I used to have a bike. I had a nice Trek with Campagnolo hardware. But when we moved across country, I didn’t bring the bike with me. The bike had been stored at a friend’s appartment, but he had moved it into storage. Logistics didn’t allow us to get the bike before we moved, so I told him to keep it. It was an older bike at that point, and it had been a little while since I had ridden it, so I wasn’t too concerned. That was over 12 years ago. But I have kind of missed having a bike. I have been considering buying a bike for a while now. I have seen them on ebay. I actually bid on an inexpensive mountain bike, but got outbid. I have been looking at cheap bikes at Target and Wal-Mart, but if I buy a bike, I think I would want one that is decent quality. I had looked of Dick’s Sporting Goods website, and wasn’t too impressed. I visited the store, and they had a much better selection in the store. I am considering buying a 2007 DiamondBack Sorrento mountain bike. I have never have a mountain bike. My old Trek would a road bike. But it would be nice to be able to ride on gravel paths as well as road. And even the shoulders of many roads where I would be riding are not the smoothest. The bike cost under $300. A little more than I was really thinking of spending, but I think it is a pretty good deal for a good quality bike. I am not planning on doing any hard core trail racing, so I don’t need a top of the line bike. But it would be good for cross-training.
The Looniness Of The Long Distance Runner: An Unfit Londoner’s Attempt To Run The New York City Marathon From Scratch by Russell Taylor
SUMMARY: I enjoyed this book. It is written with a sense of humor.
Since I am currently training to run a marathon myself also from scratch, the title jumped out at me. I had to buy it. Since the author is English, the book is in English. I don’t mean US English. I mean it is written in English English. So there is some English slang sprinkled throughout the book, prices are in pounds, and distances are often in kilometers.
After the author, while in a drunken state, sponsors some other people to run in the New York City marathon, he decides to run it himself. He comes up with the plan of writing a book about his training, and the race itself. The author’s royalties from the book all go to charity. As he was not a runner to begin with, he starts running slowly, not telling people of his goal to run in the New York City Marathon. He begins to build up his speed and endurance. Along the way he runs some shorter races. I had scanned the whole book, converted it to text, and then converted the text to speech. I was listening to this book when I ran my first half marathon. In fact, the author was running his first half-marathon in the book while I was running mine. The author manages to run his New York Marathon, and even runs it in a sub-four-hour time.
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The other day I had a message on my answering machine asking if owned a “monitor for the heart”, and if so would I be interested in being part of a focus group. They said they would pay me $85, and left a phone number. I was thinking that wit the wording “monitor for the heart” it was some kind of medicial study. I have been part of focus groups before and they are kind of fun. Plus they are easy money. Anyway, I called the lady today. The phone number had a 914 area code. I told her that she left a message on my machine about a focus group for heart rate monitors. She asked if I owned a heart rate monitor, and I asked what kind of heart rate monitors, and she said for athletic training. I told her yes, I own a heart rate monitor (actually I own two heart rate monitors, plus a small pulse meter to boot). She said great and asked if I would interested. I asked what was involved, and she said come down to their office on 5th avenue. I asked where? She said New York. I asked New York City? She said yes. I told her I was in Rochester, NY (about 6 hours drive away). She appolgized, and that was that. Bummer! It would have been interesting. Not sure what would have been involved. Maybe looking at advertising, or commercial, or maybe looking designs, and saying which one we like best. Who knows. The $85 would have been nice too. I could have bought a new pair of running shoes maybe.
I really like the idea of running slow to build up an aerobic base. But what I have a problem with is the idea of using age to calculate the Maximum Aerobic Heart Rate. This assumes that everyone’s heart rate ranges are the same as everyone else’s of the same age. That is ridiculous! I have had my heart rate up as high as 193, and I think it might still go a little higher. According to one popular formula, my Max Heart Rate should be about 177 (220-age). That’s a pretty big difference. Supposedly these wont change from working out. Also different people have different resting heart rates. And these will lower as people get into better condition. I just don’t like the cookie cutter formulas that use age. Using the Maffetone formula, my max aerobic heart rate would be 142 (180-43+5). What I have been using instead is 150. I came up with this number using the Karvonen Method (MHR-RHR)*.70+RHR (193-48)*.70+48. So I try to keep my heart rate for most of my workouts below 150. I find that I am starting to be able to go faster and longer while still keeping my heart rate below 150. So I like Phil Maffetone’s ideas other than his method of coming up with the numbers.
