I know I said in one of my last posts in October that I was planning on posting more regularly again, but I lost my rowing (and blog-writing) mojo after the last regatta of the year. It was very hard for me to motivate myself to write about something I wasn’t as passionate about any more, but I am happy to report that my mojo is slowly coming back now.

I think there were several reasons for my lack of motivation. Firstly, after the excitement of the races at the end of the season had worn off, and I often had to train on my own indoors, I started questioning whether I was really motivated enough to keep working out almost every day. As the weather started getting more and more gray, I got a little bit lethargic and quite tired. The next races just seemed to be too far in the future to force myself to do torturous workouts.

Secondly, I was travelling so much that I didn’t seem to be able to get over my permanent jet-lag, or rather my general exhaustion. I usually don’t suffer from jet-lag too much, but I guess I was just tired from my three transatlantic trips within three months. Worst of all, we did a lactate test on the erg less than a week after my return from Canada and, not surprisingly, I wasn’t satisfied with the result. Tina, on the other hand, did really well and even started doing workouts in the single, which she never thought she’d enjoy. Of course, I am happy for her that she is doing so well, but it is still frustrating when you are not making any progress because you are too tired to even drag yourself to the club to practice. 

As I was writing down my goals for 2016, however, I decided that I didn’t want to neglect the blog any longer, especially because I had so many ideas for topics to write about. After all, I am very passionate about propagating veganism and showing that vegan athletes can be successful, hopefully even stronger than non-vegan athletes. For instance, I would like to post more recipes, write reviews about vegan restaurants both in Austria and abroad, as well as weekly reports about my workout routine.

Moreover, I am planning on doing one health-related challenge each month and would love to write about my experience with that. Some ideas I have so far are cutting out refined sugar, drinking a certain amount of water (probably 3 litres) of water a day, drinking a smoothie each day, eating a salad every day, and starting fermenting vegetables. You are most welcome to make suggestions!

For now, I will leave you with a few pictures of my last workout of 2016, a 60-minute steady-state run along the Danube, and will be back with more content next week! Enjoy! P.S.: I was not arrested. Haha.