Exercise

My blog post, Volume 2 of 12: The Blog of Dreams

This post will be 10,000 pages long.

Fortunately, the pages have been shrunk through the science of something I just made up and they are now small enough to fit on the head of a pin, unlike the collected books comprising The Wheel of Time, for example, the weight of which could serve to batter down doors or stop a runaway cruise ship (like in Speed 2. I never really watched that movie but I did manage to catch the ending on TV once and I stood there staring at the screen, baffled and amazed at the sight of an actual runaway cruise ship. It was a definite ‘What were they thinking?’ moment. Good call by Keanu to bail on this sequel. That good call was subsequently offset by the many other terrible movies he went on to appear in, unfortunately, but a boy’s gotta eat).

I did not jog today due to spending a little more time with Tim getting and setting up his shiny new computer with patented* Harry Potter** interface, but I am rescheduling for tomorrow. Since it was also windy as all get-out today and I hate running in the wind (not to be confused with running like the wind) I am not too upset about putting it off for another day.

* it probably isn’t actually patented but it wouldn’t surprise me if it was
** seriously, the opening steps on initial startup that HP (Hewlett-Packard) forces the user to go through looks like some weird Harry Potter-esque thing with weird disembodied hands (Tim called them jazz hands)

Kneedful things

A good pun is hard to resist. A bad pun, moreso.

My left knee has checked out A-OK and the doctor says I am good to resume jogging, which I plan on doing this Monday. When he seemed a bit evasive on the cause of the soreness in my knee I asked, “Is it one of those ‘getting older’ things?” He immediately started in with, “Well, I wouldn’t want to put a name on it…” which seemed like a polite way of saying, “Yes”. But he was polite, so no dirty look for him!

Here’s hoping my Nike+ sensor still has some juice in it. Here’s also hoping I don’t collapse face-first into the mud after 200 meters.

Bike at 12 o’ clock! (hiking Burnaby Mountain)

Today Jeff and I hiked up Burnaby Mountain for an hour, completing our trek in about an hour instead of the expected two. It was the first time I’d be on a mixed use trail, in this case one for both cyclists (specifically of the genus mountain bike extremus) and hikers. Within moments of ascending we had our first cyclist wheeling down toward us. Since they have momentum and it’s difficult, if not dangerous, for them to try to stop, we obligingly hopped out of the way each time.  I was a bit uncomfortable with this at first but everyone was so dang polite it didn’t bother me after awhile.

Then we didn’t seem any more riders.

The climb was milder than the one we did last week at Buntzen Lake but we gained a few hundred meters of elevation, at least, and some of the parts we climbed are apparently considered advanced, according to maps (see below).

No pictures since there was only one small lookout along the way, but I may take some if we return.

The route we took is seen below. We began on the road, walked east and headed up Nicoles Trail, over to Gear Jammer, down to Function Junction and finally down the aptly-named Lower Snake Trail (switchbacks ahoy!) before coming back to our starting point on Pipeline Trail. Not a bad little workout and the weather was very cooperative — clear and a few degrees above freezing.

Trail map:

And the relevant part of the legend:

Needing knees

I have not jogged since September 20th.

This is not by design.

As it happened, back in September my left leg was ailing again and so I opted to give it time to recover before resuming my runs, as I had previously. This particular time it seemed the left ankle was feeling especially tender. I am more convinced now that the way I was running — on an oval course, always counter-clockwise — may have contributed to my left leg bearing more than its fair share and thus making it more susceptible to injury. My plan was to resume running and to either find a new course to run or to simply alternate between running clockwise and counter-clockwise on the path around China Creek Park.

By the time I felt I’d rested enough to resume jogging I began a new job and suddenly my schedule was a lot tougher to work runs around. Couple that with waning daylight hours and I let it slide longer than I would have liked.

Then something weird happened. My left knee started to hurt. More precisely, I would sometimes notice it feeling sore, though it never hurt to actually walk on it. It was most obvious when I would kneel to tie my shoelaces. What makes this weird is that I never experienced any problems with my knees when running. At first I thought I did something to hurt it and just couldn’t remember exactly what I’d done but the soreness is ever-present. I feel it every time I kneel down, though it never gets worse (or better). I plan on having the knee checked out at the clinic soon but mildly fear this may be a chronic injury that will require therapy — or worse!

If the doctor tells me it’s one of those ‘men of your age’ things, I promise to give him a dirty look.

I will update on the potential kneetastrophe soon.

Take a hike! (to Buntzen Lake)

Today Jeff and I went for a hike in the Buntzen Lake area. I am a hiking newbie still but Jeff kindly furnished me with a walking stick for additional stability, balance and to fend off marauding bears.

