Run, Koper, run

Good week! And a last one before the marathon, too. 38 19 Sep - 25 Sep This week's totals: 5x, 8:06, 85km [12:36] 1:00 1:23 1:37 1:40 2:24 10.0 km 15.0 km 17.0 km 18.4 km 24.3 km ER 10km SR 13km ER 16km ST 10x1km/4' RT 24km 144 hrm 135 hrm 163 hrm 134 hrm 5:00 min/km 5:18 min/km 4:08 min/km 5:39 min/km modern dance (1:30) body pump (1:00) power yoga (1:00) gym (1:00) Ok, I have to say the Dam to Dam really left me tired. In fact my legs felt heavy already before the run and afterwards... well, suffice to say things didn't get any better ;). So Monday was a day off and Tuesday a very light recovery jog. On Wednesday things didn't look any better so I essentially had a choice: either start the pre-marathon rest already now or disregard the pain and go for it. I decided for the latter -- make it or break it, right? So on Wednesday I went for a late run and it was going ok so I decided to turn it into a faster training -- in the end I did 13K at an average ...

Dam-to-dam week. 37 12 Sep - 18 Sep This week's totals: 3x, 3:40, 38km [6:10] 1:05 1:00 1:10 11.9 km 9.8 km 16.1 km ST 12x400m/120'' ER 10km S! 10miles (Dam to Dam) 160 hrm 125 hrm 174 hrm 3:53 min/km 5:33 min/km 4:20 min/km gym (1:00) modern dance (1:30) The week leading to Dam to Dam and since my legs felt very heavy I made it a very easy one, with no runs after Wednesday. Next week I still hope to do some serious runs with some kms and then a recovery week before the marathon.

18/09/2011 10 miles Amsterdam, The Netherlands 1:09:50 4:20 min/km 174 hrm 508/18586 (2.7%) Dam to dam, here I come... Ok, as I mentioned in the previous post I was trying to figure out where to race as a preparation for the Budapest marathon. Thyra suggested Dam to Dam (probably the most well established race in The Netherlands) and after short deliberation I realized it's pretty much perfect. Then Michal was kind enough to offer me an entry for the race and everything was perfect... or almost. After coming back from holidays on Monday I did 400m intervals on Tuesday. It was a hell of a tough training but I managed to improve slightly my figures compared with few weeks ago -- few seconds per km faster while at the same time few heart-beats per minute less. So I felt good. Tired but good. Then on Wednesday I did the usual run with SportsWorld group and, even though we were talking things very easy, the following day I felt even more tired. Especially my ha...

A very decent holiday-running week. 36 5 Sep - 11 Sep This week's totals: 5x, 8:52, 79km [8:52] 2:00 1:11 2:26 1:23 1:51 16.8 km 11.5 km 22.0 km 10.7 km 17.6 km ER 17km RS 12x400m/120'' RT 22km ER 10km ER 17km 127 hrm 158 hrm 124 hrm 129 hrm 6:31 min/km 4:20 min/km 6:15 min/km 6:00 min/km So last week I did not do very well and was hoping to make up for it this week. Indeed I managed to do the "prescribed" 5 trainings and a total of 79km, which given the conditions (heat & hills), I consider a very good result. Also in those 5 trainings I did a total descent of 1600m -- something that may not impress any mountaineer, but given that normally this figure is pretty close to zero (on account of living in Holland ;) that was quite a change for me. On Monday I was running in Mondim de Basto , which is located on a hill and surrounded by a river. The distance from the top of the hill to the river was rather short so I ended up randomly going up and dow...

Running on holidays is not easy... 35 29 Aug - 4 Sep This week's totals: 3x, 4:47, 48km [4:47] 1:37 1:18 1:51 15.6 km 14.0 km 18.1 km ER 15km ER 14km RT 17km 144 hrm 132 hrm 5:52 min/km 5:36 min/km 5:27 min/km Strongly delayed report, but I rarely have access to internet & a computer... I had ambitious plans for running on those holidays but the reality brought me down to earth. It started nicely. On Monday I did a decent run in the neighborhood of the village we were staying at. My mistake was to start at 2pm as the scorching sun and the hills turned a run that was supposed to be easy into a fight for survival. I had to stop every few kilometers because I was just running out of steam... few photos from this run below (sorry for the quality but taken from my phone that was completely misted over as I was holding it in my hand most of the time). On Tuesday I followed up with a nice barefoot run along the beach (pretty cool, strongly recommended). And then o...