Yes, right at this moment I would have been about a third of the way to Mora in Öppet Spår but, as you know, my arm problems have prevented me from even thinking of starting. But can you imagine how annoyed I would have been with this cold if I was planning to start? Mind you I probably would never have caught this cold if I were still training.

Right...back to work for me. The load is not getting any lighter.

The plan was perfect. Before I start my new job in April, I need to write two articles and finish off an old one. It would also be nice to have a bit of vacation since I spent Christmas writing my research plan. So drastic measures were needed. To be most productive I needed to just disappear for a few days and lock myself in a hotel room and let the creativity flow. I had some hotel credit left so Copenhagen was an excellent option. As a reward, I would be in CPH.

Thursday's train must have been a bag of nice viruses because I was sick directly. Or maybe others at work were sick and my slight relaxation on the train left me open for an attack. Or, less likely, it was because I didn't have my Actimel. By Friday morning I was feeling like shite and by the afternoon I was having a seriously bad spinning-room kind of day. No, my hotel was not in Christiania. Saturday I had to splash-proof the computer for a lovely sneeze-fest which continued today on the train back.

So I got way less done than I hoped and have given up the dream of getting any vacation before the new job. It's not going to happen. But, being sick has made me think less about my arm.

While we are on the topic of CPH and cycling, that place is meant for us. There was a cycle highway next to the hotel and everyone was just flying. Go to Copenhagen Cycle Chic and enjoy. They have started to include all types of cycling pictures and not just those of women in skirts.

I am sure many of you watched the Sprint races in skiing yesterday in Oslo and I have to say that it was bloody exciting. Which is why I am very happy to see that SCF will start XCE or cross country elimination in MTB. Watching normal XC is only slightly less boring than watching LVG where riders only pass once. Most of the XC courses are so deep in the forest that you only see riders when they come back to the finish area. XCE should solve that problem a bit since the race time should be a few minutes and you can't cover that much ground in a few minutes.

MCK has had a sprint contest as part of our local Göteborg races so we have at least raced this way before. I remember I ended up in a heat with 3 Elit so I was not expecting to go on. But in the 'very B final' I remember being ahead of Kristina at the start but then fell in a nice grus corner and lost by a little bit. But it was really fun.

More sprint for the people is what I say...

I am not really supposed to be taking Ipren because I am oversensitive to aspirin. And yesterday I had some funny rash on my leg and my tongue is kind of scratchy so I decided it was time to say no to drugs. So today I am clean, the rash is gone but the tongue feels strange anyway which probably means a cold. No surprise there with all my stress and lack of training.

Before I start my new job on April 1st, I wanted to get a bit of vacation in and finish up a whole pile of work I need to do with my research. Plus I need to fit in my arm exercises to get some strength back now that I have no drugs to help me ignore the muscles.

My guess is I will be running through March. It is the most time efficient training I can do since I can be rather dead in under an hour and can do this at whatever time of day or weather status.

Sometime yesterday, precisely 1 week after UlricehamnsLoppet and my vurpfest, quite a bit of the pain just lifted and I felt pretty okay. I do have a rather messed up toe but that is expected with skiing.

I went to Sport Rehab again and had the complete exam to find out that my shoulders are just fine! Woohoo! What I do have is a rather mushed up set of biceps/triceps but that heals much faster if I do their exercises.

So now I will build up my bicep strength to match my left arm. Question is whether I ever had any bicep strength before my accident???

Obviously my injury has been the main topic here this week but that is probably getting boring. So now that basically everything is official, I can make my big announcement.

I have been offered a job as Scientific Editor of a fairly large department of Göteborgs Universitet! It lasts until the end of November 2012 because of the well-known 'over 2 years = tillsvidare' thing that companies are so scared of. But they have said that this is a trial and do intend to continue it and I intend to work my ass off to be sure that I get extended.

But why is this so life-changing? Well, I have been doing research for awhile and have enjoyed it but lately I just can't get any funding for myself or my project. I struggle along in a cloud of uncertainty which is a tough way to live when you are not an actual citizen here. I will still be in contact with research since I will be editing it but I will not have the depressions associated with not getting funded after writing the application. In research we call this a 'real job'.

