Caught on Film Again!

It seems one of the marshalls at todays 10K race has posted a video on YouTube. I can be seen (briefly) at about 5:00-5:03.

Acceleration = Change in Velocity/Time

Stephen Hawking was once told by his publisher that each equation he included in his book "A Brief History of Time" would halve his sales.

I wonder if the same holds true for blog posts?

This post, titled with a sketchily remembered equation from my GCSE physics, is an amalgamation of my recent running achievements and other developments.

New FiveFingers

After retiring my normal running shoes, all I had remaining were my FiveFingers KSO's and Adidas Kanadia TR4 trail shoes.
The KSO's are good, they got me on the road to minimalist running, but they do have a flaw. They have terrible grip in wet conditions. I've come close to snapping an ankle on occasion! As for the Kanadia's, I don't won to wear them out on the roads. What I needed was a middle way, a hybrid between my KSO's and Kanadia's. Turns out that Vibram have such a thing:

Behold the TrekSport!

The FiveFingers TrekSport is almost identical to the KSO but has tread on the sole to improve grip. The rubber is 1mm thicker than on the KSO so there is a slight reduction in sensation from the ground. In practice, this has not been a major issue. I have run on road, trail and cross country in these and I love them! No nearly broken ankle so far either!

parkrun

Since achieving my first sub-25:00 parkrun the other week, I've continued to make steady progress.
At Braunstone on 4/8/12, I ran a 24:14! That was delightful but paled into insignificance compared to this week's run at Conkers:

Yes, you read that correctly!

23:47!!! God only knows how I managed that! The folks at Conkers parkrun have captured me on film once again, check out my sprint finish:

I'm briefly visible at 8:32-8:34 wearing my blue sleeveless t-shirt.

After recovering from that, I found that Adidas, sponsors of both parkrun and Team GB, were giving every parkrunner a free Team GB replica wristband to celebrate the Olympics.

Not bad for a freebie!

All in all then, not a bad couple of weeks at parkrun! Unfortunately, work gets in the way next week. Although a break to recover and consolidate my gains is probably no bad thing!

Hermitage 10K 2012

Finally, the other day on a whim, I decided to enter a local 10K race. I chose the Hermitage 10K near Coalville.

It was my third 10K race this year and the first I've run in Vibram FiveFingers.

Thanks to all the running I've been doing lately, I managed to achieve my goal of a sub-1 hour race! That's another item I can cross off The List! Unfortunately, due to a glitch, official times won't be posted until at least tomorrow. However, I clocked it with my Garmin at 53:14.2, which (if accurate) betters my previous performance by 14 minutes!

Approaching the finish (Photo credit www.runner-photos.co.uk)

As is customary, I was the recipient of yet another t-shirt, a relatively plain white technical shirt. Should come in useful for training runs.

Next big race is the Great North Run.

My Longest Run

Yesterday, I decided to test myself. I wanted to see how long and far I could run maintaining a pace of ~7min/km.

To my satisfaction, I comfortably managed 10 miles. I continued and found I was starting to stiffen-up by about 12 miles, after which I started having niggling tenderness in my knees and ankles. By 14 miles, I'd slowed down to a walk so I stopped my Garmin watch. I had been running for 2:47:31.

A screenshot from my RunKeeper profile.

I was only 1 mile short of completing the entire circuit of Rutland Water at a running pace! Just over a year ago, walking that route almost finished me! It's almost unbelievable to me how much improvement there has been in my fitness and stamina over just 9 months.

I'm glad I ran the circuit yesterday. I've proven to myself that I can cover the distance required for the Great North Run. I now have 47 days to get just a little stronger. I'm sure yesterday's run will have helped no end!

Sub-25:00 5K ≠ Impossible [UPDATED]

A momentous day!

I have finally, after 8 months & 23 days of parkrunning, crossed the 25:00 barrier!

Not quite a true reflection of my performance!

At the end, I forced myself to sprint up the hill to the finish line, at which point I promptly fell into a heap on the cool grass. A number of seconds passed as my heart rate fell. I sat up, looked at my Garmin and was horrified. I'd forgotten to stop the timer!!! When I pushed the start/stop button, it read 24:58.66.

