photo by Steve Penland

Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Should I Stay or Should I Go?

To Milwaukee this weekend, that is.  I can't decide.

The reasons to go are: A)  I need to skate a qualifying time (a 52-second 500) in order to skate the American Cup races this winter. B)  I need to see how I'm doing on ice--last year my inline season was bad but I did well once I got on ice; since my inline is similarly horrible (or actually, more horrible) this year, I want to see if history will repeat itself.  And, C)  it's September, darn it.  I should want to go to Milwaukee for some early-season ice time.

The reasons not to go are: I'm not sure I want to.

Of course, it's slightly more complicated than that.  The first American Cup race, the one in Milwaukee, will happen before we get ice here in Minnesota.  So clearly I need to go to Milwaukee to get the qualifying time in order to be allowed to skate the race (we won't mention the fact that I am frequently riding the hairy edge of being able to skate a 52-second 500 here in Minnesota, so even if we had ice before the first Am Cup I might have to go to Milwaukee to achieve the qualifying time, anyway).  This coming weekend is the best, logistically, for me to go.  But, the first Am Cup is on a bad weekend for me to be away from home, so I might not even do it; I would then have plenty of time to skate the qualifying time before the American Cup race here in Roseville, which isn't until January.  Then there's the matter of how poorly my skating (with the glorious exception of the North Shore Inline Marathon) has been going this summer/fall.  Typically my first time trial at the Pettit (the Milwaukee rink) consists of a 500 and a 3000 meter--I'm always anxious to see how I do in the longer races, since those are my best distances, so I like to do one right away in the fall.  This year, though?  Well, this year I'm pretty sure I don't want to see how I'd do in a 3k. In fact, yesterday I was just happy that I could skate 7 laps in a row (a 3k is 7.5 laps) on the oval in my inlines; I'm pretty sure trying to do it fast on ice would not be pretty at this point.

Then there's my misbehaving thyroid.  I'm still trying to get to the point where I was at the end of the summer last year, the point where I feel normal and can ignore the thyroid for a while.  I thought I was there, but now it seems some more tweaking may be needed.  I'm getting mighty sick of it, and it makes it really hard to figure out how well or poorly I'm actually skating.  So maybe doing a time trial right now, when I'm not sure the thyroid levels are where they need to be, is not the best idea.

Then there's the whole matter of that "not sure I want to" thing.  What's up with that?  I'm just not as motivated to skate this year as I've been in past years, and I'm not sure why.  Maybe it's because my summer went so poorly.  Maybe I'm getting burned out.  Maybe I'm just getting sick of making up my own workouts and mostly skating by myself and never quite knowing what I should be doing or how well or how poorly things are going.  Maybe I'd get more excited about skating if I went to Milwaukee and got some actual ice time.  Or maybe I'd really suck and I'd get even more discouraged and disinterested.

Thus, my indecision on whether or not to go.

Currently, my plan is to postpone the decision one more day.  I'll go to the oval tomorrow and try some semblance of an interval workout.  If the workout sucks, I likely will not go to Milwaukee.  If it's good, I'll probably go.

Maybe.



3 comments:

  1. And here I've been trying to decide if I feel like doing the time trials Saturday. At least now I'm fairly sure I do remember how to skate. I have been reminded of something I think every fall since I started skating, it sure is nice to be back on the ice with all my friends the skating crazies.

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  2. Hope you do the time trial, and have fun! I've decided (as today's post will detail), that it's currently not in my best interest to try to skate fast...

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  3. If you were in the neighborhood I'd be telling you to give it a try anyway, but that's an insane drive!

    I'm doing the time trials this Saturday, it's a good day in my schedule plus Coach Bob of the Loud Voice asked me today when I was going to be doing my first time trials this season, which I guess is a hint ;)

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