Team McAlister

Not much to report on today, just a short run and weight routine at the gym. I can consistently do a mile in 7:13 now, although it results in a heart rate of around 191. According to the chart on the treadmill this is heart-exploding territory and not to be sustained, but when was the last time I let a chart tell me what to do?

A couple of interesting articles for you today! This first article is about how coffee (more precisely, caffeine) lessens the pain associated with working out.

Coffee Lessens the Pain of Exercise

And this one is about how there is an ideal running pace for everyone, at which metabolic efficiency is its highest. For men this pace is, on average, 8.3 miles per hour.

Perfect Running Pace Revealed

These two articles would seem to confirm the validity of my preferred workout method, known as the Drink a Lot of Coffee and Then Run Your Butt Off Method.

I have been listening to a lot of Ratatat as my running music lately. Good, good stuff.

Tags: health, running

Today I did the same run as Sunday, but .06 miles longer and almost three minutes faster. I took 42 seconds off my average mile, and 1:14 off my best mile. Somehow I burned 3 fewer calories. Does this mean I’m in better shape now than I was four days ago? So it would seem.

The new shoes are doing well, but I’m going to have to put my Superfeet in them because today I noticed a definite lack of arch support. I don’t know how I missed that when I tried them on, or on my first run.

Tags: running, shoes

On Tuesday the thunderstorms blew through and the afternoon was pristine – crystal blue spring sky, steady breeze from due west, just a bit of coolness in the air.  Perfect.  I wrapped things at the office and dashed home with visions of a 50+ mile ride on a great route.  I was just about to swing my leg over the bike and roll when it occurred to me that at the end of Sunday’s ride, I hit a large rock with my rear tire. I decided to see if there was  any damage.  What I saw is in the pic!  YIKES!!!  About 300 miles ago, Bill at the bike shop said I had maybe 100 miles left in this tire.  I rode this tire down a 13% grade at 45 mph on Sunday at the end of a hard 36 miler that included another very technical descent that has 2 switch backs!  Not to put too fine a point on it, but I didn’t ride.  Instead, I loaded up and went straight to Chainwheel.  A new set of Continentals, AND a new chain, AND a new cassette.  Oh man!  The chain had about 3500 hard miles on it….and the cassette?  It’s my original from 3 years ago….closing in on 9000 miles.  That bright , shiny new one is an Ultegra 12-28, which is quite a change for me.  We’ll see how it works out.  And, yes I found the chunk that the rock cut into the tire.  :-)

The Ride

Today was my first run on my new running shoes, and MAN does having the right shoes make a difference! I ran (ok, mostly walked) 4.8 miles in 56 minutes. My best mile, I think, was 9:36. I say I think because I used the iPhone app Fitnio to track my run, and I’m not sure exactly what that “9:36 mile” is referring to. Let’s just go with that being my best mile time. The weather is amazing right now, so I’m very glad to have shoes that don’t constrain me to the treadmill.

The shoes are the Saucony Progrid Guide 2. I was pretty set on getting Adidas, since they were my favorites when I sold them, but the Sauconys just fit better. I tried at least one shoe in every brand at Lombardi’s before I made up my mind. Hopefully it was worth the trouble and I’ll be able to run regularly again without fear of injury. Oh, and the best part? My former boss gave me the employee discount. So now I’m sitting on the exercise ball I got with the money I saved!

Tags: equipment, running, shoes, Weather

The weather has been very uncooperative of late, so road work has been tricky.  It two attempts last week to get in one good intervals session and even at that I had computer problems that made me mad.  Today would have been a 50 mile kind of day except for the spitting rain, 40 degree weather and 30 mph wind!  Instead, I ended up at the bike shop where I was able to retrieve my rollers (finally) and check out the Guru Crono and Orbea Ordu Tri bikes.  The Crono is custom-built for the rider and is the choice of one tri world champ.  The Ordu is maybe the sexiest bike anywhere at any price and is the choice of another world champ.

