How to refuse a world cup qualification

You might ask yourself why I refused a qualification for the world cup switzerland. It's a long story, but I can try to describe the recent happenings and my attitude:
The main difference between me and a top athlete could be that the key purpose of my training is not the improvement of the performance, but getting a good feeling and doing something I can be proud of. For example, when I feel like running (and this is quite often the case ;-)), I run, notwithstanding that it would be smarter to rest, with regard to the next competition. It's simply more important for me to have as much fun as possible than to perform as good as possible. Since performing well is also a lot of fun, I run competitions. One very attractive would have been the world cup switzerland.
BUT: In the week before the testrace, I got an e-mail that said, I won't be selected for the world cup, no matter which result I run in the test race. Baam. Of course they only want athletes in the team, that really concentrate on this race and cooperate with the trainers. I'm effectively not that kind of athlete. Anyway I was surprised about this e-mail. And I just decided to show at the testrace, that their decision was wrong. I estimated my chance not too high because my training was indeed not ideal the last weeks. But at the race day I felt quite good and was motivated, furthermore there was a big will to give everything and be concentrated all the race long (Actually, orienteering should be always like this ;-)). The result was a stable race with only one mistake of about 30 seconds and a 6th place, so the condition for the world cup would have been fulfilled.
After having accepted all this, late in the evening I anyway decided to inform the athlete-helper about the situation. This lead to a selection that would have been followed by certain special constraints for me. For example I would have been obliged to work out a training plan together with the trainer, communicate, summarized: show actively, that I focus on the world cup race. Sounds not too difficult. So, GO FOR IT, I first thought.
But was this really what I wanted? I was not sure, so I went running and after about one hour I came to the decision that I want to do without the world cup, namely because of four reasons:

1) Accepting the qualification would have implied sudden changes in my race preparation, of which I think, they don't make me run better on day X: I would have discussed my training with the trainers, I would have spent a lot of time writing everything down, and maybe I even would have had to justify myself why I'm singing in the chorus on wednesday evening instead of atteding the orienteering training, for example. I didn't want all this to be part of my preparation.
2) The chance that I couldn't compete in the sprint on sunday (my childhood dream ;-)) was quite big. Only 9 world cup points so far... (on sunday, only the first 40 of the world cup intermetiate standings can start)
3) After the e-mail I've already deleted the world cup out of my mind, and somehow it's nothing but consequent to say no.
4) With my renouncement I give a world cup starting place to someone else, who wants this maybe 100 times more than me.

See you in Liestal! :-)

GPS of the Testrace 13.9.2014
Results of the testrace 13.9.2014
Qualifications for the world cup switzerland

Wonderful terrain Selamatt

My new Racer ST 5 after exactly 42.195 km under my foot.

bright look-out

It's the journey, not the destination.

Last Sunday, for the first time in my life, I finished an orienteering race with a race time bigger than the maximum race time. I was not yet completely recovered from one day of sickness, so I thought, easy, I just won't run very fast. Not a bit of it! During the race I got more and more tired and told myself: No stress, it doesn't matter. But telling me "no stress" means also killing my smallest intention to move visibly forward! And thus, I walked more than I ran. Together with a lot of lacks in concentration, a long distance (swiss championships 2014, unfortunately) takes time. 3 hours and 5 minutes. I admit, there would have been funnier things to do than lugging myself to the finish. But it was not for nothing: I practised compass-walking and did plenty of find-out-where-I-am exercices! Not least, the terrain was so gorgeous that I wished I carried my phone with me, to take pictures (... but then it would have taken 4 hours, and in consequence I would have missed the last public transport connection home. Luckily I didn't have it with me!)

