For me there is a catch to riding bicycles.  I need some level of physical fitness to enjoy it.  Getting and maintaining that level of physical fitness is challenging.   The trouble is, I lack motivation.

    During my last five and a half years in Washington, I had a 17+ mile commute to work and 17+ miles to get home.  My work was physically challenging, but not anything like carrying 120 pound baskets of sulfur out of an open pit mine in the desert.  (I saw a picture of men who earn their living that way; making only $2 a day.  It impressed me.)  When it was reasonable, I rode my bike to work.  Through most of November, all of December, and most of January, when we worked at night and the few cars that were out were slipping and sliding this way and that on frozen roads, I didn’t ride.   Besides, I was so wet and cold when I finished work -- did I mention that I worked outside -- I just wanted a ride home in a warm car.  Remember the trouble with motivation?  I did ride most of the rest of the time, though.  I didn’t like riding to work in a heavy, cold rain, but I didn’t mind riding home in the rain --  except for the extra flat tires and changing them in the rain with car and truck spray making a mess of everything -- and I didn’t mind light rain too much.  The result of all this riding is that I often rode 700 commute miles in a month and by May, I was in passable shape.

    That’s it, though.  I got myself into passable shape.  On that commute, I had five lights -- two of which were left turns -- and half as many stop signs, but I didn’t often make my commute in less than an hour.  Most of the time I didn’t have a watch with me, and when I did, I usually forgot to check it before I left home, but when I did time myself, it would take me an hour and four minutes give or take.  Even on days when I thought I was cruising along well, I didn’t often go faster.  

    There is a secret to increasing my speed.  I have been told and I have read what it is.  It’s called intervals.  I know how it works.  I was a competitive swimmer as a kid and in high school we would start the season swimming 2000 yards before school and 3000 after school, but by the end of the season, when we were preparing for the conference championships, we would swim 1200 yards of intense intervals and that was it.  The funny thing is that the last practices were harder than the early ones and that’s my trouble with intervals.  They’re hard.

    I do ride intervals, but usually just one at a time.  When I see a longish, but not too steep hill coming up, I pick a big enough gear to make myself work and then I pedal like crazy all the way up the hill and over the top until I start to really pick up speed.  Then I ease off for the rest part of the interval, but since I don’t usually have a watch, and since I remind myself I’m supposed to be enjoying myself, the rest period often ends up being the rest of the ride.  The reason for this is that I lack motivation.  

    Now, when I was a swimmer, I was pretty good: conference champ 100 yard freestyle my sophomore year and undefeated in all my races by my senior year.  I had motivation then.  His name was Ron Grant and we all called him, coach.

    There’s no Ron Grant in my life anymore and since moving to North Carolina I have even more trouble: I don’t have a commute to work because my shop is right next to the house.  I could go on training rides.  I know people do that.  In fact, I do go on training rides sometimes, but to me they seem kind of like riding in circles; not as bad as riding a trainer in the house, but not very exciting.  Besides lacking motivation, I think that on a bicycle I am more of a tourist than anything else.

    The Franklinville Post Office is a better deal for me.  It’s almost eight miles each way if I ride there and back, but I seldom do.  When I go to Franklinville, I like to keep going east and north before looping around and coming back west to our house.  Depending on how much time I have, I can stretch the trip out to two hours pretty easily and it’s no trouble to make it longer than that.  

    Another Post Office is in Asheborro.  That one is about ten and a half miles from here and it is within a mile or two of both the biggest library in the county and the only real bookstore I know of in around here.  Asheborro, with its two main drags, is also the only obstacle between our house and the very rural, and quite hilly, southern part of the county.  So if the day warms earlier and I don’t have much that needs to be done, the trip to the Asheborro Post Office can be an “I’ll be home for dinner” trip.

    So I’m wondering, as we’ve already begun our brevet season, and a week from right now I should be checking in for a 300K, what kind of shape am I going to attain this year?  With my Post Office rides, better weather, and not having to sleep during the day, I think I am in better shape this January than I’ve been in for a number of years.  And even though I am overweight, I’m only a couple of pounds over a decent weight and six or seven pounds from being pleased with myself.  But, without my commute miles, what’s it going to be like later this season?

    I think I need to find the motivation for intervals.  Ron Grant would sure come in handy, but for now, at least I have the Post Office.