addiction (plural addictions):

1. The state of being addicted; devotion; inclination.
2. A habit or practice that damages, jeopardizes or shortens one’s life but when ceased causes trauma.
3. A pathological relationship to mood altering experience that has life damaging consequences.

His addiction was to courses vain. Shakespeare.

After yesterday’s terrible, painful, exhausting long run, I figured the best remedy to a bruised ego is another annoying year-end review. This time, I thought it would be fun to review how frequent and long I ran.

First, here’s a few charts that show my monthly and weekly progress. The first two graphs show my weekly and monthly miles. The next two graphs show my weekly and monthly average miles per activity.

That was fun! Here’s some more interesting facts about my addiction:

• 797 total miles
• 128:57:57 total time spent
• 45:47 minutes spent on average per activity
• 9:43 average pace
• 169 runs
• 4.7 miles on average per activity
• 31,116 feet ascending and 34,975 feet descending
• 96,196 calories burned
• 569 calories burned on average per activity

Wow, I can’t believe I spent that much time running. The odd thing about that is I am by no means a long distance runner. My core run is the tempo run which usually doesn’t exceed 6 miles. If I miss a run, it’s almost always the long run.

Another interesting fact you may have noticed was the huge downturn of time spent running from about March to May. This was the time that I spent preparing for a qualifier; running a 4 mile long run was an awful experience.

So this wasn’t too bad considering I only targeted half-marathons. I seemed to get by a whole year using SportTracks. pyTrainer seems to have stagnated. It’s a shame because I can’t stand closed-source applications. Maybe 2009 will bring a more active community.

A few days ago, I started a 13 day vacation for the hoidays. I haven’t had a real vacation since February 2007 when we went to Seattle (pictures will surely follow). Tons of things have happened in the last few months, so I’ll run through them since I have been very negligent of most things. I’ll make a separate post about Christmas and what I expect out of 2009 soon.

We bought a house in October. We moved in and tried unpacking. Until the day before family was slated to visit, we were only half-way unpacked. We now only have the master bedroom to finish.

I finished my Data/Text Mining For Computational Biology course. The workload was lopsided with October and November having the bulk of the work. I also took the qualifier for this class. There were only 2 people taking this exam, myself included with only 1 person having attempted it before. It lasted 3.5 hours and was most definitely written by committee. I don’t know what my final grade is because the website is closed right now (seriously, who “closes” a website?).

I’ve started the Great Music Archive Project. I intend to have every music CD we own ripped to FLAC by the end of the vacation. So far, I am at least half-way done and have a whole box I have not unpacked and checked their status. Afterwards, I’ll start the Great Music Tagging Project.

Speaking of archiving, I’ve started the Great Photography Archive Project as well. This is nearly complete and will begin the Great Photography Publishing Project shortly thereafter.

I signed up for the 3M Half Marathon finally, since I have been training for it for the last 6 months (2 months off can really do damage). The event is on 25 January 2009. I usually loathe reading other peoples’ race reports, so I will gleefully force mine on the few readers that remain.

I also have a plan to start daily perl6 development without altering my schedule. I will post details once I actually start. It involves a laptop and a morning commute. Sounds dangerous, doesn’t it?

Anyways, I must continue my archival projects now since I plan on accomplishing no real work while on vacation.

It’s been two weeks since I wrote anything and three weeks since I posted my pace charts. I’m getting lazier by the week when it comes to writing a training log entry. I’m working on something to simplify my workload, but it’s rather foreign to me, so there’s a steep learning curve.

Anyways, the weeks have been getting hotter by the day. I’ve been comparing the tempuratures registered by my car’s thermometer when I get in after riding in the vanpool and it went from the low 90’s to the upper 90’s, and now it’s been breaking over 100oF everyday. The heat is getting oppressive. After about a mile, every step is sweat dripping agony. I worked hard to maintain my pace under ever increasing distances but it’s growing harder and harder to even move.

I read and interesting article on NY Times about how people in the north have been dealing with the heat and it’s rather comical. Of particular note is the following quote:

On June 7, over 4,000 women ran the New York Mini 10-K race in Central Park. When the race began at 9 a.m., it was 71 degrees and the humidity was 78 percent. The winning time, 32 minutes 43 seconds, by Hilda Kibet, was the slowest in a decade.

“From the beginning, my legs were not really moving,” Ms. Kibet told The New York Times.

