🏃♂️ Back to cold, snow, and ice on today’s run
fitness
🏃♂️ Mostly trails on today’s run
🏃♂️ Nice to see some sun on today’s run along the Leslie Spit
🚴♂️ Great crew for a ride up both sides of Achterbahn
🏃♂️ Found some company on today’s run
🏊♂️🚴♂️🏃♂️ Fitness in 2023
Wednesday, January 3, 2024
I kept busy in 2023 with triathlon training. As a reference point for next year, here’s a comparison of 2023 with 2022. My running was surprisingly consistent. Although the totals are almost identical, I do think that my structured workouts were much better in 2023. Each run had a purpose and all were part of a bigger plan. There was a trade off for cycling between indoors and outdoors. In 2023, I couldn’t quite get aligned with most of the outdoor group rides.The new Apple Watch integration with Training Peaks is really nice. Like my Garmin friends, I can finally just roll out of bed and do what my watch tell me to without having to manually create workouts 🏊🚴♂️🏃♂️
🏃♂️ Forgot to turn off the workout before getting back in the car. Got some impressive running paces! 😀
🏊 🚴♂️ 🏃♂️ Alright, signed up for the Ironman 70.3 in Muskoka. I enjoyed the race last year and look forward to a repeat
🏃♂️ Light rain, wind, and NIN playlist made for a gloomy ambience on today’s run
🏃♂️ A bit gloomy on today’s off the bike run
🏃♂️ Frosty out there on today’s trail run
🏃♂️ Another Thursday, so another hill repeat run. Note to self, next time don’t start the repeats at the bottom of a big hill. The cool down run back up the hill wasn’t fun.
🏃♂️ Felt winter coming on today’s run with temperatures hovering around freezing
🏃♂️ Hill repeats at a steady, moderate pace for today’s run. I tried to focus on my downhill form: staying loose and keeping ground contact time short
Non-default apps
Sunday, November 5, 2023
As a follow up to my list of default apps, I have a few non-default apps that weren’t on the original list from Hemispheric Views. 🏃♂️Fitness: As I wrote about recently, I use HealthFit (mostly) instead of Apple Fitness 🧘 Meditation: Waking Up, instead of Mindfulness 📓 Journal: Doesn’t count yet, since Apple hasn’t released their journalling app. Soon, though, DayOne instead of the default 📚 Books: Libby instead of Apple Books, mostly because of the public library integration 🎸 Listen later: MusicBox instead of the Apple Music libraryNew running shoe day! After 1,109 kms, I’m replacing the orange ones with another pair of Saucony Kinvara. I definitely don’t recommend waiting so long, just got distracted 🏃♂️
Choosing a portfolio of fitness apps 🏊♂️🚴♂️🏃♂️
Monday, October 9, 2023
There’s a bewildering array of fitness apps out there. Here’s an attempt to document what I’m currently using. I have some criteria when considering a fitness app: Available on the Apple Watch, ideally as a first class app, rather than just presenting data from the phone Suitable for multisport. I’ll consider a highly specialized app, though prefer one that covers at least running, cycling, and swimming Consolidated and local data.🏃♂️ Starting to see the Fall colour changes on today’s run. Powered by PUP and Rage Against the Machine
🚴♂️ Likely the last ride of the season with this crew. Getting too dark! Unfortunately we had to end early, thanks to a flat tire.
GPS Watch? No Thanks. Top Runners Are Ditching the Data.
For many, GPS watches are a remarkably useful training tool. But there are other runners, including world-class runners like Jacobs, who have a hard time understanding the fuss. To them, a smorgasbord of data is more hindrance than help. And get this: Some runners don’t wear watches at all.
I’m sympathetic to this idea. In general, I’m trying to stop obsessing over my health and fitness data (tough for this data analyst to do). That said, I’m far from an elite runner. So, I don’t have enough body awareness to intuitively know my pace zones and find realtime data on my performance helpful for making sure my runs are effective.
Perhaps more importantly, my watch is also my source of music and a way to keep my family updated when I’m out on a long run.
I don’t expect to be running out the door without my watch anytime soon.
🏃♂️ Today’s run was an endurance run with a progressive fast finish. I tried breathing through my nose for the first hour to keep things slow.
Powered by Billy Talent and Beastie Boys
Found another long run loop 🏃♂️
Tried a new route today 🏃♂️
Huntsville 70.3 Ironman notes 🏊♂️🚴♂️🏃♂️
Tuesday, July 25, 2023
After a few weeks of recovery, here are a few notes on the Huntsville 70.3 Ironman. The short version (given there’s lots of details below) is that the course was fantastic, though very hilly, and I managed to shave 15 minutes from my last 70.3. Pre-race No surprises here. There were scheduled times for registration and all we needed was the receipt from our online payment. With that, they handed over a wristband, timing chip, stickers for my bike and helmet, a hot-pink swim cap for my age group, t-shirt, and a morning gear bag for transferring clothing from the swim start to the run finish.Here we go again 🏊♂️🚴♂️🏃♂️
🏃♂️ Today’s run had no distance or pace goal. A run with no plan is usually a bad idea. This one ended up being longer than it likely should have been
Milton Sprint Triathlon 🏊♂️🚴♂️🏃♂️
Sunday, June 4, 2023
That was fun! Really well organized, friendly racers, and great weather. There were 466 racers, though other than the parking lot, it didn’t seem crowded. Swim Mass start by age group for the swim. Temperature was quite nice. Other than an elbow to the nose coming around the last buoy, a pleasant swim 😀. Bike The course confronts you almost right away with a steep 320m climb up the escarpment that really tests the legs.🥱 This justifies a nap
🏃♂️Nice zone 2 run with some pickups
