Hopefully I'll do a 5k or two down the line. Will have to wait until I get a better base. Today, my legs have been incredibly stiff/sore. I need that to get past the initial aches and pains stage.

That's great! Have fun.

OMG! You wear a hat on your head?!!!!

J/K..

I tend to take my apartmentand gate keys, my iphone, ID and a credit card, sometimes a $10 depending if i remember or not.

I run/walk carrying my phone with the other stuff in my shorts pocket. I have earbuds that fall out and if I can get back into it now that my wife is not doing night floats (EF27, how the hell do you deal with those?) and can stay with our child after he goes to sleep, i'll look into getting the over-the-ear earbud things. With/without mic i haven't decided yet.

I have these headphones and I love them.

http://www.amazon.com/Sennheiser-PMX...ds=adidas+685i

I love running with bluetooth headphones as I pretty much hate wires but am kinda pissed at the latest I just bought...

The ones I was using are these:
Motorola MotoRokr S305 BlueTooth Headphones Earphones / Microphone: Amazon.ca: Electronics

They're a somewhat old model and can get hot over the ears.

The model I'm pissed about is this one:
Jabra 100-96600000-02 Sport BT Stereo Bluetooth Headset (Black): Amazon.ca: Electronics

Technically, they should be perfect, if they were not cutting off all the time from my iPhone 4. Not too sure if it's the "outdated" iPhone 4 or I just got a faulty pair, but cutting off has been mentioned in reviews. Probably will keep them anyway as they do great with my iPad and don't cut of if I'm not moving the iDevice around. Even walking, if I keep my phone in a hand without balancing it too much, it won't cut off, but as soon as I start running, it starts cutting off. Very annoying...

These Sennheiser looks quite nice though.

FM

I find that in-ear headphones either always come out, or are the kind that stick right in my ear so far that it feels like I'm underwater. I can't stand that. So I always wear on-ear headphones.

As with FM I love the freedom of bluetooth, but it's been a challenge. I mentioned it in the headphones thread, but I went through 3 pairs of JayBird SB1's over the past 18 months as they seem to just die on me (they claim to be sweat proof but maybe not so much?).

Just this week I received a pair of GoGroove Airbands that I had ordered after JayBird refused to honor the 'lifetime' warranty on my latest pair. I guess the GoGroove are an SB1 knock off or off-brand or something, but aside from the GoGroove logo looking kind of jank on the one side, they are basically identical to my SB1's.

As for all the stuff, 85% or more of my runs are home from work, so I have a backpack full of clothes, shoes, jacket, etc. Sometimes even my laptop and an iPad, I've had that thing up to 20lbs. Keys and ID are the least of my worries at that point. :)

On the times when I get to run without the backpack I will stick ID and a single card or $20 bill in my pocket and carry my phone in my hand while I run. If I need to have a key with me I'll tie it to my shoelaces as Alan suggested.

I know you hate running, and would probably jump right onto the bike 100% as soon as you are able. But if you ever do consider running regularly, I would suggest you look into one of the many Couch-to-5K programs (C25K) out there. It's a beginning runner's training program geared to build your endurance over an 8 or 9 week schedule.

Alan T started his running not too long ago with C25K, and look where he is now.

Radii did it before he dumped/modified it to a program more suitable for him.

Dodgerchick and I are using a variation of it called Zombies, Run! 5K Trainer app for iOS and Android.

Like Alan said, don't worry about speed right now. Look at me. I'm at 16:00 min pace, running probably 80% of my route. A week from now, I'll be completing my 5K training with a 5K race, and will hopefully be able to run the entire 5K without having to walk a single step.

Just two months ago, I couldn't run 30 seconds without thinking my heart is going to explode.

When I started to run as part of my rehab, the physio told me to started out running two minutes, walk three, for three sets (so 15minutes total), and every week up the running and reduce the walking by 30 seconds per set.

Then to get up to half an hour it was 9 minutes running, one minute walk three times, half an minute change again, 14 minutes + 1 minute walk, etc

It really made it easier to break down the effort into small chunks, and was surprisingly not too difficult to move from one level to the next (this was three times a week)

I know that was based on not overdoing it because of injury, but the principle should work regardless I would have thought.

Heh. I commented on my run yesterday that it was over 80 by 7am. Turns out that it never got under 80 yesterday morning....

These are the bluetooth headphones that I use:

Motorola S11-Flex HD

They are a little heavier than some runners like though, but have great sound quality for bluetooth in my opinion. I haven't had any problems with them so far and I sweat like a pig and run in crappy weather. Admittedly when it is pouring down rain, I generally don't bring them along.

