Motivation

[Veebee]

I have always preferred the morning training, I'm fine during the week getting onto the Watt bike at gym, but come the weekends I'm horrible. The training partner thing is definitely part of my problem, use to ride with a great bunch of guys but I'm no where near fit enough to ride with them now. Truth is I ride for the fitness but also largely for the social side of it. So I suppose the solution is to fine another bunch to ride with who are of similar fitness, easier said than done.

 

get stronger on your own and just get back into the bunch you used to ride with ?

[Help.Me.]

where's the fun in that ? I ride indoors a fair bit, but if I dont spend time out it really gets to me and then I hate the trainer.

I know , i know ....but see how different we as individuals are.....crazy i tell you.....

[Veebee]

I know , i know ....but see how different we as individuals are.....crazy i tell you.....

 

crazy is spending 5 hours on an IDT in 1 day.

[fabes]

Nice thread

[Mamil]

Lose the idea that training is an onerous task that you want to avoid. 

 

Remind yourself how much you love riding your bike - the freedom of it - the pleasure of the cold morning wind on your face - the smell of the freshness of the morning, the birds in the tree on the way up Rhodes drive that chirp their hello as you accelerate up the hill at 5:15 in the dark - the satisfication of knocking out 40k before anyone else has had their morning coffee, the clarity of mind that comes with having done an early morning ride.

[twin rings]

True words Mamil, you so right. I need to concentrate on the positives and push aside the negatives. Got to start with riding for the pure enjoyment then worry about the fitness, times, avg speed, distance, etc....

[Frosty]

In Nov 2015(week after 947) my first lightie was born. At first I still rode and trained as much as I could, Yes it was a lot less but I was still training. After Argus this year(or 22km of it) I decided to take a break for the first time in a very long time. Wanted to just spend my weekends with family as I was just loosing motivation to be out riding and my wife and baby where at home. But now after not riding for just over a month I miss it. Told the wife I might have to start again sooner than I originally said. Guess we have to all find our balance between being motivated towards many different things.

I can relate to this.

 

First daughter was born in 2010, and I changed jobs at the same time (when she was 2 weeks old. I wanted to spend time with the family and chose to stay off the bike for about three months. Getting back on the bike with minimal fitness forced me to just enjoy riding. I'd often ride to Rietvlei, do a lap and ride home - max 40km and I was exhausted... only because I was trying to "race" at a level that required a 10-hour week.

 

For the next 4 years I used work as my excuse for not training, rather than finding a happy medium between family, work and play. Getting dropped was horrible, but served as an important lesson: I could relate to club members in a similar form or ability.

 

I have since made 3 comebacks, having got to a certain level then lost motivation to keep it going.

 

Training for an event might work for one person but not for another. Riding with someone/club works for some and not for others. Find out what is enjoyable, and slowly build on that.

 

The following is an edited version of the definition of fun that I got from a friend:

 

There are three types of fun...

Type I Fun - true fun, enjoyable while it’s happening. Good food, good sex, coffee, beers, riding, etc.

 

Type II Fun - fun only in retrospect, hateful while it’s happening. Things like working out ‘till you puke, and usually on the hills.

 

Type III Fun - not fun at all, not even in retrospect. As in, “What the hell was I thinking? If I ever even consider doing that again, somebody slap some sense into me.”

 

I guess you never really know what sort of fun you’re getting yourself into once you leave the couch, which is fine, because it doesn’t always have to be “fun” to be fun.

 

Maybe the whole goal, the path of the enlightened, is to turn Type III situations into Type I fun.

[Grease_Monkey]

You either want to or you don't want to. To me it is as simple as that. If you aren't getting up in the morning (not that I always do either), you clearly do not want it as badly as you think you do.

 

The more you do get up the better it gets, the faster you get, the easier your rides on the bike get, and the more you want to get up because of the effect it has on your life (on and off the bike).

 

Just man up, get up, and train. In a month's time it will be routine.

[Grease_Monkey]

Double post.

[Sitting@89]

This thread actually hits very close to home for me, I go through phases where motivation is unwavering and I easily churn out 10-12 hour weeks like its a stroll in the park and then... just like that motivation plummets and my bike sits in the garage for weeks on end.

 

Lately this has come with another massive challenge to overcome as well, I picked up smoking again after I had quit for almost 4 years, this breaks my spirit more than anything. That also leads to a vicious cycle of all or nothing thinking, if I cant be as fast or as fit as I use to be then why bother at all?

 

So my newly devised steps to keep motivation steady are as follows

 

1. Focus on only one very specific goal at a time, so the thinking that I want to loose weight and get faster, while targeting a specific race time all at once is self defeating, for the simple reason that I know that if I fail at one I also feel like all hope is lost in the other areas (my current goal is simply to loose 8kgs)

 

2. Quit Strava and GPS, if my only goal is to lose weight I have no need to log km so strava is taking a break from my training arsenal.

 

3. Set small weekly goals only related to my one main focus

 

My issues with motivation is also compounded by the fact that I recently started realizing that my frame is actually to small (the fit works but is not 100% spot on so longer rides are torture)

[Jaco-fiets]

I'm hoping the new scalpel I'm picking up this week solves the lack of motivation problem I currently have as well......

[ChrisF]

Interesting thread .... some interesting comments .....

 

 

Personally :

- I enjoy commuting to work - early morning it is just so nice to hear the birds and to build up a light sweat before the sun rise.  In the afternoon the bike is much faster than the traffic.  Okay, I have a short commute.

- family time - nothing like spending a Saturday morning with the little one on a trail.  Looking forward to our first "event".

- I cycle for my health and enjoyment ... racing and Strava dont do it for me .... it is going to end the same as using a scale when on diet - an emotional roller coaster when the numbers dont go your way, and then it is just too easy to loose motivation .....  (I say that while I do log my commute with a Polar and do long term monitoring of my stats)

[RocknRolla]

Go do a xco race, it will either get your ass into gear, or cure you of cycling for the rest of your existence.

 

Or teach you about race choices

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Simon123]

My problem was getting a younger girlfriend after I got divorced.  Just cant motivate myself to get out of bed earlier.

 

I found buying her pyjamas helped a little bit.  Most days. 

[V12man]

I find I don't need motivation to get on the bike once my feet are on the floor in the am....

 

Getting the feet on the floor is another game altogether... comes down to asking myself a few hard questions about what I want out of it on occasion....

[twin rings]

In some ways I'm glad to hear I'm not alone, sounds like we need a support group, or closer to the point, a support ride! Anyone in the Jhb northern suburbs, I WILL be riding from Broadacres on Thursday morning at 7am ????