Why the build matters more than the day itself I was sitting in the café after track Tuesday this week, coffee in hand, still sweating!! When my friend VK asked how the recovery from my hip operation was going.

Better people. Better environment. Better performance. I've been thinking a lot about environment this week. Not training environment in the technical sense like altitude, heat etc. The human environment. The people you do it with. The energy in the room when you show up.

It’s exactly one month today since my hip replacement. Thirty days since the moment I woke up in a hospital bed thinking, “Right, now what?” The first question that came to mind was, “Can I walk?” — which I quickly answered by nearly fainting on my first attempt. Humbling doesn’t quite cover it.

A few days after my hip replacement, my friend and coach, Rob Foster, travelled from Newcastle to Manchester—four hours each way—just to see me. No training talk, no data, no spreadsheets. Just care. He came to watch me hobble around Manchester and chat. As we meandered through town, the topic came up—care—and just how much it matters in coaching. How it underpins everything we do as coaches. That chat stuck with me, and it’s been on my mind ever since.

This past weekend, I took part in an endurance training camp in Khorfakkan, UAE—swimming, biking, and running alongside a group of passionate and committed people. But the real purpose behind it had nothing to do with triathlon.