Miles of Smiles

Happiness and a cheerful attitude contribute more to your health and well being than any gadget, training regimen, or supplement. The abundant sunshine of the past few months, and in particular this morning, impacts my spirits in a more positive way than the relative lack of snowfall ever could. If the temperature never dipped below 50, but a persistent cloud cover cast a pall over the landscape, the favorable training conditions would never be advantaged like they would on the dawn of a sunny new, crisp and clear day. Today is looking good.

I have only seen a few clips from the Team CSC documentary Overcoming, but Jens Voight's "my problems are the smallest" positive attitude was a quick lesson for all of us. One of the cycling magazines had a Jens interview last spring, where the author was with Jens as the rider prepared for a training ride on a cold, rainy morning. "Good day! Others not motivated!" was the quote, as the smiling Voight put the situation in a positive light, focusing on the fact that he would be gaining fitness on his rivals by going out in the slop. This guy is awesome; I am really looking forward to seeing the rest of this movie. Others may be motivated by the sunshine today, but so am I, so the least I can do is be happy without the slop!

Training went well yesterday. Monday was a rest day. Tuesday morning, still feeling pretty lethargic, I headed out for an easy run. Taking the advice of those on a few of the triathlon blogs I have been perusing, I kept the pace and HR down as much as I could while maintaining form (ie not breaking into my "shuffle"). Probably covered almost 5 miles in 43 minutes and change. Last night I climbed on the trainer. I warmed up easy, then paced it up a bit, but my HR was not climbing, though I somehow knew, even without a power meter, I was producing enough work to see a bigger number. This is a typical observation when one is a little bit tired. Continuing for 45 minutes, my HR never got above zone 2 (130-141 for my aged body). Once again, last night brought a great night of sleep. This has been typical, and is probably one more reason why I feel so enthused today.

Lots of interesting comments on G's blog yesterday. More coming today. G, I ommitted Easton from my comment on companies big enough to properly engineer a good bicycle wheel. Not that being big is a requirement. Surely you can build your own wheel too, my point is just that I don't want to be doing the field testing for anyone's ultralight "Basement Manufacturing Company" project. Just because I have dental insurance doesn't mean I want to use it... OK, time to move. It is breezy out there, but looking good for an hour and a half on the MTB.