GRANNY GEAR

2009 is here and I’m struggling to get into any sort of routine – whether it’s exercise, blogging, working, etc. This week has been hectic at work and, yes, if you can believe it, my social calendar. It seems like I’ve either done 2 workouts a day or zero. Hopefully next week I’ll get back into the routine of working out every morning. If I can do that, everything else should fall into place.

Obviously, I’ve been writing about skiing a lot lately. As a blogger, one of the cool things is that everything is so new. I have tons of questions regarding technique, waxing, ski flex, training, etc. As someone who’s been running for 30 years, it can be very difficult to remember what it was like when everything was so new and exciting. So being able to capture these thoughts and feelings along the way is pretty cool - at least to me.

Of course, being new to the sport can be very frustrating too. I still constantly find myself confused by all the different techniques, along with all the different names for the same technique – depending on who you talk to. It appears I’m still getting V1 and Open Field mixed up. Well, not necessarily mixed up, but my Open Field technique was such that I assumed it’s slower and more leisurely than the V1. Then last weekend, Chris showed me I was planting my poles at the wrong time. With this slight correction, Open Field “should be” faster than V1. Thinking back to last year’s Korte, I basically used V1 the whole way because I thought that was my best/fastest technique. Another indication that V1 might not be the fastest technique occurred to me when I read an article where it was described as the “granny gear” of skiing.

So it appears I still have a lot of work to do as I prepare for the Birkie. One thing I’m trying to do along the way is enjoying the journey. I know this can sound cliché, especially this time of year with all the resolutions floating around. However, too often, with marathons, I get so caught up in all the numbers and a time goal that I don’t enjoy all the cool things that go into each marathon build-up. Even when I trained for Ironman Wisconsin, it was more about just doing the training in order to get to the finish line. Looking back, I think I could have enjoyed that journey a lot more.

Quote of the Day;

“The problem for a 37-year-old athlete is they’ve probably been doing it for 25 years. At that point the mind goes, ‘Let’s do something else here. This is enough.’” – Lance Armstrong, talking about the challenges he faces, compared to younger riders, during his comeback