Anyhow, I got home with the rollers and managed to get in a 35 minute session.  It was nice to have them back; I’ve actually missed those stupid things.  Good training music is important when riding rollers in the garage!  Led Zepplin is great for cranking a fine, fast, high cadence.  However, Keb Mo’ is the challenge.  It’s hard to ride a smooth stroke when you’re wanting to juke along with that foot-tapping, thumping blues he turns out.  Hopefully, tomorrow will see some high-quality road miles.

Tags: Guru Crono, Keb Mo', Led Zeppelin, Orbea Urdu, rollers

Forty-six more or less easy miles today on a very social ride.  It wasn’t all BBQ and beer though.  There were 2 very good climbs;  a tough pursuit of a fast rider that had a 100 meter lead; and, 2 5-mile stretches at 20+ mph.  All-in-all a good day in the saddle.  Happy to report no hot foot, no knee pain, no back ache, no crashes or close calls.

I didn’t report on Friday’s interval training.  That may be because it sucked so bad.  I was tired from a bad week at work.  I wasn’t properly fed or watered from a day of loose nutritional living.  I also love to see old friends and acquaintances on the trail, but not when I’m on a tight schedule with a specific purpose in mind and a bad day under my belt.  Of course, I hit a social trifecta Friday evening with an old law school buddy and a couple of current riding partners who were all beginning some light evening pleasure cruising.  I had to get organized and on the clock for speed work though.  Despite all of the distractions, forgotten gear, bike computer mishaps (almost busted the Garmin!  YIKES!), and physical limitations, I rode a set of 12  1-minute x 2-minute recovery bits.  These are 15 seconds of standing sprint with 45 seconds of heart pounding hammering followed by a 2 minute recovery.  I know this is helping my overall ride conditioning.  I can easily tell when on the road for regular rides.

but the self-inflicted pain is similar.  This post covers both Monday’s and Tuesday’s rides.  The Monday ride was a nice little guy.  Covering a bit over 9 miles, I managed it in 29 minutes.  It may not sound too impressive, but there are 9 90 degree turns, 7 of which require a stop and 5 of them lead directly into a climb.  The route also includes a good deal of climbing.  This definitely counted as my interval workout for this week!

The St. Paddy’s Day trip was 42 miles at an 18 mph pace.   I spent 50 minutes with my heart rate in the 90-95% range so I think it was a good workout.

Congratulations to Jett on finishing the Little Rock Marathon and getting the world’s largest marathon finishing medal!

seems to be a shift of 24 hours or so.  I’m perpetually a day behind on updating this site.  In this case, I had a challenging 2 hours on the bike yesterday.  I spent the first hour convinced that my prior training was yielding a result of superior athletic performance.  I was riding uphill into a steady headwind at 20 mph.  Truly, feeling every bit the elite cyclist!  Since I am sticking to a very strict training schedule, the end of one hour signaled the turnaround point.  I took a quick breather and drink, let some fast-moving traffic pass and headed back for what promised to be a scorching downhill return with a lovely tailwind.  As luck would have it, the tailwind was blowing from the opposite direction!  ouch!  The one hour ride home took about 1:15 and wasn’t nearly as easy as it should have been.

I can easily remember,though, when that same 40-ish mile ride took everything I had and hurt me for days afterwards.  I even remember the first time I did that ride and thought I would die while struggling to get back home.  Ah, sweet progress.

So yesterday I decided that a run would be in order.  The knee seems to be sufficiently healed to set out on the training regimen again.  Also, I was in a situation that I thought best to avoid on a bicycle – extremely rare, I know.  I re-started my Hal Higdon program with a 30 minute walk/run.  I must admit that being out there was invigorating, although i really do hate that activity alot.  Against my better judgement, I hit the road before breakfast.  I figured since it was only 30 minutes, no big deal.  It was a nice, warm day even though the wind was kicking up between 23 and 29 mph!  Man, the rest of the day I was starving!  I ate like crazy all day!  It all worked out fine.

