GFNY Double-Double — The Lean Six Sigma Edition

It’s 5 o’Clock somewhere, but not what you’re thinking…

by Chris Geiser

The phrase “it’s 5 o’Clock somewhere” haven’t meant much to me for almost wo years now. Or at least, it hasn’t meant the same thing. As I am writing this, I am somewhere over the Atlantic. We are wheels up to Frankfurt, and the GFNY Double-Double adventure, has officially begun. Jack was delayed in Vegas, Aleksandra boarded at JFK, and the GFNY Deutschland crew of the GFNY Double-Double is on its way. En route, finishing up some loose ends for work, emailing Tom on the West Coast, texting #Toto and the whole Gavia crew on the East Coast, and giving Uli a hard time about Cozumel, while he is wide awake somewhere in Asia, made me realize, that it is indeed 5 o’Clock somewhere.

That means that somewhere, a group of GFNY jerseys are rolling out on a group training ride — it’s 5 o’Clock — AM — training time! Or maybe a solo training ride. As we start on Sunday in Germany, they will be complete at GFNY Indonesia — halfway around the world they will be racing, while we toss and turn and think about the wake up, the first cup of coffee, and the start line. I have been meaning to get back to this, for over a week. With the special editions in the books, life gets in the way. What are you gonna do? Well, you collect your thoughts, get on a plane, put on some Alice Cooper, and get typing.

We are a little photo shy, on this one — Sorry!

In my haste to get something out, I neglected to think about how Medium and airplane wifi would get along with respect to uploading images. Again, what are you gonna do? Collect your thoughts, keep typing, and promise better visuals throughout the trip.

But back to the important stuff. A few posts ago, we got into training. How would this go, this epic trip, with two GFNY races back-to-back, Sunday-to-Sunday? I decided to apply a little Lean Six-Sigma to this gig, and made the assumption that whatever I wanted to achieve would be a function of what I put into it.

Y=f(x) — yes of course — that must be it! It is!

In this case Y is the output, or how we hope to do in both GFNY events. Our results in the GFNY Double-Double. The variable x represents the training effort since publicly declaring the following on July 12, 2018:

As an aside to this — accepting where I am in the process, while part of the process, is not the end of the process. With every pound lifted, every kilometer pedaled, and every minute that I don’t take the two GFNY European Double (double-double) races ahead for granted, I am working to change the situation in my favor. If you know me, you know that I will be happy to be in both races. If you know me, you also know that, being there, while an epic adventure, will not be enough. While DFL is better than DNS, and DNF, it’s still not where I want to be, and I am in control of that. There is a little bit of AYFKM to all of it! (you’re welcome Jeff).

There you have it. For every byte of data I have collected, wattage, calories, beats per minute, meters climbed, kilometers pedaled, TSS, IF, CTL, Fatigue, Form, whatever! None is as important as Y=f(x). Without that equation, and without understanding that equation, more attention paid to what the results said (good or bad), as opposed to effort put in. “Believe in yourself, believe in your training”, it’s a great way of saying Y=f(x). (Thank you, Maestro). For every night that I got home late, or had to be up early, or traveled, or had a family event, and managed to find a 10 or 11 PM window, or a 5AM window (it’s 5 o’Clock somewhere — see what I did there), we are building x. We are hopefully building x into what we want Y to be. But what is that? Is it elapsed time, average watts, moving time, average speed — NO!

Getting on the trainer, getting out to Gateway, getting to the weight room, and putting the time in. There is a severe loss of control that comes with race day. Tires puncture, chains fall off, rain falls, the bonk decides to visit. We have all been there, and we know we can’t control it. We stoop over our handle bars at the start line and hope that none of that will happen today. When we accept our Lean Six Sigma equation, we understand that our output, is a function of our input. It is not a function of that which we do not control. Our result is measured via our output. As non-professional racers, we have to accept that view that while we can’t control our place in the standings, the strength of the field, the conditions on the course, those things cannot matter. What matters in our result are those things that we control and how we make our own luck through what we put into it.

Y, the result of the effort put in over the last 8 weeks has to equal a much more important stat. How close we can get regret to zero. When all is said and done, in both races, with the effort put in over the last 8 weeks, no matter the elapsed time, average watts, moving time, average speed — it will all equal zero regrets. We’ve done our best to prepare, we have done our best to plan, we are with the right people, in the right places at the right time.

SO LET’S GET IT ON!

Let’s do this GFNY Double-Double thing! (and it’s definitely, definitely a thing now — told ya!) Look for updates from Europe on a daily basis. They may be shorter, but I will get them out day of, to make sure every highlight is captured and crystallized.

Next Up: GFNY Double-Double — Day 1 — Frankfurt to Hameln