Autumn has come to town

It's was a nice autumn day, this day. I was plannng to run a long run, but unfortunately my legs started to stress too much, so I stopped after one hour. In the coming weekend I'll have a new try for a long run. Of course this blog goes over my trip to the Mont Ventoux, but it isnot yet certain, if we are going on the 30 of april to France. The Man has for a long time allready some legproblems and can't train at all and is desperately waiting for the snow. When it snows, he can start to ski and if he hasnot any problems while skiing then we can go in the spring 2014 to the Mont Ventoux. Wooww
Anyway.... I bought another card for another gym, so I have two places to go to ride on the bicycle when it's too  rainy outside. Also I signed up for a swimming course in November this year. A lot going on, but I have to stay healthy and at least try to run that marathon under 3.30 :)

P.S. The half marathon last summer went well. 1.33.35 was my time, I can live with that..

Finally on the bike

So today I went finally bicycling for the first time since the Tour de Helsinki. Of course I missed it, but I really concentrate on running these days. I hope that the snow isnot coming early this year, so I can train still after the Vantaan Marathon(13.10.2013). I thought a lot about how to train for the Ventoux trip. At this time I think that I'll start visiting the gym and cycle there. I hope that I can set the resistence on the same level as the precentage of the Ventoux, no idea if this is possible. Also I can watch a climb of  the Ventoux at the same time. Anyway this was a good sportweek: Some cycling, swimming, running, boxing. Keep on the good work,

Yesterday I saw a good Dutch documentary about the last Tour de France, I loved it!
http://nos.nl/video/548863-de-tour-van-bauke.html

Fear starts growing

The last week went mostly by running and boxing. I went for a night to Tallin and of course that disturbed my weekend trainings. Slowly I start to realize that it's not a small thing to climb the Ventoux in the beginning of May. I need to practice in the months March and April a lot!. One way to train can be by going to spinning hours or going to the gym and ride the bike there. I was looking for some hills to practice my climbing skills, but maybe I can use the hills in the Hakunilan sportspark( very close to my house). I have an old bicycle with a triple so I can start to practice with that.

I didnot run the coopertest, my legs were quite heavy after the TdH, so I didnot take any risk. Next sunday will be my first half marathon of this year..There is a little hill on the course, which we have to run at least 3 times, so that will have influence on the finishing time. Let'see how it goes :). This week there are even some bicycle trips in my mind  :)

The first time

So, yesterday the 140 km race was for me the first time of cycling such a long trip and also the first time to ride in the rain. :( And "almost" the first time for riding in a big group. I started in the group of 30 km/h, but soon after the start it started to rain and I lost the group. The first 35 km went very difficult: I couldn't find anyone with the same rythm and the rain made me very carefully. Only after the first stop I started to be more relax, partly also because the rain stopped.

It was still difficult to find the group with a suitable speed, I think I was pending between the 28 and 26 group or something. At 96 km I was passed by a group of riders and the first one said to me: Come on, drive alone. So I caught up with the group and I was already happy if I could stay at the group for at least 10 km. At the last stop( 116 km), the 26 km/h  group ( how did they get there??) was ready to go further and because I didn't have anything to do at the stop, I decided to go with this 26 km/h group. It was shameless easy to drive in that group, you could almost feel the speed in the group. A good way of relaxing and streching your legs already. My endtime was 5.21, netto time. Next year will be absolutely much better because this was the first time.

Things to remember:

• A lot of broken tyres, I have to exercise this before the next race
• If you have enough water, then there's no need to stop( except for a pee maybe)
• Choose your group and stay with the group

And I even found a picture from myself with my new bought raincoat :) 

Today I went running for a hour, strangely only my hamstrings are sore...