My training peaks for one of the days last week said 2k swim and 45min recovery run. An easy knockout of 2-2.5hrs with my slow swim pace. Plenty of similar days that I’ve done in the past.

Except this time, I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to swim or run or do anything. I wanted to sit and idle my time away and maybe do my to-do list and eat a pint of icecream and play some old hindi songs.  

 I’m usually pretty good with my workouts, but this has been my attitude for the past 2 weeks. I JUST DON’T WANT TO DO ANYTHING.

At first I talked myself into doing the workouts. Peak 2 weeks before taper. Hang in there.
Then I told myself to suck it up and do the workouts. 3 weeks and some odd days before race day. Just do what you are supposed to do.
I also tried some mindgames. *Just* a ride and you are done for the day. Think about how much fun you have (most of the time).

Those helped me do the workouts, but nothing brought my enthusiasm back. 

I wondered if the peak training weeks were getting to me but apart from bike being at highest mileage, I’ve not been physically exhausting myself.

I’m not tired – I don’t have the excuse of juggling to manage it all with 4:30am treadmill/trainer runs anymore. I’m up at a “decent” hour of 6am to get the kids off at school. I go to bed a decent time of 9:30-10:30pm. I can veg out on the couch in the middle of the day if I need to. 

So no, I’m not physically or mentally exhausted to that point for me to use it as an excuse. 

But I still don’t want to swim, bike or run or anything.

I’m angsty, fretful, nervous, uneasy, jittery, …. 

I debated sending Coach a text. I typed out a fairly long email to send. But eventually I didn’t. I mean, what would I say? That I didn’t want to do anything? Or that I just want to talk and get this off my chest and maybe get some sense talked into? 

I’m sure that a fair bit of it is from the #LongRoadToAugusta that started more than a year ago with the Dopey Challenge training. And some from the everyday routine of swim, bike and run that I haven’t really seen any pace improvements in (other than the bike when I had the magic wheels). And from not knowing what I want to do next in real life (since I finished up my project with my previous company). And from a mile long to-do list that I don’t have the energy to tackle even though I have the time. 

Talking to others, I can see that this is not only me. People talked to me about physical and mental exhaustion as we get so close to the race day – 3 weeks. It’s that last little push time ….

So I suck it up and do what’s to be done. It’s the last itty-bitty bit. 

Fellow athletes who are “enough already” with the training – hang in there with me! It’s truly been a #LongRoadToRaceDay for the past 4,6,8,12, … months and its suddenly not as long any more. 

We’ve all come a long way. We’ve put in hundreds of hours of hard work, sweat, laughter and tears towards our goal and we’ve all got a date with destiny to fulfill.