Ingrid's recipe

No, not for Christmas cookies :-)

Although my main focus for the time being is uphill running and leg strength training, I haven't forgotten all about flat running. Every now and then I like to do a long run, but there haven't been any short or fast runs recently.

Still I want to build a basis for the street races of next season, and I have stumbled upon some interesting advice from the Norwegian multi-distance world champion Ingrid Kristiansen. In her blog, she gives a winter treadmill schedule for setting a 10k PB in the spring. She indicates the speed of a progressive 50 min run, which should feel very easy at this point. But she will increase the speed as the winter proceeds. Her initial advice is for advanced runners who want to do 10 k below 40 minutes, and this is how it looks: start with pace 5:55. Every 5 minutes, decrease the pace 10 seconds. The last 5 minutes are at pace 4:25.

Now, my goal would rather be to manage 10k at 50 minutes or below, which means exactly 1 minute slower per kilometer. So, it is very easy to change the suggested paces to what I think fits for me: start at 6:55, and decrease 10 seconds every 5 minutes, ending at 5:25 for the last five minutes. Ingrid also gives a heart rate indication of how the pace should feel. Her heart rate at start is around 140 and at the end 160, well below her threshold.

To test this on the treadmill, I translated the pace (min/km) to speed (km/h) since this is how a treadmill works. I ended up with the following schedule, changing every five minutes: 8.7 - 8.9 - 9.2 - 9.5 - 9.8 - 10.1 - 10.3 - 10.6 - 10.9 - 11.1. It looked really easy compared to what I manage normally. So far so good. But I had forgotten how boring I find treadmill running, and how hot I get when I run indoors.... The heart rate started out even lower than what Ingrid suggested, but it ended up higher at the end.

In general, I do get a higher heart rate when I run indoors, which I think is due to the temperature. No matter where, I always find the indoor conditions too hot to run on the treadmill. I suppose a training studio holds at least 20 degrees C and of course there is no wind.... If I were to design a studio, I would keep a separate room for the treadmills, set the temperature at 14 degrees, and install some fans to simulate pleasant wind. In fact, perhaps every treadmill could be covered, like a glass bubble, and one could set the temperature as low as one wanted inside there, and the sound as high as one wanted and played one's own music without using ear plugs. I wonder if such mills exist. If not, perhaps I should apply for a patent... :-)

Anyway, so treadmill running is no fun, and I must admit that I am not sure I will be able to follow Ingrid's recipe after all. Perhaps I can rather do it outside, on a flat stretch. I found it very pleasing and motivating that it is such an easy workout, so I do want to follow it up in one way or the other.

What I do enjoy much more, are treadmill intervals at Barry's Bootcamp. I owe a lot to this kind of training, which brought me up to shape to run my first half marathons. But I haven't done it much after I got the taste of outdoors training. I do regularly go to Barry's Bootcamp still, but normally I have either personal training session with Ketil, or I do a pure strength training session, called double floor, which means that one skips the treadmill part of the class and stays on the floor throughout the entire session. This week, though, I joined two sessions with treadmill running. I had forgotten how fun it was! And I realized that I'd lost a lot of sprint speed compared to before. So I'll definitely do more of this through the winter.

The rope jump competition is also very useful for running form it turns out. I have read that many top athletes rope jump several times a week to keep their ankles strong, their tendons soft, and to increase their calf strength. I can now do 2:15 at a time. And I really feel the increased strength. It is so great to have friends who initiate such games to combine fun (there is a lot of incredibly funny discussion every single day), competition, and increased strength and form.

Play hard, win easy! .... or the opposite... whichever inspires and motivates you :-)

Wuthering heights

Or "gone with the wind"?

Both titles are fitting. Winter came early to Bergen this year, and most of my running has been at wuthering heights during the past couple of weeks. When it comes to my form and my willpower to push myself hard, both seem to have gone with the wind.

It is now four weeks since Amsterdam marathon, and things are slowly getting better, but really really slowly. At least the joy of running, the eagerness to train, and the pleasure of racing and practicing with friends are all back, and I am inexpressibly grateful for it. But I have still not got back the form I had just before Amsterdam. My training volume is much lower, too, both weekly mileage and how often I run. The day after a training session, I don't feel recovered enough, so every second day is a resting day.

The good news is: all this seems to be very normal. I have been a bit disappointed in myself because all my marathon friends seem to be doing much better than me. So I started to search and read about the subject. It turns out that getting back the form one had at the time of the marathon takes around 6 weeks. And that is if one is cautious and builds up the training volume and intensity very slowly, like the reverse of a taper. Because the risk of injury is higher all the way up to 8 weeks after a marathon. So, without knowing it, I have actually been following the recipe to the letter! Things are going forward, and I do have a plan.

As promised, I'm participating in the Blåmanen races, and the practices towards them. The weather has not really been on our side, but I find it easy to motivate myself to participate, because I allow myself to not push myself to the maximum. This is exactly my plan for the winter. Consider it low season. Do not try to impress anybody; just build form. Skip training when things don't feel right. Stay out of injury.  Participate in the coming uphill races, Blåmanen, Whisky run, and Fløyen. They provide the best possible training and wonderful social boost before and after the race.

For the first Blåmanen race last weekend, we woke up to the first snow of the season. "Oh, already on with the spike shoes... " Still I found the race on the snowy ground with a little sun shining between the clouds really pleasurable. Probably a bit too pleasurable, as my time was 2 minutes worse than last year. Of course there was snow and ice this year, which perhaps compensates for some of the lost time. On the other hand my running form was not at its top last year, so I should still have been able to do at least the same time. But hey! Now I have the wonderful excuse that it was still marathon recovery period :-)

The second Blåmanen race yesterday was a little bit worse. The conditions were a lot tougher. Windy, icy, rainy, ... Every step seemed to drag the energy of a kilometer out of me. At a few points I was so angry at the ground conditions and the wind that I shouted a few swear words. I think I managed to push a bit harder this time, but still I ended up walking more than I was planning to. On the other hand, on these steep hills, I am not sure that running is always faster than walking. I was happy at the end to see that I had exactly the same time as last year. Although the course is a bit flatter this year, the ground conditions weigh perhaps 3-4 minutes.

The final part of my plan for the winter is to go back to proper strength training. I really like weights, but for some reason I haven't found it easy to make time for this kind of training recently. So I have now signed up for weekly PT sessions with Ketil again, starting this coming week! I am really looking forward to them, and I know that he will very quickly bring back my motivation to become strong again.

