williamhathaway.com

Since Ryan ‘I’m too cheap/lazy to get my own Garmin’ Higdon has been bugging me consistently for my motionbased uploads of runs we did together, I took a quick search and found that you can get RSS feeds.  Apparently this has been available for a while, but today was the first I heard of it.  All you have to do is add ‘rss’ to the end of a motionbased vanity name to get the  feed.  Mine is http://billhathaway.motionbased.com/rss.

I stumbled across a web form that lets you easily create Solaris SMF manifest definitions.  While it only works for simple services, it is good idea since probably 90% of custom services fit this model.

Step 1. Go to the easy SMF website and put in your values

Step 2: Copy and paste the xml output into a file (a quick set of instructions for managing your new service is also provided)

Step 3: Start the service

I traded in my Toyota RAV4 and picked up the new Prius this afternoon at 2:00. Earlier at lunch, I was heading to a restaurant to meet Nate when the ‘check engine’ light on my  RAV4 came on.  Since I knew that I’d only be the owner of the RAV4 for the next 2 hours, I thought the timing was pretty awesome.   The only way it could have been better was if the light turned on as I rolled onto the dealer’s parking lot.

I’m planning on reading the owner’s manual tonight and will give some feedback after I’ve driven the car for a few days.  The one thing that was weirding me out on the drive from the dealer to my office was the fact that the car was totally silent when I stopped at a light since the engine gets automatically shut off.

What: Lehigh Valley Half-Marathon

When: Sunday April 27th 2008

Where: Allentown PA

Executive Summary: Great weather, felt terrific, ran 1:35:21 (new PR).

Full Results:

http://www.queencitytiming.com/2008_results/lvhalf2008.htm

Full Report:

I ran this race last year (my first half-marathon) and really enjoyed it, finishing in 1:43:55. This year I was excited about running it again since:

• it is well organized
• has a lot of bands playing along the course and great crowd support
• a bunch of friends were also planning on running in it
• my parents decided to come out and watch/cheer

I was pretty sure I could run faster than last year, but didn’t quite know what my level of fitness would be. The plan was to run with the Garmin 1:40 pace team for the first 5k and then decide if I felt good enough to push it faster or just try to hang on as long as I could. My friend and twice weekly training partner Jon Laman was in a similar position, our training runs typically had us running within a few BPM of each other. I knew from the Chambersburg Half-Marathon six weeks ago that if I ran with a heart rate of about 88-90% max I could run a decent race and not fall apart on the last few miles.

Jon and I drove up the night before since race packet pickup is only available on Saturday (if you can’t make it, you need to give a copy of your driver’s license to someone who will be there on Saturday, otherwise no race for you). The packet pickup process was fairly well organized, and we had our packets and chips in about 5 minutes. The bibs are really cool, they are customized with your first name in large letters so that people in the crowd can cheer you on by name. We had gotten into town a bit on the late side, and unfortunately they were all out of medium jackets by the time we arrived at the jacket pickup station, so I was stuck with a large.

We had a pretty relaxed night before the race. We ate a reasonable dinner at Fridays, bought a few provisions at the local grocery store, and watched some movies on HBO.

Got up at 6:00 and ate a light breakfast. Ryan Higdon and his girlfriend Jessica met us at the hotel and then we drove the two miles toward the race at around 7:20. Traffic was pretty crazy and we ended up getting to Allen High where the race was held about 5-6 minutes before the start. Saw big lines for the porta-potties and walked into the high school. Inside here were “normal” bathrooms there and no lines. Sweet. Said “hi” to a few friends and then we headed back outside and jogged over to the starting corrals with about 2 minutes to go.

Jon and I lined up right behind the Garmin pace team leader that was shooting for a 1:40 pace (7:38/miles). The start was all-business: right on time and no lame blah blah chit-chat while everyone waiting to start. Jon and I passed the starting line about 10 seconds after the clock began and hit our watches as we crossed the chip timing mat.

The race begins with a nice down-hill section. As with any race with multiple thousands of people, the first part of the race is really crowded. We were following about 10 feet behind the 1:40 pace leader guy (PLG). We hit the first mile at 7:16, and the second mile at 7:22. I was surprised that we were already 38 seconds faster than a 1:40 pace at the 2nd mile and wondered what the PLG’s plan was.

Part-way into mile 3 the PLG started slowing the pace down and people began really bunching up. This made it way too crowded to run easily. Jon and I decided to go around the pack and started picking up the pace to get out of the crowd.

We finished the 3rd mile in 7:30. I saw my parents at around the 3.5 mile marker (and coming back at about 5.5 miles), and that gave a nice boost. Jon and I were now clicking away the miles. Splits were:

Mile 4: 7:15

Mile 5: 7:16

Mile 6: 7:17

The courses headed off the street and onto a crushed gravel path part way into mile 7. I really like running on that crushed gravel, but since the path wasn’t very wide it made it difficult to pass people if there was a small cluster of runners.

Mile 7: 7:07

At this point we started getting into some hills. The hills weren’t very bad. I can remember struggling with them last year, but this year I’ve been running on hilly courses for training a few times a week and felt pretty good.

Mile 8: 7:14

Passed through the covered bridge. Apparently the LVHM organizers love this thing since a picture of it is on the main page of the web site, it is listed as a race “feature” and is on the back of the medals. I’m not quite sure what the appeal is, for me it is just dark and 100 feet of inaccurate GPS signal.