What happened since my last post here? Far too much to mention all the funny, surprising, beautiful, unforgettable, shocking moments, happenings and heroic actions. But it's time to inform about a slight change in my training style. Because three months ago, a 2-hours-run was still quite long for me. Coming back from a 3h-run (on Lanzarote) felt like coming back from the moon and having bet everything and everyone! But now, 2 hours for example is a quite small duration of a running training. At the moment I run about 3 hours per day on average. Somehow I got addicted to this incredible feeling at the end of a very long training when everything is fine, everyone is good, the energy is endless. During a run, the most frequent question I ask myself is: WHY NOT? And since I can’t find a sufficient reason to stop, I continue. Insufficient reasons to stop are for example:

-          1) the last train of today is leaving

-          2) such long and slow runs might make me slower

-          3) and they might stress my body

But they are simply insufficient:

-          1) there are more trains the next morning - so just run the whole night long

-          2) who cares? who said I have to be fast?

-          3) I don’t think so, because my running style is so heavily economic and joint-friendly (=ugly!!) that my body has nothing against such crazy shit. If the recovery afterwards isn't skipped, notabene.

Logical consequence: run as much as you can! Enjoy the feeling of leaving space behind you under your own power! Some days I finish after 5 hours, instead of the planned 2 hours. And here, as an example, you can read what I’ve trained in the week from july 28 to august 3:

Monday: 4h jogging, 30min strength
Tuesday: 7x1000m on track in 3:50 to 3:36 plus 7x200m in 38s to 36s, running time altogether 2h10
Wednesday: 3h10 jogging, 10min strength
Thursday: 30min jogging, 1h40 in about 4:30min/km, 20min jogging.
Friday: 20min jogging, 20min warm up, 1h04 swiss championships mountain running, 2h30 cool down very slow.
Saturday: 55min jogging, 1h50 jogging always a bit faster.
Sunday: 50min run, 3h15 jogging at the end faster.

That's what I've written down. Total running amount of the week above: 23 hours and 40 minutes. It's comforting, that this was a week in which I worked 41 hours, because this shows that it's possible to exagerrate even with a 100%-job (although not ideal, because in this week I didn't sleep enough).
Maybe this phase of immoderate training runs will be over as quick as it came. For example when the university-sport starts in its full version. But in all probability I will keep it like this. What I certainly won't do again: Bike downhill without a lamp and without company in a steep slope stressed by the sunset. Because it could have ended up MUCH worse! And: train excessively (3x5000m on track with 4h cooldown) and sleep almost nothing within three days. One day of sickness was the clear signal, that this was simply too much.

But now, seven positive things :-):

1) I'm still able to run 10km in 37:40 (Münsiger-Louf, August 9), out of a horrible training amount. Results.

2) I'm able to run 10 hours through the night after a hard race (Münsiger-Louf, August 9) and compete in another race the next day (Ursenbacher-Trophy, August 10). Read the text below to know more about this adventure:

Last Saturday, something really strange happened to me. ..No, ok, it was my own decision. I started for a long cool down after the very hard “Münsige-Louf” (10km running competition, 37min40sec). Somehow I felt very persistent (also due to caffeine), so I decided not to stress to catch the last train to Bern to the buskers festival, no, I decided to try out something new: run the whole night long. I said to myself: It’s a night of a full moon, I’m under caffeine, I have to work only on Tuesday, there’s no race the next weekend (only the next day at 11 a.m. ;-)), so JUST DO IT!
The result: start on Saturday at 18:20 in Münsingen, furthermost point in Interlaken at 23:20, finish in Münsingen on Sunday at 4:30. I would not say, it was easy, but I survived and it could have been more difficult, I think. There were terrible phases of tiredness (Hooray!! My body knows indeed something like a circadian rhythm!!), that made me run not in a straight line, almost weave, and long for the finish. Somehow these phases always disappeared again. All in all I just needed a little bit of patience and all the way enough madness not to turn around or stop.

3) From my home in Büetigen, I theoretically only have to pay 12 swiss francs to get to the sea within two days. This is the amount I've payed for my bike trip to Genova in July, apart from all the (numerous) food expenses and the cost of a new bike in Brig. I took the train until Domodossola (12 CHF for the bike transport), then I cycled from 12 o'clock to 2 o'clock in the next morning, slept 2 hours, carried on cycling, but had to realize that the only chance to stay awake was eating all the time (and this was somehow no option), so I slept another 2 hours and arrived completely exhausted under the hot italian sun at the port in Genova. Beach only 10km further, the tourist information said. No, thank you. Instead: run through the city. And now I can tell you: Genova is the ugliest city I've ever seen! But it's anyway the journey, not the destination.