Only two more weeks to tiptop shape! :-)

The days are just packed

It is quite unbelievable that I've only been in Istanbul a little more than a week. It already feels like much longer, and I feel quite settled and "local". The most interesting is perhaps that some of my new running buddies already feel like old friends considering the level of trust and affection I sense in our relationship. I wonder how things would have been if I had not found and contacted Team Istrunbul. Of course I am very lucky to move to a place where I already have a lot of close friends and family, but come to think of it, I see my running buddies much more often than I can meet with my old friends and family. It was the same also in Bergen, and I am grateful for the experience and confidence that I got from Melksyre and Fjellgeitene, which I think enabled me to get in touch with Istrunbul so quickly. This weekend Frank is visiting, and also he joined the group and enjoyed very much the social running, and not the least the super cozy coffee gathering afterwards.

Let me give a brief summary of how the three most important things related to this blog are going at the end of the first week.

Running
Well, as you can conclude from the above, it is going wonderfully well. I am so pain-free that I cannot believe it myself. I try to understand the reason, but I have no clue. Is it that my body actually prefers asphalt running to uphills and terrain? No matter the reason, I am regaining speed more quickly than I could have hoped for. In Bergen, I felt that I was stuck in slow running, and now suddenly everything seems to have opened up. Perhaps it is all in the mind, and a physical change of environment gave the necessary change of mind and inner motivation to run faster. I am now working on increasing my weekly mileage.

Eating
This is a big issue, and considering my goal of losing a few kilos this year, I am in the wrong place. This country offers (arguably) the best food in the whole world. And it is so easily accessible; my neighborhood is packed with restaurants of all sorts, and home delivery of whatever you might wish is only a phone call away. As long as I am alone, though, I have been behaving really well.  For breakfast, cereal or oatmeal, just like at home in Bergen. For lunch, my work offers a large variety of hot dishes everyday for a very reasonable price, and there are several different vegetable dishes and salads, and lean meats in the menu every day. I have been strong enough to stay away from bread and deserts, and I am very content with how the lunches are working so far. For dinner, I usually just make a salad or a quick wok, and also try to stay away from bread/pasta/potatoes there. Of course, my wonderful regime has fallen apart very badly now that Frank is visiting, and there is no limit to the variety of things we have been eating and drinking. I am taking this as an opportunity to just taste once the things that I have missed so much (mezes, kebaps, deserts, boza, sahlep, ...), and afterwards I hope I will continue to be able to keep away from them.

Strength training
I have started Pilates! I liked it immediately, and everything my Pilates trainer told me already at the first lesson made perfect sense to me. First of all, it is serious strength training, and as I asked to be pushed hard, things got pretty tough. The idea of Pilates, though, is that there is a balance between strength training and extensive stretching. And the stretching part in particular I think will do me well. (Just look at the picture above; how stiff I am!) As I had noticed myself already, and my Pilates trainer saw immediately as he studied my posture, I am very strong (and too tight) in the muscles on the front side of my body but not as strong in the ones on the back side. So now we will try to balance the strength, which means for example extensive stretching of my chest muscles, and perhaps losing a bit strength there. This is very hard for me of course, agreeing to lose a bit strength at some places, but I am willing to give it a try. In the end, if things don't work out, I'll simply let Ketil fix me up after going back to Bergen. :-) Joking aside, I do truly believe that I can get stronger and more flexible during these six months. The type of Pilates I will be doing has several interesting "machines" to do it on, which mainly give instability in many different ways so that you have to use your own strength to stabilize your body. I am sure there will be reports with pretty funny pictures in the sequel.

Stay strong and balanced.

Jump like a goat!

"I can hop, I can run, and it's very very fun" (The julekalender)

This week I had four strength training sessions! Well, I should not boast because the two weeks before that, I had none... I was out of town and could not have my weekly PT sessions with Ketil. And for some reason I found it difficult to do strength exercises on my own. Usually I am good at this, but this time I simply could not motivate myself to go on the floor with push ups, planks, squats, leg raises, etc. In theory this should be much easier than going out for an early morning run in the dark... But runs happened and strength training did not.

So I wanted to make up for it by having a double dose of strength training after coming home. In addition to my regular two PT sessions this week, Frank and I joined the strength training sessions of Fjellgeitene. This is something I had been wanting to do for a long time, and finally this week I found the time and the energy. On Mondays they do an outdoor plyometrics session with a lot of jumps, whereas on Fridays they have full body training indoors. We joined both, in addition to a wonderfully exciting and wet mountain run which was zone 1 for them and zone 3 for me, but that's another story.

The Monday session was even more fun and useful than I had imagined it to be. Intensive jumping rounds on the stairs, some jogging in between, and strength training for the arms and the abs. Since it all takes place at one spot throughout the session, it is very easy to join. If it gets too tough, one can simply take short break. I had to skip a few of the rounds on the stairs not to fall out of schedule; single foot jumps all the way up are pretty tough! The toe raises at the end, though, I nailed with no break. I have been practicing them persistently for the last couple of months, and improvement came quickly. It was amazing to see how lightly some of my friends could jump; the ones who can jump the highest are also those who are fastest - it simply shows how useful this kind of training is for speed.

I find strength training increasingly important, especially for my running. It was strength training that finally got me out of my hamstrings injury after a long period of frustration. I was so determined to get well that at some point I was strength training five times a week. Twice personal training, and three times heavy slow resistance training. As my injury got better and I became able to run more and more, my focus shifted back to running, and I have for a while completely stopped the therapy exercises. I think perhaps I should start again. But it is difficult to set aside time for it when I am now strong enough to join all the other fun training sessions that are out there...

I have been talking to friends who have had hamstrings injuries, and we all seem to have the same problem. We are weaker on the side of our injury. My injury is in the right buttock, and my right ankle, right hamstrings, and right hip are clearly weaker than their left counter parts. It could be that they became weaker because of the injury, since the left side had to compensate and work more. Or perhaps they were weaker from the start, and that was exactly the cause of the injury. In either case, I should never stop trying to get my right side as strong as my left side. And keep everything strong in general of course, in particular the core.

