Breaking the Wall

Tue, Dec 02, 2008

Tue, 02 Dec 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. Total of 10 miles. Ran the warm-up with Dustin and Derek. Then they turned around and ran back. I went a bit further, and then ran my 2.5 mile tempo.

Total time: 13:43.9

Course: From Utah Lake to Geneva Road.

Splits by quarter: 81, 82, 82, 82, 82, 82, 83, 83, 84, 82

Subjective: Probably the most even I've ever run this adjusted for the terrain. However, for the life of me could not go any faster. Felt that my power was coming from what I would describe as a compact stride.

This made me think of a Russian math joke. First, some definitions. A set is considered closed if every sequence in that set that converges to a limit contains that limit. A set is considered bounded, well, if it has boundaries specific to the nature of the beast. In a one-dimensional space (a line of real numbers) the boundaries would be a lower bound number and an upper bound number. In a two-dimensional space (XY plane) the boundaries would be a rectangle. In 3-D a rectangular ...

Mon, Dec 01, 2008

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. 10.1 mostly alone in 1:15:01. Caught up to Yvonne, an old friend of ours from our BYU ward 12 years ago, slowed down to chat, we ran to our house so she could see Sarah and the kids.

P.M. 1 with Julia in 10:19, 2 with Benjamin in 17:15, Jenny ran the first 1.5 in 13:16 with us. Julia rode along for part of it on a bike.

Sun, Nov 30, 2008

Sun, 30 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

Day of rest. Went to church. Looked at our missionary board. We have 10 full-time missionaries in the field from our stake. What is interesting is that three come from one family, and three more come from our Spanish branch. I cannot help but think it means something, but I cannot quite figure out what this means. Church average is about 20 per stake.

Sat, Nov 29, 2008

Sat, 29 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. 12 miles with Jeff in 1:34:35. Stomach has not worked since yesterday afternoon so I have not been eating much. This entire run felt like the last 6 miles of St. George. 8:00 pace was a challenge. Focusing on the positive, stomach flu helps save on food.

P.M. 1 with Julia in 10:47, 2 with Benjamin in 17:47, Jenny ran 1.5 with us in 13:18.

Fri, Nov 28, 2008

Fri, 28 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. 10.25 with Jeff in 1:22:59. Felt tightness in the left hamstring. I actually like it when the hamstrings hurt. I had tight hamstrings after my best races.

P.M. 1 with Julia in 10:44, 2 with Benjamin in 16:46, Jenny ran 1.5 with us in 12:55. Julia rode along on a bike.

Thu, Nov 27, 2008

Thu, 27 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. Earn Your Turkey 4 miler in Orem. 21:22.6, 10th place.

Today was a special day. Everybody in our family except Sarah and William ran. I ran first. We had a fast field. The start was very fast. I worked through the pack until I found Stephen Clark pacing Shaine Kirtright, and tucked in behind them. The mile markers were off. For the record, my time at the first mile marker was 5:06, but it was short. 5:30 at the official 3 mile mark which we would hit on the next lap again, and the it was really supposed to be 3 miles, but I knew already it was in the wrong place. I caught a split at the four triangles for 1.25, and it was 6:40. Now that made sense. 2 mile split officially in 10:41, I think that one was right.

Then around 2 miles Shaine started struggling, Stephen started yelling at him, and I passed them and surged to catch Gamechu, a high school runner that immigrated from Ethiopia. Caught him, he surged and dropped me, but I was able to pull back up. Tucked in behind him as ...

Wed, Nov 26, 2008

Wed, 26 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. Ran with Jeff, Dustin, and Derek. Dustin and Derek went 8, Jeff and I added 2 more. Total time 1:14:47. I overdressed at the top.

P.M. 1 with Julia in 10:32. 2 with Benjamin in 16:50. Jenny ran the first 1.5 in 12:49.

Tue, Nov 25, 2008

Tue, 25 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. Ran with Tyler. He is a business/finance major so it was fun to talk to him about the economy. We did quarters. I did 5, he did 10. 200 meter recovery between all.

Times: 69.4, 70.3, 69.4, 69.8, 69.4

Subjective: Consistent, quick recovery, faster than last week, but still slow. They all felt hard, like in all honesty I could not do them any faster even with infinite rest. Question - is the problem in the power, or in the turnover? If turnover I need to run downhill. Otherwise uphill.

