Zenit-E

Every now and then you encounter an indescructible force. Something that seems like it will last forever, or at a minimum, it will out last you. I've found a few of these things along the way. One is a plaid shirt I received as a Christmas gift when I was 19. I still have it, it looks exactly the same as it did 31 years ago. The buttons were replaced but that's all. Properly made polyester can withstand a nuclear holocaust.

Another is my Zenit-E 35mm camera. Pumped out of a former Soviet Union factory to the tune of some 12 million units, these 1 kilo bricks were the workhorse of photography in many an overseas country. I had wanted so bad to have a proper 35mm single lens reflex camera when I was young. People would take such great pictures with them. Load them up with professional looking small canisters of film and display lengthy exotic 35mm negative strips.

My camera at the time was a Kodak X15 Instamatic that accepted (rather expensive) Magicube flash blubs. They were bigger than standard bulbs, never required batteries, and triggered from a small metal spring that ignited a lightly explosive powder and caused the bulb to essentially 'blow up' inside. Don't ever drop these suckers, as they would become quickly useless if you did.

K-Mart had in it's display case in it's camera department a nifty looking black and silver slender SLR camera, marked as a Zenit-E. It was made from a single cast aluminum housing, with a long rectangular window in the front (which turned out to be the light meter) and the usual array of buttons and dials that marked a handheld 35mm SLR camera. True TTL viewing and return action mirror. However, this unit had a flaw. The stock Helios 44-2 lens had small but obvious bubbles in the main lens element. A customer who was checking it out just before me and my mom got there had noticed it. The sales guy was going to pack it up and return it to the distributer, but we talked him into cutting a few dollars off the price and I got my camera. In retrospect, the lens was half the camera's value so it wasn't a great deal.

As the Zenit was equipped with M42/1 thread mount, lenses were readily available, and rather cheaply as bayonet mounts were far more popular than the screw mount of the Zenit. I picked up a pair of prime lenses at a photo shop for 50 bucks, a very fast Pentax 55/1.8 and a 135/2.8 Haminex. The Pentax lens is excellent in quality, the Haminex also pretty good, and at 135mm makes a great portrait lens.

Zenit-E outfitted with Hanimex 135mm/f2.8 lens


The Zenit carried me until 1985, when I could afford an update and purchased a Minolta X-700, which was Minolta's top offering on an SLR. Fully automatic, the Minolta was an excellent camera although prone to problems in the mechanisms. It's been repaired once and, if I really felt the need to reload a film camera, it would need a second repair to correct the lens speed sensor. The Zenit was in the shop once to fix a faulty shutter blind that blocked out the far right portion of each frame. This was quite long ago and it's worked flawlessly since. I take it out from time to time and run the mechanisms to keep them from ceasing up.

I'm thinking of dropping by Henry's and pick up a roll of film just for the hell of it. I'm sure the film and processing will cost more than the Zenit is actually worth (as it often goes on Ebay for about 10 bucks), but it would be worth it to see what comes out of it. If not at least to see what anyone might think seeing me using it.

An ode to the junkie

8 years ago I stumbled across the Kickrunning site while looking for weight training info for runners. I created an ID and signed on and soon was posting to the boards. Kickrunning became merged with Coolrunning and eventually bought out by Active.com. While the boards prospered as kick and cool, the boards were drastically changed for Active and most of the regulars disbanded to other sites.

For over 8 years we've chatted and posted our thoughts and training. We've met each other at races and get togethers, most didn't hide behind the guise of an arbitrary user name.

Joe came on the boards about 5 or so years ago, he was a heavy guy, built like a tank with long dreadlocks and a penchant for extreme fighting events (and he competed in some events too). But he was also a kind and gentle man, who would literally give you the shirt off his back if he felt you needed more than he.

Posting as VoodooJunkie, his size and larger than life attitude made him quickly popular on the forms. He didn't hide behind his ID, he gave details of himself and his life and didn't hesitate to show up at as many events and social happenings as he could. I never met him, those that did could only have the most positive things to say, any who did were instantly his friend.

Despite his size he pushed himself in running, completing many road and trail marathons, always wanting to bring his time down, doing his best in Chicago last year with a 3:40:30.

Late Thursday he posted his last run report, doing 20 miles in 3 hours, 3 minutes and 39 seconds on a humid sticky evening. On Friday, Joe was gone. His workplace posted this article to say he died from heart failure. Perhaps his penchant for burgers (he's competed in many a burger eating contest, and has won more often than not) couldn't be offset enough by the miles he's put in. We'll likely never know.

