On looking for trouble
On looking for trouble
Estimates, going fishing, and the sounds of the skull
Estimates, going fishing, and the sounds of the skull
Jul 27, 2024
After last week’s “defeat” on the bike, I was determined to make this week’s bike count. I don’t have a long bike next week either so I decided to go for it. I need to restore morale and also get a more realistic estimate of my current level.
I woke up on a mission today. I caffeinated, carbed up, hit the road early while it was still fresh. I held 160w for almost three hours. I lost power on the way home, got a little bonkey because I’m not used to going that hard, but I made it home for 110k, about 1000m elevation (depending on who you ask) in 4:15 moving time with only 15min breaks, mostly to fuel up which I did twice.
That’s a 25.5kph which is a 7h ironman. Even if you count elapsed time, I’m still good for a 7h30 bike split 12 weeks out. I got home tired with jacked up legs, but still. 5 min after stopping, I could probably run.
In other words, I’m in a good spot to finish this thing.
And yet, going out of the shower, I could feel that thing in my head saying: “Yeah, but your shoulders are going to cause you trouble after the swim”, “yeah, but you need to drop your bike volume to reintroduce the swimming”
It doesn’t matter what the voice is saying today. What matters is that it’s incessant, relentless, and mean.
I discovered the voice a few months before I left to Bali. I’ve been working on it ever since. But today something new clicked. When I heard it, I gave it a gentle, indifferent: “yeah, whatever”
Telling the voice to go fish is an entirely new ability, a magical one. I think It’s mostly related the the state of despair that I felt last week. I spent days thinking of how to make the cutoff and that I will probably DNF, and now the numbers say that I will have about an hour to spare going into the run. This seems to pull the rug from under my trouble seeking voice.
After last week’s “defeat” on the bike, I was determined to make this week’s bike count. I don’t have a long bike next week either so I decided to go for it. I need to restore morale and also get a more realistic estimate of my current level.
I woke up on a mission today. I caffeinated, carbed up, hit the road early while it was still fresh. I held 160w for almost three hours. I lost power on the way home, got a little bonkey because I’m not used to going that hard, but I made it home for 110k, about 1000m elevation (depending on who you ask) in 4:15 moving time with only 15min breaks, mostly to fuel up which I did twice.
That’s a 25.5kph which is a 7h ironman. Even if you count elapsed time, I’m still good for a 7h30 bike split 12 weeks out. I got home tired with jacked up legs, but still. 5 min after stopping, I could probably run.
In other words, I’m in a good spot to finish this thing.
And yet, going out of the shower, I could feel that thing in my head saying: “Yeah, but your shoulders are going to cause you trouble after the swim”, “yeah, but you need to drop your bike volume to reintroduce the swimming”
It doesn’t matter what the voice is saying today. What matters is that it’s incessant, relentless, and mean.
I discovered the voice a few months before I left to Bali. I’ve been working on it ever since. But today something new clicked. When I heard it, I gave it a gentle, indifferent: “yeah, whatever”
Telling the voice to go fish is an entirely new ability, a magical one. I think It’s mostly related the the state of despair that I felt last week. I spent days thinking of how to make the cutoff and that I will probably DNF, and now the numbers say that I will have about an hour to spare going into the run. This seems to pull the rug from under my trouble seeking voice.
