PBS

Tonight on PBS:
Marathon Challenge
Tuesday, October 30, 8:00pm
CHANNEL 8 (GPB/Georgia Public Broadcasting)
Thirteen novices, ranging in age from 22 to 60, train nine months for the Boston Marathon. The group includes a former smoker, a heart-attack survivor and an overweight woman, and receives support from three-time Boston Marathon winner Uta Pippig.

How do you run 26.2 miles if you have trouble making it around the block? With good coaching, discipline, and lots of group support, as NOVA shows when it follows 13 normally sedentary people through a training regimen designed to prepare them for an ultimate test of stamina and endurance. Created in cooperation with the Boston Athletic Association®, which granted NOVA unprecedented access to the 111th Boston Marathon®, and Tufts University, "Marathon Challenge" takes viewers on a unique adventure inside the human body, tracking the physiological changes that exercise can bring about. More

Tuesday

Ran this morning at 4:30am. I need to get back into the morning run routine, so this week is it for me. 5.2 miles. It was 49 degrees out. I've had frostbite before and my hands get cold even in relatively mild weather, so I wore gloves. Also the SportHill loose-fit tights, longsleeve t-shirt, and a cap. Just about perfect for the weather.


Daylight Savings Time begins on Sunday, so it will be dark when I get home from work. My routine will be run in the morning, gym at night after work. The bad part is that the in the morning, I always had the entire free weights area to myself. Not so at night... usually a few others there with the same plans as me. I'll start at the gym tonight with just the leg extensions, hamstring curls, and ab exercises. I just hope it's not too crowded.

Monday

Basically just a cross-training day for me. I went to the gym at 5am and did my weight routine for 40 minutes.

What's the Burn? A Calorie Calculator

You can use the formulas below to determine your calorie-burn while running and walking. The "Net Calorie Burn" measures calories burned, minus basal metabolism. Scientists consider this the best way to evaluate the actual calorie-burn of any exercise. The walking formulas apply to speeds of 3 to 4 mph. At 5 mph and faster, walking burns more calories than running.

Your Total Calorie Burn/Mile Your Net Calorie Burn/Mile
Running .75 x your weight (in lbs.) .63 x your weight
Walking .53 x your weight .30 x your weight

Saturday

This morning was one of those really great runs. I did a 15-mile out-and-back at the Riverwalk, starting about 6am. Clear skies, about 50 degrees, full moon, starry sky. As I ran in the dark alongside the Chattahoochee River, the moon was over my right shoulder. About 2 miles into the run, the trail enters a wooded area with a lot of twists and turns and then a mile later into a big open area, then back into the woods, then back into the open. Best part of the run, for sure... I had planned on doing 18 but got a late start.

It looks like we'll have a new 5K coming up in November, on the 17th, in conjunction with the God Bless Fort Benning celebration. Every year in Columbus there's an annual protest against the School of the Americas, which used to be at Fort Benning. Basically a bunch of spoiled, naive college kids and some professional protesters show up in town, stand around the gates of Fort Benning, eat granola, chant, and then form into a drum circle. It's just ridiculous. The college kids even get course credit for doing this. The God Bless Fort Benning celebration is a counter to that, and draws about 20,000 people for several days. So anyway, this year the venue has been changed for the God Bless Fort Benning celebration, and it looks like there may be a 5K involved on November 17th.

Thursday

Went to the gym this morning and did leg extensions, hamstring curls, and ab exercises. The ab exercises are the Bicycle Crunches shown in this Runner's World video. I do 3 sets of 100 pretty quickly. The leg extensions and hamstring curls will hopefully fix the knee pains I'm getting occasionally. I do the Crossfit glute-ham situps on M-W-F and the bicycle crunches on T-Th-Sa.

Ran 5.5 miles at lunch today, hilly again... it's 5+ laps... on the street by my workplace. You go uphill for about 1/2 mile, then downhill...then uphill, then downhill...

The weather last night was pretty crummy, so it looks like I'll be running on Sunday.

The best news is that I went over 1,200 miles for the year with today's lunch run! I'm at 1,201.78 miles :-)

Tuesday

Went to the gym early this morning.

