Cycling through pregnancy

In our latest Breeze Guest Blog, Dawn Rahman, British Cycling's Recreation Manager for the West Midlands gives us a unique insight into cycling throughout her pregnancy.

Cycling had been my main mode of transport for as long as I could remember, not to mention the majority of my leisure time too.  I regularly took part in triathlons (slowly!) and every holiday for the last 8 years has involved cycling of some kind. In fact, 6 weeks before I found out I was pregnant I’d competed in Ironman Wales (very slowly!) and was cycling 100+ miles a week. The thought of stopping exercising, particularly cycling during my pregnancy never crossed my mind.

With the responsibility of a bump on board (and all day nausea for the first few months), I decided to take it a bit easier and focus efforts on more leisurely paced bike rides. As Recreation Manager for British Cycling, part of my remit is to promote the programme of women only rides, so I’d already trained as a Breeze champion to get a better understanding of how it all works. Becoming pregnant and being unable to race became the perfect opportunity to begin organising Breeze bike rides.

Blessed with relatively good cycle paths and canals around the Warwick/Leamington area, I initially organised weekly traffic free beginner rides between 5-10 miles. This led to me organising regular rides of up to 20 miles taking in the quiet country lanes of Warwickshire. These were still very much in my comfort zone and with the blessing of my midwife (she even came along on a few rides) I was able to do this distance up until 35 weeks pregnant.

Looking back, the weekly Breeze rides helped keep my sanity. To go from regularly exercise to doing nothing would have made me lose the plot. I also think that my regular cycling and trips to the swimming pool (unfortunately I did have to stop running as it was too uncomfortable) meant I had a really straightforward and healthy pregnancy with no complications. Shame I can’t say the same about the labour (but that’s another story!).

So at 38 weeks pregnant I led my last breeze ride, which also coincided with the start of my maternity leave. I cycled for another week after that and gave birth to my beautiful baby boy the following week. After a bit of time to recover, I was back on the bike 4 weeks later and it felt great.

At 6 weeks old, the little one went on his first bike ride, on a child carrier tricycle.  It was the perfect way to get around, and so far he seems to love it (well he falls asleep every time we go out so I’m taking that as a sign of approval.)

I’m back to my triathlon training and organising Breeze bike rides again. Of course, my little boy came along on the first one of these, and I’m pretty sure he’ll have many more to look forward to!

A big thank you to Dawn for giving up her time and writing this great and insightful blog. We can't wait to see you back in the office!