Joe was a good one. He made the virtual space and the real space a more enjoyable place. I hadn't conversed with him in a long time as he moved over to Kickrunners while I've been on the CHRunners site, both sprung up from the demise of Coolrunning. But I was always amazed at his tenacity and desire to give it his all whatever he did, there was no middle ground.

So long Voodoo



Alive is a good start to the day. Take it from there

My heel hurts

but just when I walk.

Ah summer running, the sights, the smells, the piles of garbage

Yes, it's the continuation of the city outside workers strike. The parking lot just below my training hill has an 8 foot high fence around it and a very neat pile of garbage constituting it's holdings. It's nicely done actually, every bag doubled up (or else you get to take it home and try it again), nothing torn or badly leaking. Even downwind from it, it's not too bad.

Our continuing cool summer has a lot to do with it, the baggy contents of the garbage piles aren't getting the opportunity to ferment in the heat like the last strike. The backyard pool is feeling the thermal pinch, and a lack of attention as a result (good thing I have a chlorine generator on it, otherwise I'd probably have drained it by now), but the plants and flowers have been thrilled by it all. Driving to work and running at lunchtime, the aroma of flora is almost overpowering. Back in the city the flowers and the garbage piles are basically cancelling each other out. If summer should suddenly decide to descend on us, it might be a different story.

Still struggling with scheduling. Did 7ish this morning and 5 more at noon, and I'd like to keep that trend going. Early rise tomorrow morning as I have a major task to do (demolish and rebuild a small porch) that will take the whole day so I want to get my run in bright and early or else it won't happen. Not sure how Sunday will fare, it all depends on how much of a toll Saturday takes out of me.

Press on.

Stabilty? Yet?

57 miles in 6 days over 10 runs. Some level of consistency going on.

A strike by Toronto city outside workers is creating lots of summertime havoc in the area. Summer has started both officially and atmospherically as we are finally breaking 80's for daytime highs.

The local outdoor community pool has been undergoing renovations for the last two years. The work began two years ago with a hired contracting group, which dismantled the the changerooms and storage area for renovation, took the money, dissolved the company and left a hideous looking parts trailer on the grounds. A hot summer goes by with no relief for most of the locals, and a new group is brought in to finish the job. This goes on last summer with the pool remaining closed while a new pool heating system, handicapped accessibility ramp, revamped buildings and a kiddie splash area are all put into place. The pool was filled, open for two days, the closed and drained when the outside workers strike began on Monday.

Accessibility to Toronto Islands is impaired as ferry service is halted. Garbage collection is stopped, and finally...worst of all...the local race schedules are in jeopardy as many are held in city maintained parks, and the outside workers strike has put the kabosh on that. My real concern now is whether the water fountains in the park will be running. I assume the washrooms will be locked up but surely they could have left the taps on.

Luckily we just had garbage collection at our homestead so we have maybe a bit more leaway than others may have had (garbage collection alternates with recycle pickup on alternate weeks so garbage bins fill for 2 weeks before being emptied). The picketers are blocking access to the transfer stations, which normally stay open by management staff even during strikes, which is causing more problems. In the past pickets couldn't be set up at the transfer stations for legal reasons.

Now, all of that sounds pretty nasty for a hot summer. To cap things off, we narrowly averted a strike by the LCBO which controls the booze outlets (brew drinkers, don't panic! This doesn't affect The Beer Store!).

At any rate, my schedule has settled down a bit and I've managed to get daily doubles in on weekdays. I'm keeping it light with 4-5 milers every morning and at noon. If I can discipline myself to a proper bedtime I should be able to get 7 each morning which gives me a potential 60 weekday miles, plus weekend runs.

With luck, the strike will end after I've accumulated a good quantity of mileage and I can return to the local park race series with intentions of holding no prisoners.

Hello Summer

Are you out there?

Not here, not yet. Good running conditions if you like it cool.

My log's in tatters (or taters? I dunno). Work has been keeping me busy the last week and cold windy conditions (and a ton of yard work to do) kept me home on long run Sunday. Last night I was still awake at 2 as my daughter was up late getting some school work finished, which left me cutting ZZZzzzssss.... until I had to get up.

Anyway, I did manage 5 this afternoon, a measily 2 yesterday morning and none in the afternoon. If I can squeeze in a couple this evening I will but not much hope for that. I just need to bed it early tonight and force my eyes open in the AM.

I know the plan, I know the schedule, like that back of my hand. And, as always, implementing the sucker is being a beotch. 4-5 easy Monday AM, 4-5 easy Noon. 5-6 up-paced Tues morning, 4-5 easy at noon. Wednesday hills or intervals, 4-5 easy at noon. Thursday mid long, another 4 easy at noon. Friday 4-6 easy AM, 4-6 easy at noon. Saturday trail or tempo. Sunday long.

