Getting More Zzzzz.

So I've decided to try and do some experimentation on this HR thing and the first thing I"m going to try is to make a concerted effort to  get more sleep.  I'm already off to a bad start today since it's just before midnight, but I'll start tomorrow, I swear.  Going to aim for at least 7 hours and maybe 8. Going to try for a week and see if the HR thing improves.  Again, it's a bit random, so I have no idea if there's a one to one correlation, but I suppose that's what the experimentation is for. 

As a footnote on the fitness trackers, most are able to keep track of how well you sleep and try and estimate how much deep sleep and REM sleep you get which would be helpful I suppose.  I don't have a fitness tracker yet, but I found an app for my phone which does something similar.  You turn it on and put it beside you as you sleep and it uses the accelerometer in the phone to detect movement and the phone tries to wake you up when you're in the lightest phase of sleep.  It has a two week trial before you have to pay so I guess that should be enough time to get a feel for how well it works.  It seems to have gotten pretty good reviews so I'm hoping for the best.

Fitness Band

It seems that fitness bands are all the rage these days.  With Apple coming out with their watch, I suppose it's becoming the new next big thing, being able to monitor your daily physical activity.  These things are little bands you wear on you wrist that have motion sensors in them and monitor your  physical activity and sleep patterns. Lately, they've been coming out with newer ones that can track your heart rate as well, but don't require a chest strap.  They have a little optical sensor and light that detects minor changes in your skin which represent your pulse.   Looks interesting. I'd love to know how well they work though.  Fitbit who I guess are probably the leaders in this area have the new FitBit charge HR which I'd like to try, but it seems it won't be out till the new year.  Bad marketing as I'm sure they'll be missing out on the big sales prior to Christmas.

Getting heavier

Stepped on the scale this morning. 149.5 pounds. A month ago, prior to race day I was hovering around 144. Yikes. Need to go on a diet, or at least run more or at least stop buying Costco packs of snacks.

I think I pulled a muscle in my hamstring on Wednesday. It was right after a run and I bent down to pick up a branch that was on the sidewalk and my left hamstring just sort of tightening up or cramped or something. It's a bit sore now.  I think it has something to do with weak hamstrings.  It kinda feels the sames as it did in New York last year which at the time I attributed to not running and the muscles starting to detrain a bit.  With the reduced mileage and only 3 days of running a week, I think I may be suffering the same problems.  Hopefully, it won't get worse and I can baby it for the next few weeks.

Polar Running Index

Yippe, a non-back dated post!

I'm going to get a bit technical now.  I run with the Polar RC3 GPS running watch.  When I finish my run and hit stop, it reports something called a Running Index.  This is supposed to estimate your level of fitness based on the pace and HR during the course of the run.  Over time, the number gradually increases as you get fitter, so I thought it would be interested to see how well it is able to judge running performance based on my training.  

For some basic info and a cheesy youtube video, you can find more about the Index at Polar's site.

Basically the Running Index is supposed to be able to predict your level of fitness and race times. From what I'm able to gather, it takes your max HR that you enter and uses your HR data and pace data from a run, figures out where on the sliding scale of your HR that you are at and then tries to extrapolate what pace you would be able to run at a percentage of your HR max that is indicative of various race distances.  Sounds good in theory.  The polar website I linked to has a table of estimated race times for a given Index.

So what Running Index am I at? Well that's hard to say.  See, the HR issue I occasional have really screws up the Running Index calculation since my regular maximum heart rate is probably around 187 I'm guessing which is what my watch uses to calculate the number.  The problem is when my HR spikes it sometimes gets to that number even when I'm running relatively slow and sometimes goes even higher than that.  For an example, the marathon I ran where I encountered the HR spiking issue for almost half the race, calculated an index of  46 which according to the above table means I should have run the marathon in 4:24, but the run that was used to calculate that number was actually a marathon itself that I did in 3:25. So runs with the HR spiking can't be used.

Also, relatively short runs also don't estimate the Running Index accurately. For example, the 5k race I did back in September where I ran 3.18 miles in 20:46 gave me an Index of 54 (even though my HR didn't spike) which means I should have run the distance in 23:20, again not correct.  This I can kinda forgive though.  From what I understand, the watch doesn't start analyzing your data until the 12 minute mark of the run. I guess it's to allow a warm up so the watch only had about 8-9 minutes of data to work with. It doesn't know that I already ran 12 minutes at a faster pace so it assumes that since I'm at or near my max and that I only ran at that pace for 8-9 minutes that I couldn't sustain that for another 10 so it underestimates my performance.

