2017… Hard times

If feels safe to say that 2016/17 was not a good year.

In 2016 I struggled with getting too enthusiastic with work, and essentially detonated.  my personal life, fitness and happiness all suffered. I did not get into tcr 5, thank God, else I would have been in pieces

I finally realised I was in a bad way at the end of 2016, but the after effects have persisted well into 2017.

Everything I used to love has grown stale, everything is an effort.  Suddenly I can no longer get up in the morning.

I’ve never had any problems like this before, and I’ve been shocked at how easily the house of cards has collapsed.

So, 6 months into 2017 and I finally feeling a bit better.

Ironman no longer interests me.  My knee is rebelling after 2 months of easy running – It’s not inspiring.

I’ve struggled with roadbiking over the last year.  I’ve almost found any excuse to avoid riding.  Add 3 deaths in 3 endurance races (2 in races I want to do) and my normal attitude / survival mentality of ‘its not going to happen to me’ has taken a battering.

Structured training and me have not got on at all.

So.

I dug my 10 year old mtb put again, a 26 inch wheeled hard tail, and hit the forest.  I am retro man but I absolutely loved it. Yay – fun times again.

I also picked up white water kayaking f again in the summer, rejoining the best white water club in London – regents canoe club.  The missus did a intro course again, we did a few trips and started rebuking/replacing our retro kit.  It’s a much cheaper sport than Road biking – top end kayak for £1k, top paddle for £300.  Compared to a bike or wheels it’s cheap.

However as I’ve been pushing in this direction it hits /impacts available weekends. Oh well, it’s fun.

On into winter and I start struggling again.

So I finally get a blood test – all normal except for very low vitamin D.  I feel relieved that something is wrong, that I’m not imagining things. It’s reasonably easy to fix, but will take a while for me to feel the effects.