Wednesday Weigh In

     11/5/14 official weigh in

177 lbs

Change: -2 lbs

Total loss from heaviest: 140 lbs

Current BMI: 27.7 (overweight)

Change: -.3

     Closer and closer I get to that "Goal Number" I have chosen as my stopping point.  It is strange to think that I am only four pounds away from my freshman wrestling weight.  Yes that is right, I said my freshman wrestling weight.  When I started wrestling my freshman year I weighed in at 200lbs, which was the heavy weight division.  I was getting my ass handed to me because most in that class were six foot or taller and no less than 260lbs.  I spent that first month working my ass of getting down to the next weight class, which was 175.  When I finally achieved it I pretty much hovered right around the 173 mark for the remainder of the season.  Why did I choose that as my goal weight?  Well mainly because that was the last time in my life I remember being in such great shape, so it seemed like the best place to get to.

     Today I wanted to get a run in, but with my injury from my last run I didn't want to push it.  I decided to head to the gym for the first time since February or March and get my foot pod calibrated for indoor use.  The indoor track at my local YMCA is 9 laps to equal a mile and even though it is so much better than running on a treadmill but it can still get a little monotonous.  I walked a couple of laps to get warmed up and then turned my GPS off and linked my shoe pod.  To calibrate the shoe pod I first ran 9 laps at an easy pace.  When I finished that ninth lap I stopped my watch, which showed a final distance of 1.09 miles.  Through some minor mathematical calculations I got from my friend Katie's blog runsforcookies.com  .  I reset the calibration on the foot pod and ran another 9 laps at an easy pace to see if I needed to make another adjustment.  What do you know, it was spot on.  Each lap was calculated as .11 of a mile and the total added up to exactly a mile.   

     Now that my foot pod was calibrated, I really wanted to get six miles in for the day and I also wanted to see how the pod would do on an extended run.  I had two miles down, which left me 36 laps left to get my six miles in, well my knee / IT band had other ideas.  I was doing just fine until I got started on mile three.  I started to get light pain on the outside of my right knee again, but it felt like a 2 on a scale of 1 to 10 so I continued.  When I got to mile 2.5 the pain jumped up to 4 or 5, but stubborn me wanted to keep going.  I stopped when I got to the end of mile three.  I just couldn't do it anymore, the pain was up to a 6 or even a seven.  It almost immediately went away when I started walking, but an aching pain slowly returned.  As far as the foot pod goes, it was pretty damn accurate after the three miles.  When I finished, the watch registered a distance of 2.99 miles.  If the pod stays that accurate throughout this winter, I will be a happy runner.

     As for the knee, I guess I am pushing myself to quickly since Columbus.  These little nagging injuries are starting to piss me off when all I want to do is run.  I am not really sure what I should do.  I am sure the smartest and best option is to just stop running for a while, but that is like asking me not to eat.       

Columbus Marathon Post Race Review

     Saturday morning I packed up the car and Mandy, Widdle and I hit the road for the 2 1/2 drive to Columbus for the race.  When we got just north of the city we got caught in a little traffic due to the Ohio State football game.  My parents were waiting for us in the hotel lobby and helped us unload and get settled in.  We gave Widdle some time to get use to his surroundings before we headed to the race expo.  The expo was freaking packed when we got there and the layout was not the greatest.  The packet pickup was on the second floor terrace overlooking the expo floor.  The stairs for the packet pickup were all the way in the back of the hall, which was a pain to weave our way through the tight isle ways.  When we got up there I had to go to three different stations to get my bib, shirt and goodie bag.  There was a lot of vendors there, but the hall seemed to small for everything going on.  I couldn't really enjoy the expo so we decided to just head out and get dinner before I settled in for the night.

     I really did my best to get some sleep the night before, but I just couldn’t get my brain to shut down.  I am sure that is pretty typical for most people the night before their first marathon.  I finally dozed off at some point because I woke up to use the bathroom and the clock said 2:45 and the last time I remember seeing was around 10:30.  I had my alarm set to go off at 5AM, but I ended up waking up on my own a little after 4:30.  I hopped in the shower to help wake me up and then fixed myself something to eat.   For breakfast I had three slices of white bread with a little smart balance butter, some cinnamon and a little Truvia sprinkled on top along with I a Clif brand chocolate chip crunch granola bar and a bottle of water.  The night before I had my gear all laid out so I really didn’t have to think about what I needed when I was getting ready.  

     We met my parents in the hotel lobby at five minutes to six and slowly made our way down to the starting area.  I was concerned by how far the walk was going to be, but it turned out to not really be that bad.  The weather was pretty darn good for a start to a race.  The temp was in the low to mid 40s, hardly any wind at all and partly cloudy skies.  When we reached the start/finish line we looked around for where my parents, Mandy and Widdle were going to be when I started the race.  The layout didn’t allow for any spectators near the corals pre race so we wanted to figure out where they were all going to be and I made sure I was on that side of the street when I passed them.  We took a few pictures and I began to take off my warm up clothes and get myself situated.  We hugged, said our goodbyes and I made my way to the corrals.

