Great treadmill run. This is not a typo.

On February 11, 2017 By Emerging Runner13 Comments

Oh, we can be heroes, just for one day

Today’s run (treadmill): 3.5 miles
Yesterday’s run (treadmill): 3. 2 miles
Tuesday’s run (treadmill): 1.25 miles
Last Sunday’s run (street): 4.1 miles

It snowed this week and the streets have been very unfriendly for runners. The treadmill likes to use these times to prove its worthiness to me. Over the years I have learned to appreciate the indoor option but that doesn’t mean I particularly like it. Our FreeMotion machine has been a big improvement over the tortured Sole F63 it replaced and I am grateful for that. Today it was my hero.

I worked from home on Tuesday. Although I had an early video call, I managed to squeeze in a short treadmill run. Very short. But every mile counts and I’m counting that one. I worked from home on Thursday, but limited my exercise to multiple shoveling sessions in order to get through 13″ of snow. It turned out to be a good leg and upper body workout, especially when digging out the huge snowbanks at the end of our driveway that were left by the town plows.

I stayed home yesterday because the Long Island roads were still a big mess. I dutifully hopped on the treadmill and cranked out a three miler, the same distance I would have done had I been able to run on the road. I approached yesterday’s run like a 5K, starting easy and increasing speed as I went. The last half mile was run about two minutes per mile faster than I’ve been averaging this year.

This morning I noticed that the streets were relatively free of ice and snow. Unfortunately, the sidewalks were buried under three feet of snow, leaving no place to escape from cars on the road. I elected to run inside.

For those of you who are expecting me to write about how today’s treadmill run was just terrible because treadmills are soooo boring I’m afraid I must disappoint. I put on the cable music channel and was rewarded with some great songs. I only wore my Kinvaras and compression shorts and set the treadmill’s fan to “stun”, so I felt cool and dry most of the way through. I didn’t attempt the same challenging pace as yesterday, so the run felt much easier. Dare I say, enjoyable?

Even though I could have gone longer, I elected to cap it at 3.5 miles. Rather than duplicate Friday’s progressively faster pacing that left me worn out by the end, I finished feeling energized. I liked that feeling and the treadmill is my friend. At least for today. Tomorrow may be a different story.

Running and coughing and slipping and freezing

On January 7, 2017 By Emerging RunnerLeave a comment

Oh yes, it’s January again

Today’s run (street & treadmill): 3 miles total

Whatever cold or virus that hit me on December 29 is still with me. The only remaining symptom is a dry cough that just won’t abate. I took a rare sick day on Tuesday, worked from home on Wednesday and returned to the office on Thursday. My coughing was so relentless that my boss, whose office is adjacent to mine, told me to work from home on Friday. She couldn’t stand the thought of another day listening to my hacking.

The good news is that I feel almost back to full strength. I considered going for a run on Friday morning, but ended up doing a brisk (4 MPH) treadmill walk instead. This morning’s weather was a lot colder, but I was determined to get out and run. 23° with winds dropping the real feel temperature into the teens meant a lot of layers head to foot. I did my best to prepare, but I ultimately found conditions too harsh.

I was fairly comfortable while I waited for the Garmin to acquire its signal. I started off optimistically, planning to only run fast enough to stay warm. When I took my first left off my street, I felt the wind on my face and it hurt. I decided to give it a few minutes, hoping that warming up would help minimize my discomfort. I thought I could tough it out for three miles and probably could have managed that. After completing a loop through the middle school, I saw that the lightly falling snow was becoming heavier and the ground was getting slippery.

That was enough for me. I made tracks (literally) back to my house and headed upstairs where my wife was just finishing up her treadmill workout. I quickly shed my heavy layers and hopped on the treadmill. I completed the balance of my run indoors and ended up getting in trouble for tracking dirt in the house because I’d forgotten to take off my running shoes.

I usually try to cover closer to five miles on weekend days, but the combination of not running for two weeks and feeling less than 100% made three miles seem like a good distance. Besides that, we’re in the middle of our first snowstorm of the season. I knew I’d be going out at least four times to shovel as we’re looking at 9″- 12″ at this point. Between the running and shoveling, I’ve already covered more than 10K steps today. That number will go up further when we go back out again at 7:00.

I was glad to get back on the road this morning for the first time since Boxing Day. Unfortunately , it was for barely more than half a mile. Looks like another fun session on the treadmill tomorrow.