On the other hand, slow recovery runs tend to overestimate the Index. The highest index I saw this training cycle was 66 which was obtained on a 5.1 mile recovery run two days before the marathon where I averaged 8:52 min/mile pace.  On a longer run back in September, I was able to get a 65 on an 11 mile run where I averaged 9:00 min/mile. These predict a 3:05 marathon. Yeah, not happening.

So the best combination is to find a moderately long run at a slightly fastish pace and see what Index was calculated from that.  Marathon pace long runs would have been perfect for that, but all of my marathon pace runs suffered from HR spiking issues (foreshadowing of race day, I suppose) and so the Index predicted from those is fairly low. The best run I could find that fit the bill was an LT run that was done as part of a 14 miler. This was done back on August 20th where I averaged 7:57 min/mile pace for the whole run with 7 miles done at 7 min/mile pace. This resulted in an index of 60 which predicted a marathon time of 3:20.  Now considering that this was done two months before race day, it's probably about right as I felt I could have done at least 3:20 if not for the HR issues on race day and of course I was aiming for 3:15 which I think was doable.

My runs lately have me at a running index of  55 which is probably due to the fact that I donated blood a few weeks ago, have put on a few pounds and am doing low mileage.  I think I'm going to try tracking this a bit more closely going forward.  At least I'll now have a point of reference for future training.

NaBloPoMo Cat Video

I'm running on empty here so here's a cat video. Warning. It's 25 minutes long.

Pan Am Games

So in a little under 8 months, Toronto will be hosting the Pan Am Games.  Today, they announced they would convert some of the lanes of the highways into High Occupancy Lanes reserved for only a select few.  As much as I would love to see the games run smoothly, I think it's going to end up being a major clusterfu?k for traffic and getting around.  Traffic is bad enough as it is now. Can't wait till they start closing down streets downtown. 

I thought about getting some tickets to events, but I have a high suspicion that tickets will become cheaper as the events grow nearer.  The truth is that Toronto is very much an apathetic town when it comes to sports. There are people that will support the Leafs, but will support the other sports teams only when they are winning. I suspect that in an effort to fill half empty buildings, the tickets prices will have to come down eventually. Not that the tickets are that expensive, but it's hard to get an idea of what tickets will be good to have.  It's not like deciding you want to watch the gold medal hockey game at the Olympics.

They put out a commercial trying to excite the local populace about the event.  Nice production values.  Song is kinda catchy, but it does get annoying after awhile.

Warming up

Another back dated post.  I'll try to remain on schedule. There's only about a week to go.   You may get some youtube cat video posts though.  So after some winter, it's warmed up to about 10C which is normally shorts and a t-shirt weather, but I find that I get weird looks when I go out like that in the colder months, even if the temperature says it should be so.  Knee length shorts and a long-sleeved T. 

I've started to notice some little aches in my legs, probably due to me not stretching and the lack of core and leg strength work.  I'm going to have to start that back up again. I also have a Bosu Ball that I purchased about 7 years ago that has been sitting in the closet for a while.  Back then, it was all the rage and ridiculously expensive for what it was, half a stability ball on a plastic base.  Supposed to help you utilize your stabilizing muscles which makes you stronger.  The thing is I never actually knew how to use it.  I could do squats on it and push ups, but didn't really feel that it was doing much and wasn't sure what else I should use it for.  That's all changed with the advent of youtube.  Do a search on Youtube for Bosu Ball and there are a ton of hits for various exercises. In fact, you can do a search for any fitness related thing and you'll find something about it.   Handstand running? That's out there. Bellyflop diving? Yes. Triatholon Juggling? Yep. In fact, I thought about the craziest running related thing I could think of, putting lipstick on while running and guess what? That's out there too.  In fact, she puts on all her make-up while running.





Weird, eh?

