was the boys with the huge classifications: Alex B-T had shown incredible skills in World Cup round 1 in Italy 4 days ago coming 7th out of a hugggggeee field. 

Unfortunately a pedestrian walked in to him in this World Cup round 2 costing another top 10 position (both pedestrian and wheeled strong-man are unscathed). 18th for him behind British triathlon's Joe Townsend a place above Mark Allen.

Of the MH3s Luke Jones was top 20, Dan Hopwood top 30 (out of 54!!!).

Today the Cs are racing and here's where they've placed so far (see bold)...Crystal matches Karen's silver and Katie Toft might be the only British female gold of the competition! Awks as she's not even a funded athlete for the 5th year running. Cmonnn. 

There's only one more woman (well 2 for 1 technically) to ride out of the GBCT team- Lora and Corrine. Bon chance xx

Independent 

MC2 Ryan Taylor 18th

MC3 Jaco Van Gass

MC4 George Peasgood

MC5 David Murphy

(54) MH3 Luke Jones 29th

MH3 Dan Hopwood 18th

(31) MH4 Joe Townsend 16th

MH4 Alex BT 17th

MH4 Mark Allen 19th

MH5 Matt Faucher 13th

WT2 Hannah Dines bronze

WC1 Katie Toft GOLDD

WB Laura Cluxton piloted by Laura Clode

GBCT

MC2 Matt Robertson 9th 

MC2 Simon Price 13th

MC3 Ben Watson

MC3 Fin Graham

MC5 William Bjergfelt

MT2 Craig Collis-McCann 5th

MT2 David Stone 7th

WB Lora Fachie piloted by Corrine Hall

WC5 Crystal Lane-Wright silver

WH3 Karen Darke silver

Choose your Own Sex- Confused about the Caster Semenya Ruling? This is For You!

                                      Choose your Own Sex                                                              

Male is XY, female is XX-> yes or no

Male is penis, female is vagina-> yes or no

Male is testosterone, female is oestrogen -> yes or no

*count your yeses and/or your nos*

1 or more yeses? I KNOW YOU WANT TO LOOK AT WHAT'S UNDERNEATH, have a cheeky wee read. This article is your business even if Caster Semenya's medical documents are not...

3 nos? Read for shits and giggles but you already understand basic science, congrats.

If you don't like reading here's a podcast/radio thing with my uni lecturer, Alun (listened for the science, stayed for the soothing Welsh accent).

If you’ve watched the best romcom and cult films of all time you’ll have seen consequences of testosterone abuse in male bodybuilders. In ‘50 Fifty First Dates’ the brother is a comic character because he so poorly covers up his doping behaviour and gives it away with that squeaky voice. Anyone remember Robert Paulson in ‘Fight Club’?

More testosterone doesn’t necessarily mean ‘more male’ because of the way we all have both oestrogen and testosterone and they can actually interact with each other and change each other’s production rates and things.

   

Pop-culture has been trying to tell you that for ages, even if you aren’t sciencey.

But are they a man or a woman? WE NEED TO KNOW. If you go through any kind of Biology education you’ll be presented with the two sex chromosomes- XX for woman and XY for man. These sometimes come with stereotypically male and female traits. What you really need to know is, whispers, there are more than two, woohoo!

Sometimes, if you’ve got a good teacher, they’ll tell you about the others- a singular X or XXY, Turner’s and Klinefelter’s and Double Y Syndrome and XXX+ Triple X Syndrome that challenge the binary. These are very rare but you know what’s rarer? A human that can break the 100m World Record…

If your personal definition of male and female is through external sexual reproductive organs

 You might be confused  when you learn that some XY individuals- if they have a very slight genetic mutation can be insensitive to testosterone and be born with what quacks like your average looking vulva (external bits) but be genetically ‘male’ and not have a full-on vagina (the passage to the womb because no womb). You know what occupation is perfect for T resistant individuals? Modelling! Some incredibly successful models are intersex with perfect boobs, minuscule fat mass and that to-die-for, no-hip pelvis (actually due to caesarean sections women with narrow  pelvises are surviving through childbirth so that particular ‘wide hip’ female trait is disappearing). If that’s your definition, genetics and external genitalia will sometimes be at odds and you might want to check your Western Beauty standards too…

If your definition is ‘sex hormones’ oestrogen and testosterone

Then you’ll also run into trouble because you women who go through the menopause (or very old men) have a drastic decrease in both oestrogen and testosterone to such low levels that they may be neither male nor female. Same with people with eating disorders/relative energy disorder whose bodies stop producing hormones as a last-ditch to save calories.

