The corona crisis has led to an unimaginable number of mental problems. Unfortunately, I have had to deal with this myself a while ago. The bike eventually proved to be my salvation.
My employer regularly hangs interesting information in the elevator. A while ago, it was about the characteristics of burnout.
Getting up in the morning, crawling out of bed. For thirty years I had no problem with that and now I had to drag myself to work against all odds. What the f... is wrong with me? If it weren't for my direct colleagues, I would have just stayed in bed. The motivation was gone, the will was broken, I didn't care anymore. Was I supposed to wait for that wall coming at me to crush me or was I going to do something about it? Is giving up for the weak?
Feelings went back and forth. I attended an info session on burnout; behaved normal but... "I tick all the boxes". Lots of introverted consultation with myself.... I took my seventeen-year-old racing bike out of the cellar: a breath of fresh air and "going deep" would help. Physically I improved, but mentally I was finished. The batteries were empty and wouldn't charge anymore. I had to get out to avoid going down.
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I'm just going to be kind to myself and chase my boyhood dream: live like a professional cyclist and participate in the world championships (masters). Time credit without reason, they call it. I could give a hundred reasons. Sabbatical sounded much better in any case.
The cycling season finished perfectly; lived like a pro; rode very hard; qualified in England and Italy for the World Championships on the road in the masters in Australia and eventually rode a nice World Championship in Perth. Then took the world championships on the track in Manchester. "Do yourself proud," said the mechanic who held me at the start. And so I did: I finished fifth in the scratch. In my age category there were forty competitors from all over the world; in the results there are nine different nationalities in the first ten ; "scratch" is a short intensive race, straightforward; the average speed was over 46 km/hour.
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