Cadence Revisited

Ran outside in what I would call the first winter run of the season. -8C, some snow and some ice on the ground. Wasn't too bad.  Noticed that my cadence rate was still above 90/min even though I was running relatively slow and more importantly not while I was thinking about it.  It could also be that the fact that I was counting the rates subconsciously forced me to increase my cadence. Not sure.  I'll try the footpod thing again and get some more info. 

In other news, I'm waiting on results from the Berlin marathon lottery.  I had applied for the Tokyo  one in February earlier and didn't get in and now applied for the Berlin one and the results are supposed to start coming out tomorrow.  I was hoping to find out about the Berlin results and then if I didn't get in, I was going to think about doing Tokyo through a tour group, but there appears to be a waiting list for that now so that's a no go. Maybe that's for the best though and I would probably should have already started training for that if that were going to happen.

Snowy Day

Winter's a coming. It toyed with us a bit on Sunday dropping a few flakes that didn't stick. Today was a bit more and some of it covered the ground and partially melted.  It's supposed to get cold overnight so depending on how many people bothered to shovel their sidewalks, running tomorrow might be a bit dicey.  Guess the winter running's got to start sometime, even though it still won't be technically winter for another month. 

I've started giving some thought to gym memberships again with perhaps signing up but only if I can do so for the winter months.  I have no interest is signing a year contract, knowing full well that come April I will never set foot in the gym again till next winter.  My workplace has a gym that also requires a membership fee, but it's pretty cheap. I think it's about $15 a month and you can sign up by quarter.  It's not a big gym, but it has fitness classes and all the equipment you need. It's just that they don't have that many treadmills and there's a 30 minute limit.  Almost no one uses it after hours, even though it's technically open 24/7 so I suppose anyone can use it for however long you want assuming no one else is waiting in line.  It's just it's a bit far for me to go to do a long run there on a Sunday and I'm sure it would feel kinda weird going into work on Sunday, not to work. 

There are some no frill gyms around me so I may try and see what they're like rather than go to the more established, chain type gyms or I could just suck it up and force myself to run outside come hell, high water or the next ice age.

HR Issue

So I thought I would write a post about the HR issue in more detail in case people are googleing around finding similar symptoms.

The marathon has had me thinking a lot more about the HR issue now.  It's always been something I worried about, but it obviously hasn't caused me serious harm to date, but that's not to say that it won't.  I've read about Ryan Shay and Danny Kassap who were both high level professional marathoners who collapsed during races due to the heart issues and would later die. In fact, I heard that someone collapsed 10m from the finish line at the Hamilton half marathon and that the individual was an experienced runner who also died. Part of me worries that I might suffer the same fate.

The technical medical term for this phenomenon is a tachycardia and depending on what is causing it can mean it's extremely dangerous or just annoying.  

When it happens to me, I barely notice and most of the time, I only know because the HR display on my watch is telling me. The polar info I posted during my race report is one example, here's a better more clear example from a run.  This was from a  8 mile run that included 3x1600m interval session I did back in October.

It actually happened twice during this run.  It happened near the start, about 6 or so minutes in during the warmup when the HR (red line) jumps from a little over 125 to over 150, I ran with it like this for a few minutes and then started to walk when it then comes back down on it's own and then I continue with the warm up. I then get to the track when I immediately start into the intervals.  The first one is fine and the HR tops out at about 180 at the end of the interval, proceed with the recovery which involves a slow jog and as soon as start the second one, the HR jumps to over 200, after this interval, I start a walk recovery because I realize the HR is spiking, I think it actually recovers during the walk, but my pace dropped to 0 for a while and if I recall correctly, I think I did the squat maneuver just to make sure that it was low, I then proceed to walk the rest of the recovery and then do the third interval which is fine where the HR tops out at 185, and the HR issue doesn't return.  All three intervals are done at roughly the same pace so the drastic difference between interval 2 and the first and third isn't a result of pace difference.

