Saturday, March 18, 2006
Week 7 is almost over
It's been a few days since my last post, so let me catch you up.
On Thursday I went for a bike ride with my friend Roland. We ended up going for a 24 mile ride, through Golden Gate Park, through the Presidio, over the Golden Gate Bridge to Sausalito and back again. It was a beautiful ride, especially once we got out of the traffic-laden streets and over to Golden Gate Park. Going over the bridge was a lot of fun. The wind was at our backs and it was smooth sailing all the way. The way back however, took us straight into the wind, which made the entire bridge feel like one big hill. I'm guessing that some of the wind was created by the 4 lanes of traffic that we were next to. Perhaps next time I'll try coming back on the other side of the bridge. I have to say that despite all my training, I was still trailing Roland going up most of the hills. Ahh well, it seems that no matter how in shape I get there are tons of people who are in even better shape.
The Friday swim was nice, as the pool was not as crowded as my last few trips. I got into a fairly good rhythm though having to turn around every 25M is starting to get annoying. I either need to learn how to do those cool flip turns, or get into some open water soon. I'm actually looking forward to our first open water swim next Saturday! My total distance today was 2200M, but there were various rests throughout the workout. Still, it is nice that 2200M feels like no big deal.
I woke up this morning with a bit of a sore throat, and I have had a huge knot in my left shoulder for the past few days now. However today is a beautiful sunny warm wonderful day, and we were doing 2 laps around Lake Merced. The lake is about 4.5 miles around and is a common running/walking/biking route for hundreds of people. I have been trying to increase my running speed, and I was hoping to get my average for today under 9-minute miles. Given that last weekend I ran 8 miles in 80 minutes, running 9 in 81 was probably a bit ambitious in hindsight. I took it easy on my first lap around the lake and was chatting with June, who is now training for her third triathlon. It is always nice to have someone to chat with, and it was nice to hear about June's success in losing 60 pounds and keeping it off. We ran together for the first 4.7 miles at a 9:37 per mile pace.
After my 4.7 mile "warm-up lap", I ran ahead and tried to get my average down to 9:00. Running on my own was a little tough. It's always hard to pace yourself and having a watch that tells you how fast you are going is not nearly as helpful as a person who is also going through the same thing as you. See... the watch doesn't understand hills, or being tired, it just tells you "speed up you slowpoke!". In any case, I was able to complete the second lap at an average pace of 8:44. In the end, I wasn't able to get my overall average down to 9:00, but I did finish in a respectible 83 minutes, or 9:10 minutes per mile. I was actually fairly pleased with myself... that is until one guy returned from running 3 laps in 90 minutes (an average of 6:12 minutes per mile)! That bastard... I mean... good for him.
On Thursday I went for a bike ride with my friend Roland. We ended up going for a 24 mile ride, through Golden Gate Park, through the Presidio, over the Golden Gate Bridge to Sausalito and back again. It was a beautiful ride, especially once we got out of the traffic-laden streets and over to Golden Gate Park. Going over the bridge was a lot of fun. The wind was at our backs and it was smooth sailing all the way. The way back however, took us straight into the wind, which made the entire bridge feel like one big hill. I'm guessing that some of the wind was created by the 4 lanes of traffic that we were next to. Perhaps next time I'll try coming back on the other side of the bridge. I have to say that despite all my training, I was still trailing Roland going up most of the hills. Ahh well, it seems that no matter how in shape I get there are tons of people who are in even better shape.
The Friday swim was nice, as the pool was not as crowded as my last few trips. I got into a fairly good rhythm though having to turn around every 25M is starting to get annoying. I either need to learn how to do those cool flip turns, or get into some open water soon. I'm actually looking forward to our first open water swim next Saturday! My total distance today was 2200M, but there were various rests throughout the workout. Still, it is nice that 2200M feels like no big deal.
I woke up this morning with a bit of a sore throat, and I have had a huge knot in my left shoulder for the past few days now. However today is a beautiful sunny warm wonderful day, and we were doing 2 laps around Lake Merced. The lake is about 4.5 miles around and is a common running/walking/biking route for hundreds of people. I have been trying to increase my running speed, and I was hoping to get my average for today under 9-minute miles. Given that last weekend I ran 8 miles in 80 minutes, running 9 in 81 was probably a bit ambitious in hindsight. I took it easy on my first lap around the lake and was chatting with June, who is now training for her third triathlon. It is always nice to have someone to chat with, and it was nice to hear about June's success in losing 60 pounds and keeping it off. We ran together for the first 4.7 miles at a 9:37 per mile pace.
After my 4.7 mile "warm-up lap", I ran ahead and tried to get my average down to 9:00. Running on my own was a little tough. It's always hard to pace yourself and having a watch that tells you how fast you are going is not nearly as helpful as a person who is also going through the same thing as you. See... the watch doesn't understand hills, or being tired, it just tells you "speed up you slowpoke!". In any case, I was able to complete the second lap at an average pace of 8:44. In the end, I wasn't able to get my overall average down to 9:00, but I did finish in a respectible 83 minutes, or 9:10 minutes per mile. I was actually fairly pleased with myself... that is until one guy returned from running 3 laps in 90 minutes (an average of 6:12 minutes per mile)! That bastard... I mean... good for him.// posted by Zack @ 12:01 PM 
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ah, still so competitive. sounds like training is going very well, and if it makes you feel any better, you are most definitely in better shape than i am! i hope you have a good bodyworker out there.
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