Yet Another Cycling Forum
General Category => Freewheeling => Topic started by: Nothereforafasttime on 11 March, 2019, 01:32:49 pm
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A straw poll to get things started on this one with the explanation below.
I am a 46 year old cyclist having begun riding audaxes/sportives in 2012 (swept along with the whole Olympic thing if I'm honest) and I was wondering what everyone elses current family situation is? Do you have young children, live alone, married, retired, etc, etc? The reason I ask is because after my lengthy ride last Saturday (The Kennet Valley Run 200km) my 14 year old daughter piped up and said that 'Your'e always out on your bike'. Now this suggested to me that I don't spend enough time with my family, and upon thinking about it she's probably not wrong. My 12 year old son also questioned where I was during the ride, apparently asking mum 'if he's back yet'. Clearly then a case of departing from my duties as loving father.
I should add that we are a strong family unit and we are all still living together quite happily. Now I enjoy cycling and I had planned to do other rides (I had a 300, 400 and 600 planned) but those comments from my children made me think I ought to stop trying to aspire to something even bigger on two wheels (for now at least) and concentrate more on the important things (if there is anything more important than cycling of course - ha ha!) Trying to get the enough training in and 'raw' miles on the road for those bigger rides I mentioned is pretty tough when you have a young family and I would not want to neglect my duties as a good father to them.
Sorry about the lengthy message but I was wondering if anyone is in a similar position and how do you manage to fit cycling around the rest of your life/family?
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I know people with no kids who never leave their partner's side outside of work hours.
I know mums who spend far more time on sport/hobbies than you do.
Your post seems to be asking what is normal, or possibly average. There IS no average family. Normal is not the norm!
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If other things are more important (happy family that are cared for and work, to pay for
family upkeep and bills, etc) then cycling has to take a backward step. Just sayin'.
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Yes, I echo what matt and de sisti have said. It might be possible to construct an "average" famkily out of statisitics - but it would be one that didn't actually exist. You certainly wouldn't expect to find one on here!
Maybe family discussion is needed if you are feeling awkward about this. It might be that everything is actually fine. But you need to know.
All the best
Peter
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Thanks for the feedback so far.
I guess what I am saying is that from the cycling friends that I know of, not one of them has children (or they are not living with them because they are at uni, etc) so am I in the minority where getting in anything more than 50 miles in a single ride costs time with the family? Sounds like too much of a coincidence to me.
(*cries into bowl of corn flakes knowing his kids will grow up not knowing who their father is if he keeps on cycling silly miles)
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If your 14 and 12 year-old don't know who their father is by now, is there something you don't know?!
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Haha no of course they do know me and we all live as one happy family.
At the risk of answering my own question my wife has let me run wragged over the years in taking off with my trusty steed probably too many times to take part in 100 plus mile audaxes all over the country (always a case of me stating what I'll do rather than what I want to do - subtle difference).
Who wouldn't want to be in that situation though eh?!
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Went for a long period without cycling while the kids were young. The only suggestion is to get them cycling too and go for rides together, rather slower and shorter to start with, eventually you won't be able to keep up with them ;)
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Being retired does not exclude other family set-ups.
FWIW I'm retired, no kids, cohabiting with chap who's been here since 2002.
Can't cycle myself now.
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Went for a long period without cycling while the kids were young. The only suggestion is to get them cycling too and go for rides together, rather slower and shorter to start with, eventually you won't be able to keep up with them ;)
yep, Orienteer beat me to it. by the time I was your daughters age my younger sister (your son's age) and I were touring with our father, 1 week at easter, 2 weeks in the summer and a long weekend each half term. We would use youth hostels and go from hostel to hostel initially up to 30-40 miles per day at 10 years old and up to 70 miles per day at you childrens current age. As Orienteer says initially dad carried four panniers to our saddle bag, then each had two panniers then finally when I was 16+ I started carrying Dad's luggage after lunch just to speed him up a bit.
if touring feels a bit much maybe your children could cope with a 100. If they get the bug then with a bit of encouragement and the right steed a 200 isn't unreachable.
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I think it's difficult to argue that lots of long-distance bike rides works entirely well with young children about. Personally, I only do a handful each year. We try to discuss up-front our own "me" time (for want of a better phrase) and ensure we both get to spend a bit of it by prior agreement.
