The Midnight Runner

So Sore

2010-03-21T11:21:00.000-06:00

We had our annual Alumni Basketball tourney the last couple of days. It is always a great time. Reliving the past, catching up with friends, playing some ball and realizing just how old and out of shape we really are now. Our team did pretty good this year and we ended up playing in the championship game, which we lost (and I hate losing). So that means that we played one game Friday night and three games throughout the day on Saturday.

So while it is always a great time playing it comes at a price. Those four games over the weekend sure take their toll. Let's see if I can list all of the parts of my body that are sore. My neck, my back, my arms, my quads, my calves are unbelievably tight, the balls of my feet and I have a couple blisters on the tips of my toes. But it is totally worth it.

When I got up this morning I sure wasn't feeling any looser. But I went on a nice and easy 2.75 miles run with Amy and I feel a lot better now. Don't get me wrong, I'm still going to be plenty sore the next few days. I plan to spend the rest of day with my foam roller and doing some yoga, we'll see if it helps.

It's Been Awhile

2010-03-18T01:38:00.000-06:00

It sure has been awhile since I posted anything. I have been running quite a bit and learning more about it though. I guess I just haven't really had anything to say about it though. I do plan on sharing some of the information that I've been acquiring in future posts.

I signed up for the Lincoln Half Marathon and have been working hard at getting ready for it. I'm pretty excited about it, but I think Amy might be more excited than I am since she ran it last year and had an awesome experience. And I'm actually more excited now than I was even an hour ago, I just found out the race is going to finish on the 50 yard line in memorial stadium. I always thought that would be the best way to finish it.

For my training plan I start off following Hal's Novice Half Plan for a couple of weeks. I switched for a couple of reasons. Hal's plan only gets up to 10 miles, which is almost a quarter of the race short. While I'm sure the excitement of race day could push me through the last 5k, I'd feel a lot better about the race if I had run closer to the actual distance. Hal's plan wasn't fitting into my schedule very well either. I usually ended up running Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday with a long run either Saturday or Sunday. Sure I was supposed to cross train on those off days but I wouldn't get that done very often.

When I found the half plan from marathonrookie.com I liked it a lot as it fixed both issues I mentioned above. With it I'll get up to 12 miles while still increasing mileage at a reasonable rate. It fits into my schedule much better too. I have every other Friday off from work and those are my rest days with this plan. Since I was working out at the gym on base while it was still cold and snowy out I would usually end up taking that day off from training instead of heading back to work on my day off.

My training has been going well so far with just a couple minor setbacks. I use runningAhead to map out all my runs so I know how long they are. There is a bike trail about a mile from our house that I've been running on. Since we're still pretty new to the area each time I run farther on it is a new adventure. Looking at the trail on Google Maps (which runningAhead uses) it looks like it is paved, but I've found out a couple times that isn't always the case. The first time it wasn't a big deal, instead of pavement it was a rock trail, so I just went with it. The next time it happened it was a bit more of a problem. I set out for a 6 mile run, my longest at that point, again the trail switched to rock. But then I had to cross a street and there was a bar across the trail that said 'No Trespassing' so I crossed to the other side of the creek and ran along the trail on the other side where it was paved. Well the landmark I was looking for to know when to turn around was on the other side, so I missed it. I ended up running 7.6 miles instead of 6 and ended up with a few real nice blisters. With about a mile to go I could tell I was going to have them, so if I would have ran the correct route I would have been fine.

Last weekend I set out on an 8 miler, pretty much the same route as the 7.6 miler from the week before so no surprises. My blisters were still pretty far from healed so I'm not sure if I was compensating for that or what, but after my run my the outside edge of my right was bothering me, it felt bruised. When I ran Monday night it hurt quite a bit when I ran on the road, so I ran on the grass along side it as much as possible. I've been icing it a lot and instead of running I'll continue to use the elliptical until it's better. It seems to be much better now so hopefully will be better next week if for no other reason than I'm not a fan of the elliptical, I just can't seem to figure it out. I think that my stride is too long for it or something so it feels really unnatural.

500 Reps

2009-11-11T00:58:00.000-06:00

Zunana from bodyrock.tv posts daily workouts and the one she posted for today was a 500 rep workout. I've been sitting on the sidelines planning for too long so I decided to give her workout a try.

Here is the workout. And to keep things interesting you are supposed to see how fast you can do it, while keeping good form of course. It took her just under 36 minutes.

Prisoner Squats – 50 reps
Sit Ups – 50 reps
Backward/Forward Lunge – 25 on each leg (one time back and forward counts and 1 rep)
Push Ups – 50 reps
Reptile (Plank Knee to Elbow) – 50 reps switching the legs
Turkish Get Up – 50 reps
Side V – Crunch – 25 reps on each side
Split Push Ups – 50 reps total
Jump Forward and Two Jumps Back – 50 reps total
Reversed Plank Knee Tucks – 50 reps total

If you want to see a video of her doing the workout and her words of wisdom head over to her site, it is much more entertaining than mine.
http://www.bodyrock.tv/2009/11/10/five-hundred-rep-workout/

Otherwise, stick around and read about my experience.

I didn't give the workout much thought before I started it, like how long I expected it to take or anything like that, I just got going. I'm glad I did because I might have talked myself into only doing 30 reps instead of 50 or something like that.

Prison squats - I didn't think these were too bad. My quads were burning a bit toward the end but I could have done a lot more. My knee has been bothering me a bit lately and I was worried about how it would handle them, but it didn't hurt any more than normal. I tend to stay away from squats because of my knees, but maybe if I do them without any weight I can strength the muscles and that will fix what ever is wrong.

Sit ups - When I do sit ups I usually don't go through the full range of motion like she did in her video. It was hard not to use momentum and just use my tummy muscles to pull myself up, but I don't think I did a great job. I had to take a break in the middle of these because I was really feeling the burn.

