Author: Marius

it – original training program for the youngsters (at St.Patrick High School – where “all” the best comes from) Enjoy 🙂

All is well with me. After 50 cm. of snow (just like that – in a day) I have been running on the treadmill lately. It is fine, as long as I know Kenya with its red packed sand roads and 25 degrees C is only a week away ! That is the great thing about being a runner……away from all the winter and ready to relax, train, sleep and eat…..:-) The freedom to do this, is what I remember when I think about all the time I use for my training and the hard training sessions 🙂

Marius

bored, or plan to do some web-shopping, check them out.

I also have the half-year results for the site ready now. In 6 months we have had 960 000 hits, 400 000 full page views (this is really the number to look at, “hits” is only when someone click on mb.com) and around 80 000 unique server users (how many different computers that have been on) The most active day was the 27th of September with over 60 000 hits (the day I ran in Sydney). The intersting thing is that the month of November was just as good as the month of August, so people are coming back even off-season. To the users : thank you for the great visitor numbers and the emails you send me. I cannot answer them all (or hardly any of them) but I hope you get some good information from these pages anyways.

🙂 Marius

now down at 21.49. I started with 23.40, then had 22.50, and now 21.49. This test is one of the intervalls of a longer training session – it is run on asphalt (concrete), mostly flat in the beginnings (to avoid lactate accumulation) and hills in the middle. It is a no wind course, so conditions are the same every time.

It is like this every year. In a week I am “just like that” in shape -my training is starting to work. I am a training/genetic talent – in that order (I have natural talent, but the key to my running is the combination of genetics with very thought through training) From now on I can start running the times I did last winter – and hopefully get to another level. It feels great to be back in normal shape again, from feeling all slow and strugglig for about 6 weeks 🙂

All well,

Marius

Sonia Henie Hall. We sat at a very prominent table (about 40 tables total) with people like Trine Hattestad ( Olympic Javelin Champ from Sydney, WR holder and winner of the Golden League total for all events), Egil Danielsen (Olympic Javelin Champion from 1956), Anne Tiedemann (president of the Norwegian athletics federation) and the Princess of Norway, Märtha Louise. The athmosphere was relaxed and the evening showed to be a perfect end to an Olympic year.

All thoughts about last year closed there, and it is 100 % time to look ahead.

Marius

loooong hard AT sessions, though). But today I had to….I simply did not have enough mileage this week, and “needed” some more – but tomorrow is an AT day so I wanted something easy.

So I went with a friend for 21 km – about 1 hour 20 minutes…..it was a beautiful run – up to the Nordmark chapel located in the forest north in Oslo far away from roads and city noice. It felt good for once to do this, and I might throw in some more of those once in a while. I do not believe they give me more training then the regular 45-50 minutes I do (and have physiological backing for this) , but it does give you a good float and with some sprints up hills it gives you a nice slow fartlek. Interesting – we are in the beginning of December and still no snow here ! Great for runners, but for skiing nation like Norway it is rather unusual. At least we have SOME snow right now. But I do not complain and hope it will stay like this until I leave for Kenya the 2nd of January.

All well –

Marius

run fast on the track. But since your real aim always is track running, doing track work is what I like the most. It is shorter, faster and more exciting then the long, hard distance work.

Per Halle, one of the people I work the closest with, never thought I was going to be a long distance runner when I was younger. He said I had the mind of an 800 meter runner and got bored every time I ran longer then 25 minutes. I simply did not have enough patience. But I loved track work then and I still do. Too bad my training has very little of it 🙂 Almost never more then once a week – maybe twice a week in the racing season.

I am injury free and trying to hit top-up-mileage weeks at the moment,

Marius

extremely demandig mentally to focus through the long series of intervalls (total of 64 minutes split up AT running – plus 20 min. warmup/cooldown) But I got through it with strength and determination. Now I am excited about doing more hard session and prepare for my first altitude stay in Kenya!

We have now booked tickets to go there – I will go down there the 2nd of January and stay for 19 days. Frank, my physiologist and loyal “team” memeber will be with my as usual. So that is what I am working towards now. It is great to have these altitude stays, because it breaks up your regular running pattern and the winter gets so much shorter with the mental refreshments. And it is extremely motivational to train with the Kenyans down there and “feel” that you can run with them. I have planned 4 stays this winter – just perfect.

Looking forward to new training days like today –

Marius

try to make an article from them later, when I have more time to do so. They were quite interesting – lots of information (a total of 7 hours ! ). I had heard most of it before from my phone conversations/letter writing/training camps, but it is always a good thing to be reminded once in a while. He is one of the few people I REALLY listen to. There are so many “no hopers” out there wanting to tell you what to do….but they simply do not have 1) the knowledge 2)the respect of what it takes to be really top class. Mr. Coe has both of those – he has extreme knowledge of the field and he always aims for the top. I will definately continue working with him in the future (usually we talk about every other week in the winter, once or twice/week in the summer)

On Saturday we took him out to eat at the Holmenkollen Restaurant, together with Frank and Ståle Jan. Except for Per, I had most of the “team” around me there. It was great. We all think the same way – very result oriented, analytical and knowledge based. Just seeing how well we work together – with ideas and theories – I can feel myself building as an athlete, brick by brick. I know what we have figured out works, and now we are just putting on more of it on top. With some brilliant ideas of how to do so. It was a quite interesting evening.

Now it will probably be a little quite from me for a week or so…exams coming up……so I have to concentrate on that a bit. You know, an athlete/student can never rest – either it is exams and school or it is races 🙂

All from me,

Marius

detailed training program for next year. I will continue with all the main principles from last year, but I have some new clever ideas I also want to add. This coming weekend, when Mr. Coe arrives, will be a perfect oppurtunity to discuss those things. Mr. Coe has an eye for details and systematic periodiazation – where to fit in what, and together with Frank and Per in helping me with my daily training, I hope to continue to improve. I have only run long distance since January 99 (was a middle distance runner before) and I still have plenty of time to develop.

We we also get into a discussion on when to do different stays in Kenya. I will for sure do one in January and one in the beginning of March. Then one right before the season and maybe one in December. The idea is to go down there with an interval of 30-60 days – to have “fresh” blood cells when I am at sea level. Plus, I can do short, faster work in between camps and build endurance when I am at altitude.

All well,

Marius

the middle of exams and meetings.

But it is also nice to feel the “float” again. To stride out and really use your body, with no everyday worries.

I have also started to plan next year. I will travel 3-5 times to Kenya and use altitude even more. It worked great for me last year, so that is definately something I want to continue with. With those training camps down there, the winter gets alot shorter and you are more motivated in your everyday training.

I just found out that the 5000 meters at the World Champs next year is the 6th and the 10th of August. That will suit me well, and I will plan my racing season with those dates in mind.

All well with me. With a long hard training year in front…..

Marius

Ps : check out “the message board” and participate. It is gradually increasing its number of “members” 🙂