Esimene nädal soojas kliimas

Jooksmine -20 kraadise külmaga

Nädal aega tagasi, 5. veebruaril, sai siis minu jaoks talv lõplikult läbi ning kolisin koos ratta ja jooksusussidega mõnusa Lanzarote päikese alla. Talv oli kulgenud üle ootuste hästi ja tuleb tunnistada, et mina nautisin harjumatult sooja jõuluaega ja aastavahetust. Kui ma tavaliselt krõbeda külmaga väga palju õues trenni teha ei taha, siis sellise mõõduka, kord plussis kord miinuses, ilmaga on väga mõnus väljas jooksmas käia. Ei ole ma ka eriti suur suusamees, kes seda Tartu Maratoni taga nutaks. Kui siis jaanuari lõpu poole ilm kaheks nädalaks krõbedaks külmaks ära kiskus, tegin ainult mõned jooksutrennid õues ja kiiremad lõigutrennid kolisin ära sisehalli. Ujumised üritasin nii paigutada, et koos teiste TriSmilekadega koos ujumise lõpetaksin. Mina hüppasin vette 7:30 hommikul, nemad tulid kell 8 ja koos läksime kell 9 hommikusöögile.

Laagris elan siin koos Rait Rataseppaga, kes juba novembrikuust saati on ennast siin marrokolaseks päevitanud ja valmistub siin Lanzarote IM võistluseks, üheks kahekordseks IM ja ka mõneks ultrajooksuks see aasta. Mees, kelle jaoks ei ole probleem hommikul 30km joosta, siis ujuma minna ja õhtul jooksulindi peal intervalle joosta - ulme!

Lugemine +20 kraadise päikese all

Kuigi olen siin alles nädal aega päikest nautinud on selle ajaga juba üht teist juhtunud. Olen aasta võrra vanemaks saanud, võidelnud ratta otsas tuulega, vulkaani otsa roninud, tuletõrjujaametit katsetanud ja nii mõndagi veel.

Reisisin siia koos Liisuga, kes tuli siia nädalaks Eesti talvest puhkama. Talle oli see esimene reis Kanaaridele ja seetõttu ka paras reisiärevus sees. Lendasime Tallinast läbi Londoni, kus oli vaja öö lennujaamas veeta, Arrecifesse. Samal ajal, kui mina igal võimalusel magada üritasin, kõige parem uni tuli just lennul Tallinn-London ja 20cm laiadel lennujaama radikatel, oli Liis enamus ajast ärkvel ja lõpus sihtpunkti kohale jõudes nii väsinud, et vajas väljapuhkamiseks ühe korraliku 14tunnise une. 

Järgnevad päevad aga nägid juba nii välja, et mina tegin trenni ning Liis samal ajal päevitas ja luges raamatut, aga mõnikord tuli ise ka trenni kaasa. Nii ta saigi tunda kuidas iga rattatrenni alguses on vaja kõigepealt 4km mäkke sõita ja kuidas on, kui tuul puhub nii kõvasti, et mõnikord on raske tee peal püsida. 

Matkamine mõõda kaljulist rannikuäärt

Üks lahe trenn oli selline. Mina pidin 2 tundi jooksma ja Liis tuli mulle pudelikandjaks ratta peal kaasa. Mina jooksin mööda liivadüüne ja "kuumaastiku" ning Liis rõõmustas, et sai lõpuks rahulikus tempos rattaga kaasa sõita ja päikest ning ümbruskonda nautida. Soos (mõeldud on kõrvalküla nimega "Soo", mis asub kohe väikese mäe nõlval) juhtus selline huvitav intsident, et meist mööda mootorratas sõitev, mille peal oli kaks meieealist noormeest, läks korraga põlema. Noored hüppasid motika pealt maha, ühel juba dressipüksid leekides ja mõtlesid et mis nüüd? Liis ja mina olime samamoodi hämmingus, et mida kuradit? Vett või spordijooki vist ei hakka peale kallama? Pärast lühikest mõtlemisaega hakkasime tuld tee kõrvalt võetud liivaga kustutama. Kui tuli oli peaaegu kustutatud proovis üks noormees mootorratast uuesti püsti tõsta, mille peale see taas poolemeetriste leekide alla mattus. Kui tuli sai teist korda kustutatud, siis noormehed enam sama viga teist korda ei teinud ja jäid ootama kuni mootor maha jahtub. Umbes tund aega hiljem uuesti samast kohast mööda joostes oli alles vaid suur liivahunnik. Huvitav oli see, et teised kohalikud külaelanikud põlevat mootorratast nähes ei tundunud väga üllatunud - ju siis ei olnud see nende jaoks esimene kord.

