Running Aimlessly

Having not recovered from last Saturday’s 8 ½ mile run, but itching for a different type of workout other than what I’ve been doing indoors in the past three days, it was a gamble deciding to put on my running clothes and venturing to the sunny outdoors of my neighborhood. I really wanted to run on Tuesday but had to put it off for Wednesday because my ankle tendons were still tender. I figured I’d just stop and go back home if I started to hurt too much so I wanted to keep it in the vicinity. I wasn’t even sure which direction I was going when I got out the door but started heading North, then West, then it became aimless after that point. All that mattered was running slowly for four minutes and taking a one minute ankle-recovering walk break afterwards. Maybe I’ll turn down this street, wait, maybe a couple more streets down past this construction zone. Make a left, a U-turn, a right on a street where a friend used to live, then ten minutes South on the L.A. River bike path. At this point thirty minutes into the run, my GPS watch indicated that the lap memory was full so I had to stop and walk until I figured out how to reset it to zero. Resuming the run, I headed back North, down another street, into the neighborhood park, added a few minutes by running up and down a couple of short hills, then headed back home to finish fifty minutes of meandering and aimless running. Finally! A relief from indoor cycling, rowing, and from the elliptical machine. Let’s hope the ankles will have healed enough to run on Saturday. Weight training having been done yesterday, now to start my abs workout…

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Bike Ride on Tuesday, 9/28/10

A day after the blistering heat in the L.A. area, I went out for a bike ride. In the recent cool summer months, I’ve been wearing a jacket over a long sleeved shirt while riding. Because of the heat, I only my short sleeved Long Beach Marathon 2008 shirt this time. I have not bought a cycling jersey yet. The first interesting sight I observed was an egret flying over me then while in mid-flight, urinating or defecating a few meters towards my right. Fortunately there was no breeze to blow them towards me. Then I saw the peacock again from last week and I’m beginning to think that it’s actually a pet, although it wasn’t fenced in (see: The Sights and Sounds of Monday's Bike Ride). There were a bunch of elementary school kids again boarding a boat near the Pike area, so this must be a regular outing by some schools.

 One thing different about cycling is the need to concentrate more. There is hardly any opportunity to dissociate or let the mind wander like you can when running, and that’s because you have to be constantly aware of other vehicles, avoiding road debris, and controlling the bike. Because you create your own wind while riding, it feels cooler and it takes double the amount of time to achieve the same sweat rate as running. For example, I lose approximately the same amount of sweat after a 2 hour ride compared to 1 hour of running. I deliberately tried to put in more effort on Tuesday and that resulted to an increase in the average pace by a half mile per hour. During a very short stretch, a speed of 21 MPH was even reached. I went past my usual 25 miles again and the total for the day was 31. Not bad for a hot day and another step to burning the excess calories from the last weekend’s potluck at work (see: Burn Those Potluck Calories).

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Labor Day Ride

On Labor Day, I labored mightily on the pedals during my bike ride. I didn’t notice the headwind at first and probably due to the cool morning air. I thought I was struggling because my legs were tired from Sunday’s stationary bike intervals workout. It was just on the usual L.A. bike path to Long Beach shoreline route but it just felt harder on that day. I could hardly make circles with the pedals nor maintain a steady cadence because of the wind which wasn’t gusty but just plain steady. With the cool morning and the wind it didn’t feel like I could work up a sweat even though I was wearing a long sleeved shirt and a light jacket. One thing good about riding out and back is that whatever headwind you have to fight going out is compensated by the tailwind coming back. I really thought I was riding much slower than what ended up as my average pace. On my way back home I saw yellow signs indicating a bike tour going on but I didn’t see such activity. Maybe they were left from something that went on Sunday? The ride lasted 1 hour and 40 minutes and covered 25 miles for an average of 15 MPH. Well, I never claimed to be a strong rider… Having not ridden outdoors for a couple of weeks until last Saturday, the layoff appeared to have de-conditioned my derriere because it felt slightly sore during the Labor Day ride. A day later, I read in the newspaper that there was an end of summer beach party at Shoreline Village. I guess I must have been in the area too early to see it.

On a different topic altogether, I thought I had toughened up my foot pads a little bit after walking outdoors a few minutes at a time these past few weeks. Well I was mistaken. I got a blister on the heel of my left foot after walking very slowly with bare feet on the treadmill for 45 minutes on Sunday. My injured right calf tolerated the slow walk well though.

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Witnessing A Cross Country Run and An Obesity Walk

After having to workout indoors on the upright and recumbent stationary bikes from Wednesday to Friday, I finally went out on the road bike Saturday morning. It was something I’ve been putting off for a few days for reasons I’ll explain below. I was planning on an hour ride circling the Virginia Country Club area several times but when I got there, there was some kind of cross country race going on. It looked like there was an open race where all comers were welcome to participate in, and a separate high school and maybe even middle school race. Well, I didn’t want to get in their way and also didn’t want to feel envious seeing all these people running, so I left the area and went on the L.A. River bike path instead. It’s still a surprise to me how few people use that path. There were not even too many cyclists, runners, or walkers on Saturday. When I reached the Long Beach lighthouse, there was another event going on but they were already finishing. It was a walk for obesity which was organized by a bariatric medical group who do stomach stapling and lap band procedures. My ride lasted just an hour and nineteen minutes but that was good enough since I haven’t ridden outdoors in a couple of weeks. It still exceeded my one hour goal. Don’t you think it’s interesting that I encountered skinny high school runners with obviously no obesity problems and bariatric patients on the same ride separated only by about 6 miles?

The reason why I’ve worked out indoors since last Tuesday is of course because of my recent right calf injury. I couldn’t even use the elliptical machine and have to limit myself to cycling. Well that injury made the calf hurt a lot going down stairs so either I have to step down with only my left foot with the right foot going down the same rung, or step sideways alternating right and left. I had been afraid that if I was lifting something heavy like a bike, I might fall down the stairs. Somehow doing it sideways doesn’t stretch the injured muscle too much and I found that out on Friday. Finally, I found a way to go downstairs with little pain so I could lift my bike! Not terribly exciting, but if finding something that worked made me mildly ecstatic.

On Friday, I went for a slow 15 minute walk to test the calf and as long as I do it slowly and with short steps, it felt ok. I was able to double the time on Saturday but there was some discomfort after 15 minutes. Oh, I forgot, I was finally able to wear the Louis Garneau cycling shoes during the bike ride and they felt okay.

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