Training weight, don't eat sand, coach freestyle, help 70.3 first-timer and Norseman

I almost wrote AGAIN how quick the time goes as it just did again, but I need to stop having that as an excuse for not writing here regularly and actually start writing here more often. So stop complaining and start doing.
During the last few weeks Ive had a several personal "projects" started. Some of them have been carried out already, some are in good progress, and, finally, some not. I thought I'd explain them shortly and see where that takes me (us).

Lose weight to train (and maybe a bit train to lose weight also)

Throughout summer I've swam, ridden the bike and ran whenever possible (I have some other priorities also in my life, surprise surprise). Tried not to take too much stress of that, but still kind of preparing for the REAL training regimen that will evidently come later in the fall/ winter. The main purpose for this has pretty much been keeping my basic fitness up, and my belly not exploding of all the stuff I'm eating (So train to lose weight). Five weeks ago we (me & my wife) decided to start looking what we actually eat, as it looked like no training had any effect on the number the scale provided. For me, this meant putting the carbs down at lunch & dinner, filling the plate with salad, greenies and some protein-source. I also started to look  more carefully for the portion-size, as I have the habit of getting really hungry before lunch, filling up the plate to a horrifying degree and then eating it all even if I'd be satisfied already earlier. For my wifee this meant trying out the now-popular 500kcal-days twice-a-week in addition to eating a bit less and keeping the excercise-levels the same.

Result: 6 kgs drop for me, and 5 kgs for the wife. My run has improved, and I don't know if it's because of the low-carb diet or something else, but my hr-readings have gone down also (so same speed - lower hr or same hr, higher speed). Not bad, not bad at all, especially as the changes have been sort of minor...

Start teaching people freestyle basics (swimming I mean)

I did this shortly last spring also, but now I have a class of 8 people and they will be getting 11 one-hour lesson once-a-week. I've now had three of them, and boy, has that been a learning-experience for me too. First of all, I realised I need to prepare for these meets. My preparation for the first meet was only to come up with the idea of getting to know the people and their needs towards the course. Well, the realisation that that initial "hello" took about 10 minutes of the hour was quite a shock, so what I did was try to improvize all sorts of stuff. And that didn't go well. I think I was the worst kind of ADHD-case during that first meet, and was really grateful of the people actually coming also to the second class (which I had prepared with actual training parts and a working timetable). So a BIIIIG lesson learned there on the first one. But a good one, now I am actually thinking of what people will be practicing and how much of different stuff can I fit into one hour without creating a mess. On an overall level, I get real pleasure from seeing the people getting the stuff and also understanding why they should use a certain technique instead of just treading the water. And them noticing the real effect of the technique change on their ease and speed in the water is nearly priceless :)

Not eating sand

Well, as you might guess, this is a wierd thing to encounter as it is really against any and all reason. And how tough it is to get rid of it in the first place!
Ok, just for a clarification, the person in question is my younger child, a 3-year-old boy, who, for some totally ununderstandable reason, with his mates in the kindergarten, has started eating handfuls of sand. At first encounter this was funny like "ok, kids just playing". Second time it was stupid, and the boy was told to stop it. The tenth time we decided we need to do something. For some reason the little guys have created some sort of game or play where they are stuffing the sand into their mouths. And encouraging each others to do that. So we needed to stop that. Not as easy as you would think, though... First it seemed that nothing helped. Now we have several different restrictions on the boy (e.g. no tv as long as the idiocy lasts, all "lightning McQueen" stuff confiscated (that was really hard for him)) and agreed with him that if he stays off the sand-eating for five consecutive days, we'll take him to his first real movie (the Planes). Lets see how things go there...

Wifee Half-distance training

On a sunday a couple of weeks ago I signed my better half for her first half-distance triathlon. That'll be due next July, 17th to be exact. So some time for the preparations still remain. But it was good that I did the registration for her, as no-one would have guessed that the national half-tri would sell out its 1 300 places in 22 hours from opening :o
But, I got the wifee in, and she's determined with her one-time-sprint-triathlon experience that she'll do it. And I'm sure she will, especially now as we both have been getting towards more reasonable weight considering the training. But I know I will need to drag her out of her comfort zone in some training-sessions to get her actually progressing on her training. I'll probably need a long stick there to keep the unavoidable aggression bursts on a safe distance.