Leg curl is one exercise that is just perfect for strengthening the hamstrings. By doing it separately on each leg, you can find out whether you are equally strong on each side. Side plank with a leg raise is a perfect way of finding out whether your hips have the same strength on each side. Regardless of whether or not you are weaker on the one side, it is important to train each side with the same intensity. And of course toe raises for the ankles and lower legs. Toe raises separately on each foot (for example 3 sets of 10 raises on each foot, standing on a stair step) to strengthen the ankles, and toe raises on both feet together (for example 2 sets of 100) to strengthen the legs. Oh, there are so many exercises that are beneficial for running; I could go on forever...

The stronger the faster!

Back to basics

Back to mountains; back to bootcamp!

Holiday in the sun with family and friends I don't get to see that often was truly wonderful, but you know that I was really really looking forward to getting back to some uphill training. Coming back home and going back to my routine training has been even better than expected. The few days back in Bergen have been full of wonderful training, and my legs are loving it. I have also been lucky to meet many of my running and training friends in just a few days, and I feel super energized with renewed motivation. I am still partly on holidays, and a few times this week I trained twice a day with some sleep in between. It is so nice that it strengthens my wish to be able to do this for a longer period some time in the future. I do keep telling myself, though, "Don't get carried away now; do not make the mistakes of the past". And believe me, I am cautious!

I wanted to do a real mountain hike as soon as coming back to Bergen, and I am blessed with friends who are so spontaneous that I could do it with them already the day after arrival at home. We had an easy pace hike up to Gullfjellet Wednesday afternoon, chatting and laughing all the way up and down. Still some snow there on the path towards the top, but much less than I was expecting, considering how much there was during the Gullfjellet Opp race in June. 

I also wanted to get back into serious strength training. Although I did quite a lot of it during the holidays, it is just not the same without an instructor or a trainer. Ketil is on holidays for another couple of weeks, and I wanted to fire up my muscles before resuming our personal training sessions. What better way to do it than to have double floor classes at Barry's Bootcamp?! My lovely training buddy Irene, who is by the way scheduled to give birth in three weeks and still in full training, and I made plans to go to some sessions together, and already Thursday morning I was at a core (abs) session under the instruction of Christian, and my goodness it was tough. I think I have left my abs a bit unattended during the past three weeks. Christian put high intensity and kept the heart rate going  high throughout the class, and I cannot ever remember to have sweated that much during a strength training session; sweat was dripping from my nose tip, ear flips, and elbows. Afterwards I was completely exhausted; I could not remove myself from the couch for several hours.

Christian is not only a great instructor; he is also an infinite source of motivation at all times. He has an incredible story, which is so inspiring that whenever I feel down or sorry for myself because of injury or pain, I read a couple of his posts to draw myself up. He has a serious illness, cystic fibrosis, which disables about 70% of his lung capacity. Without training he would actually die. In fact it is such a mind blowing dilemma. Thanks to his intensive training he is able to slow down the progression of his illness. However, he cannot become an old man unless he gets a lung transplantation, which he is not yet sick enough to get since he is fighting his illness so well. He improves his shape and runs marathons, and then comes a rainy winter with lots of infections where all training is lost, and he is back to square one. He repeats this restlessly over and over again. Whenever I feel like complaining, I think of Christian. He is so strong, and nobody should complain unless they fight at least as hard has him.

The same afternoon, Frank and I went for the regular Melkesyre Stoltzekleiven training. I pushed it but I was still a couple of minutes behind my personal record. A bit disappointing, since I was very close to my record just before the summer holidays, but OK since I had heavy legs from the strength training and the Gullfjellet hike, and it has after all been three weeks with no uphills. Fortunately, the race is still two months away, and I hope that gives enough time to get back into shape and improve my recorded race time. On the positive side, from the top of Stoltzekleiven we had a wonderful easy jog up to Rundemanen and Blåmanen, which was a lot of fun and went really well with respect to my injury.  My hamstrings are working quite well now for steep uphill fast walking and slow terrain running, although I am still no good at flat fast running. I think the treadmill intervals of Barry's bootcamp classes will be a nice way of getting back into speed training without putting too much strain on my injury, and on Friday I was planning to attend a regular class. But listening to my body (wow, I am good at this now!), I figured that it would be better to rest my legs, and I went again for a double floor class (no treadmill, just strength training for the whole hour). To my big surprise Ketil and his fiance Mona were there to attend the class, and I had the bench between Ketil and Irene, with Mona just behind; you can imagine the pressure I felt!

So great to meet and catch up with all these wonderful people all at once and so unexpectedly. The class was instructed by Tage the legendary, who brought Barry's Bootcamp to Norway, first to Bergen, then to Oslo, and soon to open a second branch in Bergen. No matter how good or bad shape you are in, bootcamp classes are a great way of getting into better shape. They can prepare you to start running faster or longer distances, in addition to making you stronger, or make you even faster and even stronger if you are already in great shape. I daresay it is more efficient than any other training for strength and speed.

In the meanwhile I am of course also back to my HSR training with the regular machines, and back to training sessions with Melkesyre. Although I do my own variant sometimes (walking up Stoltzekleiven instead of running intervals to Fløyen) it is simply wonderful to meet my gang before the start of a session and to rejoin them at the end. The HSR is going well, too. I was happy to see that I have kept or increased the weight on all exercises. On top of that, my injury feels even better now after a few days of uphills. The only disappointment is the leg curl which is still at the same weight and pain level as it was before the holidays. But I am able to do it properly and draw my leg all the way up to my butt. The day I will be able to increase the weight on this exercise will be a new milestone. I am looking forward to it!

Patience is power.

Holiday training - I

"Remember that you are on holiday; don't rain too much." (Ketil Ola Skjelvan)

Every summer I spend 3-5 weeks in the Bodrum area, a peninsula where the Aegean sea meets the Mediterranean, with a large variety of wonderful beaches. Taking a complete break from training during these holiday weeks has never been an option. However, the type of training has changed quite a bit since last year.

2013 and before

Until last year, my holiday training consisted of about an hour fast open water swimming six days a week. Although my running activity and form improved over the years, and I became a regular Bootcamper since May 2012, I never considered the option of running or strength training during the summer holidays away from home. Mostly because it is simply too hot to run during the day, but also because I love open water swimming and I don't get to swim much otherwise since I am not that fond of swimming pools. Holiday swimming is very motivating, as it feels pretty hard in the beginning but gets easier and faster as the weeks pass by. What I do is to pick two landmarks (or perhaps I should call them sea marks), like two piers about 200 - 300 meters from each other, and do rounds back and forth between them and time my rounds. I always change between front crawl (freestyle) and breaststroke every second round, and I have throughout the years figured out that larger goggles that cover my entire eye area (including eye brows) work the best for me. (Leaking or foggy goggles can ruin the whole swimming experience!)

