All the many physical challenges

I was up and at 'em Tuesday morning, doing a gym session and then going to the river for a workout in the boat.  After warming up and doing a set of three 8-stroke sprints, I did three 1000-meter pieces, starting each new one 11 minutes after I'd started the last one.  I aimed for a stroke rate of 80 strokes per minute, about what I'd use in a 10-kilometer race.  My times were 5:19, 5:16, and 5:10.  I feel like 5 minutes per kilometer is a reasonable goal for me in a 5- or 10-kilometer race, but this was as good as I could do today.  I'm sure the gym session had taken something out of me.

My Tuesday morning giddy-up was quite a contrast to what I'd been feeling Monday evening.  As I wound down after supper Monday, I thought ahead to my training plans for the next morning with a vague sense of dread.  I was tired and sluggish and wondering if I would find the energy to make it happen.  But sure enough I did, and it was a reminder of how much of a mind-body connection being an athlete is.  You would think I would know it by heart at this stage of life, but I'm always having to remind myself that just because I don't feel up to a challenge right at this moment, that doesn't mean I won't be ready for it later.  In the case of Monday night, the best thing I could have done is exactly what I did: get a good night's sleep.  I woke up the next morning feeling rested and ready to go.  It didn't hurt that the weather was gorgeous on Tuesday: sunny, calm, and a high temperature around 75 degrees Fahrenheit.

Tuesday afternoon I tried something new in my ongoing struggle against aches and pains: massage.  I have a friend who's a massage therapist and she said she'd be happy to take a crack at my woes, so I took her up on it.  I didn't expect all my problems to be solved in one session, and they weren't, but the massage gave me about as much relief as anything I've tried, at least in the short term.  She targeted my areas of pain in ways my chiropractor never does.  I get it that pain in one area could have its roots in a different part of the body, and the chiropractor is looking to address those root causes, but I often wish the chiropractor would just put her hand on my pain and heal it like she's Jesus Christ or something.

Anyway, having worked hard on Tuesday, and hoping to do my next big workout this Saturday, I eased up a bit yesterday and today.  I didn't really do anything athletic yesterday, and this morning I did a calm 60-minute paddle.  I think I hit the best possible window this morning: the forecast says we're in for some strong windy storms later on today, but this morning the conditions were as calm as they could be.

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