Even with no genetic mutation the levels of ‘male’ and ‘female’ hormones can differ widely amongst individuals and at different times of the day and the month that there is no ‘one or other’. There are general ‘ranges’ like there are for wingspan and leg length but Usain Bolt and Michael Phelps got applauded for being genetic outliers. Applauded for being supermen.



(I read another article which said the Phelps Usain argument was invalid because sport classifies on sex, not arm or leg length.This is a valid point worth considering. So sport classifies on sex. Yet, there is not ONE thing that makes you male or female. It's a continuum or a spectrum like colour. A very, very complex continuum.

NOT THIS

MORE LIKE THIS

There's not a point where you can make a clean cut. So the IAAF have made a messy cut, a bloody and damaging cut and it's my female performance category you're cutting into, MINE. I have issue with who is doing the cutting because it isn't scientists. It's like your operating surgeon being switched out for a butcher who is ignoring the medical textbook and shutting his eyes.


Scientists know there are huge numbers of little variables that go into what we know as sex. Chromosomes are one tiny variable, hormone sensitivity, if you menstruate or not, if you use the pill and historic discrimination of access to sport. 

Men and women share portions of all these little variables and at some point along the spectrum the 'androgenic effect of the 'male' variables' club together to make men around 10% faster in the elite running discipline over all distances. 

At the same time, all the 'estrogenic effects of the 'female' variables' club together to make women around 10% weaker. Where the estrogenic effects are concerned though it's just a hunch. Science has not done nearly enough investigation into 'female' variables, so we basically have no idea how these variables impact performance. Caster has many of these estrogenic effects to make her performance well below your male sports category. 

She also has an unknown group of variables which currently make her women's 800m world champion. What I'm saying is the biggest variable might be her leg length difference just like it was for Usain- maybe Usain had much less testosterone than his competitors? That fact might have blown this debate out the water. But his hormone levels weren't available to the public. Because men are allowed to be supermen without investigation into exactly what makes them men.)
Addition made 2 days after original publish date on 5/5/19

I think the obsession over testosterone in females is so typical of a male dominated sports governance- it’s not all about dicks or rather gonads (the site of testosterone production in men, women produce testosterone too though WHOAH). But men are allowed to be super-strong and women are not. The site of this almighty and coveted masculine power…Who runs the world? Old, white men who are, SO IRONICALLY, dependent on Viagra, sorry Beyonce. Wait is that a man on your logo IAAF? By your definition I think it is...

When women show the same type of genetic abnormality- this time in testosterone production and/or sensitivity (you can have really high testosterone levels and no sensitivity remember) they are held-back. Similarly, my team mates still stress out about how muscly they look. Men don’t own the right to muscles and that sleek lean look. At the same time, I’m your classic big-hipped, fat-conserving female phenotype and I constantly feel pressure from the media to lose weight and look a bit more athletic. Stop policing our bodies, everyone!!!

Men don’t own the right to be strong. But this is what the IAAF are saying- you can be strong but not too strong if you want to be in within our definition. We must have all our female athletes look good in crop tops otherwise it won’t be good to watch, duh! 

 It’s probably not even the testosterone difference that makes Caster stronger but if she gets breast cancer or an increased heart attack and stroke risk from oestrogen use it might make her weaker or…dead. The International Medical Association have strongly advised that no doctor carry out the tests the IAAF are asking because they breach the Helsinki human rights agreement.

Caster isn’t the aberration here. The IAAF is.

The one, poorly conducted study that the IAAF have based this decision on is wrong in almost every way. How do we know? Because science has distanced itself from it in almost every way. Their study was akin to the cigarette companies doing inhouse studies to say their products were entirely safe. They want Caster out and so they’ve made it so.

This is what women look like IAAF, get used to it but you don’t know because you don’t give us the scientific studies we need!

You do one substandard study that is fatally flawed and say that it’s enough because who wants to give women the time and access to real data that they need to be true performance athletes? Not you IAAF. I love science and what it can achieve. I’d fully support scientific studies to identify just what female variables were performance enhancing or not! You are teaching society scientific studies don’t matter. Oh yes they do. Women are so underrepresented in sports science data it is ridiculous. More please.  

I wrote this after alllll my athlete friends asked for my Scientist-athlete opinion. Trying to write up my MSc project and start my racing season. This I assure myself will be quicker than having 11 different chats! Just a quick messy one. Someone help me with my screen layout...how awful is it.

If you like reading and want more:

Here are three more good reads---

-this personal account

and

-this more sciencey one

and 

-this fully sciencey one

Around the World in Eighty Tattoos

 I love tattoos. I think we're moving into a new tattoo era which is more about art and self-expression and less about 'a mark of a gang' tattoo prestige. I'm the generation who got taught by Lena Dunham to own my body and learn to love the bits I hated by turning them into works of art.