2014

2014 was when I started training seriously. By the summer of 2014, I had already participated at Bergen City half marathon and Bergen Fjellmaraton, and I had regular personal training sessions with Ketil since March. In addition, Oslo half marathon was coming up in September 2014, as well as Skåla Opp already in August, so I realized that no running could not be an option that summer. I did not want to lose my running form, neither did I want to lose my strength, so I made a plan to continue with both during the summer holidays of 2014. Ketil made a perfect strength training plan for me which was scheduled to last about an hour. The plan was easily dividable into three parts of 20 minutes each: arms and shoulders; abs; legs and butt. I combined this strength training with swimming or running every day, except Sundays. Because of the heat, the running had to be done early in the morning. Frank agreed to join me on the running program, and three days a week we hit the roads at 6:30 in the morning. It was hard to get up, but afterwards it was wonderful. The cool wind, running by the sea, the incredible early morning views and colors... When we got back, we went back to sleep for about an hour after showering and before breakfast. After that, we were as good as new to start a new day; I felt that we got so much out of those days. We also found a steep hill to do some uphill intervals, and this ended up being my weekly routine for four weeks last summer:
Monday: Early morning run 15 km; strength training arms and shoulders 20 min in the afternoon.
Tuesday: 2 km swimming during the day; strength training legs and butt 20 min in the afternoon.
Wednesday: Early morning uphill intervals, about an hour; strength training abs 20 min in the afternoon.
Thursday: 2 km swimming during the day; strength training legs and butt in the afternoon.
Friday: Early morning fartlek (irregular, fun intervals) 10 km, strength training arms and shoulders.
Saturday: 2 km swimming during the day; strength training abs in the afternoon.
Sunday: Rest
I made sure to separate leg and butt training from the days of running, and arms and shoulders training from the days of swimming.

This turned out to be the ultimate holiday training experience. I came back from holidays stronger and faster than before, and I was really happy about the whole program. If you are up to it, I can really recommend it. Getting up early during holidays is scary for most, but you can shower and sleep afterwards, and still reach breakfast at around 10:30; it then feels like you are starting a new day.  It is really a wonderful scheme. I do have early morning training even when I am not on holidays, but the sleeping part makes the whole difference!

2015

Of course, since I was so happy about last year's training program, the initial plan was to repeat it this year, too, but that was before I started my rehab program.  As it became clear that I would not be able to run this summer, and I was eager not to take a break from my HSR training, I decided to find a gym that provided the machines for my HSR exercises. My plan was to do my HSR exercises three times a week, and swim every day in addition (except Sundays - Sundays are always rest days during holidays). During my most depressed time due to zero activity at the beginning of the rehab period, Frank bought me a new sports watch which can be used for swimming as well, to cheer me up. I did not end up going to a swimming pool for alternative training, so I was very excited to finally use my watch for open water swimming at the beginning of this year's holidays.

I found a fancy training studio with all the equipment I need, and Frank and I signed up for a month's subscription. The place worked so well that Frank and I are now going there six days a week, instead of three. Frank still does a run or two out on the road every now and then, but he found that treadmill running also works fine, at least for intervals and speed tests. He is also slowly getting the taste of strength training (I must admit I had a tiny hidden agenda here). Hence this is now my holiday routine so far this year:

Monday, Wednesday, Friday: HSR exercises in the morning after a short warmup; 2300 m swimming in the afternoon (fast intervals).

Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday: Strength training in the morning, mainly arms, shoulders, abs and back, after 30 min variety running on the treadmill; 2300 m swimming in the afternoon (long slow continuous swim).

Sunday: Rest

I am very happy about being able to run again, albeit only on the treadmill and short distance (max 3 km). I try to do variations, like a 10-15 min slow run (8-10 km/h), followed by faster intervals, for example 2 min 12 km/h, 2 min 13 km/h, 2 min 14 km/h, with a minute walking break in between, and then repeat. My injury is all the time noticeable but I can run without limping, which is new since many months. When it comes to the warm up before the HSR exercises, I use the elliptical machine rather than the treadmill, to get a variation (as you can see, variation is a key word). The swimming gives a very nice rehab workout for the hamstrings injury as well. Both during forward crawl and breaststroke, the hamstrings tendon contracts and stretches (in several different ways), and it feels better and better all the time. During the first days of swimming I could feel my injury all the time, whereas now when I swim I am able to forget it completely most of the time.

Summer swimming has a tendency to motivate me to try a triathlon. Last year, as a beginning I wanted to do the Os triathlon, but it was too close to Oslo marathon, and I did not want to lose focus or energy at that point. This year I am actually registered as a participant of Os triathlon (all these plans that were made before the rehab started...) and I feel that my swimming form is becoming pretty decent. I am still not sure whether the running part is doable, but it is a sprint triathlon with only 5 km running, so let's see what negotiations with Ane might bring after the holidays. Right now I am extremely impressed and motivated by the achievements of my friends Janne, Michal and Freddy who recently completed an Ironman race, and Caroline who just won an uphill triathlon.

Oh, I forgot to tell you about my experiences with the new swimming watch! Let me continue next week. By that time perhaps I will have taken a short run out on the roads or on the beach as well, which is the next milestone on the rehab plan.

Stay tuned, and enjoy an active holiday wherever you are!

Report from rehab - III : Ane the angel

You might have noticed that my current physiotherapist is the only one I have mentioned by name among all the different therapists I have tried. Ane Falck is her full name and she is simply amazing. She never stops surprising me. The treatment evolves all the time with new ingredients being added, and this is something I have not experienced with the other therapists. I want to emphasize that all other therapists I wrote about were highly recommended by people who are extremely happy about them, but they each specialized in one type of treatment. Normal massage, deep tissue massage, acupuncture, and intramuscular needles. I also tried chiropractic twice, so in total five therapists with each their five different specialties. It turns out that Ane specializes in all of these five treatment methods! In addition to ultrasound examinations and ultrasound assisted injections...

