weight and speed

Seen on www.shealynnbaird.com: YOUR health is YOUR choice:

Obviously there is a negative correlation between weight and speed, though speed depends e.g. also on muscle power and strength. However, when I had been 8 kg lighter, the calculator on a website would suggest, I had a 20 min faster race at a marathon distance. The calculator shows how much one gains/losses speed by additional/less body weight assuming all other parameters are unchanged (muscles, ...). http://www.runningforfitness.org/calc/

When I just think about it, any extra kg is a lot of resistance to carry for 42kg/26.2 miles. In a second step I compared then my BMI (bmi=32, age=35) to the average man:


Again it is very revieling and gives food for thought, less for my body...

toni hasler's - 4 column's principle

Very interesting and smart triathlon-approach. An optimization of 4 dimensions: Mental, Nutrition, Body and Material. Very shocking, how much energy one can save by weight reduction. One of my constant battles. In the video Toni shows that by using different material, one can save 200 gr. That means an athlete will move 3600 kg less into the finish in a marathon (100 steps a minute - 3 hours).

http://www.internettv.ch/sport/triathlontv-ch/toni-hasler-s-4-saulen-prinzip

Toni Hasler said triathlon is all about optimization of 4 dimensions:

Mental, Nutrition, Body and Material

1. You rank every dimension from 0 (=very bad) to 10 (=full potential achieved)

2. Then you multiply all four figures

      best case 10*10*10*10 = 10,000

      worst case 0*0*0*0 = 0

this is your triathlon success score. 

early bird swim reloaded

The early bird swim training of the free radicals started again in the beautiful outdoor swimming pool, 06:00 Uhr Hallenbad Opfikon Glattbrugg:

3 k swim:
6 * (500m crawl, 2 rounds running round the pool, 20 pushups)

at the end I jumped from the 3 m tower - a fear for me to conquer every time again. I don't know why that scares me so much.

Loosing weight, feeling fit, 18 days to the IM....

After race recovery

Today I took a sauna to recover, relax and cleanse my lights (Lungen). I need to work on my training plan, on my weight and on my mind's strength. Liss, the cangoroo-pro-triathlete, recommended a very good book to me: "Going long" from Joe Friel, Great book!


Today I also registered with a new social Ironman network: My page on "I Am Tri" The network is quite interesting, though still at the beginning to emerge. Let's see how it evolves.

Tomorrow I will start also with the weight and stretching training. Now it is getting serious! 6 weeks to the big race!

2nd Half Ironman done, but 0.5 + 0.5 ≠ 1 IM

Yesterdays 70.3 Switzerland IM was my hardest and best triathlon ever. Right from the beginning I had problems to breath during the swim, so my heartrate raised the first time above 174 bpm. I had to swim on the back to have enough air and to control the pulse. On the bike I became very hungry, so I ate too much too fast. The result were stomach cramps, I couldn't speed properly and had problems at the hills. The run was just a mental fight not to give up. I was awful slow, but endured. I am very happy to have experienced how hard it can get and I am right now more determined than ever to go for the Ironman in 6 weeks. I want to finish the Ironman to encourage and cheer up my family.

Lessons learned:
* It's 70% mental and 30% physical
* An old man at the strecke said: "einfach locker durchlaufen" (something like: "just run relaxed up to the end") to cheer me up. That really helped. I repeated that in my mind over and over again - until the end.
* Don't eat too fast on the bike! Start with "Gel". Have a proper food strategy.
* Train more in the lake!
* Really loose these extra-pounds!!!! Light weight saves you so much energy during the race!

Happy racing!

Zuerich Marthon Done

In 04:44 h I ran the Zuerich marathon yesterday. This was 14 minutes slower than my first marathon in Berlin. However, right now I am feeling much better as after the Berlin marathon. Things I learned:

* Don't push too hard at the beginning; it will be hard later. I started with 12 kmh (in the group to finish 04:00 h), later I couldn't keep up the speed.
* Better preparation pays off: This time I had no 30 km run - only 24km. Next time I will plan at least for one 30 km run.
* Too much weight is a barrier to speed. I am still above 90 kgs, which is at least 5 kgs too much for the Ironman in July!
* The "booster" - stabilisation socks were great. http://www.bvsport.ch/
* The nutrition was perfect: Iso-star in between. The last two stations I took coca-cola.
* Invite friends, they will push you through. I was surprised to see two friends together with Irina - my wife - standing at the race course; so I simply couldn't quitt.

