Stoltzekleiven strikes back

Stoltzekleiven just won't let me write about anything else these days... last Thursday I had a new record!

In last week's blog post I wrote about the motivating conversation I had with Mats while we were marking the course and carrying equipment up to the finish of the Fløyenkarusellen race. (The above picture shows us just before we started our task.) What I did not write then was that Mats offered to push me to a new record the following Thursday, just as Bjarne did about a month ago. You might remember that my record from January was 14:40, and Mats suggested that we could try 14:30. I must admit that I did not think it would be possible to break the record so soon, especially since I had not been able to train the way I wanted to recently. However, I was really grateful and very happy to accept the offer, just to see how far I could push it. I would be very happy just to repeat the 14:40, even with 14:50.

On Thursday, Mats and I met 45 minutes before the regular Melkesyre training up Stoltzekleiven. Our plan was to do the record attempt first, come down, and join the rest of Melkesyre on the regular walk up. So we started. This time I started a little bit harder than the last record, and I was a bit worried all the way that I had started out too hard. Mats talked to me all the time and tapped my shoulder every now and then. I must remind you that his PR is 08:43, and nowadays he can easily do 10 minutes, so he was practically dancing around me. Sometimes behind, sometimes in the front, and most of the time on the side as long as there was space for it. He was most of the time telling me that we were doing good with respect to a new record if I just kept up the good work. He also had a few instructions, like I should not lift my feet too much up from the ground, just high enough to barely not stumble on the rocks. During the second half of the course, he was telling me that the pain is only in the head so I should just keep going and not slow down. I was a bit worried at this point that perhaps I was slowing down (I did not utter a word during the whole thing, and definitely I did not have the breath to ask any questions, so I had no more information than what Mats was telling me). My worries were strengthened towards the end when he said "if you are now able to speed up a bit then we will definitely manage the record". I thought we were perhaps close to a record but on the wrong side of it, and would not be able to reach it if I was not able to go faster. I think this actually made me push a little bit more towards the end. I actually ran the parts right before and right after the wooden stairs, which I had never done before. The finish time was 14:23!! WOW, I was really not expecting such an improvement. Better than what Mats aimed for, and so much better than what I had dared to hope for even in my wildest imagination. The best part is that Mats claimed, just like Bjarne did a month ago, that I still have so much room for improving my time easily.

It is so incredibly kind of Bjarne and Mats to offer me such coaching. I have been thinking why and how it actually works. I think the clue is that these guys really know how to motivate. They talk to me all the time, and I think this is the most important part. You don't get a chance to concentrate on the pain when you have this person talking to you in a super motivating, encouraging and positive way all the way. Hearing that you are doing great, and that you should keep pushing and not give up or slow down, makes it almost impossible to slow down. I am just so grateful to these guys; I call them my Stoltzen angels.

And on Thursday we did, as planned, walk down and we did walk up again with the others after the record on Thursday. Well, to put it more correctly, I did walk up at the very back and several minutes behind the others, whereas Mats ran up with light legs in about 11 minutes. What for me was a new PR turned out to be merely a warm up for him :-)

 Someday I will get there, too!

Keeping sane when you cannot run: Melkesyre and Stoltzekleiven!

Every runner knows how depressing it can get when you cannot (or are not allowed to) run due to injuries or therapy. Since the beginning of 2015, I have only been blogging about mountain hikes, uphills and skiing, so you might have realized that I have not really been running much for a while. I had a voluntary rest from running during the Christmas break, and at the start of January my form was better than ever. Since then I have been trying out some new therapies (which might become the subject of a future blog post if successful), and my therapists have been restricting my running activity. In the beginning I was only not allowed to run flat and fast. So I could continue my uphill intervals with Melkesyre, participate in uphill races, and run up in the mountains. I was thus able to keep my spirit high, knowing that my form was not decreasing although I was not getting any speed training. As the injuries persisted, though, a couple of weeks ago I was banned from all running. Not even uphill!