I found something to make the treadmill better

On December 17, 2016 By Emerging RunnerLeave a comment

Performance supplements

Today’s run (treadmill): 3.7 miles
Yesterday’s run (treadmill): 30 minutes

I ran out of time for an outside run on Friday morning, so my only option was the treadmill. I don’t know how many times I’ve written, “my only option was the treadmill” in a blog post, but I’m guessing the answer is “a lot.” That’s because it’s my workout of last resort. I guess the elliptical is also an option, but elliptical-ling is not running. My three weeks of using the elliptical (which coincided with my testing zero impact “running” machines) while recovering from a disc problem clearly proved this.

I had what you might call a bad attitude when I got on the treadmill. I didn’t want to use it and did everything I could to make the experience better. That included running shirtless (sorry ladies, no pictures), blasting the fan and putting on what I’d hoped would be decent music to run by. The run never got better, the music sucked and my schedule limited me to 30 minutes. And they were very long minutes. I also forgot to record my distance.

After a busy work day, the ER family went over to our favorite Thai place for a get together with friends. Consuming food that registers high on the Scoville scale makes me happy. I’m wondering if that was the reason why this morning’s treadmill run was far more pleasant than Friday’s.

Mother Nature had covered the roads with a few inches of snow overnight, so for a different reason I was stuck inside today. Like Friday, I dressed lightly, cranked up the fan and put on the music channel. I was prepared for the worst because I’d planned to run even longer today. Although I’d set the speed the same as yesterday, the effort seemed lighter and the music seemed better.

It must have been the Kaeng Phanaeng Neua and Tom Yum Goong. I was happy with today’s run despite the fact that it happened on the treadmill. I ended up pushing my speed progressively and didn’t feel overtaxed like I did the day before. I’ve done enough running to know that good runs often follow bad ones for no explainable reason. But I’m going to assume todays better experience was due to the food.

My first winter run but it’s still weeks away

On December 11, 2016 By Emerging RunnerLeave a comment

Face freezing run

Today’s run (street): 4.3 miles
Yesterday’s run (treadmill): 3.1 miles

Brrrr. There are still twelve days until winter, but this morning it felt like January. Even with moderate wind, the 30° temperature felt like 23°. Yesterday morning was a little milder, but still very cold. Due to that (and an early work schedule), I opted to run on the treadmill. I felt like I should get outside even though today’s conditions were even worse than yesterday’s.

My treadmill experience on Friday was actually pretty good. By wearing only running shorts and cranking the fan on my treadmill to maximum, I remained comfortable through most of the run. I set a challenging pace and put on a cable music channel in the hope that it would distract me from the usual tedium. And wouldn’t you know it, it did. Time didn’t stand still as I’d feared and I got to the end faster than expected.

I knew it would be chilly today so I took a little extra time to decide what to wear. Wool running socks, check. City Sport track pants, check. A Nike DriFit base layer, winter weight half zip, lined winter beanie and ASICS mitten gloves rounded out the gear. I added a thin buff that I could pull up to my chin when the wind hit straight on.

Even with that getup it still felt frigid when I stepped outside. Fortunately my Garmin acquired its signal immediately and I was on my way. A half a mile in, I was still waiting to warm up. The cold wind amplified the low temperature and made my sunglasses feel frozen against my skin. I didn’t began to feel comfortable until I was halfway through the run.

It looks like tomorrow’s weather will be more of the same so I’ll do my best to protect my face from the freezing wind. I know there’s always the treadmill option, but I’ll tough it out as long as I can. If this January is anything like the last, I’ll be spending plenty of time running indoors.

Not every run is stimulating

On October 29, 2016 By Emerging Runner2 Comments

Four miles in da hood

Today’s run (street): 4.2 miles
Yesterday’s run (treadmill): 2 miles

Friday morning was cold and blustery and I needed to get out early for an errand. Due to major time constraints, I opted for a quick treadmill run that I figured would be better than postponing my workout until later. I wasn’t sure how long my work day would go and it was also my anniversary. I didn’t think it would be polite to delay our dinner by doing an early evening run.

I ended up running a couple of treadmill miles and loved that the Garmin FR 35 captured all my metrics without a foot pod or chest strap. I should have gone all out during that short workout, but I chose to start off at my current pace. I bumped up the speed once I reached the second mile and I finished in the mid nine minute range. It was a good use of the small window of time that I had.