Rather than hike around the lake itself, which has an elevation gain of a little over 100m, Jeff plotted a course up the Halvor Lunden trail which would take us up to the top of Eagle Ridge and a total elevation climb of about 1020m. We made pretty good time heading up but somewhere past 600m up the trail became snow-covered. Normally this would not be an issue but the cover was fairly thin and had frozen, making it pretty much ice. Just past Polytrichum Lookout at 680m or so, the trail becomes very steep and narrow and the ice was a little unforgiving without having claws of steel attached to your boots. After continuing up a ways we elected to turn around and head back down.

Although it didn’t seem like we had climbed very far up Treacherous Icy Slope, making our way back down took longer than expected, with each step falling into the ‘be very careful so you do not go head-first the rest of the way down’ category.

We arrived safely back in the park and ate lunch in the sun at Buntzen Lake proper. For five minutes. Not that we finished lunch in five minutes, that’s how long the sun shone on our table before it moved on. Pesky winter sun. Everyone in the area seemed to have a camera. I did, too, and took some pics, which can be found in the Buntzen Lake gallery.

Here is one of them, a close-up shot of The Pulpit, the rocky outcropping at the top that we did not quite reach.

[singlepic id=125 w=640 h=480 float=none]

It was an enjoyable outing despite not ultimately reaching our goal. There were no falls, bears and the weather was about perfect for this time of year — sunny and a touch above freezing with no wind.

Running update: no running

The problem was different this time.

After finishing the run on September 20th my left leg felt sore but I incorrectly surmised it was my shin again. However, while it was a little tender, that was not the issue. Rather, it’s the ankle, which is new. I can still feel it some 12 days later, so I’m not going to be running again for at least a few more weeks. I’ve read that there is a small chance that regular running on a track or oval can lead to each leg getting a slightly different workout and can increase the risk of injury. I wonder if that’s what has happened here. When I do resume running, I am going to try switching direction every other time, so I run counter-clockwise one day then clockwise the next. I may also plan out my first runs away from the park.

Next week, with the ankle feeling better, I’m going to resume my free weights workout in the interim, so all of my other muscles can be sore and share in the fun, too.

Here be puddles and sore legs (run)

An early afternoon run today with the temperature rising from 15C-17C, breezy and about an equal mix of sun and cloud. It had showered hard in the morning so this was the first run in a long time where I had to navigate around puddles.

It was not a very good run, alas, plagued by a number of issues:

  • rust from five days off
  • when the sun came out it felt very humid and muggy
  • my left leg was clearly bothering me partway through
  • a persistent cramp in my stomach in the second half of the run

That said, I finished at a pace midway between my two previous runs, clocking in at 5:27/km with a total time of 55:03. I ran a little farther than intended because the glare on my iPod was so bright at the end I could not read the display. It also seemed that clicking the menu button did not, in fact, present me with a menu the first few times I tried it. I suspect Apple wants me to upgrade to the shiny new nano that just came out. Total distance ended up being 10.08 km.

The midway point of the run was ‘highlighted’ by a muscle car revving its engine as it went down nearby Glen, causing a car alarm (apparently on the ‘go off if songbirds are present’ setting) to start wailing and it was that car alarm. You know the one, the worst car alarm ever, the one that has four different alarms, each one annoying in its own way. Fortunately the owner turned it off in short order. Or maybe it was an act of God. Either way I was glad.

There was not much else noteworthy on the run. I found a burst of speed for the 7-8 km stretch but the cramps and general soreness prevented me from maintaining that to the finish. I iced the left calf for about 50 minutes afterward and will see how it feels in a few days. The way things have been going I suspect I will be taking another forced break from running. I may look into some kind of cheap physiotherapy, if such a thing exists.

Chart (red denotes running in especially warm conditions, green denotes cramps during run):

km Sept 20 Sept 15 Sept 13 Sept 6 Sept 2
1 km 5:02 5:05 5:00 4:56 4:54
2 km 5:07 5:08 5:05 5:03 4:58
3 km 5:11 5:12 5:09 5:07 5:03
4 km 5:15 5:15 5:14 5:11 5:08
5 km 5:18 5:17 5:18 5:14 5:13
6 km 5:21 5:18 5:21 5:16 5:16
7 km 5:23 5:19 5:24 5:18 5:19
8 km 5:24 5:21 5:26 5:20 5:23
9 km 5:26 5:23 5:28 5:21 5:26
10 km 5:27 5:23 5:29 5:21 5:27

The tire(d) run

Today was the first time in awhile that I attempted a run with only a day off in-between.

Fortunately, it was a success!

The temperature was 19ºC but dropped a degree or two over the course — not that I noticed, because despite the sky being overcast, it still felt a bit warm. It began spitting partway through but didn’t turn to light rain until the run was over and I was heading back. The spitting did clear out most of the park by about the 6 km point, though.