Total distance - 10 miles.

P.M. 1 with Julia in 10:42, 2 with Benjamin in 17:35, Jenny ran the first 1.5 in 13:15.

Mon, Nov 24, 2008

Mon, 24 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. 10 miles alone in 1:11:56. Still feeling stoked about the economy.

P.M. 1 with Julia in 11:29, 2 with Benjamin in 17:47, Jenny ran the first 1.5 in 13:27.

Sun, Nov 23, 2008

Sun, 23 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

Day of rest. Went to church.

Sat, Nov 22, 2008

Sat, 22 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. Tempo run with Jeff. Did some bushwhacking on the warm-up trying to find a alternative route to having to run on 820 N and Geneva road. Found a one-way solution of sorts, but it was not viable - too much hole crawling and fence climbing. Total of 2.75 for the warm-up.

Tempo run. Usual course - the 2.5 mile stretch between Geneva Road and the Utah Lake, out and back twice/(three times for Jeff). The plan was 10 for me, 15 for Jeff. After I am done with my 10, join Jeff at his 13.5 and try to run as far as I could at his pace. The workout had different purposes for each of us. For Jeff - develop fuel storage capabilities. For me - learn to fight neural fatigue.

Total time: 55:59 - new course PR by 39 seconds.

Splits:

by mile: 5:43 - 5:36 - 5:38 - 5:34 - 5:38 - 5:28 - 5:41 - 5:33 - 5:31 - 5:37

by 2.5: 14:08 - 14:01 - 13:54 - 13:56

by 5: 28:09 - 27:50

Subjective:

This was a breakthrough run. I was not expecting it. I have difficulty understanding where ...

Fri, Nov 21, 2008

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. 10 miles in 1:12:33, first 8 with Dustin and Derek.

P.M. 1 with Julia in 11:05, 2 with Benjamin in 16:49, Jenny ran 1.5 with us in 12:45.

Thu, Nov 20, 2008

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. Ran alone. I got a feel of what it's like to not have the trail. A portion of the trail was blocked due to construction, so I had to take a detour for about 1.2 miles and deal with cars on 820 N and Geneva Road. This reminded me that I should be thankful for where I live.

Did 4x400 on the trail - 70.9, 70.7, 69.8, 70.0 - 200 recovery between the first three, then 400. Was originally planning the 5th 400 but because I was hitting them so slow and could not go any faster decided to break the last one into 2x200. Did them in 33.1 and 33.4. Fast speed was not happening today, but it was not as bad as a few weeks ago when I could not break 72.

Felt like the stride was not explosive enough and did not feel good control over the legs in general. Like if I had to write with my feet it would have produced the doctor's level of illegibility even if adjusted for the expected hand-foot legibility gap.

200 with Jacob in 1:41 (new record), and 0.34 with Joseph in 4:09.

P.M. 1 with Julia ...

Wed, Nov 19, 2008

Wed, 19 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. 10 miles in 1:18:28, first 7 with Jeff. Ran a tempo mile in 5:29 just because - the legs felt a bit feisty and I decided to give them a shake.

Discussed a new economic concept I have thought of. Perhaps it is not new, just plain common sense, but I do not see it discussed very often. They talk about inflation, price index, GDP, (un)employment rate, etc, but I find those measurements rather removed from real life. Example - we say that creating new jobs is good, but removing jobs is bad. By that definition, if one could completely automate the production of life necessities and conveniences that would be bad because a lot of jobs would be lost. We are producing and buying from each other a lot of gimmicky junk, this raises our GDP. If increased GDP is what we are after, producing more junk is good. When we try to spend less time producing the gimmicky junk and more time with our families, GDP goes down, so that is bad.

So I wanted to have a different set of metrics and came up with ...

Tue, Nov 18, 2008

Tue, 18 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. Ran alone. Did the 2.5 tempo run. Ran a 4.12 mile warm-up.

Tempo run:

Course: As usual, from Utah Lake gate to Geneva. Slight net uphill, mostly in the last mile.

Total time: 13:46.5

Splits by 0.5: 2:43 - 2:44 - 2:44 - 2:48 - 2:47.

