Thank you… for everything.

I have two sisters, both younger than I am. I am the oldest, most attractive, most intelligent, and most superlative son of the three of us. There are no other sons so there is very little competition in that regard which works out well for me if I do say so myself.

This isn’t about me really, but it’s going to start out that way just bear with me OK? I was book smart. I skipped second grade (Not a good idea by the way in my opinion. These days they don’t fail people because socially it’d be a bad idea… Yeah, I sort of wish they had thought that when I was skipped. I was socially way out of my league and it took me a while to not feel out of sorts, but that’s not the point.) The point is school stuff came really easy to me. I thought it came easy to everybody. I remember a conversation in High School with my Mom where I was saying that everybody should be required to take Algebra. I’d probably just heard Jubal Harshaw say it. I was easily impressed. (Moment of silence for The Grand Master please…) I know now that I was an idiot. But it was something that I thought was a gift, only instead of being grateful for it or humble for having received it, or recognizing it may have a downside. I was an elitist ass. I eventually grew out of that, but in the meantime my sister Leigh got to bear the brunt of the annoying part about my being book smart.

The thing with being a kid is that the metrics used for a REALLY long time are metrics like… school work or grades. An area in which I did pretty OK with very little effort (with the exception of math which my grade skipping didn’t help me on at all). Later, we’re skipping a lot of years here, I went to college and hit a wall. There were a LOT of people around me as casually intelligent as I was, and the spoon feeding of the high-school classes wasn’t cutting it. Suddenly school was hard. My sister meanwhile, graduated high school early, by working hard, studying hard, and applying herself. She didn’t skate through it. She worked at it. And finished early.

I was in college and needed to study for the first time ever. I didn’t have a clue how. I’d never needed to before. I failed a class. No kidding. Failed it bigger than life. The one thing I’d always done OK in without really trying was something I was screwing up and had failed at. So. I took the class again and had the highest average in the class (I have jokingly said that I beat an Asian girl in math as my highest achievement but I feel bad because when she saw she was second in class she cried. I pointed out I had the advantage of having taken the class before but it didn’t seem to help.) I worked hard on it that year. I learned to study and I studied and it wasn’t easy. I did, for one semester, in one class what my sister had done for longer and I hated it. I liked the class. I didn’t like that I had to work at it.

So I quit. I dropped out of college and entered the Navy as a Nuke. Supposedly you have to be smart to be a Nuke. I don’t know if it’s true or not, but I met people in there in the school who hated me, got so mad at me that they couldn’t stand it or even talk to me because again… I was getting it and they weren’t. Only now I knew how to study so I wasn’t just getting it and getting by. I was doing really well. I wish I’d learned to study sooner. I’d have done better when I was in high school.

My sister DID study. She worked and got done with High School ahead of schedule and joined the Marines… holy crap! I’d talked to the Marine recruiter, but as soon as he said how long his boot camp was I was done. No chance in hell of me surviving a 12 week boot camp. She did it though. I had joined the Navy and started running before I went in to get into better shape. I’d run and do push-ups and sit-ups and whatever else I thought I’d need to get through the 8 weeks of Navy boot camp. She’d done it harder though… again.

I never told her in all that time how proud I was of her for what she’d done. I got skipped in 2nd grade. I didn’t do anything to deserve that except know how to read. She’d taken time off the back end of her education… the hard years, and she’d earned it. She’d set a goal and done it, the hard way. Then she’d joined the Marines and did that too. I bragged about her to everybody who would listen. She wasn’t “in the service.” She was a MARINE. That’s not like other branches. I don’t care what branch you’re in… Marines are tougher. (OK. Navy Seals are excluded here, they eat Marines for breakfast with milk and sugar sprinkled over them. lol)

Skip forward again… she’s married with a son with a great house, she knits, she paints, she bakes and cooks and is, as far as I can see… working her butt off to be a great Mom to her son. When her husband (a Marine she met while she was a Marine) was going to be called-up and deployed and she was going to be on her own she took care of business, and didn’t fall apart or anything like that. She put on her butt kicking boots and took care of things.

When I heard she was going to do a running program called Couch to 5k I thought I’d give it a look. And I did. In management I’ve often told people I’m a sprinter, not a marathon runner. I can do anything for two weeks. No job is too hard that I can’t do it for two weeks. Need me to run 8 stores while I open a new one and train an entire crew and put in 20 hour days? No problem… two weeks, maybe three but then I’m going to need to crash.