It's not hard, it's manageable. It's just finding the bloody time, not just for the run itself but the time away from that to be prepped for it, like getting to the sack at 10ish, clearing my morning work by noon.

Even now the phone rings, I have to close up and head to the beach for my daughter's soccer game. That'll push dinner to later and then by the time dinner's settled down the tubes it'll be bedtime.

I'll get this moving yet. It's got to start in the evening, bed on time, up with the early alarm. I'd love to have the full hour in the AM, which would bring me to ~7 miles each morning, and tack on at least 4 at noon. Even that would be a sealed 11 a day through the week and then the weekend work.

Le's go dude...get 'er done.

Fast runners coming to Toronto

Thursday, June 11th, is the inaugural Festival of Excellence event to be held here at University of Toronto's Varsity Centre Stadium, a beautiful and intimate field in the uptown core near Bay and Bloor. The complex is recently renovated with a striking blue synthetic track and 5000 seat grandstand. Standing room only tickets for this event are $25 dollars while grandstand seating ranges from $50 (obstructed view seats) to $110 dollars, with finish line seats at $160 and finish area (whatever that means) at $250.

The depth of this field gets richer by the day. 100m and 200m WR holder Usain Bolt will be competing in the 100m against the likes of Shawn Crawford and Ivory Williams. The 400m sports our own Tyler Christopher and LeShawn Merritt while the mens 5000 meters has 3 sub-13 entries in Saif Shaheen, Boniface Kiprop and Ahmad Abdullah. Lists for the women's events have yet to be posted.

I think I'd like to go. I better get tickets soon or be stuck with bad seating. I think the $75 grandstand seating would be a steal for an event of this calibre, and who knows when we'll see this kind of talent in Toronto (or even Canada) again, barring winning an Olympic bid.

Sharepoint and Infopath

A departure from the usual running related info.

In my real daytime job I write code. The platform for the last few years has been web related code and I'm currently writing against MOSS 2007 (Sharepoint) and Infopath. We're using Infopath as the means to access content since it's easily modifiable by customers without the need for a development environment. This implies, unfortunately, that's it's not a development environment itself.

Infopath has been around a little while, it lets users create forms for use with workflows and a way of entering metadata with documents. It's matched with Sharepoint's document modelling and they two go hand in hand. If you install Infopath 2007, you can create and modify forms for your company and they're easily deployed and maintained using Sharepoint central administration.

What it doesn't do well at all is allow designing a form in one environment and deploying it to another. As a software developer, this is what I do all the time. This is the whole gist of enterprise level development. I've been saddled with the task of wrenching what I can out of these forms for the last couple of years. If I'd known what I was getting myself into, I would have gladly handed this over to another member of our team.

Infopath is an ad-hoc tool. You have an installation already, you create and deploy forms on it for users to use. It's architected this way, this is it's basic design. In the past, Infopath forms and templates were comparable to Word documents and Excel spreadsheets in that you really need the installed client to use them, and with Infopath you don't have any other way of using them, the technology is proprietary. To ease the customer burden, Microsoft took advantage of XSLT technology as a way of being able to render form content in a web browser. The introduction of Infopath forms services grants access to forms and form content through the browser. There's some tradeoffs with this, and this is where the fun begins.

First off, once designed in the browser, more than half the functionality of Infopath disappears. Many usable controls won't work in the browser, dynamic access to the document model is suddenly restricted. HTML is stateless and therefore the dynamic interplay of form and host goes out the window.

Secondly, the introduction of forms services inherently creates it's own tier in the architecture. This brings the dreaded NTLM double-hop restriction into clear play. As most deployments of forms and forms services will be in such environments of at least 2 tiers, virtually everyone who's ever implemented Infopath through forms services has encountered this problem.

As a bonus, data connection errors in Infopath are displayed to the user as the completely useless 5566 error, which claims an error has been logged in the event viewer (which is a lie, unless you've explicitly written errors to the event viewer yourself in the web services you may be hitting, or not) and gives virutally no detail on what went wrong. To troubleshoot, you need to peruse IIS and Sharepoint logs to see what happened. This doesn't always work because sometimes the call never makes it to the actual server, so you have nothing to go by. And don't think you can just bring up native Infopath to help (as Infopath will display the actually error encountered), because almost always the problem will not occur in native Infopath with it's direct calls to the web services, thus avoiding double-hop scenarios.