Subjective: At 1 mile felt the legs were moving quick, but not quick enough. Some components of quickness were present, but others were absent. Felt stuck in the 84 second per quarter gear on the last mile. Did not feel too bad, but just could not go any faster. In fact, the pace felt hard from the beginning, but I hoped it was just cold weather, that I would warm up eventually. The run went on, it did not get any harder, but it did not get any easier either.

On the cool down I saw a runner moving at a decent speed, and ran about 0.35 at a tempo pace to catch up. Got to meet him - his name is Drew Johnson. I remembered that I'd run with him once before, and I correctly remembered that he was a math major at BYU. I gave him my ...

Mon, Nov 17, 2008

Mon, 17 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. 10.1 with Derek and Dustin in 1:11:53. Discussed a number of subjects - mainly automaker bailout, and cross-country racing. My thoughts on the automaker bailout are that they have been making way too many cars and have been overpricing them on top of it. I think we would all benefit from a law that would force the insurance damage payouts limited to $20K or so on any car. If somebody wants to have a luxury car, and it gets totaled, let him absorb the cost. Also, tax anything above that really high, e.g. 100%. Basically, pass a set of laws that encourages meeting the needs while punishing excessive wants. Good luck with that in our culture of "I want the best, and I want it now", but I think that would help the automakers in the long run a lot more than the bailout. They WILL find ways to make most cars so that they sell for less than $20K. Of course, the market might force them to do that anyway if we just do nothing to bail them out.

Took Jacob for 200 meters - untimed.

P.M. 1 ...

Sun, Nov 16, 2008

Sun, 16 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

Day of rest. Went to church. The sacrament meeting talks were on living the gospel of Jesus Christ vs following the rules of the Church as part of the culture.

Sat, Nov 15, 2008

Sat, 15 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. Ran with Nick. This morning all of my watches were not functional. Suunto T4 died - probably dead battery. Garmin 305 refused to boot. So I had Nick tell me the splits.

We did a warm-up, 15 mile tempo, then a cool-down. Total of 20 miles.

I think Nick accidentally stopped his watch during the first quarter, so I am going to add 7 seconds to adjust for that to the relevant splits and total time.

Total time - 1:27:10 (5:48.67 avg).

Splits by 2.5 (yes we did it on the standard course, 6 times on the same stretch of the trail from Geneva to the Utah Lake turnaround):

14:33 - 14:29 - 14:05 - 14:25 - 14:28 - 15:10

Subjective: At first it felt hard. Then I tucked behind Nick and he mesmerized me with his rhythm. He picked up the pace, and I was able to handle it. We were going faster than 5:40 and it did not feel unbearable. Then around 8 miles into it I started struggling and asked Nick to back off. Was able to hold around 5:45 pace for a while until 11. Then ...

Fri, Nov 14, 2008

Fri, 14 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. Ran alone. 10.1 in 1:08:53. A little faster today for a rather odd reason. I was feeling stoked about the economy, of all things. Yes, I am excited. Hard to explain the reasons, but I am just stoked. I feel I know something to be excited about even if I cannot quite formulate it. Maybe I should try and it will come out.

Our economy has been a huge wasteful behemoth . Collectively as a nation we produce mostly junk. Junk food, overpriced cars, frivolous law suits, overcomplicated laws most people cannot understand without the help of a professional whose sole expertise is in studying those laws, multi-level marketing schemes, over-hyped gimmicks of various kinds, you name it. Only maybe 10-20% of our collective what we do goes towards something that truly honestly contributes to life quality. The rest we would not only be able to do without, much of it we would be better off without.

So with the recent "crisis" we are being forced to normalize the economy. If all of our car ...

Thu, Nov 13, 2008

Thu, 13 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. Ran with Derek and Dustin. We did 5x400 on the trail.

Times:

70.1 - 67.8 - 67.8 - 67.5 - 69.0

Recovery: 200 jog between the first three, after that 400 jog.

Subjective: Compared to last week, the effort was the same, but was able to hit faster times. Decided to increase the rest after 3 repeats to make sure the remaining two would stay faster. However, I still faded on the last one. Regardless of how fast we went I had my breathing back to normal in 30 seconds. The intensity of breathing during the repeat appeared to correlate with how fast I ran it, but the perceived effort did not. The last 200 meters of the last repeat felt very similar to the last half mile of the tempo run on Tuesday.

