[Closed] Has Cycling hurt your career?

I'd rather ride than work, any day.

No.

But kids have 😉

What is this career thing you talk of? Sorry companies don't give a f*** about you, I work to get enough money to have a life, I long ago decided to stay out of the back stabbing that dominates the careerist approach to life.

anyone else feel the same?

Yes, and I wouldn't change a thing,.....

Actually, I'd do more cheeky miles. Probably be hung over more often too.

No but then I manage to do both without them crossing paths. I understand that I will never make a living (or probably any money) by cycling so there has to be a balance. Seems to be working as Ive had a payrise and bonus every year for the last 6 years and got faster at the same time.

Has Cycling hurt your career?

probably not as much as being on here has

i messed my leg up riding and had a total of 7 months off work, that was a pretty big black mark against me, it was never the same when i came back.
But hey i'm glad i'm not there anymore.
Now i have a job and a life, and not a career:-)

not really, I just very rarely offer to do out of hours work and night work 'cause it interferes with my training... and there's always others who want the money. I'd rather train than be rich. and I'm always fairly knackered on a Monday from busy weekends and a couple of late nights in a row anyway.

Yes, in the early days I was semi pro and during that time held down a very good job, however as the competition became harder and I became less motivated my career took off.. then the same happened with sailing/career.. yadda yadda... been the same ever since.

If you talk about having a hard weekend on the bike and then turning up to work knackered on a Monday, well that happens every weekend does it not?? or it should do..

Has Cycling hurt your career?
probably not as much as being on here has

amen

I get to work every day faster and in a better frame of mind as a result of cycling, I'm physically much healthier as a result of cycling (which also has an impact on my mental health and work performance) and I save the company loads of money (and time) by using my bike for work-related travel, so no, I don't think so.

This

But kids have

probably not as much as being on here has

On the up side, we would have to run a second car if I didn't cycle to work, so with depreciation, running costs, fuel etc etc that I'm NOT paying, it's like having a (conservative) extra £4k a year gross in my pay.

Well, it works in my head... 😉

Career doesn't mean being a promotion slave. I have a career. I hate work, daydream a lot, surf endlessly and get into trouble, but I still have a career 🙂

Well, given I gave my boss's boss advice on SPDs, probably not.

I get to work every day faster and in a better frame of mind as a result of cycling, I'm physically much healthier as a result of cycling (which also has an impact on my mental health and work performance) and I save the company loads of money (and time) by using my bike for work-related travel, so no, I don't think so.

+1. Our senior partner is a huge fan of me cycling cos he can see how much more awake I am after riding to work than everyone who rocks up by tube. And I have more energy. And he knows how happy it makes me. And if I wasnt riding all weekend I may be out boozing like so many others and that wouldnt help work would it. That said I have been v tired on some weekends after big events with long car journeys.

Career? 😳

Nope.

Admission time: Alcohol possibly did which is one reason I drink very much less than I use to.

Maybe not in the sense you are thinking of but I have turned down really good opportunities because they were miles away And I wouldn't be able to cycle to work any more thus chopping off most of my cycling time and taking away my main form of exercise.

What's the difference between a job and a career?

My last place was very understanding about my regular breaking myself antics. Although they did have to force me to have time off after I broke my arm and had surgery and then came in to work the next day...

My current place my boss is an avid Lycra-ist and I think a lot of my interview involved talking about cycling.

noteeth - Member
Career?

verb
1.
move swiftly and in an uncontrolled way.

I think that makes it very relevant to you comrade 😉

cycling massively boosted my career.

A "cycling" mentality got me off the idea of working for big salary in a big corp. It gave me a sense of freedom that I wanted in my working life. It's no coincidence that within 3yrs of starting to learn MTBing I had resigned and become a freelancer and within 4yrs had moved out of the city altogether.

Id only work somewhere that positively enhanced all my hobbies/interests. Be that with freedom, freetime, money etc.

Life is far too short to spend it on a career, spend it on having fun.

Probably, in so much as that riding is far more important than the job I do.
I went self employed, but then found I had less time.
Happy now as I don't give two hoots about work, do my nine hours a day, do a great job, everybodies happy me, my boss and my customers.
Of course more cash for trinkets would have been nice, but I have a certain sense of smugness as my peers that have striven for so much seem to be dying or falling apart.
From bunking off school to ride, up to making sure I'm home less than ten minutes after leaving work.

