Emerald City

I just ran, in Seattle. I don't know how far or how long, but I did it. This week went by fast.

Sundee

My neck is so sore today. Did I sleep on it wrong or is it from the running? It hurts on both sides when I tilt my head from side to side.

Can anyone help me figure out what happened to my right side bar?

In addition to Saturday's run, I also walked about 7 miles around campus, no wonder my legs are so sore.

10/7/06 Quack Attack

I did the run up past Memorial Stadium and into the Berkeley Fire Trail, except this time I went up a bit farther than last Saturday. I definitely felt tight and sluggish most of the way up, probably due to the excessive drinking and eating crap that I partook in this week. At least that's what I think it is. Maybe next week I'll try being really healthy and see how that affects my running. Or not..... Because the truth of it is, I'm about to leave to watch football all afternoon and drink beer!

Miles = 9.24
Pace = 8:37

10/6/06 Back in Business

I really didn't want to do it, but I did. I think those days off gave me some fresh legs:

Miles = 3.9
Pace = 7:43

I actually didn't feel bad, it felt like a comfortable pace and I kept a mostly even pace throughout which is an improvement for me. I think I'm getting more used to the feel of my running and more aware of my pace.

Happy weekend!

Slacker

Between all of the socializing, laziness and wine it has been really hard to get a run in. I do this sometimes, give myself a good solid week of running and then think its okay to lay off for a while. That ain't going to hold up during marathon training time.

But for now I'm not going to stress too much. I will get back at it soon and don't have an upcoming race I really need to worry about.

Tomorrow I say, tomorrow.

10/2/06 Day Late and More Than a Buck Short

Miles = 3.9
Pace = 7:30
Pastries = 4.5

I did something no one should do today. See, we get these day old pastries and before I left work I decided to throw them away, because as of today, they were about 4.5 days old. But I was hungry and craving sweets and never eat pastries! These were enough reasons to make me take a bite out of almost every one of them before they went in the trash. Um, who does that?

Then when I got home I was so beside myself about watching the Bachelor (T minues 25 minutes now!) that the only thing I could think to keep me occupied was running. So I ran, with at least 400 gooey, sugary pastries floating around in my gut. NOT RECOMMENDED. (Not sure if Pfitz mentioned this in his training plan, maybe I should write my own training plan based upon things one should NOT do. I think I'd be good at it.)

It actually turned out to be a good run, albeit mostly in the dark along poorly lit sidewalks alongside brush that was housing a few hundred homicidal homeless drug addicts. This thought made me run fast.

I ended the run at the liquor store, natch. Hello...who watches reality TV anymore without a 6-pack cradled under their armpit? Not anyone I know.

Week of 10/2

Week 3 of Becoming A Runner Again; same thing as last week:

3x 4 miles lunch runs
1x 5-6 mile week night run
1x 7-8 mile wknd run

I've been managing to get in everything but the week night run for the past 2 weeks. Let's see what happens this week!

10/1/06 Strawberry Canyon Fire Trail

I set out today to do a long run, which right now for me is 6 or 7 miles. I ended up doing about 8.5 miles - I don't have a GPS gadget and ended up on trails for a portion of the run that I couldn't map out on gmaps.

The route was basic; uphill the 1st half, downhill the 2nd. And by uphill I mean treacherous. I think I'm getting more used to elevation, but after years of running on flat flat land it is still a challenge. On the unmapped trail section there was a hill that I literally almost lost my footing on - it was that steep - and about 200-300 meters long.

Miles = 8.64
Overall pace = 8:24
Uphill pace = 9:05
Downhill pace = 7:47

This was the longest run I've done in at least a year so I am sore but happy that I can still do it! Other notables, I woke up at 9, starting running at 11 with only a Power Bar vanilla gel pack and about 50 oz of water in my belly. I like to run on as empty stomach as possible and today was no exception - I felt great!

This is the Berkeley Fire trail - I was on the yellow part and think I went about halfway up. I'm going to go out on a limb and say the elevation over the 1st 4 miles was about 600 feet.

9/29/06 Overkill

So, out of curiousity and for dork's sake I did a detailed Lake Merritt calculation to see where the miles are *exactly*. Here are the results:

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=465632

I also calculated the small bit from my office down to the lake which is not a half mile, but really .3867 miles. And the total for the entire lake run is 3.1309, not just 3.1.

That is 163 more feet than previously tallied!

This changes things a teeny small small bit for me. Actually re-doing my calculations it speeds up my 5k pace on the lake by a few seconds. But on the overall, which is 3.9403 instead of 4.0, my pace is actually slower by a few seconds.

Here is a list of my recalculated paces:
9/28 run = 7:51/7:49 (5k pace/o'all pace)
9/26 run = 8:32/8:25
9/25 run = 8:17/8:16
9/22 run = 8:07/8:15
9/20 run = 8:14/8:20

This closes my 1st full week of logging (I'm dropping the b) everything and I think you can tell I've taken to it like bird feces to Lake Merritt.

