Dathan Ritzenheim and Jason Hartmann training in Boulder’s snowy and cold conditions as they prepare for the USA Cross Country Championship.

the week was a bit mixed up.

as usual i took it easy on monday.

tuesday is football time and the match was really tough this time. i was really wasted from the short sprints.

wednesday was a fast day. i got a couple of tempo intervalls in. as usual i went out to hard but managed to get the last part slightly faster.

on thursday i had to pay the price. the “longer” run was a bit of a mess. the starting pace was too high so i suffered badly at the end. the result was a spontaneous rest day on friday. i was tired and didnt had motivation to go out.

saturday was hill day as i was running with simo from bray to greystones and back. we finished the session with hill sprints and a hardcore recovery in the irish sea.

sunday our “park guide” adriele directed us to a long round of loops through various parks around dublin. on a beautiful day we ended up with 38 kilometeres and a nice recovery dinner at bellagio.

again a week with over 100 kilometeres.

after a little diaspora and the help of mighty F. i finally received some new shoes. lets say “good bye” and give a round of applause to my old skylons. after roughly 800 kilometers they get their deserved retirement.

its the first time i bought the same model again. the nike skylon is a perfect training shoe. i´m really keen on trying the new one. he seems to be a littlebit lighter then the old one. the sole is kind of nike free style with a very flexible layout.

also i got my hands on the most ugly looking cross country shoes around – the nike waffle in a very “special” look. i hope they are some good partners for mountain running.

like last year kenian “ueber”-runner sammy wanjiru startet his season in spain. he raced the half marathon in granollers close to barcelona. a 61:13 time was enough for the current world record holder over the half marathon distance (58.33 from den haag in 2007).
watch him flying…

solid training week. nearly the same structure as last week. its nice to average 100 k´s per week so far. my body feels good.

today i went out with simone for the weekly “long one”. after miserable weather in the morning we had a beautiful run along the beach. 32 kilometers with the last 40 minutes progressiv and sun – brilliant!

55 days to rotterdam…

amazing run this morning. i drove my car up to a snow covered wicklow gap and did a uphill run for an hour. the mountains up there are just stunning at the moment.

some readers of this blog will remember this area in different conditions 😉

im not a “heart rate guy” at all.

for training i usually use the sensor of my polar watch (the 400 something series…) to get the mileage and the speed. that is more than enough for me. i don’t want complicate things so running with too much information is not good for me.
i try to run by feeling and not by the signals of a watch.
there are some nice features in the watch anyway. as i like to do time interval’s. with the watch i can programm the alarms beforehand. so i can just concentrate on the run. the watch tells me when to stop and when to go on after the breaks. that’s a really handy feature.

every now and then i use the heart rate function just to get my resting pulse. my resting pulse was never under 40. after a couple of months of training i just did the test yesterday night. this morning my watch showed me a resting pulse of 39. im pretty happy with that. i don’t overrate things like this but it gives me a little indication that training is going OK so far.

finally im a bit of a “heart rate guy” somehow…

ireland got hit by snow. to be correct, by lots of snow. nothing is moving anymore in a country that is not used to the white element.

on my run this evening there were traffic jams all over the place. luckily i just life 5 minutes from my office.

this friday was time for some speedwork. i warmed up for 20 minutes and went on with 2 X 15 minutes on 10 k speed. the legs were pretty sore on the last 15 minutes.

as i was going out with some friends on friday night in belfast i got nice 90 minutes in on saturday morning. i was running along the river lagan. a really nice route. on a very steep hill beside the queens university i did 10 X 80 meters hill sprints.

sunday i joined a little group in phoenix park for the long run. we went out on a relaxed speed for the first loop and then slightly builded up. after 30 k i was on my own and speeded up again. so i got the last 5 kilometeres in 20 minutes in the box. i felt very relaxed on the whole run. a good muddy workout.

the weeks are flying by at the moment.

as always i took it easy on monday evening. i was jogging for 60 minutes and did a good long stretch session after the workout. i still have simo’s statement in my mind. he overtook me in raheny and later he told me my running style looked very stiff. and its true. if i want to avoid injuries and gain a better run technique i definitely have to maintain the flexibility of my muscles. that means more stretching and more stretching and more stretching and more stretching…

as always tuesday was my “rest day”, that means i play 6-a-side football with colleagues for 90 minutes. good fun and serious sprinting involved in that.

on wednesday i met up with rob and a group of runners. we started in tallaght and did a really nice 95 minutes hill session in the “tallaght hills”. very enjoyable but my legs were still a bit fatigued from last sundays raheny race.

thursday weather was very irish again. strong winds were my main enemy for the session. i was running a flat loop beside the liffey channel. the tempo was a bit faster (moderate pace) and my legs responded very good. overall i was very tired. lack of sleep during the week could be the reason for that. at the end i had 65 minutes on the clock.

So far I have 40k in my legs this week. on the weekend i gonna get some long runs in – keep on running. 64 days to rotterdam!