Rattasõit kuumaastikul

Trennidest ja oludest siin üldisemalt rääkides siis rattasõit on siis paras mägine. Ookeani äärest La Santa külast välja sõites peab kõigepealt umbes 300m kõrgusele ronima, enne kui esimest lauget teed oodata on. Spidomeetrinäitude järgi sõit võib kiiresti halvasti lõppeda, sest vastutuul võib ka kõige mõnusamana tunduvat laskumist tunduvalt aeglustada. Õnneks puhuvad siin enamasti põhjatuuled, mis tähendab, et trenni alustades saab taganttuulega mäest ülesse ronida ja trenni lõpus saab rahulikult vastutuulega mäest alla veereda. Sõidu ajal jälgin ainult enda südamelöögisagedust. Kui see tõuseb liiga kõrgele, hakkab minu Mio kell koheselt piiksuma ja ei lõpeta piiksumist enne, kui olen tempot veidi alla kruvinud. Süsteem toimib väga hästi! 

Kui veel natuke tuultest kirjutada, siis kõik, kes mõtlevad, et eelmise aasta poolpika triatloni EMV Valgas oli väga tuuline, on teretulnud siia külla tulema. Korraliku tuulega sõidad ühes suunas 55-60km/h ja teises 20km/h. Kui tuul puhub külje pealt, siis taskurätti ei lähe vaja, sest tuul ise imeb sul nina puhtaks (järgi proovitud ja toimib!).

Ujumine ja päevitamine ühes

Ujumiseks on Club La Santas olemas värskes õhus 50m bassein ja ka mõnus laguun, mis pakub väga soodsaid avavee ujumisvõimalusi. Samas laguunis toimub ka Ironman 70.3 Lanzarote võistlus ja ujumistrassi boid on siianii veel osaliselt olemas. Kuna bassein ise on aga pidevalt täis, siis käib siis kõva juurdeehitus ja see sügis avatakse siis veel kaks 50m basseini - ehk siis kokku 3x50m basseini ühes spordikompleksis... pole paha.

Jooksmiseks on lugematu hulk liivaseid jooksuradasid. Võid joosta lõputuid kilomeetreid mööda liivadüüne või matkata mööda kaljust rannikuäärt mõne vana vulkaanikraatri sisse. Lõike ja intervalle saab joosta Club La Santa staadionil, mis on kogu spordikeskuse kompleksi üks osa. 

Sel nädalavahetusel on meil torm. Öösel tuul puhus nii kõvasti, et maja katus vilistas ja ventilatsioonisüsteem undas. Tuulekiirused pidid täna olema kuni 40km/h ja homme kuni 50km/h. Isegi kohalike jaoks pidi see päris ulme olema. Eilsest 25 soojakraadist on hetkel veel 16 alles jäänud. Ma sisustan aega jooksmise ja ÜKE-harjutustega, kuigi Raidu sõnul on sellise tuulega joosta ka vastik, sest tuul pidavat jalad kokku peksma. Ise oma nahal pole veel proovinud.

Järgmisel nädalal liituvad meiega veel mitmed triatleetid. Esmaspäeval kolib Aleksandr Latin La Santasse, teisipäeval saabub Ain koos perega ja viimasena liitub Kirill Kotšegarov. 

Vaade meie kortermaja katuselt

Training planning the way it should be

Last week Sportlyzer introduced a brand new version of our training planner tool for coaches. It looks a bit similar to the old planner and still maintains basically the same "Excel-like" workflow, which so many coaches love. This time we focused on giving coaches even more detail for every week and every workout they plan. We also introduced a new feature we like to call "Workout template", which will hopefully make the life of so many coaches easier. I have been ridiculously excited about this new planner since I saw its first drawings and prototypes in the early November of 2013 and I have waited for this blogpost since they released the first beta-version for testers approximately a month ago. Here is why:

Our aim was to make training-planning for single athletes and whole training groups as fast and easy as possible. We wanted our planner to boost the efficiency of training and season planning by delivering advanced features and a growing level of detail, which we have not seen at any other training planning platform.

Take advantage of every inch of your screen to create training plans that will bring your athletes success!

The basics

This set of features was mostly already available for the last planner as well. I will still give a short overview for those, who might not be familiar with the old planner and point out 2 new features, which were made for the new planner.

Speaking about the "basics" I speak about the fundamental tools, Sportlyzer offers to create a long-term plan for athletes or training groups. First, you start with your goals or competitions, which you are preparing for. This will be your anchor points for how you want to plan your season and when you want raise the amount of training and when to rest - this is your strategy.

Depending on how long your season is and in which part of the preparation your are starting to plan, you will want to divide your plan into different cycles - most commonly named "General preparation", "Specific preparation" and "Race Season" (but you can also be as specific as "Training camps", "Speed preparation", "Endurance training", etc.). Now you already have a great view of how your season will probably look like and you can always come back and make changes if something doesn't go "according to plan".

What's new?

First you will recognise, that competitions are no longer linked to specific workouts, which gives you much more freedom in describing your competitions. Let's say you are planning on competing at a tournament, which goes on for multiple days. In the old planner you had to add a competition for each day of the tournament and for each race or game individually. It also forced you to specify duration and other things, which might not be relevant for you while planning. This was annoying so we changed it and added some more useful fields instead.

The second new feature, which already has been out there for a couple of weeks, is "Events". You can use events to describe all sorts of seminars, lectures, gatherings, etc., which doesn't have anything to do with training at the first point, but are still a part of the training planning process. For example you might want to "highlight" the athletes birthday (or you own) to create a "special birthday workout" for that day.