Lunge - For this one I did 5 reps on a leg then switched. Since the squats didn't bother me too much I didn't think these would either, but halfway through it was all I could do to get through the 5 so I could switch over to the other leg. These burned like hell and I was starting to wonder what I got myself into.

Push Ups - I've been trying to do a couple of sets of push ups to failure in the morning. I've been doing an okay job and do them around 3 times a week. I usually do between 40 and 50, so I figured these shouldn't be a big deal. I was wrong again though. I took quite a few breaks and had to do a couple of them on my knees so I would keep going. I managed to get through them though.

Reptile - I had never heard of these before so I didn't know what to expect. But since my arms were dead from the push ups, I figured they would be interesting. I didn't really feel these anywhere but my arms, but I'm not entirely sure I was doing them correctly. I did have to take a break or two because my arms were so tired.

Turkish Get Ups - I'd seen these but never done them. I grabbed on of Amy's 8 pound weights and almost started one get up before I switched over to one of her two pounders. (Actually they might only be one pound, they don't say) That was more than enough weight, my arms were so completely dead by the end of these I could barely lift the weight anymore. I managed to get through these with only a couple of breaks.

Side V - For these I did two sets of ten on each side and then a set of five. By the end of each set I was feeling it, so switching sides was a nice break.

Split Push Ups - These completely kicked my ass. My arms were so dead when I started them I wonder how I was ever going to get through them. I managed to, but all but about 10 of them were on my knees and the form on about 10 of those was far, far from perfect. Breaks were frequent and long during this exercise.

Jumps - I liked this one. It was tough and my jumps were quite a bit shorter at the end than the beginning but I only took one break this time. My balance isn't great so I had some extra hops and steps that others probably wouldn't have needed.

Reversed Plank Knee Tucks - This was kind of an awkward position. My arms were still dead so that didn't help anything either. I didn't think this was awful, but I had to take a break in the middle because my lower back was starting to hurt. Hopefully that means I was strengthening it, because I tend to hurt it more often than I would like.

My total time was 66 minutes and 35 seconds. So I managed not double her time, but only by a few minutes. I'm not sure that this post accurately described how completely dead I was while I was doing this. It really amazed me, but I'm not sure why. My heart was pumping extra and I was completely drenched with sweat by the time I was done. I'm sure that I am going to feel it in every part of my body tomorrow. I thought it was a great workout but it just goes to show how far I have to go before I am in good shape.

If you decide to give the workout a try let me know how much faster you were than me.

Do the Little Things

2009-11-05T01:34:00.002-06:00

When I used to play basketball one of the things my coaches stressed was "do the little things". The little things are the things that are easily over looked in the big scheme of things. Things like chinning the ball, keeping your head on a swivel, ball fakes, crisp passes, going to the ball, boxing out, etc. If you don't know what those things are, that's part of the point. Everyone knows how exciting a dunk or steal can be, but for those things to happen consistently the little things need to be done first. Our team took great pride in doing those little things even though our fans didn't notice them and they didn't make the highlight reel. However, our fans did notice the results those little things produced, a state championship.

The last couple training cycles I went through, all there was to running was to run. That did work for me, I was able to bring my times down quite a bit. As I'm getting back into running again though I'm starting to realize that I need to do the little things for running too. Little things that will help me produce better results more consistently. Some of the little things I'm focusing on (or need to) are my core, total body strength and flexibility.

For my core I started doing the Ab Workout for Runners from About.com after my runs. It only takes a few extra minutes and if the amount of hurt is any indication, I'm sure I will feel and show results soon.
Here are a few ab workouts from Runner's World that I plan on stealing parts of to incorporate into my routine over time to mix things up and keep my workout fresh to avoid muscle memory.
Abs Plan
The Ultimate Ab Workout for Runners
Ab-solutely Necessary

While I'm still trying to develop a plan to follow this winter I know I'm going to be incorporating some strength training into it once or twice a week. Until I find something better I'm going to be following Skip's Dumbbell Training Workout. I like it because they are simple exercises and pretty much every muscle group gets hit at some point. My plan is to do two sets of 12-15 reps on my strength days.

I've talked about flexibility, or my lack of, before. I really think that being more flexible will help me as a runner. It will help prevent injuries and help me have better range of motion, which would make me faster. I don't have a plan for this one yet though, so if you have any suggestions I'd love to hear them. What I would like is a series of stretches (static or dynamic) to do after my core workout (or before my run) that would take a few more minutes. Then in addition, I'll do yoga once or twice a week.

I'm sure there are a ton of other little things to do too, like diet and sleep, that I either don't know I should focus on, or don't know enough about so I can focus them. So if you can think of any that I missed let me know.

Normality Restored

2009-10-25T23:51:00.003-06:00

The last few months have been really crazy for us. I finished my bachelor's degree in May, then during the summer I found a new job in the Omaha area. So that lead to Amy needing to find a job and us needing to find a place to live. We wanted to take advantage of the $8,000 tax credit for buying a house but we thought that'd be too much to do from 3 hours away, so we just got an apartment. Amy had a few interviews, got a couple offers and accepted a position. In the middle of August we moved to our apartment in La Vista, and started our new jobs about a week later. We decided to start looking at houses a little bit and found one that we really liked, after a couple of rounds of negotiations we came to terms (on Amy's birthday) and we closed at the end of September. So we got another chance to move, yay. Once the house was ours we spent a little more than a week cleaning and painting and we finally got somewhat moved in (on my birthday). It's been three weeks since then and we are finally mostly settled in.

