ksylvan's Journal

12 mile run completed
Jun 28 2009 10:11

I did my planned run. Here is the link to my data.

Going to go shopping at Trader Joe's next. Jeff Galloway's run-walk method rocks! Average pace on my run overall was 12:18 min/mile and I have no soreness at all.

Have a great Sunday, everybody!

Tomorrow, a 12 mile run planned
Jun 27 2009 22:30

I'm planning a 12 mile run tomorrow.

I'm incorporating elements of total heart rate training and Jeff Galloway's Run-Walk method.

My run will consist of:

2 times { Run 0.93 miles in heart zone 1, walk for 0.07 miles }

3 times { Run 0.93 miles in heart zone 2, walk for 0.07 miles }

3 times { Run for 0.93 miles in heart zone 3, walk for 0.07 miles }

3 times { Run for 0.93 miles in heart zone 4, walk for 0.07 miles }

Run the last mile in heart zone 5 (sprint as fast as I can).

The 0.07 mile distance is chosen because at a normal walking pace, it takes about a minute to complete.

If this works as well as I think it will, given my experience with the 10.5 mile run in San Francisco two weeks ago, this sort of plan will most likely work very very well for my half marathon and marathon runs.

I hope you are all having a great weekend.

I'll report my experience after the run tomorrow.

P90X round 4 week 8 continues, and I finally joined the twitterati
Jun 25 2009 15:51

I've joined the ranks of the twitterati:

http://www.twitter.com/ksylvan

Have a great week everyone, and relish your life!

P90X Round 4 Day 50: Yoga-X
Jun 22 2009 15:55

Today was Yoga-X.

Yesterday, I did a nice 4 mile run (overall pace was 9:37 min/mile).

Work was boring. I'm distracted by the Iran situation.

P90X Round 4 Day 44: Plyometrics
Jun 16 2009 13:44

On Sunday morning, I ran in San Francisco. Started in downtown, near Howard and 2nd street, ran towards the Embarcadero, then ran along the Piers to the Golden Gate Bridge and back. A total of 10.5 miles as planned. This was a fun run, orchestrated via heart rate (3 miles in zone 1, 2.25 miles in zone 2, 2.25 miles in zone 3, 2.5 miles in zone 4 and 0.5 miles in a sprint in zone 5).

This was on top of entering in a weekend Chess tournament. If any of you know chess, you may enjoy taking a peek at my games here. I lost 2 games, won 3 games, and drew one, ending up with a slightly higher rating than I had before.

Yesterday's workout was Chest, Shoulders and Triceps + the ab sequence.

Today was my Plyometrics. I worked harder than the last time I did the same workout, based on my heartrate data.

Hope you are all having a great week!

P90X Round 4 Day 38: Back and Biceps + experimenting with running style.
Jun 10 2009 12:35

Yesterday, late in the night, I did this run.

What's remarkable about the run is that I changed my running gait based on information I am reading about the POSE method of running. Instead of running heel-toe (trying to lengthen the stride and strike with the foot out front, striking the heel and rolling onto the toe) I adopted a style with a much shorter gait and a higher cadence, landing my foot in line with the body, with a bent-knee at the point of ground contact, with my whole body leaning slightly forward and taking advantage of gravity to pull me down and forward, a sort of controlled falling.

Looking at the splits page, I see the that I ran mile 1 at a pace of 9:52 min/mi, mile 2 at 10:10 min/mi, and mile 3 at 9:37 min/mi.

What's more, I could tell that this style of running was a lot easier on my joints and more effortless to maintain!

Here's an interesting study done on this topic that informed my self experimentation.

P90X Round 4 Day 35: Early morning training run
Jun 07 2009 11:45

Trying to eat cleaner (radically reduce the processed foods, less carbohydrates, more protein and fats than I have been eating) thanks to sharpshootinstar's example. I'll also be reading the Master Your Metabolism book from the library when it comes in.

This morning, I did this run.

I'm being a lazy bum the rest of the morning since I did all my housework yesterday.

Have a great Sunday, my friends!

P90X Round 4 Day 32: Yoga-X and a short run
Jun 04 2009 18:38

I have another day off tomorrow. :-)

Today's workouts were Yoga-X and this run.

Looking forward to So You Think You Can Dance tonight!

P90X Round 4 Day 30: Plyometrics + 30 minute run later
Jun 02 2009 11:58

Back at work today.

Yesterday, I did the Chest, Shoulders and Triceps routine.

Today's workout is Plyometrics. Later tonight, I will also do a 30 minute run.

I hope you are all having a great week!

Update: Here is the heart rate graph for the Plyometrics workout from this afternoon. I think spike up to 160 towards the end is for the Jump-Knee-Tuck move. :-)

P90X Round 4 Day 28: 9 mile training run
May 31 2009 23:49

I'm continuing to explore the idea of controlling my pace during my training runs with heart rate zones.

I just did this 9 mile run. Started my runs in heart rate zone 2 and slowly worked up to running for a mile in heart rate zone 4. In practical terms, this meant starting out rather slow and slowly ramping up the intensity (and thus the speed). I also put in lots of walk breaks.

The results: This run's average pace was 11:16, finished in 1:43:24. Wow! Jeff Galloway was right about taking walk breaks. This is the best time I have so far for a run of this distance.

In comparison, the San Jose Rock and Roll Half Marathon (13.1 miles) in October of 2008, running without walk breaks, finished in 2:41:28 with average pace of 12:19. The Big Sur Marathon (26.2 miles) with walk breaks, finished in 5:49:11 with average pace 13:20.

Tomorrow, I start the second month routines for my 4th round of P90X.