In job negotiations with the new owner of the company I work for I didn’t talk about salary or compensation or his expectations. He talked about all that. I talked about time off and needing it. I know my limits. I learned early on that I’m BAD at working on something long term. It’s a limitation I have and I know it. This Couch to 5k thing… that’s a 9 week course… self started… got to get myself up off the couch of DOOM and do it myself. I have never done anything myself for that length of time. I said that if she could do all those things she’d done then surely I’d be able to do them. Once in my life I should, before it was too late, live up to the standards my sister had set for herself and surpassed over and over again in my estimation.

Last week I finished the 9 week running program in 12 weeks. I finished it because my sister who I’ve never told how proud I was of her was my inspiration. Not her finishing it. I don’t know if she has or not yet. She has no twitter feed *hint*hint*. But because of the way she’s lived her life. She’s, to my eyes, worked hard to make sure that she lives it fully. There’s an expression in racing that you run so you leave everything on the track. When you finish a race there’s nothing left in you as you cross the finish line. You couldn’t run any further because you’ve run it and run it your best and hardest without burning out too soon or crossing the finish line with any reserves meaning you didn’t run hard enough. To me she’s running the race of life that way. She doesn’t appear to be coasting through life just waiting for things to happen and I respect that and appreciate it and love her for it.

Thank you Leigh, for introducing me to the C25k and thank you for being someone I wish I were more like. You make me proud to say you’re my sister.
 
(This is a double blog post… if you see it on simplerich.com and my SimpleRunner blog in your newsreader it’s not stuttering. I am. She’s worth a double post to me.)

(PS: To those of you who say I’m romanticizing things and no brother sister is this lovey dovey… lol you’re right. We weren’t. I was an ass and she was too… but we were kids. We’re allowed. We both grew out of it and turned into decent people.)

Couch to 5k a run-down

My sister started the Couch to 5k ahead of me. I can't remember who told me about it. It could have been her or my Mom but I of course hit the Google (sic) and thought "Oh! This looks like something I can do. I don't even have to run a long time for a long time. There's walking mixed in and I like to walk. I do that all the time!" So I grabbed the podcasts from Robert Ullrey's website and stepped outside in my running shoes.

Here's an interview with the creator of the Couch to 5k program. I like how his focus on the program was to make running something people would do without getting hurt and how he intended to focus on giving those who followed it a habit of successes as we trained up. As I write this I'm on week 8 and am running 28 minutes at a time now without stopping and it's only a 9 week program so I'm getting nervous. What next?

The Couch to 5k program is around a 30 minute program with a five minute warm up and cool down on either end of the half hour and it's every other day except at the end of the weeks there are two days off in a row. There are a couple weeks where there is a long run on the end of the week so the two days off in a row are welcome recovery times. The hardest part of this program for me was to not go too fast. There were several times when I wanted to do more than it said but I told myself when I started that I would follow the program and not make up my own.

I didn't want to get hurt or screw something up and quit. I know how I am and if it hurts I'll bail on it faster than you can say "Pass the syrup." So I made myself do it in order and like the site said to. There was a hard week which repeated and there was a week that I missed a few days because work wasn't allowing me to run so I backed up a day and did that week over again too. Slow and steady wins the race was my motto. And, while the program says "feel free to do weeks over again" it doesn't say "Oh, and just skip whatever weeks you want to and go as fast as you want."

I'm a fan of structure. In my non-running life and my work life I'm list maker and check-box user. The Couch to 5k running program was perfect for me and probably anybody I know who had the stick-to-itiveness to do it. A lot of people I hear on podcasts or out in the world who talk about running say that they started it for weight loss and that wasn't why I started running. That's good too since I haven't lost any weight! I started because I like to run. I loved running as a kid. Remember when you were little and just ran because it felt good? Yeah. That doesn't change. What changes is we quit running. It's still there and it still feels good.

Week 5, Day 3 -- whew

OK. Today was a 20 minute run. That isn't a lot really... but the thing is, when I started running six, seven weeks ago. I couldn't have run 20 minutes in a row at any speed. I was out of shape. My endurance was poop, and well, I was just no good at it.

I've talked to real runners and they run marathons and they're very polite when I talk about how I want to run a 5k and I haven't yet... am not even sure I could run the entire race without stopping to walk a minute or two. I know. It's only 3 miles... but when I started I couldn't run at all without running out of air.

