Day 129 - June 5th - Four Star Day with Presents

Today Wednesday June 5th was a significant day for many reasons. A Four Star Day I'll call it.

First - Our youngest son Jonathan Dance had his last day of high school. Here is a picture of him ready to take off for the last time. Our oldest son started high school in 1990 so it has been over 22 years of high school that is now ending.

Second - the day was so beautiful that I could not run at first in the morning. All I could do is walk for 1.5 miles and admire God's creation. I saw leaves and tree branches spouting, beautiful grass, little ponds I hadn't seen before, rock formations, and sunlit vistas. I heard the roosters and the crows and all the sounds of morning. Sometimes it does not make sense to run right past them. 

Later on I ran 4.1 miles in 36 minutes at an average of 8:45miles. The first 3/4 mile is uphill and very slow so the first mile was 9:12, but I was especially pleased that the second mile was 7:59.  I'd love to get to the point where I could string together 6 miles at an 8 mile pace. 

Third - I was called down to the CDA Chamber offices by Scott Ward who helps put on the race. He was very generous and gave to me the following items worth about $750 on behalf of the race committee and the Coeur d'Alene Chamber of Commerce.

• • Louis Garneau Time Trial Race Bike Helmet. Sleek black with a visor.
  • Zoot black sleeveless full body wet suit 
  • Profile Aero Drink System
  • TACS Carbon Bottle Holder
  • and other goodies
  
  Here I am with some of the gear in the Chamber conference room. 

 

Katherine Coppock was kind enough to take these pictures including this one with my aerodynamic helmet on, something I thought I would never own. 

Fourth - On the way out the door and into the car, I saw Jillian with her wetsuit going down to the lake like she was going to practice. I thought, I guess I have a wet suit now so I could do the same. I trotted on down, put it on, and did an open water swim for the first time in about 50 years. I went approximately 1/2 mile round trip with a side stroke and back stroke just to feel what it was like. No goggles or cap as I wasn't planning on a swim.  It felt good in the wetsuit at 59.5 degrees.  I suspect I took a half hour. I have a lot of work to get down to 18-22 minutes which would be my target range. But I have started and have the gear.

Now all I need to do is get my bike fit and tuned up.

Day 125 - June 1st - 10K with Cruise Control

Today was the day for the BYU Management Society Fun Run 10k. It was actually a 5K, 10K or 1/2 Marathon depending on how far you went out before you came back on the Centennial Trail by Mirabeau Park in Spokane.

I had not been feeling well with diarhea the days before but thought why not. I may as well figure out where I am at.

I had been thinking for sometime that someone would have made some app on the iPhone to match music with your pace and I found one during the week that is call Cruise Control. To check out Cruise Control click here.

Cruise Control uses your music to control your running in four different ways.

1) Free Run - Just go for a run and the rhythm of the music will adjust to match your stride. Automatically.

2) Pace - Pick a target speed and go! As long as you match your steps to the rhythm of the music, the music will get you to your target speed and keep your there.

3) Heart Rate -Pick a target heart rate and go! As long as you match your steps to the rhythm of the music, the music will drive you to your heart rate goal.

4) Cadence -Special order for the 90 spm junkies! Pick a target stride rate and Cruise Control will adjust all of your songs to play at the same tempo.   

I thought it would be fun to set the Pace to 8:30 per mile and see what happened. I was enjoying the music on the 10K but thought about 15 minutes into the race it was quite slow relaxing music. I looked at my screen and saw 14 assuming I had run 14 minutes but a little later I saw 14 and realized the music was pacing me at 14 min miles.  I quickly changed that back to 8:30. It is quite sensitive and I believe that I accidentally adjusted the pace downward. Anyway a Beatles song came on and I passed some people.

At the half way mark I figured I had been running 8:30 miles as expected and stopped for 30 seconds taking a drink of water. So far , so good. On the way back I could see that I was fading fast. By the 4.5 mile mark I had to stop and take another drink and 45 second rest. At the 5.5 mile mark I was toasted and stopped another 30 seconds so all in all there was 1:45 seconds of rest time and that was my undoing. I finished in 53:54 which is an average pace of about 9 minutes miles. Perhaps without diarrhea and having to rest I would have made it in 51 minutes which was my target at an 8:30 mile pace.

I was the oldest runner that day and got a Subway card for the race, but next time I want to use Cruise Control smarter and be wiser and stronger and meet my target.