     The race was scheduled to start at 7:30 and the corrals were to be closed at 7:00, so with fifteen minutes till seven I hit up the port a potties to drain the bladder one more time.  A word of advice to all runners, but specifically the ladies, if you use a port a potty and don’t want to have the door opened on you than use the lock.  When you fail to lock the door it reads open and others think it’s free to go in.  After that little incident I headed to corral B and made my way to the front along the left side fence so I would be sure to see my family when I started.  The start had a great vibe to it with a incredible sound system with a laser light show going.  My corral was about half full with about ten minutes to the start when the announcer came on the PA and said that all runners should be in their corrals.  It was like a stampede of late arrivals pushing and crowding their way into the corrals.  I really think there was a lot more people in my corral than there was suppose to and I really didn’t see anyone checking bibs to see if people were getting into their proper corrals either.  With five minutes to the start the singing of the National Anthem took place followed by the start of the wheel chair race.  A few minutes later a nice fireworks display signaled the start of the runners and after a couple of minutes of slow shuffling I passed the start line and gave my family some high fives and away I went on my journey.  

     I had said that I wanted to use a pace group to help with my pace of the race, but unfortunately that wasn’t going to happen.  The time I was shooting for was smack dab in the middle of two pace groups, so I thought, I have trained all this time by myself I am going to run this race all by myself.  The first mile was awesome and sucked all at the same time.  The road was kind of narrow and with all the extra people in my corral made it really hard to get a good rhythm going.  I was constantly speeding up and slowing down and I was so afraid I was going to trip on the feet of the temporary fence they had lining the street.  That being said the good part had to do with the spectator support.  It was incredible how many people were there cheering, clapping, holding signs and offering there support.  It literally gave me goose bumps for that first mile. 
   
     Once I got to mile two I started to get into a good rhythm and was really enjoying myself.  The runners started to get spaced out and I had a lot more room to stretch my legs.  This race had some really great areas to run through once we got out of the downtown concrete jungle. 
   
     For the first 6 miles of the race my pace seemed to be right on schedule.  I wanted to be between an 8:46 and an 8:50.  I figured that would keep me close to my goal pace and I wouldn’t burn myself out by going to fast in the first half of the race.  When I hit the 10K timing mat my pace was right on schedule at an 8:49 and that is when things went a little haywire.  My Garmin started giving me what I figured out to be false info due to bad reception from the satellites.  It started saying I was running an eight minute mile pace, which was way to fast and I was so afraid I was going to burn out to early so I slowed down.  It barely budged so I slowed down some more.  I was as close to a walk as you could get without truly walking and it said I was still doing an 8:25 pace. WTF!!!  It was at that point I knew something was wrong and I sped back up to what felt like the pace I was running.  Unfortunately it was to late and the damage was done, because when I crossed the half way timing mat my pace had dropped to an 8:59.  I was a little upset with myself, but I was still on pace for a sub 4 hour finish.  My plan was to do a negative split anyway for the second half of the race so without going to awful crazy I picked up the pace and started catching up to and passing a few people I was running with before my big slowdown.

OSU Stadium

     From mile thirteen to mile eighteen I was feeling pretty good, but as I expected the miles were starting to take its toll.  I changed up my playlist on my phone to give me a little boost and keep plugging away.  Miles nineteen and twenty were not as bad as I thought they were going to be going into it.  With everyone talking about hitting the wall I was expecting this huge change where my body had nothing left, but it never happened.  What did happen was my right thigh started to hurt and tighten up.  It started off slow and just kind of bugged me, but progressively got worse as the run went on.  If I had to say I hit the wall it was probably around mile twenty two when my legs felt like I was running in cement shoes, but that feeling faded pretty quickly by the time I got to mile twenty three. 
  
     Miles twenty three and four were the toughest for me because my right thigh was in so much pain.  I changed to more of a shuffle for a little while and then tried to do more of a high step to bend my leg a little more to try and stretch it out.  Just at that time Mandy called me to see how I was doing and to give me some encouragement.  It was like she new what I needed because even though I was talking about how bad my thigh hurt, talking to her helped me relax and keep my mind off of it.  After we hung up I told myself I came this freaking far without walking or stopping and I wasn’t going to start now.  Just before I hit mile twenty five the thigh started to loosen up and felt half way normal again.  I changed my playlist again to my “last Mile” playlist which started with Eminem’s Till I collapse.  The opening of that song was perfect for my situation and gave me the shot of adrenalin I needed.

       The whole time during my training I would visualize what it would be like as I ran that last 1.2 miles.  The thoughts and emotions I would feel as I took those last strides through the finishers shoot with my hands raised high in the air.  Well I got the hands raised in the air part right.  I was so focused on that last 1.2 miles I almost got tunnel vision.  I cranked up my music as loud as it would go and told myself I am going to give it everything I got till I cross that line.  I was so focused I barely noticed my Dad and Nephew waving at me and I totally missed Mandy, my Mom and my Sister screaming at me just before the finish line.

