mental, physical, emotional - or physical, mental, emotional, or..

each day this series of words changes its positions -but i do continue to believe that mental stays a strong leader.


went out for a ride on saturday, with a group that i had not known until later in the day that they had been seasoned triathletes, iron man, and century riders. this made for an interesting, mental, emotional, and physical ride for me.

the ride began right off with a climb that lasted for 6 miles, a climb that locked my legs up right from the rubber meeting the road. not the best way to start this ride. it was goaled to be a 40 miler, my first, as to this point i had only rode a max of about 26.


there is no way to describe the fire that was in my thighs trying to keep up with this group, i was actually the one trailing behind. i had thought i had prepared myself for this mentally, as i did at least know that this group had a lot more time in the saddle than i did, but apparently i was not prepared enough.


pain continued to ensue, and exhaustion took over and the route was only about 4 miles from my house - and a stop light where we were all stopped i said i was turning around and going home, was not feeling well. i wasn't feeling well. my body was in absolute pain and exhaustion, and the last thing anyone needed was someone at 20 miles out to bonk. this was a really tough decision for me. frustrated and disappointed in myself, and lack of energy that day - that instead of going home, i turned around to conquer those climbs again that just conquered me. i was not ending this ride, or any training on a negative.


off i went, full of emotion and focus, i climbed, and climbed; and ended up doing 30 miles alone that day, primarily in climbing. and not only that, i added a brick training afterwards and ran uphill and down for 25 minutes.


an interesting thing happened at that brick - i realized that after about one mile or so, your body actually moves into another zone. the first mile is really like a brick - your legs and body are stiff and if they could talk they would say what are you doing to me. but for the first time, my body hit that second zone in my brick, that turned into an enjoyable run. a run that was full of energy and did not even feel like i had just rode 30 miles.


next day stayed strong (although it did not feel to fabulous suffering strong fatigue from the prior days training), but charged on, and added 1.1 miles to my run, and did 6.8 miles.


stay strong.


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