Posted on by Iron Rogue

Midweek Motivation: Seek The Hard

I wanted to get this post out for Monday as in “Motivational Monday”, but instead I’ll steal from Kovas at Midwest Multisport Life and do “Midweek Motivation”.



I was riding along during the bike leg of the Muskoka 5150.  I was somewhere around the halfway mark and had some of those nasty hills behind me, and I found myself cruising along and thinking to myself: ”This is nice…”

Then it hit me.  I found it “nice”, because it was easy (there might have been a slight decline) and this was a race, I shouldn’t find it easy, and I couldn’t afford to savour it or draw this out.  The easy, downhill or even flat parts should be over as quickly as possible, and I needed to get to the next uphill climb – I needed to Seek The Hard (part).

On that day, I tried to blast through the easy parts and get to where I was really working; on that course, in that weather, it wasn’t hard to find.

Seeking the hard in training is just as important – that’s how you get the most out of the time spent, and make yourself ready for any hard parts you face in training.

This last week, I sought the hard in my training.

On Sunday, I tried this WOD from AllAroundJoe, which combines swim intervals, burpees and sit-ups.




I completed the 5 rounds of 200m swim, 10 burpees, 10 sit-ups in 25 minutes flat, then did the 800m swim (after stopping to put on my wet-suit... doing burpees in a wet-suit on a hot summer day isn’t ‘hard’… it’s stupid… important to know the difference).

 On Tuesday, I did a modified bike #WorkoutHack with less hill repeats due to the crazy heat and humidity. Check this out:





On Wednesday I tried our corporate gym’s ‘Tabata’ class. A warm-up, then 6 different Tabatas (most involved altenating whole body exercises on the 20 second work intervals). It was… intense, to say the least.

 Friday was another hot day, and my weapon of choice was a Burbathlon. I’m hoping training in the heat gets my body acclimatized to it should the weather be as punishing on race day. I used this article to shape the kinds of strength work I’m trying to build into my Burbathlon workouts.






Fitness bloggers love to discuss what their mantra is; what do they repeat to themselves to keep digging deep and find the strength to keep going when they simply don’t want to anymore? Seek The Hard… I may have found mine.

What’s Yours?

14 Replies to “Midweek Motivation: Seek The Hard”

  6. Maybe Mid-Week is the time for Motivation posts… people seem to need it! One caveat about saying the mantra out loud… it might invite Beavis and Butthead-type chuckling…

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