Cyclists are weird.

Or maybe it is just athletes in general who are weird. Or, it could just be me…

Yeah, it’s probably just me.

Anyways. I wanted to share with you how my evening panned out last night:

Being my last night in Lucca for a while (I was headed to Holland the next day–and from there to the Vuelta) I didn’t have much food in the house, and definitely did not feel like going out. My morning had consisted of a 2 hour motorpace session. I covered almost 100km behind the greatest motorpacer in history–Max Sciandri–in our BMC Skoda. I was on my TT bike and we fought through the Italian traffic and the Tuscan summer heat. My afternoon had been spent watching movies. The first, Company Men just so happened to be on Sky and I was tired enough to watch the whole thing. The second movie, Take Me Home Tonight, was in my iTunes rental queue and I had recently purchased an HDMI to computer cable so I could watch movies on my TV.

Anyways, this really has nothing to do with my story, other than to let you know that after watching Take Me Home Tonight I am now in love with Teresa Palmer–who happens to be from Adelaide, Australia (yay stalking!)–Timmy Roe’s home town. I am confident he can make the intro.

So after watching these great films, I was starving. I crushed a mellow tuna and mozzarella (among other ingredients) salad after the motorpacing session, and 4 hours later I found myself quite famished.

Seeing as how I did not have much dinner food in the house, I searched for something edible. I found a pack of ‘Bio’ chicken hot dogs, as well as these super odd hot dog buns I only bought to tweet a picture of because they are ‘pre-holed’ (I never tweeted the picture…saving it for when the stars align).

So I cranked up the grill and threw two of the dogs on there, as well as one bun. The time was about 7:00PM and Tour of Poland Stage 6 was on the telly.

The two dogs went down easy. As a carb conscious person I had to cut the one bun in half in order to feel good about the meal. So two dogs, one bun down.

Two down and I was still hungry. And I was leaving the next day, the last dog would just get thrown away! I had to eat it! I had to! It would be morally wrong not to eat it. So I threw it on the grill, cut the second bun in half and heated em up.

I snarfed down the third and last dog just as Dan Martin was making his first of many attacks in the final of Tour of Poland’s queen stage. He went on to win the stage, and by the time the action on the tv was over and done with, the food guilt had kicked in, as did my stomach.

After watching guys I race with undergo a brutal 207km and 4500m of climbing, and as the guilt of the three hot dogs really started to hit hard I made the conscious decision of kitting up and heading out for an evening spin. Yes, at 8:00PM I left for my second ride of the day, AFTER dinner. I even got an entire hour in.

There are many a day where I wish I was in a sport where I could just be a massive human. Where people could call me Gigantor AND an athlete, maybe even in the same sentence. But cycling is not like that. I am 195cm (6’4″) 82kg (180lbs) and 4-5% body fat (according to a DEXA scan–the most accurate of body fat tests). When I line up with the likes of Chris Butler, my teammate, who clocks in at about 58kg, as soon as we go uphill–I get quite sad. And I am skinny! Just a dense mother.

So I thought I’d share that with you. These are the things that go on in my life. These are my struggles.

I’m on the road again, will have daily updates from Eneco. Look forward to them! I want to win this race!!