So, I'm no Steve Prefontaine, but I'm in better shape now than I was when I started. I didn't start running to lose weight or get in shape or work on my cholesterol or diabetes (which I don't have) or any of that. I started running because I like running. You'd think I would be better at something I say I enjoy. I feel silly pretending to be a runner when I haven't yet run a race and seriously, when I DO run my first race my goal will be to finish. That's a pretty pathetic goal actually.

Ugh, I'm starting to feel like maybe I should quit talking about the running thing, not because nobody reads it. I'm OK with that... it's the part where I feel like I'm talking about something really really sad. It's like cheering that I ate a cracker without having to pause for a few minutes to rest up. I haven't really accomplished all that much in the scheme of things. I'll temper my excitement for a while.

In the software department... I'm liking Cardio Trainer for the android. I wish it gave as much information as the great stuff over at Bones In Motion. I look forward to them coming out with an android app soon. (Not that I've heard they would. I just hope they will.)

Google Android My Tracks & Do-over

No more Bones In Motion log information for me for a while. I ditched the Blackberry Storm (You can keep it thankyouverymuch!) and am now a proud owner of the Google Android on Verizon’s network. I got the HTC Eris for two reasons 1) It’s named Eris! All Hail Discordia!!! and 2) It’s not Motorola (whom I don’t like at all).

I got to do Week Five over again as I only did it partially last week then stopped running for almost a week. I started over on Week 5 of the Couch to 5k. Honestly, the break came at a good time. My calves were really sore and achy for some reason. So I spent nights stretching them while I was off and will continue to do so. I may start doing Yoga in the morning if I can find another half hour in my day to do it in ARGH. I don’t know what I’m going to do when/if I start doing long runs. I’ll need more time for sure.

Today was beautiful. The BIM Active site shows Weather Information that this one doesn’t show. I hope BIM adds android support soon.

All in all it was a good run and I was glad to get back to it. My Nike+ shoe pod kept stopping working saying I wasn’t moving so I probably won’t keep using it after I get some software on the Android that I love. Which is too bad because I really do like the interface and the challenges and community around the Nike+ site.

Total Distance: 4.41 km (2.7 mi)
Total Time: 30:41
Moving Time: 28:50
Average Pace: 6.96 min/km (11.2 min/mi)
Average Moving Pace: 6.54 min/km (10.5 min/mi)
Min Pace: 4.76 min/km (7.7 min/mi)
Min Elevation: 296 m (971 ft)
Max Elevation: 320 m (1049 ft)
Elevation Gain: 96 m (316 ft)
Max Grade: 5 %
Min Grade: -13 %
Recorded: Sat Nov 07 09:53:47 CST 2009

Fort Dodge, Iowa (Airport)

From Wundergound
Temperature: 61 °F Clear
Humidity:  42%
Wind:  8 mph from the North

Why I run.

I’m going to do my first cross-blog post involving both simplerich.com and my simplerunner blog over on blogspot. I’ve started running recently (First recorded run was on June 20th or so.) so it’s been slightly less than a month that I’ve been running.

I’ve been doing the Couch to 5k training program to ease me into being able to run a 5k race from being a couch rider who didn’t do much more than walk and hike. I read Born to Run by Christopher McDougall. The thing with running books, running podcasts, and stories about runners, is that they’ve always hit me on an emotional level. This isn’t true of all sports. I read and really liked The Blind Side by Michael Lewis but it didn’t resonate with me on an emotional level. I just really liked it.

Running for me though is something that is singular in the sports world to me… I know it’s not. Golf is all you too. But with Running there’s no technological advantage to be had by the wealthy. I don’t think you can buy your way into being a good runner. I do believe you can build a good football team with money. I also believe you can pour money into cars to have an edge in racing. Running though is a guy and the road and at some point it quits being about muscle and starts being about personal drive and desire.

There’s a point in running when the runner is running not on strength but on will power and those stories are the ones that hit me in the stomach. The story of Terry Fox’s Marathon of Hope makes me cry every time I hear it. He ran 3339 miles in 143 days and he only had one leg. The other’d been lost to cancer. Phedippidations, a running podcast that I enjoy a great deal and have listened to for hours for the past couple weeks, has a great podcast about Terry Fox.

When I was in college I ran. There was a track between the University of Montevallo where I first went to college and the off campus house I was living in. I would go at night, in secret and run around the track. I never ran very far, and I never ran very long. I remember listening to the soundtrack to Joan Lui while I ran though. Still when I listen to my favorite song from that album I remember those night time runs.

