Funky Dung

Sorry for the lack of updates (or interaction with anyone else's challenges). Life got really busy. Here's how I did during the second half of the challenge: Here's how I did over the whole challenge: How did I do on my goals? very close Remains to be seen. I've been unable to train due to illness for most of the last four weeks. Oh yeah. Down to 164.

I ran the Run Around the Square on Saturday. I didn't finish in less than 25 min as I'd hoped. However, I did beat my previous personal course record by 16 sec with a time of 25:42. Here's my weight update:

It's in intelligent systems. The tentative title is Contextual Outlier Detection in Sets of Protein Structure Models Derived from X-Ray Crystallography. It's taken a long-ass time to get this close to finishing. So long, in fact, that I had to get an extension from the dean's office. After taking far too long to defend my topic, I now have the pleasure of getting everything finished in 18 months. Joy. So, don't be jealous.

My fitness goals for this challenge are simple. Finish the Run Around the Square 5K in less than 25min on 08/25. Train to finish Great Race 10K in less than 50min on 09/30. Lose 3 pounds to get down to 168 pounds. My life goal is the same as in my previous challenges: Stay on schedule for finishing my dissertation. Here's my weight loss progress from the start of May through July:

start weight: 174.8 07/09 weight: 174.0 07/16 weight: 173.4 week loss: 0.6 I guess I'm back on track. At least I hope so.

Somehow I only just now found your reply. If there's a knowledge base for asthmatic runners, I don't know about it. What's I've learned has come from lots of trial and error.

I'm pretty sure I've only experienced asthmatic bronchitis as the result of bronchitis that originated from a viral infection. In fact, that's how I was diagnosed. I had a nasty chest cold, and the cough just wouldn't go away. I went to the doc, who gave me Advair. That got rid of the cough, and I've been treated for asthma since. These days I take Flovent 250ug morning and night, and I take 2 puffs of albuterol 15-30min before running. I also take a puff during long runs as needed. tl;dr version: The intervals shouldn't caused asthmatic bronchitis, so perhaps going to your doc might not be a bad idea.

start weight: 174.8 06/25 weight: 173.0 07/02 weight: 175.0 week gain: 2.0 07/09 weight: 174.0 week loss: 1.0 2-week gain: 1.0 Two factors combined to set me back to where I was three weeks ago. First, I took two weeks off from running to rest my joints and whatnot. Second, I spent a week on vacation with my in-laws. The second factors seems to have been worse for me, since I wasn't walking to/from work daily. *sigh*

Well, there are always more variables one could account for. I don't have the time or inclination to record meteorological or dietary details. In fact, a key inspiration for this regression was a strong suspicion that the vast majority of variance in the data could be attributed to weight, once distance was accounted for. I'm able to abstract away a lot of environmental variation, though, because I have multiple instances of the same races. Each race takes place at a different time of year, and the weather for each varies from year to year. If knew the meteorological details for each race instance, I'm sure I could make a more precise prediction. However, the accuracy seems to be good enough that suboptimal precision is acceptable. tl;dr version: Meh. It's good enough for government work.

Thanks

start weight: 174.8 06/25 weight: 173.0 week loss: 1.8 # situp workouts: 1 # pushup workouts: 2 dissertation status: on schedule (barely)

Sorry for the confusion. Hopefully the edits I've made provide the clarification you needed.

Having used RunKeeper, Endomondo, and MapMyRun, both with and without assistance from Tracker Booster, I can confidently state that the accuracy of MapMyRun is dreadful. Someone did a thorough and well-controlled comparison of RunKeeper and several GPS watches and found RunKeeper to be surprisingly accurate; Endomondo wasn't studied.

I recently compared the GPS accuracy of RunKeeper, Endomondo, and MayMyRun. RunKeeper and Endomondo seem to both be pretty good. MapMyRun stinks on ice. Given the functionality of RunKeeper described by someone else in this thread (intervals coach, etc), that's the one I've decided to use regularly. BTW, if you don't mind using more battery, Tracker Booster is good for improving accuracy, though it couldn't do much to help the awful inaccuracy of MapMyRun. Hope that helps!

I'm an asthmatic runner (albeit not a fast one, by athletic standards). Two things I've done have helped me tremendously: Breathe-Right strips and intervals. The Breathe-Right strips are fairly self-explanatory; greater potential for air flow is important when your air passageways tend to swell shut. Intervals have helped me increase my speed, strength, and stride efficiency more than I can describe. I've turned every training run into intervals. It's a great way to push one's body without too much risk of an attack. Below are the interval routines I use for different route distance. Times are in mm:ss. < ~ 4mi 5:00 warm-up while (not done): 2:00 fast 1:00 slow 1:00 fast 0:30 slow 0:30 fast 0:30 slow end while > ~4.5, < ~10 mi 5:00 warm-up (10:00 for 8+ miles) while (not done): 3:00 medium 2:00 fast 1:00 slow end while > 10.5 mi I let you know when I start training at those distances again.

