How I Balance Work, Training, and School

I have often heard from people who casually quip that: “you’re a college kid. You have no responsibilities.” Sure, I don’t have kids, a mortgage, or a home that I need to maintain, but that does not mean I spend my entire day riding, and certainly does not mean I waste away my nights partying as is the stereotype of college students. Sometimes, it frustrates me when I get this comment since those people do not see what goes on outside of Instagram or race day. 

Training is a huge part of my life both literally and emotionally. However, I am also a student who works a time-consuming job on the side. The challenge for me is balancing training - not just riding - and a commitment to the athlete lifestyle with the other two major parts of my life. To be able to balance all three, I have to focus on time management, often have to skip the typical college pastimes, and also have to learn to set priorities and boundaries.

Classes run 9 AM - 12 PM five days a week. This, on the face of it, is really not bad from a time management perspective – especially after years of going to school from 8-3. It provides me a consistent schedule to work around, which is something I value as it helps me establish a routine. Beyond classes, however, I have typically 3-4 hours of work, on average, per day for class. Over time, I have had to brush aside my perfectionist tendencies and get to the meat of what matters. What do I have to do tonight? What do I need to prioritize? If this means skimming a reading that we are not going to spend much time on in class, I am no longer afraid to do so. I have come to realize that life is going to throw you more tasks than you can handle at once. You have to be able to prioritize which ones should be done to your maximum, and which ones you can spend less time on.

I work for KC&E Adventures as their operations manager, and am very lucky to have a flexible schedule with understanding bosses. However, that means working 7 days a week in most nooks and crannies of time I have. I often have 6:30 or 7AM meetings or phone calls and emails to deal with, as I am 2 hours behind where the company is based. I actually enjoy this. Since I typically wake up at 5:45 or 6 AM, the time before class is a great block of uninterrupted hours to get work for KC&E done. However, it often means, I am checking Slack before getting out of bed. My role, in reality, requires me to be flexible. While I have set tasks, the nature of a small business with only four office staff (including the owners) means we all need to be prepared to do any task and chip in at any time. This can, at times, be stressful when I get a Slack message or call on a ride, or a series of emails as I’m about to start class, or 3 customer calls before 7AM. It can be hard to set boundaries for when I am “on” or “off.” Class is off. I would be lying, however, if I said I have not answered urgent work emails and messages in class. Rides are also off as much as possible, but because of that, I need to be available starting at 6AM and then be prepared to work until 8:30PM to finish what I need to get done. Recently, I have learned to be more honest in saying what I can’t do. If I know I have an exam the next day, I just have to say that a certain deadline may be unrealistic. This is hard for me, but it is a skill I know will be important going forward. Another thing I find hard is reminding myself that I don’t have to answer messages that exact second. I am the type of person who puts pressure on myself to always be “on” and available. One strategy I have found useful is to use my weekends to get big chunks of KC&E work done. This is time I can devote, without interruptions, to larger projects and catch up on work I could not fit in on the weekdays. It also happens to be the time we are busiest as a business, so I need to be available. 

With school taking up 6 or more hours per day on weekdays, and work filling in crannies starting at 6AM and going to 8:30PM, training is really my escape. I have learned to set this aside as “me time.” On rides longer than 1:30, I train after class. If I have a longer ride, I know I need to get out right away. This fall, I started making PB & banana sandwiches to eat during our class break at 10:30 or 11 so I could head out at 12:30. While it can be strange going straight from class out onto a ride, it does help me relax a bit instead of diving headfirst into reading for school. Relaxing, however, is not alway easy. On interval sessions, it is easy to focus in and get lost in the burning legs and lungs and pushing myself. On endurance days however, I find my mind wanders, and not always to where I want it to go. It can be incredibly hard to get work projects or school projects out of my head. The easiest way to ensure I really can reset my mind is by mountain biking or riding with friends. One reason that riding is so beneficial is that it physically gets me away from campus, which helps me to step back from a day in class. Listening to podcasts on solo road rides also helps me to catch up on news, learn about history, and keep my mind off of work and class. On two mornings per week, I have gym sessions. This can mean 4-5 hours or more of a day are spent training. These days are usually the toughest, but I have learned how I can be most efficient to take more of a workload on the day previous or the day after to make up for less time on gym days

Typically, after a ride, I will head back to my dorm, shower, and, if it is late enough, grab dinner to refuel, or if it is earlier, eat a snack. On shorter rides, I enjoy getting my training ticked off the list in the morning before class. There is no better feeling than sore legs afterward while sitting in class. I can focus much better having trained prior to class.

With so much of my day being taken up by school, work, and training, there is not time for much of the usual college activities. While this can be tough, I’m not naturally the most social person. Being an introvert actually has its distinct benefits as I do not thrive on socializing. My preferred form of socialization is riding with others – multitasking at its best!

Each evening, I have a nighttime ritual of foam rolling and stretching before going to bed at 9:15-9:30. This helps me to wind down, and I enjoy listening to podcasts as I relax. Being a morning person, I stop functioning after 10 PM. I would much rather go to bed early, get up at 6, and get work done in the morning. While all of this sounds foreign to most college students, I am OK with that. I have found what works for me, and so I want to stick to it. 

My days, overall, are nothing compared to being a parent of young children. However, trying to balance school and work with a heavy training load is hard considering high-level training is more than just riding. To perform, I need to recover. Limiting non-training (life) stress is a constant battle, and I have to focus on sleep and time management to ensure I am entering each new day as fresh as possible. 

I hope that this will be my life after I graduate from college. I want to balance work and racing at a high level for as long as I can, and I know that the experience I am getting of splitting school, work, and training, will help me prepare for that.