Right start

Phew, what a day. A bit of a long one in the office today. Just one of those days where you never seem to get a chance to sit down, but at the same time you don't get anything done either. Still, not going to complain because I have a rostered day off tomorrow and so from where I am sitting, tomorrow looks a lot like the weekend. That has to bring on a smile no matter how busy a day you have had.

While the day in the office was flat out I at least had the right start to the day doing a bit of this:

That's right, this morning I headed out on the board again for a bit of standup paddling. The main difference between this morning and Tuesday morning was that today I remembered to charge the GoPro before hitting the water so that I could get a pretty sunrise photo. This is opposed to Tuesday when I had my GoPro, but no battery charge to go with it. Rookie error.

My paddle on the board this morning was another enjoyable session. On Tuesday I found that paddling on the board was just the right sort of intensity for what I was after. Today, with a bit more confidence under my belt, I found it is actually quite easy to work harder than I was after, easily hitting heart rates of 130 140bpm. So really it is similar to a lot of other exercises, cycling, running etc. I can do it, but I still need to keep an eye on the intensity. Still I am going to persevere with it. One reason I am going to stick with it is because while I can't go flat out, the cyclic nature of it means that it is more enjoyable to do steadily than something like running where I have to start and stop in order to keep the heart rate low (paddling is a bit more like riding, where you can ease right back while still moving). The other reason I am going to persevere is because I am enjoying it.

Doing a bit of paddling does throw an interesting conundrum my way though. A month ago I would train no matter what. Anything short of full blown manflu of a broken limb wouldn't keep me from my sessions. I couldn't listen to those voices telling me to ease off because I had races to prepare for and I had to get ready. Much of my mental energy was taken up with figuring out how to fit the training sessions in, but fit them in I did. Now I find myself in an almost polar opposite position. Now I want to train, but good sense and the voice of reason in my head tells me not too. Today I paddled this morning and spent a bit of time in the gym. Right now I would love to be jumping on the Kickr and going for a spin. My wife is out and the kids are in bed, so why not? But I have to accept that for now doing that level of training simply isn't' a good idea. Until I get a better idea of what I can do from the Doctor I am mean to be taking it easy. Doing 2.5 hours of exercise in a day, even low intensity exercise, probably doesn't count as taking it easy. Accepting those kinds of realisations is something that I am currently coming to terms with. It is not an easy adjustment, but I think I am getting there with it.

Back down the pool tomorrow to help Paul out with the Friday CSS session. Thresholds work, here we come.