The rains came down and the floods came up....

I am reminded of a song we used to sing in sunday school. If you didn't know it rained yet again in the Midlands this weekend with severe flooding in some areas. Warwick has been fortunate in the severe downpours we have been experiencing however the trains were cancelled out of London on friday and I was fortunate to get a National Express coach home. I was lucky as my fellow passenger who was heading to Manchester had been waiting for four or five hours by the time he got on the bus and faced a longer journey ahead after I was dropped off at Coventry at midnight. But pleased to be home safe and dry.

Anyway the long and short of it we didn't get out for a ride as planned so it back on the turbo trainer that sits in our hallway. So I sat on the bike with the front door open and rode anyway. However we need to get out on the roads, feel like my training is slipping away rather than building up.

As I write this I am aware that it is not a good metaphor for my training and as a coach I know that our words create our world and that particular context is not empowering.

Okay so new context - my body is getting stronger and will be ready for the road! Yeah baby yeah!! (the cynics amongst you can read it either way ;-)

The pathway to leadership

Recently I was one of three speakers at a fantastic reception held at Lehman Brothers on Canary Wharf. It was a fabulous evening with over 80 women working in IT attending to find out more about their ‘Pathway to Leadership’.

The reason I share this here is that I used my Kenya cycle ride as a metaphor for creating a future that we are passionate and excited about, and committed to. That future for me is one of being able to complete the ride and raise £8000 for children I will never meet, but who will be impacted by me getting on my bike. I am being pulled rather than being pushed towards this future: it is one of the things that gets me out of bed in the morning! I love that expression – having the future pull you towards it.

I’ve have since been asked to speak at the next event in November, and they even moved the date so I could be there (otherwise I was still going to be in Africa). Can you imagine how big a pull that has on me? I now have over 80 people who want to hear how it all went – another incentive to get out of bed and get training!

There is so much happening at the moment that it seems difficult to find the time to even write this but I am so excited about what is happening around me. Friends and contributors are making such a difference to Julian and me.

Also Steph and Graham, friends here in the Midlands who rode Land Ends to John O’ Groats, two years ago, have come up with a great cycle ride – moderately difficult - for the four of us to ride together this weekend. How great is that, just when I was thinking we needed to push up a level in our training, wonderful people have shown up and are working to get us out of our comfort zone!

Just quickly here to end, thank you to all of you have gone to www.justgiving/moiraandjulian.com and donated to the cause. Julian and I are moved by your contribution to us and to the children. Thank you.

Errrrhhh….

Yesterday we headed off to Draycote to get some time on our bikes. With all the rain of the last few weeks my training schedule has gone right off. I’ve had a bug and lost a good part of the week. Just finding the time to manage my training hasn’t been a priority and boy did it show in our outing yesterday.

I managed ten miles and frankly I had had enough at the end of it. Just generally felt like crap and exhausted which was a huge disappointment after our successful training weekend in the Derbyshire Dales several weekends ago where we rode 21 miles on the Saturday and a tremendous 38 miles on the Sunday and a shorter outing of 8 miles on the Monday on fairly rigorous (actually Julian says f….ing vertical would be more accurate) terrain. I felt so good after the 38 mile outing that I knew I could do Kenya. I just needed to do more riding to build stamina and power.

Went out again today, Sunday, and only did 5 miles. It felt worse than my first 5 mile outing, crikey dick, can’t believe this. All our good efforts seem to have just dissipated and it wasn’t as if we had had a night on the town either. The upside is I got off my seat to ride uphill and kept the speed up but my breathing was tight most of the ride.

We’re heading back out there on Monday night to break through this patch. Is this how it goes?