Stories

Dear offseason

9/13/2019

you are welcomed with open arms.
the 2019 race season had some crazy highs and some deep lows.
a whirlwind of a season.
both physical and emotional.

I think I should start thanking the people in my corner. You know who you are, family, friends, boyfriend, team keo, the danish squad, Barcelona people, coach, sponsors... It takes plenty of people to help an athlete on a high level. I'm very thankful.
If you are interested in some insight on my World Cup season recap you can read the previous story.
If you stay here; let’s dig into the offseason thoughts

What now?

I wanna breathe for a moment. You know that long exhale that empties the lungs fully from air. Air with frustration and a hint of relief. I have felt a bit captured in a strange state of my body most of the season. After exhaling I wanna inhale fresh air full of freedom and hope. Full of the excitement of what’s to come.
But before the dreams of the future sets in it’s important, for me, to take a step back and check on myself before I just jump straight into a ‘new year - new me’ mode. It can be quite easy to hide emotions behind fancy Instagram filters. But feelings are here. I have tried to be honest and share my thoughts with you guys throughout my injury. Which I have received lots of positive response too. It feels good to be a part of what can make other people feel less alone. But no matter how much I wanna share, I also have a certain filter on myself. Which I think is completely okay.

As much as I like to share, as much do I like to work on things for myself with myself. And now I anyway sit here and write about it?
What I wanted to say was actually just that as much as I’m setting goals, chasing dreams and in general living a ‘fast life’, I also sometimes gotta sit down and reflect a little. What good decisions did I make this season - and which ones were bad? Can I learn from it? I’m not a machine, just a human who tends to ride a bike fast.
A season with struggles definitely teach you some things. Fx who’s in your corner, even in the bad times. So to you - Thanks for keep on following my life and my writes, even when it’s not all glory and happy days - I love that I have made myself a follower group that cares and are interested in me as a human, not only as someone winning the bike-life. Thanks for being here :-)

What’s next?

The plan is to get back to Denmark and reconnect with family and friends first of all. It can be hard to keep updated on my friend's lives when I’m on the road, so in the autumn I always look forward to reconnecting with them. My friends are the best tho. We can have minimum contact for months and then I see them and it feels like yesterday.

Besides that, I will focus a bit on planing my Olympic dream. I will combine my trip to Denmark with some home races and then finish the month with a trip to Japan. Where I will go with a danish team to test out the Olympic track for 2020.

I think it’s the first time I write it down here. But my biggest goal of 2020 is qualifying for the Olympics.

But as I said. It’s important for me to take one step at the time. First I reflect and then I can start chasing dreams.

/Malene

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A look back - World Cup Season 19'

9/9/2019

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I know they said it would be hard. Actually, they didn’t expect much from me this season. As a newbie in the elite cat, what could I do?

I guess you’re always a little insecure before the world cup season starts, insecure about your level and state of mind. But when we came to the end of May and the wc season kicked off in Albstadt, I had built my confidence on my consistency throughout the winter/spring training and on my 2nd place in last year’s u23 wc overall. I knew I had what it takes to be a part of the top. But to do it? Oh, girl, that’s a different talk.

So when I managed to perform at my very best in the two first races it felt unreal. Or at least it was a dream coming true. And another approval for myself; I got this. To come home with 10th and 5th place under the belt gave me a confidence boost and I used that energy to bring home the national title 3 weeks later. What a dream start to the 2019 season! Almost too good to be true, right?

And, oh yea, that was too good to be true, only one week after nationals I took a big hit on my left side, on a bike ride, which caused me a bad infection in a wound and left me struggling with my performance for the rest of the 2019 season.

Being an athlete can be a rollercoaster-life and this was really a time where my carriages on the rail started to roll downwards.

Being an athlete can be a rollercoaster-life and this was really a time where my carriages on the rail started to roll downwards. Back then I didn’t think my infection was so bad, actually nobody thought it was that bad, but in the end, it took me 8 weeks before I started to feel like myself again. Quite sometime when you are in the middle of a race season.
I mean I finished 5th in Nove Mesto and the next World Cup I did I was 50th. Just a little difference…

Coming from such a high to such a low takes some mental stress too. What da heck is happening to me? I don’t think it's much fun to get smoked every weekend and fighting for finishing the race when I’m used to be one of the girls who are apart of creating the race. But there was not much to do. I had to just let time heal me. And eventually, it did. But that eventually could have shown up a little earlier. There is a style of being fashionably late to parties and I feel like my body did that to me, just for the race-party instead. Now the season is pretty much over and I’m finally feeling good. Not cool to be late for that party.

