'It was a one-in-a-million thing that happened but it’s not stopped me from riding and competing': Embracing aero over adversity

The crash had seemed innocuous, remembers Xavier Disley. “I was riding along in the group and we came off a long section of sand towards a different sector,” he relives the Battle on the Beach off-road race in South Wales from April 2022. “It all bunched up on the uphill and I didn’t unclip in time because someone slowed down in front of me. I went sideways and toppled into the grass.” There was no sign of any injury. “I didn’t think anything of it and finished the event,” he says.

Twenty-four hours later, however, and back home in the Malvern Hills, Disley began to feel some strange sensations. “On my bike, my back didn’t feel quite right. I had an open TT on the Saturday, and come the weekend my leg and back were so messed up that I was in too much pain to race.” Unbeknown to Disley, owner of Aerocoach and one of the country’s foremost cycling aerodynamics experts, he would never again ride a bike without discomfort. An apparently minor tumble had permanently damaged him.

Almost three years on, Disley is still enjoying success on a bike – only now it often comes in para-cycling. “We’ve all got barriers to becoming a winner: niggles, injuries, limited time to train. It just so happens that my little barrier is some issues with my leg,” the 39-year-old tells me by phone, speaking from his Malvern home. “It was a one-in-a-million thing that happened but it’s not stopped me from riding and competing.”

Permanent damage

At first Disley assumed his symptoms were nothing to be terribly concerned about. “I had this huge sciatic pain down my left leg, but it wasn’t an unusual thing to happen,” he recalls. “But after five days I was still in a significant amount of pain. I’d fall asleep out of exhaustion at times.” He hoped it would settle down with rest and rehab. “I tried some physio and was advised I had inflammation in various places that would go away after a while. But after a few weeks my leg decreased in size, and I was struggling to walk and sleep for a couple of months. I went to an osteopath, who said I needed an MRI. That revealed the problem.”

Disley had suffered a “sequestrated” disc, meaning the disc had come apart, releasing fluid that subsequently solidified and compressed the nerve root at the S1/L5 junction. As a result, the electrical signals to his left leg and foot were compromised. “When we finally knew what the issue was, I was expecting the doctor to say I’d be off the bike for six weeks or so,” says Disley. “When he said it could be like this forever, it was a gut-punch moment. That’s not what you want to hear.”

Surgery in June 2022 to remove the discharged fluid eliminated the sciatic pain, but the complications didn’t go away entirely. “Usually things improve and return to normal after 18 months to two years, once the nerve reforms,” Disley recounts the doctor’s prognosis, “but internally the damage was so bad that that hadn’t happened. It’s been two-and-a-half years now and it hasn’t improved.” A consequence of the surgery is that Disley’s back is now weaker, but the main issue is the damage caused by the compressed nerve. This causes cramps in his left leg every day, and he can neither bear weight on his left foot nor stand on tip-toes. “My left calf basically doesn’t work; the nerves aren’t supplying enough activity to the muscles.” Walking is also affected. “I have to use expensive carbon-plated running shoes that elevate my heel, otherwise it’s difficult to walk.”

Painful adaptation

As one of the country’s foremost amateur club time triallists, with a 10-mile PB of 19.33, Disley wasn’t going to wrap up his sporting career. No chance. “Three weeks after my surgery, I got back on the turbo,” he says. Drawing on his biomechanics expertise, he knew that the most important muscles for his cycling were not affected. “You see it in the paracycling C5 classification” – athletes who have an impairment in one limb, such as limited lower leg function – “that they can ride very strongly,” he says. “The muscles involved in cycling are mostly above the knee.” He realised that C5 competition may be an option, but first he had to return to proper structured training – a task made more difficult by off-putting nerve sensations. “I’m in constant discomfort when riding,” he says. “It feels like being on the verge of pulling my hamstring the whole time. If I do a sprint, I feel like it’s just going to go twang.”

Remarkably, though, the knife-edge sensations haven’t thwarted him. “In comparison to walking, riding a bike is great,” he says, “but I can only ride for two hours at a time. I ride one-and-a-half hours every day, so I can do a maximum of 11-12 hour weeks now.”

The bike has become his main mode of transport. “I tend to ride most places I go,” he says. Performance-wise, he’s noticed the difference. “I don’t have blowout days anymore where I’m crawling out of bed after a race day. I can back up training day-to-day well, and I’m probably more consistent.”

Three months after the fall, Disley returned to competition at his local club’s ‘10’. “I got a mid-22 and averaged 300 watts,” he says. It was an astonishing return, given the seriousness of the injury. Two months later, in September 2022, he rode the Porlock hill-climb in Somerset to compare his pre- and post-crash performance levels. “I averaged 365 watts for 18 minutes, which was 25 watts down on the previous year, but I was happy with that, as I had offset the power loss by being a bit lighter,” he says. In July 2023, still competing as an able-bodied athlete, he won the National Masters Track Championships in the 3km individual pursuit with a PB of 3.26, and then won the same event in the World Masters Championships in October. “I got a striped jersey which I get to keep forever,” he smiles. Of course, Disley’s aerodynamics nous has aided his comeback too. “I’m really aero, which definitely helps, and is even more important now that I’ve lost power.”

Para-cycling switch

Fuelled by the belief that his racing days needn’t be cut short, Disley enlisted the help of an athlete he coached, Will Bjergfelt, who was the C5 road race world champion in 2023. Bjergfelt acquired C5 classification after sustaining a serious injury to his right leg in 2015 – and Disley decided to follow suit. “I went up to Manchester and I was classified as C5,” he says. Since then, he has competed in C5 races around the world, triumphed in a local open TT, and in December 2024 won the scratch race in the National Para-cycling Championships. This year, he is aiming to compete in para-cycling World Cups in Belgium and Italy.

How does he reflect on the past three years since the crash? “I don’t want this to be a sob story,” he says.

“Sometimes I might get to 10/10 on the pain scale, but if you saw me riding a bike, you wouldn’t know I have issues. I feel very fortunate to still ride.” And while some doors have closed, others have opened. “I had aspirations of doing well in world masters races, but that’s no longer possible,” he adds. “I now have para-racing opportunities instead. Of course I’d like to be able to walk normally again or lie in bed without my leg cramping, but everyone in para-cycling was either born with an impairment or had something happen to them.” He considers himself a lucky man. “This is not a woe-is-me thing,” he says. “I can overlook the discomfort, cruise through leafy lanes and still burn 1,000 calories. I’m excited about what the future holds.”

This article was originally published in Cycling Weekly magazine on January 30. Subscribe now and never miss an issue.