Whenever you enter a race you will need to travel. Unless you live by the ocean or a loch with enough space for a transition area then you’re going to have plane, train our automobile it. Over the next three weeks I’m going to share my thoughts on travel...

Flying

I used to be scared of flying. Really scared. The kind of fear that makes you think twice about going to the airport. It was irrational. It was stupid. And I needed to find a cure so I checked out a website which explained in forensic detail the purpose of every single knob, button, indicator and screen in the cockpit. Knowledge is power.

The website was meant to reassure the nervous flyer. Failsafes knobs catching failsafes buttons catching failsafe indicators showing on failsafe screens. A pilot would need to be dead, dumb and blind not to know something was going wrong – and every button would have to fail before you ran out of buttons that could save you. 

And, as yet another failsafe, you can be confident that your pilot is alive and is not dead, dumb and blind because they definitely test for that in pilot school.  In fact, pretty much every airline insists on all of their pilots having eyes, mouths and ears. It’s not the law though, so, just as a precaution, before boarding a Ryanair flight, I’d check if the cockpit contains a kennel, just in case the pilot needs a spot for their dog.

And with this basic check complete, you can be confident that there are over 200 knobs, buttons, indicators and screens making sure we don’t fall from the sky. Who couldn’t be impressed by all the measures in place to ensure we can fly safety while eating a free bag of nuts? It was a revelation. It cured my fear of flying because, after checking out the site I realised one simple thing – NO MAN CAN REMEMBER ALL THOSE BUTTONS! THERE ARE HUNDREDS OF THEM?!!! IT’S IMPOSSIBLE. HE’D NEED TO BE MR MEMORY! AND WHAT IF HE CAN’T GET THE INTERNET WHEN HE’S FLYING THE PLANE? IN FACT, HE SHOULDN’T BE CHECKING THE INTERNET WHEN FLYING! HIS PHONE SHOULD BE ON FLIGHT SAFE MODE!!!! OH GOD, WE’RE ALL GOING TO DIE!!!

And that’s why I no longer fear flying because under no circumstances will I ever get on a plane again.

Summary

Don’t leave your home!