Born to Run

my camera broke.
it still has pictures in it and i still need to get them out and post about my DC trip that occurred some two months ago.

oops.

i am, however, going to be buying a new camera in the next month or so. i'm upgrading :) and possibly going to enroll in a photography class just to keep things fresh. we'll see.

anyway,
i've decided to blog about my 5k training for my race in April since Mom thinks i need to blog more.

plus i'm super bored at work.

i have 8 weeks and blah blah days til race day. plenty of time so i'm starting an 8 week training program because why should you run more than you have to?

i'll try to steal one of my roommates cameras and take pics of my training cause i'm sure you all (read: Mom) are just dying to see it. i always look like i'm going to die when i'm done. i'm not joking. people stare at me. my face gets so red and i sweat like a mountain man. but fear not, i'm not out of shape - just always been that way.

i've used a heart rate monitor for a couple of years now. it's my favorite running gadget. i love it.

you see Mom, the heart rate monitor tells me my heart rate during my runs. it also tells me how many calories i burn which is just fun to see.

when i wear it, it looks like this:



except my watch is light green and very pretty and i have on a shirt.

i also just recently bought new nike running shoes and the nike+ running chip.

you see Mom, the nike+ running chip is this tiny little chip that you put in your shoe.

It's the orange oval thing on the right.



and it wirelessly connects to my ipod (the white rectangular thing on the left) and it SUPPOSEDLY tells me my distance, pace, calories burned and other fun stuff.

so i've been using it on my treadmill runs and so far i'm not that impressed. my first try didn't record, my second try stopped recording 8 minutes in and below is the generated graph from my third try.





i'm sorry but that line is wonky. i might believe it if i was doing an outdoor/hilly run but i was on a treadmill with a constant pace. one minute i'm running a 6 minute mile the next i was doing a 23 minute mile. ugh. anyway, the only accurate thing is the 1.51 distance. i've read reviews on this gem and i've heard that it takes a few tries and calibration runs to get it in tip top shape so i'm not giving up on it yet. i really only wanted it to tell me my distance for runs outside so i guess i shouldn't complain. i can always figure out my pace myself. the treadmill hit 1.5 just about the same time so that's good.

alright, next run is thursday.