Tried to set myself up for a 600 a few years back while the kids were still young. The time away was already feeling a little too much as I built up the rides, and then a cracked frame intruded and I decided that It Was Not Meant To Be for the time being.
Definitely go with what orienteer said - get out with the kids as much as possible. When I chose to have kids I wanted to do stuff with them, not despite them. In only a few years time in the grand scheme of things they will be off away without me and I'll still be able to ride audax as an old bugger. Now is still their time (with a handful of rides squeezed in for me too ;D ).
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Tried to set myself up for a 600 a few years back while the kids were still young. The time away was already feeling a little too much as I built up the rides
My point entirely. For years it's always been the case of 'Family, guess what, I'm buggering off to cycle Lands End to John O'Groats' (which I did in 2013 and 2014 - admittedly when they were a bit younger but still old enough to remember) so I don't know what you lot are doing' and not really having a thought about what they would be doing whilst I was away but this weekend it kind of hit home that maybe I am doing too much on the bike and not enough with them (cue folk telling me 'they grow up so fast don't they' and that I'm starting to sound like a terrible father ;D)
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I'm married with a child but we didn't get married until 10/11 years into our relationship. Many of these years we also had a Son.
Where are the options for unmarried with kids?
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Where are the options for unmarried with kids?
There you go....
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I've just finished a 200k and spent two nights in a premier inn. My son (11) was at home with my wife.
I see my Son and wife every day of the week after work and most weekends. They're both happy with me heading out for rides as they know it's something I love doing and it keeps me happy. This is the same as my Son when he sometimes sits in his room playing his xbox or my wife going for walks with here friends.
I think it's unhealthy if all your happiness and enjoyment are tied to one person and you or they are dependant on it. You can't expect your children to provide all your happiness nor you provide all theirs. This is important to teach them to have health future relationships.
EDIT: Just re-read this after knocking up a lasagne for later. I don't mean to come off preachy and there are many ways to have relationships and to raise kids. This is just my take on one single issue.
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Surely the question here is how you balance the wants and needs of various family members at various times
Are you talking to your wife and kids about it?
My situation is 2 kids, one disabled the other "normal", one wife. Daughter has a busy life - now 14, son also has a busy life with carers. Our challenge is my work taking me away a lot, including some weekends, dealing with our son and making sure he's a full part of the family etc. I'm Type 1 diabetic, so regular excercise is fundamental to managing that, which is understood, and my wife needs to exercise to help manage back problems, but as usual it's a balance. I'm the only cyclist.
We've come to an understanding that one audax a month is not unreasonable if balanced with family time as well, and I try and manage training to be as non-disruptive as possible including being out before first light if that's what it takes - which wasn't a bad thing last summer tbh. Holidays, I hate sitting on a beach - last year and this, I've gone on cycling holidays in the Scottish isles, wife and daughter went elsewhere with friends, this year on a cruise with family. The other of us was then at home to help with son who is now far too big and unweildy for family holidays. Next year will be a family holiday with the three of us and overnight care at home for him. Not saying this is perfect, but it sort of works
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What about an option for ‚in a partnership - no kids‘.
That’s what I am and we cycle together most weekends
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Are you talking to your wife and kids about it?
No but judging by the type of remarks I received from my children at the weekend I will be doing more of that now.
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What about an option for ‚in a partnership - no kids‘.
Added. Any more from anyone?
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What about an option for ‚in a partnership - no kids‘.
Added. Any more from anyone?
Bah! And I just ticked "Married - but no children" for want of a better option.
Not that legal status really affects time available for cycling.
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People are away from home for all sorts of reasons. Many jobs demand this, sometimes for months at a time. Personally I don't know how they or their family deal with this, but then since I've had a family I've only ever been an office worker able to commute each day.
I tend not to go for many properly long bike rides, but for any activity that involves being away for a whole day, I would check with my wife and kid that it's OK. I would expect my wife to do the same if she were planning something involving being away for a day. Maybe you could maintain your audax habit if you communicated better?
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Mrs T and I have some hobbies which we do without the other, including audaxing for me. I try to line up all-day rides like a 200km for when she has something on so that we don't spend all our time 'avoiding ' each other :) But that isn't a rule. I think it's a balance like many things.
