Preparation for XC has started..
Door: Anne Luijten
Blijf op de hoogte en volg Anne
20 Juli 2014 | Nederland, Rijswijk
Well... since I am officially halfway through my bachelor in the USA, I have decided that for the 2nd half, this blog is gonna be in English. I am very sorry Dutchies, but most of you are perfectly able to read in English and as you can understand, my international friends have quite a hard time reading Dutch... Since I have also discovered I am getting a harder time writing in Dutch sometimes, the decision was made easily: a switch to English from now on!
I believe my last blog was about the upcoming Regionals. Since that is a while (Yes, I know: months!) ago, you can probably guess how that went. Not very well. And that's an euphemism. Let's just say that I was supposed to run a 5k, which is 12,5 laps, and I only completed 7... It was that bad. Arkansas itself was pretty bad too. A description in 3 words? Fastfoodchains, highways & humidity. That's all I have to say about the Arkansas-Experience. If you ever decide to visit America, please just come to Awesome Oregon and skip the South (Oh, and of course I am going to take revenge on this performance next year!).
With that race, my track season officially ended. And that's weird! For the first time, I am not doing a Dutch track season. No fun races in Utrecht and Belgium, no Nationals. My track spikes are probably already covered in dust. Instead, it's mileage, mileage, and some more mileage. I made this decision because I - obviously - wasnt in great shape anymore. I was tired, my body needed recovery. So instead of trying to get back in shape to get after a new personal record, I traveled through Europe with Nick. It was pretty awesome. We did some running too. It was fun to forget about the heart rate monitor or the mileage for a bit, but just RUN. We used running as a way of transportation and ran to and from the beach in Barcelona, got lost in the little streets of Venice (I was so happy when on our 3rd run there, I finally got us back to the hostel without having to ask a million times where the heck we were! I think Nick was less impressed with the giant detour we made but hey, he made me run 2 hours instead of 80 min on our first night there! Yes. we got THAT lost.), and ran up and down mountains when we did the Tour The Mont Blanc (The secret of doing a 10-days / 180 km hike in 5.5 days).
After that, I was prepared for a lot of boring, lonely runs around our canal (40 minutes run? First bridge! Fifty minutes run? One further. 80 min run? Crossing over the 3rd bridge and adding a bit on the end... Let's just say there are better places to run than in Rijswijk.). But so far, not one run has been boring, and I have actually had a lot of memorable ones! I spent some time with my friend Jip in Apeldoorn, ran trough Assen with my uncle, am getting my parents and siblings in shape by forcing them to run with me, went to my Dutch track club for some easy workouts, and ran with my Dutch coach. I seem to handle the mileage well and most importantly, it's been a lot of fun. It is nice to just focus on running, without having school or a job on the side.
That was it for now! Less than a month left before I return to Portland and the cross country season will start. It''s gonna be a good one!
I believe my last blog was about the upcoming Regionals. Since that is a while (Yes, I know: months!) ago, you can probably guess how that went. Not very well. And that's an euphemism. Let's just say that I was supposed to run a 5k, which is 12,5 laps, and I only completed 7... It was that bad. Arkansas itself was pretty bad too. A description in 3 words? Fastfoodchains, highways & humidity. That's all I have to say about the Arkansas-Experience. If you ever decide to visit America, please just come to Awesome Oregon and skip the South (Oh, and of course I am going to take revenge on this performance next year!).
With that race, my track season officially ended. And that's weird! For the first time, I am not doing a Dutch track season. No fun races in Utrecht and Belgium, no Nationals. My track spikes are probably already covered in dust. Instead, it's mileage, mileage, and some more mileage. I made this decision because I - obviously - wasnt in great shape anymore. I was tired, my body needed recovery. So instead of trying to get back in shape to get after a new personal record, I traveled through Europe with Nick. It was pretty awesome. We did some running too. It was fun to forget about the heart rate monitor or the mileage for a bit, but just RUN. We used running as a way of transportation and ran to and from the beach in Barcelona, got lost in the little streets of Venice (I was so happy when on our 3rd run there, I finally got us back to the hostel without having to ask a million times where the heck we were! I think Nick was less impressed with the giant detour we made but hey, he made me run 2 hours instead of 80 min on our first night there! Yes. we got THAT lost.), and ran up and down mountains when we did the Tour The Mont Blanc (The secret of doing a 10-days / 180 km hike in 5.5 days).
After that, I was prepared for a lot of boring, lonely runs around our canal (40 minutes run? First bridge! Fifty minutes run? One further. 80 min run? Crossing over the 3rd bridge and adding a bit on the end... Let's just say there are better places to run than in Rijswijk.). But so far, not one run has been boring, and I have actually had a lot of memorable ones! I spent some time with my friend Jip in Apeldoorn, ran trough Assen with my uncle, am getting my parents and siblings in shape by forcing them to run with me, went to my Dutch track club for some easy workouts, and ran with my Dutch coach. I seem to handle the mileage well and most importantly, it's been a lot of fun. It is nice to just focus on running, without having school or a job on the side.
That was it for now! Less than a month left before I return to Portland and the cross country season will start. It''s gonna be a good one!
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Je kunt nu ook Smileys gebruiken. Via de toolbar, toetsenbord of door eerst : te typen en dan een woord bijvoorbeeld :smiley
