It’s Not About the Bike

30/07/2010 by Simon Tomey.

Since reading this I’ve started shaving my legs, eating poached eggs and powering up hills.The message of this book is that we could all have hope and determination.

The message of this book is that we could all have hope and determination.

• Lance Armstrong had less than a 3% chance of surviving cancer but did and within sixteen months of being discharged from hospital won the Tour de France.
• He attributes his significance not to being a seven times winner of the Tour de France, but of being a cancer survivor.
• A fellow cancer patient had written “You don’t know it yet, but we’re the lucky ones”. I understand this to mean that we are designed to overcome apparently defeating setbacks and that great suffering can produce great character, but most of us never have this “opportunity”.

Certainly Lance attributes much of his maturity as a rider to the endurance he learnt as a cancer patient.

• Lance overcame great suffering and didn’t give into despair and fought like it was him against the world.
• It must have felt very black indeed as day after day under Chemotherapy he was overcome by nausea and had strength only to lie still. He had a clear vision and the determination to make it happen.

A quote I like is:

“I can deliver motivation, inspiration, hope courage and counsel, but I can’t answer the unknowable…In a way we are like the guy on the rooftop [who is in danger of drowning]…Things take place, there is a confluence of events and circumstances , and we can’t always know their purpose…but we can take responsibility for ourselves and be brave.

And remember…Pain is just a signal.

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