I did not think that I would write more about rehab until perhaps later to report on my healing, because I thought there would be not much to report about. I would simply be doing my exercises until I got better.  To my surprise, about a month ago Ane said "OK, now it's time to start treatment". Treatment? I thought HSR was the treatment. I was quite curious when I went to my next appointment with her, and it was above all expectations. She gave me intramuscular needles, deep tissue massage and chiropractics in one single session! I had been transferred to Ane from my previous therapist who is also at the same center as her, to have the injured area examined with ultrasound. So I thought ultrasound was her specialization. Then we started the rehab exercises, and as I wrote before, I am extremely happy with the way Ane is following up on my progress. Although we don't have an appointment, she very often finds me in the exercise room, corrects my posture, suggests advancements in the exercises, and simply genuinely cares. To be honest, I did not think that there was more. The fact that we have now muscular treatment in addition to the HSR training is such a nice surprise, and it gives me even more motivation to conscientiously and rigorously continue with the exercises. 

Another thing that impresses me about Ane is that not only she knows so much about so many things, but she is also interested in teaching me! She shows me pictures from books and explains how the muscles, joints or the tissue around them work, what out treatment is trying to achieve, why it works, etc etc. She also gives me links so that I can read more about both the injury and the treatment methods myself. This is, in my experience, quite non-typical of therapists. She is not only treating my current injury, but she also gives me exercises so that I can stay injury free in the future, and she gives me lots of examples from her own experiences. Ane is around my age, she is a very physically active person herself, and I have the feeling that she understands me completely. She is so compassionate and empathetic, and I have never experienced this, at least to this extent, with the previous therapists. During my last session with her before the holidays, she said "Our goals is to get you back at running, as a stronger and better runner than you were before". Wow: our goal, and better than before! I almost got tears in my eyes...

I experienced the ultimate proof of the level of her empathy when I was worried about some shoulder pain just a few days before the holidays. Ane knew that I was counting on swimming a lot during the holidays, so although she understood from my description that it was probably nothing, she gave me an appointment just the next day. I got a thorough examination of the shoulder, which was by that time already quite a lot better, and I was impressed how she was able to take it so seriously when she already knew that it would simply pass in a few days. She explained to me later that it is also important to stop the mental processes around pain and injury. In the end, pain is simply signals that our brain is producing, and sometimes it can produce these signals even when there is no physical reason. This is why many people struggle with chronic inexplicable pain. I learn so much from her...

On top of all these things, we discovered that Ane and my trainer Ketil are friends from way back! What a team! I have the pleasure of working with two of the people who are the most excellent in their work, who are among the few that understand me completely and take all my worries seriously, and whom I have become extremely fond of. My hope is to continue my collaboration with Ketil and Ane until we all retire :-) With this kind of a support team, I believe nothing can stand in my way to become and stay fast and injury free!

I am afraid too many of us hang on to therapies and therapists long after we have lost faith in them. If a treatment is not working for you, and you do not get an explanation that you are satisfied with, it might be worthwhile to look into alternatives. Do not hesitate to discuss it with your current therapist, and ask him or her to suggest alternative treatments. And when you finally find somebody whom you are 100% satisfied with, trust their methods and follow their instructions to the letter to get the results that you deserve.

Don't ever let go of people who enhance your life!

The rise of the Phoenix

There will come a time when you believe everything is finished. That will be the beginning. (Louis L'amour)

Sometimes I think that my injury and rehab period is the best thing that could have happened to my running career. Well, perhaps this is a bit of an exaggeration, but I have come to appreciate this period more and more, especially now that things are going well, I am optimistic and full of motivation again. Whereas 2014 was a year-long extremely joyful rally with exclusively positive experiences, 2015 has so far been more of a roller coaster, with sky-high ups and bottomless pits. There have been great moments of new achievements, like records at Stoltzekleiven, and wonderful new experiences, like the relay races with Varegg, and especially the trip to Holmenkollstafetten. But the period has mainly been characterized by injuries and my attempts to get rid of them, and in fact not much running. In 2014 I learned to push myself, believe in myself, and I discovered that I had it in me; the never ending motivation and the willpower to go on and on. 2015 is teaching me different things. Quite the opposite of what I thought, I discovered that I am in fact quite patient, or perhaps I have learned to become it. I have experienced moments of despair and deep sadness, but I have also discovered that I have the ability to draw myself out of such moments and get back into a positive track. Of course you know that I have been blessed with a whole army of angels, who have continuously offered support, comfort and help;  my husband Frank, my friends from Melkesyre and Varegg, my trainer Ketil, my friends Filiz and Anne Chatrine, and my physiotherapist Ane. (Note to self: I must write more about Ane later; she is like no other therapist I have tried, or rather she has the expertise of all those therapists gathered in one single person!)

2015 has taught me to think long-term rather than the next race. I think this is extremely useful wisdom for a runner. When I first realized in 2014 that I could reach physical goals that I before thought were impossible, I became quite eager and impatient to show both myself and everyone else how good I could actually become. Now I have a much longer perspective, and I am confident and patient enough to wait for some of my goals to come later and not all at once. Since I love running, perhaps an analogy is appropriate. Could it be that 2014 was when I fell in love with running, whereas now is the period when the infatuation is turning into true love? Like, when you first fall in love and you cannot see clear, and you just want more and more and more, and nothing else matters? But then you discover new sides of your chosen one that you were first too blind to see, and you learn to understand, accept and like even these sides, and you realize that you have to work to make this relationship last life long? Perhaps so. In addition, many new friendships that were established in 2014 are strengthening and deepening now, which I think fits well with the analogy.

Why did I have to become injured to reach this wisdom? There is a lot of literature, presentations, and media posts about motivation, inspiration, pushing your limits, reaching your potential, achieving the impossible, and so on. This is all wonderful, and I have found great support in reading and listening to such. However, for people who are easily motivated, have the will power and the ability to push themselves, there is no easily accessible input on how to stay injury free. Of course "rest more, run less" is an obvious advice that I have got many times, but this is not what I am talking about. I want to find out how to continue to run and compete as much as I want and still stay injury free. Quite counterintuitively, injuries happen most often when you are making great progress in your form. You experience better and better times at competitions, your resting heart rate is lower than ever, you feel great and ready to practice even more than before, but your muscles, tendons or joints are not able to follow this. How to train smarter? There are ways. I am learning, and I will let you know.