My wife has:

Jaybird Freedom Sprint

but hers are a little newer so maybe not had enough time to see if she has problems with them. They are pretty light weight and she likes them better. I dont think the sound quality is as good as mine, but they seem to make her happy.

in the last 4 days, I did 3 runs and 1 ride. very pleased with myself

Both of those pairs look like the kind that would make me feel underwater. I don't know how to describe it, I just know I bought a pair once that had that style of in-ear piece and it just sort of suctioned into my ear and was horrible. Is that how those work? Or do I just have weird ears or had a strange pair of headphones?

Not sure to be honest. I know that I have read before that you can get different size ear buds for various headphones, maybe you just need a smaller/bigger ear bud to be more comfortable? I've read some runners that get annoyed by those the same way and just run with old school ear phones, but usually have more moisture issues with those.

you have every right to be pleased, that's a pretty nice streak. Well done!

You, among a few people, with your reporting of workouts on FB have been one of the sources of inspiration for me finally deciding to get serious about training. Keep it up! :)

FM

I can totally see what you mean about button style earbuds and the suction. I kinda get that feeling too... That's why Ì found the Sennheiser that were posted earlier interesting as they seem to simply sit in the ear instead of being pushed in...

FM

Alan and others have been doing a great job dropping the knowledge here, but I thought I should offer some tips I've picked up over the years. In no particular order, here are some thoughts on running I've developed.

* Training is cumulative. What you do today builds on tomorrow, which builds on the next day and the next week, month and year. Now, sure, if you are training once a week for one week and then not running again for 6 months, you won't see anything. But if you are reasonably dedicated, you'll see progress. And you'll be surprised that after that progress, if you do have a lay off, you'll be farther along than you thought.

* Variety in training provides huge dividends. For years I ran sort of to stay in shape. I'd go out and run my 3-5 miles at roughly the same pace over roughly the same routes. That's great, and there are benefits to doing that. At some point, though, you plateau, get bored and stop running. To fight that, add variety. It spices things up and improves your results greatly. Alan has posted his training schedules and when I was running for races, my schedules and plans were fairly similar.

When I was doing my most serious training, I ran 5-6 days a week. Sunday would be a long run. Monday rest or easy. Tuesday, a medium run. Wednesday easy. Thursday was a day of either intervals, tempo or hill training. Friday rest. Saturday was generally a hard run of an intermediate distance.

Once I started varying my workouts, I noticed a performance increase pretty quickly. Pretty dramatic, actually.

* That said, not everyone wants or needs to train for performance. The bottom line is getting out there. I had a short post earlier--Feet on the Floor, Out the Door. Get out there. There are millions of reasons you can come up with not to run. But you forget those a half mile in.

* Double that said, do as I say not as I do. In other words, don't pay attention to my Strava stuff right now. I have an about to be 3 year old and a 1 month old. I'm just trying to run when I can, and I am typically running harder shorter workouts just to try to be efficient. Not much variation in how I'm running.

* Run a race. They are fun. Invite your friends or family to cheer for you. That's the best. Again, I'm not really in a spot where I can take time before and after a race to travel to it and run and everything, but I do think that there's nothing better to introduce yourself to running than to run an organized race. There are likely online calendars for your community. Find one and do it. I will make you a bet that you will not be in "last place," that you'll probably do better than you think and you'll have a ton of fun.

* Read a book about running. Not necessarily a training book. There are a lot of training books. I like those fine. Hal Higdon and Brad Hudson are probably my favorites. But read a different kind of running book.

Born to Run is a great one and recent NYT best seller. The Perfect Mile is probably my all time favorite running book about the quest to break the 4 minute mile. Once a Runner is a cult classic that you should get your hands on if you can. I've also enjoyed Running with the Buffaloes and the biography of Bill Bowerman, the name of which slips my mind right now.

* Read Runner's World. It has info for all levels of running. One of my favorite regular features they have is a column called "The Athlete's Palate." It is a column with a chef or other foodie where they talk about diet and offer a recipe. More than one recipe from that column has become a staple in our house, the best being an Italian vegetable soup called Ribollita.

* I am not as technical a runner in terms of gadgets and tracking as others here. I have a Garmin and have logged workouts, particularly during marathon training. Usually, I look back at them later in the same day or look at the previous week's work, but don't do a lot of analysis. I'm more of a feel runner. I know when I'm going fast or slow by feel. That said, a lot of the techy tools are awesome, so use whatever suits you.

I tend to divide my runs into conversational (you can easily carry on a conversation), at pace or hard.

* I listen to podcasts or books when I run. Nothing heavy. Podcasts are about perfect because they are usually contained and not heavily dependent on prior knowledge or concentrated listening. Some people call me a nerd for my running listening habits.

