“Put it at 1:30/100m and see what happens”.

I have always believed sports people tend to have a different mindset, but I don’t want to exclude everyone else I have come across.

Across 13 years of hospitals I have met some very mentally strong humans who never played sport. They just had an incredible will to live and fight. 

For those of you who are regulars, you might remember me talking about George Peasgood, a fellow GB athlete and paralympic medallist who suffered a TBI brain injury during a training ride last October.  

It is hard to believe that the words “Put it at 1:30/100m and see what happens” came from George this week as he continues his rehabilitation at the Matt Hampson foundation rehabilitation centre.

This is the very place he rode past shortly before his life-threatening crash last October before his accident.  

Peasgood had his 27th birthday a day after the accident that put him into a coma.

But it wasn’t until January 2023 that he started to recall his crash, initially thinking it had all been a dream. 

As he started to gain awareness of what had happened, on March 16th he took his first steps with the physio. 

In a social media post he said: “I have no idea how I survived this crash, and I don’t think the medical team know either.”  

As George returned to the online world it was heart-warming to all his fellow athletes and friends hear his voice and see him attack his rehabilitation as he did his sporting races. 

The current National and World time trial champion shared videos of him on his turbo trainer which was set up next to his hospital bed. 

I am fairly confident he was the only patient in the hospital riding on Zwift.  

However, it was going to be a long road from those early Zwift rides to transferring fully out of hospital and into a structured rehabilitation plan. 

I am aware first hand about how this transferring can bring a mix of emotions, but it is always nice to leave hospital and get into your own bed.  

As our team-mates race this weekend in the UCI World Cup in Italy as preparation for the World Championships later this year in Glasgow, George is going just as hard in his recovery. 

Where this road takes him is currently unknown, but I know for all of us, we are just happy to see him alive and smiling.  

Much of the research around TBI recovery is hard reading but I know George has the same mindset as I did going through recovery.

I know he has already shocked everyone around him with his recovery so far and I am confident that we will all see him back in sport.  

It is testament to Matt Hampson’s work on creating a place for people with this level of injury to get the specialist help they need.

I was not surprised to see George in the gym, boxing, and getting into the hydro pool for a swim.  

But '1:30/100m' - did I read that right? 

A few weeks ago, Peasgood could not lift his arm above his head straight and now he is swimming at this speed. 

Having not been in a pool since September 2022 I think the physio's vision was to get George into the water to feel weightless and just move. 

Unfortunately we don’t get to see his physio's face in the Instagram post, but we did get to see George swim, and I know for me as I sat drinking my morning coffee watching this video I had a smile on my face thinking 'you go mate'.

'You write your journey knowing no matter what happens next, everyone that knows you is proud to call you a friend and a teammate'.  

George's accident teaches us again how fragile life is and also how fast it can change.

It is a lesson to us all on how to approach our own challenges. 

George shows in his approach to what happened that he is someone who lives in full alignment with their values.

He's not just an incredible athlete, he's a great human.