Fifty Two Kilometres of Cycling.... in photos

A vitamin-packed smoothie is always a good starting place.

Along the way toward Wanuskewin I couldn't help but think how nice it was not to be biking through snow. 

Unfortunately I didn't get as far as I liked going north, so I reversed course and headed south.

Once I got past River Landing, I came to this Asian gazebo that I had been meaning to snap a pic of for a while.  For the hell of it I inserted myself into the photo as well.

Outside of the city limits, I was on the smaller, less traveled roads of Saskatchewan.

 

Pictured here is another of the dirt roads I traveled on outside of town.

The end of winter

The rare slope in Saskatchewan.  This particular shot was taken on the trails south of town.  Regular Saskatonian runners (and cyclists) will recognize probably every hill anyway. 

What's left of the snow girdles the trail.  It's surprising how far out of town you can get so quickly.

Under the south Circle Drive Bridge over the the South Saskatchewan River.

I made it back to Nutana only to find that, for some reason, The Room is going to be playing at The Roxy Theatre as part of their "bad movies" series.

After I finished my 21 kilometre run, I hopped on the bike what I had hoped would be another 50 clicks.  Alas, I lost my enthusiasm once I reached the unpaved portion of Spadina Crescent.

On the way back to the house, though, I stopped to snap this pick.  Soon enough the snow will be a memory... I hope.

An Expensive Habit: The Price of Running

Running could be free... if you run on your bare feet, in the nude, and if you don't replace the energy you burn.  We did it many millennia ago, though we didn't get far.  The first person verified to have run the marathon distance died.  Would it have helped if he had hydrated properly?  Probably.   It seems like all you need is a pair of shoes and some sweats. I mean sure, if you're budget-challenged, then you certainly can run on the cheap.  The rest of us, though, can spend quite a lot of money on running because we're obsessed with getting every advantage we can.  We're either trying to get under two hours in the half marathon, or achieve some other objective that very few other people care about.  Yet it seems really important to us, though.

On my last long run (16k), I fuelled up with a Honey Stinger Waffle ($2.49), a Honey Stinger Fruit Punch Gel ($1.99), and a tablet of Nuun dissolved into (Brita) filtered water ($.80)--all of which is, of course, organic.  Along the way I consumed two small packs of Sports Beans ($3.98).  I wore Hoka One One Bondi 4's ($180), an Adidas cold weather top ($120), New Balance bottoms ($80), wool socks ($5), Under Armour underwear ($20), New York Jets headband (free) and an Under Armour base layer ($100).  After the run was over I consumed a whey isolate protein shake (approx $1) and about $12 worth of food from Tim Hortons (to replace the 1500 calories I had just burned).  So basically my 16k run cost me (after we adjust for the fact that my shoes and clothes will be worn on more than just this one occasion) roughly as follows:

• Food: $22.26 (If we're being honest, I don't really need to spend $12 at Tim's every time I run 16k or more.)
• Wear on shoes: $4.86 (This assumes that I wear the Hoka's for 600 kilometres--Truth be told, they'll probably be retired closer to 400 kilometres since they're in a rotation of about 6 active pairs of running shoes, and 2 pairs of biking shoes).
• Clothing: $3-6 (Really depends on how long these items last.  I typically replace everything yearly, and I have multiple sets of clothing... so let's stick with $6).

So the grand total for my 16k run on Saturday was $33.12.  That's about $2.07 per kilometre!  I plan to run just over 700 kilometres by June 1st.

My god this is an expensive habit.

Runtastic Mountain Bike and Road Bike Apps: Useful?

Okay let's talk cross training a little.  One of the toughest parts of trying to track a bike ride is knowing how many calories you're burning.  There are quite a few apps on the market, but today I'm going to talk about Runtastic's Mountain Bike and Road Bike apps, which I've used extensively over the past month.

For starters, I tested the Mountain Bike app while riding an old BRC mountain bike with studded tires, and I tested the Road Bike app on my 2016 Kona Dew (a hybrid bike) also with studded tires.

If there's an obvious difference between the apps, it's in how they count burned calories.  Clearly my hulking BRC bike requires more effort to ride than my Kona bike, but twice as much?  Therein lies my first problem... I'm using a hybrid bike, which is clearly a more laborious ride than a road bike.  So I'm going to calculate my calorie burn at about 1.5x of the Road Bike read out.  There, problem solved... I hope.

Now, let's take a look at the interface of both apps (Road Bike is in red, Mountain Bike is in Brown):

So for roughly the same route, I appear to be much faster on my hybrid bike than on my mountain bike, yet, the calorie burn on my mountain bike is more profound.  Again, let's remember, we're estimating that I burned about 325 calories (not 217).

As with Runtastic's flagship app, the "voice coach" announces a number of different statistics (pace/time etc) every kilometre (or mile), which is pretty interesting if you're into challenging yourself to go faster.  The app is also pretty accurate with elevation, distances and speeds.

