I’m a big fan

Everyone’s all about perspective this week leading up to the 10th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. I don’t really have much to add to that conversation, so I figured I’d add a different kind of perspective.

Here’s an HD video of some images from the Cassini spacecraft. It might look like it, but there is no computer animation, just a ton of photos strung together. It’s amazing to think that we’re capable of something like this.

5.6k Saturn Cassini Photographic Animation from stephen v2 on Vimeo.

As I’ve told Sara before, I’m a big fan of space.

By |September 9th, 2011|Uncategorized|Comments Off on I’m a big fan

What a difference a day makes

Of course after whining on about how terrible things are with my running, I go out the next day and have a great run.

Vibram Five Fingers to the rescue?

 

After I got off of work early, I had the idea to put on my Vibram Five Fingers and go for an easy run to see how my running form is. It struck me sometime this week that I hadn’t run in them at all lately. Some people use these as an every day running shoe, but I like to treat them as a tool to adjust my running form. Shoes with big heels and tons of foam padding allow you to run with a pretty sloppy stride. It’s easy to get lazy when you have big buffers to keep you from noticing that you’re landing on the outside of your foot or making a variety of mistakes.

Highly worn outsole of my Saucony Kinvaras

 

I had some suspicions that my very worn-out Saucony Kinvaras (almost 650 miles in them) were contributing to this tendonitis (you think?) so I pulled on my VFFs and went for an easy run. I felt basically no pain, and quickly realized my form had gotten pretty sloppy. I got a little angry with myself for havingbeen so lazy with my running lately. After I’d been getting so many great longer runs in so often I took it for granted that I didn’t need to do maintenance. I stopped stretching as much as usual and gave up adjusting my stride and then, bam, Achilles tendonitis. Oops.

The New Balance Minimus Road shoes didn't work out for me

But, I’ve gotten lucky. It was my birthday on Tuesday (so close to 30 it hurts) and now I have a chance to run out (sorry for that terrible pun) and get some new shoes thanks to my awesome family. I actually stopped by Big Peach Running Co. and got a pair of New Balance Minimus Road shoes, but after a couple hours of walking around in them I had some heel pain and I knew they wouldn’t work. I’d wanted to like them, but it wasn’t going to happen so I returned them the next day. I did try on the Saucony Hattori running shoe and it felt great, so I should have a pair delivered on Tuesday.

Saucony Hattori: much better, thanks

 

And to cap off my first good run in a while, when I got back home I saw that my new copy of Relentless Forward Progress had finally been delivered. Time to start reading up and getting ready for the North Face Endurance Challenge 50k.

Relentless Forward Progress: reading up on running an ultra marathon.

 

By |September 3rd, 2011|Family, Photo, Running|1 Comment

10 steps back…

This summer has been a bit of a disaster. Well, running-wise at least. Outside of the running, I’ve gotten a new job, I was able to move into Atlanta like I’d wanted to for a little while, and am now able to see my friends a lot more. Plus it’s nice to live so close to great places like the Porter Beer Bar.

So there have been definite upsides (I mean I’ve seen more bands play shows in the last month that I did all last year), but with all of these changes came a serious disruption in my running schedule and my usual routines.

Man or Astroman? at the Earl

 

I get pretty sick of getting into routines, but it had been working well for me with my running. I’d usually get a ~10 mile run in before work a few days a week with a longer 15 or so mile run on the weekends. It was great, I was routinely running 40+ mile weeks and feeling as strong a runner as I ever had. But, of course, things change. I got a new, better job, which is great but left me with less time for runs in the mornings. Couple that with the fact that, for the life of me, I can’t seem to sleep well these days, and there you have a few reasons as to why I can’t seem to get up on time anymore. It’s not so much that I don’t have the desire or the drive or any of that (I signed up for an ultra marathon, I mean come on), I just sleep right through the alarms.

So I was pretty happy two weeks ago when I finally got back to a 40 mile week. Though my runs were more in the evening and not really on any set plan, I was still happy to get the miles in. Until the Monday when I headed out for a longer run and ended it short thanks to some tendonitis in my right Achilles. Lame. I’ve taken a couple weeks off and had a short 3 mile run yesterday, but I’m still not back to 100% and it’s frustrating. I was hoping to run in the Asheville Half Marathon and beat my time from last year by a few minutes, but it’s not happening.

So now I’m playing it safe and trying to get some rest and recovery in. Hopefully I’ll be back out on the road soon though. I’ve got some new running shoes to break in.

By |September 2nd, 2011|Family, Friends, Photo, Running, Work|3 Comments