Today is the first day of Daylight Saving Time!  YAY!  I managed to get in a little 1 hour ride with some hills.  It was not a high-quality ride.  I was short on sleep, hydration, and proper food, but a bad day on a bike is better than a good day in many other places.  Average HR for the hour was 135.  Knocked out about 1200 calories.  82 degrees!

I totally forgot to post this entry yesterday….oops.  I’m not sure if it was because I was so frozen that the effects shut down my brain or what.  

It was a brisk day down by the river – 42 degrees F with an easterly wind ranging from 12 – 13 mph.  I rode a bit over 13 minutes to warm up, including a climb of just over 1 mile at 9 – 10% grade.  I stood up for probably 2/3 of the climb and it felt pretty good.  Then I did 8 sets of 15 second sprints, 45 seconds of hammering it out, and 2 minutes of recovery.  Even into the wind I managed to get up over 25 mph in the sprints.  Heart rate peaked at 152, but jumped to about 150 on each sprint lap.  This interval business is getting easier even if my legs felt dead and rubbery at the end.  I made an executive decision today to take a recovery day.  Tomorrow is a 2 hour mileage and pace day – looking for 36 to 40 miles on the road.

while you’re making other plans.  If memory serves, and sometimes it doesn’t, John Lennon said that.  No, I’m not gonna fact check it; I’ll just thank you for correcting me politely, if I’m wrong.  Who said it isn’t as important at this moment as the idea that a possible corollary is: life is what happens when you’re not training.  We all have stuff that has to come first.  No platitudes, please, about priorities and always having time to train, or find a way to take care of the important things.  One of the habits of the highly successful is putting first things first.  Even if we’d rather do something else.  Today was an opportunity to get in some intervals – 15 seconds of standing sprint with 45 seconds of sitting and hammering away, then 2 minutes of recovery.  This is a slight variation outlined by Selene Yeager.  I plan to stay on this type of thing 1 to 2 days per week for the 8 weeks or so.

Tags: Intervals

Today was a good day for a little lunch hour ride.  Only 15 miles in 50 minutes, but into a 10 mph headwind in the first half…of course, it turned into quite the nice tailwind on the return trip!  The best result from today was keeping my HR up around 150 for 41 minutes.  Bike riding is harder than  it looks, too.  This winter has been spent learning how to pedal in a smooth, high-cadence with light down pressure and good pull on the backside of the stroke.  It seems as though every time I go out, this element improves.

I decided that my training was in need of some serious heart-pounding, lung- burning time on the bike.  Nothing like some intervals to get your blood pumping.  After a good warm up, I started some 1 minute all-out efforts with 2 minute recoveries in between.  The main lesson from today is that a whole bunch more of this kind of day is needed.  The original intention was to use some type of plan from Chris Carmichael, but poor planning resulted in just going out and pushing myself through a few laps.

Never having been a runner, I’m not all that familiar with the attendant injuries. For the past few weeks I’ve been trying to learn to distinguish between all the different sorts of pain that come with this sport. Sure my legs are going to be sore, my calves feel like they’re on fire about 60% of the time now. My upper leg muscles weren’t used to anything more strenuous than walking up a hill or an occasional bike ride. So there’s a certain amount of just shutting up and getting over it that I have to do. But the past few runs have had me worrying. All the info I can find points to shin splints, but fortunately at this point it’s not bad enough to warrant real recovery time.

I’m pretty sure that it’s my shoes’ fault. I’m running on neutral trail shoes when I definitely need at least a stability shoe, more likely a motion control, in the road variety. Maybe this week I’ll hit a few specialty running stores and get gait analyses and shoe advice. Until I can afford new shoes though, I’ll just have to back off on the running and maybe substitute biking. If it would just stop freaking raining all the time I’d put some miles on the ol’ Cannondale, but until that happens I’ll be on the stationary at the gym (ugh). Now’s as good a time as any to start swimming, I suppose, but I want to swim even less than I want to run.

