Hello Tom here, just a quick one before we start the show this month. It's a different show to the one we initially had planned.

I was going to speak to Justin McCurry, who's written an excellent book on Kirin in Japan.

We are going to run that interview in a few weeks time now. The reason is because Lizzy is back.

Lizzy Banks is back with us. The first part of this episode is going to be a quite long but fascinating and very revealing conversation about Lizzy's recovery from the concussion that she suffered at Strada Bianchi all those months ago.

It's a recovery that's still ongoing and it is a fascinating conversation and Lizzy is as eloquent as ever.

The second part of the episode is going to be a chat with Jason Smith, who is the creator of the driven project, the ceramic speed driven project, which looks to completely reinvent the drivetrain.

So do stick around for that because I said that is again a fascinating chat, a pure tech chat, but we'll start off with my conversation catching up with Lizzy.

Here we go, here's the episode.

You are listening to Service Course by the cycling podcast with Lizzy Banks and Tom Wally.

Well I am delighted to be back after a month off and I am delighted, more than delighted, super delighted to have Lizzy back with us.

Lizzy you've been off for what four months after a concussion? I am so delighted to be back. I've been away for four months, recovering and still recovering from concussion and post concussion syndrome.

It is such an eye step to be back on the podcast, back with you Tom and a huge thank you to you and Ian Boswell for picking up the pieces for me in my absence when I just deserted you and kind of walked off the face of the earth for four months.

We have been in touch haven't we, but it's one of those things we're going to talk about it now really. The bulk of this podcast is going to be catching up with Lizzy because you've been through quite a journey.

We've sort of left you alone a little bit because when you've got a concussion looking at screens and stuff like that is a massive no no isn't it?

Yeah, absolutely. So in terms of actually talking the talking side of the the podcast was something that I would have been able to do, but I wasn't able to look at my phone or look at my computer in order to well firstly even contact Tom to arrange anything but to do any research about anything I had such bad screen sensitivity that in the first month or so maybe six weeks I wasn't actually using my phone at all.

My husband was my personal secretary and he would reply to my messages for me and would just write voice notes and things so it was really a no go and kind of there was such a yeah cognitive processing aspects to it that if I listen to anything complicated.

I would have to listen to it on to not point eight speed and I would only be able to cope with a couple of minutes of complicated information which you know Tom is excellent talking about complicated information.

So yeah, you couldn't actually process it for long enough to be able to talk about it. So it's been it's been quite a really close to it and you know I've learned so many things and I hope to actually do a full podcast on the tech side of it in the future actually because I didn't realize how much technology there is coming into so many different sports about concussion there is actually a new technology that's currently being trialled in rugby.

That is it's an eye tracking device there's two different companies that are making it it's an eye tracking device and and your your visual visual ocula tracking and the way that your your eye muscles work is supposed to be one of the first things that that is a recognizable thing that changes with concussion and so it's something that you can use and within 10 seconds can tell you whether or not there is concussion there.

And I think that that is something that could become so important in cycling because we all know firstly how many people land on their head in cycling and I think concussion is massively under diagnosed in cycling but also the time pressured aspect of a bike race.

You know we do these UCI concussion protocols and people are low to you know if you if the cameras aren't on a bike race which was what it was with me yes I hit my head and I thought why do you feel a bit dizzy but by the point that my new bike came along right on the bikes come along next to the next thing I've got to do is jump on this bike and go again and so if somebody doesn't actively see you land on your head then those things will get missed and you know you're not going to then want to stand by the side of the road for for five minutes or something.

Doing a protocol but if you can stand by the side of the road for 30 seconds and 10 seconds of that be an eye tracking test and then you go okay right you're not well enough you need to come out of the race.

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