Countdown to Triathlon – 207 Days, 29.5 weeks to Race Day (See Installment 46 of "The Journey", 220 mile bike ride, below)

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY -  No quotes today - I think the fog has fogged my brain.

It's pea soup foggy tonight and 41 degrees.  It will be difficult and probably impossible to get myself out the door in the morning to swim.  I'll probably get on the elyptical trainer unless the sun comes out later in the day.  I'm sure Roxi would like to walk since we've been in Mendocino and she has been here by herself.  Don't worry though, she knows how to use the can opener and turn the faucet on for her water bowl.

I forgot to mention the whales we saw this last weekend.  They were heading south toward Mexico.  We could see their spouts with our eyes, but when using the binoculars we could see their backs.  It was really neat to see them.

The Journey - Installment Forty-Six

       “The Hill” was my daily special challenge.  Just riding in that temperature was a challenge because I do not do well in heat and humidity.  My energy is totally sapped when the temperature rises and the humidity causes me to literally wilt and my energy drains like a battery on “discharge”. That hill was my nemesis.  Whenever we saw we were approaching a hill, Hollen would yell at me to pedal faster.  I would start pedaling as fast as I could when I saw I was approaching it so that the momentum would help me get to the top.    It took almost two weeks before I could get to the top of “The Hill” without stopping.  The first several days I had to stop about half way up that incline and I felt that my heart was going to burst. Finally, one day it happened.  I actually made it to the top and started down the other side.  Of course that still meant that I would have to go up the hill again from the other side on the return trip.   Oh how I hated that hill.  In retrospect, it wasn’t much of a hill as one imagines a hill.  It was more a steep incline.  But to me, it seemed like a mountain.  Again, Hollen used this hill for training purposes.  He told me to look up to the top of the hill when I approached it and that by doing that, it would help me to visualize the completion of the hill.  This small example also taught me that we all learn and accomplish tasks differently.  He likes to see his challenge before him.  To me, the challenge was demoralizing.  I had to glance at the upcoming hill, but then I would look down a few feet in front of the front bike tire and keep my eyes pinned to the road directly ahead of me so as not to scare myself at what was looming in the distance.  This method of climbing hills became my way to navigate each and every hill on the actual bike ride a few months later and always I would say, “Come on Lord!  I need your help.  We can do it, You and I!  Help me Lord!”