To help alleviate the problems, data connection files can play the role of intermediary between Infopath, forms services and the service layers you're trying to reach. It doesn't necessarily solve them, but it at least gives you a fighting chance of getting things to work. For starters, you can add explicit credentials to the connection files (bad idea from a security standpoint, but it usually will work). Or you can leverage some back end help in the form of Single sign on, Kerberos authentication, or forms services proxy. The forms services proxy is a bit of a mystery, there's tons of info telling you how to enable it and get the forms to use it, but squat explaining what it actually does from within. Kerberos ain't all that welcome either as it and Infopath don't seem to get along very well, as we're now discovering in our rollouts. It's less about Infopath in this case and more about web services, but you have few options on how to access server content in Infopath without web services. You'll find that you'll need to go back to Visual Studio to make your web services Kerberos friendly before this option is viable.

I can only recommend to anyone out there that's planning on using these tools that they should do their homework first. There's much more information available than when I started, and I sure could have used the information in the links below when I started this. Good luck, you'll need it.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms771995.aspx
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc704269.aspx
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms772101.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/infopath/archive/2006/10/02/Data-Connections-in-Browser-Forms.aspx
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb787184.aspx#ip2007AdvancedServerSideAuthentication_UsingtheSingleSignonService

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms464040.aspx

http://www.thenewmossness.com/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=19

Mississauga Half Marathon

1:33:02

I'm good with that. I'd figured on a 1:35 based on my training. My 5k on Wednesday evening gave me some hope for a better finish. It's hard to say if that race impacted my finish today. I was glad for the hard workout which let me get a better feel for the effort and I could handle breathing harder as a result. On the downside my quads were a bit sore throughout the race but honestly never became a problem. Were I doing the full, I'm sure it really would have shown up, but I could handle it over the half.

This was about 5 seconds faster than I had run this course 2 years ago. I wasn't in great shape then either, so maybe with a little work I can reclaim a PR here next year, even though I'll be in a new age bracket then. It was nice to see the sub 22 opening 5k, despite being into the wind, and being able to keep in the 22's the whole race. In case anyone else ran this and didn't notice, the 10k sign is about 250 meters past the actual 10k split point.

All and all, a good effort. A bit chilly down there, but good for running the half. I'm curious how those doing the full handled that N/W wind.

1 day, 14 hours, 24 minutes, 12 seconds

So it says on the banner when I navigated to the Mississauga Marathon main page.

I've done Mississauga 3 times. I ran the inaugural run, doing the half marathon, finishing in 86th place of 1907 participants. If memory serves me right (and that would be rare), I believe the 10k didn't finish at the same location the half and full did in the first year. So that puts me as one of the first hundred people to ever cross that finish line.

The second run was the full in 2005, and got me a ticket to Boston. I last ran it in 2007, doing the half and a reasonable 1:33ish finish. This year I'm not so sure what to expect. My longs are in the 14-16 mile category and run nearly every week, I've been trying to sustain that all important mid week mid long. Bigger weeks as of late (50s and 60s) have me tired on my longs, but the pace hasn't reflected it as I've been able to run 16 in the mid 8's, even though I've been trying to keep them easy. My 5k race on Wednesday (or, more accurately, my 4.7k race) was run at about a 6:40/mile pace, so that shows some pace improvement as spring moves on. It's not a matter of getting faster, it's a matter of being able to hold the pace that seems to improve when the miles get up there.

I skip this race every other year mainly due to the timing. It falls on Mother's day, and I can't exactly make that day for me every year for obvious reasons. It would be nice if they could move it by a weekend, then I could make it my late spring staple. Or maybe I could have Mother's day moved?

Anyway, for the others that are making the trek to Miserysauga on Saturday and Sunday, good luck to all!

My First Win!

If you're a runner, you can't help but fantasize about barrelling down the finishing straight, a multitude of spectators wildly applauding as you break the finish line tap, your arms raised in glorious victory and hoards of runners start filing in behind you, each relegated to serving their personal goals rather than that big one.

So let's first make a few adjustments.

There were no wildly applauding spectators. There was the race crew, comprising of two co-directors, a photographer, a small handful of setup volunteers and the guy riding the lead bike.

There was no finish line tape, just a line. There were no hoards of runners filing in behind me, unless 6 constitutes a hoard.

However, a W is a W, and a W is what I got. The race was part of a 64 race summer series known as the Beat the Recession 5k Trail Series put on by a couple of enthusiastic runners that have staged events before. It's 20 dollars per event, whether you sign up online or onsite. The courses aren't deadly accurate or certified, but most trail racing is more about the course than the distance, it's a race, not a time trial. The events move from location to location, and this one was located a convenient 1 mile warmup jog from my house. Makes it kind of obligatory to enter. Future events are located here and there around Toronto in small city and regional parks. These are easy trails, not the kind you encounter in the 5 Peaks series where you need your wits about you every second to avoid having something really bad happen to you.