Hilly run at lunch on the North Marina Riverwalk. Here's my route Breezy and warm, nice run

Monday

Lifted weights in the a.m, ran 5.7 miles in the evening.

 

 

Sunday

There's a good article on The Importance of Protein for Endurance Athletes on the Badwater site.

My son left some protein powder in his room when he went back to school, and I've been adding it to milk and even to Gatorade, after my long runs, for the past month. I can tell a difference. Now I even have my own protein powder, both whey protein and soy protein, and in different flavors... I drink it after lifting (soy protein) and after running (whey protein).

Saturday

On Friday I ran 2.5 miles & did ab/back exercises.

This morning I got to the Columbus Riverwalk at Rotary Park & ran to Fort Benning and back: 15.3 miles. Finished, showered at the YMCA, then went by Starbucks... I had to be at work at 10, otherwise I would have done the Cross Country 10K at Fort Benning today... bummer.

Next Saturday I'll plan to do 18 miles again.

Thursday

Cloudy, chance of rain... in other words, just about perfect.

YMCA gym early early for weights, since I missed in Wednesday due to my Atlanta trip. Psssst don't tell anyone, but I want to get to 235 lbs on the bench by this summer so that I can surprise my son with that. The secret, like in running, is consistency... I'm going to be there in the mornings or at night and just keep adding a little weight each week until I get 2 45-lb plates on each side for my regular workout.

I was busy at lunch so wound up running after work, but the weather was pretty nice. Breezy, 75, fairly humid. 6.2 miles but the last mile was fast.

Wednesday

Wow, long day...

Took my wife to her appointment at Emory Hospital in Atlanta. Got homearound 6, walked her & the dog around Lake Heath, then when back and ran 3 laps around it. 5.7 miles running.

Monday

The weather in Columbus was beautiful today. Got up early and lifted weights at the YMCA this morning, ran 6 miles after work.

I ran 42.2 miles last week; at the end of the week I was 1157.63 miles for the year. I'm in the 1200 Mile Club with the Columbus Roadrunners, so I'm glad that I'll probably hit 1200 miles sometime this month.

Saturday

A brisk 52 degrees here this morning... I had to hunt all over the house for my long sleeved dri-fit shirt, but found it and got to the Riverwalk at 6am. Ran to Fort Benning and back and then a little extra for a total of 16.7 miles.

Someone was asking about the Podrunner mixes. I use the 175 & 180 beats per minute ones sometimes. My normal pace is probably in between 175 and 180, so 180 is the one I use when I want to go a little faster. These are free downloads and they're measured in beats per minute. The 180-bpm one I have is nearly 2 hours long.

I'll be at Below The Knee on Saturday & Sunday.

Friday

There's a really good opinion article in the New York Times by Frank Shorter about the Chicago Marathon. It's entitled, "Running Into Trouble". Those of us who live and train in the Deep South run all through the hottest part of the year, so we're (I think) knowledgeable about the dangers of running in hot & humid conditions... but it's still a good read.

Went to the weight room this morning. Running at lunch today, since the weather will be ABSOLUTELY PERFECT!!!!!!!:-)

Wednesday

There's an article in the online Fort Benning Bayonet about the Fort Benning Army 10-mile team. Please read it. These runners are FAST!


OK. For me, it was weight training at 5am. Work then straight to the Riverwalk after work for a 10 mile run. The same route I did Saturday, except I turned around at the 5 mile point.

Lots of folks on the Riverwalk tonight.

Tuesday

Another 5 mile run at North Marina during lunch. I start at the marina and head south; I saw a few Total Systems runners running north yesterday.

FYI, the creepiest place on the entire riverwalk is about a mile north of Total Systems, just north of the projects, where the bathrooms are- there are always homeless people there, lots of them, and it's common to see men and women wandering around with bottles in brown paper bags. I've run the riverwalk top to bottom and that is definitely the only spot I don't like.

Monday

Went to the gym this morning and did weights. Ran 5 miles at lunch, North Marina riverwalk. 80's, about 60% humidity... not too bad.