This will be a challenging job and that I look forward to. In terms of cycling, I will be giving priority to races that are close to here because I think my weekends are going to be needed.

Maybe the lighting is just bad here but I apparently missed a rather nasty series of bruises on my left leg. I know I could feel something when I walked and now I know what it is. Yep, my plans of attempting a bit of trainer time this weekend are looking not so great.

I had my first semla of the year today and that is bad news when I can't train very much or really do much of anything. But next time I will buy a right-handed semla since I have trouble getting my right hand up to my mouth without pain. =)

In my continued experimentation on myself, I thought it was best to do a proper study. Yesterday I did not know if my improvement was from extra healing time or the drugs. But now I know the answer. Last night I took my Alvedon/Ipren as suggested by the doctor and my arm felt kind of okay. I could do a bit more with it but it was still long from healed.

A good study should also fade out the drug to see if the problem returns. So this I did by sleeping. I woke up this morning and before I took my morning dose, the arm was crap. Horribly stiff and painful. Now I have taken the pills again and the pain is still there but not as much. So there is my proper medical experiment. Drugs are da shit.

I am hoping that I can start running or something next week. I will also try to sit on my trainer and see if there is any chance I can ride. I doubt that I can grip the handlebar without pain yet and at this moment I would prefer a sport with brakes.

My first tip of the day is NK Apoteket. No queue at all...just walk straight up and instantly get my drugs.

When I woke up this morning I felt much better but this is not a real effect. I always feel like crap for 2 days after a långlopp and then on the 3rd day all the träningsvärk is magically gone. So that was this morning. All that is left is a #&%¤ of a pain in my arm.

Yes, I don't need any special exam to determine which muscle is hurting. It is the one I kept landing on repeatedly. I will admit that I was able to move my arm more but it hurts like crazy. So I am definitely following the painkiller approach for now.

My first experience with the local vårdcentral was of a doctor complaining that I was listed in Bergsjön despite the fact that I had changed to them. Things are not terribly efficient, I suppose. So he said an X-ray would cost him over 1000kr and that I was not getting one. Lovely.

After moving my arm around in various ways which were more violent then yesterday at Sport Rehab, he concluded that nothing was broken but I needed to get rid of the pain. So he suggested a stomach-eating superdose of both Alvedon and Ipren and if that did not work I should take a morphine-like pill and fly around the room for awhile.

He also said that I needed to start moving my arm or else I would be stuck permanently crouched over. Huh? Sounds like something you would use as a threat to a small child. He also seemed to shit on the exercises I got yesterday in that typical 'I am doctor...superior being' way.

Just like everyone said, the first visit is essentially to get drugs. Then they wait and see if things get worse after a week. Then, maybe, you might get to see a specialist sometime in a month.

Has anyone else had a similar experience with vårdcentral? Feel free to comment and complain...

I just got back from Sport Rehab and managed to get an actual time instead of drop-in because they could see from my attempt to fill in their form that I was definitely in pain. And pain was a problem since no matter what they did to my arm, I had pain. About all they could say was that it is not swollen but that I should still have it checked or X-rayed at a doctor's to see if I had any interal damage.

He did not seem to think it was too bad but can't really make any call for sure until my general pain and inflammation are down. Some of this may be träningsvärk. So I will check the doctor tomorrow afternoon and then I have another appointment for next week at Sport Rehab. The best-case scenario is 2 months of rehab and I already have the page of exercises I need to do.

So I have definitely managed to get out of doing Öppet Spår this year... But the owner of Sveriges största cykelblogg just announced that he will not do Vasaloppet either so I should not feel so bad.

I am just waiting for Sport Rehab to open their drop-in at 12.00 because I am rather messed up. My guess is a dislocated shoulder which means a load of therapy and other expensive stuff.

But on a positive side I finished a ski marathon! And that has to be worth something for a cyclist.