Where the apps fall short, however, is with heart rate tracking via Apple Watch.  Unlike Runtastic (running) for Apple Watch, you cannot begin and end bike rides via Apple Watch.  The upshot is that you need to use a separate heart rate monitor if you want to track your heart rate.  So far the only workaround I can think of is using the Activity app that comes with Apple Watch and using it to track your run as well--doing so will give you your average heart rate.  It's then a simple matter to find your maximum heart rate using the Health app on your iPhone.  Hopefully, though, Runtastic will make its cycling apps available to Apple Watch.

The apps are useful if you're training and need to keep an eye on your kilometres.  After all, if you want to fuel properly it really does help to know how much energy you need.  Of course, you can do this all without apps as well.  Your choice.

Recap of the 2016 Brainsport Brainfreeze Half Marathon

Rule #1 of racing, always move furniture the night before, and then refuel with a Twix.

I don't have any other rules, so I'll stick to the recap.  As you might expect, if you live in Saskatoon, Brainsport events are generally well organized and fun.  So let's discuss.
First off, the half and 10k both got started on time and followed 10th Street East to Broadway, where it continued over the Broadway Bridge and onto 4th Avenue.  Then the course turned right onto 20th Street and winded onto the trail along the river (heading North) up to the turn-around point near the Waste Treatment Facility.  There was still a fair amount of ice along the course and at times you had to dodge and jump a bit just to avoid it.
I ran my first kilometre at a 4:38 pace, which (upon hearing Runtastic announce it) caused me to slow down to a cruising speed of about 5:35, which became my average pace.  The next kilometre was alongside the South Saskatchewan River (as all but the final kilometre would be) with views of the Bessborough Hotel as well as the river, of course.
Like everyone else whose run on the trail--which I should identify as the Meewasin Trail, for anyone from outside Saskatoon--I'm familiar with the dips and depressions and all the little things that a runner needs to know to pace him or herself properly.  I know, for example, that running the path under the University Bridge is a damned good time to bank a few seconds by speeding up a tad.  I also know that the ascending path from the late Mendal Art Gallery to Spadina can be, on occasion, kind of an annoying little jaunt.

As it turns out the Brainfreeze is not chip timed, nor is it a fun run either.  The race, which benefits the Huskies Cross Country Team, is something of a throwback--in some ways it reminds me of my military days when we'd run our allotted distance and then shouted our bib numbers out at one of the NCO's at the finish line. At the Brainfreeze, each runner's timing is recorded by hand.  The post race spread is not unimpressive, though I did have one complaint.  The spread consisted of water and coffee, pastries and bagels... but no protein recovery drinks.  Not a big deal as I was able to secure a small quantity of Muscle Milk from the local 7-11.

 For what it's worth, I ran in a pair of Hoka Bondi 4's.  I probably would have finished a few minutes earlier in lighter racing shoes, but as nearly all my training has been in Hokas, I didn't think it was a good idea to change anything major for race day.   I wore an Adidas cold weather sweater, with the Brainfreeze's technical shirt underneath, and a pair of New Balance running pants.  I was perhaps slightly overdressed for the event, but it's better to be overdressed than underdressed.

As for my own race and performance, right as I got to the 19k point I knew I had locked-up a sub-2 hour half marathon, barring either a bizarre injury or epic meltdown of some sort.  In fact, I had maybe 15-16 minutes to finish the remaining two kilometres.  Naturally, though, those final two thousand metres would be the toughest of the entire race as they would be almost entirely uphill--to the tune of over 60 metres of elevation over the 19k mark.  I struggled, of course, running uphill on the Broadway Bridge into Nutana and my heart rate climbed to more than 185 bpm.  But as I made the final turn, I realized that I had a PR locked-up.  It was a good race.

5 things to know about Runtastic Interval Training

 

The Interval Training feature of the Runtastic App is buried in the menu to the extent that I've only used it twice.  In fact, the first time I used it there was no audio support (you need to have voice coach activated, or else hold your phone in your hand in order to know when intervals are beginning and ending).  At any rate, last Thursday I did 40 minutes of interval training (albeit, half of that was warming up and cooling down).

Here's what you need to know:

1. The audio coach will announce each interval for you, and in doing so provide a heads up before the interval is to begin and before it is to end.  It's really hard to screw up.
2. You can design your own interval sessions or use one of the incumbent sessions
3. Forget Apple Watch.  If you're using Apple Watch to monitor your heart rate, you need to use Apple Watch in order to begin a Runtastic session.  Alas you cannot (as of now) start an interval session using Apple Watch.  As a result, you cannot have heart rate data recorded by Runtastic during interval sessions--unless, of course, you use a separate bluetooth heart rate monitor.
4. You can perform intervals by either time or pace.  In my case, I alternated between 1 minute of nearly all-out sprinting and 1 minute of recovery "shuffling".  I probably covered about 220-250 metres during each intensive run--roughly a 4 minute per kilometre pace.
5. Gear. This may seem like a no brainer, but it's probably a good idea to wear "performance" shoes as well as calf compression sleeves if you're new to interval training. I found a bit of soreness in my soleus muscle post-run--in fact, that soreness lingered for two days.