In the meanwhile, my first priority is recovering from injury. It is going slowly but forward. When I was hung up on short-term thinking, I could become so sad about the time of training I have lost since January and how good I could have become now if I could have continued undisturbed. But the new long-term-thinking me has completely stopped thinking about such things, and I concentrate only on the now and the future, the emphasis being on enjoying the moment. Channelizing my focus into activities that I actually can and am allowed to, enjoying and becoming good at these, are nice ways of keeping the motivation and the level of happiness up. Here are some examples of what keeps me going these days, which might be helpful for others in the same situation:

1. I am doing intervals and fast walks up Stoltzekleiven and Ulriken, pushing my time further and further down. My form is surprisingly good after having lost so much time with immobility, and I am doing my best to keep and improve it.  My time up Stoltzekleiven is back to where it was around the time when I had my records, and you can imagine how great a motivation this is.

2. I am setting new strength training goals, like a certain number of kilos I want to be able to lift or push, or certain exercises I want to be able to perform. This week, for the first time ever, I was able to do clapping push-ups during my PT session with Ketil. It starts as a regular push-up, but on the way up you clap your hands before you set them on the floor again on your way down. Such small games and new achievements provide a lot of fun and entertainment, as well as help me keep on a positive track. The rehabilitation exercises that I do at the physiotherapy center have considerably increased my leg strength, and I think this is one of the reasons why things are going so well at Stoltzekleiven. After all, PT sessions and rehab sessions altogether amount to an hour of strength training five days a week, and the difference is noticeable.

3. I am concentrating on longer and longer uphill fast walks, and really enjoying these immensely as I can increase the mileage of them. I am back to discovering new paths on the mountains around Bergen, and I am loving the surprising variety this wonderful nature so close to me is offering. This weekend Frank and I tried two variants of a course that I had heard of several times before but never tried. Walk up Stoltzekleiven, jog down to Munkebotn, and just below the lake there take the path up to Kvitebjørnen. My goodness, this must be one of the nicest paths in Bergen. It is steep up all the way to the top, with stairs of wood, stone and metal, and incredible views. Once you hit the top, it is more or less flat all to way to Rundemanen offering great views all the way. Or you can shortcut by walking down to Sandvikshytten and back to the top of Stoltzekleiven. There are so many cabins on these paths! And these are all so well kept and nice to pass by. I will for sure write about various combinations involving Kvitebjørnen later; for now I give you here the gps details of the part starting from the top of Stoltzekleiven, going to Rundemanen and down to Skredderdalen.

Another thing I have learned during this period is that I can participate in races just for the fun of it or for the training, and do not always have to push to perform my best. I am considering Gullfjellet Opp next weekend. I had dismissed it, but now I am thinking about participating in the class where time is not registered. I am also considering Storehesten Opp. These are minor races that might enter my B list. On my A list already two races are lost, but I am hoping to be able to participate in the remaining two: Skåla Opp and Stoltzekleiven. For the first, I will probably change my class from competition to no timing. For the second I hope that I can race properly and improve my recorded race time. When I can start running normally again? I don't know. And I am not asking this question anymore. I am cherishing the improvement, enjoying the things that I can, and looking forward to all the uphill races of the fall. But first, hopefully a lot of swimming during the summer holidays and some spectacular mountain hikes that have been life-long dreams.

Run when you can, walk if you have to, crawl if you must; just never give up! (Dean Karnazes)

Report from rehab - II : HSR training

We shall overcome...

I have not been running since April 22. You'd think that I would be going mad at this point, but actually it is going surprisingly well. The first four weeks, where I was not allowed to do any kind of activity with my legs, no strength training or biking or even extensive walking, were pretty hard. I almost lost my motivation to recover and ever start running again. These first weeks were necessary to give the injury a complete rest so that the swelling and the irritation could calm down. After that the active rehabilitation phase started, with heavy slow resistance (HSR) training three times a week, in addition to regular strength training twice a week, and gradually increasing hiking/walking activity. Still no running for quite a while yet, but you can imagine how much I enjoy and cherish my uphill walks to Stoltzekleiven and Ulriken these days!

The injury that I have been struggling with for a long while is an irritation around the upper hamstrings tendons. At the back of our thighs we have three muscles stretching from the knee to the hip. These muscles each have their separate names, but they are altogether referred to as the hamstrings muscles. These muscles are attached to our knees and our hips with tendons. The tendons around the hip and the butt are called the upper or origin hamstrings tendons. My current injury is at and around the tendon attahed to the sitting bone and the surrounding bursa (small fluid filled bags that we have many of in our body, usually around the joints). The condition is probably a variant of so-called proximal hamstrings tendinopathy combined with pain from the ischiogluteal bursa. According to recent research, the most commonly accepted best way to deal with any kind of tendinopathy seems to be HSR training.

Unfortunately nobody told me this until I met my current physiotherapist Ane. I had an MRI examination already in May 2014, and the findings there should clearly be interpreted as an early stage of the injury that I am describing there. Although I showed the MRI results to every therapist I have been to, as my condition worsened, nobody was able to suggest the correct cure. My previous therapists were all into treating me with their various methods, whereas with HSR training I have to do the job myself. Ane examined my hamstrings with ultrasound, and combined with the old MRI result, she concluded tendinopathy and immediately and very firmly put me on the described rehab scheme.

 

So what is HSR training? It is a series of strength exercises for the legs and the butt, performed on various weight machines at the gym, with so heavy weights that you can barely manage 8 repetitions. These 8 repetitions are done on each leg separately, and then the whole set is repeated 3 times. Strength training on machines is not necessary for normal functional training, but in therapy the machines make sure that you put the effort on exactly the right spot and the right muscle. The idea of HSR training is that the muscle uses its own strength around the tendon both to contract and to stretch, all very slowly. I am doing a series of nine strength exercises three times a week, increasing the weights whenever I can. In addition I have a series of two active stretch exercises which I do twice a day. I do leg press, toe press, leg curl, leg extension, hip abduction, etc etc. The exercise that really goes right into the heart of my injury is the leg curl:

It is important to do it without flexing your foot. The foot should be completely relaxed, and then you pull the weight with your leg until your lower leg has a 90 degree angle with your thigh. When you don't flex your foot, you are not at all using your lower leg muscles and the hamstrings are doing all the job. My goodness was this painful the first time I tried it! I had no chance of doing it even with the lightest weight, even if I flexed my foot and helped with my other foot. In fact, even without a weight I could not lift my leg without flexing my foot! Remember that the first time I tried it was after four weeks of no running or leg training, so the fact that it was so painful at that point was really depressing. However, you cannot imagine how fast it has become how much better when I started the HSR training! Now I can lift the lightest weight completely correctly with my injured leg, no flexing of the foot and no help from the other leg. Next week I plan to move to a higher weight! It is still painful, but it is a kind of pain I can work through, as opposed to in the beginning when it felt like a sharp knife was being inserted into my tendon. I think, when I am able to do this exercise completely pain free, I will be able to start running.

