Remember that time that everything went exactly as planned? Yeah, me neither.

I had my ankle fused on March 13, the day before the Great Snowstorm of 2017, and after the 2 most miserable ski weekends all season. Yes, the 2 weekends that I’d set aside after the high school nordic season to ski at the mountain on my own and with my kids, but you know, it’s Vermont, I expect winter to be fickle.

[caption id="attachment_9229" align="alignleft" width="250"] First time trying out the bike![/caption]

But I had a good aerobic base from daily riding all last summer, and nordic skiing all winter. I figured at a minimum if I kept up pedaling a bit every day and got out on the road as soon as the weather got nice, I’d figure something out.

Turns out I didn’t need to worry too much about it, as week three post-op provided a skin infection (turns out restless sleeping CAN cause injuries if the inside of the cast is rubbed just so for several hours a night), a course of antibiotics, and a specialized treatment involving “go back to bed and don’t get up till your fever is down”. Week 4 started better, with a 30 minute pedal and even motivation to do a core workout (situps are easy when you rest the cast on the bed!). But, week 4 day 2 offered up a stomach bug. Crawl, vomit, back to bed, repeat. And, another week in bed, resting.

Week 5 is when things started to get serious. It was one of those wonderful weeks where each day gives you a little bit more energy than the day before. It starts to feel like the light at the end of the tunnel is just right there. Not back to work yet, but back on the cycle! Still training indoors, but luckily I had never watched the West Wing before and it’s on Netflix and a really good show and there are 23 episodes a season. Over the course of weeks 5 and 6, I worked up to a solid hour on the trainer. Some days just slow and steady, others with a few bursts of faster speed thrown in.

I got my cast off yesterday, so now I move from non-weight bearing to gradually starting to walk in a boot that I’ll have on until June. The marathon is a scant 4 weeks from this Sunday, and I am woefully underprepared. Not that I’ve ever let that stop me before, and I’ve done the couch-to-race prep enough times in the past I’m pretty sure I can do it.

The weather this coming weekend looks to be entirely not bad, the bike path is a half a block from my house, and the handcycle will make its street debut. I’ll post back next week with a mileage report. I figure if I can ride an hour straight on a trainer, I ought to be able to eke out maybe 8 miles in a go by the end of the weekend - but when have things ever gone exactly as planned?