So now that normality has been restored, we have time to get back to some of the other things in life, like running. I have access to a very nice fitness center there and I can get Amy in as well. The place is huge. When you first walk in there are a ton of cardio machines, treadmills, elipitcals, bikes, stair climbers, etc. Then there are racket ball courts, tennis courts, weight machines and free weights, volleyball courts, basketball courts and a indoor soccer field. The whole area is surrounded by a .4 mile track that is 2-3 lanes wide. They also have a 5 lane lap pool. So it is a pretty nice benefit that we'll be taking advantage of this winter.

It seems like I have a ton of time and a big weight off my shoulders now that I'm out of school. So I've came up with quite a long list of things (probably too long) to fill the time. I really didn't work out much during my last couple of semesters so getting back in shape is high on the list. I don't have a plan for that yet though. While I plan on getting a bulk of my exercise from running, I also want to mix some other things in. I'd like to swim from time to time, which could be interesting because I am not much of a swimmer. I also want to do some weight lifting and I like doing yoga, so I'll have to work that in too. I've been looking at the P90X program and it is something that I want to do. But I don't feel I'm in good enough shape to do that yet at this point. So I think maybe that will be a new years resolution.

Oh yeah, I'd also like to work on getting on a normal sleeping schedule. But I am pretty close to scrapping that idea. For as long as I can remember I haven't slept normal. And a normal schedule kind of conflicts with my other hobbies of programming and poker. If I'm the middle of a programming problem or playing cards the time seems to just fly by and all the sudden it's three in the morning and I'm wide awake. I'm not a big fan of using drugs to help either. After I take them Amy tells me stories that I have little to no recollection of. I'm somewhat inclined to believe her because they are too crazy for her to make up. Even after I take them I'm not wide awake and ready to go the next day, so what's the point wasting time sleeping? Also I'm writing this post at one in the morning. (Yeah I probably need help, but denial and justification are easier than fixing the problem.)

So I guess my next course of action is to come up with a workout plan that will get me back in shape and also allow time for me to whittle away at our ever growing to-do list of house stuff.

Good Idea, Bad Idea

2009-07-10T22:35:00.002-05:00

It's time for another edition of Good Idea, Bad Idea.

Good Idea
- Going on a walk.

Bad Idea
- Going on a 2.5 mile walk wearing jeans and Birkenstocks when the temp is pushing 90 and the humidity is about 60%.

I now have at least three blisters on my right foot and two on my left. There is one in the middle of the bottom of each foot. So things could be interesting the next few days as those heel and I keep running.

Happy Summer.

Havelock Charity Run

2009-06-08T22:23:00.003-05:00

This last Saturday was the 31st annual Havelock Charity Run. There are two races, a 10k and a 3k. Since I'm just getting back into things I opted for the 3k. Going into the race I really didn't have any expectations or even a goal time. For some reason, I think it is just because it is a round number, I picked 15 minutes. I really didn't think I would come in under that though because I've been running about a 9:30 pace and I probably been pushing a little too hard at that pace.

Since I'm 6'5" I have a somewhat large stride and hate having to shorten it because I'm running behind someone. So I started up toward the front of the pack even though in the past this has caused me some hurt. I actually did a good job of holding myself back though and not taking off like everyone else. In fact I felt like I was holding myself back a little too much, but I decided that was okay because I would rather finish strong than putter out and die or end up dry heaving partway through the race like I did a few years ago.

One of the problems with starting out toward the front is that all those people that didn't do that, they pass you. And that can be pretty discouraging. But since I didn't realy have any expectations it didn't really bother me too much. I just tried to keep my pace steady and keep going.

Partway through the race there was a sign that had the number one on it. I didn't know it that was one mile or one kilometer though. I checked my watch but it wasn't much help, it read 7:14. So I was thinking, if that was a mile then I went out a lot faster than it actually felt like, but if it was just a kilometer then I was going way too slow. Going out too fast was a lot more likely so I was guessing it was probably a mile. That meant that my goal of 15 minutes actually seemed possible for the first time. I had to tell my legs to take it easy though, they were all exicted and want to make sure we got to the finish in time, silly legs.

The course was pretty much just a rectangle. So if we call the first stretch side A, then side B was pretty much a gradual incline. I finally passed a few people going up that and I felt like I was going to be able to pick it up a little bit along side D.

My plan was going great then I started dry heaving a bit. So much for that holding back thing stopping that from happening. I tried to run through it but then it got worse so I had to stop. I had a few somewhat strong ones then I felt fine was on my way. In the meantime, all those people I passed along side C had passed me back, plus a few more. I did try to push it a little bit harder the rest of the way and I finished in 14:22, for a 7:43 pace. That put me in at 112 out of 616 and 94 out of 261 guys.

I guess I was happy with my run. It's hard for me to be happy getting beat by so many people. I am fairly certain that I left all I had out there on the course and is really all I should ask of myself. I would rather get my ass kicked now and take things slow than to push myself too hard and get hurt, so I'll take what I can get. And for me running isn't about how I do compared to others, its about being active, getting in shape and improving against myself.

Just a little over two weeks until my next race, a 5k in the Kearney Community Olympics. I have some work to do since I haven't ran more that far for over seven months.

HIIT

2009-05-27T00:13:00.004-05:00

HIIT stands for High Intensity Interval Training. I've ran across it a few times over the last couple of years and thought is looked interesting. The way that they work is after you warmup you have 6-10 intervals of going all out for a short period of time, then you take a little time to recovery at an easy/medium pace. They say this jacks up your metabolism for the next 24 hours so you can keep buring calories and it is also supposed to be some miracle workout that helps well trained athletes cut their time down 2% in just 7 weeks. All this stuff came from the Wikipedia article, check it out here.

Anyway, it was actually kind of cold out today and rainy this tonight. And on top of that tonight's game had already start by the time I got up from my nap (have I mentioned I don't sleep normal?). So I decided to give the treadmill in our clubhouse another shot.

