Fitting it in

So on Monday I'm not going to be inthe Alps, or hacking it down some Moab slick rock. I'll also not be cycling across a desert or even finishing the coast to Coast.  I won't even be in Keswick, Cannock or Coed.  Instead on Monday I'll be  going somewhat reluctantly to work before finishing at five, rushing to after school club pickups to dash home for a fast cook tea before the whole family heads back out. My wife goes to gym and I'm taking my kids to the first of the weekly clubs (guides) which lasts for a total of 1.5 dark and usually damp hours. To far away to bother going home and then going back I prefer to wait. But I have a secret weapon on Mondays. Early that day I've got riding tops, tights  and shorts out ready to put on after the fast cook tea and I've also stashed my mountin bike in the back of the van along with riding pack. Because Monday nights is guide night which means 1.5 hours of mountain biking for me.

 In the world of epic this wouldn't register a tremor, with its single lanes and double track climbs and yet it never ceases to put a smile on my face. You see the thing it's my adventure, my escape from the monotony of work. It's free and it's only doorstep away. But it doesn't end there on Thursday last week in between appointments I had a two mile trail run in the heart land off industrial West Midlands. This was preceded by two in between appointment runs and two cycle to  work commutes.

I like most of you after the work shopping family social commitments have zilch riding time, so most of the time if I'm riding / running then I'm I'm fitting it in.

And do you know what ? It's just the way I like it. I get a real buzz of self ( and smug) satisfaction of getting In a cross country run while everyone else is bed, or splashing through puddles along the canal and dodging road kill on the bike into work while everyone else endures traffic jams and Chris Evans. Or sliding through the mud picking on empty trails on a Monday night while everyone else is either a guides the gym or pretending to enjoy I'm a celebrity. 

Yeah I'd love to be on some mega Trans Alp Epic and hit the trail centres every weekend but for me, for now that ain't gonna happen so I'm more than happy to keep fitting it in.