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My employer is quite flexible in that if I'm away over weekends, there's an implicit assumption that I'll claw at least some of the time back. This time of year is particularly $bastard$ for weekends due to a gvernment imposed deadline for clients that we need to work on to approve their data. So last weekend I did some hours, this weekend just gone I was in my office about 8 hours on Saturday, and from 7:45 am to 10pm yesterday. I'll take a few easy days this week anf next and maybe head out for a ride or two if the weather is good.
Last tiem we made it official after I had a 14 day stint in Saudi and took TOIL when I got back, I got run over. I won't make that mistake again, stealth for me from now on.
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Married with a 9yo daughter. I effectively put long distance cycling on hold whilst my daughter grows up. Last long ride was PBP 2011 (daughter was 18 months old) and even then I did almost the bare minimum of riding to get there.
Nowadays I get to do the occasional longer ride (usually one or two 200s a year) but couldn't contemplate going for anything longer (300+ let alone PBP or LEL) as I feel that the necessary rides to get there would just eat up too much of our family time. I get plenty of time with my daughter during the week (I collect her from school 3 days a week) but it's time with her AND my wife that is scarce and usually only available at weekends. I know plenty of her friends only get to see one of their parents (usually the dad) at the weekend as they're busy at work throughout the week (up and out before the kids wake up, back home after they're in bed) and whilst that works for some it's definitely not for us.
I only work 4 days a week at the moment, so I have one day (9am to 4pm) to myself whilst my daughter is at school and an after school club. 7 hours is enough to get a nice long ride in but the rhythm is broken by half-terms and summer holidays. At the moment I've been using my Mondays more for swimming/running (or recovery from long runs the day before) but now the weather is nicer and the daylight better I'll be upping the mileage for Veloview tile bagging rides up to 120km or so.
Current plan is for more running/swimming and therefore triathlon as the training can be split up into smaller chunks (no 8 hour long slow swims) and easily fitted in during a week here and there without much disruption, even a 3 hour long run at the weekend can be done by 10am leaving the rest of the day free.
I've no idea whether I'll actually return for, say, PBP 2027 when my daughter will be 17. I'll still be a relative youngster of 50 then so I'll have no excuse on that front.
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Nowhere to vote if you’re married with (grown-up) kids that no longer live at home.
When we did have live-in kids my wife and I had an arrangement where she’d do her thing one day at the weekend and childcare was my responsibility, and vice versa on the other day.
Worked well for us, but every family is different (as that Russian chap nearly said).
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Two young kids (10 and 6), so very rarely do long rides at weekends. Try to limit them to 2-3 per year, including one when on holiday and they generally are in exchange for my wife doing an art course or similar. But kids are growing up and I have done up to 50km with my eldest (shewas super-motivated as the ride took in 3 countries and a ferry journey) and 25 with the youngest.
What I can do is long commutes- 2 days a week my wife is at home, so I have no pick-up or drop off commitments. If I get out by 4am one day a month, I can do 100km and be at my desk for 9. I love riding at night and now with VeloViewer exploring, I can target more tiles.
I also try to do a 50-60km ride once a week before work- a more civilised start time of 6am, but no new VeloViewer tiles reachable in that time any more.
A couple of well-timed cups of coffee at work and an early night soon after the kids go to bed, mean that they can be completely unaware that I've been out. My body seems to give out on the 20km ride home, by which time I've been up for 15 hrs and done a days work, but it is good training for 200km rides.
Have also taken to running as I can sh@g myself out in much less time than cycling... Kids cycle to school- I run with them and then take a scenic route home. Again little cost to family life.
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I have a tolerant family, but balance for us means maybe one Audax a month; for one thing, I have some volunteering that takes weekends as well. At that level, I struggle to get beyond 100km. In reality, that's one a month during autumn and winter, a bit of a peak around now, when there are lots of shorter events, and then relatively little in summer, when the events are all longer. With luck, the extra March events will get me fit enough for one or two 200km events around the end of this month.
My all-out cycling was in student days and just after, before we were married. As a student, I raced up to five times a week. When the kids were young, I managed on riding one club 10 a week, riding to work, and not too much else. Then, as any speed I had ever had (not much, in reality) faded, I discovered Audaxes.
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As others have said, many families have a parent who is away a lot. In the war some children never saw their fathers until they were several years old. I know a lovely family in which the father is away somewhere secret and out of contact ( submarines) for long periods. The mother still rides and races her bike as well ( with extended family and friend support). Professional cyclists are away for months on races, training camps etc. I was involved in pro cycling for many years so away almost every weekend, and worked late other times. My kids seem to have grown up as responsible, stable and successful people - who have a very strong work ethic - they saw that work was important.