It was fun to lead the pack, to have the bicycle escorting me through the route and clearing the way. It was small and would have constituted 'cherry picking' if I'd known who was going to be there, but I showed up not really knowing what to expect. Their innaugural event last Sunday featured 2008 Toronto Marathon winner Daniel Mburu of Kenya, who took the win in a casual 17:16 (compared to my 19:26). I'm sure it was not much over a jog for him. For me, it was leave part of my lung on the course, as I hoped nobody in the group behind me was sandbagging it.

They return to this venue again in 3 weeks. I'm hoping support for the series picks up. It's fun, well organized and fairly casual at the same time. And it's cheap, anytime you can get a race in for 20 bucks, it's a good deal. I know I need the occasional race to get the legs turning over, speed workouts and tempo runs don't quite reach the same level as gutting it out in a race.

This morning I felt fine, did a nice easy 5 miles and had no after affects to deal with. My concern was getting a bit burned before Sunday's half in Mississauga.

It appears that Ryder Photo did the event photography, as their website has a link to it, hopefully whatever pics they took will be up soon. I'm thinking I was looking a bit stressed down the chute.

Dead slow Monday

Man, was I slow today. Progression run on Saturday and just under 16 yesterday, the two together kinda took the pop out of me for a day. I did a lowly 2 miles at a 12ish pace this morning (I never concern myself with recovery pace, I just saunter along at whatever feels good no matter how slow) then added 4 at lunchtime at a more normal easy pace of 9 but just didn't feel very energetic.

Yesterday I popped downtown to watch the runners at the Sporting Life 10k, catching most of the 12,000+ as they rounded the bend at Yonge and Richmond. I was then thinking I should have joined them, the RDs added 800 spots at the last minute at a reduced rate (sans T-shirt) if you just wanted to run without the goodies.

I've got 6 days to the Mississauga half, toying with how to spend the week. I did 62 last week, I think I'll just cut volume the last 2 days prior and go with that. Weather at this point shows cloudy and chance of a shower, temps okay. It's been a while since I've raced a half, still not feeling like I've regained my levels back from a docile winter.

Back in the 200's

Managed to squeeze in just over 200 in April. It's been a peculiar spring up this way, it's like the weather really doesn't want to break. On the flip side we've had some pretty hot days going in to the 80's a couple of times, but for the most part it's been coolish with a persistent wind. The sun make sup the difference, keeping it feeling warm. Good for running, keeps you feeling comfortable once you've warmed up.

I'm looking forward to the Mississauga half next weekend, it'll be my first race since the Hair of the Dog on New Year's Day. I'm keeping the race and running budget down to the bare minimum this year. I'm finding race fees getting more and more out of hand. It follows the concept of what the market will bear, and as long as folks are willing to hand over 50, 80, 100, even more for race fees, then events and RDs will continue to charge those numbers.

There used to be a few sources of cheap races in the area. The Ontario Roadrunners Association used to host their 'Orange' race series, which gave fun little 5k and 10k events at about 15 dollars for a non-member like me. As a bonus they were held in the park I train in which meant a warmup jog from the house to the start line. These events are history now. As a substitute I was running some XC stuff the Ontario Masters were doing, but they've also bumped fees for non-members (mostly a ploy to get you to join...the race fee is the same as a membership fee...that sneaky Dougie Smith :-) ). I might join up, maybe next year when I turn 50 and I really do feel like a master. I'm still just a young gun.

Anyway, I'm limiting myself to this, the Nightcrawler, maybe the Toronto Challenge as I mentioned last post, and maybe a fall half (or even full, depends on my training).

Speaking of people willing to pay expensive race fees, the Sporting Life 10k goes this Sunday. I imported the confirmation list from the website and came up with 11900 entries. This includes 7 Kenyans and 4 Ethiopians (just in case any locals had designs on the win). This will be my destination for Sunday morning, sprinting down to catch the leaders as the turn off Yonge Street, which makes for a great viewing point as you can see them well up the street. New course this year, they've finishing in Fort York and they'll be turning west off Yonge onto Richmond. Years past, the exited Yonge east and looped back to finish below the CN Tower, which meant I could see the leaders turn off Yonge, then jog over and catch them at the finish. Can't do it this year, I have to run just as far as the leaders to get there, so I have to choose my vantage point. I'll still be able to catch the pack at the finish line. The new route cuts down on cheating to, there's no short cut as they route is already the shortest distance.

