Yep, track training is it

Okay, first I went on the track and really ran, but not rounds. I didn't have the strength to actually do full rounds. So I ended up running the straights and walking the curve. I also did 3 straights on my balls (feet balls, what the hell were you thinking?! I'm a girl, for crying out loud.) and what can I say, it felt sooooooo RIGHT. I worked mainly on my motions. I was on the track for about 35 min and at the start my Polar had the same behavioural issues like yesterday, but after 10 min it started to work right, so the track stats have to be taken with care. And I don't need to buy a new chest belt and send the old one in. :-D

time: 35 min.
in zone: 17:51 min
HR: 138 bpm

After that I didn't march the big round at the Markkleeberger See, because I didn't feel like it. Since I promised to listen to my body... I have to say, it was a really nice round of about 6 to 7 k. I even got the gift to see a gray heron. I love these birds, they look so elegant.

The stats:
time: 1:08 hr
in zone: 14:05 min
HR: 117 bpm

I also decided to change my training schedule. The runs are a lot shorter and more often, not just 3 times a week. This way I feel, I can do more track work and build my strength in a better way, than with the long and slightly boring runs of the beginners marathon schedule. I really think track work is the best for me at the moment. I'll talk with my coach on January 7th about it.

That's it for today. I hope you're all safely back from your holidays and might have gotten a little session in today.

Keep running

Snow, speed training and nutrition

No, I don't have the job yet. But if everything goes as they had planned I should be told today, if or if not. And the answering email from Tuesday was nice. I'll post the content of mine and theirs in the next post.

In the last few days it snowed a lot in Leipzig and gives it a real christmasly (does this word exist?) feeling. I still have to get some presents, even though I went shopping for them with my friend on Wednesday, but we did get distracted by earrings/necklaces and cosmetics. I even bought the Clinique holiday set, yeah I'm such a girl. So, I'll have to go again today and also finish that darned earring board for my friend.

Speed training
Yesterday was speedtraining and it snowed during the whole session. When I went to it, I had to wait for the street car and in front of the street lights the snow swirled in the air, it was stunningly beautiful, it looked like small diamonds flowing through the air. I wished I could have taken a picture for you. But I wouldn't have a clue how to take it. At least not with my Ixus.

Since I was too slow for the 6:30 group at the last training, I went with the fast beginners this time. And would you believe even them were too fast for me. They ran a 7:15 pace. And I couldn't keep up, because my friend asthma showed up for a long time no see. I guess it was the cold and the pace. So I fell back and ran my own pace back to the track. I got there and did my thing. The fast groups were on there and the slow beginners "group", which consisted of 2 girls. And yeah, they were to slow for me (the beginners, not the fast groups ;-). So I ran my own pace. What I found pretty interesting was, that I'm abled only on the track to control my pace to that extend that I stay under my anaerobe threshold for a whole hour. After that hour, I'll be running in the anaerob pulse no matter how slow I run. Bugger!

Yesterdays stats:
distance: approximately 7.5 km
time: 1:08:54 hr
in zone: 45:50 min. !!!! That is the best result ever. Does that mean I have to do all my training on the track?!!!
heartrate: 153 bpm

After the training I took my aminoacids. Yuk! But they do really help. I don't have sore muscles today.

Sunday will be the next long run/march. 20 km!! Thankfully a friend of mine will accompany me on the first half. She hasn't been training in the last few months and so isn't abled to do the whole distance. :.-( Which is sad, because I tend to get crazy on the last 2 km. I just want to sit down and wait for someone to pick me up. So I start to sing stuff off key and with no connection to the music I listen to. Or putting in little dancing steps or moves. And that is when I do 15 km, how crazy is this going to get when I do the 20?! HELP! Anyone?

Athletes Nutrition!
I read something really interesting a few days ago. We endurance athletes take 19% of our energy from proteins. Which means if you train or race an hour and you burn about 800 calories(I don't, but maybe you.), 19% of them, which are approximately 150 calories, come from proteins. That are 38g of protein per hour. Now think about how long an Ironman is! How much proteins you burn then, you literally burn your own muscles!!!
And what do we do before, during and after the big race? Shoveling carbohydrates in our mouths. No wonder that you need to rest for weeks afterwards and feel like you don't have any muscles at all at your first time back on the treadmill or bike or pool. (I never did an Ironman or triathlon, so I can exclude me here.) Because you didn't replace the burned protein! Endurance sports means burning fat and proteins, you don't need pasta, bread or waffles to race!
Get's one thinking, huh?

Oh, and I just found out, the New Years Run in Leipzig will be!! Yeah. Do you run a New Years Run?

KEEP RUNNING.

Ps: Welcome official reader No. 5.

New Look and my first miss..

Hi,
I thought it was about time to give this blog a new look and some new features. In the sidebar you'll find such interesting things as: my weeks training schedule, my weekly weight shed (no, I don't lose weight, I shed it!) and my run / marched distances in km. (Have you recognised my sarcasm? Find it.)

I haven't trained today and I can't give you a good reason for it. The weather sucked and I had other things occupying my mind so I shifted my 12 km to tomorrow.

Yesterday on the other hand, we've had fabulous weather so I went on a bike ride to get some nice pictures of Leipzig for you. I took a lot and I will share them with you in the next weeks, there is no point in having 60 pics in one post.

First the speed trainings Start and Finish:

This is where we started with the first 1000 m leg last Thursday.