That same day in similar weather and humidity, in Cambridge, Md., nearly 1,400 athletes raced in the Eagle Man Half Ironman — a 1.2-mile swim, a 56-mile bike ride, and a 13.1-mile run. Among them was Amy Roth, 32, the director of corporate partnerships at the Whitney Museum in Manhattan. She had trained hard, but the run, in particular, was difficult in the intense heat.

“I felt like I was dragging along but I couldn’t move any faster,” Ms. Roth said.

Still, she ran at a mile pace of 8:07.

“There were very fast people, very good athletes, who were walking, who just couldn’t do it,” she said.

Afterward, some posted comments, agonizing over their sluggish times, on Slowtwitch.com. “You could see the neuroses: ‘Oh, my God, am I getting slower? What does this mean?’ ” Ms. Roth said.

The next day, 190 professional cyclists started the Philadelphia International Championship, a 156-mile race. It was 79 degrees at 9 a.m. start, and 94 degrees when the last cyclist finished in mid-afternoon. About half of the competitors dropped out. The winning time, 6:14:47, by Matti Breschel of Team CSC, based in the Netherlands, was nearly a half hour slower than last year’s time, when it was cooler and drier.

I can’t help but say these people are a) ill-prepared for a possible weather scenario, in the summer, and b) are just whining and looking for an excuse. Don’t get me wrong, when your body runs hotter than you’re used to, it can be grueling to do much of anything, much less run a race. This seems to be an egregious case, especially the 10K-ers, of pinning the blame on heat and not poor training.

I also fiddled with the Garmin on 30 June 2008 by accidentally deleting a lap while a workout was in progress. This results in the workout being stopped. Doing this twice means I ended up with three GPX files that needed merging. GPSBabel and was more than happy to solve this problem for me (still had to remove the track divisions so they were all part of one track point collection).

Anyways, I ran the annual Too Hot Too Handle 5K again this year. It’s the third time so far with my previous times being 31:06 and 27:51. This year I obviously had a late start in preparation, what with the qualification exam and all. I have been working real hard to not run and hide from the heat and learn to thrive in it; I was sure I’d be ready this year.

Sunshine and I headed out a little early so she could get some coffee while I picked up some batteries for the camera. About half-way to the venue, I realized I had left my bib on the dining table and we didn’t have enough time to turn around and pick it up. I figured I couldn’t possibly be the first person to forget a bib, so we forged ahead. I was right; they had a form to fill out. It actually worked out for the best because I was able to go to the end of the chip table, where there was no one trying to get the chip of such a high bib number, and snag my chip replacement in a hurry.

They decided to line up the 15K crowd with the rest of us 5K-ers, which meant there was surely going to be a strange split at about 1.5 miles. I wanted to try and push myself the best I could to beat last year’s time but I realized that might not happen with the mere 2 months of training. I was right again; about a mile into an 8:30 pace, I was huffing and puffing. My legs were stiff and my chest was already tired.

Not to disappoint, there was a redirection for the 5K route to go up a hill into the neighborhoods. Great, this was all I needed. My legs weren’t going to be able to handle a ton of hills and the first hill was brutal (as you can tell from the elevation chart). I walked it with great pride and a lack of knowledge as to whether this would be the last hill. It was and I was able to coast down for a while. I was really tired near the end of 2 miles. I had stopped to walk briefly too many times but I knew I had to just suck it up and finish strong. I finished with an official time of 28:31, just 40 seconds off last year (or about 13 seconds per mile). Not the greatest, but good considering. At least it was better than Keep Austin Weird and now I know I am catching back up to last year’s performance.

Sunshine and I enjoyed some freebees. I picked up another free Brooks shirt for being decked out in Brooks gear. I also enjoyed another beer; Stampede beer has now offered up free beer at 2 events I’ve attended and I always love to partake in free booze. We took some great pictures and I hope to get the photo publishing aspect to my site working soon.

I just wish I could mentally push through pain like this man.

I didn’t get to posting the previous pace chart logs, so I’m lumping the last 2 weeks into a single post here. Yes, I know it’s already Wednesday. Yes, I know I’m getting lazier and lazier. In all fairness, Sunshine had 2 exams last weekend, so I picked up the slack around the house so she wouldn’t have to do any of the chores.

I blatently ignored the PA’s recommendation to not run with the fresh stitch. I did take off the following day and skipped the interval run, but I figured I’d give the extended interval a try and see if I would pop the stitch. Everything was fine, so I continued throughout the week at a slightly slower pace than usual.