Norseman 2014

Yes, I'm a stupid man. I knew that triathlon is getting ever more popular, but I didn't understand that it's hit the Nordics also. So two of the IMs I was planning on having in my back-pocket IF the lottery from Norseman didn't go my way are now off-limits (Copenhagen and Kalmar). Now I'm just biting my nails and awaiting for the enrollment to start and the lottery to happen, because that'll be the only chance I'll have for next year to do the ironman distance. Well almost at least, as I decided that maybe I'll just have to budge and participate a small national full-distance if the lottery will fail me. But we'll see. One side of me can't wait until the lottery on November, and another side does not want to get there as getting the invitation there would actually mean that I'd have to go. and even worse, TRAIN. Aaagh!!!!

Ok, so five present projects for now, I'll leave the rest for the next update :)

Half a year later...

...so it's been a while since I've been here. The spring went in recovering from the surgery, summer went in starting up with the training again, and now it starts to look like fall all over again. And I'm eagerly waiting for the registration for norseman to open (still some weeks to that though...)
During the summer I had a success in luring my wife also into the long distance-training. I'd say it was a success as I got this previous cycling-hater on bike, and even doing a couple of over 80km rides during the summer! And as I went with her, most of the times also with the smaller rides, I got my cycling legs a bit back too :)
Finally, now a couple of weeks back, we both participated in a local sprint-distance triathlon, which was a first for her, and we really had fun there, even though it was raining the whole swim (well, that did not matter) and most part of the ride (that did make it a bit harder). Luckily, the run was dry.
But that's for that, I'll now start actually updating this blog a bit more frequently (not too high a requirement when looking back to the previous frequency).
As an end-note, I'm really scared if I don't get the slot in the lottery as I dis-succeeded in reserving a place in the replacement-races I was planning to take part in if I did not get the slot (Kalmar or Copenhagen) as they were filled up sooooo quickly. But now I have to go, but I'll return soon :)

Recap for the past three months, including spinal surgery and other interesting stuff...

I know three months of silence usually kills any blog there is, and I don't assume these texts are any different from that, but sometimes things happen and (b)logging goes way down in your own priority-list. At least for a  while.On the other hand, I don't think I'm able to explain the last three months very shortly or in a totally structured way, so I'll just let the text flow and see if I end up with the longest and most difficult to follow -text I've ever written or not :)
I just checked that my last post was at 22nd November 2012. At that point I was in the middle of "medical process", i.e. waiting for an invitation for future examinations by an orthopedic doctor. During the following week I got examined by a specialist (on tuesday), got a waybill to a magnetic spinal-scan, had the scan on friday, and spent pretty much the whole friday waiting for the results at the local ER (the only way to get the results examined ASAP). Finally I got in to hear about the results. And that was something I still have hard time to understand. At that point a senior spinal-surgeon had examined my scans, diagnosed a massive spinal hernia, and reserved a surgery for the following tuesday (three days from that date). And I never had thought it would be THAT bad... After getting all these info I was sent home to prepare for the surgery.
After I got these news I pushed them forward to my wife, who also didn't quite get it first, but when she did, she got quite scared. For some reason I really did not understand how serious the situation was, not then, and probably not even now...
So, the weekend went in a sort of mist for me. I couldn't quite understand what was happening, a good example of that was that we actually argued with my wife if we should cancel a trip to Milan that was reserved for us, starting two days after the surgery. I actually thought I could manage the trip, so that was the level of denial I was in. But finally I agreed to cancel the reservations, and am glad I did, I would not have been in any condition to travel at that point.
So, then came the big day. My younger brother had agreed to drive me to the hospital (some 50+ kms) and also pick me up afterwards. Still, even when I was at the hospital, I did not realize what was happening. I got to the laboratory to provide some blood-samples, got to the spine-surgery department, changed my clothes, got the IV, and was pretty much on the spot taken to the operation room. The next time I woke up, I immediately noticed a change on the right foot. It actually felt better :)
I had to stay for the night at the hospital, but was released the next morning, and was quite happy to get out.
So, for the next 6 weeks my exercise consisted of long slow walks (again) to see if the foot would come back. And some trainer-cycling. Slowly the power started to return to the calf, which relieved me quite a bit, as the surgeon that I talked with after the surgery had told me that as the numbness had been on for so long (three weeks), it was not certain if it would be repaired even after the pressure from the hernia had been removed. The Christmas week came and we drove to Lapland in the north of Finland, where we had reserved a cottage right next to a skiing resort. Didn't do any skiing though. But I'm glad my family did :)
After the six weeks I had an appointment with the doctor that had operated me, and I got a pass from her to start living normally again. A few day later I visited a physiotherapist, who provided me with some guidelines on how to strengthen up my core muscles. She also did some tests to me, and found out some weaknesses both in the core-muscles (that I thought were in first-class condition) and the big butt-muscles. Apparently I had mistaken my top-layer stomach-muscles to be the core muscles :o
Anyway, I got some really good instructions on how to strengthen myself up in the middle of the body, and a pass to gradually start training again.
So, the last four weeks I've been first riding my bike on the trainer, and then found a new total-body-workout from doing the cross-country skiing. And that is something I've really fell in love with now :) Ofcourse it helps that my wife also does it :) :)
During the last week I skied over 50 kms, with four different sessions, so I think this is a good way to keep up and enhance my endurance during the winter. And it's a bit more forgiving to the right calf than actual running, so I'm able to strengthen the muscle before the summer and running sessions. Presently I'm still only able to run as I used to (on forefoot) for 50 - 100 meters, if even that. So finding out how to run again will be a challenge during the spring and early summer.
But, all and all, I am able to train, and that is enough for me presently :) Maybe next time I'll even get into details of the sessions I've done ;)