While it happens randomly while I'm running, it most often  happens when I come to a stop after running and then restart suddenly (like with interval repeats), this makes stop light stops a pain in the behind because it will usually trigger an event.  I can usually get it to stop by doing the walking/squatting thing. This isn't a problem on long runs or intervals where I can throw in a walk recovery, but it becomes an issue when doing tempo runs where I like to do continuous running for between 4 and 7 miles. Breaking that into pieces to throw in a recovery isn't so great.  I was lucky enough this training cycle that I didn't have any HR issues when doing the tempo runs, but I did notice that the HR spikes seemed to be more frequent this training session during long runs. Other ways of getting it to stop involve what are known as vagal maneuvers which force the vagal nerve to send signals to slow down the heart, they involve holding one's breath or dipping the face into cold water or bearing down like you're having a bowel movement.  These are all difficult to do while running. I discovered the squat method while trying to do the bearing down thing. I'm not sure how one can pass a stool while standing up so the first couple of times I tried it, I would squat down, but I found the act of squatting was itself enough to get it to come down which I'm kinda thankful for.

Over the years, I've tried a number of different things to try to mitigate it. I'm constantly eating salt, which supposedly causes an increase in blood volume which supposedly helps to prevent it. I've been taking calcium&magnesium supplements which supposedly prevent it. I've cut out caffeine completely from my diet  which is supposedly another potential cause. Another potential cause is not getting enough sleep and this is one thing which I have difficulties with.  I can usually get by on 6 hours of sleep, but I find it hard to sleep for longer than that.  My body just naturally gets up after 6 hours.  I guess I need to figure out how to reprogram the internal alarm clock.

I did attempt to get this looked at a few years ago. Family doctor referred me for an echocardiogram and a stress test.  The echocardiogram did not reveal anything abnormal about my heart, and the stress test wasn't able to reproduce the HR spiking symptoms so the doctors' diagnosis was everything's fine, but I knew that something was still not quite right. I purchased an ECG monitor a few years ago on ebay, hoping that some blatantly obvious ECG problem would show itself, but while it's easy to spend $200 on an ECG device, the $100,000 medical degree that allows one to interpret it isn't so easy to come by. But hey if you're curious and can see a difference.

Normal at rest -HR 56

Tach, jog HR 176

The only difference I see is the tachycardia one is just faster.  The shape of the waveforms look pretty much the same. Ideally, I should have captured the ECG running at the same pace, both when it's spiking and when it's not.  It's just not easy to do since I have to run while carrying the ECG monitor with wires hooked up to my chest.  I did this experiment only once while running around a track back in June and I was excited to capture the tachycardia event with the monitor, but I realized after I should have planned it out a bit better. I'm thinking maybe I should try it out on a treadmill.  

The cause of tachycardia is usually a result of extra signal pathways in the heart that cause extra signals to make the heart beat faster.  The way to cure this is through an interesting procedure called a catheter ablation where they use drugs to force your heart into the spiking mode and a catheter is sent into the heart and the tissue that generates the extra signals are basically burned off. This is kinda scary cause after all this is your heart and if they get it wrong, there's a chance you're wearing a pace maker for life.  I've been reading recently that they've introduced a new technique where they use liquid nitrogen to first freeze the tissue to see if it solves the tachycardia problem first. If not, they let it thaw and start looking elsewhere so this at least offer the possibility of a do-over but it still seems kinda risky. 


In any event, I've decided to try and get this thing looked at again from a medical viewpoint and will hopefully get some more information this time around.  First appointment is tomorrow with family physician to try and get a referral to a cardiologist. 

Graffiti

Day 15, so half way there. This is going to be a bit of a filler post since there's only a couple of hours left in the day and I don't feel like thinking too much right now.  Here's a pic of some graffiti that I saw in an alley somewhere.  I don't remember where exactly, but thought it was pretty cool. 

Cheating at the Marathon

By now, you've probably heard the story of Tabatha Hamilton who was disqualified at the Chichamauga Marathon this past weekend.  She crossed the finish line first in a not to shabby time of 2:55 or so. She had a really good day and ran a 1:18 negative split.  That is, she ran a 1 HOUR and 18 minute negative split.  That's right. After crossing the half mark in 2:06:51, she then proceeded to run the second half in 48 minutes. To give you some reference, the men's half marathon world record is 58 minutes and change. 

Now she claims that the timing half timing mat was wrong and that she crossed at about 1:36:51 which put her second half at 1:17:30. That's still a 19 minute negative split. I'm sorry, but you don't accidentally run a 19 minute negative split.  It's fairly obvious that she cheated. Now I will admit that I've given some thought to how best it would be to cheat at a marathon. Not that I would ever do it (or so i think), but it's an interesting mental exercise.

