The Engineered Boulderer

Let’s just get it out there from the beginning, I didn’t reach 100 push ups as I guess I had hoped. In fact, I don’t even feel I came close, but we’ll get back to that.

In danger of turning into a fitness blog I recently took a maximum heart rate test. I was concerned about the accuracy of my maximum heart rate. Since I’m in the middle of a heart rate based training program, I need to be sure that the heart rate zone I’m in matches reasonably well.

I regularly visit Reddit and broaden my horizon considerably through that avenue. The other day I clicked through to the site one hundred push ups. The site has the premise that anyone can train themselves up to do one hundred consecutive push ups with just six weeks of training.

I would tend to agree with them, and since I’m not at 100 yet I decided to take the challenge.

I finally did it. Yesterday I completed my first marathon, the Copenhagen Marathon, in the time 3:59:55 (five seconds below the four hour mark).

Honestly, I don’t know now whether I will run another marathon. However, given that I am already–the day after–looking at possible races, I think it is very likely that I do run another marathon. If I do run more marathons I also know that I will strive for the Boston Marathon. There’s only one hitch in that you have to qualify for the Boston Marathon. For my age group it means I must complete a marathon in 3:10:00…

Thinking back to yesterday this entry describes how the race unfolded from my point of view with a few lessons (hopefully) learned thrown in for good measure.

Today I ran a half-marathon. The aptly named Helvede I Nord, or in English Hell In the North.

I’ve expressed my frustration with the Nike+iPod system before, listing both shortcomings and improvement ideas. After declaring my marathon goal I have become even more aware of those shortcomings, and those frustrations topped Sunday last week when I ran a new personal best in a 10 km race. After the race my iPod, which I had calibrated just the week before, said I had run 9.47 km. That’s a 5% deviation.

Having wanted a Garmin Forerunner 305 for a while I finally decided to just buy it. I had just learned that my next bonus would be quite reasonable, and my birthday is just next month. Of course, it was only after talking to my mom a couple of days later I realized how stupid it was to buy something off my wishlist this close to my birthday.

Yesterday I ran the Sparta Marathon Test 1. A 10 km race in and around Fælledparken in Copenahgen. As with the Marathon Start Op race in October my goal was to run the 10 km in 45 minutes. A goal I feel short of last time, finishing with a time of 46’24” (which was still a personal best by-the-way). This time, however, I felt better prepared, even if the run was at 9:30 on a frosty February morning.

I felt really good throughout the race, and although I had periods where it was hard going, I did have energy to sprint the last 100 meters or so. So, what time did I reach? Well, I’ll tell you, I crossed the line in 45 minutes 3 seconds!!

Although I missed my goal by a measly 3 seconds, I am still very happy with that result. Of course, I am now setting my sights higher for my next 10 km, but I don’t think that will be until the autumn. In the meantime my next focus is Marathon Test 2 which is 15 km, a couple of half marathons, and of course the marathon in May.

We are very fortunate with where we live. We have forests a mere stone throw away in almost all directions. Another fortunate factor, for me, is that there are mountain bike routes in several of these forests.

Yesterday, I took a ride on the blue trail in Rude Skov which really rekindled my love of cross country mountain biking.

In 2008 I will try something new: documenting myself each day. I will do this by taking a self portrait each day and posting it to my A year in my life – 2008 set.

I have seen several people create so-called 365 day projects”. The first was Matt Haughey whose goal was simply to take a picture each day. Matt has since embarked on a much more ambitious project. On flickr I have seen several people partake in “365 day projects:http://www.flickr.com/groups/365days/ where they take a self portrait each day. However, it took my discovery of the ever awesome macaddict, who is already on his second 365 days, to get my inspirational juices flowing.

Since 2008 is a leap year, and I wanted to cronicle the year, I couldn’t really make a 365 day project. Therefore, my 366 day project is named A year in my life, and started today with the first day of 2008.

The rules I have set up for myself are very simple. I take one self portrait each day and upload it to flickr. The picture must be a self portrait, and it must be taken on the day it is uploaded. I am sure I will end up bending the rules when I forget or feel too busy, and maybe there will be some pictures in there taken with the crappy camera in my mobile phone, but the aim is to have uploaded 366 self portraits when 2008 gives way to 2009.

This entry marks the public beginning of my project.

Last week marked my first visit to Finland. Working for Nokia I – of course – expected this to happen sometime, I just had not foreseen that it would take more than two years before my first visit.

My visit was to the northern Finnish city of Oulu. Oulu is about 600 km from Helsinki, and only 200 km from the Polar Circle. This is very clear since the sun rises after 9 in the morning, and goes down already at a quarter to 3 in the afternoon.

I don’t know what my expectations were from Finland, but below are my impressions and thoughts on my few days in Oulu.