That weekend I went to meet a new potential running partner but he had to bail on me. I ran a really good 7 miles at a decent clip (compared to recent performance). I usually don’t have trouble with irritable bowels or weak bladders. In fact, I rarely ever suffer while I run other than being constantly out of breath. Well, that weekend, I suffered a miserable 7 miles. I woke up with an upset stomach (maybe Mexican food wasn’t a good idea), downed some Pepto and hoped for the best. The best never happened. I wanted to vomit every step of the way, but I couldn’t. That must be what hell is like, perpetually on the verge of relief. I sucked it up around 3 miles when a woman passed me. I told myself I just wanted the agony to end but I suspect my ego had something to do with it.

Last week’s runs were tough. The heat is starting to pick up just as my distance is starting to amount to something substantial. I’m starting to suffer from cotton mouth and my sweat is evaporating before I finish. The temperature is near the low 90’s when I usually head out and I think it’s starting to climb upwards.

Speaking of temperature, I ran the Keep Austin Weird 5K last weekend. I mentioned the idea to my brother and he leaped at the idea. When I tried to bail out, my Mom dropped a guilt bomb on me. I signed up and decided to drive down by myself (Sunshine had exams). By time I got down there, he had picked up the packet and went out to buy some running clothes. Apparently, he had been getting very excited at the idea of running the event with me, which was ironic because we fought like cats and dogs as kids.

Needless to say, the event lives up to its name. All of the oddballs come out of the woodwork. The costume contest is usually a big draw and the live music afterwards is usually a pleasure. Unfortunately for me, this was the first 5K I’ve done all year, especially after the hiatus, and it was not a good confidence building race. I should’ve known better when the event started at 6 PM.

According to weather.com, the event took place in about 100^o F heat. That made things very difficult. Around 1.1 miles, I started suffering. The first water stop wasn’t until 1.6 miles, if you discount the icecream at 0.8 miles, and there was no shade. It was excrutiating and I didn’t appear to be the only person suffering. Everyone who wasn’t in a costume looked like Death Warmed Over. I think I was starting to overheat near the end because I stopped sweating and started getting cold chills. I wasn’t alone; I passed at least one person that needed EMS attention. The heat was too intense; I will probably costume it next year.

The uptick is my brother was boasting that he’d be doing 6:30 miles. Turns out he finished in about 28 minutes, a mere 1.5 minutes before me. If I had been having a good day, I could’ve beat him. This is significant to me because he’s always been the athletic one of the family and I’ve always been the family brain (shut-up, no comments). As much as he had always ragged on me for being bad at sports and overweight, it sure felt good to know that I was within reach of being better at a physical activity than my 1% body fat brother. Hopefully he’ll want to do more events in the future because I did have fun lining up with him.

Well, without further ado, here’s the bigger than usual list. Note that the 20080628 event is the race.

So this past weekend lived up to the mythos. In fact, the week leading up to it was something else as well. So my tale of last week is broken up into a few sections here, which I’ll go over one by one.

The Pee Pants

On Wednesday, during my tempo run, I noticed everyone I passed was giving me a funny look. An elderly couple looked at me as if they were confused. I jokingly thought to myself that they must not be used to seeing a lanky guy like myself expending so much energy to barely move. A mother and daughter walking their dog refused to respond when I greeted them. Then, one woman on a bike initially gave me a welcoming smile but then sort of glanced down and winced. It was then that I realized there was something wrong, so I checked to make sure my baggage was stowed (if you know what I mean) and everything was in order. Everything seemed fine except there was a sweat pattern developing around my crotch. I’m sure it looked like I peed my pants, but I didn’t and it could have looked far worse.

The Ulcer

Jay: I farted on Jason’s pillow, he farted on Jonah’s, thinking it was mine, and eventually pinkeye-d my pillow. I’m not proud of any of this.

Well, I didn’t develop pink-eye, but it sure felt like I did. Friday morning I stuggled to keep my eyes open and found it grew worse throughout the day, leading into light sensitivity and soreness. I assumed it was just something in my eye and a night’s sleep would clear it up. It actually became worse, so I went to the optometrist. Turns out I had developed an ulcer in my upper right eye and it had become emergent. I had to apply drops in my eye hourly and go back the next day to check to see if the prescription was effective. I took the opportunity to live like Batman the next day and avoided spending any time in the sun.

It cleared up by about 80% on Sunday and I was told I could scale back the prescription usage. I should be able to start wearing my contacts again by Friday.

