Mitch's Training Blog » Sweat365 » Fitness Community

4×800 sprints

Mitch Roberts — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 02:39:00 +0000

Treadmill works well for sprints when you are on the road.. 4×800 sprints with warm up and cool down.

Workout:

Type: Run
Date: 01/07/2009
Time: 18:39:01
Total Time: 00:35:30.00
Calories: 464
Distance: 3.6 miles
Average Pace: 9:52.11/mile

Hotel runs

Mitch Roberts — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 12:21:34 +0000

Simply exhausted today - spent 14 hours flying yesterday from Seattle to Tampa; just many flight delays and changed flights. Finally got to bed around 12:30am only to be woken up to find out we may have a rodent of some sort in the garage.. ugh.. run details are not thrilling today. Hotel treadmill area feels like you are in a coffin too.

Workout:

Type: Run
Date: 01/06/2009
Time: 04:21:35
Total Time: 00:25:00.00
Calories: 294
Distance: 2.2 miles
Average Pace: 11:21.82/mile

No Technology Saturdays

Mitch Roberts — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 19:14:06 +0000

During my stationary bike spin on Saturday with my friend Peter he asked me if I had read my wife’s blog about “no technology Saturdays”. At the time I had not. As Peter and I talked about the possibility of what it would look like with no laptop, no football games, etc, I could feel the hair stand up on the back of my neck and I started to feel anxious – and I had even started it yet. Hmmm. Big red flag there! At the time I had not read it but upon my return home I found the blog post and sat down with a cup of coffee.

She got the idea from an article that she read a few days earlier (here is the link for those who didn’t see the post - http://yesmagazine.org/article.asp?ID=3032. The article talks about cutting out all electronics for one full day, but we chose to allow cell phone use – hey, it might even have us actually call someone rather than emailing or hanging out on Sweat365, Twitter, Facebook, or surfing all day. This also meant that we chose not to blog at all for the day (sorry Brad, took a day off).

Now, for any of you that know me not turning my laptop on is like pulling my fingernails off. I work to some degree 7 days a week, be it mornings, days and nights. But, at 9:30am on Saturday, I turned off my laptop and the TV never came on all day. Quickly we left the house to go shopping (it was really a way to get away from the possibility of even looking at my laptop). But when we got back we realized we needed to do something in order to keep busy. I had a list of things I wanted to get done since I was traveling the following week, but the amount of tasks that we got accomplished was an eye opener; we just kept going all day. Here is the list…

· Washed both cars (via carwash)
· Cleaned the hardwood floors
· Did several loads of laundry
· Cleaned up kitchen
· Washed all of the dishes on the counter
· Wife cleaned up her part of the office
· Put all Christmas lights away with the new totes we picked up while shopping
· Went to the bank
· Dusted and washed the chandelier light panels
· Cleaned the bathroom shower
· Anxiety – it’s only 3:30pm…. NOW WHAT??
· Counted the change in the change cup - $21!!!
· Cleaned the garage enough to get the truck inside out of the colder weather
· Found cookies and a card at the front door (my son and I help pushed someone out of the snow just before Christmas)
· At 6:00pm realized, sh*t, it’s only 6pm! NOW WHAT!!! My laptop was staring at me saying “you know you want to turn me on, it’s ok, you worked all day!”
· Cooked dinner
· Washed all of the dinner dishes
· Cleaned kitchen (again)
· 9:00pm rolled around; decided it was time for bed since we had a 10k run the following morning

So there it was - my first Secular Sabbath (or No Technology Saturday). To be really honest it wasn’t that bad at all, and actually had us get some things done that we would have normally let sit (because we were on the computers). In looking back now, outside of blogging my workout, I didn’t really miss it the laptop being on all day, or the television for that matter. We typically don’t watch much TV but when we are left to our own devices, and it’s early in the evening we might just flip on the tube and find an episode of The Real Housewives of Orange County or The Girls Next Door and get sucked in (now any of you have seen these two shows know how stupid funny they are). It was an eye opener how much time we have on our hands when technology is turned off.

Going forward we have declared that Saturdays will be our “No Technology Days”.