     It took quite a while for the weight of what I had just done to impact me.  I really think the overall shock to my body and aching pain was all I could feel at the time.  I was greeted by my family who were so happy for me, but all I could think about was my legs and how hard it was to walk.  Don’t get me wrong I was happy, how could you not be after completing a task such as a marathon, I just expected all those feelings to take place immediately at the finish line not a day or two later when I was able to sit back and reflect on it.  If I had to guess one of the big reasons I don't think I was able to just soak it all in and enjoy the moment is because of the hotel.  Apparently their was a Fleetwood Mac concert that night and the hotel was fully booked and they weren't allowing any late checkouts.  I finished around 11:30am so almost immediately I said we need to get going to I could get in a quick shower and pack up to head home.  This also kept me from enjoying all the post race festivities that were going on.
     
     This post has already gone on a little to long so I think I will end it here.  I'll come back with some final thoughts on my training, the race and what my future running plans are. 

 

Say Hello to My Little Garmin

     I got a nice little present in the mail on Friday, my new Garmin Forerunner 220 GPS watch and foot pod.  Those of you that caught my Wednesday Weigh In post from 5/7/14 already know that I made the change because I was just getting tired of the issues my Nike watch was giving me.       
      A little over a year ago when I was researching GPS watches the Nike+ Sports watch was getting pretty good reviews from users and the price point was very attractive to someone who just got into running vs. the other brands on the market.  The first time I connected it to satellite it did take a little bit to acquire, but I thought that was normal.  From that point on it would usually take anywhere between 15 seconds and 2 minutes to acquire a signal, but in the last couple of months it was taking up to 10 minutes or in the case of my run on Wednesday, not at all.  The watch is powered by TomTom, and I recently read online that Nike and TomTom had parted ways, which is probably the reason for my issues. 

     Over the past couple months I began doing a lot of research online for what would become its replacement.  Pretty much all the reviews pointed towards the new Garmin Forerunner 220 or 620.  While I was in San Diego for Ragnar I was able to get some great feed back from my teammates that used both the models.  While everyone had raving reviews of them the biggest tip I took away was from Katie.  She stated that if she had to do it over again she would have saved her money and just got the 220, the few upgrades you get with the 620, in her opinion, was not worth the cost difference, and I agreed.  

     Now the only reason this post is even possible today is because of the love and support from my Mother and Father.  They have been so supportive and proud of my running and weight loss that when they heard about the issues I was having they thought an early Birthday/Christmas present would help with my upcoming marathon training.  So I just wanted to say Thank You both so much for your support, not just now but for everything you have done and/or sacrificed for me over the years.  

     Ok now back to the watch, I am not going to do a full product review with all the tech specs, there are plenty of those online just Google it.  I spent Saturday night reading the quick start instruction and getting it set up. I was amazed how quickly the GPS locked on; I was sitting inside my house and I had a full strength connection in no more than a second or two.  I like how there are two data screens that you can layout with up to three data points on each.  You can also set it to continuously rotate through those screens, but I haven’t tried that yet.  Out of all the features this watch comes with the one that excited me the most was the vibrate alert (#).  With my Nike watch it would only beep when I crossed each mile, but I am always wearing headphones and never hear it, so I constantly have to look at my watch.  With my Garmin I set it up to beep/vibrate when I hit each mile, which especially helps at the end of my runs so I will know when to shut it down without having to break stride to monitor the watch.  I also love the Bluetooth capabilities and the ability to upload your run almost immediately afterwards for analysis.  So far I only have one negative and its a super minor one, the limited color combination choices is annoying to me.  The 220 only comes in white with purple trim or black with red trim, which is the one I got, and the 620 comes in white with orange trim or black with blue trim.  If I had my choice I would have gotten the white with orange or black with blue trim but I can live with black and red.

     I got to head out Sunday and take the watch for a spin, and all I can really say is, wow it was nice.  It didn’t feel heavy on my wrist and again I wasn’t even out my door and I already had satellite signal.  I did a simple 4 mile loop just so I could get use to it and play with the features.
     I did find that I had to re-adjust the data fields; I had the elapsed time showing vs. the lap or mile time which I prefer.   The big test for me on the accuracy of the watch came this morning when I did a 4 mile out and back run.  All my previous out and back runs with my Nike watch were off by as much as a couple hundred yards.  I would assume that if I start at a line, ran till the watch said two miles, turned right around and came back to that line, it should be four miles.  Well with my Nike I was going past that line every time and most of the time it was by a large amount.  Well today’s test landed me at the 4 mile mark within 3-5 feet of the line, which if that trend continues then I will have to say this watch is pretty damn accurate.

     I will continue to play with it (#) and get all the setting just where I want them but my first impressions are so good that I feel like I wasted a year of my life with the Nike watch.  It also made me wonder how many extra miles I ended up running as a result of the Nike’s low accuracy.