No, I have not completely stopped training. After a spring with a rather high activity level for me with training for and completing the Brolopp in June and lot’s of roller skating with Friday Night Skate during the summer, some of my joints (not the smoking type) have been a little bit congested. One of my coaches suggested to take a break with the jogging and do some fitness training. The plan is to do this program, that I got from a instructor at Novo Nordisk, 2 times a week. Download as PDF. You are welcome to use it if you like.
Since floorball is such great fun, I continue to play that, even if it probably would be better not to 😉
In January I start a running program again to prepare for Göteborgsvarvet May 21.
During the summer, every 2nd Friday, a special event has been arranged in Copenhagen city – Friday Night Skate. I had the pleasure to attended the last 3 occasions, after I found out about it and had the opportunity to attend.
The Copenhagen version of Friday Night Skate started in 1999 with inspiration from similar events in other cities around the world. You find a collection of links to other cities on fns-cph.dk. It’s a social event and not a competition. You skate together with 300-700 fellow skaters. There are in liners, roller skates and even skateboards. Some have brought the baby jogger incl. baby. Some babies/kids have even safety belt and helmet on but not all. I didn’t hear about any accidents either so that’s lucky. But a MC police hit the road with his bike on the last trip. Nothing serious happened…
The procedure is that you normally meet up at the same place and same time every time, skate around 20 km on the streets of Copenhagen, escorted by MC police and with help from blockers that are volunteers that block the side streets so we can pass safely. It’s a special feeling to skate on the streets, passing red lights and with police escort – and it’s free.
Thanks to all those people that spend time to arrange these kind of events! I’m looking forward to spend more Friday nights skating around Copenhagen next year…
The 11 of January I started my training for the ½ marathon over the Öresund bridge. It started with an “agreement” with our neighbor over a glass of wine some time in the autumn 2009. During the long winter I have followed a program i got from smarts.se, some Swedish guys that used to give advice on how to train.
During the training period I suffered from aching ankles and one of my coaches meant it could be a combination with “little” bit overweight and running on ice, snow and other difficult “street texture”. The feet and ankles have to compensate for the “insecure” foundation with some micro movements. Instead of running I did some cycling and rollerskating instead.
The smarts.se training was much about time and intensity. To find out the intensity for 80% intensity: 0,80 x (max pulse – rest pulse) + rest pulse.
The training started with 45 minutes jog with 70% intensity (for me at the time: 0.7 x (195-80) + 80 = 160 bpm) for the first 3 weeks. Then 60 min. for 2 weeks.
Phase 2 was 80% intensity 2 times a week and 1 time rush training. During the process I was recommended to try a competition week that included a ½ marathon, just to get the feeling of how long 21 km really is.
The last 5 weeks I have been using a program from jogg.se called “formtoppa” that I found more alternate (sorry, but can’t find the link to “formtoppa” anymore).
22 weeks later, that means Saturday June 12, the big day arrived and we, x colleague Søren, neighbor Catrine and Håkan and I took the bus to Kastrup, Denmark. It started to piss down and I got the feeling that if this continue it is not going to be fun. Just as fast the rain came, just as fast came the sun and everything was fine again.
The waiting time was a bit long at Kastrup Beach park and then we walked a few kilometers before the actual start line. The first experience was the planes just flying over us, “waving” with their wings, at least thats was we thought. Next we entered the tunnel and was VERY warm but the “sound waves” was great. On the bridge we had lots of sun, great view and lots of tail wind – a fantastic experience. After reaching land again, people had gathered to cheer and at some places along the way there was music. After 21,1 km I was VERY happy to see the finish line. Was feeling a bit dizzy after passing the line and it was very crowded to get to the water depoes , get a medal and something to eat. Then I had to find the luggage that had been put on a lorry in Denmark.
We finished of in style with a great (and late) after run dinner at Casa Swedanes. Thank to all the participants for making this a day to remember.
The “Brolöp” was unique in different ways. It is the only race that pass both under and over water and that start in one country and finish in another.
My time? 2 hours 11 minutes.
A cool slide show from the finish line, made by Sydsvenskan.
Swedish blog that describe the day quite well, made by Linda Andersson.
When I used to paint I used acrylic paint and brush or water color and pencils. I use photos as reference and like to be as realistic as possible and sometimes exaggerate details.
On Moderskeppets blogg I just red about Bert Monroy who take it to the extreme using Photoshop and Illustrator to make Hyper Realistic Art. Bert also share his knowledge on Revision 3.com.
Wednesdays I attend a class, Interface design and Digital Estetics, where I learn about different aspects on web design. Thought it was about time to get a proper education in this area 😉
At one of this classes we were introduced to Color Scheme Designer. It’s a cool and useful tool that helps you find a matching color scheme for your web site. Very easy to use and lots of adjustments, try it…
Photoshop is my favourite software. Some play computer games, I play Photoshop. The “dark” side is that once started playing I can use hours trying different things. And soon Photoshop CS5 is released with some really cool features. Just wish I had unlimited time…
Today I gone through some of the Quick tips on “Moderskeppets” website, learning new stuff trying some of them, thanks Moderskeppet for sharing.