Here are some tips that I think might be useful if you want to cheat at a marathon.

1) Don't set a world record.
This is fairly easy.  If you're cheating at the marathon and want to get caught fairly quickly, be sure that you run the race, or portions of the race at a pace that's faster than any other human being has run in the past.

2) Don't win.
This is another fairly easy rule to keep in mind.  Leaders of a race usually have a bike or escort of somekind.  If you suddenly pop up in front of the escort without the escort seeing you pass them, it's a definite red flag.

3) Know the course.
Knowing the course ahead of time allows you to plan your route, you can easily see where you can cut portions of the course if you need to.  Marathons will usually post the course route on the website.   Course that have out and backs are good to cheat with as are courses with loops, as you can cut out portions of the race but still generally be around where you need to be. The caveat being that if the race has a timing mat in the loop, this can get you into trouble (see point 4).  Courses that are point to point in one direction are harder to cheat at unless you have "alternative" transportation.

4) Know the location of the timing mats and do the math.
This is what ended up betraying Ms. Hamilton.  If you know where the timing mats are, you can plan exactly where you have to be at certain times and cross the mats at those times to give the illusion that you are running continuously.  I would say that you have to be fairly precise about this. Your pace between the various mats has to be fairly consistent.  For some races, this is generally easy as they will have a mat at the half and finish. So you need to figure out what time you want to run, head to the half mark and cross the mat at about half what your goal time is and then head to finish and cross the mat at your goal time. Some races may only have a mat at the end so it's really easy to cheat at those races.  A race like NY is going to be very hard to cheat at, just simply because they have so many timing mats and they aren't all advertised.  Also some of the mats are on bridges and they will be generally hard to get to unless you are running in the right direction.  Also the mats aren't precisely positioned so even though you may figure out that you need to cross the 8 mile mat at a certain time, if the mat is actually at 8.3 miles and everyone elses times is delayed by that, a "proper" 8 mile split will still out you. If you haven't run the course before, you can find out locations of timing mats by looking at the results of previous races. 

5) Figure out your alternative transportation.
Even if a course has out and backs and loops, the presence of timing mats at the turnaround portion can seriouly affect your ability to cheat as you will need to travel to the turnaround point to cross the mat. This is of course, why they have the mats there in the first place.  While you could just simply run there, which is what you're supposed to do, you need to get there faster so you will need some form of alternative transportation.  Rosie Ruiz had the Boston public transportation system at her disposal which I think runs parallel to the route so that would have worked out well. I think you might be able to do it with a bicycle or if you have an accomplice with a car, that might work too.  Again, this would be highly dependent on where the race is.  If it's in an urban setting with lots of streets that are blocked off, a bike might be the best option.  If you're running in Boston with a lot of roads than run parallel to the race route, a car might work better.  It would certainly leave you more room for error.  


6) Try to blend in.
One of the trickier parts I would think would be how to casually join the race to get onto the course so you cross the mat and then how to casually leave the course in an inconspicuous manner.   The easiest way I think would be to join the race at a portapotty stop.  No one on the course is going to question a runner that appears to join from a portapotty.  Likewise, no one is going to question someone who appears to be stopping for a bathroom break.  If no portapotties are around, if you can plan it ahead of time, you might find a store or a fast food restaurant that you jump into/out of with the excuse that you had to stop to use the bathroom.  One of the potential problems I see is not so much with runners, but more so with spectators.  Runners on the course are constantly coming and going so the likelihood of anyone questioning you is low. On the other hand, a spectator who has been standing in the same spot, might notice that you've joined the course, crossed the mat and then left the course again which leads to my next point.


7) Conceal your bib.
The point of cheating at a race is not to get caught and in our world of smart phones and camera's, it's extremely easy for someone to get a pic of you if they suspect you're cheating.  Of course, having a picture of you is only half the battle since they still won't know who you are. If they get a picture of your bib number though, the battle is lost. With that, they can figure out your name, what your finish time was and any past results to see if anything is up.  With Ms. Hamilton, her previous fastest marathon was 4:25. Visible bib number's also allow race photographers to indirectly map your progress which can be helpful to prove that you were at a certain point at a certain time, but they can also be a detriment since if there aren't pics of you at other points of the course then it potential raises some questions.  Now you don't necessarily have to not wear your bib. You just have to show enough of it so that people know that you aren't a bandit. You could fold it in half or pin half of it to the lower part of a shirt and then cover up the top portion of the bib  with a fuel belt or a jacket or something.