Ran a cool down to make the total 10 miles.

My original plan was to increase to 8 repetitions once I am able to do 4 averaging under 70, which I accomplished today. However, I decided to revise the plan. Instead, work on getting those as fast as possible. First under 67, ...

Wed, Nov 12, 2008

Wed, 12 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. Easy 10, first 7 with Jeff. Total time 1:21:11. Of all things discussed civil unions. My argument is that if we do allow civil unions with benefits, then two or more people living together should not have to engage in the "alternative behavior" described by Leviticus 18:22 in order to form the union and receive the benefits. E.g. two guys finish running for college and decide to try to run professionally. One year one trains full-time, the other works and trains when he can, then they trade. They share an apartment and kitchen duties to save costs. One should be able to put the other on his health insurance.

P.M. 1 with Julia in 10:26. 2 with Benjamin in 18:00. Jenny ran the first 1.5 in 13:23. 200 with Jacob in 1:52.

Tue, Nov 11, 2008

Tue, 11 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. Ran with Tyler, Derek, and Dustin Williams, Derek's friend and athletic trainer at BYU. Tyler and I did the standard 5 mile tempo. Derek and Dustin ran the warm-up with us.

My original plan was to do only the second half of the tempo, but Tyler persuaded me to do the whole 5.

Total time: 27:46.4

Splits: 5:30 - 5:30 - 5:37 - 5:34 - 5:35.

By half: 13:48 - 13:58

Subjective/Descriptive: 5:30 pace for the whole 5 was rather ambitious given that last week I barely managed 5:29 for 2.5, no nap on Sunday or Monday, leaves, and a wet road. Nevertheless we decided to go out at 5:30 and see what happens. We hit every half mile on the dot for the first 2 miles. The first mile felt a bit aggressive. Second mile felt good, just perfect. Third mile at first felt too good and then it started feeling hard, about 0.25 before 180 turn, and even harder afterwards. I tucked behind Tyler, and the fourth mile felt a bit better, but still not enough to take a turn upfront and lead pursuit ...

Mon, Nov 10, 2008

Mon, 10 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. Easy 10.1 alone in 1:09:55. The temperatures were cold, but not freezing. Very runnable, although my feet started getting wet towards the end. Almost ran into an uncovered drainage opening in the last mile. Somebody had lifted the cover and had not put it back. So this gave me a chance for some small weight training exercise putting it back on. Surprisingly it did not take me very long - handy tasks, even very simple, often take me a lot longer than they should.

P.M. 1 with Julia in 9:03, 2 with Benjamin in 17:06, Jenny ran the first 1.5 in 13:14.

Sun, Nov 09, 2008

Sun, 09 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

Day of rest. Went to church. Counted the kids during the Sacrament meeting to make sure everyone was still there. Then I thought of the hymn Count Your Blessings and realized I was literally counting my blessings. Every child is a blessing and I now have 6 of them. Then a short while later one blessing (Jacob) escaped and I had to chase him.

As luck or perhaps God's will would have it, I got to teach both in Sunday School and in the Elder's Quorum. The lesson in Sunday School was on the plan of salvation, and in the Elder's Quorum on knowledge.

Sat, Nov 08, 2008

Sat, 08 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. Ran with Jeff, Tyler, Michelle, and Julie Esplin. Jeff and I did the standard 10 mile tempo. Tyler and Julie ran easy. Michelle did some mile repeats with us during the tempo.

The tempo went better than I expected. 56:38.9 for the whole thing, which is actually a 3 second course/workout PR. Splits:

5:47 - 5:42 - 5:40 - 5:46 - 5:44 - 5:37 - 5:40 - 5:31 - 5:37 - 5:34

By 2.5: 14:20 - 14:19 - 14:04 - 13:55

By half: 28:39 - 27:59

Subjective/Descriptive:

Started out slow on purpose to not kill Michelle. Too slow - 91 the first quarter. I warned Jeff about overcorrection, so the next one was 87. After that Jeff just let it loose, but Michelle made it with us to 1.25 in 7:13.