Diving deeper

Now you have the big picture and it is time to go to "the real stuff" and plan some actual training. You will recognise the "Excel-like" structure of the training planner, which looks similar to the old one, but gives you way more detail from the first moment on. To focus every inch of your screen on training planning, we created a wider and cleaner view for individual training planning and moved the comparison between planned and done training to another view. You will find a new "Effort" field, which is meant to describe the intensity of the workout from the perspective of the coach. That way it will be possible to compare it with the subjective intensity of the athlete after the workout and will create a better understanding of the workout.

We also added weekly summaries to the right of the input forms. This is a great help to keep an eye on training distribution between different disciplines. As a triathlete I am always concerned whether I am doing enough running and enough swimming or too much cycling. This sneaky little thing on the right will help me keep an eye on that. It also contains the "target duration", which comes from the strategy that I wrote about in the previous paragraph.

Operations like copying and pasting workouts, days or whole weeks has been made easier using the little blue submenu to the right of each row. You can copy and paste single workouts, days or even weeks. Copy-pasting works not only in the context of one athlete, but you can also copy the workouts of athlete A and paste them into the diary of athlete B. It's a great way to save time while planning!

If you select "Save as template" it will open up a whole new set of opportunities for you. If you use it right, it will become one "great playground" and save you a huge amount of time!!!

Workout templates

Templates are great! It makes planning so much easier and so much fun. Using templates is basically like copy/pasting with a memory. Every coach and every athlete has his or her favourite workouts and workouts, which they repeat constantly. It would be great, if instead of copy/pasting every single one of these workouts, I only need to drag them out of a box and drop them on a specific day. I call it accelerating training planning by 200% as I will never ever have to write a workout any more, since I will just drag and drop them out of a box. If necessary I will make small adjustments, but mostly I think my 75min Fartlek run, will remain a 75min Fartlek run for a very long time.

And this is what the new planner is about. Stop wasting your time writing and thinking and recalculating and start drag and dropping your training plan according to your strategy and the training cycle you are in. You will never be able to do everything 100% like you planned, but you will be able to adjust your plan in a couple of minutes and still stay on the right course.

Where do we go from here?

We will not stop here. We already are working on more sneaky little tools and features, which will allow coaches to observe and plan the training process of their athletes in a more convenient way and with less headache (at least less headache because of unnecessary paperwork).

In order to stay on the right course we would love the feedback of as many coaches as possible. So, if you are a coach and you would like to contribute to our work, send us an email hello@sportlyzer.com. If you are an athlete reading this post and you want your coach to give Sportlyzer a try, send us an email with your name, the name and email of your coach and we will talk to him.

Also keep in mind, that we all a human and we tend to make mistakes. If you find any bugs or fault behaviour with the new planner, please send us an email hello@sportlyzer.com, or report it to our forum and we will fix it as soon as possible.

Less is more - the Mio ALPHA

Since the introduction of smartphones, tablets and other little gadgets into our lives, training has never been that engaging, social and easy to monitor like before. My work as an iOS developer at Sportlyzer gets me in touch with a lot of new sports-gadgets, which are made to make training easier, more fun, social, exciting, adventurous, bla bla bla... Mobile apps that count your squats, wristbands that count your push-ups, watches that analyse your swimming technique, glasses that show you the best route to the next McDonalds - I've seen them all! I believe agegroupers have never had such a huge tech-support while going for their 8k Sunday run.

Polar F6

Let me show you what used to be my favourite sports-watch. I made the background myself - pretty neat! It has been my favourite watch for over 7 years, although I sometimes had to take it apart and put it on the radiator because it was soaking wet. Never the less it worked perfectly and still does. It measures heart rate and even has a alarm clock to wake me up in the morning (or drive my girlfriend nuts, because I've had the alarm for 7:15a.m. each day since 2009).

By the way, I also own a couple of other sport watches, like the Timex Ironman Global trainer and a Garmin and about 5 or 6 HR-chest straps from different companies. But I still love to keep it simple and I prefer the F6.

Let's compare my all-time favourite with today's most popular sport watches... you will spot some differences:

• Watches seem to be able to track nearly everything I do (GPS, accelerometer, power-meter etc.)
• Countless new features (customisable training zones, virtual trainer, workout templates, multipart workouts..)  
• More options, more menus - limitless fun and adventures while studying a new watch
• Bigger watches, bigger displays, more buttons, more sensors
• Most watches come along with their own online training platform (garminconnect, polar personal trainer...)
• Compatibility with smartphones, other sensors, mobile apps, facebook etc.
• ... the chest strap? Well... nothing fancy there.

I guess the last point is something you have never really thought about. And yet, the chest strap is one of the key elements when using a sports-watch because otherwise how do you get to monitor your heart rate, right? We do have super-accurate GPS-watches, watches using gyroscope and accelerometer data to recognise our movements, even different swim styles. These super-watches all connect to your smartphones, communicate with a ton of mobile apps and upload our workouts even before we can get under the shower. Everybody can see your routes on Strava, Endomondo etc. Yet you still have to wear that silly and wet band around your chest... why? 

