The Road To Athens - Slowly Back In Shape

Today's run, the second of the year, was an easy 6km at 6:37min/km and 151bpm heart rate. The speed was slightly higher than last time and so was the heart rate. My target HR is 145bpm but given the fact that I ate chaotically during the holidays, I don't expect to reach that level soon. I think it will be at least a week or two until the extra sugar and "bad fat" will be burned.

The picture is from a park called Cismigiu, within 3 minutes walking distance from where I live now. I like to run there because it's flat, quite diverse and a lap has 1.4 km. The 48 hours race in Athens will have a 1 km lap, so I try to do as many runs as I can in conditions similar to those of the official race.

Some people ask me: "How can you even run 24 or 48 hours on a 1 km lap? Don'y you get crazy?". Well, it's the mental challenge that I'm after, not the physical one. I run in 1 km laps in order not to get crazy. Of course, I have a physical goal, which is to get over the 300km limit, but the main benefit is training the mind. During those races you get to meet so many parts of yourself that you didn't even know they existed, you get to solve so many problems, to overcome so many perceived limitations, that I can hardly think of a similar self development tool. Perhaps a very long back to back ultra, like Ultrabalaton or Spartathlon. Or some Tony Robbins 3 days event. Although I cannot vouch for Tony Robbins since I never attended any of his events.

Today's run felt very easy, I had no troubles at all. Surprisingly enough, the extra weight that I put on - I estimate 3 kilos - doesn't feel too much. Which generally means the joints are in good shape.

2017 summary:
Total runs: 2
Total distance: 14km

If you want to know why I run - and why I run ridiculously long distances - you can have a look at my latest book published on Kindle and Amazon: Running For My Life: from zero to ultramarathoner.

I'm a serial entrepreneur, blogger and ultrarunner. You can find me mainly on my blog at Dragos Roua where I write about productivity, business, relationships and running. Here on Steemit you may stay updated by following me @dragosroua.