Recovering by setting up my bike

After the marathon, I’m taking some time to get my bike set up for this season. Having another little project keeps me from going crazy with my training and allows some time for recovery.

Re-installing my Ergomo bottom bracket

I’m using an Ergomo as a power meter on my bike and have been quite happy with it. Sometime late year however, something strange must have happened, as the readings were about 20 watts low. (The first time I realized this was in my main prep race last year .. suffice it to say that it was not a good race as it took me some time chasing my goal wattage before I realized something was wrong.)

There was nothing obviously wrong with it, so I decided to re-install the bottom bracket that houses the measuring unit. I’ve done the installation a couple of times by now, so it was (almost) routine …

my bike on the work stand

the bottom-bracket area .. the Ergomo cables are still protected by black tape

a better look at the bottom bracket and the cables with the tape removed

First, disassembly:

• get the pedals off (remember that the left pedal is reverse-threaded, so it come off clock-wise)
• get the cranks off (there is a special crank remover tool for this)

crank remover tool

bottom bracket with crank removed

• now unscrew the bottom bracket (this requires quite some force .. this time the right-hand side is reverse threaded!) – requires a special Ergomo tool to properly grip the nut

view from the right hand side

• It was here that I realized that this nut has been loosened a bit, it was quite easy to get off. I hope that this was causing the funky readings.
• the left-hand side is regular threaded and is a little bit easier to get off .. just be careful with the cables
• then you can completely remove the bottom bracket

Then, re-assemble:

• clean & grease everything,
• then put everything back together using the suggested torques (quite easy to get these wrong, so use a torque wrench!)
• when mounting the bottom bracket, the Ergomo cables need to be in a certain position (after tightening!),

this is before tightening with the right torque. Afterwards, the cables come out in line with the down tube.

Piece of cake! After some more cleaning, fixing cables, lubing everything and pumping up the tires, I should be ready for my first ride of the season!

Hard & successful Marathon

Ran the Hamburg Marathon today - and it was really hard. Temperatures were quite high (reaching a maximum of 23°C - 75°F) and not a cloud in the sky. I'm sure the heat was causing problems to a lot of first-timers. I made sure to try too cool down as good as possible at the water stations, but the 2.5k between them sometimes felt like eternity (especially towards the end), but I'm getting ahead of myself ..


Start was at 9am, and almost everyone was running short/short. I had brought a long-sleeve with me, but stuffed it into my Camelbak before the gun went off.


Lot of charities collecting money. The main one "Phoeniks" had runners collect some change from the people watching, and then dumping them into big bins caried around by bikes .. didn't see much of that going after 15k ...


The first highlight of the course. After about 12k it goes down to the harbor. Really a Tour de France atmosphere here, with tons of people screaming at you. As it is also downhill, this is a tricky section to keep to your pace. I was okay for now: I wanted to run about 28min for each 5k section to be able to go sub-4h. I was just a bit slower, but made sure to drink as much as I could, try to keep as cool as was possible, and preserve energy for the second half.



The next very nice section comes around the 15k mark. When shooting this picture I had the main downtown area behind me. The nice thing about Hamburg is that there is a lot of water, and the downtown area is bordered by two artificial lakes: Binnenalster ("Inner Alster", the name of the dammed river) and Außenalster ("Outer Alster") which you can see in the background of the picture. The loop around Außenalster is about 7k and is the main running training area for those who want to "be seen".


This is shortly after the half-marathon mark - still pretty crowded and it stayed that way to the end. I had passed the half-way point in 2:01:14, so I needed to run a little bit faster in the second half if I wanted to break 4 hours.

I was starting to feel the heat and slowed down just a bit up to the 30k mark, even with my heart rate getting higher. I didn't want to kill myself three weeks before Rennsteig, so I was thinking about just running it in. I wasn't feeling all too good as well, but hoped it was just a bad patch and wanted to give it 2 more k before cutting myself a bit slack.