To the trails

I hit the local East York harrier trail this morning to check out it's condition. The run was my substitution for the start of the Southern Ontario 5 Peaks Trail Series, which kicks off today in Chicopee. I'd run a couple of their races last year and had a blast, doing Durham forest and Rattlesnake Point. I even amassed a handful of age group points (I slid into 16th spot for males 40-49, just behind Des Maloney, not bad for having only run 2 events). Next year I turn the big 5-oh and want to run their full schedule in my new age group.

The local trail I ran this morning was in not bad shape, mostly runable. The section behind Massey Square at the east end of the trail (it ends at Vic Park, where Dentonia Golf Course begins) was a bit tattered with fallen trees and you have to pick your way around them. Everywhere else was in perfect condition, lots of mud along the upper swamp section high above Taylor Creek, and the switchbacks at the west end were fun as ever. I really like this course and try to get it in every couple of weeks. By later summer the growth gets pretty thick, you gotta keep your mouth shut to with the proliferation of flying creatures about, so I've learned to breath with my teeth clenched (having once swallowed something sizeable while pushing through some branches that I'd rather not ever learn what it was).

It's 2 weeks to Mississauga. For anyone doing the full, they're getting into taper mode. For me doing the half, it's full speed ahead with my foot planked firmly on the gas. Mississauga will be a good long tempo run and hopefully give me a much needed boost as I prep for the the Nightcrawler and maybe the Toronto Challenge. The Challenge is supposed to be an accurate course based on feedback from those that have run it, although it's not listed as certified according to Merrel's. However, mts does list the Nissan 5k challenge course as certified for 2007 and I believe this is the same course the Toronto challenge uses (it was originally named the Nissan Challenge). I'll assume it good for marking a 5k time against. The MTS site, by the way, is a good comprehensive listing of certified courses through Canada, very well done. Not the number of times the Nightcrawler course has been remeasured as the city's been doing work in that area the RDs have had to adjust start/finish lines nearly every year as a result.

Beauty Saturday upon us, mid-high 20's today, rain tomorrow and hot again Monday.

Boston has come and gone

and I watched it on TV, and the net while I worked.

I have my Boston shirt on from 2006 today, the one that came with the race kit, the one you only get as a registered runner. I don't wear it too often, I don't want it to wear out. It's a good quality Adidas long sleeve navy blue shirt, very simple with the BAA logo on the front, Adidas logo on the back, and '2006 BOSTON MARATHON' printed on one sleeve.

I had also bought a nice short sleeve shirt, which has seen a lot of wear, and a gaudy silver 2006 jacket, which has seen almost no wear. I don't know why, but I thought that jacket looked mega cool when I was standing in the expo. Sure seemed to change when I looked at it in proper lighting. But I do put it on for picking up race kits and stuff, I just ain't wearing it to dinner, or drinks with friends. It's like a flashing sign saying "Look at me! I'm a nerd! Look at me! I'm a nerd!". But I had to have it, it's symbolic, ya know?

I get a flood of enthusiasm when Boston runs. Watching some of the big local races gets me excited too, but nothing like Boston. It's the screaming crowd and the flood of runners that have already proven themselves capable of maintaining that clip. Even just following the net blog reports during the race gets me going.

Too bad I didn't get to run yesterday, spent the day prepping for a demo today and clicking 'refresh' on the BAA site. On top of that, it was pouring rain all day, the harsh horizontal stuff accompanied by a brisk N/E wind, and cold...nasty cold.

I put in a little extra 'ooomph' in my run this morning, although it was short at about 5 1/2 miles (for an 'ooomph' kind of run, that is). I have a tendency to do this a couple of days after a long run, not quite sure why, but about 2 days after my longs, my legs want to go, regardless of whether I run or rest on Monday.

I did get in 65 miles last week, and all is and was fine. My legs and my joints and stuff are toughened up enough that going from 40 to 60 or so miles really doesn't stress me at all. I'm not a 10% rule kind of guy, in fact I'm not really a rule kind of guy at all. They're just guidelines, take em for what they're worth.

I didn't hit that masters 5k I mentioned on Saturday, it would have been a waste as I was sluggish from my bigger week. I'll be in better condition as summer approaches. Mississauga half is in 2 1/2 weeks, I'm hoping to not embarrass myself too badly in it.

Nice while it lasted

Yesterday it was nice and calm outside. No wind, not enough to even flutter of the flags. Today, we get it back, out of the east, brisk even though it's fairly mild out.

This is one of the adventures of spring running, having to figure out how to dress. The wind makes you cold when it hits you and hot when you run with it. At least in the summer it's consistent...hot. Maybe termed better as 'warm', 'hot' and 'stifling hot'. Still shades of the same colour and it doesn't change how you dress because you're as close to nude as you can get away with in public.

