How to train whilst sick!!!

Well after months of careful study I have finally figured out the trick to training when you are sick.

YOU DON"T

Far out I would have thought that would be obvious, I mean honestly what is wrong with you.

Numpty...

The process I followed to get to this rather astounding conclusion was this:

• Have sore throat three weeks ago - have a day off.
• Feel pretty okay - tell yourself that other people train sick and to stop being soft.
• Train for the rest of the week, do a hard Saturday ride and completely fall in a hole
• Have a couple of days off
• Feel okay - start training again, fly to Phuket, keep training
• Get to two days before Race Day and feel average again - don't race
• Fly home - get very little sleep for 48 hours.
• Decide you feel okayish - go for ride
• Fall in massive hole and feel terrible again.

See, it just doesn't seem to work. Well not for me anyway.

So as you may have gathered I am feeling rotten today. Of the various bouts of feeling rotten that I have had over the past three weeks, this is by far the worst. I have had the day off work and spent most of the day just generally sitting very still. This afternoon I am feeling marginally less rotten, but it is an improvement of percentages, rather than a jump.

As mentioned yesterday I headed off to the doctor this morning. As predicted his first (and predominant) impression is that it is just a cold. I wasn't at all surprised since it feels just like a cold. If it feels like a cold, smells like a cold and tastes like a cold etc...

He gave me a form for a number of blood tests though, more to be sure than anything. The only thing he was sort of concerned about was Ross River Virus, since I was up in Darwin about 4 weeks ago and I have a few of the symptoms. He still thought a cold was more likely, but wanted to be sure. As for the other tests, the doctor felt it was a case of , you are getting this test, you might as well get these others while you are there. A lot of the blood tests are the same as I had back in August, which turned up clear, so he didn't expect them to find anything this time around.

The doctor suggested that I have a week of rest to knock any cold on the head and then get blood tests if I am still feeling bad. Personally though if I have Ross River I would prefer to know sooner rather than later so I am going to head down and get the blood tests done tomorrow. From my perspective I can't see any point in waiting. If they are clear then I know and I can get on with resting and training, if they aren't, well then that will be something else. 

So from where I am sitting right now I am looking at a week or so of rest to finally get over this cold, or a lot longer period of resting to get over something much nastier. Not a range of choices that I am particularly thrilled about, but there you go. Fingers crossed for just being a cold (that is my gut feel by the way). That will still mean a bit of a rest and the associated frustration that goes with that. But the up side is that I will still have a month or so to go before Albany, and hopefully that will be enough time to get fighting fit again.

Time for sleep.