Training at Alpha

As mentioned in earlier posts I have been really lucky to get a sponsorship deal with Alpha Fitness and Rehab which is based in Toll Bar Business Park, Stacksteads. When I applied for the sponsorship I didn't expect it to be so extensive but this deal and the support it provides me with couldn't have come at a better time. Alpha is owned by Dan Whittaker and Sanjay Joy, I have known Dan for a good few years. He was a talented sprinter and took many a county medal off me in my running days. I was never really a 100 or 200m runner and only did them to add to the clubs points/medal tally but even if I had of been  concentrating on 100m and 200m I wouldn't have been able to challenge the little shit. I dreaded him moving up to 400m! It's pretty odd that neither of us can run anymore, I doubt anybody thought 10 years ago that we would both be out of able bodied athletics.
  I really did have a bad summer on the track this year, the chair kept falling in bits, I kept picking up niggles, I was chasing times in races where people didn't want to do any work and I just ended up down right fed up. I've struggled with depression since my injury, completely losing the plot for a while, training and competing has helped me get it under control. Maybe it is something I have always had and it only reared its ugly head when 18 years of running came to an abrupt end. Anyway, I had a long chat with Jenny and we decided to cut the track season short and concentrate on getting ready for the road races in the Autumn both physically and mentally. At about the same time I got a Call from Sanjay asking me to go up to Alpha for a chat. Both Dan and Sanjay are physiotherapists, they did a full assessment on my niggles and we had a good chat about my sport and what was on offer from Alpha. We decided to work together and planned the way forward, the lads had picked up my rollers from Pioneer gym in Bacup within a week. Once my rollers were at Alpha the lads got me to do a session in my race chair, they looked at the technique of pushing a race chair and looked at my movement. Straight away it was obvious that I had some serious muscle imbalances in my back, and shoulders. My Left trapezius was way bigger than my right, seeing footage of my own back in action was a bit shocking. I knew my back had been playing up but I didn't know the problems were that obvious!
It was then that the hard work started, I was really happy that I had gotten the sponsorship deal but I didn't expect the support Alpha was about to give me. Sanj got to work using kinesiology tape on my back and shoulders, I was taped almost constantly for a month. Dan started acupuncture on my shoulders, not the most pleasant experience of my life but it does work. Sanj Massaged me a few times a week between taping and acupuncture. Dan put together a strength and conditioning programme and gave me one to one delivery of the programme. Having someone who understands elite sport as well as how the body works delivering your strength and conditioning is perfect. I've been to a few gyms now and it is hard to find somebody who hasn't done a mickey mouse gym instructor or personal trainer course - it's even harder to find a properly qualified strength and conditioning coach who is genuinely interested in my sport. Gym idiots are one of my pet hates, I did Sports and Exercise Science at Loughborough Uni which is Europe's leading sports uni but I always feel like I have to defend my qualifications because of all these gym idiots. In the 80's if you were a bit thick your teacher would tell you to be a mechanic if you were a lad and a hairdresser if you were a girl. Now all the numpties go to college to do sport related courses and they devalue real qualifications. Gym instructors who push cutting carbs out, using herbalife or juiceplus instantly lose all my respect and receive the title gym idiot. Luckily there aren't any gym idiots at Alpha and that's something I do not miss from the other gyms.
 After 18 years in able bodied athletics I didn't have the perfect build to start out as a wheelchair athlete when I got injured. My legs still work to some extent so they are pretty big compared to my competitors but my arms are small. The other lads at Weir Archer get strength and conditioning coaching at the club in Kingston Upon Thames, I don't have that luxury so I have trained on my own in the gym since I started training in my chair. I don't mind training on my own but when you are using free weights on your own you need to be well within yourself so you can get the weight back on the rack safely. At Alpha Dan is there to spot me so I have been able to push things a bit further than before.
  The sessions are great, we use resistance bands for a lot of exercises. They look a bit daft, nowhere near as butch as weights but they are harder work. A weight weighs the same at every point in the exercise (even if it does feel like its getting heavier haha!) but the resistance band gets harder the further into the exercise you get. I hate them! I love them for the training but I hate the pain they cause me! I do free weights too, I have improved with them all so far but still need to improve a hell of a lot more.  Most of my sessions end with me pushing on the rollers, that is something I haven't done before and it seems to be working wonders. Having Sanj playing good cop, encouraging me all the way and Dan playing twat cop, giving me abuse the whole way also helps push me on another level. When I get in the chair after strength and conditioning my arms are dead, it takes me a good 10min to get moving properly so trying to sprint is hard work but good practice for when I get to the end of a race. I have almost been sick on the rollers a few times now, shouting for the bin to yak in.
 All three of us have been over to Preston to train on a cycle track, a one mile loop built for cycling so it has no sharp turns, no pot holes, no women drivers trying to kill you, no grids for your wheels to fall down and no idiots pulling out of side streets running you over and blaming it on somebody else. I did a session of one and two mile reps with Dan sat in my day chair taking splits and Sanj shouting them as I completed each lap. I did 7 miles faster than my mile PB so I know I am heading in the right direction. After the miles we put into practice a new starting technique that we had been discussing for the previous few days, we'd tried it on the rollers but this was the first time I had a chance to see if it worked for real. Sanj filmed me do a normal start then five of the new starts, the new starts are faster and quite a bit faster.With a bit more practice my sprint PB's are gonna be smashed next year! Such a shame I have to wait 6 months before my first sprint races!
 Session complete Dan finally got out of my day chair, I think the group skiing on the tarmac circuit thought there had been a miracle and he was cured from some nasty disease. I got my kit on and we headed off for a bacon butty, nothing better after training.
  Since starting training at Alpha I have definitely become fitter and stronger, in Lisbon last weekend I pushed into a head wind at a half decent speed and that's not something I have managed to do before. I have less niggles and I panic less when I do get a niggle because I know I have the backing of two physio's who know their stuff. Something else has changed for the positive in the short time I have been training at Alpha too, my mood, it's not something either Sanj or Dan know about (well they will now but I find it quite hard to talk about, so I have never actually mentioned my depression). I've got two new pals who I get on really well with, we can all take the piss out of each other and we all have the same sense of humour. I normally dread winters training because the dingyness of the valley in winter seems to make my symptoms worse but this winter I know I am going to be laughing near enough every day when I get to Alpha.
 I do feel a bit of a fraud being so well looked after when most people at my level are desperately trying to get the money together for the odd massage but I ain't going to waste the chance. I will take the opportunity and run with it..... well so to speak!