Getting out to run or ride should be simple. But often it is not. The best intentions to go out for a workout can be lost for lack of a simple item, like a biking glove, or one of your running shoes, buried under a week’s work of wash-needy clothes in the base of a closet.

Unless you’re really organized, these obstacles hold you back.

Because even if you have the best gear in the world for your sport, if you can’t find it when you need it, there’s no use owning it.

So it really is all about the gear sometimes. And we almost always wish it weren’t.

There are times when you can turn out to be thankful to have misplaced your rain jacket when 10 minutes after you wanted to go out for a run but were forced to look around for your rainproof gear, the skies really open up and you realize it turned out to be better after all to wait.

A few times in my cycling career I’ve actually gone OUT INTO THE RAIN. Yes, when it was pouring. If you want to ride badly enough, you suit up, know your shoes are going to be soaked through in minutes and go out and ride. That is also known as getting hardened for the sport. Because if you’re racing in the rain and you’ve never ridden in a downpour, you cannot possibly be prepared to handle wet conditions.

Cycling can be tough in wet conditions, for sure. Even if you are wearing the right gear, there is the condition of the roads to consider. Skinny tires can skid out easily. Fat tires can toss up sticks, grit and oil. Your teeth get grindy as a result. Down south you might even watch out for snakes flying up from your tires.

But that’s all great stuff that happens when you’re already out running and riding. Great stuff. Really.

It’s getting out the door that still remains our greatest challenge. Like right now I’m thinking about getting out for a ride on a Saturday afternoon. But it’s now 3:53 and I have a speaking engagement at 5:30 pm. If everything went absolutely perfect in the next 7 minutes, I could get out for a ride of 45 minutes and pedal hard, just for the kick of it.

I didn’t mean to let it get this late. But there are relatives in town and sometimes you sacrifice your precious workout time to be civil when you won’t see them again in months. That’s called being a grownup.

In actuality, I know where all my gear is. But racing around trying to get ready is just not how I like to go about riding or running these day. I’d go for a 25 minute run, which takes less time, but my hamstrings are very fitful coming off the bike accident, and two days in a row is a bit much to ask of those slabs of brittle meat.

So I’ll walk the dog for exercise and plan on making tomorrow a better workout day. It is also supposed to warm up in Illinois for the next four days.

Keeping perspective when your gear doesn’t fly onto your body is the best way to keep sane. No sense beating yourself up for one missed workout unless you’re keeping some sort of streak going. Of course you’d never let relatives or gear or time or injury stand in your way if this was your 1,113th consecutive day of working out. You’d dig around and find any type of gear you could, then hobble out the door for a mile if that is all you can manage. Mark it down as a workout. Tell yourself you’re tougher and more dedicated than most.

Yes, its all about the gear sometimes, both the wearable and metaphysical type. As in mental gear to get you prepared and keep you prepared.

Almost always wish it weren’t about the gear. Perhaps if we could run and ride naked this would all be so much easier, wouldn’t it?

All you’d have to find is your courage, and perhaps your humility.