Happy go lucky

In the last blog entry I wrote about how much I enjoy uphill and mountain running/hiking. Weather gods must have liked it! As an unexpected reward, I received during the past seven days beautiful sunny winter weather and five wonderful uphill and mountain running and hiking experiences.

Sunday and Monday evenings I had the pleasure of doing, for the first time in the dark, two hikes that I know very well. Sunday it was Geitanuken in Åsane in the northern part of Bergen. I really like this hill, as it offers a 360 degree view from the top, which is really rare for Bergen mountains. And Monday it was our own neighborhood hike from Nattlandsfjellet up to Nubbevannet along the ridge facing the city. Incredibly enough, I had never done this in the dark before.

As much as I enjoy hiking in the dark with a headlamp, Tuesday and Wednesday it was time to take advantage of the beautiful sunny weather and the daylight. I was lucky enough to be able to leave work early, and even luckier to have friends who could do the same to join me. Tuesday offered a 16,2 km course and a combination of hiking and running from Ulriken to Svartediket on the heights of Bergen, and Wednesday we went for a shorter version just up to Ulriken via the steepest path and down on the slightly longer path to the south. It felt incredibly good to enjoy hours of sun in the darkest time of the year!

As enjoyable as all these wonderful hikes were, the highlight of the week came Thursday evening during the regular Melkesyre training at Stoltzekleiven. This hill will never stop surprising me. Since 2001 it has given me a lot of memorable experiences and pleasures, along with a lot of pain, and it has constantly helped me to improve my form over the years. Until 2013, my best time ever up Stoltzekleiven was 17:15. In the race of 2013, after a lot of training during that fall, it rewarded me with an incredible jump to 15:58. In 2014, I managed 15:10 as my official race time, and improved it further to 15:02 later in the fall. It was in fact one of my announced goals to reach below 15:00 at Stoltzekleiven in 2014. On Thursday, 22 days overdue, it happened! I managed 14:40!!! The feeling is so amazing that I think I still haven't touched the ground yet since Thursday!

I must explain, though, that I did not do it alone. I got fantastic help from my Melkesyre friend and mentor Bjarne (whose official 2014 time is 10:22!). He was right behind me all the way up, giving me precise instructions on many things, like step length, placement of hands, how to follow the path, at the same time pushing me, albeit very gently, and most of the time telling me how great I was doing. I cannot describe how grateful I am to Bjarne for this amazing experience. It came at a very unexpected time. First of all, in the middle of winter and really off season. Secondly, I had been to muscle therapy the same afternoon, and I had been running and hiking several days in a row. In addition, as during all of the hikes described above, I was wearing spikes, which were extremely useful on the icy paths on the way down, but really not ideal on the bare rocks up the hill. There is more good news: Bjarne has pointed to several small mistakes that I am doing, and by simply correcting them I can improve my time further without necessarily improving my form.

Unfortunately I do not have a finish picture from the last Stoltzekleiven experience, but below is one from September 2014 which shows how I normally look when I reach the top (just that on Thursday it was far worse than this...)

The bottom line of this week's story is that nothing is impossible! Don't ever slow down on your goals and expectations. Plan your weeks as much as you can to take advantage of the possibilities that life offers at all times.

Seize the day!

Up here there is freedom!

"Nu er jeg stålsat, jeg følger det bud,
der byder i højden at vandre!
Mit lavlandsliv har jeg levet ud;
heroppe på vidden er frihed og Gud,
dernede famler de andre."

I’m resolute now, respond to the call
that bids there are heights to wander!
I’ve lived out my life as the lowland’s thrall;
up here there is freedom and God withal,
the rest merely grope down yonder.

The above are the last lines of a famous (and very long!) poem by Henrik Ibsen called "På vidderne" (On the heights) from 1863.  The poem expresses Ibsen's fascination with wandering in the mountains, and in fact it is the first document where the (nowadays very widely used) Norwegian word "friluftsliv" (outdoor life) was ever used in written form. Recently I find myself agreeing especially with the conclusion expressed in the above last lines.