Yes got sacked from a bike shop in Cardiff after having to have 6 weeks off on doctors orders after a big crash, near death and surgery 👿

move swiftly and in an uncontrolled way

True, although I don't even need to be moving swiftly in order to injure myself - last time I cracked my ribs, I was riding [i]uphill[/i]... I'm that good. 8)

Didn't help my career when I took out the lead programmer on my team and he broke his leg as I led him down a quarry wall. Six months off and the project was late and over budget. I didn't get another project to manage for ages...

When you're on the deathbed do you think you'll remember all the great days at work and the career advancement or the days riding amazing trails with friends or having an epic race/ride?

Having got a written warning for misconduct due to the amount of time I was spending on here when work was slack a couple of years ago....hell, yes!

JCL puts it well.

If by hurt you mean totally ended with little hope of every going back, then yes. I just hope that JCL's words are true every day when I get up in the morning and again when I go to bed at night.

Career?

My career has hurt my cycling. What's worse is that's it's not even that much of a career. Dammit.

Never impacted mine, it's been a huge part of mine.

I've either worked in a human performance lab where it is assumed you'll be tired from training most of the time. Or, worked in the bike trade. Or, got paid to ride/write about bikes.

if anything, cycling has been the biggest boon to my career ever.

LoCo - Member

Yes got sacked from a bike shop in Cardiff after having to have 6 weeks off on doctors orders after a big crash, near death and surgery

😯 and 👿 and what a pity you industry folks don't do naming and shaming!

I had to postpone a rough-and-tumble course once after I spannered myself in Smith's Combe (so worth it!!) but i still went to work and got loads of stuff done i otherwise wouldn't have had time for. When there are all these terrible sttistics about how much sick days cost businesses and the taxpayer, what is the statistic for how many fewer sick days cyclists take than non-cyclists? Despite supposedly a hugely stressful and emotionally demanding job and the 2 fantastic pathogen-vectors asleep upstairs who should bring me all manner of terrible bugs home from school, I am 2nd out of 65 with just over three years without a sick day. Wife rides loads too including commuting and she is similarly good at not taking days off sick. I am sure bicycles have something to do with this.

big crash, near death and surgery

I jacked in a well-paid job to live somewhere with good riding, so most definitely,

Hurt my career? Well yes!

As the golden boy in a development lab there were a few raised eyebrows amongst my peers when I sacked off working Fridays in 2007 with the specific intention of going riding more. The concept of money being useful but time being even more useful was something they couldn't get their heads around. Since then I have definitely been out of the frame

There are many Mondays when I turn up like the living dead and in the summer when mid-week rides beckon my performance at work the following day is the lowest priority.

I dont care. Work will chew you up and spit you out I have no desire to put it before everything else.

I try and balance both.
My mate just interviewed for a good job, he asked about their facilties etc. for cycling and based on the fact they intimated that they didn't support people cycling to and from work he declined the job. Fair play, its important to him.

Working in a people / intellectual type role I find that being physically knackered from longs rides not a problem. In fact I often spend the 2 -3 hour rides in the evenings thinking about work and sorting out problems. Often turn up to work with a big long list of things to do that I'd decided on the bike.

Of course, sometimes it means I'm a few seconds late to meetings as running up stairs hurts....

I moved offices and the first thing i said was where will my bike go. Not that they where arsed but they new i would move if i could not go on my bike.

Work life balance really, life comes first.

Actually since cycling became the new golf a lot of my customers ring for a chat and it helps business, the boss thinks that sort of relationship is priceless.
I'm in the electrical and building trade, taking customers to the bike show would have been unheard of a few years back.

Nice thread topic.

I started mountain biking in 1989 aged sixteen. My cycling mileage finally settled to normal (less than hundreds of miles per week) in May this year. I graduated last September aged 39 and got a career.

Trying to work out how to reinstate my mileage. I'll let you know.

Cycling? No.windsurfing - yes.
And I worked in the industry at the time.

One of the best definitions I've seen for career was 'rapidly downhill out of control' - which fitted my work and cycling very well.

Work life balance. You can love your work, but work to live, not live to work. If you go into work on a Monday morning fully rested, you've wasted the weekend!

I've got my work, and a job doing it. What is this career thing?

Its surfing that led to a misspent youth, teens, twenties. Now have a pretty boring job that im stuck in for at least another year. Im slowly moving to bikes more as i dont know how many more years my back will stand up to surfing. God i wish i could retire tomorrow... have you seen the surf forecast!

Hmmm...
Having been very overweight 10 years ago, and now having lost 5 stone thanks in part to taking up cycling (and living a healthier lifestyle), I suspect cycling has helped me in ways more important than my career.

I have a well paid, responsible job, but I have no ambition, as this would eat into exercise and family time. I plan meetings around bike rides, so I guess it does affect my career, but I don't care.