So here is my question to all of you – WHO IS WITH US???

Let us know how it goes. What are you noticing? What are your ideas? What did you get accomplished? What obstacles did you come across?

Sunday Run; 6 miles, :53 minutes

Mitch Roberts — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 18:09:44 +0000

Trail was still very slick today, and snow and ice in several places. And it was cold! Took a few miles just to get warm. Felt good today though and maintained a sub 9:00/mile. Happy about that.

Workout:

Type: Run
Date: 01/04/2009
Time: 10:09:46
Total Time: 00:53:00.00
Calories: 761
Distance: 6 miles
Average Pace: 8:50.19/mile

Saturday Spin

Mitch Roberts — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 20:00:00 +0000

Supposed to be a day off or light run, so I chose to do a 45 minute spin with Peter instead.. I could feel the cycling legs coming back finally too!

Workout:

Type: General Cardio
Date: 01/03/2009
Total Time: 00:45:00.00
Calories: 409

Back to the Pool

Mitch Roberts — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 15:11:13 +0000

First swim in the pool in about 6 weeks. We swam some in the ocean while in Kona but nothing that was distance oriented. I can tell I have been away far too long. Good to be back though.

Workout:

Type: Swim
Date: 01/02/2009
Time: 07:11:14
Total Time: 00:22:00.00
Calories: 172
Distance: 800 yd
Average Pace: 2:44.96/100yd

New Year’s Day Run - 5 miles, :44 minutes

Mitch Roberts — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 21:02:52 +0000

First run of the year felt good - hard pack gravel trail in Redmond with the Resolution Series group. Today was 5 miles or 5k, depending on what you wanted to do.

Here is the series as a whole:
January 1 – 5k or 5 miles
January 31 – 10k or 10 miles
February 28 – 15k or 15 miles
March 29 – 20k or 20 miles

Workout:

Type: Run
Date: 01/01/2009
Time: 13:02:53
Total Time: 00:44:00.00
Calories: 631
Distance: 5 miles
Average Pace: 8:47.86/mile

Dig out the garbage truck, then go to the gym

Mitch Roberts — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 16:53:42 +0000

Hey, after 3 weeks of no garbage pickup due to the wintery conditions, I wasn’t about to let the garbage man fend for himself in the dark of the morning. His truck got stuck in the snow and the chains that were provided didn’t fit his tires (hmmmmmmm). So a few neighbors, my kid and I helped dig him out so that he could be on his merry way.

Workout:

Type: Run
Date: 12/31/2008
Time: 08:53:43
Total Time: 00:29:40.00
Calories: 387
Distance: 3 miles
Average Pace: 9:53.08/mile

5×800 (10k pace)

Mitch Roberts — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 16:57:25 +0000

Tuesdays will be our speed workouts going forward now that we have started to hunker down. Today was supposed to be a 4×800 at my 10k pace (still trying to figure out what my 10k and 5k paces are). Since my run last night was anything but good I pushed the distance today by another 1/2 mile at 8:57 pace. I am starting to see the benefits of speed work too, and I have only done a few rounds of it. Historically, I have always been a 10 minute miler, but now that is dropping to 9:30/9:15, and the best part is that I am able to maintain that pace too…

Workout:

Type: Run
Date: 12/30/2008
Time: 08:57:27
Total Time: 00:31:00.00
Calories: 445
Distance: 3.5 miles
Average Pace: 8:51.76/mile

Novocaine + empty stomach = bad run

Mitch Roberts — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 05:03:47 +0000

Was at the dentist today and received several shots of novocaine for some dental work. Got home, mouth to numb to eat, and we headed to the gym. After about 2 miles I got really dizzy and had to stop for a second and walk. Then I thought wait, this is just like Ironman! So I fired up the treadmill again and ran, dizzy and all… why not train in those conditions, right? Ok, maybe not smart but it sounded good at the time!

Workout:

Type: Run
Date: 12/29/2008
Time: 21:03:48
Total Time: 00:33:00.00
Calories: 387
Distance: 3 miles
Average Pace: 11:00.55/mile