As you might remember, my running adventure started about a year ago with the decision of participating in Oslo half marathon in September 2014. As I increased my mileage and started to get more experienced, I was sure that long and flat runs would be my "specialty", at least when it came to races.  The intuition was simple: I would probably never be fast enough for short races, so if I wanted to do something "impressive" I should go for distance and endurance. What I did not consider in the beginning was the concept of uphill / mountain racing.

Of course I have always loved hiking in the mountains. Alright, "always" is an exaggeration, because I had never ever done this before I came to Norway as a 16 year-old. The pictures are from my first mountain hike in the Norwegian mountains (near Førde in Sunnfjord), and as you can see I had some lack of motivation on the uphill parts. In particular, I found the downhills followed by uphills really annoying; what is the point of going down now, when we have to climb even more to get to the next top? Why on earth are we actually doing this whole thing?? Fortunately, it did not take long before I got captured by the wonderful feeling of reaching a top and being able to see the amazing views offered by it. Since then I have preferred mountain hiking to hikes in forests, etc. As long as one is on the west coast of Norway, there is actually no other interesting way to hike. During a year I spent in the US, and during various visits to countries like Germany and the Netherlands, I had many forest hikes, and I was able to confirm how much more rewarding I find climbing up to a top and reaching a view point.

Despite this background, when I started my longer and more frequent runs in the beginning of 2014, and especially after I experienced the Bergen City half marathon in April 2014 as a huge success, I was expecting to become a mainly half marathon runner. Nowadays, as you know, I participate in all sorts of races, but my favorite by far has become the mountain and uphill races! In fact I think this is also the area where I can perform the best and have the most potential. This was perhaps first triggered by the Bergen Fjellmaraton in June 2014, and probably I started considering it more seriously after Skåla Opp in August 2014, but I think I actually realized that I could be pretty good in this kind of racing during the Blåmanen Opp races in November. I realized that was able to get close to and even beat many who are much better than me in flat races! In addition, mountain races are much more gentle to the body than flat races; you use your muscles but don't get high impact on your joints. After a flat half marathon race, I need at least a couple of weeks recovery time, whereas after a mountain race the recovery time is much shorter if hardly any at all.

Of course my fascination for mountain running is also both motivated and supported by the people who have inspired me the most in this adventure. My personal trainer and good friend Ketil whom I really look up to and learn so much from all the time (and get told off by every now and then...) is an experienced mountain runner. The same is true about my Melkesyre friend (in fact Mr Melkesyre himself!) Bjarne, who is an incredible motivator and whom I receive a lot of invaluable advice and help from all the time. Famous mountain runners and champions, like Sverre, who are so generous to share their experiences and to teach me new tricks, have most probably influenced my preferences as well. Last but not least, having good friends, both within and outside of Melkesyre, who are willing to participate with me in uphill and mountain races, and in particular training sessions, have made this kind of races definitely my favorites.

I will of course continue to participate in flat half marathons, and who knows maybe in a year or two I might even feel ready for a full marathon. My aim is to get better and better, and I really enjoy (and find very useful!) moderate speed 21 km training runs. But I see now that this kind of race will probably not become my main "thing". I want to do a few half marathons every year, always including Bergen City, and perhaps traveling to other cities for fun. But I cannot imagine myself regularly participating in local half marathons, repeating the same course over and over again. I think I will need the motivation of a fun and enjoyable course or a new place for this distance or longer on flat courses. I also run 5 km and 10 km races nowadays. I do try to get better and better in these as well, and I get very motivated and inspired when I get a good rank. However, I consider this kind of races more as speed and mental training rather than racing.

Next uphill race on my B list is already on January 28!

H.O.P.E. (Hold On - Pain Ends)

The title is very optimistic, but to be honest I am not sure whether I believe it anymore. What strategy is best? To hope for the pain to end or to learn to live with it? I have been practicing the first for a while now, but I have come to understand that I might have to settle for the latter. A combination of both is of course the best: work actively for the pain to end, but at the same time continue to enjoy everything fully despite the pain.

