Mark: Hello, Mark here coming to you from my home. I'm going to start off by talking
about that actually, because you may well have noticed a slight change in the style
of our videos as of late. Both Heather and myself, filming from our home, and that is
likely going to continue for the foreseeable future. Obviously, we have discussed the current
situation on the show, and in a couple of other videos, but I just thought I would say
today, obviously, some areas are hit harder than others out there, particularly Italy.
I would really like to just say, our thoughts really do go out to you. Obviously, everyone
in the world is being affected by this. Here in the UK we're in self-isolation, social
distancing, we are allowed to go outside once a day for some form of exercise. Most people
go for a walk or a run. I'm going often for a run each day or walking my dog, but other
than that, we pretty much got to stay inside. We're not allowed to go out and meet others.
Everyone's just trying to be as safe and responsible as possible.
That goes into our work as well. We are not stopping, we will keep going, and we are going
to keep providing videos for you. Obviously, we do have a load of videos in the bank, so
you may well see some videos coming out that we shot weeks, maybe even months ago, so don't
be surprised if you see us out cycling on the roads. They will have been shot way ago,
but we also are going to be filming, going forwards. Heather will be filming her own
content, myself, too. Some of you been asking about Fraser. We all
miss Fraser here. He is still around though don't worry, he hasn't left us. He's just
taking a little bit time out and will be back with us very soon. Obviously, in light of
the current situation, a lot of us have gone to indoor training. Obviously, that's all
we can do. Some of you have been sending in messages and asking about indoor training
setups, and I thought today, I wanted to show you my own personal indoor training setup,
it may give you some inspiration, some ideas. I'm going to suspect not though, because I
think you're going to be slightly underwhelmed by my indoor training setup. It is not anywhere
near as glamorous as you might expect, but I've got something pretty special today. I
have just received this. It's coming from Elite. I'm going to be unboxing it today,
and I'm going to be showing the rest of my indoor training setup.
All right, doesn't take a genius to guess, yes, this is my kitchen, and yet you probably
noticed, that's my bike. That is my bike in the kitchen, that's my current indoor training
setup. Told you it wasn't as glamorous as you expected.
Me and my partner, we bought this house about a year, year and a half ago. We bought it,
It's a lovely cottage which we really like but a lot, because the location, we're really
outdoors, we love to be able to do stuff from our doorstep, and we've got a do, we like
to go off into the fields with him. We can do that right from our doorstep right here,
so we love that. It's quite a small cottage, we're renovating
it at the moment so I do apologize. If we go around the rest and look at the rest of
my indoor training setup, it's a bit of a mess, which we love, but not so great for
now when we are stuck indoors, as you can see. I'm super-excited to be able to upgrade
this today, and I was actually going to show you around the rest of the house first, but
I've been looking through the packing notes which have come from Elite. I can't speak
Italian, but we have got, what I can see, a turbo trainer, a steering travel block,
bottles, a mat, a couple of things. I just can't figure out what they are. I just want
to get this upgraded. It looks amazing. Let's do that first and then I'll show you the rest.
Promise. [music]
Let's pause here for a second, take a look what we've got here. We've got the Elite Suito.
That's how you say it. Super compact design, I'm pretty impressed with that. It's come
installed with an 11 speed cassette already. I think that's an 11-28. Got a few stats here,
gets up to 1900 watts. I think that might be a limiting factor. It's come with a bunch
of stuff here. Adapters, I guess for thru-axle or standard quick release. Who needs instructions,
aye? All right, let's get it set up. [music]
All right, there we go, all set up, running nice and smoothly. I've actually got my Canyon
Aero down here at the moment, so just enjoying a slightly more relaxed position given that
riding indoors a bit more at the moment, which, on that note you may be interested to hear
that I actually used to hate indoor training. I would avoid it all costs. I'd ride outside,
whatever the weather, but over the years, I've come around to it. Quite a few people
have been trying to persuade me along the way, and towards the end of my career or pro
career, I was doing a lot more indoors. I found it a lot more time-efficient, you'd
be more specific in your sessions, and really get a lot of quality from them.
