Irina Shcherbakova: accident in Fethiye, women's weaving and skating for fun

Guest

Useful from the issue

1. Extreme sports insurance

   Irina advises to take out travel insurance with coverage of extreme sports: even if she is lucky, like her, she will get rid of thoughts about where to get money for treatment abroad.

2. Fix the accident through the police

   In Turkey, an accident registered by the police made the examinations free of charge: the neurosurgeon's paid appointment was returned to her after she brought papers from the police to the hospital.

3. Helmet and glasses are mandatory

   Fragments of the windshield remained in the helmet and on the glasses: according to Irina, it was they who saved her head and eye.

4. Start small

   You don't need an expensive bike and a uniform at the start: try it first, find friends with whom it's fun to ride, and only then invest in equipment and training.

5. The roller trainer teaches balance

   Roller skates improve off-road coordination, and one-leg exercise quickly shows if the pedal pull-up is lagging behind the pressure.

6. If the trainer is not working, change the format

   When burned out on the home trainer, Irina and her coach added rollers, the gym, and outdoor riding. If you value company, look for it in the off-season too: joint rides, challenges, group workouts.

7. First aid kit in your pocket

   In addition to the repair kit, Irina always carries a first—aid kit with bandages and plasters - in one autumn in the mountains it came in handy several times.

8. On the slopes — slower and together

   On an unfamiliar serpentine, it helps to watch turns on the navigator in advance or follow the leader; in a group, the slow ones ride behind and look out for each other.

9. Eating on a long race

   After the first Tsar Grader, Irina recovered for a month: cramps, numb finger, digestive and immune problems. Her conclusion is to think over the food at a distance in advance.

Meeting with the windshield

Irina has a tradition: upon arriving in Fethiye, she immediately assembles her bike and takes a warm-up lap around the peninsula. This time, after three kilometers, a car came towards her, and the distance of a couple of meters was not enough for anything. Irina flew over the hood and hit her side on the windshield — it shattered, the fragments remained in the helmet, the glasses were scratched by the glass.

According to her, she owes a whole head to a helmet, a whole eye to glasses. There were no concussions and fractures, and the bike was almost not damaged: the anchor was torn out, a couple of scratches on the steering wheel and a barely noticeable figure eight. Friends suggested that she did not have time to load the bike with braking, and the main blow fell on her. The very next day, having borrowed a helmet from friends, she went to the peninsula again to check that there was no fear and skating still brings joy.

Insurance and police in Turkey

Irina's main advice from this story is to take out insurance covering extreme sports, even if in her case it was not needed. Since the accident was registered by the police, and an ambulance brought her to the hospital, the initial examination and tomography were free. The neurosurgeon's appointment had to be paid for the next day, but after a statement to the police, the money was returned to the hospital.

The statement to the police concerns the driver's violation of the rules — this is his case with the state. Compensation for damages to Irina herself is a separate application through a lawyer, and she is still deciding whether to file it. Ilya and Irina remember a familiar racer who crashed a couple of years ago on a serpentine at Tlos without insurance: a crack in the pelvis, a hospital in Turkey, a plane to Moscow — and six months later he was racing again, and then the Tsar Grader passed.

Where to start and with whom to ride

When asked in the chat for advice for beginner girls, Irina responds that gender doesn't matter here: don't set grandiose goals, move step by step, and don't splurge on expensive cycling clothing and equipment right away. She herself started with MTB, then had an inexpensive road bike with an aluminum frame, and only after several seasons did she get a bike worth upgrading. The best motivation is friends who show by example that riding is cool.

Irina chooses a pack not only by speed. In the summer in Moscow, she is more likely to be able to coincide with the guys, but it's more important who is riding next to her: they talk in a group, and when they fall or punctures, a calm company resolves the situation without nerves. On the slopes, she prefers to go slower with the girls, looking out for each other, and always carries a first—aid kit with her - she came in handy five times last fall.

