Last days before the Berlin marathon 2008

September 24, 2008

The heat is on! Only 4 more days to go to Berlin – the second marathon of my life. I’m really getting excited about the race. I will toe the line with one of the greatest distance runner of all times: Haile Gebrselassie, who will once again go for the World Record (2:04:26 from Berlin 2007). The weather forecast is almost perfect: overcast and temperatures around 15 degrees. It seems the weather can’t be an excuse and there will be some fast times. For my part I’m also pretty confident that I will improve my PB from my marathon debut (2:25:05, Mainz 2008) by a significant margin. The training at altitude went really good and I could do 95% of the planned training. Since I had such a good training during the summer I am taking a really relaxed taper-period now: The afternoons are training-free during this week and in the morning I am doing only few kilometers. The week before my first marathon I can remember that I did a lot more mileage, but this time and want to save the freshness in my legs for the last 10kilometers of the marathon.
So, Friday goes the flight to Germany (with Finish comrade Miika Takala) and on Saturday we are going to move to the official athletes – maybe we’ll have a chat with Haile? Anyway, it will be another astonishing experience to be in the elite field of a World Marathon Majors competition. The marathon will be broadcasted on German-TV station rbb (they will also provide an online live stream on Sunday) and on Universalsports.

Ivan Ukhov flops in Lausanne – How you should not prepare for a competition

September 4, 2008

Well, on this website the focus is mainly on marathon but I can’t resist to show you this high jump videos from YouTube of the Athletissima Super Grand-Prix-Meeting in Lausanne (Switzerland) 2008. It shows the last jump of Ivan Ukhov (RUS). As you can see there is something wrong with this guy (he already jumped a respectable 2,30m this year). Reportedly he “warmed up” with Wodka Red Bull and entered the stadium in a drunk state. He already had problems to remove his T-shirt and could even jump over his warm-op height of 1,80m. Also at the height of 2,17 when he officially started his competition he failed and became a laughing stock for all the spectators.

Enjoy the Videos

The second Video is from a different view and shows his preparations. Really funny somehow. On the other hand: How can a high-performance athlete do something like that? He is ruining his whole career and reputation.

marathonscene-training camp is moving from Kühtai/AUT to St.Moritz/SUI

August 22, 2008

After 2 weeks of good training in Kühtai I am moving over to St.Moritz tomorrow, August 23rd with Miika. I’m already looking forward to St. Moritz because the running trails there are much better and you have hundreds of kilometers. Of course the altitude from Kütai is higher (2000m compared to 1600m sea level in St.Moritz) but in Kühtai there is only a small (2,4km), flat round around the lake and apart from that only a lot of hills.

Erik Haß, Mike Mariathasan and Miika Takala (from left) running in Kühtai/AUT at an altitude of 2000m sea level

marathonscene at training camp – Greetings from 2020m above sea level

August 11, 2008

While the Olympic Games started in Beijing and the first medals already have been awarded, marathonscene is having a bit of a down time because of a 5-weeks altitude training camp in Kühtai (Austria) and St. Moritz (Switzerland). Since the internet-connection is not perfect, there might be only few updates in the next 4-5 weeks.
The first 2 weeks (until 23.08.) of the camp, I will spend in Kuehtai at 2020m above sea level with Finn Miika Takala and German Mike Mariathasan. On August, 23rd we will move to St.Moritz and Miika and me are continuing our camp there. The weather here in Kühtai was great for the first days and the conditions are pretty ok. The running trails are not as perfect as in St. Moritz and apart from a 2,4 km loop around a lake it is steep terrain and you always have to go uphill or downhill – not the best case for a marathon runner. Nevertheless the training is going fine and I am waiting to get the first faster kilometers under my feet. The first 2 days were of course very easy because of adaptation to the altitude but in the next couple of days I will increase the volume to normal mileage.

Test entry

July 13, 2008

The first blog entries are going to be published soon.