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Enter the Skier | General | ASI Reports | States
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Michal Trnka first came to Australia in 1992 and came back the next year to take up residence in Mt Beauty. Last November he gained Australian citizenship and is now eligible to compete for Australia in international competition.
If you can't work it out from the Polar heart rate curve below, Michal's session involved 21 three minute intervals, with a rest of a minute and a half in between. It was done runnning with ski poles on the side of Big Hill behind Mt Beauty. The scale along the bottom is time, and the red dots mark the start and finish of each interval. Below, find Michal's description of this type of interval session.
Note: This image is about 60k so it may take a little time to download.
It is only that last year if I did 8 same intervals I had trouble to return back home and had to rest for a week, and now since January, I was able to do three times more twice a week. Possibly this could be due to use of blood lactate analyser together with heart rate monitor, I don't know. Somehow it gradually happened, I just couldn't stop and kept discovering new limits in myself again and again. Maybe I didn't go hard enough, who knows, it's hard to say if you train just on your own. To get motivated each session I try to imagine that for each single interval I am racing with somebody like Dahlie, Alsgaard, Marsland whatever. This was fine a year ago, but now I have run out of the names of the best world's skiers I knew.
Sometimes I even won an imaginary race! I really wasn't worried much about placings as I could win any time I would imagine. What's a pity that it doesn't work like that in reality.
Worse was that I started running "out" of the hills! Often when I got to the top, I still could keep going, however nobody in my imaginary race field was prepared to do a few more lactic intervals down the hill with me, and there went my motivation. How disappointing! So now during the short rest period of the intervals I have to opposite sprint downhill instead, so I don't waste precious altitude just for the resting and save it for more intervals.
Maybe tomorrow I'll do something really tough... How about just to come along watching BBD, let alone to try keep up with him?
XC is the official website of the Skiing Australia Cross Country Committee. It is produced with the assistance of the Australian Sports Commission and the Kangaroo Hoppet. The editor can be contacted via hoppet@netc.net.au.