By then I was feeling a little bit better, so I decided to give 4 hours a try. Any HR guidelines were thrown out, a rough calculation required me to run about 5.30Min/k for the rest. I was still taking my time at the aid stations to try to cool down, so I had to run even a bit faster than that. But I manged (barely), and still had to sprint a bit to reach the finish line after 3:59:55. (Thought of waiting 4 more seconds ;-))


Right after the finish, pretty cooked and a little sunburned.

Being able to raise the pace even when not feeling all too great was a big confidence booster for Rennsteig. Now I need to focus on recovering in time and not doing anything stupid ...

Carboloading with Primavera Sauce

Took today off from work to collect my race package for Hamburg Marathon. If you're interested, I'm number 3617.

Two days before a race is my "carbo-loading day" - basically I have a large pot of pasta with sauce and eat as much as I can. I had some time on hand, so instead of using a "normal" store-bought tomato-sauce, I did my favourite Primavera Sauce with a bunch of cut up vegetables:

• melt some butter
• add an onion and sautee it for a few minutes
• add celery stalks and carrots (about two or three each)
• add two bell peppers (yellow/red for color)
• add a zucchini and some asparagus (there is some fresh white one right now!)
  
• add some milk and a bit of parsley, salt & pepper
  
• let everything simmer while cooking the pasta
• toss the sauce and the pasta, add some parmesan cheese

Delicious! Takes a while to get processed by my body, but I feel it really adds some zip for race day.

Shortened long run & Have I really gained a kilo?

Shortened my long run a bit. Wanted to do 26k, but felt sluggish after a long day at work. Had to stop twice for a solid bio break, and even after the sun was shining the whole day, I still got cold hands when the sun started to come down - no good signs. So I cut the run to almost 20k, and felt better once I was on the shortened route. Pace was okay, I just didn't feel to good. But I'm still pretty confident for Sunday's marathon.

One bad thing is that I have actually gained 1kg of body weight while on vacation. My weight is usually screwed up for the first few days after a long trip, but it should have normalized by now. So I'm a bit frustrated, but it seems that I didn't eat good enough - coupled with no training. Dang. As I'm still a bit over my planned race weight (and a lot above my "ideal" race weight), this is a bit of concern. But "weight issues" is probably an issue for another (longer) post ...

Goals for Hamburg

I'm running Hamburg Marathon this Sunday as my last prep race for Rennsteig. Here are my goals for this race:

• last test-run for equipment, clothes etc.
• practice restraint (I'll be running a bit quicker than at Rennsteig, but running 5.30 k's will still require some restraint with all the people around me.)
• run while eating and drinking (eat as planned for Rennsteig, even when running a bit faster - a Cliff bar and a bag of ClifShots during the race), take time at aid stations
• enjoying myself and the race - shoot a couple of pics!
• try to run sub 4h (pace at 5.30 min/k - 27.30 to 28 Min for 5k)

Here's the equipment I plan to use:

• clothing - short tights, running T-shirt, plus long sleeve shirt for first section (later stuff into Camelbak), usual socks
• shoes (my standard long run Brooks Adrenaline)
• Camelbak (with 2 liters of fluid and food as mentioned above, plus toilet paper)
• my usual Polar HRM and strap (no GPS available ;-))
• cellphone (for info and camera)
• iPod (in case I need some more entertainment)

I'm not going to use a hat or sunglasses (unless wheather changes dramatically).

Race Morning - rough timeplan

As I'll be doing a big prep race on Sunday (Hamburg Marathon), I want to do things as close as possible to my real race at Rennsteig in not quite four weeks. So I've put a timeplan for race morning together:

• 6:00am: Race start (they start really early start at Rennsteig!)
• 4:45 - arrive at race site, then pick up race number and relax till start of race
• 3:30 - leave from my friends (it's 160km, but mostly Autobahn and there shouldn't be too much traffic)
• 2:30 - wake up, put on race clothes, start breakfast, continue eating while driving
• 8:00pm - go to bed, get 6 hours of sleep
  

As Hamburg starts at 9am (a more regular time), I can move everything 3 hours forward (still a 5.30 wakeup). As the drive is a bit shorter, I'll have even more time on hand while at the race site. I'll better bring a good book ...