After the first 2.5 I thought I'd be lucky to keep the pace. But then 4 miles into it things did not get any worse. During the second half of the tempo Jeff pressed harder, but I was not too miserable at first. I just tucked in behind him and tried to zone out. He had an ...

Fri, Nov 07, 2008

Fri, 07 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. 10.1 alone in 1:14:32. Did a 0.5 pickup in the middle in 2:42 (82,80). Felt decent.

P.M. 200 with Jacob in 1:56, 0.34 with Joseph in 3:44. 1 with Julia in 9:49. 2 with Benjamin in 17:19, Jenny ran 1.5 in 13:09 with us.

Thu, Nov 06, 2008

Thu, 06 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. Ran with Derek. Learned from him that M-16/AK-47 effective range is 500 meters, but a stray bullet can kill you from as far away as 800 meters. This made me remember some dark Russian humor: The optimist is studying English, the pessimist is studying Chinese, but a realist is studying AK-47.

We did 5x400 with 200 jog rest. Splits: 71.8, 69.9, 69.3, 69.1, 71.1. Derek hit around 67 in the last 3. I was happy with how it went. Even though it was cold, and we had some leaves on the ground, this is the fastest I've done this workout since St. George.

Dropped Derek off at 8 miles, ran 2 more to make it 10. Then ran/walked with Jacob - 200 meters in 2:01.

P.M. 2 with Benjamin and Jenny in 17:50. 0.34 with Joseph in 3:39. 1 with Julia in 10:29.

Wed, Nov 05, 2008

Wed, 05 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. We got our first snow. However, it started during the run, and I was wearing Five Fingers. Got to experience the snow. It was rather cold, but not as bad as I anticipated. Ran the first 6 miles with Jeff, the rest on my own. Discussed politics. 1:25:12 for 10 miles, got beat by a boltushka, I suppose we deserve that since we've been talking the whole time.

P.M. 2 with Benjamin in 17:05, Jenny ran the first 1.5 in 13:09. Took the Fast Running Van to get the the tail blinker fixed, they found literally a hornet's nest under the light cover. Wasps made a nest there.

P.M-2. 1 with Julia in 10:03. 200 with Jacob in 2:08.

Tue, Nov 04, 2008

Tue, 04 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. Tempo run with Derek and Tyler. During the 4.12 warm-up talked about the economy, what affects the cost of living, and to what extent is the government regulation of the free market necessary. My thoughts. Comparing free market to a race. No individual competitor should be unfairly aided or hampered by the race officials. However, strict rules are needed to make sure nobody cheats. If you trip or punch somebody, cut the course, ride part of the race on a bike or in a car, use roller blades, poison a competitor before the start, or do something of that nature you are disqualified. If a famous runner is struggling and falls behind we do not give him a ride to catch up to the leaders or to be back on pace.

Then we ran the 2.5 in 13:42.1. The rough plan was 5:30 pace and we beat him by 3 seconds. I drafted behind Derek and Tyler most of the way. The splits were mostly unavailable due to the trail being heavily covered with leaves. We got our first split at 0.435 - 2:28. About 4 seconds off ...

Mon, Nov 03, 2008

Mon, 03 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

A.M. 10.1 alone in 1:09:58. Yes, I like to beat the 1:10 guy when it is close. The sleep and a day of rest yesterday seemed to help. Felt energized from the start. Decided to measure the depth of it. Ran 1 K in 3:22 over a fairly thick layer of leaves in the middle.

Ran 200 with Jacob in 1:44.

For some odd reason I got interested in the demographics of Denmark. I think if I had the patience to deal with the academic bureaucracy and our cost of living relative to income had not been so high I might have even become a sociologist. But I am somewhat satisfied with programming for a living and studying sociology as an amateur. In any case, I found this link:

http://www.denmark.dk/en/menu/About-Denmark/The-Danes/Population/ThePost1967Period/

And the following statements:

The last 30 years of the 20th century showed a far-reaching change in the demographical ...

Sun, Nov 02, 2008

Sun, 02 Nov 2008 05:00:00 +0100

Day of rest. Slept nearly 11 hours. This shows the severity of the neural fatigue yesterday.
Went to church. Had a meeting afterwards. Went to a baptism in the Spanish branch in the evening.