This made me feel so down: wow! More down than I had imagined and thought was possible. For a normally cheerful person, this came as a huge surprise, and not being able to shake it off gave me a feeling of failure. Fortunately I have wonderful support from my running friends and my trainer Ketil. Whenever I am with Melkesyre I get a boost of energy and motivation, and the personal training sessions with Ketil make me feel super strong and ready for anything that might come. So I decided to take every opportunity to meet the gang even though I am not able to run. Last week, for example, was the second race of Fløyenkarusellen. Since I could not participate, I volunteered to help mark the course and carry equipment to the finish. This way I got both exercise and the benefit of meeting my friends and cheering them to finish at the top. An unexpected bonus was thanks to Mats who was the other volunteer. On the way up, this dialogue ended up being a part of our conversation, while we were discussing Stoltzekleiven:

Me: -I had a new personal record a couple of weeks ago.
Mats:  -Wow, that's impressive during the winter; what is your time?
Me: -14:40
Mats: -That is incredibly good! (Says the guy whose PR is 08:43!) I am sure you can go below 14:00 at this year's race. (Exactly what I am hoping for!)
Me: -That is so nice of you to say. I even have a long term dream of going below 13:00 in a few years. (It is really more a dream than a goal.)
Mats: -Why not? If you are motivated and willing to train for it, there is no reason why you cannot do it.

I cannot describe how much this conversation increased my spirit and helped me get out of my negative thoughts and down period. It is quite incredible that something as simple as this can be so helpful. (Note to self: give your friends this kind of feedback when they are speaking about their goals - no matter what kind!) Of course it has even more effect when it comes from a person who is an expert and knows what he is talking about.

Another thing that has cheered me up a lot recently is Stoltzekleiven itself. This short and very steep hill, which has over the years helped me transform from an overweight and untrained person to an active runner on the way to become a proper athlete, has been extra generous with me this winter. It rewarded me with new personal records several times for the past few months, and as I was feeling at the bottom, it came to my rescue again and got me up. This passed week, I went up Stoltzekleiven five times. When I am not allowed to run, this is a perfect way of keeping my heart rate up. On Tuesday, with my sister- and brother-in-law, Gro and Børre, we went up twice, keeping the same slow pace both times. As these guys are so much faster than me at the race, doing slow pace with them and having cozy conversations on the way felt really good. On Thursday I was at the regular Melkesyre Stoltzekleiven training, and today I went up there again with Melkesyre on the way to our weekly Sunday meeting at Brushytten. Both of these went also at moderate and slow pace, and being able to spend quality time with my good friends on the way up and down was perfect healing for my soul.

The form confidence boost of the week, though, came yesterday when I did Stoltzekleiven all alone. Unwilling to let go of my regular meetings with Melkesyre, I went with Frank to the meeting point of the weekly Saturday uphill intervals. I had the opportunity to chat and laugh (and take the pictures that you see above) with the gang before and after the interval training, but as they were running intervals, I went to Stoltzekleiven. This time I tried something new; an advice that I got from one of my heroes, Sverre:  "Divide Stoltzekleiven into four parts. Run (for me: walk) each part as fast as you can, and at the end of every part take a break and stop your watch. After a couple of minutes, restart the watch, and continue until the next break point as fast as you can. Continue like this until the top. Look at your total time excluding the breaks. Aim for at least (!) this time at the race. Once you have achieved the time you want with the four parts, decrease the number of parts to three, then to two, and then finally try to do the whole course in the same time." Yesterday, I did the four part interval training up Stoltzekleiven. I did not time the breaks; I just waited for my heart rate to go down to around 135 before I continued. The total time (excluding the breaks) was 13:59!!!!! I think Stoltzekleiven loves me ;-) Do I need to say what I aim for at this year's race?

I have the feeling there might come more blogs entries about Stoltzekleiven... Stay tuned! 

The snow wins: back to skis!

My enthusiasm about running with spikes on snow and ice has been challenged. During the past few weeks we have received in Bergen much more snow than usual, and my favorite running and hiking arenas, up in the mountains, have been covered with deep snow. Running with spikes works perfectly on hard snow and ice, but it is challenging and tiring on soft and deep snow. Last Sunday I had a great hike with Benedicte up to Ulriken, which went perfectly up the steep path to the top, but we were very much slowed down on our way down via the longer path, which was covered with deep and soft snow. We were up to our knees in the snow; we could take some steps without sinking and then had to take quite a few deep steps, which made it really difficult to get a good "rythm". (In addition, I almost disappered in a small river hidden under the snow and had to be rescued by passing by skiers!) Tuesday evening Frank and I had a really nice hike up to Rundemanen, in perfect winter weather with the full moon appearing above Vidden just as we arrived on top of Rundemanen. This time the snow was hard and nice all the way, but still difficult to run on, because the hard part was a thin and uneven stripe in the middle of soft deep snow, and it was again difficult to find a running "rythm" as we had to place our feet exactly where other feet had been placed.