You never know a good thing... ...until you lose it!

Yes, that line from Dream Warriors (and others, I assume) pretty much sums it up for me now. Or "be aware what you wish for as it may come true..." could also work. On my last post, if I recall correctly, I was in pain with my right foot, and wished it would go away. Well, on last week's Monday it did go away, but it also took something with it, something I'd like to get back ASAP :). But lets go back to that Monday (November 12th) for a while, I'll shed some light on the events then and afterwards.
So, early at that mentioned Monday morning I had some pain in my right foot, again, but that was nothing unusual anymore, so I went to kiss my wife & children goodbye (they were all asleep still) to leave to work. As I leaned down to say bye for the day to my daughter, something happened in the right hip, and the pain intenisfied quite much. So much that I had quite a diffulties to put on my shoes and walk to the car after that. Sitting in the car for the 1 h commute was truly agonizing, and when I got to the parking-lot, I had to take a few minutes time-out to actually get up from the car. At that point, finally, I decided that I'd get an appontment with the doctor at the office to see if there's anything that can be done on the leg. So, after limping the distance to my desk, I called and got the appointment.
So, when the time came, I got to the doctor's office, and he examined my back and the leg. I had not lost any power from the leg, but I was not able to bend the leg more than 30 degrees from my back-line, so the doctor sent me home with an order to get my hip x-rayed to find out if it actually has something to do with the spinal discs, or if its some piriformis -issues.
When exiting the doctor's office, the leg had decided to explode with pain. Maybe the examination caused it, or just the terrible chair I sat in at the office, but the pain had got even worse. Tears in my eyes I decided not to take the elevator but to walk the stairs (Don't ask me why, I was not apparently thinking straight at that point...). Well, walking the stairs was a challenge that I did not need at that point, but I walked them anyway. I was so concentrated not to cause any more pain to the right leg that I did not pay attention to the left one. So I stumbled, had to put all my weight onto the right leg, and nearly cried out loud from the pain.
I'm not sure how long I just stood there trembling, unable to move, but at some point I realised I had started slowly walking again. The highest peak of the pain had gone, and I could actually walk to my desk, grab my things, walk to the car and drive home. The driving was a bit weird, because the pain that I had when I came to work had kind of disappeared after the stumble in the stairs.
As I had had pretty much enough of everything for the Monday, I decided to get the x-rays on Tuesday and try to rest for the rest of that day. Lying down I noticed that I had lost the surface feeling of most of my right calf, part of the right back-thigh and part of the buttock. I did not pay attention to those things too much at that point however, I was just glad that the pain had pretty much gone away...
On Tuesday morning I noticed that I was not able to use the right foot as usual. The pain had gone, but apparently it also meant that the connection to the muscles (the biggest calf-muscle, part of the back-thigh and part of the buttock) was non-existent. I could walk (well, limp actually), but I couldn't tip-toe with the right foot. And I couldn't put my weight on the right foot, as the strongest part of the calf was unavailable.
Fast-forward from Tuesday Nov. 13th to today, the situation is pretty much the same. This monday I went back to the doctor's and with the x-ray -diagnosis, he put me on the urgent-queue to an orthopedist. And sent me back home for two weeks.
So, here I am now, awaiting for the call from the orthopedist, and trying to figure out ways to help my body heal and not break from any other parts of it. Training has succumbed to slow short morning walks. And considerations of maybe going for a swim at some point.
As a summary, I wished I'd get rid of the pain, which I did, but got also rid of some of the services from my right foot. And I think I would have needed those in the future!
Apparently this blog has presently more information on my short medical history than my training. I need to change that, so as soon as I get some professional help and guidance on how to make my body heal, I'll treat those guides as training plans and work from there. I'm still adamant that I'll be in Norway in the August of 2014!! :D