And so it was time for my first ever ski marathon in wonderful Ulricehamn. If you remember my last trip there, I was talking about perfect conditions. But with over 600 people signed up, I knew I should not expect anywhere near perfect. I started last because I had no idea how this would go and I know my skis have some speed so I did not want to crash into people. They annouced my name as being the last person to start and the club IK Stern and said I would certainly not be the last to finish. But I am the master of coming last so he should stick around for 5 hours and see.

The start was slow and I had a hard time judging which distance I should have because I had such massive glide. So I was out in the left track passing quite a bit. People were braking on the hills and I am not very good at this so it was crash time quite early. The part of the 10km trail was brutal like before and they added this little elite part which was insane. But I did the first 10km in an hour which was fast. This was partly because I was jumping positions a lot with a guy in a UK hat plus a couple of women. But then it came to the golf course which was just diagonalåkning which I am weaker at. My strength was uphill and that was where I could catch people. So the first lap was total 20km and I was only lapped by about 10 elite. At 2 hours for Lap 1, I knew immediately that I went out far too hard.

I seriously considered quiting but then I thought, nej, I will do this marathon. But I could feel I was weak as soon as I started. The first part was quite nice when it was empty so I could fly nicely down the hills but now the falls were starting to hurt. Overall it was like 15 falls...fan!

At 25km the cramp monster was awake in both of my legs (front and back) plus my right shoulder and I was not at all strong so I stopped for a Squeezy gel. That helped but I knew I had another 5km until I would get any sportdryck and that was a tough battle. In the little elite section they had these quick downhills about the size of the one at MCKs CX race and just as steep and naturally a left corner at the bottom. I took a nasty fall and was quite fed up so the next two of these I actually took off the skis and walked. That was good for the cramps too. This is around when 4 of the 6 people behind me passed. I seem to have been racing those that only did the 20km.

The break was good and 3 cups of sportdryck were gone plus I added a bit more kick wax. Conversation was good so I took a deserved break. They said that it was only the golfcourse left and I had been thinking that too. But the golfcourse was a series of left turns so if you fall you get thrown to the right. Of course today I had already fallen forward and backward as well as right. Some of these corners were at the bottom of hills and there were no tracks plus this 10cm hill of snow down the centre from the braking. In the first of these I managed to stay upright but I switched tracks and ended up in front of a girl who stuck the tips of her skis between my skis and ended up with her arms around my stomach. Yes, how YOU doin'. =) But her and the guy with her were the only ones left so now I was in dead last.

The next left turn went more normal and I fell yet again on my right side. But this time my shoulder was killing and suddenly I could not move my arm. Fan. 7km to go and now what? I started again and tried to use my right arm was it was killing. So at first I tried without using poles or only using the left side but sooner or later the endorphins kicked in and I could move it sort of. This KILLED! All I had to do was get to the elljusspår which I love and could get away with a lot of coasting. There were 3 more left turns on hills and I took off the skis again. I did not want to fall on that side again.

By some miracle I finally made it to where I was supposed to get sportdryck but they were gone. So the last 3km would take the last out of me. Once I was at the elljus I forgot that there were a series of uphills and somehow I managed stakning and walking up the hills. I was gliding down towards the finish area but it is not over yet...you still have to turn back again and up a series of death hills. Today they were death hills.

But by then I was running on that different fuel motivated by a finish line. The final stretch is slightly uphill so I had to diagonalåk som fan and some of those others that had finished ahead were cheering me up to the line where I did one of those single ski slides...as if I had anyone else around.

I finished this freakin' marathon and probably did the last 7km with a seriously damaged shoulder. I have never had so much bodily harm in a single race and despite Lap 2 from hell, my total time was 4:45 for the toughest 40km a motionär could ever see. Of course I was last. But I don't care. Under 5 hours is enormous! To go from zero skiing ability in December to finishing this race February 13th is a hell of an achievement. But Öppet Spår? Not a chance right now.

