First Busy Week of Summer

My first 'real' busy week of the summer is almost over. I'm thinking I may have bitten off more than I can chew with coaching two evenings a week (plus races on saturday), working in the shop 3 afternoons a week, a summer internship in the mornings, plus two night shifts a week in NICU research lab. All that plus training for some sport aspirations that I thoughts were long gone but seem to have been dredged back up by coaching.

Why do I do it all when most of my friends are content with the easy summer research job? Maybe some summer shadowing? You see, I have a confession. My first year of college, my grades were pretty good. I had a 3.7 or so (although I did withdraw from a calculus class that I retook later and got an A) and was well on my way to an honors degree. Then, I got this hairbrained idea to be a professional cyclist. I'd raced bikes since I was 14 and had some regional success but nothing major.

I applied, and was accepted, onto a European semi-professional team. Classes took a backseat to training and I was on my bike or in the gym 5-6 hours a day. My grades plummeted- at one point I was on academic probation (i.e. below a 2.0 GPA). Far, far from the grades one would need to get into medical school. I up and moved to Europe and said the hell with it all.

This went on for about two years; I was invited back to Europe for a second season and started training hard again over the winter. Then, disaster struck. My hip started to hurt, I assumed it was part of nagging back problems I'd had since I broke 4 vertebrae in a crash years ago, but it got progressively worse. Soon, walking hurt, at times I couldn't even get out of my bed. My dream of becoming a professional cyclist was quickly vanishing.

I also had a lot of free time on my hands because I wasn't able to train so I threw myself into school. The grades went back up, I began doing research, received research grants, and decided I had to make up for lost time. As such, that's how I'm here now. Making up for mistakes on my youth (haha, a whole 2 years ago), retaking almost every class, and hoping somehow it'll work out.