BEHIND EVERY VICTORY…

After joyously watching Bec McConnell take her third World Cup win in a row and cheering along with the rest of her big Australian fan base, I noticed in her posts and interviews how much she thanked her team and support network for her success.

Now this isn’t an unusual thing - many athletes will thank those that help them get to their achievements. But it got me thinking about how everyone, not just elite athletes, need a support network around them to get through life’s ups and downs.

Being 18 months into retirement from professional sport, I’ve been reflecting on my past support networks and what my next one needs to look like. In the past it was clear as to what help I needed - coaches, physios, dieticians, managers, and sponsors are some basic ingredients to an athletes’ support network. More importantly for me, I had some amazing family, friends, partners, and mentors.

Now I don’t have such specific goals, it is less clear as to who to ask for help, but if the last 2 years of the pandemic has taught me anything it’s that we need others to contribute to making our personal goals and time spent successful and meaningful.

Who is in your current support network? It looks different for everyone, but I highly recommend writing down a list of people that you regularly ask for help or advice, people that encourage and enable your personal and professional goals, and people you would call on when the chips are down. You might be surprised at who you write, or who you don’t.

Now look at where some gaps may be. For some, it may be that you need a coach to help you get to your next level of ability or race goal. For others, it might be a little harder to figure out who that person is. Do you need a mentor in a specific area of your life? Do you need a psychologist? Do you just need to reconnect with your local group rides?

You can use the structure of an athlete’s support network as a blueprint for your own:

• Coach: this can range from a fitness or skills coach all the way through to a business coach or even a transition coach if you are going through a career change.

• Physios and dieticians: these are all the specific people to fine tune your health and mobility. Do you need to get some regular massages? Do you need to do more strength training but don’t know how? Do you need some performance or clinical psychology? There are so many different ways to maximise your health and potential, but taking the first step is the hardest part!

• Mentors, advisors, and team mates:

We all need a mentor to be good at anything, be it an athlete, weekend warrior, parent, employee, business owner or anything else that requires some experience and perseverance. Advisors are much the same, but make a short list of people you would actually want to take advice from and block out the rest of the noise. The rest of your teammates can be your peers, colleagues, riding buddies, local club, or your friends and family. Include them in your journey in every way you can and the experience will be much richer for it.

Some of these connections you will have to pay for, but think of it as an investment in yourself. Some connections will be free of cost but invaluable in time and effort. Regardless of the transaction, every connection you have in your core support network must feel like they are truly in your corner. If you feel backed and believed in, this goes a long way in being able to believe in yourself.

Now that the world is opening up again it is the perfect time to create new connections to help you towards whatever goals you have, or to reconnect with old relationships that were important to you in the past but were left a little neglected. Be part of someone else’s support network too. As with a team behind an athlete’s success, the shared joy of helping another is just as good as the joy of your own success.