Motivation

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Motivation is something that I seldom struggle with these days. There was a time when I found it hard to motivate myself; if I wanted to go to the gym after work, I'd have to have packed my bag beforehand and employ tactics such as the ten minute rule, where you allow yourself to go home after ten minutes if you want to, in order to gee myself up enough to get it done.

Nowadays, motivation is something I seem to have in abundance, possibly too much at times, and I need to hold myself back. That is until it runs dry, which it always does. Let's use the example of running.

Although I have probably run thousands of miles as a child in the playground, playing football and playing in general, I remember when I went for my first proper run. I was nineteen and I ran a mile as fast as I could though I honestly have no idea how fast I did it in. The days before Strava were simpler and possibly better... It was awful, rather fittingly I ended up outside a cemetery, coughing and gasping for air.

Since then I have run on and off, mostly as preparation for the football season though by no means regularly. I ran the Great North Run for the British Heart Foundation in 2011 and thoroughly enjoyed it, though not enough to kickstart my running career. The thing is, I have never consistently enjoyed running. At times it has been pleasant and I've enjoyed the associative benefits e.g. quiet time alone, the ability to switch my mind off, being in nature but they have seldom outweighed the negatives which I won't go into.

In March 2017 I decided that I was going to give running a good go. I read up about it, realised I had been running pretty much all my runs as fast as I could and that, if I was to slow down, I could enjoy it more and probably get faster. It started with three runs a week and I gradually built up to being able to run every day for almost four weeks from May into June. In that time I started to swim, as well as lots of bike riding, so decided to knock the running "streak" on its head. Strangely though I was quite enjoying running.

Although I wasn't running every day I was still getting out five, sometimes six, times a week in the lead up to the Poppy Half in November. That race result, where I took ~18 minutes off my PB from six years' prior, provided a great motivational boost which lead to me running consistently through to Halfs/Halves in Marrakech and Hastings, in January and March respectively. (I also remember my performance in the Poppy Half hugely surprising an avid running friend of mine -- doubtless that would have given me much motivation knowing we would be running Marrakech and Hastings together.)

After the Hastings HM my motivation dipped and it never fully recovered. I had a few good weeks but my motivation had wilted and I found myself drawn to cycling, perhaps because I had recently moved to Sevenoaks and started to ride, socially as well as my commute, with other cyclists. So I wonder whether my, I guess fickle, motivation jumped ship to cycling and hasn't looked back since? I have run five or six times this calendar year and it's hard to foresee a future in which it returns in earnest.

Having said that my motivation for cycling seems to be fading a little at the moment. Whether I have pushed too hard, or I am burned out from too much structure, it's hard to say.

During a recent trip to Mallorca we, without realising, rode the Mallorca Half Ironman course in reverse. The two people I went with are both triathletes; one did an Ironman last year, the other is doing the same event this year. Ever since I have been thinking about how the Mallorca HIM seems like it could be a lot of fun (though I'd need to learn to swim, and run a little more frequently than this year's average of once per month...).

I wonder whether my motivation has had its head turned by the murky waters of triathlon. I guess time will tell. Until I find out it's full steam ahead with the cycling time trials. In a couple of weekends I will be supporting a clubmate with his 24 hour time trial. Surely my motivation won't be swayed by that, will it? No. Definitely not. What have I done..?