Two weeks passed, an overhaul decided

So it's been two weeks since my last post. For me, those two weeks have mostly meant pretty consistent...
...pain. In my right foot. In my previous post I mentioned my training regimen had already resulted to something, and that that something was a lower-back pain that nested in my right buttock, but radiated (and still radiates) to the whole leg, especially outer side of my right calf. Presumably this is some version of the spinal disc herniation.
That pain is something that I've never ever before experienced. Its most intense when I stand up after a longer period of sitting, especially in the car, and it just simply stops me doing anything and everything until it slowly levels down. And believe me, having this for almost three weeks now has had me thinking different options, e.g. putting the leg on e-bay for sale or to be replaced by a wooden stick, or anything that would just provide a way out of the situation. I actually already contacted some medical help too, and got instructions to take a inflammatory/pain -medication daily for a week or two and see if the pain goes away (apparently this all is caused by a septic (inflamed?) muscle pressing on the main-nerve for the foot, so the inflammation needs to be healed before a real recovery can start).
But anyway, as I've gotten so scared of this situation A) continuing and/or B) returning at some point in the future, I've not trained at all for the past two weeks. Unless some walking with the family can be seen as training, and for me, that is not. Fun it is, but not training.
I've also started to wonder if I actually should really listen to this body of mine... I recall one situation like this from my earlier years, where a change of shoes and running style caused an infection on both of my calves (shin splints), so I was unable to run downhill at all. Naturally, this meant that at some point I just decided to stop running for a while. After finally accepting the situation then, I decided to engage a stretching routine to be done daily, and actually carried that out for several weeks. The results of that are present even now, as previously I was not able to touch the floor with my hands when standing with straight legs, but now I can tap my palms to the floor if I want to. But that change in the approach to training required quite a leap mentally, especially as at that point when I had only trained for marathons (=running) and nothing else...
So maybe I should actually use this downtime to something useful? Last time I mentioned not having a plan, and that bothering me to some extent. Now I need to have a plan, but totally different from the one I thought I'd have. I need to plan how to gradually level up my fitness even if I'm unable to run (at least for longer distances), and how to avoid this present situation at all costs...
The more irritated I got about this situation, the more it actually made me think. For instance, I have nearly one yard of books on my shelf dedicated only to the "mastery of endurance". Those include guides for planning your season, planning your training in all the three disciplines, books on nutrition for endurance athletes, Yoga for athletes, strength training etc. Why the hell won't I just sit down and not think of what I can't do, but think of what I can, and start from that?
So, as it seems that an extra-strong core will be a main factor in NOT getting this pain back again, I opened the Triathlete's guide to strength training and Sage Roundtree's "the Athlete's guide to Yoga". I created myself a core-routine for the next three weeks, and after that, I'll see if I need to add something to the routine (I was not able to carry out all the moves, so I have the possibility to update when I get my fitness back :)).
And, I've decided to start swim training again next week, probably two morning sessions per week at first and we'll see how the things develop from there. And finally, I'll follow the advice of M. Fitzgerald' to "say yes to the good stuff", in other word's, I'll gradually start to change my nutrition habits to reflect my caloric needs daily and stop eating like I was training several times a day as I really am not.
So I guess I'm now on the process of getting over a speed-bump. It took me a while, and I apparently needed some butt-kicking before that, but it's happening now... Let's see if after next week I actually have something good also happening training-wise and not just these negative thingies :D