On this photo I’ve been trying Gradient Map, Lens Vignette and other adjustment layers.
This is Nicolai…
Skiing is one of the best thing I know. Unfortunatly I only manage to have one week a year in the white stuff the last couple of years.
The other weekend I looked through our photo archive and found some nice photos that I scanned and created a little web album and here is the story behind some of the photos:
In the late 80’s I spent more hours on the slopes. Two years as a ski bum in Ischgl, Austria and the winter season 1987/’88 Vibe and I spent in Meribel, Les Trois Vallées, France that bills itself as one of the largest ski able areas in the world.
It is a massive interconnected ski region, consisting of three main resorts and eight villages in three valleys: Vallée de Courchevel – Courchevel 1,300, 1,550, 1,650 and 1,850 meters. Vallée de Méribel – Méribel, Mottaret are in the middle of Les Trois Vallées and provides the most convenient access to the area. Vallée des Belleville – Les Menuires, Val Thorens that is the highest village in Les Trois Vallées (2,300m) and the highest ski resort in Europe.
On our tour around the world in 1989-1991, we visited Treble Cone, Wanaka, New Zealand. Treble Cone ski area is located in the Matukituki Valley, 28 km west of Wanaka on New Zealand’s South Island. Driving time is about 30 minutes from Wanaka and 100 minutes from Queenstown, a major tourist resort.
The skiarea faces northeast, giving the field protection from cold southerly winds and providing lots of sunshine.
Treble Cone offers the largest lift-served vertical drop on the South Island and is voted having one of the best views in the world.
Finally my floppy disks are copied to the computer to be burned on a CD…
They are destroyed and ready for the graveyard – may you rest in peace…
While working with these old school storage utilities I thought a little bit about how storage of data has changed during the last decade and what the future will bring.
The floppy disks could hold some 2 MB each and you needed several of them to copy data and for applications. On a CD you can burn 700 MB (350 floppy disks), a DVD around 4 GB and a USB flash drive can these days contain up to 256 GB!
What’s next? More data on smaller utilities. The challenge is maybe that the USB slot size is too big 😉 or are we going to use small data cards looking like SIM cards for the mobile? What’s the limit?
In the future the storage utilities are maybe so small that we have difficulties handling them, we misplace them and can’t find them, a baby, dog or cat swallow them, there isn’t room for the label :-)…
2009 is a gonner, very rapidly I would say. 1½ hour to the Danish Queen’s new year speach. This year we are having a “real” Swedish new year (probably with some Norwegian input) for the first time in many years. The festivities start at 19.00 so we have time to watch the speach – tradition is strong…
Yesterday we spent the evening at Vallåsen Skicenter with 4 hours of skiing between 17.00-19.00 on lit slopes, clear sky, lots of stars and full moon. Maybe that should be a new tradition…
Last year we went to Gran Canaria 5 December for a week in the sun. This year we went to the same place 11 December. That could be a tradition…
Time to say goodbye to the zeroes and welcome to the teens. Hopefully with some good food, wine, champagne, drinks, nice company and fireworks – that is the tradition 🙂
Sunday 1 of advent Swedish cities have “skyltsöndag“. This is to get the Christmas feeling starting. The shops are open and display Christmas decorations in the windows. Some serve “glögg och pepparkakor” (mould wine and ginger bread). According to wikipedia the first skyltsöndag was in Stockholm 1953.
Blacknwhite.dk had together with Shiva Tea House also opened and I served glögg and “æbleskiver” from 12.00-18.00. Æbleskiver is a Danish tradition/delicates and are mostly enjoyed at Christmas time served with icing sugar and jam. Translated to English æbleskiver is apple slices but these days there is no sign of apples in it. It’s a small ball made of a sort of pancake dough. In the old days (1700) it was slices of apples fried in flour and butter.
Among all of the visitor there was a very nice, happy and friendly blind couple. They were born blind and could only distinguish between light and dark. I served them æbleskiver and glögg and tried to explain what it was. The challenge was when they asked what kind of shop blacknwhite.dk is – what kind of interior decoration is it? It was really a big challenge because how to describe a pink drawer, grand-pa watches, silver glossy tin cans, multi coloured patch work blankets etc. to someone who always been blind?
We also had a talk about the internet. Even if they were blind they surfed the internet. Some blind people use “read back” that read the content on the page. This couple used a Braille pad where they read the content on the page with their fingertips, incredible. This made me think about the importance of web accessibility. Just think about a small detail as a phone number written 12345678 which is twelve million three-hundred and forty-five thousand six-hundred and seventy-eight instead of 12 34 56 78 – twelve thirty-four fifty-six seventy-eight…
size is too big 😉 or are we going to use small data cards looking like SIM cards for the mobile? What’s the limit?
