Motivation, it’s a funny kind of thing. It’s amazing how motivation is there and then the next day it’s gone. And not just gone, but like over the horizon gone, with no sign of coming back. This happens to me every year about this time, give or take a month or two. Before last year, I would hang up my wheels after the last big road race of the season, the gateway cup and not touch them until the spring. I would make half ass attempts to “maintain fitness” , whatever that means, through the winter but I would always fail. Not like I was worried about failing in this case. Quite frankly I didn’t really care. I would adopt the seefood diet, you know the one where what you see is what you eat! I would not even really think about riding the bike. I would make excuse after excuse NOT to ride the bike. Afterall is it the “off season”. I told myself I can take a month or two off and still have plenty of time to get back in shape by spring. I would sit around at night, watch tv, eat food, and gain about 15-20 pounds! I would not pick up the bike again until april. Man the early few months of riding and racing sucked.
Things changed a bit last year though. A good friend of mine put together a Thursday night gravel ride here in town. We would meet at 5:30 and ride about an 1 ½ to 2 hours along the trail and back gravel roads. It would be dark due to daylight savings time (that is a totally different topic). We would ride with lights and as it got colder I figured misery loves company and I would not really have an excuse not to ride when 20 of my riding friends were out there. So I invested in a set of good lights and some “gravel” tires for my road bike. One thing led to another and I purchased a used cross bike frame and than built it up from spare parts I had from over the years. Over the winter we would ride every Thursday. It was the best day of the week. Those rides were awesome! Kept me motivated over the winter to keep riding. Nothing to serious but for sure not a couch potato. Come spring time I was ready to hit the road and I was riding pretty well. Fast forward to now …..
The lack of motivation is back. Not really sure what happened or where it went. I mean there has been this awesome cross series every Tuesday for the past 12 weeks here in town. It has been totally kick ass! The Thursday night gravel rides have started back up and those are a ton of fun. But something is missing this year. If it was not for the Tuesday cross or Thursday gravel rides I don’t think I would be riding right now. I mean I even bailed on a ride today when asked by a good friend. Granted I did work yesterday and had stuff I wanted to get done today but normally that would not of stopped me from going.
I think motivation has set sail, has left the building. Not sure where the hell it went but it needs to come back fast. Not because I have these big plans for next years racing but because if it doesn’t I will balloon up like bloating road kill in the hot summer sun before it bursts! So we will see what the next few weeks bring. And with it being the holidays and all that just means I will be stuffing lots of goodies in my pie hole! I need to get back in the saddle!
Maybe this is what I need for motivation?