For what it’s worth, my personal view is that families run around children, rather than run around respecting everyone’s needs and wants, doesn’t long term do the children any favours.
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We have one 5 year old and 2 grown up. We were never fast and the most I have ever ridden in a day is about 108 miles. Before the 5 year old came along we did a few overnight rides and 100s as well as touring 30 - 60 + miles per day, partly guided by what the middle one was up for (he has lived with us full time since he was 13, prior to that we had him at weekends and worked around that). We stopped riding any distance almost entirely when I had the now 5 year old, partly due to his needs but also due to clarion suffering injuries and changing circumstances in other areas. We will get back to it when things settle down, but it is rare that we do much separately and we never leave N with other people, so he has to be accommodated in what we do.
I would look at what you can do with your children rather than without. At 13 and 14 my stepson toured with us and enjoyed it. At 16, he rarely got on his bike, unless we were doing a 100k - he did an overnight 100k on fixed having barely ridden that month. He liked the challenge, but not the everyday riding.
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As others have said, many families have a parent who is away a lot. In the war some children never saw their fathers until they were several years old. I know a lovely family in which the father is away somewhere secret and out of contact ( submarines) for long periods. The mother still rides and races her bike as well ( with extended family and friend support). Professional cyclists are away for months on races, training camps etc. I was involved in pro cycling for many years so away almost every weekend, and worked late other times. My kids seem to have grown up as responsible, stable and successful people - who have a very strong work ethic - they saw that work was important.
For what it’s worth, my personal view is that families run around children, rather than run around respecting everyone’s needs and wants, doesn’t long term do the children any favours.
All true enough, though in many cases this was facilitated by Woman who brings up the children while Man goes to work. For better or worse, many of us nowadays are in a different situation: where both parents work full time, kids do at least some childcare hours, and we want to share out the remaining time as best we can. Thankfully of course, kids seem to cope great with a whole range of upbringing. As long as everyone is getting a fair deal and nobody left unconsidered (including the adults), there is plenty of room for differences.
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I know people with no kids who never leave their partner's side outside of work hours.
I know mums who spend far more time on sport/hobbies than you do.
Your post seems to be asking what is normal, or possibly average. There IS no average family. Normal is not the norm!
Yes and no. Although I agree that there is no such thing as an average family or even an average person, take a look at the demographics on an event like PBP or LEL. My feeling is that the groups of, say, "under 30", and "over 50" are over-represented compared to the overall population, while the group "between 30 and 50" seems to be under-represented. Of course, I have no strong stats to back up my claim, it's just an impression, but it's very tempting to say that people in the ages where you often have younger children tends to have less time for long distance cycling!
This is at least our case, a family of four, the two happily married parents riding the same bicycle as the forum name suggests. We cycled a lot when we had no children, and as long as the children were young enough to be happily cared for by family/friends, etc during our occasionnal long rides. Then for the last 6/7 years, our cycling reached minimalist proportions, mostly due to family duties, but we expect very soon, when the children will still be at home, but old enough to care for themselves, to resume long distance cycling.
A
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"demographics" are just another form of averages :)
(who cares what other people "in the same demographic" do?? As my Mum used to say "if everyone else jumped off a cliff, would YOU do it?? "
Most people in my demographic don't ride a bike!
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Who asked you to jump off a cliff? Certainly not me! The fact that older /younger people are over/under represented in some activities is just a plain fact that can be easily observed. No one said you were forced or prohibited to do anything because other people off similar age do or don't do that!
Alain
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Ne pas nourrir le troll :)
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I didn't have 4 children to let other people to look after them. I took up audax when I was divorced- it seemed a pretty time filing activity for when they spent the weekend with their dad.
I think I probably spent more time cycling than they would have liked- more than one family row contained a child telling me she hated me and that I loved my bike(s) more than them.
What matters more, your children or your cycling? In 20 years time, what will you be prouder of, spending the weekend on your bike dragging your sorry arse round some wet Welsh weekend? The welsh hills will still be there when your kids have left home.
The obverse to that, of course, is that if you cycle to escape, what kind of parent are you if you don't have that time.
Solo long distance cycling is incredibly self indulgent.