Because you are used to it! It is already programmed into your brain, that when you go for a run you start by looking for your chest strap. Otherwise there is no use of your sports-watch. I was also used to it to it until I got the order to make the Sportlyzer Sportstracker app compatible with a new gadget called Mio ALPHA. Mio ALPHA is the first continuous heart rate sport watch that measures your heart rate directly from your wrist. After implementing the code and testing the watch during training, I knew, that this was going to be "the next big thing" on the market, that I even put away my Polar F6.

Now I am really happy to be a proud owner of a Mio ALPHA watch and a Mio Brand Champion.

I'm not going to write a long review about how it works compared to my other sport watches - other bloggers have done that and there is a list of them at the end of this post. I've had the watch for a couple of weeks now and here is why I love it.

Here is why I love the Mio ALPHA:

• It works - no matter what I do, no matter where I am
• It is so simple to use
• I don't have to worry any more about a thing
• It helps me to focus on the important things
• It is really comfortable and looks great (even my girlfriend likes it)

Mio Global is not the only company working on measuring heart rates directly from your wrist. There are a couple of other startups working on basically the same thing, but Mio ALPHA is the first one with a reliable watch designed for athletes. Unlike its competitors, who are working on all-day monitoring systems, Mio focuses on doing one thing really well and this is measuring your heart rate during training. Even at really high intensities (HR > 190bpm) the Mio ALPHA keeps its accuracy and that's something even some of my heart rate straps have problems with! Of corse you can argue, that it has no GPS, accelerometer or gyroscope, but how often do you need that stuff anyway? I choose my pace looking at my heart rate and not the latest Strava updates of my friends.
Sometimes less is more!

Here are some articles and reviews about the Mio ALPHA:

• http://www.dcrainmaker.com/2013/02/monitor-bluetooth-smartant.html
• http://gizmodo.com/5981963/mio-alpha-review-one-giant-leap-for-heart-rate-monitors
• http://www.geekosystem.com/mio-alpha-hrm/
• http://www.macnn.com/reviews/mio-alpha-continuous-heart-rate-monitor.html
• http://reviews.mtbr.com/review-mio-alpha-heart-rate-monitor

Sportlyzer Year in Review

Facebook offers everybody to see his/her last year's review - see the 20 most popular (or most embarrassing) Facebook posts of 2013. I also wanted to see my "TOP Facebook Moments of 2013", but all Facebook was able to show me, were pictures of me training or competing - not that impressive.

But let me share the numbers and statistics behind these pictures using Sportlyzer. Sportlyzer is an online training diary and management system. In my opinion it is really easy to use and has all functionality a normal endurance athlete might need. It won't give you an in-depth analysis of your SRM-bike sessions (however, you can still upload powermeter files into Sportlyzer), but it will do the most important work for you, which is storing, sharing and keeping your training plan in sync with your coach. 

One year in a single view

First I will show you the overview of my last year as it is shown in the yearplanner of the coach-view in Sportlyzer. You can see a week-per-week view of how much training was predicted (the line on top), how much was planned (dark-grey bar) and how much training was really done in that week (light-grey bar). You can also easily see where my A,B,C,D races where placed.  It is a great way to view the whole year in one view and it gives you a great overview while planning your season.

As you see, I trained really hard from February until May and than had my main season with many competitions before I started preparing for the Ironman 70.3 Lanzarote in October, which was my main goal last year. After my last race I basically rested one full month and started training again in November.

Summary

You can also find a nice table with the sum of all individual activities. I picked out the TOP 3. You can see, that I was quite busy on the bike but not that much on the run track and neither in the pool.

To show you some more of my biking Sportlyzer also offers also a table to show the amount of training per month.

And you can see a month-per-month total of training sessions.

You can open each month to see how you did in each discipline individually.

Training camps

That's enough about the summary of 2013. Now lets have a look at a training camp. I chose the 5 weeks on Fuerteventura, which I had the privilege to spend with Alexandr Latin and Kirill Kotśegarov. Here you can see the total of each day in the training camp and how it was divided between different diziplines. As the camp progressed, the bike session became longer and while I did hardly any running in the beginning of the camp because of an injury, I slowly started running more regularly at the end.

How about some more detail? Let's have a look at my busiest week of 2013. This time it was a training camp in Lloret De Mare in Spain. You can see how my training was divided between different weekdays and a peak on Sunday. At the bottom you see a weekly summary for each dizipline. 

Favourite sessions

Now last but not least I will show you my longest bike ride in 2013 and how my friends in Sportlyzer reacted after I posted this session.

If you would like to find out more about Sportlyzer you can visit www.sportlyzer.com . If you already are using Sportlyzer and you would like to see your own statistics of 2013, you can find a description on how to use the statistics page here:

http://blog.sportlyzer.com/how-to-design-a-statistics-page-for-training-data-analysis/

TriBox iPhone App

TriBox

Made by a Triathlete 

for Triathletes 

So the last couple of weeks I have been thinking and making plans for my next season. Obviously preparing for the World Championships will be my main goal for the next year and everything I will do is totally focused on reaching my peak for September 2014. It will be hard but also exciting journey to Mont Tremblant, which I am really looking forward to.

