I spent years in a real-life, fundamentalist cult where the rules were not so much guidelines as a long, constantly updating list of things that might get you side-eyed, corrected, prayed over, or quietly removed from everyone’s group text. Thou shalt not wear pants if thou art a woman. Thou shalt not practice yoga unless thou art willing to invite Satan directly into thine hamstrings. Thou certainly shalt not question the leadership even when you have proven they are lying. I sat in the pew, listened for cue words, played covert sermon bingo like a Fundie insurgent, and thought leaving would be impossible because the walls around the community had been built out of friendship, shame, and the kind of theology that turns independent thought into a gateway drug.
I finally left. And I got shunned.
Which is a very clean word for a very messy thing. Real shunning is quieter than people think. It is not usually a dramatic door-slamming or a righteous decree issued beneath bad lighting, though I would have appreciated the theatrical clarity. It is smaller than that. Meaner in its smallness. It is realizing that a whole community can vanish because you stopped fitting the story they wrote for you–you stopped following the rules they needed you to follow. You are abandoned by the community that systematically cut you off from others in the first place. No one announces it cleanly. They just recede. They become willfully oblivious when they pass you in a store. They look past you with the practiced calm of people who have been told that cruelty counts as Christianity if they do it quietly enough.
And I think that kind of loss changes how you return to anything: including cycling. It took me a few years to go back to my regular things–in fact, I took a good deal of time enjoying the freedom I had never had, and the joy of living I had never felt. And even though road cycling was never a cult, it did have its rigid commandments. It had its ways of belonging that I could no longer adhere to, so I took some time away.
The Cycling Community I Lost
A power number is not a moral diagnosis; it is just a number.
Unfortunately, there’s a particular humiliation in coming back to cycling after time away, and it’s not just the first ride back, it’s the whole ritual of return. So I shut myself in. The terror over wearing dated kit or riding badly pushed me to hide. In fact, I even built a shed in my yard to ride my bike solely on the trainer, and I refused to share my power numbers on Strava. Even my Zwift Racing League team was too much to face with my fitness level–I quietly dropped away because I had been on the verge of catting up before I left; I could not face them now with my current watts per kilogram.
If shame were logical, it would have hobbies. It would take up sourdough starters or pickleball and leave the rest of us alone. Instead, shame likes to sit in the corner with a clipboard and remind you of who you used to be, as though past fitness is legally binding and publicly unacceptable.
It’s time for freedom.
With fear and trepidation, I did an FTP test. As I glanced up at the screen, I was faced with truth: 137. In all honesty, that number seemed a little high based on the way I was riding up that digital Zwift hill.
And I hate that it feels shameful to say that my FTP is 137 because that is exactly the problem. A power number is not a moral diagnosis. It is just a number, and it’s also proof that I was on the bike sweating and enjoying the process. Those watts are not evidence against me. They are not proof that I am bad.
Recently, I watched a GCN video in which Alex posed the question whether it’s possible to race without training. It felt so out of touch for a man whose lack of training meant he could only push an FTP of 300w, so then what did that say about me rolling up to a group ride with the lungs and legs of a has been?
And maybe that’s why this return feels tender in a way I didn’t expect. I’m not just trying to rebuild fitness. I’m trying to come back without handing my self-worth over to another set of rules. I am trying to love something without needing it to tell me I am acceptable. That is the echo I am trying to pay attention to now. The old fear that belonging can be revoked. The old habit of disappearing before anyone can decide I am not enough. The old training that says if I cannot show up as the acceptable version of myself, I should not show up at all.
Cycling did not create that wound.
But cycling can press on it with surprising accuracy.
Restoring the Joy of Cycling
So I’ve admitted to you all exactly what my numbers look like, and I have to push past the shame to admit it. But that is how shame works; it makes you the main character in a trial no one else is holding. Cycling is a sport that anyone should be allowed to enjoy–there is no other sport like it, and I have never found so much joy as I have spinning along the bluffs near the ocean. I want everyone to love cycling the way I do and without judgment or barriers that keep them from experiencing the vast benefits of the sport. And I’m back in.
What are my next steps?
It’s time to stop thinking that I’m not good enough. If the number is low, the number is low. If the fitness is gone, the fitness is gone. If the comeback starts at 130 watts while watching Band of Brothers again, then congratulations to me and Easy Company; we are beginning where we are.
So I am trying to stop treating my return to cycling like a courtroom.
I am not on trial.
My FTP is not evidence.
My old category is not a prophecy.
My teammates are not a congregation waiting to vote on my worthiness.
And I do not need to arrive back fit enough to be allowed back in. That is the whole lie, isn’t it? That you have to become acceptable in private before you can rejoin in public. That you have to fix the shame before you can be seen. That you have to lose the weight, raise the watts, clean the chain, update the kit, solve your whole psychological operating system, and only then may you clip in with the group.
Hard pass. I already gave too many years to systems that required a polished performance of belonging. I am not doing that with bikes.
The Plan to Return to Cycling & Build Fitness
So I decided to return in honesty and on my own terms. And definitely to gravel–I really like the idea of all those bags that I used to eschew in favor of clean lines. I am working to build my fitness and boost my numbers, but I’m not pretending or hiding while I do it.
I started a 28-day training plan based on the one presented by TristanTakeVideo on YouTube, specifically the 28 Day Training Plan meant to build cycling fitness, climbing strength, and power over four weeks. There is also a structured version available through TrainingPeaks, which will automatically send your workout to Zwift or other platforms of your choice as well as to your cycling computer for outdoor rides. Here’s an article that should explain how to connect everything if you need it.
I’ll report back on how it goes: what workouts actually fit into a real life, what broke me, what helped, whether my FTP crawled upward from the low 100s. I’m also going back to my fantastic e-racing team: Coalition. Even when my legs weren’t feeling it on any particular race day, the support and motivation I got from my team was unbeatable. At every level, they’re a group of kind individuals who tout inclusivity for everyone who wants to race.
As far as the real-life cult is concerned, I also have built a decent writing career from it (under a pseudonym, of course). Who knew that the crazy things that went on inside this insular Fundie church would make for some popular and relatable creative non-fiction on the outside? But I’ve purposed to write and ride at the same time thanks to a handy cycling table that lets me type and pedal (not sponsored–I just really like this trainer table).
So I’m learning not to hide away, and that is the part I do not want to lose in all of this. Being shunned from one community can make every other one feel dangerous, but not every group is waiting to punish you for being human. And I have to remind myself that I do belong in cycling. If you’ve ever felt shamed about your power numbers too, remember that you’re not alone. Let’s all just go for a ride.