Experior's Group - CLOSED (Page 11)

Spleen is just a college nickname. I was in a bar with my room-mate and he introduced me as "Spleen Ramsley" as a goof to a couple girls he just met. I immediately played along. They didn't believe Spleen was my real name, but he & I insisted it was. We kept the joke going by telling friends of ours in the bar the night to call me Spleen for the night. After that the name stuck. The picture is just a medical drawing of a spleen. It's a great name to use online since it's almost always unused as a screen name if I sign up someplace.

My main goals this season are to PR the Oli and HIM I'm repeating from last year. I'd like to go 2:45 and sub 6 in each. I think I need to have a more run-centric approach to hit my goals. I want to be a faster swimmer too, but I think becoming a better runner is lower hanging fruit.

Not much on tap for tonight. I'll probably hit the sack early so I can be ready for tomorrow's ride. I'm still a bit under the weather. Nose totally stuffed. So annoying.

I just looked up my club hours and they close today at 1:00 pm.  Dang....  I guess I can do my Core Workout at home.  I may go to the Gym early tomorrow as the Club closes at 1:00 pm on New Year's Day as well.  I have the Oregon Duck Game for the Rose Bowl at about 1:30 pm so I will be going to Brother In Laws to cheer for the Oregon Ducks against THE Ohio State Buckeyes. He has beer on tap; nice IPA so it could be long day on New Year's Day.  My wife is coming along so I do have a designated driver if I partake too much.

Plans for upcoming days...Tomorrow - I bought the H2O Audio Interval for music while I swim and the IPOD Shuffle Gen 3 to go in it for my X-MAS gift and want to try it out and then I may just go ahead and run my 4 mile run on the treadmill after.  Sat. is Indoor Cycling Class and then I have my long-run 7 miles on Sunday.  Plenty to do and CALS. to burn. 

Be safe everyone!!!

Happy New Years everyone. I'm jazzed! Just signed up for my first race. St. Louis Half Marathon April 4th!

Happy New Year Group Experior!  Here is the summary of our early entries in our January challenge.  Hope to hear from everyone else today with their January goals (just message/inspire me with your goals/updates).  If I've got something wrong or you'd like to update your goals just let me know.  I'll update the table on Sunday and update it each Sunday during January with results that you all send me.

Have a great day everyone.  Our family is all going to the gym later this morning, so we're getting the year off to a good start!  (Note that I'm not mentioning what happens after we go to the gym... lol)

	Weight Loss Goal	Progress	Other Goal	Progress
Brian	-6	0	2 days/week core work
Heidi	-4	0	Run 3x / week
Melinda	-4	0
Michael	-6	0	750m of kick drills/week
Pete	-6	0
Phil	-8	0	1 mile non-stop swim
Scout	-5	0
Stu	-6	0	7 hrs of training/week
Ted	-5	0

Edited by juneapple 2010-01-02 1:08 PM

Good morning everyone.   How are we all today?

I ended up staying up late last night for the first time in ages.  My brother is in town -- I see him only once every 2-3 years -- and we ended up behaving as college students.  Ugh.  I'm too old for this.  He does it almost every night.   I have no idea how.

I think I convinced him to go on a bike ride with me today.  It's not in my plan, but the pace will be easy (ha ha - don't tell him I said that  ).  I have a tempo run that's gonna be hard after last night.

I hope everyone has a wonderful year this year.

Happy New Year everyone!! Good luck to all with 2010 goals, if we only pretend everyday is January 1 it might help with the motivation.Off to the gym for swimming and weight training.Melinda

Mornin' folks!  Had an early 5 mile run.  Now waiting for guests to arrive to watch the winter classic.  I make a crock pot full of turkey chilli yesterday...laundry room sink is full of ice and beer...GAME ON!

Scout

Chili must be the food for the day although I think the Chili I will be eating will not have turkey (preferred by me, but I am not making it) in it.  Going to wathc the Duck game this afternoon. 

Had a nice swim and figured out my T-Pace this morning 1:42.85; something to improve on here.  My last Sprint 100 yd. pace was 1:44.  I also ran about 4 miles on the treadmill.  I reminded myself why I always try to run outside.  Even with the rain it still looks better and is more motivating to run outside than on the treadmill.  For me anyway.

GO DUCKS

Posting to get our group back on page one.  We seemed to have drifted to page two.

Darn those Ducks.  Not a very good game for the Ducks this evening.

Working in the garage today.  May stop at the Y on the way home for some swimming drills.  If not, I'll spin easy tonight (maybe) and run long tomorrow.  Have a great weekend everyone!  Oh and by the way, I just spent a great $20.  I finally got around to ordering myself a RoadID.  No more taking my drivers license with me on rides/runs....

Scout

Good morning everyone.  I hope we're all headed for a great and healthy weekend.  It's going to be COLD.  (It's below freezing here right now.  I'm sorry, but that's not supposed to happen in SC!)

OK, the holidays are now officially behind us.  (No, the fact that it is 'Victory of the Armed Forces' Day in Cuba does not count.  We've stated some great goals to pursue for 2010.  I guess now's the time to get started...

Have a good one, everyone.

Happy New Year!
Well, I made it through the holidays without my weight going any higher than it was 2 weeks ago! I consider that an accomplishment, especially since I haven't been feeling great.
My plan is to do an easy run at the Y today. I'm still feeling pretty sick, but I'll feel sick whether I run or not. So, I might as well get my butt in gear.

Then it's off for one more celebration with friends!

Very cold here in  St. Louis. Off to the Y to find some treadmill space or indoor track if not too crazy. Have a 6 mile run schedule. BTW Found some nice deals on UA, Nike and other clothes on clearence at Sports Athourity yesterday.

