Final Stretch

Well, I went to the volunteer mtg tonight.  Next thing is the event itself!! 

Here are a few things to note:

1.  The are NO headphones allowed on the race course.  Speakers are allowed, but no earpieces.  Last year I passed a few people wearing speakers --weird.  I like to train with my iPod shuffle, but races themselves are great to do untethered anyway.

2.  We need to round up some reflective vests to wear during the dark hours.  Anyone have any?  I've got one, and have 2 ready for our volunteers.  We need to find 3 more (2 per van makes things the easiest).

3.  Tapering is real -- we should all start to take it easy about now and rest during the next week.  Any more hard training will only wear you down now.  Do some short comfortable runs, get lots of good sleep, and hydrate well during the week.  Also, as we heard in recent emails, during the 3-ish days before the event switch off whole-grains to the puffy stuff.  :^)

4.  Packing -- everyone will need to bring a bunch of stuff to survive, both running stuff (shoes, layered clothing, etc.) and non-running stuff (sleeping bags, earplugs, towels, favorite snackies --I'll have plenty of peanut butter tortillas).  There are several lists out there, including some in the articles below.  I'll try to post one here as well, later...

5.  May I underscore using Body Glide or similar anti-chafe product!


Here's another article written by a guy that I ran HTC with last year.  He's a running coach, and does  sub-6minute pace legs... Check the links at the bottom too:

http://running-advice.com/blog/?p=4166



And here are links to the articles we've been tossing around in email:

How to Survive HTC:


http://www.portlandrunningcompany.com/component/content/article/60


Carb Loading:

http://www.livestrong.com/article/389533-carb-load-diet-before-a-race/

http://www.powerbar.com/articles/224/carbohydrate-loading.aspx

Hellyeah

The Helvetia Half. Our backyard run. We've wanted to run this race for several years - especially since it's so close to home. Why run the backroads for free when you can pay money? The stars aligned this year -- our marathon training called for a 12 miler on this exact date. We signed up, the Farrer's watched our kids, we biked to the starting line (zooming pass all those people walking from the Intel parking lots ... suckers!), the sky was overcast, the rendition of the Star-Spangled Banner induced tears, and I stuffed my pockets with free Cliff Bars. Oh! And the run was fantastic. We had fun and ran a good race.

Amazing Boston Marathon

New (unofficial) world record in the Boston Marathon today. He ran the 26.2 miles at a 4:42 pace!! That would bury the needle in our little gauge to the right there... INCREDIBLE.

Time to "Log Your Run!" Everyone

OK, I think we're rolling on the running logs and stats now. Check out the "Team Stats" in the right margin. If you click on the button that says "Log Your Run!" it should open up a Google Docs Spreadsheet. The first worksheet is the table for logging your runs.

Instructions for logging a run:

1. Make sure you're signed in to the spreadsheet (upper right "Sign In")
2. Go to the first empty row
3. Click in the first column and find your name in the drop down list.
4. Enter the number of miles you ran
5. Enter the number of minutes it took you
6. Enter the date of this run
7. Enter any comments you want, like where you ran, weather, or whatever. If it's that good, write a post!
8. Save the spreadsheet --click Save upper right (it often auto-saves)

Don't worry about getting the mileage and time exact. This is more for fun and to get a rough feel for how we're doing, how often we're running and what our average pace might be (race day pace is always faster!)

The second worksheet has a table showing totals and averages for the team. You can't edit this worksheet. The gadgets in the right margin of this blog pull data from this worksheet and display the pace in the "gauge" and the total miles and times we've logged.

Anyway, let's see how many miles and how many hours we can log before Hood To Coast!!

(Let me know if there are issues with the logging... I tried to grant everyone permissions to edit the spreadsheet.)

All Aboard!

Here's warm WELCOME to the rest of the team to this Blog. I finally granted our whole team permissions to add posts to this blog (long time coming! sorry!). The blog is used to swap stories about our training, share in the triumphs and challenges, motivate each other, and talk running or whatever else is loosely connected to Hood to Coast 2011.

How's it going? Let's hear some chatter!!!

Pace Gauge Arrives

I've wired up a pace gauge --see right margin. It's pulling data from a Google Spreadsheet that so far has a few runs logged for Robin and me. That's our average pace. In the next couple days I hope to enable the editors of this blog to update the spreadsheet, and allow the gauge to measure us all! I'll also be adding some other cool graphs that Google provides... Stay tuned, and keep on running!!!

Would you, could you, in the rain?

The past couple of weekends have been rainy (I know, no surprise). It has made for some chilly runs. Last weekend I was running alongside a golfing range as rail pelted down. Another runner on his way up the hill was running under the trees, and tossed out a wry, "Beautiful day!" as we passed each other. At least we weren't being pelted by golf balls. I always get nervous running that path when the country clubbers are practicing those long drives.

Despite the rain and chill, the air portends springtime which makes for excellent running weather.

How're y'all doing with your H2C training? Are you hoping to get hit by a train to get out of the deal? Or are you in the thick of Spring Training and getting some miles under your belt?