Hence it seemed time to start thinking about skiing. As one of my favorite Norwegian songs by De Lillos expresses it so nicely:

"En fisk kan puste under vann  
En fugl kan fly høyt over sky  
Men det finnes en ting som bare mennesker kan  
Nemlig å gå fort på ski  
Vår Herre ga oss denne mulighet til å gli"

A fish can breathe under water
A bird can fly high above clouds
But there is one thing only humans know how to do
Namely to ski fast
Our lord gave us this opportunity to glide 

So why not take this opportunity? Around Bergen there are many nice cross country skiing arenas with groomed trails. With the amount of snow we have had recently, they are just perfect for fast skiing as an alternative training instead of running. However, I had only touring skis, since I usually do my skiing in the high mountains far away from Bergen. Touring skis are broader than trail skis, and they have steel edges which makes them much easier to navigate off piste and on loose snow. The drawback is that they are quite heavy and not really appropriate for groomed trails, as they slow you down substantially on the narrow trails. Still I loved my touring skis, and all these years I have been unwilling to let go of my steel edges. I learned to ski when I was 17, and struggled a lot, especially with up and downhills,  until I got skis with steel edges. Only then I got the real taste of cross country skiing, as the steel edges make it so much easier to break downhill. Since I was not born with skis, as many native Norwegians are, I am still uncomfortable when the speed gets high, and I need to be sure that I can break and stop on my way down, regardless on how hard and icy the snow is.

Last week, though, with the confidence that all my running and competing experience has given me, and taking into consideration that I have, after all, been skiing in all sorts of conditions for many years now, I felt bold enough to purchase a pair of racing skis. They are so much lighter than my old skis, and I was pleasantly surprised to experience that they have quite sharp edges, too, though not steel. (I still think racing skis with steel edges are an excellent idea! Do they exist?) This weekend I had the opportunity to test them in Voss, about 90 km east of Bergen. I managed to break nicely on quite steep downhills, so I might finally be over my addiction to steel edges. And of course I had to also try skate skiing! This for me always looked like magic I would never be able to perform (trying it on touring skis always ended up in disaster). Even during my first attempts this weekend I ended up with my nose buried in the snow, but slowly I started to get the hold of it. Fortunately I was surrounded with family who are all experts, so I had several teachers with helpful instructions and tips. However, the tip above all, which really made the difference in the end, came from my youngest son Aksel: with the poles you have to push yourselft towards the left as you glide on your right foot! My moves are still very uneven and I am quite slow, but skate skiing turned out to be so much more fun than I could expect that I think I will practice at every opportunity in the future!

It's never too late to learn and try out new things!

Hot hot hot: Bikram yoga

I have tried out something new. Again! In my quest for getting rid of my leg injuries I am constantly searching for new remedies. As you might remember, three weeks ago I started muscle therapy and my therapist tells me that my leg muscles are too tense. I have to stretch more; both more often and harder. I am trying to do this but not always succeeding to set aside enough time and effort everyday. To loosen my muscles I thought yoga could be a good idea.

To be honest I never considered yoga seriously before, because I don't think it is proper training on its own. (I know many people will disagree, and I have several friends who are eager yogis). I do see that it gives flexibility and body control, but I do not see any cardiovascular or muscle strengthening effect. However, for my purposes it seemed to be a perfect addition to running and strength training. When I discussed the matter with my trainer Ketil, he mentioned that Bikram yoga was something he had considered trying. This is a type of yoga done in a hot room (40 degrees C), and all poses mainly target stretching and flexibility. Also my muscle therapist Rune agreed that this would be a very useful thing to try, in particular because of the heat. Both Rune and Ketil say that sweating is good, and especially now when I am running mostly outside in the cold, I am probably not sweating enough during training. Sweating is supposed to help carry away bad stuff from your muscles. I do not have any scientific evidence here, but all experts in training seem to agree that sweating is beneficial.

