Training Log Archive: Torino

Bike O Middle Champs (only realised at home that it was supposed to be a championship, bummer)
I gave a good effort, it was physically hard and I pushed but somewhere I lost lots of time. Best time was at 43 min, then 48 min, 51 and 51 then me. I was really disappointed with the placing. I made mistakes at the 2 easiest controls as I was too fast and missed a trail and had to go back. Other than that, I think, I must have had the wrong route choices. Still I need to work on seeing what's the best in Bike -O. Then, when it is so fast and physical, I am still not such a strong biker. But some single tracks which are always fun to me.

After the bike O-race there was the chance to do the double: a street-O. Initially, I did not feel like doing it anymore as I felt tired and there were long lines for downloading and generally the club was a little over their heads with the 640 people for the regional street O and almost 200 for the bike-O, but Urs urged me on, so I went to the start anyway. It was quite long not technically challenging but still very nice. We started on a hill in a nice parc, then ran down this hill through some nice neighborhoods, then over the 100s of traintracks into the old and creepy metal industry production area, back over 100s of traintracks into the old pedestrian-only part of Winterthur. I cam in 5th again out of 15 and was pleased.

Urs and I went to some nearby woods and did a few loops to take advantage to our summerlike weather and gorgeous views.

Sprint Bike-O in Frauenfeld on army training grounds (or former, I don't know). It was quite hard to get to interpret several signs on that map. I made a little mistake to #1, then a big one to #2 where I totally misread the map and ended up approaching the control from behind going up an incredibly steep small slope through the nettles (but I wasn't the first one!). Little route choice mistake to 3 and not seeing the trail that went off the road and having to go back. Another mistake on #6 again misreading the map and the exact location of the flag as I started to ride up a grassy ramp, then deciding that the flag had to be hidden behind one of those wooden walls that were used to ? shooting?, so I slid down another steep earthbank. From then on, I picked up speed and ended up being 2nd. :-)

Went back from the schoolhouse with Urs, and then we did my course again, this time, Urs was reading the map, and I could do lots of explaining of the O-map. He's really good at it!
Biking back to the school again.

Training in 2 parts: first pickung up the car (running) at the garage, then driving over to the Dählhölzli and running a smallish loop.

Started when the sun was shining, then ran into a thurderstorm with some hail (while I was in the woods luckily) and finished with sunshine again ;-)!

For the second time this week, I could not fall asleep again until after 2 am even though I almost fell asleep on the couch while watching TV a bit! This falling-asleep problem has bothered me now for close to 2 months, and the following day is always kind of wasted as I have little energy. It's the pits. And I have tried herbal stuff and histamine, but they don't help much in falling asleep. :'(

Good Yoga class with a good pace!

A thunderstorm went over Interlaken just before 6 pm, so only 2 of the most dedicated and faithful people showed up at 6:30 pm! We NWed without a drop of rain falling on us and went over to the Rugen, went to the top and circled it. As these 2 people are the best, we had a very good pace.

Teaching a fitness yoga class here in Berne at Urs's work place, the financial supervision office. It was quite hard with a new class of youngish people (10 participants). I got a good workout and was told that it was harder than their normal aerobic class!

My back pains were gone afterwards!!

After a lazy day, finally went running in the evening. Biked to the Dählhölzli animal park and started running from there. Biking back home.

It was a wonderful warm and incredible summer's day! Maybe that's why I was so lazy and took a nap in the afternoon? The municipal huge pool on the other side of the Aare from us was packed with people (!!) and many were already floating down the Aare, it said that it was 16 degrees Celsius (60 o F), still way too cool for me.

Teaching my normal 3 Tuesday classes; one part of it was core strength training and a third part was a short circuit. The core strength was pretty intense on the floor and I think I got a pretty intense back and side back pain, more than normal sore muscles. Additionally, I also did squats with sitting down on a very small ball which was a challenge, but doing it for a full minute was tough on my quads.

NW class for seniors; we went to do the gnome trail and the Harder loop.

Earlier, I had the core conditioning class which was pretty hard, and I must have had sore muscles the next day.