You might be able to improve RunKeeper's GPS accuracy using a free app called Tracker Booster.

Using a smart phone app is actually a pretty good idea, because they can use A-GPS, which uses cell tower triangulation to aid in positioning when GPS coverage is spotty. Just make sure you use a good app. The GPS functionality of MayMyRun stinks on ice. RunKeeper and Endomondo seem to be really good, though.

For 7 years I ran in Brooks Adrenaline GTS. This year I bought my first pair of semi-minimalist shoes, Inov-8 F-Lite 230s (I'm not dogmatic about this, so no flames, please.). I still use Vasque Blurs for off-path trail runs. A couple months after my purchase, I'm still not entirely sure how I feel about the Inov-8s. I've gotten used to less padding in general. However, accidentally stepping on gravel or stones hurts like hell - a problem I never had with the Brooks. I'm pretty sure ditching padding and pronation control has improved my stride efficiency, but I worry about doing lots of miles without padding. In a couple years (after I finish my dissertation) I'll be training for a marathon again (last time was 2010). Any advice for high-mileage minimalist shoes? For the record, I don't do barefoot, and I don't want monkey toes (Vibrams).

I've been weighing myself almost daily since mid-2003. I also have my race times dating back to 2005 recorded in a spreadsheet. I have multiple times and weights for each distance. For instance, I've run the Fathers Day 10K every year since 2007, Great Race 10K every year since 2005, and the Run around the Square 5K every year since 2006. I have an assortment of "one-off" race times at various distances, too. All I did was feed a sheet with four columns to SPSS: weight, distance, total time, and pace. I ran two different linear regressions, one with weight, distance fixed to 10K, and total time; and the other with weight, distance, and pace. I let the regression routine handle the rest. I ran the regressions in the first place because I began to suspect that improved fitness was having a negligible effect on my finishing times. The results seem to support that hypothesis. On the other hand, improved fitness helps me run farther and faster when training, leading to additional weight loss, and weight loss helps me run farther and faster in my training, so fitness can't be ignored. No surprise there. What was surprising to me was just how strong the dependency on weight was.

Being the nerd I am, I also did a regression with both weight and distance predicting minutes/mile pace. Pace (minutes/mile) = .142 * Distance (miles) + .063 * Weight (pounds) - 2.942 For a 10K race (6.2 miles) and a weight of 175, the prediction is 8.96 minutes/mile. I ran 8.63 minutes/mile on Sunday.

Well, according my regression, my total time slows down .538 minutes per extra pound. That works out to 32.28 extra seconds. Divide by 6.2 miles, and you get 5.21 seconds/mile. So, for me, 2 seconds is a low estimate. Good luck on your dissertation. What's your field? Mine's intelligent systems, with a focus on bioinformatics.

OK, I'm passing on the RPG stuff this time around. I just didn't find it useful or rewarding in the previous challenge. This challenge is the first part of a 13-week goal. The primary goal of the second part will be to beat my 10K race PR on 09/30. I've determined that there's a fairly linear relationship between my weight and my finishing time for any given distance. 10K Time (minutes) = .538 * Weight (pounds) - 39.573 My 10 K PR is 50.82 minutes, so my target weight to hit 50 (± 1) minutes is 166.5 (± 0.9) pounds (I was actually just under 172 lbs at the time, so I over-performed.). I've been trying to lose 1/2 lb per week since late January. So far I'm well ahead of schedule, but I'm sticking with the planned rate and not trying to force continued "excess" loss. Since I'm about 173.5 right now (173.6 on 06/20), that means I'm shooting for 170.5 at the end of this 6-week challenge, 170 after the interim week, and 167 at the end of the next (which will end 09/24, I think). Of course, if I'm below 171 in 7 weeks, I'll revise my goal for the second 6 weeks appropriately. So, that takes care of the first fitness goal. The other two will be to do push-ups and sit-ups three times a week each. My life goal will be to stay on schedule for my dissertation.

Here's my final weight chart for the whole challenge:

Thanks for the reply. I weight myself every morning (or nearly), after I've peed and before I've gotten dressed, wearing just an undershirt and boxers. That's about as much experimental control as I can manage under the circumstances. My full weight chart can be found here.