Recovering in different ways

stats of the week: run 14 km, cycled 98 km, hill walked 42 km
stats of the previous week: run 6 km, cycled 39 km, hill walked 35 km
stats of the week before: indoor cycled 1 h, hill walked 8 km

Recovering from London meant a lazy week at home first, then a week of easy hill walking on the island of Sardinia, followed by a sportive week in France.

I still suffer from a mild heel spur that keeps me from intensifying my running. Luckily I am able to do short jogs up to 10 km without bigger problems.

Some impressions of Sardinia:

Walking Mt Ventoux was a very different experience after 10 times up there via bike:

A happy day - Number 22 in the box

 London Marathon 2021 result: 4:31:34, 133rd M65 of  333, 19,600th overall of 35,867

As you see in the photo, my 22nd London Marathon was a very happy day. The world seemed to be back to normal. More than 35,000 runners on the route, the crowds were nearly as big as ever and the people's behaviour let me forget the Brexit. Londoners are as polite and helpful as they have been in better times.

My race plan - alternating 5 km running by 500 m walking - worked until km 32. Then I had to extend the walking parts and to shorten the running parts. It was a strange feeling to walk already after 5 km when everybody raced by. But it payed. In spite of my limited preparation I was able to keep my pace far into the race and was very happy to finish after roughly 4.5 hours. This experience makes me hope that I will be able to keep on running for some more years.

From Ventoux to the Mall

stats of the week so far: cycled 133 km
stats of the previous week: run 42 km, cycled 205 km

Finally I managed to do a long jog of 23 km - having walking rests in between every 5 km. I still hope this enables me to get to the finish line on the Mall in London. My plan is to walk 500m every 5 km from the beginning on.

On the way I celebrated a jubilee at Mont Ventoux: my 10th ascent on the bike, 5 from Sault, 3 from Bedouin and 2 from Malaucène.

Failing to prepare for London

stats of the week: run 24 km, cycled 234 km
stats of the previous week: run 13 km, cycled 46 km
stats of the week before: run 14 km, cycled 124 km

Building up my mileage was interrupted by an infection that kept me resting for a week. Now I aim to do just one longish run of more than 20 km to get somewhat fit for the London Marathon. The plan is to finish the marathon by jogging 5 km each followed by a short rest and some minutes of walking. This hopefully will enable me to get to the finish line at sub 5 hours. Last year this worked fairly well.

This weekend's highlight was a bike tour from our French home at Mollans sur Ouvèze to the Ardèche Gorge and back the next day.

Success in Berlin

stats of the week: run 14 km, cycled 90 km, indoor cycled 30 km, treadmill walked 12 km
stats of the previous week: run 35 km

The Berlin Half Marathon was a success regarded my limited volume of training. Unexpectedly I was able to finish just sub 2 hours at 1:59:29. The final 3 km were a tough fight but I finished in style in front of a doctor who inspected my eyes and let me go on to receive my well earned medal. It was such a good experience to be part of real running event again.

Now the next countdown has already started: 5 weeks to London. I hope Boris Johnson will let us in.

Photo: Enjoying the final stretch to the finish line in Berlin.

Ready for Berlin

stats of the week: run 39 km, cycled 73 km

I was able to fulfil my schedule and increased my long run to 18 km. Quite happy about this. It nearly feels like at the time I was a real runner. Now I look forward to Sunday and running my 7th half marathon in Berlin and 60th half marathon overall.

I don't feel ready for a sub 2 hours but 2:05 should be possible if it isn't a bad day. Half an hour slower than in former years, that's life.

Farewell to Provence

stats of the week: run 29 km, cycled 110 km

I was able to extend the "long" run to 12 km what is sufficient at the time. I still hope to get to about 17 or 18 km to prepare for Berlin Halfmarathon in 2 weeks. Cycling has to stand back now and I reckon most of this year's cycling is done meanwhile. I will certainly sum up more than 6,000 cycling kilometers this year what makes still one my best cycling years ever although my performance was somewhat low.

Some more impressions of my number one cycling area.