I never told anybody, and didn’t stick with it because I was afraid I wasn’t very good at it. I’d never run track in high school and if you ever look at runners while they’re running… they’re not beautiful creatures. Nor are they graceful or awe-inspiring. They’ve got a sort of zombie-like shuffle that they do, and their faces are either pale or flushed, and always glisten with an unhealthy wetness. I was far too self-conscious then to admit to anybody that I was a runner.

I’m still self-conscious but there’s something about it now that’s different. Something that hit me when I was playing golf with my Dad. There is only one thing I can think of that looks more ridiculous and laughable than a golfer’s posture and swing… and that’s doing it badly and looking like an idiot and still having to chase the ball. It dawned on me that day on the fairway that golfers don’t look stupid to other golfers unless they golf badly.

Running’s the same way. I’ll look tired. I’ll look like I’m shuffling along and look nothing like the tall lithe Kenyans who break land speed records. But I’ll be doing something that I’ve wanted to do for over 20 years but was too embarrassed to do because of what other people would think. What a stupid waste of my time.

So. I run. I love to run. I like finding limits and pushing them. I like that I’m doing something that most people don’t/won’t do. I’m not doing it for my health or to lose weight. I expect it will improve my health and my weight’s not bad enough to really bother me that much. I’m doing it because I like it. I like it outside, and I like how I feel after I’ve run.

I’m going to run a 5k race in the spring. I don’t know where or when yet but I’m going to. I haven’t got a goal time yet either. But I want to run at least one 5k in spring and maybe a 10k in the fall. I doubt I’ll ever be good enough to run a marathon, but by next year I wouldn’t rule out a half-marathon if the running gods smile on me.

If you decide to run, or if you’re a runner, I’d love it if you’d drop me a line, say “Hi” or even point me towards some more good running podcasts or websites I might find helpful. Like I said. I’m a complete newbie to this running thing and while I enjoy it, it doesn’t mean I’m doing it right at all and I can use all the help I can get.

Thank you all for reading this. I know it was longer than my usual blog posts. Take care of yourselves and the ones you love.

Week 3 - Day 3 of Couch to 5k

Week 3 - Day 3 of Couch to 5k Still running on schedule. I am due to take two days off tomorrow and the next day and then onto week 4! Can you believe it? I'm tempted to do another day of week three. I'm just not as comfortable as I think I should be at the end of the run.... although I'm better than I was the first time and you don't get better by doing the same thing over and over. You improve by pushing yourself a little bit... Just hard for me to decide what to do with it. I got a Tai Chi DVD to do during my non-running days. If I'm in a hotel I"ll use an exercise bike or something, but no more hiking or walking on the days off. I still think my running form is better than my walking form and MAN is that sad?!? Activity Route: -- Elev. Avg: 1049 ft Location: Fort Dodge, IA, Elev. Gain: +3 ft Date: 10/13/09 Up/Downhill: [+150/-147] Time: 06:04 PM Difficulty: 1.9 / 5.0 Weather: Cloudy 44 F temp; 44% humidity 44 F heat index; winds E 10 mph Performance Distance: 2.66 miles Time: 0:39:08 Speed: 4.1 mph Pace: 14' 42 /mi Calories: 370 Map Elevation (ft) Pace (min/mile) Splits Mile Pace (min/mile) Speed (mph) Elevation Gain actual +/- avg actual +/- avg 1 13' 38 -1' 04 4.4 +0.3 +26 ft 2 14' 17 -0' 25 4.2 +0.1 -6 ft end 16' 56 +2' 14 3.5 -0.5 -17 ft Versus average of 14' 42 min/mile

Posted from www.bimactive.com

Week 3 Day 1 of Couch to 5k

Holy crap! There was no warning I was going to have a 3 minute run today and I wound up starting it on a down hill followed immediately by an uphill... I was dragging by the end of this run. I won't do the hill again for a few weeks I think. Activity Route: -- Elev. Avg: 1107 ft Location: Badger, IA, Elev. Gain: +3 ft Date: 10/09/09 Up/Downhill: [+137/-134] Time: 01:43 PM Difficulty: 1.4 / 5.0 Weather: Freeze Warning until Sat Oct 10 2009 09:00 AM CDT 48 F temp; 46% humidity 48 F heat index; winds N 13 mph Performance Distance: 1.77 miles Time: 0:24:50 Speed: 4.3 mph Pace: 14' 04 /mi Calories: 254 Map Elevation (ft) Pace (min/mile) Splits Mile Pace (min/mile) Speed (mph) Elevation Gain actual +/- avg actual +/- avg 1 13' 53 -0' 11 4.3 +0.1 -20 ft end 14' 23 +0' 19 4.2 -0.1 +27 ft Versus average of 14' 04 min/mile