Tags: equipment, injuries, running, Weather

Took a whole minute off my 5k today. 27:24. I did the first mile in 8:03, and the last 3/4 mile at 7:34 pace. I think. Everything was a little blurry at that point. I’ll do some longer distance this week, and then next Thursday try for 26 minutes. I’m pretty confident that I can hit 25 minutes within 3 weeks, but we’ll see how that goes.

I either need to take a little more time between waking up and working out, or I need to just hold off on the coffee until after I’ve run. “Coffee slosh” is brutal when you’re trying to set a personal best.

My weight loss seems to have stalled at 7 pounds (I’m at 203 now). I am, however, losing body fat, which really is just as good. I think the disparity is due to strength training. I can’t seem to find an exact figure anywhere, but I’ve heard that muscle weighs two to three times as much by volume as fat, depending on the specific muscle and the person. If anyone knows better, please speak up in the comments!

I figure I have a couple of options to lose the remaining 13 pounds. Just reducing calorie intake would do it eventually, ditto for increasing cardiovascular exercise. Cutting back on the weight training would do it too, at the cost of muscle mass but with the result of a more compact and efficient body composition. If I were going to focus on running or cycling, I think that would be the way to go. But I’m going to start swimming again at some point, which takes a considerable amount of upper body strength. So the only reasonable path to take seems to involve eating less and running more, which totally sucks. Oh well. At my height and build, 190 pounds is exactly where I need to be if I’m going to be a competitive athlete. Also, being 13 pounds lighter would mean 39 fewer pounds of force every time my foot hits the ground while running, and based on Dad’s knee history that is pretty important to me.

Are there any nutritionists in the audience? I’d love some pointers on how to cut back on calories while still getting all the necessary nutrients. What’s a good protein:carb:fat ratio for someone training for a marathon? How many grams of protein should a 200 pound guy trying to lose weight (but not muscle) have daily?

Tags: goals, running

Last week was sort of lost due to a trip to LA. The highlights were crummy bikes in the Marriott workout room, a tour of dts Digital Cinema’s engineering department, and the porn convention at the hotel….seriously, there was an internet porn show at the hotel. Trés bizarre! Anyway, it was a good op to let my knee recover some….the trip, not the porn show. Since my last entry I’ve had a couple of good rides. Last Sunday was about 32 miles, decent pace, good rolling terrain. Nothing too strenuous and the knee held up well. Today was the bad boy though. 48 miles. 3:21 and change, about 3,000 feet of elevation gain with a westerly wind that nearly made forward progress impossible. Going East, I was a star. Knee is fine even after 4 significant climbs that averaged in the 11 -12% range – and 2 of those were directly into the teeth of the wind! It’s great to be back in the saddle and getting some quality miles in. The dodgy knee continues to improve.

Tags: cycling, health, injuries

Laura’s visit threw me off, and then it rained for a solid week, so in the past two weeks I’ve been running twice. Last week I talked about the 5k and my goals. Well, this week I made exactly no progress. 28:30, three seconds slower. I did, however, do my first 8 minute mile today. I’ll take another shot at it tomorrow and see if I can improve.

Today’s workout music was Girl Talk’s Feed the Animals. (Warning, MySpace link!) It is impossible to get bored with that album. Put a Radiohead riff behind Jay-Z, and you can hold my attention for as long as I can stand to be on a treadmill.

I broke down and bought some new workout clothes. I only have two sets of clothes suitable for running, and I got tired of washing them by hand in the sink after every workout. Next month, perhaps, I’ll finally get real running shoes. This is really just a roundabout way of saying, don’t be surprised if you see ads on the site soon.

Tags: equipment, goals, running

…I’m alive, despite what you might think from my lack of posts lately.