I am late and very nervous about my first ever ski race. My waxing is sådär and if I had time I would have taken your vallaskola Sven but this has been a bad week for time. So I slopped on some Toko for glide and a pile of V40 for kick and we will see what happens.

Whatever happens is fine. It is a nice day outside so I will enjoy it. But first I need to actually drive there so no more time for writing here...

There is now a rather scary took which you can find here under Beräkna din sluttid. With 75% certainty according to previous results, they can predict how long a Vasaloppet will take.

Being a 35 year old male, I clicked the option for 'risk of not making it' and came up with 10 hours and 38 minutes at -8C and 10:51 at 0C. Ganska otränad is probably a better description of me and that gives 9 hours 43 minutes. Being vältränade gets things down to 8 hours and 55 minutes. None of these are terribly encouraging, if you ask me.

For tomorrow's UlricehamnsLoppet they have now set a maxtid for the first 21km lap. I have 2.5hours to get around or they pull me. Based on my time there before in the complete absence of people, I should manage. But with a ton of people...nja...I have no clue what will happen. There are also 3 dryckstationer and those are dangerous. It is nice to talk to people.

Finally I pronounce this week officially done. After waking up at 05.00 today to get to work early to help set up for the thesis defence, I have been pretty dead. The dinner and party tonight was lugn for me because I was already sedated before any drinks. Dansband music is not my shit and other 80s Swedish classics are also not my shit. A little Håkan in Göteborg would have done wonders but maybe that is taboo. Or maybe I have left the indie crowd behind me in Uppsala. Anyway, it was nice and now I can finally sleep...

I am the only person here that is happy to see some snow today. But there will be no snow angels because it is that wet snow that is not very fun. But inland in places like Borås and Ulricehamn, this is securing ski perfection for the next little while.

But last night I felt sick anyway despite my decision to just not be sick. Tomorrow someone in the group is defending her thesis so that means arriving here early to fix everything plus a dinner and party after. None of this is good for cold virus fighting but it will be fun anyway.

Sunday is UlricehamnsLoppet which will be my first ever ski race. Of course that is making me nervous, especially since I haven't been skiing since my first time there. The course is the 10km I did plus a golf course extension and some of the elljusspår. 40km total which means 2 laps and a clear risk that I may be lapped. Lapped? Nej...that can't happen in a 2 lap race. Or? Hmm...I will make not getting lapped my first goal.

I see that we have one guess about what my life-changing decision is. Nej, I am not shaving any legs until at least April. And a prof career in CX would be fun but, well, no bank loan is going to help a lack of natural talent. Anyway, when things are all final I will write about it. For now you can keep guessing...

Anyway, my complaint of the day is about scheduling. Of course summer MTB races tend to conflict with other things held during the summer like music festivals. The eternal conflict has been that Way Out West is on the same weekend at CykelVasan. Last year I chose the cycling and had to hear for months about what I missed. Yesterday they just announced that Pulp will play WOW so at the moment it is looking bad for CykelVasan. To feel better I can point out that CykelVasan was a ganska tråkig MTB race. But I did really well in it and the atmosphere was great.

In that typical way after a stress-filled weekend of moving and a hard work week, my slight relaxation on Sunday has left me very open for sicky sicky germs. And right now I don't have time to be sick. So my thought is to just not be sick. Simple as that. =)

In other news, I am in the process of making a life-changing decision. More on that later...

Nej, there was no cycling or running in my Sunday agenda afterall. Walking up and down stairs was plenty for me. But this morning I am back in business.

My only real pain was the back of my thighs and that has to be from the utfall while holding a 10kg weight. Nasty little exercise that is. Maybe my 20 leg lifts made things a tad worse. But that was only because I couldn't even manage 2 full body weight chin ups so I had to do something.

Sure...I have a bit of träningsvärk today. But not near as much as I thought I would have. So that means I should manage some kind of training today. But reality says unpacking is a better choice. These boxes are driving me mad.

Today was MCK MTBs training day at Allebike and naturally I am always tempted to buy things there because they actually have things. But I only bought some cleaner and ski guards so I don't scratch the glide sections. I did manage to escape the temptation of their lovely frames.