Big plans mean big a budget, which is why I am searching for help and sponsorships for the next season (and the following). I am quite aware of the fact, that at the moment I am just one out of so many athletes, who also are looking for a sponsorship and that in order to become sponsored I have to pull off something really special. One day I stumbled on an article about just the same problem that I have at the moment.

"So You Wanna Be Sponsored" (www.pinkbike.com)

Yes, I'd love to be sponsored! But what is the special something about me? Well... I could tell you my story of how I started as a rower in Germany and how I moved back to Estonia and how one day a guy named Ain-Alar Juhanson started to me train me. I have a lot of exciting stories about both triathlon and rowing and I have no problem telling you every story I know but at the same time I know that these stories will not help you sell your gear, which is your main goal as a sponsor. I also know, that as long as I finish "only" somewhere between the TOP 20 and TOP 50 of a 70.3 Ironman race I am not a great advertisement since most of the publicity is focused on the TOP 5 of the race. But there still is something that makes me special - something that makes me different from others...

Yes, there is! And it is not that I have a blog or that I have a homepage or that I might someday have 5.000 friends on Facebook. What makes me special is that I build apps. To be more precise, I build iOS apps for iPhones and iPads. I have been doing this a couple of years and as a computer science student it has served me quite well (winning some student awards for mobile applications and a "24h-Code-Marathon"). So I thought why not turn the one thing that I am really good at (besides swimming, biking and running) into something useful for my training? Well to be honest I already do it at some point, because I have programmed my own training diary, which allows me to log my training sessions in less than a minute - no matter where and when. It's called Sportlyzer. You can have a look at it, if you like to - it is completely free for athletes and you can also invite your coach to write you a training plan and basically do everything else (competitions, tests, long-term performance evaluation etc.). It's kind like TrainingPeaks only without the super-complicated stuff that most people don't really need and never use but pay a fortune for (This is just my opinion and if you use TrainingPeaks or any other similar software and you like it - that's great!). In my job I get in touch with a lot of professional athletes and coaches and I just love showing them demos and see their eyes pop out when they have their "Oh my god is it really that simple?"-moment. :)  

I'm sorry I just got a little bit off topic. What I wanted to say is that I am passionate about making apps and that's why I made one app to help me in my everyday life as a triathlete and I'd love to share it with all of you guys. This app is called TriBox and it has all the basic functionalities you might need when you are swimming, cycling or running. I know there are a lot of similar apps that all do the same stuff, but I believe this is the first one made by an athlete for other athletes. While programming this app I focused on making it the fastest and most convenient to use. No flickering ads, no stupid limitations, just a clean and nice way of getting your stuff done. Each of the functionalities has its own story how it found its way into my app and why it is made just the way it is.

• Pace Calculator

This neat function allows me to quickly calculate the running pace for my next running session and a lot more (e.g. if I have to run 10x400m at 10k race pace on a 200m indoor track I can quickly calculate, that in order to keep a 3:20min/km pace I need to run each loop in 40seconds. Now lets change the drill to 6x800m on a 400m track and I want to run a 3:40min/pace - that's 1:27min per loop). I haven't re-invented a wheel here, but that's something I need to calculate on a daily basis, which makes it a must-have functionality for me. 

• Time Projector

Every time triathletes talk to each other and at some point they end up comparing their race results and personal best times on the bike and so on. But for me it is no help if you tell me that your 70.3 IM bike split was 2h 25min - what I want to know is your bike speed, running and swimming pace. The time projector basically helps me to convert your time into speed and vice versa. This a something every second triathlon app offers, but I haven't seen that many apps, that allow you to specify your own race distances. I started triathlon by racing 111 triathlon events (1km swim, 100km bike, 10km run) and I desperately needed a tool that allowed me to convert between time and pace for these events!  

• Race Memories

When you race your first triathlon race you most probably will race a second and a third one as well. Triathlon is extremely addictive and I believe that every event is special and every medal and race deserve to be remembered. TriBox helps you to remember your past races and keep your favourite race moments alive. Just save your results and link them with a picture of the medal or you crossing the finish line and you will remember these races in the future. You want to know how? Did you recognise the animating pictures on the main view of TriBox - your race memories will be animating there as well! The only thing you have to do is sit back and enjoy your beautiful memories.

• Checklist

Don't worry, I am not out of ideas! Checklist is a simple and quick tool to make sure you have everything you need packed and stored in the transition area. Forgetting small things is not only a rookie mistake and it can happen to all of us. I have chosen a wide collection of things you might need for a triathlon and made sure you won't forget to pack your bags right for your next race.

Conclusion

This is the first version of the app and while you are reading this blogpost I am most probably already working on the next version and the next functionalities to come. Training and racing gives me the opportunity to collect a lot of new ideas and I love to test out new things to see if they are possible with the iPhone. This also means that the next time you have a "there should be an app for it"-moment, feel free to contact me and tell me about it. I also appreciate your feedback and look forward to some constructive criticism as well. If you like my app and the story behind it I would be really grateful, if you tell your friends about it and help me reach more people with my app.