9/17 Lewis & Clark Marathon Half Marathon, St. Charles, MO 3:51:13
9/18 St. Jude Memphis Marathon, Memphis, TN 3:49:08?
9/19 Mississippi Coast Marathon, Waveland, MS 4:34:00
9/20 Little Rock Marathon, Little Rock, AR 4:14:46
9/21 Wichita Marathon, Wichita, KS 4:23:13
9/22 Des Moines Marathon, Des Moines, IA 4:06:33
9/23 Lincoln Marathon, Omaha, NE 4:15:34
9/24 Boulder Backroads Marathon, Boulder, CO 3:48:23
9/25 Casper Marathon, Casper, WY 3:54:12
9/26 Deadwood Mickelson Trail Marathon, Deadwood, SD 3:53:34
9/27 Fargo Marathon, Fargo, ND 4:16:22
9/28 Montana Marathon, Billings, MT 3:56:44
9/29 City of Trees, Boise, ID 4:08:51
9/30 Seafair Marathon, Bellevue, WA 4:07:52
10/1 Portland Marathon, Portland, OR 3:44:12
10/2 Mayor’s Midnight Sun Marathon, Anchorage, AK 4:27:18
10/3 San Francisco Marathon, San Francisco, CA 4:08:22
10/4 Maui Marathon, Maui, HI 4:26:40
10/5 Desert Classic Marathon, Surprise, AZ 4:45:16
10/6 Valley of Fire Marathon, Overton, NV 4:06:55
10/7 St. George Marathon, St. George, UT 3:20:04
10/8 New Mexico Marathon, Albuquerque, NM 4:09:58
10/9 Route 66 Marathon, Tulsa, OK 4:17:36
10/10 Dallas White Rock Marathon, Dallas, TX 4:12:20
10/11 Baton Rouge Marathon, Baton Rouge, LA 3:59:27
10/12 Rocket City Marathon, Huntsville, AL 4:15:27
10/13 Marshall University Marathon, Huntington, WV 4:09:17
10/14 United Technologies Greater Hartford Marathon, Hartford, CT 3:29:28
10/15 Boston Marathon, Boston, MA 3:59:27
10/16 Breakers Marathon, Middletown, RI 4:14:12
10/17 Portland Marathon, Portland, ME 4:12:37
10/18 New Hampshire Marathon, Bristol, NH 4:14:13
10/19 Stowe Mountain, Stowe, VT 4:19:03
10/20 Cleveland Marathon, Cleveland,OH 4:12:34
10/21 Grand Rapid Marathon, Grand Rapids, MI 4:06:03
10/22 LaSalle Bank Chicago Marathon, Chicago, IL 3:28:19
10/23 Twin Cities Marathon, Minneapolis, MN
10/24 Green Bay Marathon, Green Bay, WI
10/25 Tecumseh Trail Marathon, Bloomington, IN
10/26 Otter Creek Marathon, Finchville, KY
10/27 Georgia Marathon, Atlanta, GA
10/28 Bank of America Marathon, Tampa, FL
10/29 Marine Corps Marathon, Arlington, VA
10/30 Kiawah Island Marathon, Kiawah Island, SC
10/31 Triple Lakes Trail Marathon, Greensboro, NC
11/1 Baltimore Marathon, Baltimore, MD
11/2 Delaware Marathon, Wilmington, DE
11/3 Philadelphia Marathon, Philadelphia, PA
11/4 New Jersey Marathon, Long Branch, NJ
11/5 ING NYC Marathon, New York City, NY