I'm back on a stationary bike this evening for the first time in yonks. Tonight's is a slightly different session from any I've experienced before; it's on a machine called a Wattbike. The difference in technology from other static bike is quite marked apparently, but the upshot is the same: you're there to suffer. Cycling, competitive cycling, hurts. And cycling indoors magnifies this agony. You've nothing to distract you from the essence of what it is you're doing.
Normally I love challenging myself on a bike; that makes me sound like one of those arsehole haircuts that applies to go on The Appentice, doesn't it? The type who are convinced that the ability to remain upright in a suit after only four hours' sleep more than compensates for a double-digit IQ. I'm not like that, really I'm not. It's just that I've always loved competitive cycling, and am reasonably adept at it. Also, there is something joyous about being really fit. Your body feels like it's separate from you, like it has an objective existence outside of and independent of your awareness and/or influence. You're just given preferred user status, and that's enough, believe me. Life is effortless when the corporeal system is well-tuned. And the mind falls in love with this new hunk, like a giggling schoolgirl. It's great.
But maintaining one's fitness is harder, particularly when the weather gets cold, as it has in London recently. I've let my fitness slide a bit and now it's time to suffer. I need to court it again, win it back; I've treated it with blithe indifference and its ardour has cooled. Hmm...I never learn, do I?
Men, huh? We're all the same.
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