Laura (my beautiful, awesome girlfriend) was in town last week, which meant no training, which meant no updates on training. We did, however, walk so much that my feet hurt for two days after she left, so I’m going to pretend I trained a little bit. Touring the city on foot is not only a great way to take in the flavor of the neighborhoods, it’s a great way to wear yourself out.

Today was my first day back at the gym. I did a 5K run (3.1 miles) in 28:27. I held an 8:37 mile pace for the first two miles, a big first for me. Most of the last mile, after a little walking, was a 9:30 pace, about on par for me. My heart rate was 184 for about the first 18 minutes, and for the last six or so minutes… For a little while I thought my heart might explode, messily, and that would suck because they’d probably make me clean the blood off the treadmill. My next goals are to do three miles at 8:37 pace, and then to break 25 minutes for a 5K, then to add distance a half mile at a time. At the same time I’ll stick to my loosely interpreted version of Hal Higdon’s schedule, with a weekly long run and cross training day.

I’m seven pounds in to my 20-pound weight loss goal, so that’s going well. Laura bought me a stovetop espresso pot, so I’m drinking lots of very strong coffee. I mention this because supposedly coffee, being a stimulant, not only suppresses your appetite and lowers your blood sugar but also allows you to exercise harder, longer. I’d drink it anyway though, I looooove my coffee.

I loaded up some different music on my iPod for the run today. Modest Mouse’s We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank is a surprisingly good running album. I’m to the point now where I don’t have to listen to Dragonforce to distract myself from how hard running is, which I count as progress. Dragonforce is still awesome though. I’m toying with the idea of reviewing albums based on how they help with a workout, so maybe look for that in the coming weeks.

Overall I’m pretty happy with how training is going. After a week off I was still able to accomplish a personal best, and each goal I set I accomplish fairly painlessly. Maybe I should be setting the bar a little higher, but I like feeling like it’s easy to be awesome.

Tags: health, music, running, san francisco

…my name might be Gimpy.

A day after completing this ridiculous 20-mile run, I’m still a bit stiff and sore.  I’ve got some tightness in my left hip flexor, and my left ankle isn’t feeling too grand either.  Interestingly, both knees are fine, as is the right ankle, which earlier had been giving me trouble.

So, 20 miles.  We’re having this heat wave up here:  55 degrees on Saturday, 56 today, 63 tomorrow!  But yesterday there was a bit of a break in the warmth–it was about 35 degrees with a stiff south wind.  I set out at approximately 2:00 p.m., headed east to the lake, turned north for about three miles, then went back south.  I did this because there’s only one water fountain along the lakefront path that stays on through the winter, and I wanted to hit it about midway through the run to refill my water bottles.  Going south, I reached said fountain at about the eighth mile, and continued south to the Museum Campus, where I turned around and went home.  This divided up the run into four somewhat equal phases.  Map of the run here.

Phase One:  Home to Foster Avenue
Mild stiffness in the left ankle to begin the run.  A slight fear that I’m not wearing enough clothing.  I wear UnderArmor tights, running shorts, a long-sleeved microfiber shirt, running gloves, and my new technical fleece hat.  (This new hat is much, much warmer than the one I lost in Arkansas.)  Also my long-run socks and the new pair of shoes.  Running into the wind without an UnderArmor top, this ensemble is a little chilly.  Some mud on the path at the lakefront, but heading north, the path is mostly clear.  The south wind, at my back, makes this part of the run very easy.  Belmont Harbor is still frozen over, which makes it a little like an air conditioner.  Phases two through four after the jump. Continue Reading »

Tags: Chicago, clothing, equipment, gu, hydration, long run, running, Weather

something valuable – power, wisdom, Ding Dongs? Well, whatever else may accrue to me, I’ve learned that running as a recreational activity is not in my future. Here’s the deal: I know I can make a half-marathon distance at a 14 minute or slightly better pace. I also know that a shorter, faster run jacks up one knee pretty badly, at least right now. So, the plan now is to continue training on a very moderate program. “Real running” will only occur as an element of an actual competition. I need to have a much deeper running base and a lot less weight to stay serious about this. Today was a nice, short little ride that helped recover some athletic motion in the bad knee. About 18 miles. EZ pace. Nothing spectacular, but it was better than sitting on the sofa.

