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1 mcal, and finally a use for WMA

Thursday, January 22nd, 2004

The training program said to run 8 km in 48 minutes today, but as I’m still letting my legs rest, I again went on the Precor elliptical trainer, aiming for a 15 kcal/min pace. Since I wasn’t totally exhausted after the first few minutes I increased the resistance over and over until I hit an (for me) insane resistance and pace. I managed to keep that pace until the end, which gave an average of 20.12 kcal/min, or a little over 1000 kcal (or is that one mcal?) in 50 minutes. I feel a little suspicious of that machine, it felt a little too easy. Or maybe I’m just getting super fit.

A third explanation may be that I skipped the music, instead listening to the .NET Rocks radio show, the episode with Sam Gentile. My JOS MP-100 has WMA support, but I’ve never found a use for it until now. The episode was fairly uninteresting, but Sam’s critique of COM Interop, and particularly the RCW system, was spot on. However, I do disagree with hosts about the importance of the other Interop direction (CCW), since I’m currently working inside a COM framework in which I’d like to plug in .NET classes. There’s got to be a lot of COM based frameworks around still, no?

Next time I’m going to listen to the Rory Blythshow – his blog is hilarious, and I hope the show is as well.

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777 kcals later

Tuesday, January 20th, 2004

Today was interval training. My legs are still not fit for running, so I used the elliptical trainer. I usually use the ones from Technogym, but now one from Precor was available, so I tried that one, and noticed that it could vary grade/pitch (along with resistance), which made the movement even more running-like. I really liked it, unfortunately it’s pretty rare at the Sats gyms. I averaged 17,3 kcals/min, which for me is really intense.Got a slight case of heartburn, though.

Friday is payday, which means I’ll go to Löplabbet and try out a better pair of shoes. Hopefully this will mean less strain on my legs.

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Still burning those calories

Monday, January 19th, 2004

My legs still hurt from the treadmill, so for this sundays long run I substituted the elliptical trainer. I burned 1278 kcal in 110 minutes, which is slightly less than I did last sunday, but I’m reasonably happy. I am not happy with my legs, however. I am starting to suspect that my running style is causing unnescessary strain to my legs, so I’m going to try to fit out a new pair of shoes to balance this.

Also, so far the training program for a four hour marathon has been pretty tough. I hope my general fitness improves at a more rapid pace than the program progresses, otherwise this is going to be one exhausted spring.

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My legs, they hurt!

Thursday, January 15th, 2004

The training schedule said I should run 8 km in 45 minutes today. My legs, still hurting from sunday’s 15 km run, said otherwise, and flat out refused to cooperate after half the distance.

Previously when my legs have been feeling less than OK, I have switched from the treadmill to the elliptical trainer (sort of a cross between a stairmaster and cross country skiing). Since the movements are different, I’ve tried to adjust by focusing on how many calories I’m burning per minute: around 11 for low intensity training, around 14 for higher intensity — same for both the treadmill and the elliptical trainer.

Running can be pretty hard on the legs, and so far for me it has. Maybe I should stick to the elliptical trainer during the weeks, and only use the treadmill on the long sunday run. Eventually I expect my legs to adapt to the abuse.

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must… watch… more… TV

Friday, January 9th, 2004

So, the “Book Group” DVD actually did appear before the holidays, but I have not sat down and seen it yet. And to further pile opon the stuff of things that needs to be seen, the first season of 24 is on sale, like everywhere for around 200 SEK. I never saw it when it aired, which I’m kinda glad about now, because it seems like the kind of show that lends itself nicely to 18-hour viewing marathons. It’s going to be fun…

Speaking of marathons, my training for this summers marathon goes on, and I’ve already started to feel pain in my ankles. Today I switched the treadmill run for a elliptical trainer session. Since I don’t know what running 35 mins at 10.5 km/h would correspond to on that machine’s setting, I erred on the tougher side. After about 15 minutes I realised my mistake, but couldn’t admit that to myself, so I went on. Kinda exhausting, but I think my newborn stubbornness is a vital quality for a would-be marathon runner.

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This year’s new years resolution

Sunday, January 4th, 2004

So, I very rarely make new year’s resolutions, but for this year I had actually thought one over and decided that it made sense: During 2004, I will finish in a marathon race. I’m primarily focusing on Stockholm Marathon, but failing that, I’m also thinking about the New York City Marathon, which is later in the year, giving me more time to prepare.

I’m following the suggested training schedule for a 4-hour race, which today meant a 14 km run (on a treadmill), which was as exhausting as could be expected — and it’s still only a third of the real race.

The importance of good music to listen to when running cannot be understated — today I loaded my JOS MP-100 with Jimmy Eat World “Bleed American” (worked out very good), MC Solaar “Mach 6″ (the uptempo songs worked fine, but not the slower ones) and Entombed “Inferno” (Works as good as ever, particularly “The Fix Is In”).

A strange thing is that the MP-100 only weighs around 34 gram (including battery), yet at the end of the run felt very heavy around my neck. I’m glad I didn’t get an Ipod.

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