8) Don't be too aggressive in your goal time.
You should pick a time that allows you to run a pace that you can actually hold for a few miles. This is for a few reasons. It will be likely that you wont be able to join and leave the race at the timing mats exactly so you may have to join and leave the race some distance away from the mats.  If you can't maintain the pace you're going for, you will stick out like a sore thumb to spectators as everyone is streaming by you.  For Ms. Hamilton, her average "pace" was to be 6:42min/mile. I have my doubts that she could maintain that pace for 400m, let alone for 4 miles. Her time goal was too aggressive.  Also, it helps that if you can run with a few other runners and are seen by spectators as these act as potential witnesses to your athletic feat. 


Well that's pretty much all I can think of. This is fairly common sense stuff, yet cheaters seems to be ignore these obvious pitfalls.  I guess if you want to be lazy at running a marathon, you might as well be lazy at cheating in a marathon too.

Running on Air

So the past year, on trying to increase pace, I tried something slightly different. If you've ever registered for anything on the runner's world website, you've probably been spammed with their book entitled "Running On Air: The Revolutionary Way to Run Faster by Breathing Smarter".  I was intrigued at the idea of gaining speed by just changing breathing patterns so I borrowed it from the library.  I realized that I have too many  running books that I haven't read yet and figured I could get a look at it and see if it was worth buying. 

In summary, probably not worth buying.  The basics of the breathing pattern is described on their website at http://www.runnersworld.com/running-tips/running-air-breathing-technique?page=single.
In the actual book, the basics of the breathing is within the first 50 or so pages and the rest of the book is just general running stuff that you can find in any running book.

Basically the gist of the method is to coordinate when you breath out with alternating foot strikes so you switch back and forth between which side hits the ground when you exhale.  This is good at preventing side stitches which is  something I learned long ago.  The problem with the breathing technique for me is that it's very unnatural. I've tried to practice the 3-2 breathing pattern for long and recovery runs,and I feel that I'm just not getting enough air in.  On LT runs though, I do naturally alternate between sides in a 2-1 pattern which is good (breathin in for 2 step, breath out for one step).  The other thing I learned from the book is a different way of breathing during short fast races like in 5k and 10k which is basically to breath in a 2-1-1-1 pattern where you breath in for 2 steps, out for 1 step, in for 1 step and out for 1 step. It's a bit awkward at first since you basically have to force the breathing pattern and it's not symmetrical, but I think it works. Towards the end of races, I had generally have done a 1-1 breathing pattern, but I always felt like I was almost hyperventilating. This 2-1-1-1 still allows me to get the oxygen I want but not be panting like a dog. This technique worked out well for me in the 5k and 10k races I did. 

Glad to have read it, but not going to be buying it.

More Random Thoughts

Ok, 12 days into this National Blog Posting Month thing and I'm already starting to struggle for ideas.  I think I've put on a couple of pounds since the marathon, mostly due to the all the chocolates I've eaten since Halloween. I had a 100 pack of mini chocolates that was unopened. I probably should have thought about trying to return it, but I thought I would be able to manage it. Nope. One look at my garbage pail of discarded chocolate bar wrappers and I realized yeah I'm going to be a bit heavier.

I was thinking of doing a race this weekend just for fun.  There's a 10 miler close by that I've done before, but a few years ago, I had decided I would only enter races if I was actually going to race them.  I had figured out that I was spending so much on races for fun and much of that was going to tech shirts and medals that I don't really.  Anyways, I probably won't sign up since I don't think I would be able to run it particularly fast.   Plus they are forecasting snow for this Sunday. Winter's a coming.

I am looking at maybe doing a Boxing Day 10 miler towards the end of December since that would coincide well with the start of another training cycle leading up to an early May marathon.  Just got to get used to running in the cold again.  For now, it's just recovery runs to try and maintain some level of fitness.  Will probably start working in some strides and some short tempos in the next few weeks. 

