REDEFINING SUCCESS

The pandemic robbed us of racing and forced us to think differently about why we ride. Chris Marshall-Bell questions whether it’s high time to grasp a ‘new normal’

- Chris Marshall-Bell

On paper, Peter Kibble couldn’t have started his 2020 racing season any better. His first two races were National B events on consecutive Sundays before the first lockdown hit, and he won them both. Aged just 21 at the time, he should have been delighted with his progress, but no. “I wasn’t happy after winning them,” he tells CW candidly. “It was more like ‘Oh, cool, something to put on my CV’ and then I moved on. I didn’t stop and think about what I was really doing and what I had achieved.”

Racing for the Welsh Racing Academy, Kibble was in his final year as an U23 rider – a crunch year in which he would either fulfil or fall short of his dream of turning professional. “I’d always said my goal at the end of U23s was to have a pro contract,” says the 23-year-old. “Looking back, I had put too much pressure on myself to achieve that. It got to the stage where I was chasing results purely to put on my CV to show teams.”

Kibble’s cycling life was in cruise-control mode: he was accurately headed towards his target, but the meaning of the mission had got lost along the way. In the end, it got too much. Compounded by Covid-19 obstacles, Kibble quit racing. “My numbers were good, everything was quantifiable and indicated that I should be racing well. And I was on track, but my heart wasn’t in it. I had lost track of the process and had really lost the enjoyment of cycling.”