Mental Toughness?

While the first workout of Ironman training was relatively uneventful (a fairly easy swim, followed by a quick strength session), I was excited (and scared) for my first bike class. The bike class is the thing that really holds the Ironman training together; it's when you, as an athlete, have the most chance (at least until the outside rides) to interact with your coach and your fellow trainees.
So, I packed my bike into my car Tuesday morning with excitement and a bit of trepidation. Around 3pm, my coach e-mailed to say that bike class was cancelled. I was disappointed, figuring that I would do the first bike workout on my own and that I would have a rather anticlimactic first week of training.
I loaded myself, bike still in trunk, into my car for my trek home.  I figured that since I got on the road right around 3:45 that I would have a fairly long ride home, but make it in a reasonable amount of time. Unfortunately, this was incorrect. What should have been the first day in my bike training quickly turned into more than a half-ironman spent in my car. I got onto Lakeshore drive around 5pm after spending over an hour on 90/94. I got off of Lakeshore drive around 12pm (and then had a rather epic drive home in whiteout conditions- I ran at least one red light right in front of CPD for fear of stopping and ending up stuck in a snowdrift) after two police officers helped me turn my car around and literally pushed my out of the space that I had been occupying on LSD for the past 5 hours. During the course of the night, I made friends with a couple people in cars around me, had a woman try to sell me a baggie of oreos through my car window, and had a guy in complete ski gear ask me for jumper cables (thought to bring snow pants and goggles but no jumper cables, huh?). I listened to the radio for nine straight hours. I used up my laptop and my blackberry batteries. I read a young reader's version of a book that I had already read. I graded three papers, but then I realized that if I died, I didn't want grading papers to be one of the last things I did. I went back and forth wondering if I should try to stay hydrated or try not to make myself have pee. I contemplated running home at one point. I contemplated biking home at another. I stayed put.
So, what should have been my first bike class, turned into an adventure of a completely different kind. Perhaps there's something in common between sitting in your car for nine hours and an epic endurance event.
Perhaps not.