Four weeks of training and I feel good. I started my winter training by a strength block as I've done previously prior my best seasons. As usual my legs were aching after the first training sessions but I recovered quite quickly and opposite to last season I have now been able to complete all sessions without problems. In addition to training at gym I've tried to do some hill intervals now that I've found a couple of hills here. My weeks have included 2-3 strength sessions at gym and hill intervals of varying length. Best was the one of 90mins continuous hill running up and down several tops with devilish 666m elevation in total. The longest climb was 1,7km and 140m ascent. In other trainings the hills were only moderate.
In the middle of this heavish strength period I entered myself to a 10km road race in Stratford to get some variation and to run faster for a change. My legs felt a bit heavy and tight from the strength before the race and running didn't feel very easy but I managed to go under 40mins, which was quite ok at this phase. I was second woman and 15th overall, yay! Results
I also ran an awesome o-event in Sheffield just a day ago in beautiful landscape of Burbage Moor with some really fun and tricky orienteering (see the maps below). Terrain was predominantly open moorland but contained areas of complex rock details that offered great technical challenge. There were two micro-o sections on a specific 1:2000 boulder map on the backside of the normal 1:10000 map and you had to turn the map four times during the race. I really fancied the detailed micro-o parts but I also liked the course as a whole as it offered a variety of challenges from details to long legs and you had to adapt your speed at the right level and change your techniques during the race. Results
Now that I've hopefully got some power in my legs, I'll be ready to do more miles during the coming months. In a few days I'll be on my way to Mexico for some warm and sunny runs before skiing in Finland :)