Remembrance Day

So today's Remembrance Day, known as Veteran's Day in the US and Armistice Day in other's parts of the world. It's that time of the year when we remember those who gave their lives for what we have today, which has special significance in light of the attack in Ottawa a few weeks ago at a war memorial.

I heard on the news this morning that the police were still looking for the Remembrance Day flag kicker from two years ago.   As the story goes, a group of people were trying to raise some money for veteran's by selling these little Canadian flags that people would then stand up into the ground.  This guy, allegedly, ran through the flags kicking them down and trampling on them. Someone did manage to get a cell phone pic of him...as he was giving everyone the finger.  What class. Now this story is only allegedly and he doesn't appear to be trampling any flags here, so it's possible to give this guy the benefit of the doubt, but it completely amazes me that in this world of social media, that this guy hasn't been outed yet. Judging by the picture, this isn't some newbie runner as he's got a lot of running gear that you don't just pick up at Wal'mart: the calf sleeves, tri shoes (?), the compression tights. He probably runs quite in a few races and someone in the running community must know who he is.

Which got me thinking of how quick would I be outed if I did something similar.  I think it would be pretty quick. Not including, the managing editor of Huffington's Post, I guess a few non-runners might recognize me and leak my name. A google search would probably come up with race results, race results lead to race pictures, searches of race pictures might lead to this blog and social media accounts and then before you know it news organizations would be posting about the 4:51 marathon I did back in 2010 and my snot pictures from 2006.

It could just be that this guy is such a nice guy that people that do know him don't want to get him into trouble, which I suppose is a possibility or maybe it was just a big misunderstanding. To be honest, maybe it's just the patriot in me, but I find it unfathomable that anyone who lives in this country would go out of their way to kick down Canadian flags.  I guess we'll never know the real story.

Day 11

runScribe Foot Pod

A while back, I had posted about increasing my cadence rate and purchasing a polar foot pod to help measure it.  After wearing it for a few weeks, it's basically gone into the closet along with my other under used tech gadgets. I may decide to break it out during the next month or so while I'm not really concerned about pace.  I had also commented on maybe purchasing a garmin foot pod since that allows me to see real time cadence feed back which the polar one doesn't.  Instead I decided to go down a slightly different route.

runScribe is a kickstarter backed project whose goal is to make a foot pod tracking device.  It's a bit different than the conventional foot pods in that it doesn't attach to your laces. Instead it gets mounted to the back of your shoe either by industrial adhesive or a clip.  It supposedly gives a bunch of feedback on how you, run such as how much your foot rotates in, whether you heel, mid or forefoot strike and of course your cadence.  It originally was a stand alone system and the only way to get info from it was to upload the data after the run, but one of the target goals was that if they reached a certain funding level, they would make it compatible with the ANT+ system which is what garmin uses.  They basically blew past that funding goal as well as some others, so I ended up joining the campaign to hopefully get one of the early devices so that I could use it with my garmin and get instant feedback. I actually ended up buying two.  They say it's supposed to be used with one on each shoe, so that you can get data from both shoes, but it can also be used by having one device on two different pairs of shoes which is why I think I want it.  Originally, these things were expected to ship in December, but that's now been delayed.

They had a booth setup at the NYC marathon and were getting guinea pigs to test out their prototypes during the marathon which I think is kinda cool.  Based on the feedback they got, they've decided to make some changes to the device so it looks like the shipping date is now slipping into January.  I'm sort of interesting to see what data they will post about the runners in NY and how accurate it is.



Day 10

Random Thoughts

Did my first run since the blood donation and it kinda sucked which was expected. Add to that, the two weeks of limited running since the marathon and well sucky runs all around.  While putting my socks on this morning, I noticed that I actually had normal toe nails for once. I don't think I had any black toenail issues this training cycle which I suppose I can attribute to experience and sticking with the same pair of shoes for the past few months.  I bought a few pairs of Brooks Adrenaline's GTS 13's back pre-training cause they were on sale.   Running Room was clearing out last years model and they were $90 a pair which is cheap up here in Canada where it normally retails for about $150.