Not to say the outdoor riding isn't great, it really is, and it's really important, but
you can find, when you're trying to do this hard sessions, can be quite annoying if you're
getting stopped at junctions, traffic lights, or the road surface is terrible, or even actually
sometimes just the rolling terrain, as great as it can be, it means that you're fluctuating
in your power. When you're trying to do a quality workout, and stick on a certain power,
that can be quite frustrating. On the indoor trainer you haven't got any
of that, you can just crack on, even with some smart trainers on Zwift you can go into
what's called ERG mode, and it'll just lock you into a set power, so there's no escaping,
you are bang on the money. Which on that note, I am about to link this up to Zwift. I believe
it's Bluetooth, so it should be nice, quick, and simple. As I mentioned before, I'm in
my kitchen, therefore I can't leave this up all the time. Although my partner is brilliant,
and she probably would allow me to, it's more me, actually. I would hate having up all the
time. I do pack this down after most rides, in fact, every ride I just pack it down and
get out for the next one. I know that's probably quite frustrating.
A lot of people couldn't deal with that, but that's the way I like it and that's how it
is. On that note, I thought I'd now show you where I do store the rest of my bikes. Again,
warning, it's not as nice as you might expect. Yes, that is it. This is where I store my
bikes. I'm still working on it, we sorted it out quickly when we first moved into this
house, and I haven't done any more to it. I've got some plans, but this is it for now.
I have actually got a garage external to the house which we store things like surfboards,
SUP boards, those outdoorsy gear in there, obviously not for now. Here, I have room for
five bikes. I've got my BMC four-stroke mountain bike over there. I love that bike.
I've got my Felt TT, which I love the paintwork on this one, it's really cool. My partner's
bike, which is a Cyclocross touring bike. Actually, Lance and [unintelligible 00:08:00]
actually bought it for her, and then we've got this old school vintage bike here, which
is my neighbor's bike actually. He's dropped it around, because I said I'd fixed it up
for him, put some new cables in it, and some new brakes, and whatnot. There's space for
my Canyon Aero, and then obviously, we've got all sorts of bits of tools and equipment.
I've got streamer actually down there. We've got helmets, bike shoes, and got on running
shoes down here. It's a bit of a mess, got a load of wood here because we are obviously
renovating the house and various bits and bobs. Just down here, we've got another bit
of indoor training equipment. This is an indoor pull-up bar. I would attach this pair on to
the doorframe. It always scares me it feels like I'm going to break the doorframe but
done it countless times. Normally, whack out a couple of hundred of theseeach day, so I
know it works. Also, I'm limited in height here, so I basically
have to bend my knees, and even then I'm almost hitting my knees on the ground. It's a silly
house. Anyway, there we go. I really like the pull-up actually, it's been a staple exercise
I've done for years, I've always found it really good for swimming. It's like functional
strength, I know it's a bit of a fashionable term these days, but it genuinely really helps
swimming, activating everything, getting everything working as swimming is such a whole body movement,
and you need to be able to activate, not only the arms, but then the lats, the back and
the pull-up is fantastic for that. There is no escaping with the pull up, but
now, let's head upstairs. Take a look at some the rest of my indoor training setup. I'm
actually quite out of breath from two pull-ups. Up here, this is our living room, also Reggie's
home. Reggie, what are you doing? This is where he hangs out most of the day. Hey, boy.
All right, let's get everything out of the way, Articulates, Monopoly, really important
things. Now before I actually open this up and get stuck into this chest, let me actually
explain why everything's hidden away, because you might have sensed it already. I want to
pack my bike away. It's all stored away in a little room. If you actually were to come
into my house, you probably would have no idea that a triathlete lives here.
There's a good reason for that because well, I've been involved in sport, basically in
my whole life. I'm extremely passionate about it. I've been involved in elite sport, in
swimming since the age of 11 or 12. For me, I need to switch off when I get home. This
is just a personal thing, and I do totally respect some people who just love everything
up and about, absolute fine. Personally, this is how I deal with it. I put everything away.