Training: plan, trainer, and Krylatskoe

This is Irina's first season with a coach and a plan, which she, by her own admission, constantly breaks — for example, instead of a calm two-hour ride by heart rate, she goes on a long mountain climb. By the end of January, she realized that she was burned out on the home indoor trainer: it's hard for her to train without people around. The coach suggested changing the format, and the plan added a rollers indoor trainer, a gym, and outings to the street.

The roller skates had an unexpected effect: at the first training session, she was sweating from exertion and clung to the steering wheel, and by the end she was already letting go of her hands. This improves off—road coordination and shows weaknesses - when pedaling with one foot, it became clear that pulling up works worse than pressure. Irina describes Krylatskoye as a separate, noticeably more commercial world compared to free urban coffee shops: everything is for money there, and it's important to understand why you need it.

Fethiye and Moscow coferides

When Irina first arrived in Fethiye without a bicycle, she was sure that the mountains on the bike were not hers. A year later, she returned with a gravel pit, started with flat routes along the canal and the sea, then went with local guys to the ascents, and later climbed alone to the ascent with a drop of about 2400 meters. She calls solo skating meditation: silence, your own pace and pauses when you want.

Irina tells about Moscow about the early Rebellion coffee events with a cafe base on Frunzenskaya and two speed packs, about the Easy Cycling Club arrivals, where up to seventy people began to come last season, and about their thematic trips and off-season meetings. In the winter, she herself started a telegram channel for joint trips to the street - to her surprise, five or six people came to the first announcement. According to her, small companies are sprouting from big clubs, which make their camps in the Moscow region and neighboring regions.

Women's weaving and why train so much

According to Irina, the Moscow women's Hundred is ten years old this year; she came there as a participant, then helped, and organizes the last seasons herself with a new team of assistants. She is inspired by the stories of girls who were afraid of distance and riding without guys, and then drove a hundred and after a few years became ride leaders. When sportswomen began to arrive in recent seasons, the fast pack stopped waiting for the rest at the finish line, and Irina added a distance of 200 km — she was driven without shifts by strong racers.

To the question of what she is running away from, Irina answers honestly: last summer, after parting with her husband, large volumes helped her to survive the pain, and the speed then increased noticeably. Now, she says, there is nowhere to run, and mileage figures have become secondary — it is more important with whom and where you will pass. Her first race, the Tsar Grader, ended with cramps and a month of immune problems, and now she knows what to change in nutrition at a distance. Road group races scare her with rubble, so it's more interesting to race uphill.

Ilya's announcements

Ilya talks about the continuation of the gravel rating: it will include Tsar Grader, SHULZ, ARDOR, Pokrova and Gravel Instinct, and the cash prize will be given to the one who passes all the rating races and scores the most points. He also calls for cyclocross in Veliky Novgorod on April 12, shares winter walrus near the Kremlin and the team's plan to go around Lake Ilmen for a while, and also breves around the Novgorod Kremlin — Kremlin, two-kilometer circles up to 200 km.

Timestamps

1. 00:00Launching a stream
2. 01:34Accident on the first day in Turkey
3. 04:51Insurance, hospital and police
4. 13:39Who is Irina and the women's weaving
5. 15:15Advice for beginners
6. 17:41Coach, plan and Krylatskoe
7. 20:13With guys or in a women's tutu
8. 27:34Roller trainer and technique
9. 34:01Why do cyclists love Fethiye
10. 43:35Descents, first aid kit and group riding
11. 46:51Winter trips and clubs in Moscow
12. 53:33Gravel ranking and road riders moving to gravel
13. 59:16Goals, volumes and what she's running from
14. 1:13:24Women's weaving: 100 and 200 km
15. 1:18:28Do girls have a special way

Mentioned in this episode

Tsar Grader · Fethiye · Women's weaving · Rebellion · Easy Cycling Club · Queens · Gastrodynamics · Gravel Instinct · SHULZ · Pokrova · Krylatskoye · Kremlin