 

I've had 3 or 4 incidents recently where various species of wildlife have paced my runs.  About a month ago I was running by the airport and a coyote ran alongside the fence next to me for about half a mile. Then I had an armadillo run in front of me on the Riverwalk for about 30 yards. I had a goose run down the trail in front of me for about 50 yards at Lake Heath. And today, a monarch butterfly stayed right by my side all the way up the hill, so about 1/2 a mile. Just bizarre. I'm thinking either I'm becoming more in harmony with nature, or I probably need to wash my running clothes more often.

 

Probably the running clothes.  

 

Plan for tomorrow: wake up on time, run in the early a.m.

 

 

Sunday

Lots of OCS Candidates came into the store this weekend, and quite a few Ranger Indoctrination Program [RIP] students. Most of the OCS candidates came in with shin splints & needed new running shoes. The running program at OCS is pretty demanding and it often comes right after less demanding Army schools, so the students get quite a shock and a lot end up with shin splints. The RIP guys have already been through basic & Airborne schools, so they're in pretty good shape. A lot of them just pick up lightweight training shoes.

If you have shin splints, you need to check out the Runner's World Forums, specifically the Injuries section, and even more specifically, the Shin Splints section.

So I ended my week with 7 days, 43.1 miles, weight = 180.

Next week, here's the plan:

M-F mornings: run 5-8 miles depending on how I feel.
M-W-F evenings: lift
Tu-Th evenings: not really sure
Sat: planning on 16 miles.
Sun: 2 or 3 miles

I've never followed a plan yet, so we'll see.

Saturday

Long run day... The Tuskegee-Morehouse parade was going on this morning & I didn't want to get caught up in traffic, so I started from Rotary Park & headed south to Fort Benning. From the boat ramp at Rotary Park to the posts that cross 10th Division Road is 7.61 miles... since I did an out-and-back I ended up with 15.22, according to my Garmin.

Here's a link to the route from this morning.

I'll be at the shop all day Saturday & regular hours on Sunday.

Friday

Gym this morning. Ran 5 miles on the North Marina Riverwalk at lunch today.

I get a lot of questions like, "Mike, how is you're able to rock that fabulous 6-pack?"

Actually, I never get that question. I'm not sure I ever will get that question. But I'm just enough of a geek to upload video using the new MSN Soapbox video uploader, which converts a lot of different file formats and is very fast.

So I would rate the production value a D-, but at 5am using my phone, it's not bad. I usually do 3 sets of 25 of these 4 times a week at the gym:


Video: situps

Thursday

Ran this route on the Riverwalk last night, so I slept in this morning. Ran 2.5 miles after work. Will run tomorrow morning.

Wednesday

Went to the gym this morning. 2 of us there in the free weight area... I know they're building a new YMCA downtown, and even though I'm looking forward to using a great new facility, I'm sure it will be a lot more crowded even at 5am. That part, I'm not looking forward to. Right now it's great: go in, turn on the radio to whatever station I want, then knock out a workout quickly without having to wait on anything. Try doing that at any other gym in town.

I'm going to try to run North Marina today at lunch if I can. If the weather holds out. If not, I'll run this evening.

My friend Skyles sent me a map of his run yesterday somewhere close to Boston. I guess he's traveling.

UPDATE: I drove to the Riverwalk (Rotary Park Entrance) and ran 8.2 miles after work, since my wife was going to a class at the new gym on Fort Benning. Weather was perfect. Groups of cyclists, but didn't see any other runners tonight. A couple of walkers.

Tuesday

Early run this morning, 4:30 am. 7.5 miles at fairly easy pace, up to the point where I got chased by a dog, then it was more like a sprint, then dead stop, then sprint, then dead stop, then sprint

Probably will walk with my wife tonight if she wants, then go to the gym. I need to swim. Also, I really need to get an indoor trainer for my bike... I've promised myself that this winter I'll use that on days when the weather is just too awful to go out and run.

Monday

Got up and went to the gym at 5am, did the usual including 3 sets of 20 of this lovely exercise: glute-ham situps. Work was like a 10-hour tooth extraction... got home and ran 3 miles.

I'll run early tomorrow morning.