The only discomfort I felt was some light cramps on my right side but they didn’t affect my pace.

After another slowish start (5:05) I again finished with a strong back half, though I could clearly feel the effect of only having a day off. The second half of the run left me feeling pretty tired, even as I worked to maintain my pace, but my consistency from 5 km to 10 km was probably the best ever — I only dropped my average pace by 7 seconds in that span (compared to 12 in the first half). I finished with an overall time of 54:03 — a full minute faster than Monday and an average of 5:23, my third best pace to date.

The titular tire (say that three times fast):

The top of the photo is the gravel of the kids play area, the bottom is the path I run on. I continue to be baffled at how things like this end up where they do. What is the story behind someone rolling a tire, complete with rim, into a public park? People are weird.

Chart (red denotes running in especially warm conditions, green denotes cramps during run):

km Sept 15 Sept 13 Sept 6 Sept 2
1 km 5:05 5:00 4:56 4:54
2 km 5:08 5:05 5:03 4:58
3 km 5:12 5:09 5:07 5:03
4 km 5:15 5:14 5:11 5:08
5 km 5:17 5:18 5:14 5:13
6 km 5:18 5:21 5:16 5:16
7 km 5:19 5:24 5:18 5:19
8 km 5:21 5:26 5:20 5:23
9 km 5:23 5:28 5:21 5:26
10 km 5:23 5:29 5:21 5:27

The slog run

After a week off to rest my tender left shin, I opted for a morning run under overcast skies, with the temperature ranging from 15-17ºC. There was almost no wind at all, which is unusual. The sun poked out briefly a few times and made me feel like I was wearing a warm, damp blanket when it did, but was otherwise not a factor.

Given that it had been a week, I expected my time to be slower and it was. The shin was not a problem though by about the 8 km mark I could feel it. It didn’t hurt enough to affect me, I was just aware of it. I was both tentative and sluggish, starting out right at the five minute mark but dropping off noticeably each km in the first half. My average pace was saved by a stronger second half again and that much is reassuring.

I didn’t experience any particular problems during the run. The trail was damp but only had one easily avoided puddle. The lack of any breeze made me feel warmer than I would have otherwise but it was still manageable. Overall, a rather dull affair. Total time was 55:03, about a minute and a half slower than my previous zippy pace.

I iced my left shin for 45 minutes afterward and am going to try to run again in two days. We’ll see how that goes!

Chart (red denotes running in especially warm conditions, green denotes cramps during run):

km Sept 13 Sept 6 Sept 2
1 km 5:00 4:56 4:54
2 km 5:05 5:03 4:58
3 km 5:09 5:07 5:03
4 km 5:14 5:11 5:08
5 km 5:18 5:14 5:13
6 km 5:21 5:16 5:16
7 km 5:24 5:18 5:19
8 km 5:26 5:20 5:23
9 km 5:28 5:21 5:26
10 km 5:29 5:21 5:27

A fairly zippy run

In a taste of things to come, today’s run was in light rain, with the temperature a cool-for-the-season 12ºC. Despite the inclement weather and it being a stat holiday a fair number of people were at the park, either jogging or walking their accursed dogs.

My body definitely seems  to prefer cooler days when it comes to running. I had another good start (4:56) but slumped surprisingly in the 2nd km (5:03 — still a decent time). I had an excellent and very consistent second half, however, and finished with my second best time ever — 5:21, only one second off my fastest run back on February 26th.

Unlike many recent runs, there were no cramps or other bits of discomfort to slow me down. My left leg seems to be holding up fine. I think I got a bit of a mental boost from the other runners, as they were all jogging at a much more casual pace than me. I lapped several of them and you can’t help but feel a little fast when you do that, even if they’re not exactly tearing up the place themselves.

Chart (red denotes running in especially warm conditions, green denotes cramps during run):

km Sept 6 Sept 2 Aug 29 Aug 22 Aug 19 Aug 11 Aug 7 Aug 4
1 km 4:56 4:54 4:54 4:59 5:02 5:07 5:04 5:02
2 km 5:03 4:58 5:03 5:03 5:04 5:09 5:08 5:08
3 km 5:07 5:03 5:09 5:08 5:08 5:13 5:12 5:15
4 km 5:11 5:08 5:13 5:13 5:12 5:16 5:16 5:19
5 km 5:14 5:13 5:17 5:16 5:15 5:18 5:19 5:23
6 km 5:16 5:16 5:21 5:20 5:18 5:20 5:21 5:26
7 km 5:18 5:19 5:23 5:24 5:21 5:22 5:23 5:29
8 km 5:20 5:23 5:26 5:27 5:23 5:24 5:26 5:32
9 km 5:21 5:26 5:28 5:30 5:24 5:26 5:27 5:35
10 km 5:21 5:27 5:29 5:33 5:23 5:26 5:27 5:37

634 km (and a run)

Last September I began using the Nike+ and my iPod nano to track my runs. Since then it’s recorded 634 km. Not bad. It would be more if I hadn’t sat out nine weeks with injuries to both of my legs (at different times). Still, it’s a decent amount of running considering the last I did was back in high school 28 years ago.