Thank you for reading and downloading TriBox!

Silver

Download App Here

Kokkuvõte hooaja tipust tipuni

Lanzarote 70.3 Ironmanist on juba rohkem kui kuu aega möödas ning keha ja vaim on saanud korralikult puhata. Pärast MM-i kvalifikatsiooni võtsin korralikult aja maha, tõmbasin stepsli täiesti välja ja tegelesin muude asjadega. Pärast niivõrd pikka hooaega oli see ka hädavajalik, et koguda uut värskust järgmiseks aastaks. 

Viimase 30 päeva jooksul oli mul võimalik väga palju ringi reisida, uute inimestega kohtuda ja lihaste asemel hoopiski ajurakkude "ülekoormust" kogeda. Pärast lühikest puhkust Lanzarotel tutvusin paar päeva Londoniga. Eestisse tulles läksin üsna kohe Saaremaale 3 päeva jooksule, nädal aega hiljem olin juba töö asjus Hamburgis World Rowing Youth Coach konverentsil ja 2 nädalat hiljem samalaadsel konverentsil Tallinnas. Selgituseks ütlen veel, et töötan iOS arendajana sellises Eesti idufirmas nagu Sportlyzer (https://www.sportlyzer.com/). Kunagi tuleb ka üks põhjalikum blogipostitus minu töö kohta. Konverentsidest veel nii palju, et jumal tänatud, et ma kasvasin üles kakskeelsena ja oskan rääkida kolmes keeles!

Kuid lebotamise aeg hakkab läbi saama ja vaja on ennast jälle tõsisemalt kätte võtta. Tegelt on olukord täpselt nii, nagu ütles Herje, kui ma esimest korda pärast puhkeperioodi tema ÜKE-trenni astusin: "Ma ei teagi, kas sind nüüd õnnitleda MM-i kvalifikatsiooni puhul või kaasa tunda - tõsine trenn hakkab ju alles nüüd pihta!". Nii ta tõesti on. Ja täpselt sellepärast ma nautisingi neid viimaseid nädalaid, sest ma tean, et järgmised nädalad, kuud, aasta(d) saavad olema rasked, sest tööd on vaja teha palju. 

Kuid enne kui täie rauaga uude treeningaastasse kihutame, viskaks väikese pilgu tagasi ja meenutaks, mis juhtus eelmisel aastal. Mis läks hästi ja mis oleks võinud paremini minna. Mida ma sel aastal õppisin ja mis vigu ma tulevikus vältida tahan.

Ajavahemik 70.3 Ironman Lanzarote 2012 - 2013
(10. november 2012 kuni 5. oktoober 2013)

Numbriliselt:

• Üle 530 üksiku trenni
• Treeningtunde selles ajavahemikus: ~760h (31,6 päevi ~1 terve kuu trenni)
• Läbitud vahemaa treenides: ~11.700km (91% maailma läbimõõdust)
• 10 nädalat erinevates treeninglaagrites.
• Treeningute või võistluste käigus istusin 160 korda keskmiselt 2,5 tunniks ja 75 kilomeetriks ratta või spinningratta peale.
• Tegin üle 40h ÜKE-t, millest võib järeldada, et veetsin kuskil 200 minutit planguasendis.

Mida ma siis ikkagi selle aja jooksul õppisin

Pitsa "Giganto" koos Aleksandr Latin ja
Kirill Kotšegaroviga Fuerteventural

Eriti sooviks esile tõsta varakevadel 5 nädalast treeninglaagrit Fuerteventural koos Eesti proffide Kirill Kotsegarov ja Aleksandr Latiniga. Pean ausalt ütlema, et selle pika aja jooksul ei möödunud päevagi, mil ma ei oleks ala spetsialistidelt jälle midagi uut juurde õppinud. Kõige tähtsamad õppetunnid olid treeningu intensiivsuse ja puhkamise (magamise!) tähtsuse kohta. Õppisin ka seda, et treeningu ajal ei tule mitte mõelda vaid sellele, kuidas hetkel käimasolevat treeningut läbida, vaid kuidas pärast trenni kõige kiiremini taastuda ja järgnevateks treeningutes valmis olla. Mõelda ei tule vaid tänasele päevale, vaid ka järgneva(te)le päevadele ja treeningtsüklile tervikuna.

Kahjuks pean tunnistama, et ma ei õppinud nende 40 päeva jooksul mitte ühtegi venekeelset lauset või sõna, mis oleks kõlbulik siia blogisse kirjutada. Selle eest sain korraliku õppetundi rattakummi vahetamises ja parandamises, mis oli meil laagris peaaegu igapäevane nähtus. Laagri lõpuks sõitsin ees viiekordselt lapitud ja taga kolmekordselt lapitud sisekummidega. 