Ok, let me back up a bit. I tried to run on the treadmill in our clubhouse awhile back (on 5/12 to be exact), but it didn't go great. The treadmill acted funny for me. I don't really know how to explain it, but I'm going to try. As I was running it was like I'm too fat for it or something and the tread would slow down when my foot landed. I had to catch myself a few times so I wouldn't fall. But Amy ran 5 miles on it last night and didn't have any problems.

And now back to the post. I decided that Tuesdays are going to be speed days for me and I had seen some HIIT podcasts before so I talked to my best bud, Google and he pointed me to GetFitPod. It had exactly what I was looking for, thanks again buddy. They have a 25 minute HIIT treadmill workout (get it here) which was exactly how long I wanted to run.

I started out on the treadmill, went through the warmup and the first interval, with the treadmill doing the same damn thing it did before, but only it only happened when I was going fast. Then on the second interval it was doing it a little bit more and then it just shutoff. I must have tripped something in it because I had to reset it after that. Anyway, that was it, just 5 minutes on the treadmill, and those will be the last five minutes I'm ever on it. So I moved over to the Elliptical machine and started over. I was able to complete the workout without killing the machine or anything like that, but it did sound like it was going to fall apart when I was going all out.

The podcast was great. The dude talking told you a little bit about what was going on during the warmup and then pretty much just left you alone until it was time to speed up or slow down. This workout was in a ladder structure, the hard parts where 30, 45, 60, 90, 60, 45, 30 seconds with a minute of recovery time between each.

I loved the workout. When I was going as hard as I could for 90 seconds (and the intervals after that) my legs burned like hell and I felt like I was going to die, IT. WAS. AWESOME. I'm going to make my Tuesday runs be HIIT workouts for the foreseeable future. I highly recommend checking them out.

Pushup Update - Week 2

2009-05-25T23:53:00.004-05:00

Week 2 of the hundred push up challenge didn't exactly go great for me. In fact I think it would be fair to say that it completely kicked my ass.

On day one I missed the minimum for the max on the last set by 4. I manged to do a total of 58 though.

On day two I took tons of time between sets instead of just the 120 seconds I was supposed to, probably five minutes at least. That helped me come up just three pushups short. My total that day was 68.

Tonight I did day three. Well that isn't quite accurate, tonight, I attempted day 3. I knew from the very first set it was going to be a tough workout. I had to take a break halfway through the third set, manged a few more after that and then I quit. It just wasn't going to happen tonight. I did 11 out of 14 for the third set, skipped the 4th set of 14 and didn't even attempt to max. So I only manganged a total of 44.

Since I was so brutally defeated by week I'm not even going to attempt a max to see where I'm at like I'm supposed to. I'm just going to pretend that it never happened and do it again.

P.S. How do you spell pushups anyway? Is it pushup, push up, or push-up?

2009 Kearney Community Olympics - Schedule

2009-05-19T21:30:00.000-05:00

In a recent post I presented some of the information I had on this years Community Olympics. Here is the tentative schedule of events. Apparently it may be altered slightly depending on the number of teams entered.

Friday, June 26
5:30 p.m. - 6:00 p.m. -- Jazzercise, Kearney High School
5:30 p.m. - 7:30 p.m. -- Men's Doubles Pickleball, Horizon Middle School Gym
6:15 p.m. - 7:30 p.m. -- Track & Field (Long Jump, 200M Dash, 4x400M Relay), Kearney High School
7:30 p.m. - 9:30 p.m. -- Women's Doubles Pickleball, Horizon Middle School Gym
8:00 p.m. - 10:00 p.m. -- Women's, Coed & Men's Obstacle Course, Harmon Park

Saturday, June 27
7:30 a.m. - 9:00 a.m. -- 5k Run/Walk, Good Samaritan Hospital (east parking lot)
9:30 a.m. - 2:30 p.m. -- Coed Inner-tube Water Polo, Harmon Pool
9:30 a.m. - 2:30 p.m. -- Mixed Doubles Tennis, Harmon Park
10:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m. -- Men's Two-Person Scramble Golf, Elks Country Golf
12:00 p.m. - 2:00 p.m. -- Women's Two-Person Scramble Golf, Elks Country Golf
3:00 p.m. - 4:30 p.m. -- Men's Croquet, Harvey Park (west soccer fields)
3:30 p.m. - 10:30 p.m. -- Coed Kickball, Harvey Park
4:30 p.m. - 6:00 p.m. -- Women's Croquet, Harvey Park (west soccer fields)
6:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m. -- Coed Doubles Horseshoes, Fairgrounds
7:30 p.m. - 9:00 p.m. -- Coed Doubles Cup Stacking, Harmon Park Activity Center

Sunday, June 28
7:15 a.m. - 8:30 a.m. -- 3 Mile Mtn. Bike Ride, Cottonmill Park East Shelter
7:15 a.m. - 8:30 a.m. -- 3 Mile Wellness Walk, West Lincolnway Park
9:00 a.m. - 10:30 a.m. -- Women's Kayaking, Harmon Pool
9:00 a.m. - 10:30 a.m. -- Men's canoeing, Cottonmill Park Marina
10:30 a.m. - 3:30 p.m. -- Women's 6-on-6 Hard Court Volleyball, Horizon Middle School
11:30 a.m. - 3:30 p.m. -- Men's Over-the-Line Softball, Harvey Park
12:00 p.m. - 2:30 p.m. -- Hot Shot Basketball Competition, Sunrise Middle School
3:30 p.m. - 5:00 p.m. -- Kearney's Best Dance Crew Competition, Merryman Center
5:15 p.m. - 7:00 p.m. -- Barbecue and Awards, Harmon Park Sontorium

100 Pushup Challenge

2009-05-17T21:48:00.004-05:00

Last year I was working on completing the hundred pushup challenge. But I got busy with school and I couldn't commit myself to finding time to do my pushups. It's actually kind of weird. I would have had plenty of time to do it, but I just had so much stuff to do for school that I was always stressed out about it. Now I have all the time in the world. Since school got out I've been learning about web developement and am starting on a couple personal projects and I also started working out again. I think it was just the stress of school that stopped me from doing this stuff before, but I'm done now :-).