I'm on my last pair and shopping around, they no longer have last years model and the other discounts aren't quite so steep yet.  They're now selling this years model at a discount of $119 in prep for next years model  I may buy a few to hedge my bets, but I'm thinking the price will come down in the new year.  Google showed me the website 33-off.com which is a Canadian site that also sells discounted shoes.  Never tried them before. They don't have the Brooks shoes in my size at the moment, but they are selling the Asics GT-2000 for 98.95.  I think this is the follow-up model to the 21xx series that I've used before so I might try these again.  Only thing is they provide free shipping on orders of over $99, which means I can buy two pairs or buy one pair and some filler item. I hate buying filler items. I have to do that on amazon all the time, and I always end up with something that I never use.  Why can't they just charge me the extra 5 cents and give me the free shipping? 

Niagara Falls Non-Race Pics

Don't have much else to post about the race, maybe some follow-up thoughts on the HR issue, so here's some pics I took the following day.  The wind conditions on the Monday would have been perfect for race day. Wind from the south which would have been a tailwind for almost the whole race.  Unfortunately wind from the south isn't too great if you want to see the falls from the Canadian side since it means if you want to get up close to the falls, the mist is basically being blown into your face so you're going to get really wet. Having had my passport with me, I crossed over into the US to see the falls from that perspective for the first time where the wind would be blowing away from me.

I actually like the viewpoint from the US side, maybe even better than from the Canadian side. You can get a lot closer to the water and the area is a little less commercial and more National Park like.  I ended up staying way later to try and get some shots at night when they turn the lights on which was at 7pm which was much later than it needed to be.  For example, this week, they now turn the lights on at 5pm (albeit with an extra hour gained because of the switch back to Standard Time).  Unfortunately stupid me forgot to bring the mounting plate for my tripod so all I got were some blurry pics of some lights. Next time, I guess.

Changing out the oil

Went to the blood donor clinic after work today to give blood. Second time this year.  Last time was in March before the marathon training began and before that, the last time was in 2010.  Back then, I just had hit 25 total donations and got a nice thank you pin and a customized 25x donor card and thought that would be the end of my donating years, but I suppose times change .

I think two is about my limit for the year. I used to give more often, but it obviously gets in the way of training.  The first time was in high school during a Grade 13 physics class.  I remember distinctly because the teacher said we could either write a pop quiz or give blood.  Easy choice.  In university, giving blood was a cheaper way to get quickly intoxicated.  Give blood and drink a beer. I'm sure that the nurses wouldn't condone that sort of thing and I suppose it was just a coincidence that the blood donor clinic was located in the same building as the campus pub. 


This officially puts an end to any thoughts of doing another marathon before the end of the year as I'm down a few red blood cells and wouldn't be in a position to race another marathon anytime soon.  I've always considered giving blood to be like getting an oil change.  Swap out the old blood and get some new blood in there.  I know that doesn't make any sense, since it's my body that is producing the red blood cells and it does so constantly, and I'm not technically swapping it with some EPO infused super blood that can heal all ailments (Kahn blood).  Nonetheless, I like to think that somehow I'm getting some sort of benefit from it. 


Day 6

Race Video

I decided to buy the race video and pictures from the race.  I haven't purchased race photos for a long while now.  The first couple of races you do, it's a bit of a novelty. But after a while, it's just a photo of you running.  Sure some are special, like your first marathon, or your first Boston and it's always nice to look back at them.  I bought the race video cause I actually like that I have a relaxed and smooth form and don't appear to be struggling while running.  I didn't even know they had so many cameras. I assumed that there would be a finish line video, but didn't know about the rest of them.




The first video is about the 9 mile mark with the wind coming from the side where you can see the peace bridge in the background. This is after the out and back in Fort Erie. You can get a sense of how alone I was at this point. The second one is at the half mark after I stopped where I'm running with a bit of a group into a direct headwind. The next one is about 200m from the finish line and the last three are at or close to the finish where I seem to be motoring right along. I gave some thought to trying to catch the guy in the blue singlet, but thought it was going to be close and not wanting to ruin his or my finish line photo, I backed off a bit at the end. 

Post Race Pic

Rather then give out the customary mylar sheets after the race, they gave out these thin "jackets". They seemed to be water repellant. I don't think they were that good for blocking wind or retaining heat.  They almost look like something you would wear if you were going to paint a room.  Should be a good throw away water repellant thing to use in a future race. 

Now to get Katy Perry out of my head...

Day 5