Joe's Bit's & Bob's

Joe here - welcome to my 'bits and bob's' blog, the one-stop shop that pulls together the things we are thinking about, doing, working on, using and developing.

Yep, it's busy here over at Team Joe Barr!

One thing I'm thinking about - as I close one season and open another I inevitably turn my mind to what inspires me to 'go again'? What inspires me to marshal the necessary dedication and determination, to address performance shortfalls?

It's a simple thing really.

Mastery.

Mastery of the most intriguing craft, that of constant motion on two wheels.

It's a deeply personal craft as the dynamic interaction between me, my bike, the road and the environment produces either effective or ineffective motion (flow or struggle).

If you ever wondered what my coaching philosophy is it's this. I can train you to be effective on the bike but coaching is also about developing relationship with the bike and the road. It's learning how to manage objective and subjective data over time and distance to produce a performance.

One book I'm reading - I usually have a performance book on the go and right now its The Passion Paradox by Brad Stulberg & Steve Magness. It explores both sides of passion, the more harmonious side and the more obsessive side. It's a useful read for us endurance cyclists who have other important parts of life to keep in balance too.

And...yes..Jill bought it for me.

One performance lesson - one thing I did differently this year that worked well; I took zero time off the bike after Race Across America. Why? Because it's hard to recover form/condition after a hard stop, even a hard stop of 2-3 weeks. So no matter how fatigued you are keep moving forward gently, your body and mind will find balance again.

Always remember the Albert Einstein quote "Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving forward." This is especially true after a very big effort or life occurrence.

One thing I'm working on - our 2020 season! For the first time we'll be doing a season launch with our new title sponsor Nov 27th so stay tuned!

We've got a great line up of sponsors which are supporting our most ambitious season yet. We'll be racing on 3 different land masses over various distances. We'll be upping our media so you can join us on our journey. Exciting times ahead.

Coming soon - we get asked lots of different 'how-to' endurance questions from bike maintenance, selection of equipment, training and nutrition so in early 2020 we'll be launching the Team Joe Barr Community. This will be a digital platform that will house various how-to videos. We will also host live feeds on specific issues so you can ask questions. We love to share our experience so please post your hot topics as we'll be starting to shoot these videos soon.

Race Joe Barr Series - registrations are coming along very well. Don't wait too much longer to throw your hat in the ring as space will become limited. It's a fantastic race weekend with 3 distances to choose from. It doesn't matter who you are, if you're courageous enough to be on the start line you're a champ in our eyes!

Race Ready Workshop - is scheduled for Nov 23rd and there is still space available. It's a cost-effective way for those registered in our race series to get some valuable training and nutrition advice before you hit that start line.

Favourite snack - right now my favourite pre and post-training snack is White's Oats Apple and Cinnamon Toasted Oats with Greek Yogurt. I frequently get bored with snacks but this one has lasted from Race Across America and it's staying!

Upcoming training - this weekend we are back on the TJB Coastal 330 route to lay down some route time milestones. We'll be posting videos and hosting discussion from the course so if you're interested make sure you check it out on our facebook page.

Finally - 2019 World Cup standings, calculated by the World Ultra-Cycling Association (WUCA), are being finalised. WUCA’s World Cup is a competition that ranks global endurance racers based on average speed in ratified races of 12 hours, 24 hours and 1,000+ miles. You'll hear more about this in the coming weeks as we're high up in those rankings after a successful season. We're pretty proud about it! It's challenging to be fast over such different distances in one season.

Until my next 'bit's and bob's' update keep the bike moving forward and keep yourself safe on the roads.

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