Mis ei läinud nii, nagu oleks võinud

EMV poolpikkas triatlonis

Jooksuga oli hooaja vältel pidevalt probleeme. Suure tõenäosusega sai kevadel liiga palju ainult ratta peale rõhku pandud ja jooks jäi osaliselt ka vigastuse tõttu tagaplaanile. Põhja ladumise asemel sai liiga vara liiga suurte kiirustega harjutatud. Ilma korraliku vundamendita ikka ei saa - olgu tahe mistahes suur.

Aeg-ajalt jäid ujumistrennide vahele liiga suured augud sisse. Ma ei tea, kas see on nüüd tänu pikale sõudmiskogemusele või lihtsalt heale õnnele, et mul tekib ka suhteliselt väikese ujumise mahu pealt suhteliselt hea veetunnetus ja suudan peagrupil sabas püsida. Halvemal juhul oleks mõni võistlus võinud ka teisiti lõppeda.

Mille eest ja kellele ma eelmise hooaja eest tänulik olen

Inimesi, kellele olen eelmise hooaja eest tänu võlgu on liiga palju, et neid kõiki siia blogisse ära mahutada. Alustades enda sugulastest ja lähedastest, kes hoidsid mulle pöialt ja aitasid ka rahaliselt kaasa, et saaksin ennast korralikult treeninglaagrites ja võistlustel realiseerida, kõikidest inimestest, kes käisid minuga koos laagrites ja võistlustel, pakkusid öömaja, transporti ja aitasid nii kuidas said, kuni erinevate treenerite ja nõuandjateni välja, kes ei lubanud trennis viilida ja olid kohe kohal niipea kui minu tähelepanu hajuma hakkas ja mõnda harjutust enda jaoks lihtsamalt teha tahtsin. Eriti pean tänama enda tädi, kes on alati nõus mind koos rattakastiga mitusada kilomeetrit sõidutama ja kes on nii mõnegi kopika minu eelarvesse lisanud, samuti Liisut, kes ootab mind pärast mitmetunnist rasket trenni alati sooja toiduga kodus ning kannatab alati mu lihasvalu ja väsimuse üle virisemist ära ja Aini, kes aitab mul treeningkavasid koostada ja eesmärke püstitada. Aitäh kõikile ja kohtume uuel hooajal taas trennis! :)

Järgmise (treening-)hooaja eesmärgid? 

Pöörata rohkem tähelepanu ujumisele ja jooksule. Parandada oluliselt üldvastupidavust ja lõppkiirust mõlemal alal. Õppida paremini enda piire tundma ja tõsta oluliselt treeningute kvaliteeti. Ja loomulikult tahan septembri algusel MM-il endast 100% välja pigistada. 

Saaremaa 3 päeva jooks

Tegemist oli minu jaoks kohustusliku puhkusega. Suvel lubasin enda tüdrukule Liisile, et pärast pikka hooaega veedame koos ühe nädalavahetuse kuskil spas. Hiljem sain pakkumise minna Saaremaa 3 päeva jooksu ajaks Kuressaare Grand Rose Spasse, mille üle ma ei pidanud kaua järgi mõtlema. Mina sain ennast 3 päeva jooksul välja elada ja Liis nautis enda nö "3 päeva spa maratoni". 

Muidugi me ei olnud üksi. Kuressaare oli paksult spordi- ja jooksusöpru täis ja puudu ei tulnud muidugi ka TriSmilekatest. Ürituse teeb eriliseks see, et erinevalt teistest rahvajooksudest kohtutakse kaasvõistlejatega lausa kolmel päeval ja koos ollakse mitte ainult jooksurajal, vaid pärast jooksu ka spas, restoranis ja ööklubis.

Grand Rose Spa

Esimene jooks toimus reede öhtul kell pool 5. Tuul oli tugev ja meenutas Lanzarote saart selle "väikse" vahega, et 30kraadise kuumuse asemel joosti napilt 5kraadise jaheda öhtuse päikese all. Mina eelistaksin iga kell kuumust külmale ja vöistlemine külma ilmaga ei ole mulle kunagi sobinud. Önneks on 10km suhteliselt lühike jooks ja väga kaua külmetama ei pidanud. Lühike, kiire, aga valus.... Stardikoridorist välja joostes puhus tuul tagant ja kiirus oli algusest peale meeletu. Proovisin asja rahulikult vötta, jalgu niisama ringi ajada ja teiste vöistlejate selja taha pugeda, et kui tuul vastu keerab, siis jöudu säästa. Esimese poole jooksingi suhteliselt hea tundega kuskil 15. kohal 5-liikmelises pundis. Ette ei trüginud ja alati eesjooksja selja taga tuules. Graafik oli seal 35 ja 36 minuti vahele.  Teise poole alguses tekkis aga esimene raske moment  ja nii kaotasin ma ühenduse grupi ja energiat säästva tuulevarjuga. Ülejäänud maa oli vaja juba üksinda tuulega rinda pista ja mida lähemale finiš tuli, seda valusamaks jooks minu jaoks muutuski. Olin tulnud siia puhkama, mitte ennast juba esimesel päeva rihmaks tömbama! Vöistluseks mingit ettevalmistust ma teinud polnud. Pärast 2 nädala tagust vöistlust olin käinud köigest 1 korra jooksmas. Viimane kilomeeter puhus õnneks jälle abistav taganttuul, mis puhus mind finišisse ja sealt juba edasi spasse, mullivanni ja sauna.