Tags: cycling, health, injuries, running

but it’s for the best. Afterall, when one’s race pace amounts to a 13:06 mile, humility is an easy virtue to cultivate. Today’s scheduled run was 4 miles at pace. A nice warm-up was followed by 2 miles of actual running, 1 mile of walking, and a final running mile. Several observations include a definite absence of sore calf muscles, a longer stride, a more confident foot-strike, and better overall looseness. However, the knees are organizing a revolt. A coup d’ patella is brewing on the horizon. (Probably at the behest of free radicals lurking the neighborhood.) I intend to win the hearts and minds of my rebellious body parts with generous applications of ice and Aleve, stretching, and recovery time (thank you bicycle!).

Tags: health, injuries, running

Well, I did it. It took me 1 hour and 47 minutes for a blazing 5.05 mph average. I walked a pretty significant chunk of it, because it turns out that running on pavement hurts. I also stopped twice to stretch, for the same reason. This would seem to indicate that I have no idea how fast I’m running or how to pace myself, because if you factor in the walking and the stops I beat the pants off my usual treadmill average. I think I made it through with no injuries, save the beginning of a blister on my big toe. I will definitely have to get new shoes if this is going to be a regular thing. Suggestions are more than welcome!

The route I took is beautiful. I should have taken my camera, maybe I’ll do that next week when I repeat this insanity.

Tags: running, shoes

Last weekend was abysmal.  There were weather issues, there were health issues, there were injury issues, there was all kinds of work-related busy-ness issues.  The long and short of it — short, really — is that I missed both my weekend runs, one of which was an 18-miler.  Now, given that I’ve got two 20-milers scheduled for the rest of this cycle, I’m not too worried about it.

This week was a “step-back” week, meaning the long run is shorter, as are some of the mid-week runs.  It’s meant to help the body catch up and recover in preparation for another push upward in mileage.  Considering that I missed 26 of the miles I was supposed to run last week, I was already kind of stepped back.  But nevertheless, I followed the plan–5 miles each Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, all on the Tropical Rainforest Treadmills in the University of Chicago Amazon Gymnasium.  Well, not really, but they do keep it hot in there.  And when you’ve gotten used to running in like 12 degree weather, 75 is really, really hot.

Yesterday I did an 8-mile pace run, actually beating my projected marathon pace (1:08:32, for an average pace of 8:36, 24 full seconds faster than I hope to run in the race).  It was “warm” outside — 34 degrees — and I used the balmy weather as a chance to practice my pace out of doors and to start to break in my new pair of running shoes, the ones I’ll be racing in in March.

Today I did 13 miles.  I was trying to keep it slow, because, you know, that’s what they tell you to do for the long runs.  I ended up averaging 9:19/mile, which is probably 20 seconds faster than I should have taken it.  But it felt like I was slogging along and would never get anywhere.  I’m tired and all, but I really felt like I could have pushed it harder.  Which is probably how I’m supposed to feel at the end of a relatively easy week.  Today’s run totaled 2:01:02.  Splits after the jump.

My first 20-miler of this cycle is in seven days.  Let’s hope my ankles make it.

Continue Reading »

Tags: Chicago, equipment, health, long run, running, shoes

Getting back into a comfort zone is good. Today, I was able to get in an easy 3 hour ride and it felt great! About an hour in, I ran into a couple of regular riding buddies and we cruised for about an hour before I split off. There really isn’t anything special to report. It was just a fine day to be out and a fine way to spend 3 hours. Beats the stuff out of running.

Tags: cycling