There’s No Right Time

Mélanie Katcher started cycling at 31. Which, depending on which corner of endurance sports you’re hanging out in, can somehow feel like you’re already late.

You aren’t. Five years later, Mélanie isn’t talking about all the time she lost by not discovering cycling sooner. She’s discovering what she’s capable of now.

And that’s a story worth telling.

Finding Cycling at 31

There’s a version of endurance sports that can make it seem like everybody started young. They ran cross-country in high school. Raced bikes in college. Swam competitively before they could legally drive. Then there are the rest of us.

Mélanie found cycling as an adult and started building her identity as an athlete from there. There was no lifelong cycling résumé. No predetermined path toward becoming an endurance athlete.

She started. That’s it. And sometimes that’s the hardest fucking part.

During our Fireside Chat, Mélanie talks about what cycling has given her, how she’s continued to improve and why starting later hasn’t prevented her from finding a place in endurance sports.

If anything, it has made the journey hers.

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Sometimes You Need to See It

Our conversation also gets into something bigger than cycling: representation.

It’s difficult to imagine yourself somewhere when you never see anybody who looks like you, started like you or shares your experiences.

That matters in cycling. It matters in running. It matters in triathlon.

And it matters every time somebody stands outside an endurance community wondering whether they’re enough of an “athlete” to walk through the door.

Mélanie also talks about discovering duathlon and realizing there was another way into multisport.

Run. Bike. Run.

Wait. You can skip the swim?

Therea are times when an entirely new possibility opens because somebody finally shows you the door exists.

Start Where You Are

That’s what I love about Mélanie/s story.

There isn’t some dramatic proclamation that everybody needs to completely reinvent their life.

It’s much simpler. Start where you are.

Maybe you’re 21. Maybe you’re 31. How about 51?

The starting line isn’t checking your birth certificate. And five years from now, you probably won’t give a shit that you didn’t begin sooner. You’ll be too busy thinking about everything you’ve done since you finally started.

Mélanie Katcher started cycling at 31. She’s still getting better. She’s still discovering what’s possible. And she’s still getting started.

Watch or listen to the full Fireside Chat with Mélanie Katcher and then tell us: What sport did you discover later than you expected?

Take Risks. Bet On Yourself.

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