totally out of control

my training is spiraling totally out of control together with the frantic pace of life in the past weeks....

I sometimes go to sleep at 2am or maybe sleep 4-5 hours at most, work a lot and also cater to different family commitments. Unfortunately running tries to fight for space in a disorderly manner.

Highlights of the past 10 days:

- 45 Km long run... I was not gone nut, but in the morning I woke up in Dongguan and went for a 35k long run in the fantastic setting of Tangxia Dapingzhen Park

I have never been there for a run and is really a great place: no cars, inside a forest, a very demanding course...
I wanted to run 2h30' and clocked 35k in the process
The park will for sure be one of my future training grounds!

In the evening, I was in HK and a visiting relative asked me if we could go out for a jog and show him where to run near our home... well...OK... so another 10k very easy..


- 23Km MP run.. starting at 21.30... I finished thew workout at 11pm and then collapsed in bed...

- all this mixed up with days of no running and easy runs...
total daily 45Km and I was not even too tired

Escaped from the Great China firewall

I did not blog for a while because suddenly I found that my work PC's gateway was moved from a HK server to a server in China... So I was caught inside the "great China firewall" and no more blogs, no more foreign news, no more youtube and so on and no more of any website which use a dynamic IP....

Well, not that I spend my working time blogging or reading news on the net, but in a "factory life" the work desk is also the refuge for spending the time after work... usually there is no much to do outside and we do not have our family here, so it is not unusual to stay in office until very late (9 or 10pm) to enjoy the facilities: PC, air-con environment....
the fact that my PC was connected to a HK server gave me also the special privilege to escape all the limitations of internet in China...while if I surf from home I become a common china citizen for whom any search on google give a blank page...

All said, I begged my IT guy to find a solution to get my PC out of exile... and here it is... free again

So more about running in the next occasion

Cold, freddo, frio ! And shattered legs

This is the temperature here this morning....
For a town located at the Tropic is really cold, compounded by a cold drizzle...
I know that compared to North Dakota o Sweden I am in a paradise, but the issue is that house DO NOT have any heating system and insulation. So 3C outside, 3C also in the bedroom or while you step out from the shower....

With this weather I felt better going out running than staying at home, at least there was some endogenous heat production.
The problem is that I come out from the Half Marathon really shattered: Monday I could not even walk downstairs and I opted for riding a stationary bike in the gym (honestly very shameful for a former hard core cyclist...).
Tuesday it was not much better and so I gave it a miss...
This morning, I ventured out in Dongguan before sunrise in total obscurity and it was slightly better but I was basically shuffling....

Being so shattered after an hilly race does not give me good signs for the HK marathon (which is very hilly). So from now on I will focus more on hilly courses and uphill/downhill training....

Half Marathon Championship - report

The start...

After the injury of 1.1.11 I did not feel too confident about doing well at the HK Half Marathon Champs, but it ended up in a decent and satisfactory race for me.

For once, it was a perfect chilly morning in TaiMeiTuk, with temperature around 12-14C, dry and just a moderate wind from the North. I do not think it can be much better than that for running...
With 2400 runners at the start, the race is one of the highlights of the local calendar and it is also one of the very few which is run on closed roads.
I did a couple of jog on friday and saturday and the leg was now working OK, but my HR was totally out of control for such speed... even at slow jog I was over 150bpm... for sure 5 days of inactivity were not helpful.
Also the night-time feeds on weekend are really tiring... I really envy those who fall asleep in few minutes.
For me, after the usual 2-3am night feed of our baby, I can not fall asleep anymore until maybe 5-6am.. and right after that is time to get up for work or else...
So it is really a hard moment for me to train harder or more... but let's go on and see what I can improve (if any).

The course is basically the same as the HK Cycling Championship which I did in June (well, basically it is the only section of road in HK which can be closed to cars for few hours without affecting 3 Mln residents...).
If hills make a nice cycling race, they also mean a HARD running race, so I was planning to start easy for the first half of the race and keep energies for the flat section at the end...

I am #5543...

More or less, it did all went to plan: I really controlled my effort in the uphill section and I was 22nd OE and 2nd Master at half way, than I started to make up grounds and pick up those too daring.

After 14k we eventually come back to the flat and I was really tired, but it was evident that also everybody else was tired... (see exhibit below).

The good point was that I was now around 14-15th place and digging deeper I also caught the 1st Master with 4k to go.

The last 2k were on the famed dam, with strong wind from the side and everybody really hurting badly.

I had to push hard to the end because the 2nd Master was only few seconds behind and I was also taking advantage of being in a small pack of 4, so we were pushing each other hard.

1k to go, 500m to go, 300m to go and everybody start to sprint like rabbits and I am left behind from their younger legs (seriously, I lost 9 seconds from the 12th place in 300m !!! how could they sprint so fast)

The time: 1h16'45" valid for 16th OE and 1st Master (full results HERE)

in 2008 I run 1h15'20" on the same race, so I still margin of improvement versus my previous self (2 kids, many sleepless nights and several injuries before....).

Great race also for Stefano (3rd overall) and Colin (5th overall) to round up another good showing of our newly formed team

Stefano P. in good company

General consideration is that the competitive level in HK has risen dramatically since my stop in 2008...

in 3 years, there are many new young and fast runners and is not a granted to place even in the top 20...

In this race, the winning time has always been in the around of 1h12'-1h13'... this year 1h10'05" with a sprint finish... while 1h13' was only good for 6th place....

I close with a tribute to Thomas and KaHo who did put up a great duel up to the finish line

No need to explain who is Thomas the kenyan and who is KaHo the local. 

Year Start .... badly

There is a saying like "if you do something on January 1st, you will do it all your long"....

So I must really fight my negative thought about getting up from bed on 1/1/11 and being injured !!

I felt a kind of swollen area in the lower section of the "anterior tibialis". I went to a jog but it was worse, so I bailed out and started with RICE...
When I dorsiflexed my right feet, I felt a sharp pain in the shin and even walking was hard...
In short, I did not run until this morning (5 days...), did some cycling, swalled some Voltaren and iced daily...
The pain was less and less every day and today I was able to run 11km, even if my HR was much higher than it should have been...

Now, Sunday is HK Half Marathon Champs, so I am not going to miss it anyway, but a big question mark on my performance. A pity.... because I closed 2010 in excellent shape.
Let's see on Sunday

NOTE: if you want to pick-up your next race and want a good competition, read this ranking of worlds races