Sorry for the tangent, back to the post.

I started doing the hundred pushup challenge again and I just finished day one of week two. I amazes me how quickly the number of pushups I can do increases. When I did my initial test I managed to do 18 reps, which was more than I expected. I felt it for the next couple of days though. For my last workout I did a total of 58 pushups in 5 sets with shorts breaks between sets. So I did substantially more than I did that first day. With each workout that I have done I have been less and less sore afterwards.

I still have a very long way to go and 100 pushups without a break still seems impossible to me, but I'm going to keep plugging away at it until I get it done.

2009 Kearney Community Olympics

2009-05-17T21:11:00.003-05:00

There doesn't seem to be much information on the Kearney Community Olympics that are held here every summer. This year I have some of the information early, instead of the day of like usual. So I thought I'd share it with the world.

PURPOSE: To encourage exercise, community spirit, teamwork socialization and fun.

TEAMS:

Team members must be 18 years of age or older as of June 26, 2009.
Teams are usually comprised of co-workers, neighborhoods, service clubs, churches, friends, etc.
Teams must consist of at least 10 people, but no more than 30.
Each team shall appoint a team captain and an assistant captain.

EVENTS:

Jazzercise	Pickleball	Track & Field
Obstacle Course	5k Run/Walk	Inner-tube Water Polo
Tennis	Golf	Kickball
Croquet	Horseshoes	Cup Stacking
Mtn. Bike Ride	Wellness Walk	Kayaking
Canoeing	Volleyball	Over-the-Line Softball
Hot Shot Basketball	Kearney's Best Dance Crew

I'll get the tentative schedule posted sometime in the next couple of days, but all of the events will take place June 26th, 27th and 28th.

I'd love to be able to just link to the Parks and Rec page with all of this information but I haven't been able to find it online. This page is all that I could find on it: Park & Recreation. If anyone knows of a better source of information please let me know.

Flexibility

2009-05-10T22:44:00.003-05:00

I may have mentioned it before but I'm pretty much as flexible as a board. I always have been. I decided to do a little test. I sat with my heels against the wall and a ruler between my feet and I reached as far as I could. Now most people wouldn't be able to do the test this way because they would hit the wall. However, I was 3 inches short of it. According to this article, that is actually Fair for a guy.

I haven't done any research on it yet, but I suspect that I can improve my flexibility by just stretching more. I enjoying doing Yoga so I figure that will be a good way to improve my flexibility. YOGAmazing is a site that has free podcasts and stuff and he has one on Flexibility that I liked so I'm going to plan on doing that once or twice a week. Then I'll measure my flexibility the same way I did before to see if I improve any.

I Graduted

2009-05-08T23:31:00.003-05:00

I am finally done with school. Today I received my bachelor's degree in Computer Science. It was a long road, 9 years and 4 schools. But I stuck with it and finally achieved my goal. The last semester I was extremely busy with three classes and working 40+ hours a week. So that didn't leave me much time for working out. But now I'm done and I feel like I have all the time in the world, so I'm going to start training and blogging about it again.

Last weekend Amy ran her first half marathon and she did great. She had an awesome experience and ran about 10 minutes faster than she was expecting to. It was definitely a motivation to see all the hard work she put in really pay off.

I've decided to train for the Buffalo Run. It is a 5 mile race in Lincoln on 9/13. So if I start the clock on Monday 5/11 that gives me 18 weeks to get ready, which should be plenty of time. I think I'm going to follow Galloway's 10k training plan. It is only 13 weeks long though so I'll have to make some adjustments to it. I might just do the first few weeks twice to get back into the swing of things. I also decided that I'm not going to worry about monitoring my heart rate for now, I'm just going to run.

That's all for now.

Weekly Recap Week 4

2008-08-03T17:11:00.000-05:00

This week was my first fall back week and it was great, but I'm looking forward to getting my mileage back up again.

Monday 7/28 - An easy two miler. I ran with Amy as usual but I couldn't keep up with her, my legs where tired and I didn't feel like going after it. I took an ice bath after my run too. I kind of like doing them, it's only the first few seconds that are bad. But I don't fit in the bathtub very well, it's a little bit too short. Someday when we move out of this apartment and get a house I'll probably do them in a trash can standing up, or figure out someone to sit in one. Until then though I'll have to settle for just having most of my legs under the water.
Distance 2 miles, time 20:47, pace 10:24, average heart rate 145.

Wednesday 7/30 - My sleeping is starting to get really messed up. I took a little nap after work for a couple of hours and I was really out of it for awhile after I got up. I finally got my run in around 11. I love running at night, it's just me out there all alone with an occasional car. It was a beautiful night too, clear sky with lots of stars shining.
Distance 2.5 miles, time 27:13, pace 10:54, average heart rate 151

Thursday 7/31 - About an hour and a half of ultimate. Good times and lots and lots of sweat.

Saturday 8/2 - Man it's August already, that sucks. It means school is starting soon and I have to get my project from last semester done still (or take a C, which is very tempting). We were in Lincoln again this weekend and it was extremely hot. So instead of running in 100+ degree heat we paid a visit to Amy's parents and used their treadmill. It has this nice little feature where you can set the number of miles you want to run. Once you hit that point the treadmill alerts you of that by promptly stopping. I didn't fall though, just almost. Being inside in the air conditioning with no hills or anything really keep my HR down.
Distance 2 miles, time 21:00, pace 10:30, average heart rate 138.