Here's what I plan to have for breakfast:

• 3 scrambled eggs
• 4 slices of toast/white bread with honey, nutella, sausage, cheese
• glass of orange juice, coffee with milk
• apple, banana
• maybe a yoghurt

This is basically the same breakfast I've been using for my IMs and it's worked quite well. About a thousand calories, and good enough quality to take some time to digest and give me power over the day. My stomach seems to be handling it okay, I haven't run into any problems so far.

Tempo run felt easy

Felt really good on my interval run today. Was quite a bit faster than the weeks before and felt quite good running faster, so I'm quite confident that in my week of rest (if walking and standing counts as a break ;-)) I haven't lost much.

My plan for the rest of the week:

• Long run 20 or 25k Thursday evening
• Saturday faster run of ~10k (official "kick off" of the running season ...)
• Sunday Hamburg Marathon

Feeling quite optimistic right now about my Rennsteig plans. Let's see how I feel after the Hambrg marathon ...

30 minutes of Running after 10 hours of driving

Just got back from our Paris trip. When we got back, it was still light so I quickly unloaded the car, put on my running clothes and went for a nice refreshing 30 minutes jog. Felt really good ... now I'm so ready for bed.

On vacation till Monday

Guessing my time for Rennsteig

Friends and family are asking me for predictions for my Rennsteig time. My usual answer is along the lines of "I don't know, it's the first time I'm doing such a long race" which is true ... Until I've done one of these longer races, I have no idea how my body is going to react. I've got some background with my Ironmen, but even in those I've not yet put a decent run together.

.. but of course I've got some time in mind. :-) Mainly, it is an indication for my wife when to expect me at the finish in Schmiedefeld, but it is also a guideline for my pacing for the first few k's when running slow is incredibly hard.

So here are my thoughts ..my marathon PR is 3:29:39, which is pretty much a 5 min/k pace.

• Doubling my marathon time gives 7:00 hours .. Rennsteig is only 1,75 times a marathon, but the terrain is much harder.
  
• Doubling the distance usually adds 10% to the pace,which gives a 5:30/k pace. For 73k, that would be a 6:45 (but that does not factor the terrain in at all - so it's quite unrealistic).
  
• To compensate for the trails and hills ... somewhere else (a German website) I've read that 100m of uphill (running) adds 5min . Rennsteig has 1500m of total uphill, that would be 75min (1:15h). Adding that to the above calculation gives 8:00h.
• Some plans I've seen (another German site by Andreas Butz) state that it is possible (when well trained) to run Rennsteig at +45sec of Marathon pace, but for first timers (and people like me doing the race a bit more relaxed) +60 to +90 seconds per k is more realistic .. 5:45/k -> 7:00h, 6:00/k -> 7:20h, 6:30/k -> 7:55h
• My easy training pace is somewhere between 5:45 and 6:00 min/k. Even when slowing down towards the end and with all the hills, 6:30 should be possible. Even during my worst IM marathon time, I was averaging 7:00/k (which would be a 8:30h).

All in all, I think I can go under 8:00 and will use 6:00 to 6:15/k as my pacing guideline for the first 25k or so. When I get there, maybe I'll adjust my plans, but at that point in the race I'll probably be going based on feel anyways.

Got my long run in!

Today I manged to do the long run I had planned for yesterday. I went at 9am, right after breakfast (to get my stomach used to running when full). Apart from my usual #2 pit stop, everything worked great.