Pildi tegemiseks läksin korraks gruppi ette - loogiline eks?

Teise päeva jooks oli märska rahulikum - 16,195 km Saaremaa läänepoolsemas osas. Tuul oli endiselt tugev ja sääred juba kergelt pinges. Rajakaarti vaadates oli selge, et jooksma peab väga targalt ja strateegia mängib suurt rolli. Esimesed 8km oli sisuliselt vastu tuul ülesse mere äärde, kus puhus meeletu küljekas ja viimased 5km "lennati" tagantuule abil finiši poole. Minu jaoks oli selge, et esimese poole jooksen rahulikult kuskil pundis teiste jooksjate selja taga, ette ei trügi ja proovin viimasel 5km midagi korda saata. Möeldud, tehtud. Jooksin 7-liikmelises grupis pidevalt 2. vöi 3. reas ja tulin ainult enne joogipunkti pundi ette vedama. Vötsin enda joogi ja läksin tagasi tuulde. Mere ääres küljetuulega vajus punt tee äärde ja kohati joosti isegi 1-2 reas tee körval muru peal, et kuidagi tuulevarjus püsida. 5,5km enne löppu toimusid otsustavad lükked. Need, kes olid esimesed 8km pundi ees tööd rüganud, vajusid kiiresti taha ja passiivsemad jooksjad tulid ette. Mina pääsesin koos kahe teise jooksjaga ette, kuid 3km enne löppu läks tempo päris karmiks ja taas hakkas jöud minu jalgades raugema. Vahetult enne löppu prooviti minust taas mööda minna, kuid nagu juba eelmisel päeval, päästsid mind viimasel 200m avanenud jöuvarud jalgades ja sprindifinišis suutsin enda positsiooni hoida.

Õige jooksja kannab ka ööklubis
kompressioone

Ülejäänud päev möödus jälle saunas ja kuuma- vöi külmavee vannides vedeledes. Protseduurid, värgid särgid. Öhtul ööklubis räägiti, kes liigub isikliku rekordi suunas, kes on juba isiklikku rekordit parandanud ja kelle Saaremaa 3 päeva isiklik rekord on hoopiski seotud ölle vöi rummkoola joomisega.

Kui pühapäeval ärgates oli samm pulksirge, päkad juba kergelt paistes ja sääred ei töetanud head. Ees ootasid viimased 16km Kuressaare linna vahel. Usun, et ma ei olnud ainus, kes oleks hea meelega pika distantsi asemel osa vötnud rahvajooksu kepikönnist. Oli näha, et vöistlejate soojendus jäi tagasihoidlikumaks. Keskenduti pigem käe- ja puusaringidele. Stardis keegi väga esimesse ritta ei trüginud ja pärast stardikiirendust otsiti üsna pea rahulik tempo ülesse. Mina liikusin esimese kilomeetri koos naiste liidriga ja keskendusin enda rütmi leidmisele. Rada oli kahe aasta tagusest vöistluselt veel päris hästi meeles - esimene pool üsna kurviline ja laineline, teine pool algab tuulelise löiguga, mille järel tuleb üks väga raske saepuruga kaetud löik. Erinevalt eelmisest päevast jooksin ma seekord enamus ajast uhkes üksinduses kahe suurema grupi vahel. Grupp, millega eelmisel päeva jooksin, alustas suhteliselt kiirelt ja mina "tiksusin" 20-50m nende taga enda tempos. 

Teisel poolel oli märgata, kuidas osad mehed minu ees olevas pundis ära väsisid ja vaikselt taha kukkusid. Neist mööda joostes nägin, et nende seas oli ka neid, kes esimesel päeval minust mööda jooksid. See andis omakorda viimasteks kilomeetriteks mönusa emotsiooni kaasa. 4 km enne löppu tekkis minu ümber 4 liikmeline punt, kus hakkas üsna pea köva positsioonide vöitlus peale. Üks neist üritas vahetult enne vastutuule löigule keeramist pundist eest ära joosta ja ma olin ainuke, kes tempotöstmisega kaasa suutis minna. Saepuru löigule keerates püüdsime siis juba järgmise vöistleja kinni ja viimased 2km tösteti järk järgult tempot kuni mina enam kaasa minna ei suutnud. Lootsin, et kui suudan vöistluse kuidagi viimasele paarisaja meetri peale venitada, siis vöin teised sprindis lüüa, kuid pidin neil varem minna laskma.

Löppkokkuvõtes siis 20. koht üldsarvestuses kolme üsnagi ühtlase jooksuga (päevade kaupa siis 19. , 20. ja 22. koht). Löppaeg 2:38:47 on küll natukene kehvem, kui kaks aastat varem joostud aeg, kuid parem koht üldarvestuses suurenenud vöistlejate arvu kiuste ütleb, et selle aasta tingimused olidki raskemad kui 2 aastat tagasi.

TriSmile punt Saaremaa 3 päeva jooksul