Here is another test that I have to take before starting to run: single foot back plank. Lie on your back. Raise yourself on your elbows with your body straight, so that you are touching the ground on elbows and heels only. Then lift one foot off the ground. It may be hard, but it should not involve any pain. If you cannot do it because of pain in either thigh, then you should not run until the pain is gone. I am determined not to start running too soon, and I am also very careful in not getting carried away with my uphill hikes. I am allowed to do them fast and hard, but if something does not feel right, I slow down and take one or two days' break before the next uphill adventure. I also make sure to do at most two fast ones a week, and the others in moderate pace. Next step is to do longer hikes in the mountains avoiding the temptation to run. Wow, I feel so patient and wise! :-)

The nice thing about being in this phase of my rehab period, which I called determination,  is that I can do increasingly heavy activities and all the time I notice improvement. My injury is healing and activity feels better and better, albeit extremely slowly. I suppose the first four weeks of inactivity were necessary, but interestingly I felt no improvement whatsoever in the injury. As soon as I started HSR training, I could very quickly notice improvement. It is small, it is slow, but it happens all the time! It is so rewarding. If you are avoiding running due to an injury, please check the HSR training exercises that are recommended for your injury. For knees, ankles, heels, there are targeted exercises, and the healing will be much faster than just avoiding activity.

In my regular strength training I can now resume almost all my regular exercises, except those that target explosiveness of the legs. Ketil continues to add fun to my days with various games during our PT sessions. It feels so great when he tries new ideas on me and I can do them! He escalates the excitement by setting up the game from the start of the session so that I know that some new experiment will happen but I don't know what it will be. You might remember the push ups on the balls; they have by now become a regular weekly exercise. This week, we played building blocks. While holding an exercise ball in the air all the time with both legs. The important part is that you have to take every block with both hands and place it in the other pile also with both hands (it is much easier if you take with one hand and pass it to the other hand - yes I tried to cheat).

(There is a video here, but I am afraid it does not play on some mobile phones and tablets.)

Yesterday one piece of news made me very optimistic and gave me new inspiration. My friends Hege and Elisabeth, who both had long periods of not being able to run due to injuries, are back stronger and faster than ever. This weekend they both became number 2 in each their class in an uphill (from 0 to 1500 m) half marathon! As Elisabeth recited from a well known quote: 

What defines us is how well we rise after falling.

Extreme is my normal

Another race went by with me as a spectator. I am getting used to it now. Shoulders down; I am determined not to participate in any race until after the summer.

On Saturday was the Ulriken Opp race, which I had signed up for a long time ago and was really looking forward to. On April 19, Frank and I did a test run of the short course, and completed it in less time than my race time last year, although we kept an easy pace and did not at all push it. So I was expecting to improve my race time by a couple of minutes, at least. But then came my "no running, no uphill walking, no strength training at all for legs" period of four weeks, starting from April 22. That is fortunately over now, and I am into some heavy slow resistance (HSR) training and allowed to walk uphills if I keep them not too long and not too fast. I will come back to the details of this in the next post, but the important part here is that I was able to walk up to the top of the mountain and be a part of the Melkesyre cheering gang to help our friends and all competitors up.

Not being able to use my legs (except for two short relay runs) for four weeks has been an interesting experience to put it mildly. I wrote earlier that I think this will make me a better runner, and I truly believe it. It has made me put everything into a new perspective, as sometimes looking at things from the "outside" can give a clearer picture. However, one should not push perspective too much. At some point I was losing my perspective, in fact the whole picture. Fortunately I am surrounded by great people who were quick to grab me back into the state of mind that I should have.

During these four weeks I went through some stages that could perhaps be categorized as relief, acceptance, resignation, and change. Relief because all kinds of running had become so painful, and I was still doing it in variations which I thought would be fine, that finally not being allowed to run was in fact a relief. Although my mind was very unhappy about this restriction, my body responded very positively. My resting heart rate went down significantly, and my leg muscles felt much better after a few days. I realized that I had actually not rested properly during the past 12 months. Then came the acceptance phase, where I tried to make the best out of the situation. I increased the number of my strength training sessions from two to three or four times a week. I was also fortunate enough that this whole period coincided with an extremely busy period of work, so it was easy to accept and even appreciate that I was not to run or walk. Resignation came when I realized that this rehab period could actually be very long lasting, and it could take months before I could start running again. I gave up all hopes of participating in any of the races that I had signed up for until after the summer.  

Change was when I started to think and feel differently. And different was not good in the end. I started to enjoy lying on the couch after a long day at work. I felt glad that I did not have to go out in the bad May weather that we have had this year. When I saw pictures on Facebook from the training sessions that I could not participate in, I did not feel anything; I was simply indifferent. I did not have the feeling of missing it or being a part of it; it all started to become distant to me. Perhaps the worst was that I started to think in a different way about my goals. I wrote in an earlier post that many people found my goals and training extreme; they used to tell me not to overdo it, not to exaggerate. At that point I did not let this slow me down because I had enough of motivation from great runners with extreme goals and habits, and the "let's not get carried away" advice usually comes from people who do not themselves have the same kind motivation. But during the change period, I started to think that they were right. I started to question what the point was, and to discard my earlier goals. However, the goals for me are so closely related to the joy of achievement that running gives me, that in the end I started to lose the will to run... At the end of this period, when I was finally allowed to start walking uphill, I almost cancelled my planned first walk up to Stoltzekleiven because the weather was bad and I was tired after a long day at work. It was so strange. I was expecting to be so eager to get started again after this long period, and instead I found that I had to force myself to get out and get going. That really scared me. I thought I was losing my edge.