This morning’s schedule was a little more flexible and the weather was decent. It was 39° when I went out and I wore track pants and two light layers on top. That would have kept me comfortable throughout the run, but the temperature rose four degrees in the 40 or so minutes I was out there.

I’m still not used to starting strong since most of this year I’ve lacked energy during the first minutes of my runs. I expected to go easy today and was prepared to run a little slow. Somehow I ended up doing better than normal. I’m improving but still running half a minute off my targeted pace.

Today’s run was pleasant but my neighborhood roads were not very stimulating. The only interesting thing on my route was the work being done using heavy equipment at the middle school. Steamrollers are cool. I hope to go somewhere more interesting tomorrow and cover about five miles. I may do even more if conditions are good.

Denial of both service and stimulation

On October 23, 2016 By Emerging RunnerLeave a comment

Treadmill data more stimulating than treadmill

Today’s run (treadmill): 4 miles
Yesterday’s run (street): 3.1 miles

This weekend’s weather isn’t great for running, but I managed to get in a couple of workouts today and Friday. Yesterday my friend and portfolio advisor (Steve) came by for one of our periodic financial reviews. Before we got down to business, we hit my neighborhood roads for a tidy 5K run.

Steve is a Crossfit guy whose workouts focus primarily on strength training and high intensity activities. Cross-fitters incorporate running into their training, but it’s typically 400 meter intervals between squats, push ups and other dynamic stationary exercises. I imagine it would be hard to adapt from intensely anaerobic workouts to an aerobic training event like running. Steve said the first mile is always his slowest. I’m guessing that’s due to the heavy cardio aspect of running.

Steve and I ran my typical Friday route and the pace we set seemed challenging to us both. We were surprised to discover that our speed did not reflect our perceived efforts. After Gmapping the route, I calculated that we’d averaged about 10:30 a mile. We did talk the entire time and that’s an indicator that we weren’t pushing all that hard. According to Garmin Connect, I averaged 76% max HR which is about nine percentage points lower than what I’ve recorded on recent high 9:00 runs.

After Steve and I finished up, I settled into my work, only to discover that my company’s email system was down due to the massive DDoS attack on Dyn. That was fine as I had plenty of non-email work to do and, fortunately, our other systems were accessible through the VPN. By 5:00 PM, our mail server started pushing through messages. I caught up with the most important stuff and left the rest for Monday morning.

This morning the weather had taken a turn for the worse. I’m willing to run in sub-optimal conditions but the howling winds, steady rain and chilly temperatures forced me to accept the treadmill as my only real option. My enthusiasm for today’s run dropped a few levels, but I dutifully got on board. I set the speed to 5.6 MPH and edged it up to 6.1 throughout the run. Unlike running outdoors where you can see your progress, the treadmill provides very little sensory stimulation. I spent the entire time thinking about the wonderful moment when I would hit the stop button.

With humidity close to 100%, I felt all used up at the end. I’ve been hoping for more dramatic improvement in my performance but I’m leveling right now. Still, at this level, I’m running almost a minute per mile faster than I did in September. Yesterday’s humidity was 94% and today’s was worse, so I’ll blame that for not pushing any harder.

I’m excited that I’m going to see the Runsketeers tomorrow. Per my opening reference to the weather, the winds on Sunday are supposed to be fierce, with gusts up to 40 MPH and a real feel in the high 30’s. Should be fun.

Good running beats treadmill tedium

On October 9, 2016 By Emerging Runner2 Comments

Oh, hello deer

Today’s run (treadmill): 4.1 miles

Mother nature can be thoughtless when it comes to my running preferences. I woke up this morning to driving rain that wouldn’t stop no matter how many times I looked out the window. Once I started to believe the weather reports, it became clear that my only option would be to run inside on the treadmill. I really didn’t want to do that, and thought one more time about braving the rain and the accompanying high winds. Ultimately, I decided that running outside in those conditions while wearing glasses would not work too well.

I stalled as long as I could by setting up the floor fan and gearing up for my treadmill session. As I did all that, I thought about the performance gains I’ve made in recent weeks and hoped they would translate to this type of workout. I finally hit the start button and set my speed to what I averaged for pace on yesterday’s outdoor run.