4) Zermatt (swiss-o-week 2014) was great! Here some epic moments:
- the incredibly cool sheeps (Oberwalliser Schwarznasenschafe)
- the view to the Matterhorn from an unusual direction (picture only in my head)

- the cool rain on my skin
- the incredibly beautiful horses
- the tourists that asked me for the way to Zermatt while we always saw this place down in the valley.
- all these funny and friendly Asians, always smiling and taking pictures.
- the foresight
- the sudden weather changes
- Eric Bucher that lends me a body warmer, so that I don't have to abandon my aim Gornergrat. Thank you!


- the high wind shredding my hiking map
- the energy after a 5h run
- the morning ambiance on the campsite
- the sudden orienteering flow after a phase of unmotivation
- the swim through the Schwarzsee in pouring rain
- the nice people of my club ol.biel.seeland
- the sound of glacial ice falling down
- touching the Matterhorn
- the man on the wheelchair, that was speeding through the village, holding on to one of these electric cars

5) Here are the results of the awesome Strongmanrun 2014 (June 7): Results

6) Almost forgot: World Cup and Jukola in Finland. Awesome, great, fantastic, superb, ... even with terrible results in some races.

7) I've finally found the perfect hot chocolate. In Biel. <3 <3 <3

Warming up for the Münsiger-Louf 2014.

Wasting my last strength for the sake of a good picture at the end of the race.

Heading for Thun, very unsure if I will make it until Interlaken.

Yes, I did it. At about 5 in the morning after the 10 hours run.

Passing the delicious carbonara sauce on my way to Genova.

Genova, apart from its touristic old town, consists of a terribly huge quantity of scooters, motorbikes and cars.

... when you forget to take off your shorts before jumping in the fountain.

Walliser Schwarznasenschafe. Coolest sheeps ever.

Touch the Matterhorn.

Photo shooting also in subprime weather.

My bike for one day.

... when there's just no bigger lake available.

No worries, I'm not always just running. Sometimes I'm also watersliding. Fisherman's Friend Strongmanrun 2014 Engelberg. Can't wait for the next edition!

Ready? Let's get toasted!

Tomorrow I'm having the fun of my life at the strongmanrun in Engelberg (SUI) (www.strongmanrun.ch). On monday I'm flying to Helsinki because I got the chance to compete in the 3rd round of the orienteering world cup, a sprint race consisting of qualification and final in Imatra (FIN) (http://www.worldcupimatra2014.com/in-english/general/). It's followed on thursday with a sprint relay. Then we're heading to the legendary jukola relay (http://www.jukola.com/2014/en/), which takes place about 50km from Kuopio (FIN). It will be awesome to finally run again for Järla! So, the next seven days can come. Let's get toasted. ...Don't wonder what this might mean. I just came home from the "toasted challenge" (which was hilarious!), and the main point is that it sounds good...

GP BERN 2014

from january to april

A lot of things happend since my last post in January (!). Logically. You can always think: if I'm not blogging, my life is going on well. I'm blogging, when the bad concience is getting too big. As it is the case now. Actually I have a lot to tell! Or rather: I had. Sometimes I wrote some sentences down, that I absolutely wanted to include in my next post, but now I can't find those pieces of paper anymore. Except this one, probably from one day in February:

"Marzili - still my favourite place. Realized this yesterday when I granted me a short swim in the 6 degree cold Aare. Simply the best!"

The picture belonging to this cold-water-flash is locked in my dead mobile phone.. anyhow I don't manage to wake it up again.

