120 kinds of horrible

I am pretty okay at swimming.

I am intimidated and a little awed by running.

But riding. Riding I enjoy.

Except this morning.

This morning I did not enjoy it. In fact, of the 120km that I did, there are none that I would willing relive.

There are many reasons for my lack of enjoyment. Some of them were beyond my control, but unfortunately, the blame for a few of them lays squarely at my feet, so I can't complain to loudly. Actually it would be more accurate to say I shouldn't complain to loudly, because really I shouldn't, however, I am more than capable of complaining loudly, and so far I have been.

So what made this morning so bad? In short, the weather. This morning was miserable in Perth. It is unpleasant now, but earlier, terrible. Howling wind and squally showers. This is the bit that was beyond my control.

The bit that was under my control was that I didn't have to go out in it. I have a shiny new wind trainer and so I could have done the session in the warm, dry comfort of my own home. I did think about it, boy did I think about it. I probably spent 5 minutes just standing there staring at the wind trainer and listening the wind howling outside, thinking, 'that might not be a bad idea'. However, in the end I headed out on to the road. It wasn't just a random act though, there was some actual reasoning behind doing so. The reasoning was this:

• It is mostly just a lot of wind and not that much rain (that turned out to be a bit incorrect)
• Avoiding wind is not a great reason to jump on the trainer
• Being on a wind trainer for 4 hours is going to just plain suck.

As I mentioned above, I got the bit about the rain a little wrong. This combined with the fact that there really was a lot of wind, meant that being out on the road was horrible. Worse than being on a trainer for 4 hours? I am not sure, but at this point I sort of wish I had found out. Certainly a lesson for the future, because one thing we can be sure of, this winter is going to get wetter before it gets drier.

The second reason that the ride wasn't great was also my fault and this one was probably a bit more avoidable. As I mentioned yesterday, my intention was to catch up on my Thursday run (which I missed) last night. The good news was that I did catch up on that run, and it was a cracker. But the bad news was that I think the solid run from yesterday zapped my legs a bit. From word go this morning they were just tired. Combined with the strong winds and the motivation sapping weather, it made for a tired ride.

It was an awesome run though, in conditions every bit as bad as this morning. As bad as the ride was this morning though, it was great to have a run where things were starting to feel right again.

Anyway, so the ride is done. I have questions over the quality of the session, but perhaps it just means that I actually did an easy volume ride at the right intensity for once.  If nothing else it was a solid exercise in perseverance. Those kinds of exercises are usually worth the effort.