Unsure if the influence was actually Lena Dunham or a really incredible girl in my school who I obvs only looked at, silently, in awe- shout out to you Caroline Ward- you got a beautiful arm piece just after leaving school and I just though absolutely YES, you know?

 Don't think we ever actually spoke..I still remember how you did that talk about Stephanie Meyer's Twilight books when we were all sixteen, before they were even a thing and I went to a book shop and bought the first book that very same day. You can be my cult leader any time...

Anyway doesn't everyone struggle with body positivity? But I can never stop bubbling over with joy when I think about tattoos. I'm not stereotypically beautiful but images and art tend not to have one solid line of 'what is beautiful' like Western beauty standards so when my skin gets endowed with them I can get that same burst of joy...

I got my first tattoo after attending the Rio Paralympics. I got my second as a stop gap after planning to get an extensive piece but then my friend's funeral was on the same day as the appointment and well, you up there, you ruined it! Six months later I got my first fun tattoo, less of a statement, more of a companion (not any less pretentious than a huge leg piece mind you).

When I travel for myself and not sport anymore (and have made an extensive fortune....) I plan to do a tattoo crawl and get a tattoo from each of my favourite artists. Should maybe credit my fav Aussie mechanic Mikey Winter, who travels the world with the team and stops off to get a tattoo at each place he goes...think Mikey may actually be my fav mechanic ever.

My first I got in my hometown of Glasgow (31/12/16)- creds to Kym at custominctattoos

My second was in my birthtown of Manchester (18/12/18)- creds to racotattoo

One day, I'm going to call the trip 'Around the World in Eight(y) Tattoos'-- *there are actually ~21 examples here*.

CANADA- Toronto

Jess Chen is an artist that has a range of different styles- to me, she's the one who can do these epic free full body florals and she is second to none, she also does tiny, cute fruit and flower pokes for those not so keen on the biggest tatt commitments.

Rat666tat is so astonishingly good at custom tatts, is there anything they can't do.  To express my individual soul and get some incredible colourrrr I'd go here!

SOUTH KOREA- I first got instagram solely to look at tattoos and all of the ones I was obsessed with continually came from South Korea- I'm unsure if they have finer needles, different and specialist ink or if I'm just the KPOP lover but for tattoos.

If I am so lucky to need a Tokyo Paralympic tattoo I want it to be Poly_sj who does it. They run a tattoo shop in Seoul. My first stop tattooing around South Korea because look. 

Tattooist_Dahh has so many different styles, focused on small intricate pieces playing with perspective. They use blue a lot (my fav colour) and landscapes but not always. Honestly, I would get all of the tatts that they have ever done. Too many to choose from, I just can't.

For highly stylised, with hints of tradition but modern colour intensive work it's Pitta_kkm... so bright...so detailed.

Incredible use of colour and incredibly realistic landscape shots daldam_ is just... how intricate can you get?!

Abstract human portraits and cartoon style or abstract scenery M_Tendo is your gal. Nothing has a face but everything is so identifiable? So INKcredible. Has this light blue that is everywhere in her work like a signature:)

USA- NYC

Eva is better than Van Gogh himself...she also does incredible original pieces...anything..everything..

The artist who really represents my brain if it was to be splatted against my body: julianllouve.

USA- CHICAGO

Keara McGraw was just meant to tattoo. I love her single colour linework, perfect chaos- intricate interlinking drawings of beautiful things. Her feathers and petals are just out of this world. Would just let her have my arm for doodle practice any day.

SPAIN-MALLORCA/ USA-LA

There is nothing Adamexiste can't do. Best at naturalistically capturing the unnatural- best at portraits?

BERLIN- there are too many in Berlin...

For motion, coffee cup, paint brush swirl, black, thick statement strokes, symmetry in the faux-accidental  I need heloise_florent.

I need to make a billion trips to Noiia Berlin and to Unikat Berlin- to all of their artists and residents..ever employed?

AUSTRALIA- MELBOURNE

For circle-line-triangle geometry, colour popping flowery beautiful complexity it's all about Luca. 

HUNGARY- if I get a piece by Balazsbercsenyi I'll need to be put into the Gallery for Modern Art.

INSTANBUL- hakandik paint mee. 

The colour work and accuracy when doing Munch lookalikes but for me that's the most beautiful sunflower field I've ever seen in reality or in tattoo: Ayhankrdg

ITALY- for watercolourrr, 3D blocking can't quite describe the beautiful style- Luca <3

Cowboy-maverick-starwars-helmet-stetson just joking my 2019 team isss Storey Racing!

Because of the Storeys and their vision, I can be a respected athlete taking up space in the cycling world and owning my place on their team for the third year in a row. I wanted to write a twisted, mysterious thankyou card and, like all my blogs, I've had it brewing (like Black Circle Coffee) for a while.

