Sleet, sweat & snot

I've done nothing but count this week - count reps, count minutes, count miles. It's been one of those uneventful winter training weeks. Just damned hard slog. I've ticked off the sessions, I haven't cut corners and to be quite honest, I haven't really enjoyed it. But, I guess that out of 30-weeks of training some of them are going to be simply hard slog - just going through the motions.
 An i-pod is worth it's weight in gold during times like this - find some good tracks, turn up the volume and visualise the race - it works wonders when the spirit is fading.
I've also found some great motivational movies on You Tube to while away the hours on the turbo.  This week I watched James Cracknell complete the Marathon De Sables, so much pain and suffering, it helped to put my humble dawn endeavours into perspective.
 Now I know there's plenty of purists out there tut-tutting at such apparently mindless training. I can hear all the good advice about the need to stay focussed during training - keep an eye on your cadence, think about body positions, breathing, blah-de-blah. Well let me just say that I completed 10-hours this week and in order to push through the heavy legs, dark mornings and cold nights I needed other, additional distractions!  Job done, box ticked. I know every week won't be like this, I'm at the end of week 7, I've just had my hardest week yet, and I'm just suffering from winter training misery.
My skin is suffering too.  I looked in the mirror this week and was horrified to see the state of my face, it looked as if someone had taken a piece of sandpaper to it and roughed it up in the night. Sore and stingy with huge flaky, dry patches. Now, I'm not a girl who spends a fortune on cosmetics. I don't get the whole fake bake, gel nails, handbags and shoes things. (See how lucky you are IronPhil? My greatest excesses are spent on training kit.) But I draw the line at looking like a ruddy-cheeked farmer's wife!  The perils of daily abuse - chlorine, sweat, snot, rain and wind. You'd think with this amount of fresh air and training  I'd look the picture of health, with radiant glowing cheeks. Hmm, clearly not. Don Fink and 220 Triathlon mag don't have any tips for this little girly problem. A kind colleague suggested nappy cream, another suggested petroleum jelly. Have you ever tried to wipe away sweat and snot when your face is caked in either of those substances? Today's 2.5 hour bike ride even came with a free exfoliation thrown in - cycling into a combination of heavy rain and wind actually feels like you're having buckets of gravel hurled at your face. Some women of my age would pay a fortune for that kind of natural exfoliating treatment!
I think the best solution is a small lottery win, just enough to pay for a winter training camp in the sun, a quite long winter camp - say 4 months?! I'll be back in May. Mind you, just check out this view...that's the reward I get for running up a local hill in the rare hours of daylight. I think that's worth the sweat!