For me the sweating was the most scary part of this adventure. I tend to be naturally warm, and I usually get very uncomfortable when the temperature goes above 30 degrees C. I am for example not very fond of hot tubs and saunas, except for a short while when I am really cold after skiing or running in the cold. On the other hand I do have quite a bit of experience in training in warm and humid conditions (though never above 30 degrees C), both during full classes at Barry's Bootcamp Bergen and early morning runs during summer holidays in Turkey. So I felt confident that I could manage Bikram yoga, and thought it would be good exercise of strengthening my will power, in addition to the benefit to my muscles. I was pleasantly surprised to find a very convenient place for this: Bikram Yoga Bergen situated very close to my work place. They have a very reasonable trial offer: 380 NOK for 10 consecutive days of yoga. Of course I will not be able to go everyday for 10 days, but if I can go around half of them I will still be very happy.

Friday afternoon right after work, I went to my very first Bikram yoga session. I read all the instructions on the web page, so I kept drinking water throughout the day to be properly hydrated, and I chose the lightest training clothes I have. This yoga studio is an entirely mobile phone free zone, and the whole atmosphere is very serene and calm, so I did not find it appropriate or possible to take a picture, but my outfit for the session was exactly the same as shown in this picture, except the shoes and the socks (yoga is done barefoot):

As soon as I entered the yoga room, the heat hit me like a wall and my first reaction was panic: "I cannot breathe, I have to get out". I did stay inside the room though, and I slowly moved to find a proper spot to place my mat and lay down to relax for the 10 minutes before the start of the class. At first my heart rate was very high, and I immediately started sweating. OK, off with the tank top! Most ladies were in their sports bras, and most gentlemen had bare upper bodies, so this seemed both appropriate and necessary. After five minutes my heart rate calmed down and the sweating stopped, and I was very relaxed, almost asleep when the instructor entered the room... Then the fun began!  When I got up the heat hit me again, it was much cooler down on the floor than higher up in the room. And did I mention that every session lasts 90 minutes?!

A session consists of two breathing exercises and 26 poses, and everything is done twice. To my pleasant surprise I was able to do most of the poses quite perfectly. Thanks to my personal training sessions with Ketil twice a week, I had the strength and balance to do all the exercises that required these. I was also much more flexible and bendable than I thought I was, although the back of my right leg really hurt on the first set of most poses, but behaved much better already on the second pose. Only on three of the poses I did not manage to go all the way, and this was mainly due to my hips not being bendable enough. But I feel that I can get there in no time, because also here already the second set was much better than the first. The real challenge is definitely the heat. During these 90 minutes I sweated like I never did before or even thought was possible. The sweat was not dripping from my fingers, elbows, chin, etc; it was literally running! My towel on my mat became very quickly completely soaked, and I could squeeze a lot of liquid out of it after the class...

At the start of the class the instructor told us, the new ones, that we should take breaks as we feel necessary, and our goal should be to manage to stay in the room throughout the session. In my experience this was unnecessarily scary. I felt no need to leave the room, and I did not need to take any breaks except for trying to understand the details of a pose by looking at others. Perhaps they do have experience with people wanting to leave the room. I think, since I don't like the heat, I was prepared for the worst, and that might have helped me get through the session with less troubles than I would have otherwise.

I think yoga can be good additional and alternative training for all runners. I plan to go as much as I can during my 10 day trial period, and then try to go once or twice a week, at least as long as it is cold outside. I am not sure how to find time for it all. Perhaps I can negotiate with Ketil that my totally training free rest day of the week can contain a yoga session?! Some people are laughing at me because I am all the time trying out new things, but if I did not then I would not have so many things to tell you about :-) I think life is a one time adventure and one should be curious and eager to try out as many things as possible. Keep a positive vibe, be perceptive to the possibilities that come along, widen your horizon, and live fully every single day. Today the winter weather in Bergen is incredibly beautiful, and I have the pleasure of having planned what I expect to be a wonderful hike up to my favorite Bergen mountain Ulriken with super pleasant company. And guess where I'll be off to in the evening... Yes, Bikram yoga, indeed.

Namaste!