I know I keep mentioning the Garmin FR 35, but that’s because it surprises me (in a good way) every time I use it. This morning I selected “indoor run” and hit start. Once I got going, I saw that it was tracking my pace and distance (and of course heart rate). That’s a huge upgrade from my old FR 210 that required a foot pod to capture any run data. As I went along, I compared my speed and distance between the treadmill and watch display that were roughly equivalent.

The tedium of the treadmill experience motivated me to dial up my speed throughout my run. I ended up pacing only 19 seconds per mile slower than my next big performance target. I would have hit that had I done today’s run one minute faster. Still, it was my fastest pace on the treadmill since I ran intervals on it earlier this year. My cadence and stride length were also captured and showed improvement from yesterday.

Later in the day, the ER family went out to lunch and then stopped into Dick’s in Mellvile. This store has just doubled in size with the addition of a Field & Stream store. My efforts to find some decent lightweight track pants went nowhere (and by the way Dick’s, have you heard of any other clothing brands besides Nike, Under Armor and Adidas?) but it was fun to explore the adjacent Field & Stream store.

I don’t do guns and have only fished a few times, so I wasn’t interested in any of that stuff. However, the outdoor clothing was fun to look at and I always want to buy one of those Carhartt heavy duty hooded sweatshirts when I see them. The showroom had a big display with a bunch of real (stuffed) animals, including elk, moose, wild turkeys and this caribou (see picture at the top) that took a selfie with me.

Tomorrow is Columbus day and that will give me another weekend day to get in a run. There’s no rain expected for tomorrow, so I’ll be doing that outside. Today’s treadmill experience was mostly positive and I was pleased with my performance. But ten times out of ten, I’d rather run outside.

O Canada and fitting in some running

On August 10, 2016 By Emerging Runner2 Comments

Land of maple leafs, moose and fun

Today’s run (street): 3.3 miles
Sunday’s run (treadmill): 20 minutes
Friday’s run (street): 3.25 miles
Wednesday’s run (treadmill): 30 minutes

My running over the last week has been a blur. The only clarity being today after we returned from a trip. I worked from home on Wednesday and did a treadmill run. I got outside and around the neighborhood on Friday. I needed to fit those workouts into busy work days and didn’t do a good job of tracking my treadmill mileage.

View of the Green Mountains

We headed to Montreal on Saturday and made a stop in northern Vermont to see my brother and his family, along with my mother who was visiting from Florida. We were only passing through for a few hours, but we made the best of it and the kids loved spending time with their cousins. All too soon we were on our way to Canada.

Cool happenings at Place des Arts

We stayed near McGill University in area that was adjacent to a lot of nice restaurants and close to the Place des Arts. I did a treadmill run in the morning on a machine that was not up to my standards for a fitness center unit. I was tired from travel and struggled to get through 20 minutes at an easy pace. Well it looked easy on the display, but it felt much faster. I ended up covering 16,000 steps that day, so I didn’t mind the short workout.

Swim, Bike, Run in the Old Port

We met up with friends who live in the city and had a great time with them. While we were in the Old Port we stumbled into the middle of the Montreal International Triathlon. There were runners and cyclists flying along sectioned areas and swimmers in the St. Lawrence River. We needed to sprint to get past at the cross points.

Montreal has a lot of energy and it reminds me so much of Europe. My brother had mentioned that Les Habitants “didn’t get the memo” that smoking is pas bien. Unfortunately that proved to be true. On the positive side, we covered a lot of interesting ground and had some great meals. We were sorry when we had to head back home.

When we got back, I went out for a run around my local streets to cap off a really nice mini vacation. My running was back to where it was prior to that hotel run and I did well considering the heat and humidity of the day. I really would have liked to run outside when we were away, but the timing didn’t work out. The next time we go back – and we will – I’ll definitely do my running on the rue.

Fitbit fits and multicolored running

On May 7, 2016 By Emerging Runner2 Comments

These colors do run

Today’s run (street): 3.6 miles
Yesterday’s run (treadmill): 3.1 miles

I really liked my Fitbit yesterday, because it showed that I had reached 6,500 steps after my morning run. I really despised my Fitbit this morning when I checked post-run and saw that it didn’t record a single step. What a waste of exercise. The saving grace is that my Garmin captured my run and, using the SPM metric and elapsed running time, I estimated that I ran about 6,400 steps. My Fitbit will never know this. Adding insult to injury, I expect the Fitbit to put a message on the display tonight shaming me for moving so little today.