Best version of you: at first, the Storey Racing hashtag might strike too close to the 'live your best life' cliche pedalled by affluent, genetically-endowed instagram influencers. That is until you get shaken up by a big scare.

Say you're sitting in the doctors' office and they say you might have cancer. Then they follow that up by saying even if that's not the case you're in for significant surgery. Whilst you're trying to ignore the life that has started flashing before your eyes, they put you into a big blank, humming metal tube of oblivion (otherwise known as an MRI machine) where there isn't anything else to look at apart from your past regrets.

Then you realise, with a kind of floaty feeling, that you have been living your best life and are, right now, the best version of you. You realise, if you got given the grimmest of diagnoses you wouldn't change many of the big things at all.

I'm just saying if your world did flip for a second and you did see the world from a refreshing, if mortally terrifying, point of view (that turned out to be totally ok, in this little narrative) that you'd take the #bestversionofyou hashtag to heart, more than ever before.

The Storey catchphrase is on (and in) the hearts of their women's pro-cycling road team. Fittingly (tight fittingly...in the nice Le Col team Lycra) we have a heartbeat trace like a superhero logo on our jerseys. Actually, when I tried on the kit for the first time I felt very like one of the Incredibles.

 It is just as true now in 2019 as it was when I joined the team back in 2017 except there's Incredibles 2 which is even better than the Incredibles and is more about the supermum and super huge gurgling baby with multiple powers and a rather sleep deprived superdad...remind you of anyone ;)?

 The *best version of you* heartbeat is on each one of us and in us, powering us round our races, one maximal heartbeat after another. In this team though, it's not just about the self. Yeah, Sarah/Barney have got their name on it but we're all different and encouraged to be- road, track, cyclocross, youngster to experienced, para and/or legs of the gods. You can find it all in the team.

2019 to 2020 will be the qualification year of the cowboy-maverick-starwars-helmet-stetson of Huub Wattbikes' AND the victory & passion heartbeat trace of Storey Racing (so Mod that Team Wiggins brought out similar kit to us). I'm so grateful for their continued support as Mount Fuji's shadow draws nearer. Thanks to the sponsors for making it all possible:

Helmet? KASK 
Glasses? Adidas Eyewear UK 
Coffee? Black Circle
Gels? Secret Training
Power meter? Jam Cycling
Trike components? Brother Cycling/Phil Jones
Charity? Boot Out Breast Cancer
Healthcare? HMT Hospitals
Kit? Le Col
Recovery drinks? Lamb and Watt Tonic Water, Eisberg Wine😉
Soft tissue therapy? Holistic Life

Mon and I 💙💗

How I'm Going to Live my 2019 [trigger warning: suicide]

How I'm Going to Live my 2019.

Edit from 2025: grief is very hard to write about and I didn't do a good job here. However, this is one of my most viewed blogs. So, I thought I'd clarify right at the beginning; my friend D took his own life and on seeing the new year come in, when he couldn't, I felt he needed a blog post. 

----

I started this piece the night after I got home from seeing D in June:

"I went out with my friends last night and while they got progressively drunker and I stared into my alcohol-free Kopparberg... one of them, on his fourth vodka, had launched into a speech. It began 'no one would have taken the bet on Hannah when she was born' and I immediately tensed because I wasn't drunk enough to hear someone holding forth on my premature birth, well not drunk at all because I had my Cycling World Champs in a few weeks..."

At first, I titled this 'Know One Knows' which is chilling, now. The main theme was going to be my staggering ascent to being able to walk after all my surgeries and then racing my trike. After not being predicted to do much at all with my body and not being able to at various points in time my current level of ability often shocks me. The blog was going to be all the usual solipsistic Paralympic mush blah blah blah.

As with many unfinished blogs on my blog account, it stayed there. It stayed there and then, on a Tuesday night in summer, aged 23, D was gone. No one knew he was going to do it; not even the people he lived with who were closest to him. There wasn't a note, there was nothing at all but the train driver who saw him do it. I don't want that to be how I think of D. 

See, D had given me the speech he gave to wayward kids in his career advisory role. The speech that had made me write the blog. That unpublished blog sat here like the lump in your throat when you hear the words suicide increase in young men. 

The thing was, the speech was awful, cringey, sensationalist, littered with disability-cliches but the final sentence really did tie my future up in a neat bow for me right there, in a small Glasgow pub: 

"she doesn't ask people what she wants to do in life, she walks up to them and tells them how she's going to do it". It was so profound that I rushed home to write your words down, D.

That's the quote I start my 2019 with now. 

Exit stage left.

(for D.)