What is normal?

Last tuesday I was sitting at my desk after 5pm (not normal for me as I'm usually out the door as soon as I can be for training) and circumstances led me to ponder some philisophical/tough questions. Firstly I had to work late as some deadlines were bought forward as I was going to be out of the office on Thursday/Friday for a work course in Auckland.

So there I was working away and all I can hear is the excited laughter of most my female colleagues as they all prepared to head off to 10 pin bowling. I had no idea that this was happening and last time I checked I was still a girl... so my conclusion was that I had declined so many social invites for sport that I now no longer warrant invites... this was an immediately sobering thought and raised the question- to what lengths do you go to to represent your country as an amatuer? and what is the impact going to be when I finally rack my bike and hang up my shoes for good. Will there still be friends there? Will I even know how to "have a good time" in the partying sense? Will I even want to? Other questions were: am I going to regret doing all this training now and not getting out there and doing what others consider normal.

It is so easy to get caught up in your own world when training for three sports. SO easy to crawl into bed at 8.30 - 8.45 every night so you can get up when the alarm goes off at 5am. SO easy for weeks to go by before realising that you haven't talked to anyone outside of work and triathlon training buddies... and sometimes your husband when you are not snapping at him :-)

Anyway back to last Tuesday night...I finished work at about 6pm and headed off into the dark for my first true night time training ride of the season (a 2.5hr hills session)... it takes a while to get used to riding in the dark again after a summer of training. But it takes you back to basics- you are out there by yourself, hardly anyone else silly enough to be out there, just you, the bike, the fresh air and good training to be done. Hmmm back slightly to reality... I forgot to mention the poor drivers (not in the financial sense either). You have to be SOOOOOO aware of what is going on out there and I always work on the assumption that the drivers have not seen me. This way I am riding as defensively as I can.

Anyway, it was on this ride that so many of the above questions were answered. I would hate to go out partying every weekend... I LOVE training, I love the endorphins you get, the sense of achievement when completing hard sessions. I love that crazy tired, I can't move feeling you sometimes get and then amazingly waking up the next day and doing it all over again. I know my true friends accept my eccentric training ways and forgive my lack of correspondence. I know that I wouldn't be me right now without swimming, cycling and running!!!

So in answer to the question above.... for me- this is normal...