I think I might start doing these posts more than once a week, like after each run instead. The way I've done my last couple is that I start a post, write about a run, then save it and add to it the rest of the week. So I figure, why not just post it instead of saving it?

Pushup Challenge Phase 1 part 2

2008-07-31T23:40:00.003-05:00

I've joined the 100 push up challenge group on RunningAhead. It's nice to have other going through this too in case I have any questions or if I struggle.

This week things went a lot better than last week. I was able to complete all the workouts successfully and I did more than the minimum max each day so I'll be moving onto phase 2 starting Sunday.

I guess I should explain the phase thing. In the forums on the RA group people started referring to the weeks as phases since they were repeating weeks also. I think it's a good idea so I'm going to do it too.

Here are the boring details that you don't really care about.

Day 1
Planned 7 - 7 - 5 -4 - Max (5)
Actual 7 - 7 - 5 - 4 - 8
Total of 31

Day 2
Planned 9 - 8 - 6 - 5 - Max (7)
Actual - 9 - 8 - 6 - 5 - 12
Total of 40

Day 3
Planned 10 - 8 - 8 - 5 - Max (10)
Actual 10 - 8 - 8 - 5 - 15
Total of 46

Weekly Total of 117
Combined Phase 1 Total of 222
Grand total of 239

Book on the Run

2008-07-31T23:33:00.000-05:00

I don't read as much as I should or as much as I like to. Ok wait, let me rephrase that, I don't books as much as I should. I read all the freaking time, really it's about all I do. But I don't read books much, I just surf the internets finding all kinds of interesting stuff. If you'd like to be as cool as me check out reddit, digg and use stumble upon. I also lurk in the forums on RunningAhead quite a bit as well, but I think I'll become more active there one of these days. One of the best comics out there is XKCD too (reading and understanding this one definitely puts you up there on the coolest list).

Why was I writing this post? Oh yeah, since I don't read books too often I figure running is a great chance for me to "read" some. So I get books from the library, rip them to MP3s, put them on my Cowen D2 and listen to them while I'm running.

Another side note. I know that it is technically illegal for me to rip the CDs to MP3s, I guess I could just download them in a format that allows me to do what I want instead, though I doubt that would be better. In my defense, I only put the MP3s on my MP3 player and delete all traces of them once I'm done listening to the book. I never share or distribute them. Occasionally I will return the CDs before I'm actually done listening to the book, but that's just cuz I'm a nice guy and I don't want some little kid left out in the cold wishing she could listen to Harry Potter but can't because some guy in his mid 20s is listening to it for 30 minutes three times a week which will take him more than two months to finish. Actually that hasn't happened yet, Harry Potter is always checked out :-(

I've added a little link thingy on the right hand side of my blog titled, Book on the Run. Which is a link to the book I'm currently listening to on Amazon. For purposes of total discloser, I'm an affiliate on Amazon so if you buy a book through that link, or any other link from my site, I get a little money. I think so anyway, but it's never actually happened and I don't really expect it to, but if it does that would be awesome, cuz I like money. I'll probably try and post a few paragraphs about the book once I'm done, but book reports have never really been my thing.

Weekly Recap Week 3

2008-07-28T22:04:00.000-05:00

It was a good week, nothing newsworthy though. I ran a total of 9 miles for the week. Wow, I have a ways to go to get back to where I was last summer. I actually ran 10 miles in one shot. Oh well, slowly but surely I'll get back there. It was also my first week of the 100 push up challenge, look at my last post if your interested in knowing more about that.

Monday 7/21 - Easy run with Amy when it was pretty hot and humid out, even through we didn't go out until around 8:30 at night or so. I have a feeling it's going to be that way for a couple months at least, I shouldn't complain though, I love this weather compared to winter. Nothing special about our run really, it was pretty slow, but my HR was up a bit cuz of the heat though so it was probably a good thing it we didn't run any faster.
Distance 3.13 miles, time 36:47, pace 11:46, average heart rate 145

Wednesday 7/23 - A nice little 3 mile easy run, same course at Monday actually. We ran a little faster than on Monday, but I'm not really sure why, just one of those things I guess.
Distance 3.13 miles, time 34:23, pace 11:00, average heart rate 155

Thursday 7/24 - We played a pickup game of Ultimate Frisbee again. Man I am so out of shape for that. It's fun though and if I keep playing and running maybe I'll get back in shape a little bit. I'm sure the fact that a few of the guys that play are current or were recently cross country runners at UNK doesn't make me look any speedier.

Saturday 7/26 - We were only supposed to run 3 miles, but I through together a course that went around a nearby lake that was a third of a mile too long. Really what's a third of a mile in the grand scheme of things? So we ran it. It goes along a bike trail that runs next to a little channel thing and went by campus where there is a bridge near a dam, it's pretty cool I think. To get down to the bridge you have to run down this really steep hill with just a dirt path and grass, err weeds, that are more than waste high.
Distance 3.34 miles, time 38:45, pace 11:37, average heart rate 145

This upcoming week, the one starting today, is a fall back week. I'm looking forward to it because my legs are getting kind of tired. I'll only be running 6.5 miles and I plan to take them all pretty easy.

Pushup Challenge Week 1

2008-07-24T21:33:00.001-05:00

I completed week 1 of the 100 push up challenge today. To summarize the week in three words or less, I'm a wuss. (I'm only counts as one word even though it replaces two right?)

And now a few more details...

Day 1
During my initial test I was able to do 17 push ups, way more than the 10 push up cutoff for column three of the workout plan. The first day I was supposed to do sets of 10, 10, 8, 6 and then max out, resting 60 seconds in between sets. The first two sets went fine. I struggled a ton and only managed to do 7 for the third set. Then I rested a few minutes and was able to do 6. For my max I was able to pull off 2 whole push ups before my arms were completed drained of all strength. Which was slightly below the 7 minimum the site says I was supposed to be able to do.