Mile 9: 7:14

I was starting to drag a big mentally at this point. Mile 10 is typically the toughest place for me in a half-marathon since you are fatigued but can’t quite “smell the finish” yet.

Mile 10: 7:32

Mile 11: 7:04

Legs were starting to get very tired, felt like I had to work hard to maintain speed.

Mile 12: 7:21

Pushing harder trying to reel in some people ahead of me. Can hear the announcer and crowd coming from the stadium. Intensity is way higher than 1/2 mile ago. Glad this wasn’t a 14 mile race as I was getting really really fatigued in my legs. Lots of people now giving their all and jockeying for position.

There is a small hill just before the 13th mile ends as you enter into the stadium for the 3/4 lap finish. Was busy hating the hill but then saw a race clock reading 1:34:something and knew I would break 1:36 unless I really locked up. Goal for the next minute: don’t lock up.

Mile 13: 7:15 (felt way harder than that, I guess 12 miles of running earlier takes a toll)

Now I’m on the track with about 200 meters to go. Found a new set of gears in the legs and passed a couple of people as we all headed towards the finish line. Felt awesome. Tons of energy from the crowd. Stadium finishes rule.

Final .11 miles: 36 seconds

Chip time: 1:35:21 (new half-marathon PR by 3:34 and 8.5 minutes faster than last year. Sweet!)

Overall thoughts: I was really happy with the race. Nice even effort where all the splits were +/- 15 seconds of the average pace (no Harrisburg Half-Marathon Death March). I was a bit worried about my hamstring, but had no problems during or after the race. I felt very tired at the end but recovered quickly.  I am a little sore in my quads (on Monday morning), but not really worse for the wear.

MotionBased

(My Garmin Forunner was calculating the splits a little whacky so I ended up manually pressing the lap button a bunch of times at the mile markers.)

What: Lehigh Valley Half-Marathon

When: Sunday April 27th 2008

Where: Allentown PA

Executive Summary: Great weather (about 50 degrees), felt terrific, ran 1:35:21 (new PR and 8:34 better than last year)

The results are not up yet on the official LVHM site, but you can see them on the timing company’s web site  now.

For the last year or so, I’ve been going back and forth in my head about getting a new car. My 2002 Toyota RAV-4 has treated me well over the last 6.5 years (except for the occasional mocking comments from my wife and friends that it is totally a chick car), but at 161,000 miles it now is in need of a bunch of work.     Finding out last week that the air-conditioning is dead has finally pushed me past my indecision point and I went to the Toyota dealership today and placed my order.  I should take possession of a 2008 Prius on next Monday.

I look forward to trying to game the gas mileage as much as I can with the cool feedback system and will do my best not to be “that jerkwad  guy driving the Prius asking why you hate the environment”.

I was hitting Gerrit’s blog and came across an entry that talked about freerice.com. It is an ad-supported site with a bit of a twist. It gives you a vocabulary quiz and for each word you know the definition of the site donates 20 grains of rice towards the UN world food program. The site FAQ calculates that they have donated about 28 billion grains so far. I played the vocab game for about 10 minutes and learned a bunch of new words. The only downside was that when I decided to switch to something else, I got a bit of a guilty feeling that by quitting now some poor kid would stay hungry. Oh well, I think I earned someone a meal’s worth. Not sure how effective it is, but I like the concept.

Another cool semi-related item I heard about was the PlayPump.  It mates a big strong metal wheel that kids can play on with a water pump.  As the kids (or adults) turn the wheel, it helps pull up clean water from a well.  This saves a lot of time in places where people otherwise would need to walk down to a river and carry water up by hand.  Getting clean water reduces a lot of water-born diseases and also frees people up to do other things like attending school.

Monday: ran 7.2 miles at Wildwood.  Felt pretty good running the first loop, decided to try pushing it a bit on the second loop.  Felt strong for first mile, and then ‘pushing it a bit’ turned into close to ‘going all-out’ for the 2nd and 3rd miles, and I averaged about 6:55 for the loop.  I was pretty pleased with the pace, given the hilly course.   Did a mile cool-down jog and left calf was mildly sore.

Tues: jogged 1.5 miles @ LA Fitness warming up before racquetball with Mark and Ryan.  Played 55 mins worth of racquetball.  Mark won both games, but I was happy with my level of play.

Wed:  ran 10.6 miles around Camp Hill and Harrisburg with Jon.

Thu: ran 3 loops (9.4 miles) around Wildwood.  Wasn’t planning on going that far given yesterday’s run, but the weather was perfect and felt really good.

Fri: stationary bike for 30 mins very easy

Sat: ran 12 miles with Jon and Ryan at Conewago.  Due to scheduling issues, we didn’t start until 1pm and it was about 80 degrees.  I had huge streaks of salt on my face and shirt after the run.

I signed up for twitter.  Not sure how it will work out, but if you want to follow my minutia, you can find it here.

I was reading the NY Times and saw an article  Changing Speeds to Go the Distance located in the style and fashion section. I thought the section was kind of weird, but the title intrigued me.  The article is mis-filed.  It was written about Sara Hall (2006 5k champion and wife of the US Olympic Trials marathon winner Ryan Hall) and how she recently shifted her focus from the 5k to the 1500m.  Terrence McMahon, the coach of the Halls, is interviewed in the article and mentions how a lot of people pick one specific race distance and focus on it, never realizing they might be better at a different distance.  The article covers some of Sarah’s training, has some tips from Terrence,  and has a video where Sara demonstrates some drills.  Worth the 5 min read and 3 mins of video.