Cycling might be the problem...

My ultimate goal in life would be to simplify. I mean simplify everything. Basically, get up in the morning and have very little to do. Have the bills on auto pay, downsize to a smaller house with less stuff so less can go wrong, and have a passive income.

I'd like to just get up, drink my coffee, check my email, train, relax, watch some TV, play on the Internet and do work for about an hour or two a day, three to four days a week. To keep it interesting, I'd travel and do races all over the world. That would be my dream situation.

Obviously you can tell I had a lot of "stuff" to deal with today. However, without eating breakfast, I've had more energy than normal and it helped in getting a LOT done today. I was super productive. Nothing feels better than finishing the day and having everything done on your "A" priority to do list. That doesn't happen very often.

I was even able to slip out at lunch time and return my Finis SwiMP3 player. It didn't work as advertised and the technical support with Finis was terrible. I had multiple emails back and forth and when they started telling me I should try to up the volume on the original MP3 file I started shaking my head. What? How do you go to the original file and up the volume? The straw that broke the camels back was when they told me I should look at getting earphones. What? The concept was that you don't have earphones.

At that point it was time to take it back. I was a little concerned I wasn't going to get a refund because I was dealing with a small swim store. It seemed at first they were resistant to give me a refund. It's never a good sign when an employee has to get the owner when someone wants a refund. The owner could tell I was irritated and gave me the refund. I'm not sure I would have got a refund if I wasn't, to put it mildly, as forceful as I was. I wasn't taking no for an answer. In many ways, for peace of mind, I prefer dealing with larger companies with a strong refund policy. Especially for higher priced items. There's no "will they take it back" anxiety.

My left hamstring felt really good today. The rest and the hot bath on Monday seemed to really help. I did my tempo bike ride tonight and by the time I was done my right hamstring was a little sore. I've now realized what the problem is, it's the bike. I think my cycling has really improved and I need to push it hard to get my heart rate up. By pushing it hard to get the heart rate up I'm putting a lot of stress on my muscles.

It's a weird problem because I've never experienced it before and I don't know what to do about it. I'm going to have to talk to MAO. I have a feeling that if I can figure it out and not get injured, I may have a break through year on the bike. Especially if I get my weight under 170 lbs. Tomorrows run will be the first real test to see if my hamstrings is better.

Tempo Bike - 1:30:03 / 54.06 km / 36.02 kph / 139 avg hr