Today I opted for a morning run as a change of pace. Under a sunny sky with little wind I started out with the temperature at 12ºC. It climbed to 16ºC by the time I finished, though I don’t think it played a big factor in my effort.

I had a very good start — the first two km both came in under five minutes but the second half was marred by some cramps and gas (sorry to those running behind me! :P) bringing my overall time down lower than I would have liked. Still, I finished with a pace of 5:27/km and an overall time of 54:38, which is an improvement from the last run. My left leg is still feeling a bit tender but holding up okay for now.

I was a bit surprised both before and after my last run and I want to note both surprises here for future reference. I will be making reference to the past three runs, with the most recent being #3, etc. After #1, I felt fine. A few days later my left leg felt a bit sore. Now, if I hurt myself when running it never surfaces later — I feel it during the run and very much so immediately after. That this didn’t happen made me wonder if there was another cause. I realized I had developed a bad habit of using the sub-woofer under my computer desk as a makeshift foot stool. The problem is it is quite small and my legs were very stretched out. I probably hyper-extended the left leg a bit in the process. I’ve seen conditioned myself to not use the sub-woofer for anything but playing bass! Run #2 came a week later, as I wanted to give the left leg a bit of a rest. The surprise here came the next day when my thighs were actually sore (in that “hey, these muscles haven’t been used in awhile” kind of way). That seemed odd, but it’s a good reason to get off my butt and get back to running more often.

Chart (red denotes running in especially warm conditions, green denotes cramps during run):

km Sept 2 Aug 29 Aug 22 Aug 19 Aug 11 Aug 7 Aug 4
1 km 4:54 4:54 4:59 5:02 5:07 5:04 5:02
2 km 4:58 5:03 5:03 5:04 5:09 5:08 5:08
3 km 5:03 5:09 5:08 5:08 5:13 5:12 5:15
4 km 5:08 5:13 5:13 5:12 5:16 5:16 5:19
5 km 5:13 5:17 5:16 5:15 5:18 5:19 5:23
6 km 5:16 5:21 5:20 5:18 5:20 5:21 5:26
7 km 5:19 5:23 5:24 5:21 5:22 5:23 5:29
8 km 5:23 5:26 5:27 5:23 5:24 5:26 5:32
9 km 5:26 5:28 5:30 5:24 5:26 5:27 5:35
10 km 5:27 5:29 5:33 5:23 5:26 5:27 5:37

Crampy so-so run

A late afternoon run today as temperatures are cooler now. Under hazy cloud, intermittent sun and 17ºC, I ran with the wind, against the wind and at one point mildly cursing the wind.

That one point was when the wind actually blew my cap right off my head. I snatched it out of the air with ninja-like reflexes and put it back on without breaking my stride. That was probably the highlight of my run. The other was the opening km, one of my fastest yet at 4:54/km — and that was without really trying at it. Such things encourage me.

It had been a week since my last run because my left shin had been feeling a bit tender and I wanted to give it a little time. While I could feel it today it didn’t hurt, had no impact on my time and felt fine afterward. A much larger impact was mid-run when I first got a cramp in my lower abdomen and then some minutes later another in my chest. These always have the same effect — they restrict how much air you can inhale and that inevitably slows me down. The averages during this part of the run, with 4 seconds between km, demonstrates the effect vividly.

My iPod cable proved to be vexing. I could not get it to stay tucked in my left pocket like normal and eventually just gave up, letting it swing all over, pretending it wasn’t really distracting me. I think I’ll finally use a velcro strip to cinch it up to the right length for the next run.

Chart (red denotes running in especially warm conditions, green denotes cramps during run):

km Aug 29 Aug 22 Aug 19 Aug 11 Aug 7 Aug 4
1 km 4:54 4:59 5:02 5:07 5:04 5:02
2 km 5:03 5:03 5:04 5:09 5:08 5:08
3 km 5:09 5:08 5:08 5:13 5:12 5:15
4 km 5:13 5:13 5:12 5:16 5:16 5:19
5 km 5:17 5:16 5:15 5:18 5:19 5:23
6 km 5:21 5:20 5:18 5:20 5:21 5:26
7 km 5:23 5:24 5:21 5:22 5:23 5:29
8 km 5:26 5:27 5:23 5:24 5:26 5:32
9 km 5:28 5:30 5:24 5:26 5:27 5:35
10 km 5:29 5:33 5:23 5:26 5:27 5:37