Posted from www.bimactive.com

Couch to 5k: Week 2 Day 3

Here it is the last day of week 2 on my Couch to 5k week run up. I'm doing well in spite of the break I took due to work being profoundly weird for 4 days.

My running is a good thing. I'm not good at it yet. I won't lie. I run and walk for half an hour and I think I run too fast because I run faster than I can talk comfortably. That's not what I'm supposed to do. The problem is on treadmills I can see how fast I'm going and I pay more attention to things like my speed and pace than I do to my breathing. That's stupid. I need to learn to run for comfort and not for speed, especially right now. The thing is, I can't find any good sites that will tell me what a good speed is for me. Somewhere should be some sort of average speed for a 40 year old male beginning runner that says "If you're running 6 miles an hour you're fine. 7 is a bit too fast, and 5 is too slow." But no. I can't find anything that says that. What I find instead are sites that say things like "Don't worry about it!"

Here's another annoying thing. So many sites give times NOT in miles per hour, but in minutes per mile. What the hell?!? Where will I find that anywhere else?!? I don't have a mile measured out that I walk and then time it. I have a watch. It tells me when I've walked a given unit of time. *sigh* I need to memorize the conversions. 5 mph is 12 minutes per mile, 6 mph is 10 minutes per mile, and 7 mph is 8.5 minutes per mile.  Really good racers run 4 minute miles.

Running form is something I wish I had a trainer for. Whenever I focus on fitness either diet or exercise I'm always surprised at how often about.com shows up at the top of my search results. There is some good running stuff over there, and this video about proper running form is helpful.

Day after soreness

So, the first week of Couch to 5k I didn't experience any soreness after running, just after walking on a down day... that was when I found I was stepping out too far, increasing the length of my stride and driving my heel down into the ground. My shins didn't love that at all.

This week though, week two with the increased run times (increased by 50% from previous week) I'm noticing soreness the next day in my calves. It's not a bad soreness, just an awareness of the muscle. It makes the importance of the rest day between runs more obvious though. The resting isn't sitting in an easy chair with my feet up though, and that was something I learned from running websites. Resting is just a different type of exercise, walking, biking, something that isn't running... and isn't as hard as the running. It's still a time for the muscles to recover, but not to recover by going comatose while I watch a football game and binge on carbohydrates.

So, today my calves are a little sore, and weirdly enough my left knee for the first time. This is the first of two rest days that I moved from the weekend to here due to work travel. If I'm unable to hit a treadmill or a track in Denver this week I may do some, don't laugh, Leslie Sansone work out in my hotel room. She's got a 4 mile thing that I could do on the run day. It wouldn't be as intense as a run, but it'd be longer and endurance is good... just need to keep up the working out so I stay fit and as close to on plan as the job and real life will allow.

For tonight's active rest I think I'll hit the bike at the hotel and read some on the kindle.

Charts/Graphs/Progress

I need a way to track my progress and I'm not sure what I want to track truth be told.

I like the graphs from Nike+ but the gadget is a pain since I don't have the right shoes, and I'm not a hundred percent it's as accurate as I'd like it to be. A pedometer would be good if I ran and walked with the same stride length.

This chart came from Nike+ and I like it a lot. In fact I like the whole site. I wish it weren't so flash heavy because everything I click means I wind up waiting for the next page to load. That's not very smooth operating really. But it's information dense and has nice running training programs, a place for goals, etc.

I'm a fan... now if I can find something similar... and a way to track the stuff. Oh, and those podcasts for Couch to 5k are really really useful. If you're even considering doing the program I can't imagine doing it without the podcasts.

Today was my first day of week two which extended the length of time I'm running by 50% but cut the intervals. (It's run a while, walk a while just like my grampa said to do when I was little... "if you get tired of running, walk; if you get tired of walking, run.") I gotta say... I felt it. glad I didn't skip ahead. Working hard to keep on the program so I don't mess things up and quit due to injury.
Any suggestions for tracking distance, time, anything on running?