Posts

Showing posts from August, 2008

Nike Human Race 10k

[gallery] I ran the race in 53:32:35 at 8:31 minute per mile.  You can view my stats here . The Ben Harper concert was so fine. Ben played a solo on the tombolas during his first song and then threw the drum sticks in the audience and I caught one. The race was a blast, but it was challenging.  It was really hot and humid and there was little breeze.  I am glad that I trained in the afternoon and evening during the heat so that I was prepared for this race. Running with 13,758 runners who were all wearing the same red shirt was amazing.  As I looked up ahead of me I felt like I was a part of a flowing read blob that was winding it's way through the streets of Austin. Austin had more runners than New York or Los Angeles. which are much larger cities by population and area. There were more than 700,000 runners world wide running in the race. Out of the 750,000 runners I finished in 46,721st place. In Austin out of 13,758 runners I finished in 1,114th place. One of the nice things tha

Nike Human Race Last Day of Training

Well all of the RunTex Fit City training and Nike club runs are over.  I had such a fun time running and going to the bars after the training runs.  I do not drink alcohol and do not go to bars.  It was a refreshing twist to be in a hot and sweaty crowd of runners in a bar in Austin. I ran in 100 degree heat from July 19 until last night training for the Nike Human Race on August 31, 2008.  Last year I struggled to run back to back 10 minute miles on a tread mill.  Last night I ran 7.02 miles around Lady Bird Johnson Lake from Mile 0 to the MoPac Brige to I-35 in 1:01:56. Below is the pace that I ran each mile. Mile 1 at 8:07/mile Mile 2 at 8:15/mile Mile 3 at 8:54/mile Mile 4 at 8:29/mile Mile 5 at 8:25/mile Mile 6 and 7 9:48/mile (my cool down run) The RunTex coach and Coach Ware (HT track) say that stress training helps make you run stronger. I have never measured my running until I started the Nike Human Race training. Now I have a Garmin 405 and it makes a bi

RunTex training for the Nike Human Race 10k session 7

I did something that amazed me last evening.  The RunTex training session finished with another 2 mile stress run.  During a stress run you run about 70-80% the first mile and then you run was fast as you can for the second mile.  This training is for running under stress at the end of the race.  The first time that I did it a few weeks ago I ran the 2 miles in 15 minutes and when I finished I was really tired.  This time I ran the 2 miles in 15 minutes 10 seconds and I was not exhausted like the the first time.  I rested and talked to members of the class and when the coach said for the class to do a cool down jog I decided to run some more.  I looked up and saw some Nike Human Race pace setters with a group of runners at the water coolers.  I decided that I would run with them.  After we started runing I thought we would run at a 10 minute mile pace but after talking with a sweeper I found out I was running with the 9 minuted mile pace group.  I ran with them for about four miles bef

Wifi Cowboy Promotes Healthy Snacks

Image
I have a web site that I use to write about my experiences with farming and rual land management. The WiFi Cowboy web site has banner ads from Google. Today I noticed that Hostess was the ad displaying on the site. I had to laugh at what was going on because here I am writing about healty food and there is an ad for Hostess products. I am experimenting with Google Adsense so I am learning how the ads appear on pages based on the text on the page.  I am also experimenting with the Wifi Cowboy web site by using pure XHTML 1.0 Strict standards.

Nike Human 10k Race Training Run Number 8

Training Data from my Garmin Fore Runner 405 can be viewed online. I still remember last summer barely being able to run 4 miles in the heat in 45 minutes.  Now I am running 5 in under 45 minutes. Data collection does have it's benefits even when you are measuring just your own personal performance. This training run was very humid and I did not feel like running right before the start. Running with 45 other people started out with the 9 minute 5 mile group gave me a lot of motivation to just do it. What surprisies me about running the hills in Travis Heights is that I thought that the elevation gain would be more than the elevation gain on the 24th street hill on the Starbucks training run.

Paris Hilton for President

Nike Human 10k Race Training Run Number 7

Image
I am really excited about running.  I have been running again since February 2005 without a watch or timing device.  This year starting in January I challenged myself to run 1,000 miles in a year.  So far I have run 589 miles this year.  Most of the miles have been around LBJ Lake by myself.  Well in July I started training with RunTex and the Fit City Team to train for the Nike Human Race 10k.  I just ran my second run using my new Garmin Forerunner 405.  I am now collecting data to improve my strength and speed. Today I ran again with the 9 minute 5 mile group.  The pace leader also had a Garmin Forunner 405.  we ran for about 1.5 miles at 7.5 minute miles. This was faster than I was use to, but I kept up. The Garmin 405 sends data to my computer wirelessely when it is in range. When I looked at the data from today's run I was amazed that I averaged 8.23 minutes per mile.  The after the last part of the run up the hill I was running as fast as at the start of the run. During the

RunTex training for the Nike Human Race 10k session 5

Image
I purchased a Garmin Forerunner 405.  This training run on Newnan street was a test for hill training and the GPS tracking.  I ran from the hill training over to the 6th bar for a total of 4.09 miles.  I ran the hill 7 times and then ran halfway 3 times backwards for a total ascent of 1,399 feet and a total descent of 1,325 feet.  Now I would have never guessed that I had run this much ascent in two miles but I did.