It was getting warm again, and I quickly took off my long sleeve shirt and fixed it to my Camelbak. (Had enough to drink with me today!) I deviated a bit from my planned route to run a bit on an almost finished section of a new freeway being built. The second half was spent on some hilly terrain. When doing my normal marathon prep, I work hard to run up all these little hills (usually with my HR soaring). Now - as I will do when running Rennsteig - I start walking as soon as my HR goes up, making the whole run a lot easier on my legs without costing me much time.

An interesting new way of approaching hills! I've always been a little sceptical about a run-walk-strategy for a marathon, thinking that that would be something for "beginners" being concerned with finishing. Now I'm beginning to think this strategy may be prudent even when trying for a faster time.

All in all, I'm very happy with the way this Easter workout has been: Fr 36k, Sa 16k, Sun 7k, Mo 25k -> 85k over four days .. not too shabby! As I didn't run into any real issues, I'm quite optimistic for Hamburg marathon in two weeks and for Rennsteig as well. Most of the hard training is done now ...

Too busy for a long run

Had too much to do to be able to do a long run. After preparing lunch, eating, some cake & coffee and cleaning up, it was 6pm before I could have a clear headed moment. It was nice to have everyone over & I enjoyed preparing everything, but it was still quite exhausting. I then decided against a long run and took a little nap.

After 30 minutes that I felt a lot better and was even toying with the idea of doing my long run. But it was already too late (unless I wanted to run into the dark), so I went for a nice little form run. My energy was quite good, so I managed to go for an easy 40 minutes with a few strides (always a good sign if I feel like doing those). Have another "slot" for a long run tomorrow morning (Easter Monday, still a holiday here in Germany), so hopefully I'll get it in then.

It's getting hot in Germany

Only managed to squeeze in 1:28h of running today .. Easter is a busy time! Need to do more than 2h tomorrow to manage to run more than 73k (the Rennsteig distance) over these three days.

The sun was out in full force today. As I didn't have much time to run, I did not take any hydration with me .. mistake! Towards the end I was getting really hot and a sip of water would have been great. I didn't feel to good today, was still tired from yesterday and had to walk a bit to keep from getting too tired. Still, my pace was pretty good, even if it didn't feel very fast.

We've got another family event tonight - our tradional Easter egg eating contest. The record from quite some years back is 20 eggs. (Yes, that is cooked chicken eggs.) I'll stop at ten tonight. Then we'll have our parents over tomorrow for lunch (turkey!). If I can run with all that in my stomach tomorrow afternoon (and ~25k at that), at least my stomach should be in shape for Rennsteig. I'll keep you posted!

Long long run

After a big family meal I managed to get out for a really long long run. Went for 3 1/2 hours in very nice sunshine (short/short). Didn't feel too good during all the time (guess my stomach was still busy digesting the meal), but was going nonetheless. Didn't feel miserable, and it was good to realize I could continue without feeling worse. In the past, too often I was feeling either great or like sh!§. So that was encouraging.

Took my cell phone and shot a few pics of the scenery:


Trail starting right behind my house.


One of a lot of lakes around Reinfeld (usually the result of damming the creeks). @Nigel: Notice the swans! ;-)


It's tricky to get a feeling for how steep these trails get from the photo. But running is almost impossible - at least it's not faster than power walking.


An old ammo storage shelter back from the Cold War. Has been converted and is now used as a bat retreat (not kindding).


The last rays of sunshine for the day ( 2 1/2 hours into the run). Had to put on a long sleeve shirt pretty soon after.



Almost home ...

Gotta be a bit short .. need to get another run in!

Easy evening run

Last day of work before a long Easter weekend and a vacation. Really look forward to a few days off.

Went off for a 1:10h run in the evening - first run in short tights. Got a bit cold towards the end (the sun was already down), but felt nice and relaxed. Ready for a big training weekend - hopefully I'll manage to squeeze the sessions in I want to do (3h, 2h+, 1:30h). We'll see how I'm holding up. Now I need some sleep ...