Here my polar data:

Beat knows & new distance record: 3.3 km Swimming

Today I went to Beat to discuss training issues I experienced while pushing the training for the Ironman. Beat is the shopowner of Santa Monica:
http://www.santamonica.ch/ and I think also founder of erox: http://www.eroxswiss.com/. Despite that, he is a great guy having huge experience for Ironman-Training. Anyone in the triathlone scene in Zürich/ Switzerland knows him. On top he really has the right equipment in his store. We discussed four points:

1.Freezing while on long biking tours
* Beat asked me for my clothing and explained I should change my combination. New layers:
1. net-shirt
2. Frottee/Terry-Fleece
3. New breathing active windstopper jacket for biker.

2. Biking shoes feel uncomfortable while being on the road more than 2 hours
maybe they are too small. due to the long distances the feet start swallowing after a while - for short periods then the foot feels numb and squashed. We will examin this in 2 weeks. Beat needs to have a look at my shoes.

3. Running Shoes
Maybe I need new ones. we will examine them also in two weeks.

4. Nutrition I wonder why I don^t loose any gram weight - although I train like a dog. Beat suggested to hide the scale and only look in the mirrow to see if everything is okay. He said: muscles weight twice than fat and right now I am replacing a lot of fat with muscles. :-( Good and bad - since I have to carry the muscles arround in the competition.

* Kieselerde
During Long swimming sessions I experience sometimes shoulder "adjustment-pains". So I think "Kieselerde" might help. Beat said, maybe I should rest a day or plan for "recovery" training sessions.

* Additionally Beat recommended stuff called "basic balance" from "Sponser". It is a "basic mineral salt" composition. It tastes like dishwater. No joke. It^s medicine- nothing more.

* At the same time Beat said: while training for the Ironman: no milk, but soya and no yoghurt and no cheese! Man, this will be really tough for me.

In the evening I swam 3.3 km - wich is a new swimming distance record for me. 65 turns. Meanwhile I get used to flip turns. :- )
Here an example I found on youtube:
It really helps to look at the knees while turning.


Stay strong folks, the next season is approaching fast!!!
the free radical

Ironman day!

Today is Ironman day. Very interesting race in Hawaii, since a lot of new girls/guys turned up. My personal training is still low-level. I am still recovering from the marathon in Berlin. Today I went jogging with Irina. It feels, if my legs are different ones after the marathon. Anyhow, it is getting time to get serious into training.

No fun with the training & Job pressure

This week I recognized, that I lost fun while training. I found 3 reasons why I don't get my gear on and complete the training sessions:

1. Too much focus on running
Since there are only 36 days to go for the marathon in berlin, I was focused only and too much on running. I neglected biking and swimming totally, so there were no balance. After two days picking up the normal training (swim and bike), I saw, that my generell stamina isn't there anymore.
=> Action: Balance the training, do more swims and bike sesssions!

2. No stretching
I had some serious problems with my achilles tendon. No stretching and wrong nutrition (higher weight) contributed to pain in the muscles, who are responsible for the force transmission of pushing the foot from the ground.
=> Action: Do stretchings!!!

3. Work and training not in sync
I skipped a lot of trainings during the last 3 weeks. Terrible.
=> Train together with a trainingspartner!

4. Wrong nutrition
While working my eating habits become irregular. I have to make a nutrition plan every evening before the next day!
=> Plan your nutrition!

move it!

Again a week closer to the marathon race. I have to get up and go training! 42 days to the marathon. Highest risks/needed actions:
1. I am too fat right now: 90 kg. - Goal: 83!!!
=> no sweets, alc and junkfood - instead regular fruits! & water
2. I am not trained well enough: I need long runs during the week!!!
=> go for the training: intensity and length/quantity
3. frequency training
4. Stretching
5. Swimming