The wind is an element I abhore. Maybe not so much in the summer, it's quite a relief to have a good cross wind when it's a hot day and you need that cooling effect. Usually though, you're either into it or with it, either battling you're way through it or sweating up a storm when it's at your back and at the same speed as you. That little microclimate builds up around your skin and all that heat you're producing follows you along, blown along with the breeze. I figure if I stopped or changed direction, this cluster of sticky sweaty boiling air moves along and wraps itself around some poor sap walking along the sidewalk just ahead.

I want it calm all year around, I'm good with that. I create my own cooling 10k per hour breeze shuffling along on my bread and butter training runs. When I run harder the air accomodates by moving faster over my skin, a self-adjusting form of air conditioning. I haven't figured out how to keep it there during jogs between intervals or adjust it on a hard hill climb.

Anyway, a couple of days into a hopeful 60-70 mile week. Tomorrow might be a bit tricky with an early start at work for a remote dial-in and some Microsoft technical rep visiting that we're supposed to meet at somepoint during the day, hopefully not at noon as that's my second run. I'll figure out a way to get them both in, methinks I'll be doing an after-hours run at try to maintain my 10 mile a day diet.

A little better

10 miles yesterday with an embedded hill workout. Kinda impromptu, I headed to the beaches and continued onto the grounds of the water treatment plant. The plant's been redone to make the grounds accessible to the public to walk around and it's a solid steep climb from the water's edge to the main building. A few times around the plant then a good quick return home. Today's just 7 1/2 recovery but at least I'm starting to feel like I'm moving again.

Mississauga half in 4 weeks, I'll push the length of these runs each and double up as much as I can.

Passed Dougie Smith of the Ontario Masters T&F Association this morning, he was poking me to be sure to show up next Saturday as they're doing road races this summer, using this course. Given that it's a 5 minute jog from my house to the start line, I might take it in, it'll give me a bit of racing practice if nothing else.

Still not doing it

I'm still not getting out there to do the things I need to do to improve. Stuff happens, I lost 2 days last week and this morning I had to transport daughter to soccer practice, which occurred smack in the middle of what would have been my hill workout. Opted to just do it near the office at noon, except that a lunchtime meeting kicked in and cut that out. I did get out for a couple of miles but no time for the workout. Now it's late and I won't get back in time to get it in before din din. Arguably I could be doing that instead of typing.

Laziness, life, all that stuff. My theory has always been run when you can, because later might not be so accomodating. Things will settle down a bit but I need to make adjustments to fit in the work I need to do.

The plan was always pretty simple and effective. Monday easy (used to be rest, last summer it was 4-5 AM recovery, 4-5 PM recovery), Tuesday light tempo (or easy) AM (double up with 4-5 easy in PM when available), Wednesday either hills or intervals AM (double up again with 4-5 easy when available), Thursday 8-10 easy AM (and blah blah double up), sometimes I tripled on Thursday with an available hour during soccer practice with youngest daughter. Friday easy (AM / PM when available), Saturday moderate to hard tempo depending on how I feel, and Sunday long.

It works, as long as I stick to it. I need to discipline myself to get to bed on time and not be farting around at night, get out the door no-matter-what in the mornings, and make that time for doubling up when I could. It doesn't help that I spend too long at work, partly guilt driven for spending too long at noon, which leaves little evening time and I'm up late making up for it. Then stuff happens in the mornings that cut in, my Wednesday run is now interfered with due to taxiing my daughter in early. I'll have to move the hills/intervals to Tuesday, relegate Wednesday to easy junk miles and tighten focus on the Saturday tempo run.

I read an interview with Deena Kastor not long ago where she talks of thinking and living like a runner if you want to be one. I don't need to revolve my life around it for sure but I do reflect back on that article and take some of it with me. So getting to bed on time, organizing my day better so I can double up, and staying disciplined in getting those key workouts in.

Last year at this time I was working on a 200+ mile month. Weather's been a bit tough this year too, we've had heavy cold rain over the last week, snow and sub freezing temps with high winds (the one element I really hate running in is wind) and makes it tougher to get out.

Spring is here!

You can tell by the white stuff on the ground.

I did a nice slow 15 miles yesterday, getting in the good weather while I could. I missed Friday as I was megabusy at work and it was hammering rain all day. Saturday we were up early to head to the Elmira Maple Syrup Festival, and I was waddling around the rest of the day laden down with pancakes and maple syrup. Not sure how much of it burned off on the 15 miler.

