Adventure, I crave adventure.
The adventures that I crave don’t need to be polar explorations or hunting for the ark of the covenant or Indiana Jones.
But adventures create memories and memories create contentment.
Sometimes the adventures are a walk with the dog on a freezing cold day or when it’s pouring with rain and sometimes they exist on a bike or in a triathlon, sometimes they’re a holiday with my family and sometimes they’re things that I do at work which are a little bit out of my comfort zone (perhaps like building the new practice).
I only really realised this year but adventures sums it up though and when I’m just bumbling along in a rut day-by-day doing the ‘all retch and no vomit’ thing; that is where my sadness is and that is where my health becomes effected.
And so on Sunday I undertook another adventure.
Everything to do with triathlon and cycling was swept aside with everything else in the summer of 2020 but there was one little beacon left at the end of the year.
Iain Hamilton and the good people behind the Outlaw triathlon started a new triathlon a couple of years ago called Outlaw X which runs in north Nottingham at Thoresby Hall and is a half ironman in a beautiful and wonderful setting.
When everything was cancelled this year they refocused all their efforts and because I was entered into other events as a relay team our entry was transferred to Thoresby.
It’s become a little bit of a focus in the triathlon world with people like Alistair Brownlee racing and other high-level pro triathletes because they can’t get racing anywhere else.
The sad thing is though that I’m in no fit shape to take on the bike leg of a half ironman triathlon, 56 miles on a time trial bike as fast as you can (haha).
I have just not been able to put my head into a place to hurt myself on a bike at all this year because I’ve been putting my head into hurting myself in other parts of my life.
It doesn’t really matter though, I’ve ridden my bike a bit and although the other 2 members of ‘French Toast Mafia’ (our team name), Louis Dunne and Mike Sosin are in a much better place than me and are much fitter than me. They are able to make up for my shortcomings as we all make up for each others shortcomings from time to time.
I’m not sure how many times French Toast Mafia have raced now but it is a few and it has involved things like half ironman and ironman races and also taking a horsebox to Norfolk to race at Holkham last year and to sit in camping chairs and drink beer the night before we raced and have a wonderful time (you might call it an adventure!).
On Sunday morning I found myself beside my bike at around 7.40 am at Thoresby Hall watching Louis Dunne (prospective young professional triathlete) tramming it up the grassy hill from the lake towards me, and for me this is a win.
Regardless of what I do on my bike (and it wasn’t great) I am able to hand over to Mike some 3 hours later and another adventure will be in the bag.
New adventures don’t have to come on a bike, they can come anywhere.
They can be in gardening or walking or listening to music , they can be in meeting friends or making new friends or just going somewhere where you haven’t been before but adventures are the stuff of life, they take your emotions to places where they would not otherwise go and then they put a time stamp on them so you don’t forget.
Blog Post Number - 2508
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