No plans, just run & ride

Ok, the subject pretty much describes what's happened after my previous post a week ago. As last weekend went by without any training, I had so bad conscious that I might have a bit overdone it this week. I had two trainer -spin sessions, on Monday and on Friday which totaled to ~80 minutes. Additionally to this, I also did two runs, on Wednesday and  yesterday totaling 100 minutes. As I compare this week's total time to last week's, it can easily be seen that my training appears to naturally follow the main principle of only adding 10 - 15% more training load per week (to keep out of injuries etc.). Only with a small tweak of adding one zero in the back of that 10 % -figure ;).
So, looking at the totals, time-wise I've added 100% to my previous week's training load. Ok, some of it comes from the fact that I decided to also record my yoga warm-ups and the stretching sessions, but still, even if those are taken away, its 65% addition. Looking at this now, it feels really idiotic.
But, on the other hand, maybe it had to be done. AS I also mentioned earlier, I seem to derive my motivation   to train more from bad conscious of not doing training earlier than actually aiming at something like "higher fitness" or...  ...or even the Norseman. This is something I need to change.
I also realized last week, that the kinds of "I've-not-run-for-one-week-now-so-I-have-to-do-this-session-with-4:30min/km-average" -trainings play a big part in this non-structural training of mine. It seems that whenever I put the running shoes on, I have a mission to demolish my previous average (or whatever). And that's not the way to go.
So, my thoughts of being the type of trainer like Óscar Freire are apparently not based on real-life but some wierd self-image. Just to explain what I mean, Óscar mentioned at some interview that I read in the procycling-magazine himself being a type of unstructured trainer that listens to his body and decides based on the feelings he notices what he's going to train (or not train) that day. With me, it goes more on the not-listening even if should -side, so maybe a structured plan could work better for me...
But anyway. As I now have some real results from the training (ischias -type pain in the low backside), I'll probably try to put up some plan next week. Maybe that'll actually provide me with an option to just go do (run/bike/swim) what I'm supposed to according the plan and not try to prove that I'm in the same level of fitness that I was four years ago. Because I'm not. And because I need to get there and past... oh, here I go again... ;)

First steady steps into the... ...candy-shelf?

Ok, so its Saturday already. Quite a busy week at work I have to say, but still managed to get some training there also. Some fast morning runs on Monday and Wednesday, and an easy-one on Friday. Did also some core-power work on Tuesday. And the traditional 5 Sun Salutation B's every morning :).
So, I guess this looks like the start has actually happened (for the training). However, today I realized my left Achilles-tendon is quite sore, so I'll have to consider doing some cycling/ trainer work instead of the running.
Presently it seems like my body has grown slower in reacting to the training. I mean, usually you could see the results of your extra calorie consumption already after one or two weeks after starting training, but presently I'm in the week four (or five, depending on how you calculate), and the only effect the training has had is the heightened urge for anything and everything unhealthy. A good example for this was yesterday (friday), when, for the first time in almost a year, I could not go past the candy-shelf without grabbing all sorts of sweets & chocolate to the cart. And this happened even if, in the morning, I had made the mistake of  stepping onto the scale (as an old scale-abuser, this was of course after the run and before breakfast ;)). I say mistake, because the scale showed the real numbers to my face. 5 kg gain after July :(
And still I had the balls to confiscate really unnecessary energy from the candy-shelf. Aaaargh!!!
Presently, looking at my sugar-swollen belly, I'm planning on a bike-ride today or tomorrow to, if nothing else, satisfy my self-conscious and the coach-in-the-head. I guess this is how it is for me now, the motivation to train nowadays comes more from the bad conscious of my earlier endavours than from any actual training plan or target.
But shortly returning to the coach-in-the-head mentioned earlier, his nagging about creating a real plan instead of just going out and doing what seems to be fun at that point has started to bother me a bit. Well not that much that I'd actually dig the training-bibles etc. from the bookshelves and started creating a plan, but still. I know that at some point in the near future I actually need to put up a plan also, but presently I'm in the denial-mode still on that front.
Let's see how this is going to work, and how long it's going to take for me to actually put the effort and create the plan (as it's not like I wouldn't be able to do the plan as I've done it several times earlier and also succeeded in carrying it out at those times). I don't know why that is so hard presently, let's see if I find out the reason later...