OK, what are we actually talking about? The above can be applied to many kinds of trouble in life; my focus right now is injuries caused by running. I have had an injury in my right buttock for about one and a half years now, and I am slowly losing hope that it will ever go away completely. This injury came in the early fall of 2013,  several months before I started running longer and more intensively. I am not really sure what caused it, because it is not something that happened suddenly during a run, but it progressed slowly. In the start it felt like a pain at the back of my right thigh, and later it has become more and more concentrated around the buttock. In May 2014 I got it examined by MRI scan, and yes there was in fact edema right in the middle where many small muscles are intervened underneath the big buttock muscle (gluteus maximus). Since then I have been regularly receiving physical therapy, and I have also tried several sessions of acupuncture. It is better now than before. I think. Or I have got used to it.

In September 2014, I got a new injury, the IT band syndrome, which turns out to be one of the most common running injuries, especially for women.  I quickly realized that I was running with wrong type of shoes, and got new ones, and I started doing some of the exercises that are recommended to cure this injury. Although I was very optimistic in the beginning that I would very quickly get rid of this, it has stayed with me. The trouble with this injury is that the advice about how to cure it is so diverse and most of the time so contradictory that it is really not easy to know what to do. Exercises to strengthen the gluteus medius muscles (on the upper side of the hips) seem to be recommended by everybody. However, whether or not stretching, foam rolling, or resting helps seems to be highly debated. During late fall, my physical therapy and acupuncture sessions also treated this injury. Again it is much better now than in the beginning. I think. Or I am also used to this injury, and have learned how to keep it under control and to live with it.

With each of the injuries, I had a period where I was quite depressed and worried that this would slow or stop my progress. However, as time went by I have come to terms with the situation. Fortunately neither injury bothers me much during competitions. As long as I warm up properly, and I have had a few days of rest before, everything works fine during a race. After a competition or a hard training session, though, both injuries, especially the buttock, can be really painful for days. To keep my spirit high, it also helps to realize that almost everybody I know, who is an active runner around my age, has some kind of chronic pain that they have to live with. So this is perhaps just a part of the game. I have now decided to stop physical therapy. It is extremely pleasant while it lasts, but unfortunately I don't think it is curing either of the injuries in the long run. I have learned a lot from my physical therapist who has been an active runner and skier all his life, and in that way the physical therapy sessions have been very useful.

Last week I tried something new: deep muscle massage. Now, this turned out to be something completely different! It was extremely painful, and it did in fact give me renewed hope that my injuries can become better. I could feel the effect of the massage for days, so at least it is clear that it started some processes in my legs. The therapist, who was recommended to me by several of my friends in Melkesyre, has a lot of personal experience in running and training, and treats many active athletes. He told me that my leg muscles are in general very tight. What to do about it is clear: more really slow runs! This is exactly what all experienced runners recommend, and what new beginners find very hard to follow. I have not been good in this respect in 2014, and it a clear goal for me this year to do a large portion of my weekly mileage as slow and moderate pace runs. On the positive side, the therapist also asked me whether I do strength training. I was happy to be able to answer that I do at least two full hours of strength training every week in terms of PT sessions, which was very well received. Strength training is in fact very important for runners, but it is largely neglected by many. I have now ahead of me a couple of weeks of intensive deep muscle massage, slow runs, and focus mainly on uphills. No matter how it goes, it feels good to try something new, and to again start believing that I might get rid of the pain at some point.

Hold on, pain ends! Maybe :-)

Resting, having fun, and improving

It sounds too good to be true: resting, having fun, and still improving your form! In fact, every now and then, for short periods, it seems that this is actually what it takes to become a better runner. I have been hearing and reading about this for a while, and I decided to test it during this Christmas break. Some call it a "seasonal break"; the idea is to have a couple of weeks' break from running, and it is supposed to improve your form. If you are running and training not more than 3-4 times a week, then you are getting enough rest between your sessions. In this case, a seasonal break is probably not what you need to improve your form, but it might still be useful for gathering motivation and inspiration.

Let us first review what resting does for you. When you train hard, either strength training or running, you tear and wear down your body and your muscles. When you rest, the body repairs itself, making the worn parts a little bit stronger every time. This is exactly how you get stronger and faster, which means that if you do not get enough rest then you cannot improve your form. So far so good. The real question is how much rest is enough. This seems to be very individual from person to person, and I don't think there is a universal recipe that fits all. I myself have a complete day off from running and other training once a week, which is a strict instruction from my trainer Ketil that I do not deviate from. (OK, I admit that sometimes seven or eight days might pass between such days...) Other than this, my rest is normally slow and easy training rather than no training. Exceptions are around races, where I do have complete rest days before and after, depending on the length of the race.