There is a style of being fashionably late to parties and I feel like my body did that to me, just for the race-party instead

Cause yes I was there. To finish up my race season I did the World Championship and the last World Cup in Snowshoe. And honestly, I felt great out there. I’m might still a bit further back in the field, fighting around the 25-30th position, but I was competing. And it felt awesome. I had the energy to push and ride my bike good. Which was something I missed the weeks after the crash/injury.

On a positive note from this season;

I can see that when I race, I always race the absolute best I can on that day, when shape was there I went for 2 top tens (Alb+Nove), when I wasn’t 100% healthy I did 2 times 50th (Lenz+Val), and for the last two races I did 2 times top 30 (msa+sshoe). I’m consistent and I can trust myself when I’m on the start line, so if I can manage to stay out of trouble, I think I can do some awesome races for the future.
Life hasn’t been too bad this summer, which must mean that something about the village around me is working well <3
Motivation for 2020 is there

/Malene

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Unreal

8/10/2019

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How to accept your reality when ‘real’ seems so unreal?

On a mission

For a while now I have tried to accept my situation. Or to be more specific I have tried for the past 6 weeks. It’s 6 weeks ago I crashed, made a hole in my elbow and picked up a nasty infection. The skin healed quick, the wound took some weeks and for the last, still fighting. My immune system has been on a big mission. Actually, my body is still shipping out stones and pus of my scar. I try to joke about it - I mean my body is just weight optimizing, right?

But when stones etc. make it to the surface of my scar, I can’t help but feel pain inside of me. I say a lot of bad words to myself, feeling it so unfair. Why me? Why did I have to crash so unfortunate just before a big block of important races?
And it’s not like xco racing is forgiven. I mean I cannot hide. Let’s say I’m at 80% at the moment it’s like the difference of being 5th or 50th. It feels so strange out there. In every race I did, while my body has been fighting, I have pushed myself to the limit, just in Val di Sole my avg heart rate was 183 but I was still riding so slow, finishing 52. My body simply couldn’t do more.

But it makes sense, that if the immune system is busy, they don’t care much about repairing the muscles.

Pieces of information

Not that it’s a big surprise for me that I’m not racing fast at the moment. I have felt a big impact since the crash. Mostly on my ability to recover. But it makes sense, that if the immune system is busy, they don’t care much about repairing the muscles. So my recovery processes have been going really slow (still isn’t normal yet), which have had consequences for my racing/training. My body’s ability to respond to my training has simply been so low. And that doesn’t make a strong world cup racer…(Not that it’s that simple).

For sure there are more to it, but this is where I have felt the biggest impact. This empty, slow Malene, who I’m very unfamiliar with.
So why keep on racing, when you get smoked every weekend?
Good question ;-) I try to look at it as a big challenge, trying to get most out of each race and ride the best I can. Around the rock, over those roots, right corner, left corner… It’s not the same to race in the back end of the field, but that doesn’t have to change my moral. And every race I have done since my crash has given me pieces of information about my recovery process I wouldn’t have known without.

This long injury was definitely not what I had in mind when I crashed back then, I felt my season was just started and I was so motivated to continue on that wave. I thought it would take some weeks and then I would be back on form. But it has been so different, and I never thought an infection could impact me this much.

And of course, I’m scared that people think I’m weak or I’m giving up.

The plan is to line up on Sunday again, for the 6th round of the UCI Mountain Bike World Cup here in Lenzerheide. With the same mindset, just ride as good as possible from A to B. And if I feel more energy running in my muscles than last weekend, well, then it’s a success. I can’t really care about the number on the result list, I have to look at my own performance.

I rode up the rock garden in Val Di sole every lap fx, and after watching the replay I learned that many of the front girls made mistakes many times. That’s something to be proud of.
My mind is so ready to go, I got the skills and the will, but my body/health, which is one the most important part of racing, has just not been on the same level.

It’s not that easy tho. I wish it was. Because of course, I care about getting smoked every Sunday at the moment. And of course, I’m scared that people think I’m weak or I’m giving up. But the truth is, that when I’m out there racing my absolute best, while the leaders still are more than 10 minutes ahead of me, it's so difficult. It takes so much courage, bravery and will from me to finish the race. And afterwards to see all the small positive notes. It takes tears and bad nights, but I do it, and I have actually been pretty positive througthout this whole thing, that can’t be weakness. Riding my best while not caring about what others might think of this slow version of Malene, can’t be weakness.

I hope this unreal feeling of my reality will be over soon.
In my last post, after Les Gets, I said I wanted to make the upcoming weekends a staircase. Lenzerheide is step 3. I cross my fingers that it will be another step in the rigth direction. I feel it's me against the clock, season 19' is soon to be over.
And fyi I havn't accepted a slow Malene

xoxo
Malene

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