In this state of mind, I was at Barry's Bootcamp this Tuesday morning for my PT session with Ketil, when an old acquaintance, Petter Vallestad, passed by and waved at me with his huge smile as always and shouted "Go Pinar!" I know Petter from when we were both regulars at Barry's bootcamp classes. From a normal bootcamper he went to the extreme;  he is one of two guys from Bergen who participated in the Jungle Marathon in Amazonas in 2013: 254 km in hot, humid weather through the jungle with all sorts of vegetation and insects. Only very few people completed this course, and all the others were professional runners. I have been following Petter's achievements online but it had been a while since we had met. It turned out that he has also been following me via my blog. He invited me to a lecture on Thursday, and we ended up texting a bit during Tuesday. And bang my motivation was back! He was able to draw me out of my negative thoughts and make me remember that extreme is my normal. I can never be moderate when it comes to things I am passionate about, no matter what they are. However, I had a question to Petter: How do you stay injury free? It seems Petter has a recipe for that, and he will tell me all about it over lunch in a few weeks. I will tell you more about him, his achievements and his recipe after that.

Such a simple thing was enough to be reset and get back on track. After this I was clearly more responsive to positive impulses and grabbed every opportunity to get my act together. The first Stoltzekleiven walk was great. I went at a pace which I consider slow and easy, there were hundreds of people on the path all of whom I passed, nobody passed me, and I reached the top just 2 minutes behind my personal best. I was really happy to see that my form had not decreased much. Then on our Thursday PT session, Ketil was more a psychologist than a trainer, and he had all sorts of tricks to get me laughing, screaming and hungry for new goals. Look what he made me do:

Balancing on four fitness balls and doing push ups. It looked impossible. Are you sure this is actually doable? Did anybody try it before? I asked him. Somebody must be the first, and you are the strongest I have, he replied. Ha ha, he knows exactly what to say, and I choose to believe him. It did work after a bit of falling down and getting up. In the beginning he had to hold the balls under my feet; it was like learning how to bike. I kept shouting Don't let go, don't let go, you're still holding, right? But then he had to let go to be able to take pictures. I also got as homework to make a training plan/log so that I can see my progress, which is important now that I am not racing and timing my runs.

Then came the evening before the Ulriken Opp race, and my Melkesyre friend and big idol Jeanette asked me whether I wanted to walk up slowly with her so that we could cheer on our husbands and all other friends when they came racing. This was the last in a sequence of positive impulses to drag me out of my comfortable hole of laziness. To be honest I was not planning to go and cheer this time, but when Jeanette asked, I immediately wanted to go. She is also injured these days, with very similar restrictions to mine, and it was great therapy to chat about these things. She is an athlete at a completely different level than me, and I look so much up to her and find great motivation in her achievements. Although she is one of the best, she is also constantly chasing to improve herself. This, what many people find strange and unnecessary, is what I so totally understand and find that it is something inside me so strong that it is not really a choice.

So, thanks to these wonderful people who, at exactly the right moment, found and grabbed me, I am back on track. No running still for a long while, but enjoying all the things that I actually can do, seizing the opportunity to do more strength training and get stronger, and meeting my running friends again although I cannot join the full training sessions. Maybe I can name this period determination.  I am determined to get rid of my injuries this time, be patient and stay out of running as long as it takes, so that I can be back stronger and faster than ever before.

Coming soon! To a racing arena near you ;-)

Personal training revisited

It is quite amazing how much stronger I have become during the past year, thanks to personal training (PT) sessions. This week my trainer Ketil and I had our 1-year anniversary.

You might remember my first post about personal training, the benefits of it and what you should look for in a personal trainer. When I first started my PT sessions with Ketil on March 10, 2014, I had already been strength training and interval training on treadmill three times a week at Barry’s Bootcamp since 2012. Thus I considered myself strong and fast. It was therefore a big surprise to experience how much stronger and faster I became already after a few weeks’ of PT sessions once a week. Within a month I was ready for my very first half marathon! In the beginning, I was both running outdoors and still going to bootcamp classes once or twice a week. After half a year though, having gotten the real taste of outdoors activities, with running both flat and uphill, long and short distances, and participating in lots of races (of course with the great influence of Melkesyre), I found myself not participating in enough bootcamp classes and thus not getting enough strength training. At that point we increased the number of PT sessions to twice a week. I have my PT sessions early in the morning before going to work, which leaves the afternoons of these two days also free for outdoor running.

From earlier posts, you already know how much I appreciate Ketil and how enthusiastic I am to have him as my trainer, with his vast knowledge and experience as a trainer and an athlete. By now he is also a good friend, and I have hard time imagining how I would manage without his continuous expert advice and guidance. The benefits of a personal trainer are perhaps more obvious at the start of a running career. At least many of my friends are asking me why I still need a personal trainer now that I am strong and a runner with more routine and knowledge. So I thought I would explain how the PT sessions are helping me, at the same time answering some of these questions.

An alternative to PT sessions could perhaps be going to morning bootcamp classes twice a week and do double floor (with this option, you skip the treadmill intervals and do strength training for the full hour). However, during a PT session we do a lot of exercises that are not possible to do in a bootcamp class. More importantly, each week’s exercises are carefully designed by Ketil depending on what kind of outdoor activities and races are coming up, and whether I have injuries, pain or weaknesses that need to be worked on. I also have a couple of strength goals that are not related to running, but that do require the equipment in the PT room and the guidance of a trainer.

In addition to the practical and physical benefits, I get an amazing energy and boost of self-confidence after every PT session. The sessions are a lot of fun and we laugh a lot, and I feel super strong as I almost every time manage something new which I could not do before. When I am struggling with injuries or pain, or when I am worried about my form, Ketil gives me all kinds of motivating pep talk, as well as reassuring and comforting comments about how well I am doing. He has an incredible confidence in what I can do and how far I can reach, most of the time much more than I do. And all of his predictions come true! One of the things I appreciate the most is that he takes all my worries seriously, no matter how small or stupid they might sound. He fully understands and appreciates what I am struggling with, and he always has exactly the perfect feedback to get my spirit back up high in the sky.

A question that I get often is whether it is not expensive. This depends on what other expenses one has. I am not into jewelry, accessories, or expensive brands, which leaves quite a bit of room for expenses related to running and training. I drive an electric car, which gives savings in parking, city entrance toll, and gas. Every now and then PT packages are on sale, and I make sure to grab a whole bunch. Many of my friends are regulars at training centers that charge quite high monthly membership fees, and they end up not using their centers that much after all. In this respect, paying only for the classes that you actually attend (both with PT and bootcamp sessions), as it is the rule at Barry’s Bootcamp, might be more economic in the long run. If you are thinking about it, I would say just try it now!

Cool leg muscles these days by the way - bikini fitness next! :-D