Solid fast run

Did my faster session again (using my podcast to do 8*4 Minutes "fast"). Felt good all the way and managed a good pace. Seems I've gotten enough rest, so I'm looking forward to my long runs over the weekend.

Hopefully the weather will hold up. Today was nice and warm (although I ran in longsleeves and tights), but it started to rain a bit towards the end. But it felt nice to start the run in sunshine and not to have to run in winter clothes and with a light.

Nice Spring Run

Felt really good and relaxed on my run today. Went for a mixed trail and asphalt run for about 17k with some hills. Was fresh and didn't have any bad spots. Good to be back after the bad spots last week and all the exhaustion.

Running in northern Germany is really great. It doesn't get too cold in the winter and we don't have too much snow so that running outside might get tricky. By now it's relatively warm so you can shed the winter clothes, but not so hot that you have to worry about drinking all the time or overheating. (I'm still running in long sleeves and long tights). There are so many small streets for the farmers around here that you can run on good pavement with hardly any traffic if you want to. If you don't like that, there are a lot of trails around here (some still a bit muddy) so no need to stress your legs. Also, you have your pick between flat runs, rolling runs and some pretty steep hills. About the only thing we do not have is long hills .. but you can't have everything.

This is the thing that I am most worried about for Rennsteig .. long hills. Don't know what affect that'll have on my legs, but I guess there is not much I can do about it. Maybe you've got some ideas? Let me know in the comments ...

Busy spring day - just a "squeeze run"

Very busy day on Saturday. It was one of the first nice spring days, so I spent most of my day with yardwork. Scored some "brownie points" with my wife who is feeling better. All I managed was an easy 45 Min trail run. Just got home when it was getting dark. Want to do a longer run today, weather still looks great.

Training plan for Rennsteig

Here's a rough plan of my training plan until Rennsteiglauf:

• (6)Week of March 30 (this week) - 40k+
  Recover from race last week, on the weekend 2 runs of ~1.30+h
  
• (5) Week of April 6 (Easter) - 80k+
  13k Tempo run during the week, then 3 longish sessions during the Easter week (ideally 3h, 2h, 1.30h)
• (4) Week of April 13 - 40k+
  Recovery - trip with my wife to Disneyland, maybe some easy short runs
  
• (3) Week of April 20 - 80k+
  13k Tempo run during the week, Hamburg Marathon as long training run (goal: sub 4h)
  
• (2) Week of April 27 - 40-50k
  Recovery, maybe 1.45h on the weekend
  
• (1) Week of May 4 - 60-70k
  13k Tempo run during the week, 2h+1h on the weekend
  
• Race Week - Week of May 11
  Easy, then race Rennsteiglauf - 73k (goal - sub8h)
  

Feelin' okay (even with my wife being sick)

Feelin' quite okay today. Did a short run and managed to include some strides towards the end. Felt pretty fesh.

My wife got sick again, some kind of flu with vomiting, diarrhea and fever. Hope I'm not catching it, and I hope to do some training this weekend. Well see, this is still recovery week.

Recovering

After last weekends race I'm still in recovery mode. As the week before the race I was pretty trashed as well, I'm trying to make extra sure that I bounce back and do not put myself in a hole. So I'm taking things extra easy this week.

Went for a super easy walk run (mainly to get my bike from the train station) last evening without any problems. But I've noticed that the "tiredness" usually hits me a few days after the race rather than right away. So I'm trying to get some extra sleep and not do anything stupid like stuffing myself with "bad" food. Managed quite well so far.

I'm hoping to bounce back by the weekend. Would like to do three runs on Friday/Saturday / Sunday, but not a real long run (each run shorter than 1.30h or so). When I manage that without being totally pooped on Sunday, I should be okay. Need to get some bigger effort done on the Easter weekend, that is more or less the last chance to get some decent volume in before Rennsteig. I'll post a rough outline of what I want to do until then a bit later.