This morning was horizontal rain at about 1 degree C, not my ideal conditions. The temps dropped later in the day to change the rain to snow, making it much more paletable and I did a late day 5 mile street loop. Tomorrow will be chilly and windy but not too preciptous. The cold always seems colder at this time of the year, partly because we're getting accustomed to warmer temps, and mainly because cold at this time of year is accompanied by a good stiff wind, as it's the only way to get all that arctic goodness this far south.

Missed the spring sprint this year, a nice chip timed, cheap and (reasonably) accurate 5k on the boardwalk. It was the start of my running season last year, chugged along at a pedestrian 20:55, and didn't really feel like doing worse than that given my pathetic training this winter, and besides Elmira and it's maple syrup was calling. This race has become popular for the local hot shot club runners, you can tell by the times, with 50 folk breaking 20 and the top finishers in the 15's. Notice the entries of Ron Da Silva Jardine (at 16:48) and James Earl (17:02), both of the East Toronto Striders running club. Both these guys are my age, just a touch younger. I'm always guaranteed to be a few spots lower on the age group page when the striders show up. Fortunately, I get a few months reprieve from them next year when I tick over to 50 and they take a short while to catch up. I'll hit the sprint for sure next year and see how I do in my new age bracket. I'll need to be better than last years 20:55 if I want to make an impression though. We'll see.

Perfect Running Pace Revealed

So Livescience.com posted an article regarding a study at the University of Wisconsin - Maryland regarding running efficiency in terms of calories per kilometer. While the article and study is interesting of it's own, the author makes a rather grand statement to present his slant on the study:

"The most interesting finding: At slower speeds, about 4.5 mph (13 min/mile), the metabolic efficiency was at its lowest. Steudel explains that at this speed, halfway between a walk and a jog, the runner's gait can be awkward and unnatural."

This entry has quickly permeated the net, primarily due to the wording of the article and the way it's being perceived. As an example, one comment on the article reads as:

"posted 03/30/2009 08:18:18 AM

gid wrote:

I'm wondering, is walking at 4.5 (with a low metabolic efficiency) good for losing fat? am I right to assume that low metabolic efficiency means that more energy is expended per hour and per kilo? "

Similar comments appeared on Diggs and Running Ahead along the same lines, mostly of form like "they must have used elites in the study, because a 7:13 pace is very hard to me to maintain", that sort of stuff.

This is where you, as the reader, need to look closely at what's being said. The Running Ahead link is of particular interest as it presents graphs used in the study. These graphs show the data from the 9 subjects, each with a Y axis presenting energy consumption as calories per kilometer, and the X axis as pace as meters per second. Viewing them as is, you can't help but think "it must be easier to run at that faster pace than a slower pace". And...you would be wrong.

It's a quick an easy conversion to change the graphs to show energy consumption per minute (instead of per kilometer). The conversion is straight forward:

(CaloriesPerKilometer * PaceAsMetersPerSecond) / 16.667

for each point.

I picked the second graph entry for an example, applied the conversion and my values came out roughly as:

2.0 m/s = 10.3 calories/minute
2.4 m/s = 11.7 calories/minute
3.0 m/s = 13.5 calories/minute
4.0 m/s = 16.7 calories/minute
4.5 m/s = 20.4 calories/minute

The lowest energy consumption is where you would normally expect it, at the slowest pace (2.0 m/s). In comparison, the study graph shows the lowest calories/kilometer (~73 cal/k) occurred at a much higher 3.7 meters per second, about the average for the males in the subject.

To look at the original graph, you would think this subject would find it easiest to run at 3.7 m/s. However, they will be consuming about 15 calories/minute at that pace (and sucking in all the oxygen to burn it), while slower paces, as we would normally expect, consume energy at a slower pace (and thus you breath easier too).

What you can notice is the sizeable jump in energy consumption per minute once you pass that noted 'sweet spot' of 3.7 m/s. From 2.0 to 3.0 m/s (increase of 1.0), your rate goes up by 3.2 calories per minute. Same from 3.0 to 4.0 (increase of 1.0), about 3.2 calories per minute. However, go from 4.0 to 4.5 (only 0.5), energy consumption goes up 3.7 calories per minute, more than twice the increase rate than below the 'sweet spot'. It get worse from there, the curves from the original study are parabolic so the energy demands per minute will increase dramatically as pace goes up beyond that point.

What this all means, don't be fooled into thinking there's a magic and quick pace where running becomes remarkably easy and you'll become a highly efficient running machine. Sure, you'll use less energy over a given distance, but the barrier for most runners sits at the energy consumption rate per minute, not per mile (or kilometer), because that's what dictates how hard the effort feels and how hard you have to breathe to keep up.

The article misleads the reader into thinking something that's not true.