After eight straight runs over my vacation break, I had a long layoff. My return to the office resulted in no running until yesterday. I was able to determine that my average step count during a work day is about 5,500 and I’ve been adding about 5,000 more when I got home. If I can’t fit in runs Monday through Thursday, I need to generate more steps at work. I’ve been using a stand up desk in my office for the last year and that’s better than sitting, but it’s impolite to stand during meetings and worse to pace around the conference table.

The weather this week has been cold and rainy. Yesterday I stayed inside and used the treadmill. As I ran, I thought about how much I dislike the treadmill experience. I tried to think about the positives – the softer surface, no wind resistance (except for the fan), no broken pavement, no cars, and no hills. I had the TV to distract me and I could just set my pace and zone out. Unfortunately, it doesn’t quite work that way for me. I usually turn off the TV after a few minutes because it starts to annoy me. The lack of true forward progress feels futile. My only thought is that every step gets me incrementally closer to finishing.

This morning started with rain, but I had to bring my son to the high school and wouldn’t have been able to run before then anyway. By 9:00 AM the skies had cleared, and I got outside for a neighborhood run. There was a lot going on for us, so I wasn’t able to cover that much distance. I appreciated the cool air and the cloudy skies. My run almost felt automatic. It was as if I was riding along, rather than doing any work.

While my son was getting through his SAT and I was running through my neighborhood, my wife and daughter were at Citi Field participating in the Color Run. This is a non-competitive run where participants get sprayed with colored corn starch along the way. The “race” starts in the corridors under the ball park and winds through the playing field and then around the stadium area. It was a fun pre-Mother’s Day activity and definitely more fun than taking the SATs.

Tomorrow is officially Mother’s Day so I’ll need to get out early. I hope the rain will stay away long enough for me to get a few miles in.

Run, hike and Fitbit

On April 27, 2016 By Emerging Runner4 Comments

ER and ER Jr taking on the trails at Bethpage

Today’s run (treadmill): 3.3 miles
Yesterday’s run (street): 3.25 miles
Sunday’s run (street): 3.5 miles

It’s nice to be out of the office this week. We’ve had some great days so far. Since work often gets in the way of my weekday running, I try to take advantage of off days to fit in extra workouts. That’s been the case so far on this vacation. I’ve been able to run every day since Saturday.

I can barely remember Sunday’s run around the neighborhood, other than that it was windy and a little cold for the short sleeves and shorts I wore. Like Saturday, I had good energy and I felt I moved well. Yesterday I got out fairly early and enjoyed the quiet roads, courtesy of school vacation that kept both buses and parents off the roads.

Yesterday afternoon, my son and I decided to do an impromptu hike in the woods at Bethpage. We parked in the northeast corner of the lot and entered at the trail head at the far end of the picnic area. We followed the main trail that parallels the bike trail and then cut to a path that led us to the big field. We ducked back into the woods and began to take side trails, one of which led us to the paved path where the short but very steep hill begins.

We stayed on the bike trail for about three quarters of a mile before going back into the woods. We followed a winding path that eventually brought us back to where we’d started out. It was a good hike with some nice climbs and I was glad to get a second workout in on Monday.

Post-run selfie, Sunday or Monday. I’ve lost track.

We had buckets of rain this morning starting at around 4:00 AM, but conditions cleared up by about 9:00 AM. Even though the rain had stopped, I decided to save a little time and stayed inside, covering 3.3 miles on the treadmill. It was a good progression run and, like the three before it, I finished my last mile running a fairly fast pace (for me).

I’d given my wife my Fitbit a couple of years ago because I got frustrated with it. Not that it didn’t work, it was just that I’d frequently leave it on my dresser instead of transferring it to my next pair of pants. And everyone knows that a run or walk that wasn’t captured by a device technically never happened.

My company just did a wellness challenge and every participant got a Fitbit to track their contribution to their team. I didn’t participate, but I became envious of people when they’d announce their step count. I decided to get back into the Fitbit game and ordered a new one. The building where I work is humongous and every meeting I’m in seems to be as far from my office as physically possibly.

I’ll be curious to see how much I actually travel during the workday. I wish I had it now so I could track my progress during this vacation week.