And this is the finish for the 1000 m. The stairs lead up to the central stadium of Leipzig. After the 3 min trot this is the start for the second, fourth, sixth and eighth leg of the Speedtraining.

Leipzigs new town hall and the skyscraper.

Though it looks like a medieval castle, the townhall was build from 1899 till 1905. So it's quite young. The old one was build in 1556/1557. (We've got 2! town halls in Leipzig.)

Rowing in December, you wouldn't think this is possible. But thanks to climate change...

Let's hope our leaders find their courage and decide something useful in Copenhagen this week.
It was marvelous to watch this man, his moves were fluid and really graceful.

And even though it was just 3 PM, we had a wonderful "sunset". (Well the sun didn't set until 4 PM, but it sure looks like a sunset to me.)

That's it for today.

KEEP RUNNING.
(If only I would. *cringe*)

Recovery Day

Where to start?!

Okay, first the speed training with the running seminar yesterday.
We met at 7 p.m. on the testfield of the DHFK (German University for Physical Culture, it is now a part of the University of Leipzig. But if you ask any denizen of Leipzig for the DHFK, he/she will still know where you have to go.) We were a huge group as you can see.

Since the track isn't big enough for 8 different pace groups, the six "slow" groups went down to run at the river bank. (Seems to be the runners route in Leipzig, we met so many.) The training went as followed. We had to run 1 km in the time we wanted to have our normal pace later. Between the "fast" 1 km legs we had 3 minutes of trot. This 1 km we had to ran accordingly to our schedule 6 to 10 times.

So, since I want to run a 6:30 (hahaha, dream on girl!) pace, I had this amount of time to run from the special parkbank to the second stairs, which is exactly 1 km. (I'll see how the weather is on Sunday, to get some pictures for you.) And my schedule said 8 km.

If you've read my post from last week, you'll know that my normal pace is 8:57 min and I only ran 3,5 km then. You're starting to guess it, don't ya? To make things worse, I walked 11 km on Wednesday to and fro the city (5 km one leg), after the 12 km training on Tuesday. Worsest? Yesterday I walked 9 km home through the city. I guessed it was fabulous weather so why pay for a tram ticket when I have legs?! When I got home at 3:45 p.m. my feet hurt already. And then I went to speed training!!! Do I have to write any more?!?

I got there with the tram (streetcar) and walked to the changing room. Meeting all the other runners was really exciting and I couldn't get the grin from my face. Peter, the organizer, called out the groups and so I went to the 6:30 group. HUGE mistake! We trotted down to the start at the river with Katharina (our tutor). Where we started with the fast running. Well the others started. I ended up with two Ladies trailing 100 m behind the group. What a humiliation! And if that wasn't enough, my right calf couldn't decide whether it wanted to cramp or not. After km four I wanted to throw it, but I stuck with the two ladies and did 2 more. After them we trotted back to the track grabbed our things and left. Well before I left the track I trank my vial of aminoacids. Eek, but if it helps. I went home by tram.

When I got home I was totally beside me. I even took a bite from a cookie! Luckily I realized what I did after the first bite and gave the rest to my dad. (Later I was really hungry and ate a buttered roll. >-( ) After that incident I sank into a hot and very relaxing bath and granted myself a chocolate treat - Fioretto!!! (I bought it myself and don't work or write for this company and this is my honest opinion.)

Necessary items to train for a marathon: chocolate treats and a bathtub!!!

http://www.clawfoot-connection.com/Fgallery/clawfoot222.jpg
(This would be my dream bathroom. Sadly my parents have only a normal bathtub / bathroom. But it's better than nothing.)

Oh, and since my Polar didn't work I don't have any stats for you. Sorry. But here is my Mampf
Diary:
BF: 350 ml protein chocolate shake, 2 golden kiwis (the fruit! I'm not a cannibal.)
Lunch: Veal with a Dream Apple and 2 golden kiwis (pic)
Dinner: buttered roll (told ya I was totally off)
Snacks: 1 waffle with vanilla cream, 1 bag of nuts, 1 Fioretto, 1 bite of a chocolate cookie

Yesterdays lunch. Strange but Yummy!

Today was SCAL(R)E DAY! I wanted to know if I had lost some weight since Wednesday, hopefully another 300 grams. I was NOT prepared to see this:

Weight 64,2 kg

Thats 800 grams less. And it wasn't water! It's been bodyfat. The full scale stats are this:
Weight: 64,2 kg
body fat: 29,1 % (minus 0,9 % since monday!!!!)
water: 51,7 %
muscles: 34,1 %
bones: 7,6 kg

So, yesterdays nightmarish training was worth something. My thighs aren't too sore, but we'll see what they say tomorrow. Essentially I took this day off to recover. My mom was really nice and got me some marvelous beef tenderloin (she was so mad at the butcher, because it was really expensive). This is what I made for my lunch today:

Beef tenderloin with sautéd mushrooms and a tossed salad with bell pepper and tomatoes. The dressing on the tenderloin is "Balsamico Cremoso". This was a culinarily marvelous meal. *Sigh* After that I took time to recover more deeply (afternoon nap ;-).

As you can see I'm back on track when it comes to eating Paleo. Next scheduled training is on Sunday. 15 km. Tomorrow my dad and me will repaper the kitchen of my grandma. No other workout, though I thought I would run my 3,5 km but my legs feel crappy. So, I'll give them more rest. And since the weather is bad too, I've got no guilty feeling for not being out in the sunshine.

KEEP RUNNING!!

Leipzig south-western sky, Wednesday, ca. 3:30 pm.