Odenwald Hike with Christian and Imke

The Odenwald is a small mountain range just 20 km away from Mannheim. We went the Neckar valley upstream passing Heidelberg driving to Neckargerach for a small morning hike with Christian and Imke.

Starting in the small town we followed the river for a while before hiking in the meadows and forest of the Odenwald.



On the way back to the Neckar valley we followed down the Margarethen gorge which offers a lot of cascading waterfalls. It is quite steep and luckily the weather was dry and sunny, otherwise this would have been a slippery path.



The view was astonishing when we finally came out of the gorge and had "our" river back. The village on the photo is Guttenbach.



Unfortunately I missed the photo of all 4 of us on the bench. Mine is far too overexposed. I should finish the photo book before playing around with my Nikon D90.

Perfect conditions

Ladenburg was a great race. Luckily the rain didn't show up and it wasn't so hot like in 2005. Heiko and me jumped off the boat and started in the last row to avoid the trouble at the front. During the 1.8 km I lost sight of him and I left the Neckar after approx. 27 min, on position 300 of 350 starters. It took some time to get out of the neoprene, it is a bit too small for me, I guess.

The bike part was fantastic, I had a lot of fun overtaking around 100 competitors on the way up the two hills. When I arrived back in Ladenburg for last disciplin, the running, I was already on apporx. position 200. I found my rhythm pretty fast, it was a lot better than some weeks ago in Maxdorf, so I could speed up a little and overtake some more 50 people.

At the end I finished in 2:43 h, 5 minutes slower than in 2005. But I am totally happy with the result, regarding the small amount of training compared to that year.

The Ladenburg triathlon festival

Time has come again. Next weekend the Ladenburg olympic triathlon will again be hold near Mannheim. Having to skip it last year, I will compete again this year. Swimming in the Neckar, cycling a some mountains in the Odenwald forest and running a nice loop within the Ladenburg park, this is a really nice small triatlon.

And the starter crowd will again be magnificent, e.g. Ironman world champion Norman Stadler and Ironman European champion Timo Bracht will again fight a duel.

Holiday in Mannheim

My parents have been in Mannheim for a good week, visiting the city and surroundings. We have been to castle Auerbach and did a bike trip along the river Neckar to Bad Wimpfen, a very nice old city on top of a rock overlooking the Neckar valley. A very nice scenery.


The castle Auerbach


Me and my recumbent bike


Bad Wimpfen


Me and my parents on top of a city tower


Good old cobblestone


A friendly tree in Bad Wimpfen

Ladenburg Triathlon

Yesterday our global planning and basis administration team jointly visited Mannheim's brewery "Eichbaum". Later we went to the Irish pub like every Thursday. As a last step we went to an Asian karaoke bar before getting some sleep.

Today is our company's summer party, which will be conducted in a location near Mannheim. This time I'll not stay until the end, because I'll compete in the Ladenburg triathlon on Saturday afternoon.

Time is ticking away. The 2 week countdown for the Ostseeman begins on Sunday. :)