Day 2
I was pretty sure day one was just a fluke, I used to be able to do 50 push ups everyday after a couple few hours of practice (about 8 years ago). So I stayed on column 3 and was supposed to do sets of 12, 12, 10, 10 and max with 90 secs rest between them. Again the first two sets were too bad. However I could only do like 2 on the third set. So I quit. I decided I'd try again later but do column 2. I played on the Wii Fit for around a half hour or so and gave it another shot. This time it was sets of 9, 8, 6, 5 and max, again with 90 seconds rest. I was able to get through each set but my max was only 4, it was supposed to be at least 7.

Day 3
I decided I'd do my push ups during lunch today. I'm pretty certain that in my current state I am not where I need to be to do column 3. So I swallowed my pride and dropped down to column 2. The sets for column 2 are 10, 8, 8, and then max. I was able to get through all of but I was only able max out at 7 and I was supposed to do 10.

Since I'm such a wuss I'm going to start over and do week 1 again and this time I'm going to do the second column all three days. I think I'll feel a lot better about it if I'm able to finish my workouts.

Amy is doing this 100 push up challenge thingy too, and she is a doing a lot better than me. Her initial max was only 2 push ups, but she got through every one of her workouts successfully and did more than the minimum max all three days.

Why I run

2008-07-23T22:46:00.000-05:00

I started a "series" of posts awhile back on why I run. I think I only wrote one though so I'm not real sure that qualifies as a series.

Anyway another reason that I run is because I can. I'm not going to go into a lot of detail on this post. This is actually my second time writing it. I had Amy read the first one and we decided it probably shouldn't be posted, too much personal information. Don't get me wrong I have no problem letting people know what I think and where I stand. However there was info in it about other people and I don't think it is my place to write about them.

So here is attempt number two. I run because I can. It might sound like kind of an jerk reason or something but it's really not. There are many people out there that aren't able to run, some of them used to, some of them might wish they could and others could careless. Whatever the reason they are out there and we all know too many of them. There are all kinds of reasons maybe they have an illness or decease, or maybe they were injured, or maybe there is some other reason. When I do think about skipping a run or doing it later I think of them. I say to myself, "Self there are people out there that can't run so get off your lazy ass and go run, if you can't do it for yourself then do it for them."

Although not exactly what I'm trying to say I think this quote from Steve Prefontaine is great and can be looked at along the same lines, "To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the gift."

Weekly Recap Week 2

2008-07-22T00:21:00.003-05:00

Last week was a good week, all of my plans went well and were on schedule. My cousin got married on Saturday and I got all prettied up in a tux. We had a good time at the wedding, lots of good memories. Other than that nothing real exciting happened. I guess I borrowed a car from my folks that I'll use until I get one. We are thinking we are going to get a 2009 Honda Fit once they come out, which will hopefully be soon.

Monday 7/14
Best run in a long time. I love rain and thunderstorms and ever since I started running again I've wanted to run in the rain but it hadn't worked out. Well Monday night I had my chance. We went on a 2.5 mile out and back run. It was raining when we started but it was coming. Actually it was probably pretty stupid for us to be out running since there was quite a bit of lightning. It started sprinkling a little a few minutes into our run then it start coming down pretty good. It was really windy too, but it was okay because it was at our backs. Ah, but you might recall that just a moment ago I wrote that it was an out and back run. Well the back part wasn't quite as nice. It was like we were getting pelted by little rocks or sand the whole way back because the rain was blowing the rain so hard. It was a great run though and I loved every minute of it. The only thing I would have changed is I would have like it to rain a little bit harder.
Distance 2.5 miles, time 29:28, pace 11:48, average heart rate 146.

Wednesday 7/16
Must not have been an eventful run at all, I don't remember anything about it (other than it was the loop). I don't even remember if I ran with Amy. I don't think I did though because I didn't head out until 9:30 and that is getting to be a little past her bed time.
Distance 2.5 miles, time 25:18, pace 10:08, average heart rate 158.

Saturday 7/19
We were in Lincoln again at my parent's so we ran along the same trail as a couple weeks ago, just a little bit farther. We ran in the morning since we had the wedding in the afternoon. It was only about 9:00 when we ran (which is pretty early for me) but it was already really freaking hot out and pretty humid.
Distance 2.98 miles, time 33:18, pace 11:11, average heart rate 150.

Oh yeah, I started a new book this week too, Digital Fortress by Dan Brown. I'll have to update my little Book on the Run thingy on the right sometime. So far it's pretty good. I'm not sure I'd say it is a literary masterpiece, but it is a good book to listen to on the run.

Weekly Recap

2008-07-17T06:40:00.001-05:00

I really want to write up a post each week saying how my runs went the week before and what my plans are for the upcoming week. So for this post my last "week" will really be a couple of weeks.

Week 0 of my plan. Why 0 and not 1? Well two reasons, I'm a computer programmer and a lot of times we start counting at 0 for arrays instead of 1. The real reason though is that Amy was busy all week and couldn't get the runs in so I added a week before the plan so we could be on the same schedule.

7/1 - The first day of the plan. I ran what I like to call "The Loop" it's a 2.5 mile run along the bike path nearby and it kind of goes in a circle, hence "The Loop".
Distance 2.5 miles, time 24:31, pace 9:49, average heart rate 163.

7/3 - A nice 2 mile jot around the neighborhood. There were a few people shooting off fireworks but it was nothing compared my my forth of July run last year.
Distance 2 miles, time 19:03, pace 9:47, heart rate 150.

