Alive and kickin’

No, I haven’t died or stopped running. And I haven’t stopped enjoying our life in the mountains either, quite the contrary. The thing is quite simple: the winter season was busy beyond words so the one activity I cut off was blogging.
During the past few months, we had many interesting guests. (As 12HonzaDe mentioned we should be gathering all the stories in a book). Also, we did a lot of skiing, hiking and ice-skating.

However, since virtually EVERYBODY around us started (trail)running, time was ripe to introduce a new activity. The one new sport that I recently became obsessed with passionate about is kickbiking.
Last autumn we quickly bought two low budget no-brand kickbikes and eagerly started practicing. It quickly turned out that pushing 15 kg of metal on hilly dirt roads is a great workout!
I started reading more about kickbikes and how they are made and realised we needed totally different machines: with solid yet light frames, low clearance, 100% reliable brakes and last but not least with wheels that can be centered and that actually turn. So a few days ago I met Lada Blaha, the one guy in Czech who knows all about kickbikes, at Velorama and bought the famous folding beauty on 20 inch wheels made in Roznov: Mibo Royal.

Already after a few minutes on Prague cobble stones it became clear that this vehicle is a whole different level. And so after 3 weeks of continuous sore throat and severe coughing I just couldn’t hold myself back anymore and went for a first Mibo trip around Niedernsill.


This kickbike is a dream. Contrary to what I was accustomed to with the previous one, it was an easy 20+ km ride on both paved and unpaved surfaces (Niedernsill – Uttendorf – schutzgebiet – Pirtendorf – Uggl – Niedernsill) and something tells me that there are more beautiful kicking mornings to follow.

End of Juneathon 2016

Yet another 30/30 score, yet another Juneathon successfully completed. With some trips abroad, professional duties and of course the kids, I needed to improvise but challenges make us stronger so here is the (not too impressive) statistics:

Run – 6 – 33.2 km – 5.8 hrs;

Bike – 8 – 0.0 km – 4.0 hrs;

Walk – 18 – 76.4 km – 19.5 hrs;

Cross – 9 – 0.0 km – 4.7 hrs;

Total – 41 – 109.6 km – 33.9 hrs

Overall satisfaction as my goal was 30 hours of physical exercise.

 

Juneathon 2016

Can you believe this? Another Athon is here – as the matter of fact, it has been here for over a week now… It is my ninth one and sadly, it caught me a bit off-shape. Daily running hasn’t been my routine for a while but I still do almost daily fitness so for this Juneathon, I figured at least 45 minutes of cardio every day. So far so good. I have been stepping, rowing, spinning and cross-training on the elliptical for almost an hour every day and I have been running a bit too. The world is still beautiful up here…

Good luck to all my fellow Juneathoners!
As always: Slacking is not an option.

JD30 and JD31 – Long Live Janathon

Twenty five years ago, I was a frantic sporter. I loved cross country skiing. The fate (and good reviews 🙂 ) brought one of my former co-racers to our guesthouse this week. Of course we fixed an evening on the snow together (Day 30). Weird feeling to be catching up after so long.

And then the last day of January, I shoveled snow – again. For me, this was a Grande Finale, a finish in style. I live the life I always wanted to live: with a great family, in the mountains. Looking after 40 guests (and 2 little Duracell rabbits) sometimes takes all my energy and on those days Janathon helps to put everything in the right perspective.

Thank you all for joining, reading, commenting and sporting daily. Your (virtual) support is magical. I will be there in June again!

January total: 31 days of 35 activities totalling 38 hours.

JD28 and JD29 – cross country

More of the same really. Plus beer. And friends.
Day 28: cross country ski
Day 29: cross country ski

P.S. If I manage to maintain the alcohol level under control, I may very well be able to finish this Janathon :-).

JD26 and JD27 – Still white

and still loving it. A lot of mist on Lechnerberg which makes it harder to localise and catch E as she races down. And a lot of (wet) snow which makes it harder to run. Made it from Uttendorf home today, partially through the woods.

Day 26: ski
Day 27: run

JD24 and JD25 – another snow combo

No surprise that we went skiing again, on Sunday. The kids can now manage 4x Lechnerberg. But since the temperatures started to become normal again (and a fellow blogger commented on my lack of running :-)), I went for a run (in the snow!) today, for a change. The uphill section actually followed an official 1974 European cup sledging track:

… which had to be rewarded later on:

Day 24: ski
Day 25: run

JD22 and JD23 – More of the same

If you don’t like snow, stop reading. This Janathon is truly special for the amounts of white powder that we are happy to play in.

Yesterday, we discovered another kids slope, this time in Maishofen, at Schloss Kammer. Baby lift and sledging free of charge, nice sunny slope, horses watching us from the white meadow next to us… and NO people at all, just the four of us!

And today, I went for another cross country workout to Uttendorf. Turns out there are now 3 different loops (the one around the lake is good for evening training just like last year). Perfect days, what can I say…

Day 22: ski

Day 23: cross country ski

JD20 and JD 21 – Cross country, snow hikes

More of the same, really: the snow conditions are PERFECT, there is not even a beginning to describing how wonderful these days are. My first ski alpine tour took place this morning, then I taught V. some cross country moves and there was another longish snow hike yesterday…. I simply cannot get enough.

Day 20: snow hike
Day 21: ski alp tour, cross country

JD19 – Cross country

It seems like this Janathon, April does everything except running. But as I woke up this morning with the thermometer showing -18C, running was out of question (sorry, I know I am a softie).
So I went cross country skiing (well, skating) instead.

Day 19: cross country skiing