* There are a ton of ways to challenge yourself, be it by time, distance or whatever. One thing I've done during races is to try to count how many people I pass. Who cares how fast you are going, just pass the guy in front of you!

* I think the half marathon is an awesome distance. You've run far enough that you feel like you've really accomplished something, yet not so far so that you've wrecked your body for weeks.

* I think the 800 is the perfect interval. It is really hard to maintain a pace for 800 meters. There is also this thing called the Yasso 800, where if you are training for a marathon, you run your 800s at two zeros less than your marathon goal. So, if you are gunning for a 4 hour marathon, you would try to run a 4 minute 800. Obviously not perfectly accurate, but kind of surpising how close it is.

* Have fun--run with a buddy or alone. Mix it up. Just get out there.

I think I'm addicted to Strava.

Great advice, I really appreciate all your guy's posts.

Thanks digamma! You're definitely one of the runners that I see your runs and use it as motivation to keep doing the effort to improve to some day get to that point hopefully. Love your insight and experience

that was a very inspiring post digamma. FWIW, The Perfect Mile is selling for 2.99 for kindle...

FM

so, who's gonna attempt the "Any way 10k" Strava challenge that's happening this weekend?

If I understand it right, you have to get one run of at least 10k in either of the two days, right?

My longest run so far has been 7.2k but I followed it with a 1k cool down walk. I was planning on running a long loop around where I live this Sunday morning. Mapped, it comes at about 8.5k or so. Definitely a challenge, but not impossible especially if I finish it with a cooldown walk that I leave as part of the run and not do it in two separate workouts...

FM

I run a half marathon on Sunday morning so I'm in.

Doing mine tomorrow. I need to make a small adjustment to one of my repeat routes that gets me to 9km currently in order for it to be 10km's tomorrow.

I was going to run 10k this weekend for the challenge and to beat my 10k time done past month but being with a cold for 7 days already is going to make it impossible. I tried to run 3 days ago and was so tired after 4k as I can't breath by my nose that is still congested and my lungs are not fully clean yet.

Might try to run a bit again today or tomorrow but doubt can do those 10k. Sucks to feel like shit for a week when I felt like superman a week before, beating a few pr.

Doing relay for life with the family all day today, so woke up at 5am to run the 10k challenge. I screwed up my pacing big time, but set a new Personal record on the 10k for myself!

wow, have fun! :)

FM

I thought I read in here that all-downhill segments didn't count on Strava for PRs. I'm pretty sure that the one-mile PR today was heavily downhill-aided. There was one area that was downhill for dang near a mile.

Nice! Congrats!

So umm... I think I overextended myself. On my last run I added 1/4 of a mile but ended up with heart palpitations for 2 days (I still feel it a bit, but not as bad as Thursday). I read up on it and it seems that I'm either dehydrated, or it's part of my body adjusting to runs. I'm sure it's nothing serious, so I think I'm either gonna walk, or take it r e a l l y slow.

hey, take care, that's kinda scary...

FM

I'm weighing between getting a watch versus running the app on my phone. A couple of questions for those running this on the phone from someone who probably has not quite wrapped his head around exercising with a work phone:
1. I'm assuming that people strap the phone to their bicep? If so, how difficult is it to view the app during a run? Or potentially toggle screens for different info? In my mind, I guess I'm seeing the strap holding the phone in place blocking part of the screen and the buttons being more difficult to manipulate. Am I way off base?
2. Do the mobile apps integrate with the foot pod? A quick look at the Strava iPhone site seemed to suggest that it does not. I'm likely to do a decent amount of treadmill running in the winter, and would like to capture that data into Strava as well.

You are running in pretty severe condition weatherwise.. with the high amount of heat there. So you definitely want to make sure that you are keeping yourself hydrated. That doesn't just mean during the run, but also the days leading up to it. If you're planning on running in that heat a few times a week, you really need to make sure to drink enough water every day (even on non running days).

Also in hot weather, you really need to take it back a hair over what you expect your pace should be. Go by feel, if your heart is working too hard, its always better to slow things down, or even stop all together. Heat is serious stuff and nothing to mess with.

1) Yes, that is generally where most people wear their phone. (Some do choose to carry it in their hand, or others will slide it into a belt/fannypack/pocket) When I use an app on my phone, I don't even bother trying to look at it when I am running. Most of the better apps will tell you over your headphones while you listen to music basic milestones along the way or different intervals. often it is fairly configurable if you want it telling your distance/pace/etc every 5 minutes or 1/2 mile or whatever. So you don't necessarily have to look that way.