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Ne pas nourrir le troll :)
If you think that _I_ am trolling, monsieur, then vouz ne comprendez pas, I'm afraid!
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I'm somewhat torn atm.
Not over cycling, but training, and racing, for another sport.
Ideally, I'd train 3-4 times a week. 1.5hrs most sessions, up to 3hours for one long session.
Then a race every 2-3 weeks. The races are not local, so that means a car drive (haven't got to that stage yet).
Even fitting in training is difficult now that MrsC has moved down to live with me. She isn't here all the time, she tries to get to see her (ill) mother and her daughter as much as possible. But when she is here, I feel the pressure to get back home. If I go training, I don't get home until 9pm weeknights. If I do a weekend long paddle, currently that is most of a day.
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Just introduce them to Fortnite. You could be gone for a month or two before they notice.
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I do a lot of hours on the bike but half of those, weekly, are commuting. When we had a child I had to make a few decisions and lifestyle changes. I’m probably home about the same amount of time and I now work far less hours than I used to.
I’m pretty present at the school and know all of the teachers. There’s some Dad’s there I have never even met as they’re always away with work. I just got back from a, albeit early, parents evening where we were in the minority having both parents there.
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My current family status is multi-ethnic: black, white and red.
Oh sorry, current not currant!
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My children are now grown up and have been
booted out bribed to get their own places. However, when they were young, there was a certain conflict, so I got round it to a large extent by either going out very early in the morning, or doing night rides (see FNRttC), meaning I could not be blamed for always being out of the house when domestic duties required a responsible adult.
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When my kids were very young my cycling was part of my job, three games afternoons a week and the occasional weekend race. Then I moved to a day school and pretty much stopped cycling for 20 years until one of my now grown up daughters suggested we go on a cycle tour together. Early on in that 20 year hiatus I did teach the kids how to ride and took them out for small local rides.
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Sorry I've come to this a bit late.
I cycled with my first wife. I used to marathon race kayaks but she didn't care for sitting in the car waiting for the race to end. Cycling (touring) was different although I never got her to a tt when I competed. We had a lot of pleasure on an old tandem. It didn't stop the marriage breaking up though.
My second wife does not cycle (once tried the tandem, 20 very gentle minutes on a machine since admired for its comfort and she couldn't sit down comfortably for a week!). Her sport is the sofa. When the kids were little I took them cycling but we had even more success motorcycling (a sidecar is great but a trailer behind an estate car is more calming for the nerves of the mother who stays at home or works the week-end especially if it rains or a "certain quantity" of doudous are involved). Generally when the girls were little we did things like that together and mum was happy to leave me to it or ride shotgun in a following car. We only got one week-end away all four with a big sidecar but that was fabulous. Things changed a bit when the girls discovered rhythmic gymnastics and followed that every week-end 'with the slightly unwilling co-operation of mum and dad). I got (and still get) guilty feelings about doing things without involving at least one other family member (which means that now I feel obliged to justify time out) although it doesn't stop me completely, it just means that I feel obliged to make the most of the opportunities. Things will get more complicated now that I am taking on the secretary's job in the cycling club but we will sort that undoubtedly.
People talk about the distances they can do with their kids. My experience hasn't worked like that but it's not important; what's important is the time you make to share with them, that's what they remember. If you really want to involve them in training and give yourself a good workout - buy a tandem and train on that! Or do as Yvan the Terrible (organiser of the Ménigoute SR series) does - train while they are sleeping!
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Hi.
I have two kids,daughter 18 and son 11.I work 5on/4off,5on/5off,4on/5off 12 hour shifts.It works out that I have two weekends a month off and two working.I can squeeze my cycling in when my Rotas fall midweek when the lad is at school.I cycle Sunday’s on my weekends off with the CC but also with my son.He got his first drop-barred bike aged 8 and has been road riding with me since.He’s also a member of a CC and races.This allows me the spend time with him and cycle.When it’s my weekends on my wife takes him to cycle training and we get out on the bikes midweek after school.We take our bikes on holiday and my wife always encourages us to go and ride whilst her and my daughter do girly stuff.
We seem to have a good balance.
I have a week away cycling with friends every year and have done since 2002.It used to be in the Lakes but now it’s Mallorca.In a year or two he wants to come with me along with my mates lad who’s a year older.
We’re hoping to squeeze in the Way of the Roses later this year too.
Works for us!