Anyway, after some outdoor warmup with the kids, Karlsson decided to kill us with some styrka. Naturally, those pilates balls were first on the agenda just to destroy the illusion anyone may have about their good balance. This stuff is always tough. I should be training this here now that I have a room and know where the ball is. The rest was your usual tough sets of weights and various lunges and other torture methods.

To top the morning off we had the obligatory 500m race on the rowing machine. Philip was the champion of the day. I delivered a decent 1:49 after sliding a bit off the seat in the middle so I probably could have done 1:47. I beat Tomas with this time since he fell off the seat with about 100m to go and decided his first experience with a rowing machine was not going so great. So with burning throats, it was time for a yummy lunch with some planning for the season.

After lunch was a spinning pass which was basically like a normal gym pass. No high intensity TC-style stuff...just typical climbing. This felt pretty good and by the hour I was still ready for some more. Of course now I feel like I want to die, but that is why we have sofas and TV.

Anyway, I felt like my skiing has had some good effect on my fitness level and strength. Good good.

So, now I am enjoying the view from my apartment in actual daylight and it is nice. But if I sit here any longer I will be late for our MTB training day up at Allebike. More on that later...

It seems like the two sports of skiing and cycling are in conflict with each other and I am straddling a dangerous line by doing a bit of both. Or is this just like LVG vs MTB? A quick look through most results lists shows that many top MTB marathon riders are also pretty good at skiing. And I would agree that skiing keeps my MTB muscles going during the winter and it is more fun than running. Or it could be frustration among cyclists in general. No one wants a cyclist to ride on the road and no media covers cycling. Skiers receive all the praise and are national heros.

In my case, I need to take a break from cycling once in awhile and do something else. In case you haven't noticed, I am racing quite a bit and I am sorry to say that towards the end of CX season I felt it was too much. That was mostly the snow and the fact that I am not so great at riding in snow. I tend to have the same reaction after too much XC...mostly there because I am so bad at it. So I am all for alternative training in other types of sports.

So my cycling readers...what is it about skiing that is annoying? Post a comment below. I will start...those bags you wear around your waist are silly. =)

Just for a moment there I was all excited by SMHI. There is a snow warning for tonight! But then I read it would only be 5cm which is useless unless someone picks it all up and puts it on a ski trail. Then it will be switching to rain tomorrow again so, yeah, no break for skiing this time. Things are looking more positive inland a bit though...

Here is a challenge for you. Take all of your sports stuff and put it in one place. This is what I did. And boy was I surprised!

It's a good thing I am single or this pile of stuff would be causing conflict all the time. The only conflict I have now is that I can't find anything...

After the move I am going through one of those 'Where the hell is that?' phase with basically everything I own. I made an attempt to find some bike things to start to prepare for Saturday and the MCK MTB training up at Allebike. But with no dubbdäck or any sort of mud flaps, I am not sure how welcome I would be on a typical winter pass. Then again, I am always at the back so mud flaps are probably not needed. I had them once but I have no clue where they are now...

Anyway, I am switching back to my 'I don't care' mode now that the next round of colds are spreading on the bus and the weather is very much useless for skiing. 45km of skiing in wet snow is easily the same as 90km in perfect snow and this is precisely what I will do on February 13 for Ulricehamnsloppet.

When we speak of fiasko in this country we are usually discussing hockey VM and another case of Canada winning against Sweden. But I have a fiasko of my own to discuss. With my moving I have happily ignored everything for the last few days. Now I am back. So how about the weather SMHI? 3C and rain or 2C and grey for the rest of the week. 5C and rain for Saturday. FAN!!! Even my new favourite place Ulricehamn is above 0C.

I know I wrote that I would not quit this time. But I am pretty damn close to doing just that. I can't drive 2.5 hours just to find snow while having a full-time job. Besides, did I mention that I have been in pain since last Wednesday? All I did was ski 24km and move... =(

I am on schedule with training for Vasaloppet 2012 but 2011 is looking bad.