Stepped on the scale for the first time in two months yesterday.  223, which means I've gained a whopping 12 pounds since Hallow'een.  Whoops!  My goal is to dump 6 this month.  I'd like to back at 210 by my next race in mid-March.
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 Didn't get a very long ride in yesterday, but I did get some bike time and topped it off with a 6K fun run at the local running store.  One of my daughter's Kindergarden classmates did the run with his Dad and kept up with all the grown-ups.  This kid might have a future as a runner!

Thanks for the tip! I've been meaning to find time to get over to SA and look for some deals.

Thanks for the Sports Authority Info.  I need a new top for cold weather.  Want to pick-up a new UA White running top for a 10K Race on Jan. 17th.  Tired of wearing black all the time.

Went to the gym today and did my Core Workout before my 1.5 hr. Indoor Cycling Class.  2x's a week Core Workout is my 2nd Challenge along with the weight loss; was able to get that done this week even with the busy schedule.

Hi everyone - managed to get some drills in today at the pool after work.  Then DS and I splashed around for about 40 minutes...

Really not looking forward to tomorrow's run.  Supposed to be really cold and windy in the am.  Not sure if I'm going before church or after church in the afternoon when it's a degree or two warmer.

I was at the LRS the other day taking advantage of an end of year sale.  Was planning to just by new shoes.  I bought myself another small little Christmas gift...






Scout

Here 'tis.  Send me your updates on Saturday! 

	Weight Loss Goal	Progress	Other Goal	Progress
Brian	-6	0	2 days/week core work
Heidi	-4	0	Run 3x / week
Mark	-4	0
Melinda	-4	0
Michael	-6	0	750m of kick drills/week
Pete	-6	0
Phil	-8	0	1 mile non-stop swim
Scout	-5	0
Stu	-6	0	7 hrs of training/week
Ted	-5	0

Edited by juneapple 2010-01-05 5:55 AM

I'm off to South Bend today where the week's weather forecast is for snow everyday.  How do you folks up north manage?  I'll admit it, I've become a weenie southern pup in the last 30 years! 

Anyway, between the weather and my work schedule, it is likely to be a sad week for training, but will be aiming for 7 hours/week when I return.  Did get up over 5 hours this past week.  Swim and run distances are back to where they were before the OLY in the Fall.  In January, need to get caught up with the 20month HIM plan.  Will post my 2010 race goals later this month when I have time to figure out the schedule.  You all have some great (and inspirational) goals!

-Stu

Good morning all.

Scout -- very nice tree ornament!

Stu--have a safe trip!  I lived in SB for a few years.  I can't say I liked the weather....

It is frigid here this morning.  When I got up at 5:30 the temp outside was 18 degrees.  Now I know that you folks in the frozen tundra think that's nothing, but here in South Carolina 18 degrees is epic.  I might have to wimp out and do my long ride today on the rollers.

Have a great day everyone.

I'm bagging my run today.  Temp is in the teens with a wind chill around 0, and it's REALLY gusting out there.  I'm switching up and will ride the trainer this afternoon while I watch the Flyers game.  We may be going to an Eagles party later this afternoon, so hopefully I can continue with the good eating habits that I tried to start yesterday....

Have a warm day everyone!

Scout

I think I may get lucky today with my 7 mile run.  Only a 20% chance of rain here in Oregon; heck 50 to 60% at this time of the year is good.  Sorry about the weather in other parts of the country.  You sure do have to be flexible.

A few people have asked me "If intervals are so grand, why shouldn't we do all intervals all the time?"  The short answer is that you'll get injured, but I thought it might be useful to say a bit more about that, so here goes.

When we train, there are (at least) three types of stress that we put on ourselves:  metabolic, mechanical, and psychological.

Metabolic:  This refers to the fact that you are working your muscles.  When you work your muscles, you literally damage them, and they get stronger during the act of repair.  The more your damage them (i.e., the higher the metabolic stress), the more time and energy is required for repair.  Now here's the big point:  metabolic stress is generally thought to go up as something like the 4TH POWER of wattage.  (The precise relationship isn't important here.  What's important is that is isn't linear -- not even close.)  That's why (even ignoring other factors, like air or water resistance) going just a little faster is trivially easy when you are going slow, but so darned hard when you are already going pretty fast.
   An additional point about running:  much of the stress you are putting on your muscles is via eccentric contraction (the muscle is lengthening against tension every time you hit the ground) and this is harder on your muscles than the mostly concentric contraction that you do in biking and swimming.  That's one reason that the latter two can be done harder more often.

Mechanical:  This refers to the pounding and stresses and strains that your bones and soft tissue take during training.  These are very high in running, somewhat lower in biking, and even lower in swimming.

Psychological:  Well, each of us has to deal with this in his or her own way.  As I'm sure we all know from experience, it takes some measure of concentration to maintain a hard pace, and that level of concentration just isn't going to be feasible for many of us day in and day out.  Hard exercise also, apparently, triggers the 'fight or flight' mechanism (whatever that is...I'm definitely out of my element here, so just reporting what I've read!), which overall can increase stress on the body, including the immune system.  Too much hard exercise can, so the theory goes, end up making you sick.

So get out there and do the hard stuff, but also do the easy stuff, and the resting!

Here's a coupon code good for $1 off a new order at roadid...

ThanksMatt607010

Scout

got a nice ride in this morning for 40 miles. nice clear and beautiful for an early january morning. the ride back was into a nice head wind and a slight grade. so the quads are felling nice.