2) There are various ANT+ type footpods and even I believe a bluetooth footpod out now that can work with the iphone, but I do not personally know if strava supports any of them or not, or which apps do. I believe somewhere on his site DC Rainmaker has done a review of iphone supported ANT+ footpods (and heart rate monitors). I'll try to see if I can dig that up and edit it in here later. If you use a watch with a HRM/footpod or an app that supports them, you can later upload that data into Strava and it will support it (ie: my footpod information when I do a run on treadmills is picked up just fine by strava when I upload it from my watch). I'll try to find which iphone apps support ANT+ footpods natively for you.

Ok, from what I can tell, Garmin, Polar and Wahoo all have ANT+ footpods for the iphone. Polar has the only bluetooth one.

Polar Bluetooth Smart Stride Sensor (Footpod) In-Depth Review | DC Rainmaker

Garmin iPhone ANT+ Adapter and Garmin Fit app Review | DC Rainmaker

Wahoo Fitness ANT+ iPhone Adapter | DC Rainmaker

Wahoo Fitness ANT+ iPhone Adapter | DC Rainmaker

Edit: according to Wahoo's page, Strava app on the iphone does recognize the ANT+ footpod, as does like 150+ other apps

Second Edit: From Strava's support page:



Third edit: I can't find many apps that seem to support the Garmin ANT+ adapter for the iphone. You might be stuck using garmin connect app on the iphone and then copying that data over to strava or elsewhere. So if you want to go the way of ANT+ for iphone, you're better off with the Wahoo brand. But I think if you're going to invest in that, you would be happier with a watch.

i just carry my phone in my hand, and look at it from time to time.

That's what I do too. And I have no need for the heart monitor or footpods. I just run with my phone in my hand (along with my iPod).

I just watched Spirit of the Marathon on Netflix. Makes me want to go out and run right now.

I also carry the phone in my hand and look at it from time to time, also have set audio cues in ismoothrun to tell me if I'm running too slow or two fast and times heart rate, etc every half k. I have an arm strap but it's too tight around my biceps and find it uncomfortable so I don't use it. I have no problem at all with carrying the phone in my hand, but I know some people find it distracting. I also wear a bluetooth heart rate strap monitor around my chest.

Of course also listening to heavy rock in the phone too :)

punched in my first ever 10k for the Any Way 10k this morning, clocked in at a pace of 5:03 per km over 10.2 km. Don't need to say that I'm VERY happy with this run. 7 PR in all with my 8th km clocking in at 4:58...

FM

Oh yeah it's great huh? It's because of this movie that I started running.

Very nice run!

I leave my phone in my shorts pocket and use ismoothrun to keep me on pace.

Anybody know of any Strava promo codes for Premium?

It hasn't sunk (synced?) to Strava yet, but I just uploaded my half marathon results to Garmin. New PR of 1:34:02, I'm very happy! I placed 106th overall and 13/239 for the M35-39 category.

The only disappointing part was my pacing. I was a bit overconfident, came out too fast for the first 6-7 miles and then couldn't sustain it. There was a time when I thought I might be able to come in around 1:30 or so, but that was crushed in the second half. The last 4 miles were really, really hard miles. Live and learn! :)

Awesome job! Sounds like a pretty large field in that race. Did you have corral starts or just a free for all? Very impressive time!

Very nice!

That's awesome Fidatelo!

FM

I see you have upgraded anyway but I did look last week and couldn't find any. I ended up signing on a month to month basis, at least for now... I really like the pace distribution and heart rate analysis so far.

FM

I didn't ever find any strava codes for a trial and I had looked for 2-3 months before finally pulling the trigger a couple of months ago. I got premium for an entire year when I did it. I think premium has some pretty cool stuff, but so far any of the premium stats analysis stuff in strava I feel is so much more powerful in the SportTracks desktop application I use.

I can't honestly say it enough, if you're a stats geek like me, you'll love Sporttracks. Since it is a desktop application, the only thing it is missing for me is the social interaction that comes with a community, things like the segments, challenges, kudos, and comments that help provide extra motivation or encouragement. But from a stats analysis standpoint, it is easily my favorite. Plus since it is an application, there are tons of plugins that people have written for it to do other extra stuff. I know some of you may enjoy doing that type of thing too *cough Ben*

The stats show 3800 in the half marathon, plus another 650 full and an equal number of relay participants (not sure if that's teams or total relay members). There is also a 10k run and a 'super run' and I think another one. So not super massive, but still reasonably legit (it's a Boston qualifier).

Anyways, they send you out in waves based on the event you're running. For the half they split it into two waves, 1:50 and under are supposed to go first and then the rest. I was stuck in line for a porta-john so I ended up starting in between the waves, basically by myself, which ended up being pretty sweet. I caught the back end of wave 1 in reasonably short order but it was still way more manageable at that point than the giant herd start I'm used to.