7/5 - I was supposed to run 2.5 miles but Amy already had a 2 mile run planned so I just tagged along. We were in Lincoln so we ran along a bike trail near my parent's house. It's a nice trail runs a long a little creak thingy, probably more of a drain. Anyway there were cute little baby duckies and stuff along it in a few places.
Distance 2 miles, time 22:09, pace 11:05, heart rate 145.

That took care of week 0. It was a pretty good week and it feels really great to be running regularly again. Total mileage for the week was 7 miles.

Now for week 1.
7/7 - The Loop again. I really like this run so pretty much any 2.5 mile run I have will be on this course.
Distance 2.5 miles, time 24:31, pace 9:49, heart rate 164.

7/9 - Nice easy 2 mile run with Amy. I like going out on runs together. We both have our headphones on so we don't talk or anything, just nice to hang out I guess. I annoy her when we run together though (and most other times really). I run about three steps in front of her the whole time. I don't do it on purpose, I think it is just because my stride is so much longer than hers.
Distance 2 miles, time 23:31, pace 11:19, heart rate 139.

7/12 - The Loop again (I told you I like it). I mixed things up this time though and ran it backwards. It's a little tougher that way though. It wasn't really my intention when I started my run but it kind of turned into a tempo run and I was pushing myself toward the end. It felt great, in that my legs burn like hell and I can't breath sort of way.
Distance 2.5 miles, time 22:17, pace 8:49, heart rate 161. Strange minute faster pace but a lower heart rate. I just don't get it.

Well I guess that gets me caught up on the past weeks. This week (which we will pretend isn't almost over already) I have two 2.5 milers and a 3 miler planned. I'm in a wedding in Lincoln this weekend, but I should be able to get my run in on Saturday morning without much trouble. I really need to look for some new shoes when I'm there though, I have over 360 miles on my current pair.

100 Push Ups

2008-07-17T00:32:00.004-05:00

While I was stumbling tonight I came across the site, hundredpushups.com. It has a six week plan to increase the number of push ups you can do to 100. Since I've thinking a lot lately about doing more to get into shape than just running, I figure this is a good way to start.

I can't do the program justice in just a few sentences (but I'm going to try anyway) so make sure you check it out yourself if you're interested. Here is my attempt. You start off by seeing how many push ups you can do without stopping. Then based on that number you do a number of sets and reps three days a week. After a couple of weeks you test yourself again and adjust the column you follow accordingly. Then after six weeks you test yourself again and you're supposed to be able to do 100 push ups.

I don't know about you, but 100 push ups seems like quite an impressive feat. Being able to do that many push ups in one go in just six weeks seems a little unlikely to me. But I'll give it a shot, I got nothing to lose.

Like I said you start things off by doing an initial test to see how many you can do. I managed to 17 of them before my arms were shaking too much to push myself back up. That gives me a rank of 3 and I'll start off in the third column. I'm planning on my three days a week being Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. And I'll start things off on Sunday.

There has been this little voice in the back of my head for a couple weeks now telling me to do before and after photos. I honestly I have no idea why. It's not like I'm going to be losing any wieght, I mean I'm 6'5" and I weigh 175 pounds. That gives me a BMI of 20.7 and my bathroom scale says I have only have 8% body fat. I have this dellousion that I can get ripped someday. So we'll see if I can get Amy to take some pictures sometime.

Thanks Jim

2008-07-11T00:07:00.002-05:00

I meant to post this a few days ago but I'm just getting around to it. One of my interests besides running is personal finance and making sure Amy and I do stuff the right way today so we don't have to worry about stuff in the future (or at least not as much). There are a ton of great personal finance blogs out there. One of the blogs that I subscribe to is Blueprint for Financial Prosperity. A little more than a week ago Jim reviewed Financial Infidelity then had a drawing for a free copy of the book. I was lucky and won the drawing and received the book last weekend. It's a nice hardcover edition even. I probably won't get to it for a few weeks because I'm reading a couple of other books now, but I'm looking forward to it. Amy started it and thinks its interesting so far. So thanks for the book Jim, keep up the great work on your blog.

Ultimate Frisbee

2008-07-10T22:46:00.002-05:00

We had so much fun playing Ultimate Frisbee in the community olympics that we put our names down to play in pick-up games and stuff. Well tonight we got together for the first time and played a couple of games. I guess to start things off I should talk a little bit about what the game is just in case you don't know.

Basically you run all over the field throwing the frisbee to your teamates trying to get into the endzone. After catching the frisbee you can't run or anything like that, you just have to pass it on. If your team doesn't complete a pass then the other team gets to be on offense. So the pace of the game is similar to basketball. If you want to know all the rules and everything check out Wikipedia or the Ultimate Players Association website.

There were 8 of us that played tonight, 4 girls and 4 boys so it worked out pretty well. It is fun to get out of the house and meet some other people, we don't do that too often. Amy and I were far from the best out there, but since this is only the second time we've played I'll cut us a little slack. We need to work a little bit (or maybe a ton) on catching the frisbee. The other guys that were out there are (or were) cross country runners from UNK and the intermal champs so they could run all over and knew what they were doing. Me and Amy, however, got tired as hell after not too long and dropped a lot of passes that we shouldn't have. We had a great time though.

Every once in awhile I'll play some basketball, but I usually don't run up and down the court except for once a year at our alumni tournament. Amy always makes fun of me because I am like completely dead about 3 minutes into the game. After we played tonight she said she never really played a sport like basketball or soccer where you have to stop and go and change direction and all that fun stuff and pretty much just run your ass off. But now she knows what its like and I don't think she'll give me too hard of a time when I'm dead five minutes into the first game at next years alumni tournament.

I really have no idea where I'm going with this post. I really just wanted to say it is a ton of fun and if you can get a group of people together to play go for it, you won't be disappointed. If you are in the Kearney area feel free to join us. You can just show up next Thursday, July 17th, at Baldwin park at 7:00.