Same reason why when I went to university, I did Industrial Design, rather than Sport
Science, like a lot of my friends did, because I'm doing a lot of sport and actually just
wanted to pursue another hobby, something I was passionate about that took my mind off
of things, and gave me a little bit of a break from it. Anyway, that's why I do that, and
that's why everything's in a chest hidden away, and you wouldn't know that it's here.
Anyway, let's have a little look. All right, it's a bit of a mess. We've got
some rugs and all sorts in here probably you back down. I can run you through this. Here
we have a foam roller. This is one of the go-tos. I use this a lot. I know massage is
kind of personal. Not everyone believes in it or agrees with it. I swear by it. If I
didn't have massages regularly, which I did do a lot when I was racing professionally,
I'd be a very broken man. I use that a lot. I've got some other massaging bits here. I've
got this. It's on two roller skate wheels. I actually totally forgot I had this, but
it's got a soft patch in the middle that's really good for the bottom of your cave into
the soleus, and the Achilles area, and the hamstring actually. I might start using that
again actually, it's really good. What else have we got here? This one, I use this one
a lot. Two tennis balls, bit of physio tape holding it together. Really good, again for
your calf, your hamstring, but particularly I use this on my back actually. I'm sure some
people out there would advise otherwise, but it's really good for getting on either side
of the spine and being nice and soft. I've got a cricket ball, just for getting
to those real big knots, so the glutes and stuff. I got a bunch of these silly, physio
spiky balls, never use them. Don't know why I've got them. What else have we got? We've
got this roller. Good core exercise. I used to do this quite a lot. Not that you'd know,
but nice, simple, easy, cheap device, so recommend this. We've got a bunch of dumbbells, casual
40 kilos each, nothing too crazy. We've got a couple of skipping ropes here.
I used to do a lot of skipping actually. As a swimmer, we used to do a sort of land training
to warm up for swimming. Don't do enough anymore, but I actually think it's really good for
running, and it's good for your ankle stiffness, the reaction and ground contact time. I should
do more skipping. Actually, maybe I'll do a video on skipping. I've got a couple of
bits. Don't know why I've got these. I've had these since when I was a swimmer,
no comments. I got a bunch of physio bands. Pretty nice, I think these should be in every
triathlete's equipment box. Bunch of physio bands, whether that's looped like this one
that's really good for putting around your legs and working on your glutes, or these
kind of just straight bands that you can tie to anything. Not only for the glutes and natural
strength, but also for the shoulders. If you're new to swimming or you're upping
your mileage or you've had shoulder issues, these are really good for the rotator cuff
strength. It's actually working on those smaller muscles. A lot of people think you need to
be big and strong for swimming. It's not necessarily the case actually, working on those smaller
finer muscles is really important for controlling the movement in swimming and that's where
these come in, so really swear by those. I've also got, I think this is the final bit.
I've got a couple of swim cords, a few swim cords actually. That's actually a bungee for
a swimrun, but somehow made it in here. I've got a couple of swim cords here. Obviously
really relevant for now when we can't swim, a lot of people are using swim cords, so you
can attach those around your, I don't know your door handle around the bottom of your
stairs, you can attach them around a post outside. Some of them got paddles on them,
like this one. Some just have, just standard boots but you can just go through your normal
pull action and work on your technique, also your strength, a little bit like overgear
training on the bike. This one's really high resistance, so you
can really sort of like, feel that movement and work on the strength in that. I think
that's it with all my indoor training setup and equipment I've got lying around my house.
I use a lot of it quite regularly. That's why I put it all here, ready to be used. I
hope that has been interesting. As I've said a few times during this, probably a bit of
a surprise how simple it is, and basic it is, but it works for me.
I've made it work over the years and I'm really happy with that. I'd love to hear from you
guys as well about your indoor training setups and what you think of mine. Drop that down
in the comments section below and I hope you've enjoyed today's video. If so, give this video
a like, and don't forget to follow GTN on social media.