What Is Stronger, Fear Or Hope?

The Ban Is Completely Out Of My Hands. And I Think In Most People's Minds, Even If It's Unrealistic To Them, It's One That I Left Myself With No Choice On.

There Were No Shortcuts, I Realized. It Took Years Of Racing To Build Up The Mind And Body And Character Until A Rider Had Logged Hundreds Of Races And Thousands Of Miles Of Road. I Wouldn't Be Able To Win A Tour De France Until I Had Enough Iron In My Legs, And Lungs, And Brain And Heart.

I've Read That I Flew Up The Hills And Mountains Of France. But You Don't Fly Up A Hill. You Struggle Slowly And Painfully Up A Hill, And Maybe, If You Work Very Hard, You Get To The Top Ahead Of Everybody Else.

Through My Illness I Learned Rejection. I Was Written Off. That Was The Moment I Thought, Okay, Game On. No Prisoners. Everybody's Going Down.

It's Frustrating In The Sense That I Still Think I Could Be Competing At Some Sport At A Fairly High Level, Which Nobody Cares About. Nobody Wants To Hear Me Say That.