In my experience, the most important thing is to listen to your body and decide each day's exercise depending on how you feel. I check my heart rate every morning before I get up; if it is slow then I know that I am good to go for tough exercise. If it is higher than normal, then it is a day for taking it easy. I read once that you should decide what kind of training you are going to have, during your warm up. Just listen to your body; make it a hard and fast one if you feel up to it, or make it a slow one if that's what your body tells you. The worst mistake you can make is to stick to a plan, regardless of how you feel and how tired you are. In the beginning I used to make the mistake that I think many eager new beginners do; train hard several days in a row. Then I would have days where I felt really exhausted and experienced high heart rate. Now I know that most of my training should be slow and easy, and this is exactly what I will strive for this year. Longer and slower runs, combined with faster and shorter intervals. Uphills are always perfect, they boost your form without wearing out your legs. The most important thing, as everybody will tell you, is to make sure that you have fun all the time. If running and training stop being fun and start to feel like an obligation, then you are on the wrong path, and you might risk losing your motivation.

Back to my seasonal break: with the above background I decided to take two weeks off from running during the Christmas break. My initial plan was actually to take two weeks off from all training, but not surprisingly, I did not manage that. There were just too many fun activities planned by Melkesyre and too nice weather to have a complete rest. But I did have a proper rest from running. This is how my two weeks went:
-- Days 1-4: complete rest with no training what so ever
-- Day 5: easy strength training
-- Day 6: complete rest with no training
-- Days 7-9: slow mountain hiking
-- Day 10: the only day with "proper" training: uphill interval running
-- Day 11: slow but tough mountain hiking (where we almost got lost in the fog)
-- Day 12: only strength training
-- Days 13-14: complete rest with no training
So my legs did get a proper rest from running, and I had a lot of fun during the mountain hikes and the other training sessions. But did the seasonal break actually work? Yesterday I got a proper opportunity to test the effect. I participated in a half marathon training arranged by the organizers of Bergen City Marathon, and I was very happy with the outcome.

I was lucky to have some of my Melkesyre friends, Cathrine, Roger and Hege, to do the 21 km training together with, and even more Melkesyre friends, Ove, Laila and Vibeke, joined us for the last 10.5 km. (The picture above was taken after the finish.) Although it was planned by the organizers that the around 150 participants would divide into three different pace groups, we ended up in many more much smaller groups of individual pace. I ran next to Roger for all of the 21 km, which was extremely pleasant, useful and motivating. First of all, when you have company, time and distance go so much faster and easier since your mind is occupied with other things than just running. Secondly, when you are talking all the time, you cannot run too fast, which is perfect as this is training and not competition. And last but not least, when you run next to a person, you both get pushed to run a little bit faster than you would have done otherwise. In the end, I ran 5-10 minutes faster than what I was planning, but I felt that I had an easy enough pace and comfortable heart rate all the way. The best part was that we started slow and got faster and faster all the time. Our starting pace was around 6-6:30, whereas it was 5:10-5:20 towards the end. I completed the course in 2:00:15, which is 35 seconds faster than my competition time for this course from April 2014!

I must admit that after my struggles during Oslo half marathon in September, I had started to doubt whether my half marathon form had at all improved since April. About a month ago, with Melkesyre we had a 21 km practice run at 6:30 pace, at the end of which my legs felt quite tired, and this added to my worries. However, I did get an incredible form boost after that run, which really convinced me that I should do more long and slow runs. The run of yesterday was not slow enough to qualify as a slow run, but it gave me renewed self confidence with respect to running half marathons, which I think might be just as useful. Now I think I have a chance of a good improvement of my time at this year's Bergen City half marathon!

Right now I have a feeling that I am in better shape than ever. Is it due to the seasonal break? I don't know. Probably not entirely, but I am confident that it has been useful. Tomorrow is the fourth 5 km race of this winter. It will give a new opportunity to test my form.

And guess what? Today is a complete rest day!