Ok. There were lots of runners-highs in my numerous trainings which were sometimes excessively long ;-), there was a try to improve my 800m an 1000m best times indoor (failed), a greeeeat one-week running training camp in Lanzarote (sport from dawn to dusk), a freestyle snowboard course, the swiss cross country championships (3rd place), the survival run in Thun, the sprint training camp in Italy, and then the testraces where my foot-injury started. My biggest fear was that it doesn't get better. Because I had to realize that I'm absolutely not made for no running at all! This fear was the worst. But as always I have to emphasize the positive things: Have you ever done an orienteering training in high heels? I have! Thanks to my injury. I began to love these shoes, that allowed me to do a whole orienteering training without feeling any pain in my left foot, and thus without thinking of it. This was fucking important for my mental health! ..Which is for sure related to my physical health. I strongly hoped that the pain disappears soon, so that the latter sentences were not complete bullshit.. And I can happily announce, that I can already run normal again now!! After about two weeks of a huge training workload of inline skating and biking and strength training and slow-motion-jogging and swimming and high-heels-therapy ;-). Can anybody tell me why I'm always favoured by so much fortune??

So now, the Grand Prix of Bern can come! The testraces for the world champs in Italy too. And if you are in switzerland from mai 8 to mai 10, come and listen (and watch) the masterpiece I'm preparing intensively with "Der chor" these days ;-). Information here: http://www.derchor.ch/website/Aktuell.html

 Ah now I found a note that I've made after my running camp in february:

"I'm back from Lanzarote with about 206 km running training in my legs (within exactly 7 days). Great that I sometimes don't feel like running now! The first day at home I even felt more like biking!! It was just awesome there on the impressive canary island and in the club la santa, which was simply a paradise for me (more than 30 sports, a shop with plenty of chocolate and ice creams, cold sea water, ...)

one day I wrote down some impressions. It was the 7th of february, the 3rd day of my training camp:

Every day I discover my new "one and only" sport, wednesday it was step aerobics. I could haldly stop! Thursday it was windsurfing. I got soon addicted to the feeling of the wind in the sail."

"shopping in the swiss alps"

Nothing's impossible

I'm definetely looking forward to the season 2014! The latter has already started with the first race of Elite League which was a lot of fun (as expected) and ended up with a fifth place for me (as set as my goal). Cool!
Results 1. Nationaler OL 12.1.2014:
qualification race
final race

The weeks before without any competition felt weird and made me hungry for more. Even so they were great! Parkour, inline skating, snowboarding, running as much as I wanted, work at the kiosk, jump in cold water and of course: be mad at any given opportunity. Please note that my motivation is not always at the highest stage. For example, in the last orienteering training I made only about 3.5 km in 1 hour due to a lot of walking/climbing instead of running. I was very tired and stumbled over the fallen trees like a awkward jumping jack. But it was beautiful, sometimes I couldn't help laughing at myself, and it still counted as an orienteering training!)

Here an incomplete list of what I learned in the last days:
- Caffeine makes me run 12 km as a cooldown even if there is the final race a few hours later. This day I ran not less than 42 km, I calculated! Second cooldown after the final race included. Yes, the endless running started to bore me and made me tired somehow, but I couldn't stop! At about 16:30 I broke off with a 50 second bath in the lake in the nearby park. Nice! It was about 360mg of caffeine...
- It's possible to go to an orienteering training without a map. Just print it within your 8 minutes of transfer time at Bern railway station.
- Football two against one can be extremely funny. You just have to add new rules.
- Parkour with gloves only if you like them dripping wet.
- I'm able to life on bubble gums and peppermint tea during one day. A lot of sport as usual. It was a funny new experiment, it worked!

Some results of races I haven't mentioned yet (which does not at all mean they were not cool!):
Bieler Cross 10.11.13
Langenthaler Stadtlauf 23.11.13
Basler Stadtlauf 30.11.13
Course de l'Escalade 7.12.13
Trotteuse Tissot 14.12.13
Zürcher Silvesterlauf 15.12.13 Sie und Er (together with Gil Meyer)
Zürcher Silvesterlauf 15.12.13 Elite

One of my latest orienteering trainings:

..and some more pictures of a great winter so far:

snowboarding

on track

zibelemärit

freeze

snowshoe walking above the fog boundary

because of too much energy and for lack of anything better to do

on track 2

"meine Auszeit" :-)