9/28/06 Fowl Play

Miles = 4.0
Time = 30:33.8
Pace = 07:38.5

Split 1 – office down to the Lake = 02:52.8
Split 2 – Lake 1st mile = 07:52.6
Split 3 – Lake 2nd mile = 07:55.3
Split 4 – Lake 3rd mile = 07:44.6
Split 5 – Lake last bit (.1 mile) = 01:03.2
Split 6 – stretch = 09:40.7
Split 7 – lake to office = 03:05.4
TOTAL = 40:14.5
3 mile time = 23:32.5; pace = 07:50.8
5k time = 24:35.7; pace = 07:56.0

I'm like George freaking Costanza down by the lake - ducks, pigeons, seagulls, obtrusive geese EVERYWHERE. Either they have no spatial awareness or they're downright inconsiderate.

Maritza fed me her leftover gel/gu stuff about 30 minutes before my run. (Power Bar Double Latte, produced on the same machines as milk.) I can't say whether this is the cause of my faster running, but I ran fast today. Yay!

9/27/06 On The Fence

Does deciding on your bike ride home that you're too burned out to run make you a quitter, a loser? No. It is a feasible and healthy way to rejuvinate your body when it is most needed. Rescheduling your run for a different day of the week is not faltering.

So there.

Since I have no mileage or pace to report I will mention that shortly, when I can download the data, I will be adding my past mileage to my "breaking the tape" page. I will soon link this up to this blog so I can see how much I've run in the past few months or so. Most of my recent runs have been recorded so it will be interesting to see how it all pans out.

I couldn't post something w/o a graph, so here is the elevation of my bike ride home!

9/26/06 Wheat Berries

Miles = 4.0
Time = 32:53.8
Pace = 8:13.4

Split 1 – office down to the Lake 02:56.7
Split 2 – Lake 1st mile 08:12.8
Split 3 – Lake 2nd mile 08:47.0
Split 4 – Lake 3rd mile 08:34.7
Split 5 – Lake last bit (.1 mile) 01:09.7
Split 6 – stretch 01:38.0
Split 7 – lake to office 03:13.0

I think I need to recalibrate my lake mileage to figure out why my 1st mile is consistently faster. I refuse to believe that I am poor at pacing myself but that might be it....

Here is an elevation chart of my little lunchtime lap:


I know how my fans love the charts.

9/25/06 Olfactory Overload

Split 1 – office down to the Lake = 02:54.2
Split 2 – Lake 1st mile = 07:42.1
Split 3 – Lake 2nd mile = 08:31.8
Split 4 – Lake 3rd mile = 08:29.5
Split 5 – Lake last bit (.1 mile) = 01:13.1
Split 6 – stretch = 13:32.0
Split 7 – lake to office = 03:27.8

All of it = 45:50.5

3 mile time = 24:43.4; pace 08:14.5
5k time = 25:56.5; pace 08:22.1
overall time = 32:18.5; pace 08:04.6 (I don't get how this pace pans out, but I have no time to play with the numbers right now)

Oakland smelled like crap today.

9/24/06 Goals

Goals for the week:

3x 4 miles sometime during M-F (noontime)
1x5 miles sometime during M-F (p.m.)
1x6-7 miles wknd

5 runs
23-24 miles
Will it happen??

9/23/06 Hilly

Miles = 6.7
Time = 57:42.6
Avg Page = 8:35

I didn't mean to add the extra .7 but I missed my turnaround point. I'm testing out new routes and basically have no idea where I'm going. I am NOT used to any hills, slight rises, or even bumps in the sidewalk so running around here is always novel to me. Here is the graph of today's run's elevation:





About 473 at the highest point.

Total miles for the week = 18.2

9/22/06 Mindful

Split 1 – office down to the Lake = 03:18.2
Split 2 – Lake 1st mile = 07:53.0
Split 3 – Lake 2nd mile = 08:11.6
Split 4 – Lake 3rd mile = 08:07.9
Split 5 – Lake last bit (.1 mile) = 01:13.1
Split 6 – stretch = 03:40.7
Split 7 – lake to office = 03:30.0

time (incl stretch, warm up, cool down) = 35:54.5
time (incl warm up, cool down) = 32:13.9; pace 08:15.5

3 mile time = 24:12.5; pace = 08:04.2
5k time = 25:25.7; pace = 08:12.1

Since this is the first time I've really been serious about timing myself I'm actually surprised. Do I normally run this fast? In any case, I have been challenging myself more now that I see the numbers, so that is good and actually working. I need to make sure I keep this consistent. I had a lot on my mind to keep me occupied as well today and it went by quickly. Another sunny, breezy CA day!

This weekend I am going to try to do a longer run, as in a 90-120 minute run. Since I didn't do my designated runs for this week (3 x 4 mile lunch runs, plus one 6-7 miler after work) I am not sure what to do with the weekend.

9/19/06 Tuesdee Fun Run

Maritza and I finally ran together today. I'm stealing split times from her site because she's the cool one with the GPS gadget.

Miles = 3:52
Time = 34:33
Pace = 9:48

Breezy, sunny, perfect running weather.

Tester

This is a test.