Fit for the winter

This morning was cold.  3 degrees at my house.  I don't ride when its 3 degrees.  I've tried before and the result was an experience only a small bit better than being attacked by a raging chihuahua.

So instead of layering up like a Taco Bell burrito, I left the bikes on the wall and with sad sadness, sadly grabbed the keys to my automobile.  

As I headed out to the interstate, I realized I had forgotten my wallet.  This only happens when I'm thinking of women which is to say it happens all the time.  SO I turned around, went back to the house, and grabbed my wallet.  While I was there, I noticed the bikes on the wall, hanging there like pieces of art.

But as it was still 3 degrees, I left them on the wall and went on to work where I write about cycling while they pay me to write software.  I've said too much.

What does all this have to do with racing in the cold?  Well, suffice to say there are limits to us all.  Some people find 3 degrees exhilarating.

Me? I shun the bitter cold the way the Amish shun the cell phone.

So this is training in February in great adequate state of Colorado.  You'll get a week of sub freezing temperatures and then a week of 50 degrees and sunny.  Followed by a week of rain, locusts, and frogs.  Then the cycle starts again.  But not the cycling.  No, the cycling doesn't start again until late March and by then, its too late to be fit enough for road season and you have to concentrate on 'cross season which begins in September which is a long way away perhaps even longer than this run on sentence.

So what am I going to do?  Pray for warmth?  I do that every night and so far God has not delivered Heidi Klum naked to my bedroom.  Ride the trainer?  HA!  What's worse than riding in the cold you ask?  Riding the trainer indoors.  Maybe I should mind my diet, stretch, and go to the gym.  No, no, and hell no.  I've lived a long time on key lime pie and I'm not about to mess with a good thing.

   

So as best I can ascertain, my cycling season is already over.  Not from injury, not from alien abduction, but because of the weather in Colorado.  If it weren't for the lousy offseason weather, I'd be looking less like this:

and more like this: