{"id":945112,"date":"2026-10-29T11:44:11","date_gmt":"2026-10-29T11:44:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/945112\/"},"modified":"2026-10-29T11:44:11","modified_gmt":"2026-10-29T11:44:11","slug":"turning-my-head-made-me-feel-dizzy-but-i-could-still-race-indoors-how-virtual-racing-helped-a-tt-record-holder-after-an-unusual-diagnosis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/945112\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Turning my head made me feel dizzy, but I could still race indoors’ \u2013 how virtual racing helped a TT record holder after an unusual diagnosis"},"content":{"rendered":"

Alice Lethbridge<\/a> could count on one hand the number of times she rode outdoors in the previous 18 months, and still have two fingers left over.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t that she didn\u2019t want to ride her bike on the roads \u2013 quite the opposite, actually \u2013 her body just wouldn\u2019t let her.<\/p>\n

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The 41-year-old, a former 100-mile and 12-hour British time trial record holder, was competing in the East Cleveland Classic in spring 2024 when she showed the first symptoms of thoracic outlet syndrome, a condition that compresses the arteries between her ribs and collarbone, and left her with numb hands and nausea.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI just couldn\u2019t be in the bunch,\u201d she tells Cycling Weekly. \u201cIt was making me feel very dizzy turning my head outside… I started to feel like maybe I was going to vomit.\u201d<\/p>\n

Later that summer, her hands got so worryingly cold she decided to see a doctor. The diagnosis took almost a year, but the realisation she had to stop riding outdoors was immediate. Lethbridge turned instead to her indoor trainer<\/a>, and, in the face of adversity, spun her way into her \u201cfittest ever\u201d shape.<\/p>\n

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\"Alice\n<\/p>\n

(Image credit: Future)<\/p>\n

\u201cI could ride on a trainer because you don\u2019t have to turn your head to look over your shoulder,\u201d she explains.<\/p>\n

\u201cI kept thinking it was going to be short term, then the treatment just kept getting delayed, so I said to myself, \u2018Why don\u2019t you just focus on indoor racing for now?\u2019 I guess I flipped it: I prioritised indoor racing, and then saw if the outdoor racing could happen.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Fortunately, Lethbridge, a biology teacher by trade, was no stranger to racing indoors. She joined Zwift<\/a> in the lockdown of 2020, and within two years, made her debut for Great Britain at the UCI Cycling Esports World Championships.<\/p>\n

Dogged by the symptoms of her condition, she began training up to 20 hours a week during the school holidays, or 10-12 in term time. Often she’d wake up at 5am to complete a turbo session before work.<\/p>\n

\u201cLast summer, I would say, I was at my fittest ever, which was incredibly frustrating to be stuck indoors and not be able to race outdoors with it,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

What to read next<\/p>\n

\u201cI switched to become a bit smarter with the training, and look for different ways to keep endurance decent without doing the traditional long weekend rides.<\/a>\u201d<\/p>\n

For Lethbridge, that included higher intensity intervals<\/a>, and joining group rides on Zwift and MyWhoosh with the FemmeCycle Collab<\/a> community she helped expand. \u201cI needed to find something that acted as a substitute for being with a team outside,\u201d she says. \u201cThat\u2019s what has kept me really motivated throughout all this time being stuck indoors.\u201d<\/p>\n

The racing, too, proved a huge success. Thanks to her consistency, Lethbridge was able to raise enough prize money on MyWhoosh<\/a> to put towards physio treatment for her condition, something she now describes as \u201ca massively welcome bonus\u201d.<\/p>\n

As for longer-term treatment, however, that’s still up in the air. Lethbridge was able to return to outdoor riding this summer thanks to a round of botox injections that paralysed the affected muscles. \u201cUnfortunately it\u2019s worn off now, so I\u2019m back indoors,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

The doctors have suggested trying a second round of injections, something they have never prescribed before. If it all goes to plan, Lethbridge is hopeful she\u2019ll be back on the roads for longer, enjoying the breeze, the sun, and the outdoor racing with which she first fell in love. \u201cBut I\u2019ll still use the indoor training because it\u2019s just so much more efficient around work,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Lethbridge’s advice to anyone struggling to find the motivation to ride indoors is simple: join a team. \u201cNot being around club mates regularly or racing team-mates is the biggest challenge for me,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you\u2019ve signed up and said, \u2018Yeah I\u2019m going to race with the team in this event,\u2019 it\u2019s the same as telling your friends, \u2018I\u2019m going to turn up for the ride outside\u2019.<\/p>\n

In fact, she adds, \u201cIt\u2019s even easier than racing outdoors \u2013 you just click a link and you\u2019re in.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Follow us Add us as a preferred source on Google Newsletter Subscribe to our newsletter Until this summer,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":945113,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[64,63,784,85],"class_list":["post-945112","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cycling","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/945112","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=945112"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/945112\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/945113"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=945112"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=945112"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=945112"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}