How long had I been laying on the grass? At most, I reckoned thirty seconds. I had no choice but to await the official results. The only certainty was that I had succeeded in running a sub-25:00 5K!

Then it came:

Lies!!!

Not possible. I started my timer exactly when the race started, I was late stopping it by several seconds. I beat 25:00! This was only the second time the volunteer at the finish line has been in charge of timing. My best explanation for the discrepancy is that the timer was started several seconds before the race start was actually announced.

I'm claiming today as having achieved my goal of a sub-25:00 5K because I know that is what I did today.

I will erase all doubt at my next parkrun!

UPDATE 29/7/12:


Vindication! The glitch was noticed and rectified. New official time = 24:28!!

Grabbed off the parkrun website

With Regret... You're Fired!

I decided to take up running in October 2010. I got a couch to 5k plan, I bought some gear including a pair of Brooks Adrenaline GTS 10 shoes.

My faithful Brooks Adrenaline GTS 10's

On my first run-walk session, I made the classic mistake of sprinting instead of running, hence running myself into the ground. That experience led to all my gear being consigned to the bottom of my wardrobe for 12 months.

Then in October 2011, I joined the beginner's sessions hosted by my local running club, saw the error of my ways and became a runner. My Brooks have taken me from run-walking to running, through ten parkruns and a 10K.

Here enters the influence of a book. Specifically 'Born to Run' by Chris McDougall. I dabbled in trail running and minimalist running in Vibram FiveFingers (VFF's). I entered a trail race and bought some Adidas Kanadia TR4 trail shoes. Recently, I've been doing more trail running than road running while gradually increasing my mileage in my VFF's.

There is a fundamental difference between my Kanadia's, VFF's and Adrenaline's. The Adrenaline's are 'stability' shoes with padding designed to eliminate unstable motion as the foot lands. Neither the Kanadia's nor the VFF's have this. So, as I've grown used to the trail and 'barefoot' shoes, my gait has subtly changed.

I first noticed this on a jaunt around the town bypass a couple of weeks ago. Toward the last 1/3 of the loop, my legs started to hurt and I felt myself fighting the shoes. The Adrenaline's were trying to force my feet to land in a way that had become unnatural for me. Instinctively, my legs tried to override this effect causing an ache in my ankles, shins and knees.

As an experiment, this morning I did the same run in my VFF's. No pain was experienced at all (although, as this was my longest ever run in VFF's, I felt the onset of blisters at the base of my big toes). Also, I was over a minute faster.

A screenshot of my bypass run data. The far left is in VFF's, the rest were in Adrenaline's.

So, today with regret, I've made the difficult decision to retire my trusty old Adrenaline's. It has become clear that they no longer suit the running style I've grown into. Minimalist footwear is the way forward for me.

I'm grateful to the Adrenaline's for getting me through my first hundred miles and establishing 'The Running Bug' in me for many years to come.

My Second 'Barefoot' parkrun

Proof I was there in my VFF's!

Following the other week's cancellation, I've finally done a 'barefoot' Braunstone parkrun, my 'home' parkrun.

At Braunstone, the route is mostly on a tarmac path, except for part of the midway hill which is a dirt track. As such, it was a little less forgiving to the feet than the soft, muddy, dirt trail at Conkers.

Despite this, I managed to run quite comfortably keeping the late Caballo Blanco's mantra of "Easy, Light, Smooth, Fast" in mind.

Another PB! 25:04.84 according to my Garmin!!

I was elated at the end to look to my GPS watch to see a time of 25:04.84! That's 2:09 faster than my previous best at Braunstone and 27s faster than my effort at Conkers the other week!

I was even more elated when my official time was posted, exactly matching my own estimate!

A screenshot showing my official time.

There is no doubt in my mind now that I'm significantly faster in my VFF's. Now, only a mere 4 seconds off crossing another goal off The List!

Me approaching the finish line. (Something very odd happened to my hair along the way!)

Caught on Film

It appears my antics, and those of my fellow parkrunners, have been posted to YouTube for all eternity!

Outward Bound

I appear about 25 seconds in. I'm towards the left of the frame wearing a red t-shirt, holding a blue water bottle.

Return Leg

I'm right at the start of this one.