The Stitch

As per our Sunday evening routine, I was finishing a few things on the grill (mushrooms and under-cooked pork) when yet another emergency occurred. Our cheap knives have this bad habit of not staying in the handle, which led to one of the steak-knives doing just that. From about 3 feet off the ground, it feel tip down into my foot. There wasn’t any pain, but gravity took over and blood starting spurting out. I yelled at Sunshine to try and get her to bring me a towel to stop the bleed. Her response: bring a towel and the Britta water pitcher, apply the later before the former. This just caused more blood to pour out, so I took the towel, wrapped the wound, and hurried into the bathroom tub.

I don’t claim to be even remotely medical, so I figured a hospital visit was in order. The hospital may be less than 5 miles away, but we had to wait 2 hours to see a doctor, bleeding wound and all. After a smart-assed male nurse came in to give me a tetanus shot, the PA decided I only needed 1 stitch, which was quickly administered.

She also recommended that I not run (the fact that I was a runner was only logical after she took my blood pressure and found it to be 104/55) until the stitch was removed next Wednesday. I said to hell with that and ran yesterday and today anyways, albeit slower than planned. I figured if there are people that can run without feet at all, then the least I could do was deal with a single stitch without whining.

So here are my pace charts for last week. I burned ~1500 calories and struggled with the heat all week. I took a few walk breaks due to the oppressive heat. Sunday was not a good run, as you can tell from all of the up and down motion in the chart. Hopefully this week will turn out better.

So last week didn’t produce anything eventful in the running area. I powered through the runs and found that I get better in second extended interval than the first. I struggled with intense 40 mph winds on Wednesday’s tempo run which sapped the energy from me and caused me to walk a few times. Uphill and into heavy winds like that is no way to start a 3 mile tough run. I also made the mistake of changing the route Wednesday due to the increased distance that I definately paid for thanks to the wind.

The only thing worth noting is I had an excellent run on Saturday. I did not fatigue until the halfway mark, which is about 2 miles further than it took last week.

I’m posting this late in the week because of the troubles I had with SportTracks again. This software is seriously pushing my patience. I accidentally hit the start button on my Garmin when I was changing on Saturday, so there was a few seconds of no movement until I realized I had done so. The trouble came with importing the data. SportTracks has this nagging bug where it does not successfully delete the last track, so my pace chart was horribly skewed because of that accidental split. I kept trying to remove it and did everything I could think of. The solution I stuck with was splitting the track at the time that I thought I finished, then removed the new activity.

These kinds of bugs are trivial to fix, but take an extrodinary amount of time to get resolved in a closed source environment. Every little nitnoid like this is driving me closer and closer to an open source solution, such as PyTrainer. In fact, I am tempted to get started helping with development.

Anyhoo, here’s the charts:

So there’s several things on today’s discussion agenda. Let’s get right down to business.

First up, I made a minor change to the site. I am now sifting the main content feed through FeedBurner. This means I will hopefully get a better idea who’s reading the blog. All I know right now is the tiny bit of information from the WordPress Stats plugin and that Google Reader thinks my blog is the most obscure thing I read. You may have also noticed that I updated the plugins and fixed the obsocialbookmarker plugin to provide links to some of the aggregators I’ve heard of. If I’m missing your favorite, do tell.

Also, I hit a milestone with my last post; it marked my 500th blog! That’s right, I’ve written way too many words that way too few people read. I’ve had some ups and downs, a few contintributors who have long stopped contributing, even watched as my wife set up her third Blogger account. Here’s to the next 500 posts!

The reason why I have not posted recently was more out of a superstition. Monday night was an incredibly intense game 5 of the Stanley Cup Finals between the Red Wings and the Penguins. It lasted for well over 100 minutes, into three overtime periods, and ended with a disappointing goal by the Penguins. Fear not, the Red Wings went back to Pittsburg to steal the cup from them on the Pens’ own ice. The celebration afterwards was riddled with boos and hisses, but it was still a sweet victory to see my boys bring The Cup home for the 4th time in 11 years.

Lastly, I never got to posting last week’s pace charts. Monday was tough because I stupidly decided to run in the afternoon and it easily broke the 90’s. The other runs were tough but managable. I’m still struggling with the long run. I felt better than last week, but only slightly. I think I am going to try and focus on maintaining a pace for a long time because I see to have trouble beyond 3 miles. Hopefully, this is just a decreased stamina due to the extended break and not loss of ability. I also need to see about excluding the walk breaks during the intervals as it greatly skews the graphs, so I decided to change to a non-continuous bar graph so it would display something useful.

I’m blathering, so here are the charts: