A shoe, some dust from muddy shoes, a brochette, and a brush
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Running Again

Byrichard
Reading Time: 2 minutes

At the start of this year I started running again. This wasn’t a new year’s resolution. I just decided that I wanted to start running, so I did. For five years I have been walking around in circles. Some take me above the A1 motorway and others take me below it. The walks are all familiar and I do them so regularly that I see the changes from week to week.

I thought I would take up rollerblading but this landscape is not friendly for rollerbladers until they are comfortable stopping. There are downhill slopes in three out of the five possible directions I can take. Every single route has downhill sections.

The advantage of running, in contrast to cycling is that you can go for a run straight from home, from the car, bus, train or even scooter. No need to put anything on the back of the car, or improvise a carrying solution. You just wear appropriate shoes and go.

My challenge isn’t cardiovascular fitness. Walking and cycling ensure that I am in good physical form. According to Garmin my vo2 max is 45 and my fitness age is that of a 20 year old. The limiting factor are my legs and joints. I can run and push further than my body wants to be pushed, and if I am not careful I will damage my joints again, and have to stop.

My running goal, for now, is simple. I want to get to a place where I am comfortable running for five kilometres without stopping. I then want to repeat this until I feel comfortable building speed. I can also increase running frequency, from every two to three days, to every day. It’s only later that I can consider running further.

With Strava, Garmin and other apps it would be easy to give in to temptation and to run further than others but that is not the goal. The goal is to run comfortably, without injuring myself, without paying beyond what is comfortable.

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Slalom Swimming

Slalom Swimming

Byrichard

Slalom Swimming isn’t talked about enough. Slalom swimming is the type of swimming you do when you’re one of the stronger swimmers but not the strongest. You’re going fast enough to overtake certain swimmers but too slow to keep up with others. As you overtake some swimmers you’re forced to swim to the side to overtake them.



Linear swimmer


As well as having the slow swimmers to content with as you overtake them you also have the linear swimmers. These swimmers swim in a straight line without ever moving to accommodate other swimmers. You are the one forced to move out of their way over and over again. When you’re swimming one or two kilometres this means that you’re swimming more than the length of the pool on each lap. These are the people that impact my enjoyment of a swim.


A lane to myself


A week ago I had a lane to myself for an entire hour. During this hour I swam back and forth along the centre line for the entire duration and it felt good. It is for this reason that I swam such a distance. The length of the pool was just twenty five metres so i had to do quite a few back and forths.


For the last two lengths of the swim, I practised breath-holding. I swam my penultimate length under water successfully and then took 30 seconds or so to get my breath back and swam the final length underwater as well. When you perfect the technique of swimming under water it feels like you’re gliding. You make one stroke, let yourself glide, and then you do another stroke. you repeat this until you’re at the other side of the pool.


Cold water


Many years ago when i was taking swimming lessons as a child I would always get cold and start to shiver. Eventually the swimming teacher would let me get out of the water and go to the showers. As children we would stay under the showers until we had used up all the hot water and then we’d get out and be really thirsty and enjoy an ice tea. It tasted so good.


My reason for not swimming is often that I like to be warm and swimming pools are, or at least, were cold. I like to swim when I know that I will be warm when I get out of the water. Thanks to the most recent heatwave my psychology changed and I want to swim again.


Having a broken arm and limited access to swimming, cycling and other sports also helped. Swimming with an arm healing with a break is simple to do. You don’t need to worry about lifting weights, about pulling, pushing, torsion or other forces. You can also modulate the strength of your strokes according to what feels comfortable.


Price


One of the strongest motivating factors to go swimming is that it’s a third as expensive as gym membership and more affordable than climbing gym memberships for a year. A year’s membership would be amortised after just 45 swims. If you go swimming five times a week you’ve amortised it in five weeks. The other advantage of membership is that you can go for just half an hour or an hour. You work out and get out and get on with the rest of the day. You also get a full-body workout.


No need for an internal combustion engine.


The final advantage is that you don’t need a car to get there. As it’s within walking distance you can easily walk there without worrying about petrol, traffic or parking. When climbing, you always have to worry about those aspects.

Rock Climbing in Virtual Reality
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Rock Climbing in Virtual Reality

Byrichard

Rock Climbing in Virtual Reality has an interesting future because some people are afraid of heights, others don’t have the muscle tone to climb and yet more live too far away from climbing locations to enjoy the sport. Virtual reality is a great way of enabling people to get some of the sensations of rock climbing without the safety concerns.

As I watched this video I was curious to see whether it was a passive experience and then noticed the playstation controller. That’s a nice enough way to go “rock climbing but it it was up to me then I would pair this with the HTC Vive and it’s related controllers. Ideally I would go a step further. I would develop a conveyor belt system, place it vertically and program it to put handholds where the climber has somewhere to grip. As he or she climbs they would place their weight on the hand hold and it would slide down as the person climbs.

We have seen demonstrations of equipment that can emulate 3d shapes and textures. The challenge would be to take this from being flat on a table to being vertical and strong enough to hold someone’s weight. Tests should be carried out on near vertical and vertical “climbing routes” before being rotated to allow for the climbing of overhanging routes. You would definitely get a workout from such a configuration. Gamers would go from their current physiognomy to being toned and healthy. The next generation of gamers are going to be fit thanks to Virtual reality workouts.

This could also be attempted for sports like Via Ferrata, via cordata and others. Via Ferrata is a simplified form of rock climbing and via cordata is walking around a nice landscape where safety gear is available to keep you safe in case of a slip or fall whilst hiking.

I really look forward to when this gaming/fitness training experience comes of age.

Mischievous Shoelaces

Mischievous Shoelaces

Byrichard

Today I went for a run earlier than usual and had to deal with mischievous shoelaces. They decided to come undone at least three times during the first three kilometres before I finally got them to behave.


I went for a run earlier than usual because rain is forecast for this afternoon and if I go after lunch then I get rained on. I prefer not to run in the rain, if I can avoid it.


It rained anyway, but light rain. The type that doesn’t soak your clothes and you down to the bone. It was rain that is noticed, but doesn’t stick around. It evaporates by the time you’re done with the run.


Today’s run was meant to be a 5.6km run and I did run most of the distance, except for the three stops to retie shoe laces, and a short walk when I felt I didn’t have much energy after yet another climb. A run that should have taken half an hour took fourty minutes. I did not feel as energetic as sometimes and this wasn’t helped by having to stop and start a few times.


I’m on week 11 of 12 of this training program so when next week is done I will be able to try another training program. The aim will still be 5k, but with a better time.


And Finally


I am trying to develop a running habit but I still don’t enjoy it. I still struggle to run the required distance. With cycling I struggle to go at a certain speed, or over a specific distance but I don’t find it as hard. Walking comes naturally to me. I don’t struggle. Walking and cycling feel natural. I haven’t reached that, with cycling. The day that I can daydream whilst running is the day that I will have achieved my goal.


Rock Climbing and live distribution
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Rock Climbing and live distribution

Byrichard

Live distribution of sports such as Rugby, Football, Tennis, Skiing and other sports is easy to justify because of the audience size. Rock climbing and live distribution of this sport however is harder to justify because it is a niche sport. Sponsors exist and interest in the sport is growing. We see that there are a number of climbing events, via ferrata groups are popular, the number of local climbing gyms is increasing but for a mass audience to watch these events is still unlikely.

I noticed recently that recorded as live climbing events are available on youtube and that we can watch two to three hour broadcasts of these events. If you are learning to climb and if you want to perfect your climbing technique then these broadcasts are excellent because you can watch exactly what the climbers are doing. You can see where they put their feet, which hand they use for a certain hold, how they balance their body on the wall and how they clip in the rope. In effect these videos are climbing lessons for the youtube generation. You can imitate climbers with the same physique as you. You can really watch the climber try hand holds and foot holds. “Does it feel comfortable? No, then I try this, ah yes, this is comfortable.” Watching this process teaches the average climber to be methodical about finding foot and hand holds. In climbing you need to look up and down. You also need to look for small movement opportunities. Moving a foot up five to ten centimetres can make a hand hold easy to access.

People have been rock climbing for generations but it is making its way in to the mainstream. Recently Rock climbing was accepted as an Olympic discipline and we will see this sport at the 2020 olympic games. As this is a sport that requires strength, agility, stamina and intelligence it is a natural, although modern, olympic sport.

Second thoughts on E-bikes

Byrichard

Yesterday I rode an e-bike over 5km and played with the eco, touring, sport and turbo modes. I experimented with the gears and I experimented with a variety of gradients and surfaces. Through this trial I got to understand how e-bikes work. 


Gaining momentum


E-bikes are great for helping you get up to 25 kilometres an hour and after that, if you have the strength then you can ride the bike at over 25 kilometres per hour for as long as you last. When you start to get tired the engine will kick in again when you slip down to below 25 kilometres per hour and assist you for the rest of the journey.


Bosch engines are gentle, they assist you from a standing start, following your pedal force to gradually get you up to 25 kilometres per hour and above. Once you reach 25 kilometres per hour and above the engine cuts out and it’s a normal bike. 


Weight and gearing


E-bikes can easily weigh 23kg or more so having the right gears is important. I tried riding an e-bike without changing gears for the first few minutes and I was able to move it along. When I started to shift gears I saw how light the e-bike felt. This is important for uphill segments if the battery dies. 


Two types of engine


There are two types of engines. There are gentle engines such as Bosch, to give you a more pleasant cycling feel and then you have other engines, such as Yamaha and others that are meant to be more forceful. In a sports supermarket, I tried another e-bike and that engine was punchier in that you pedalled a quarter of a crank rotation and it threw you to 25km per hour. The latter option felt more like driving a scooter than riding a bike. It defeats the purpose. 


Summary


E-bikes assist you in getting to 25 kilometres an hour and if you’re a strong rider the engine will sit in the background and kick in again when you get tired. Although the bike’s engine is limited to 25km per hour it is not like a car or scooter. The speed limit is for the engine, not your pedalling power. If you’re a strong cyclist you can easily reach a higher speed. This implies that on downhill segments you could reach your usual speeds of 50+km per hour. 


As a next step I would like to do a full range test, from Nyon to Geneva and back along the roads I take on a bike. Those are undulating and there are moments that get exposed to strong headwinds. I would also ride the route du Lac. If it survives those routes I would be confident to replace my petrol driven scooter with an e-bike. 


I could opt for a 45 kilometre per hour bike but I’ve found that I love my 2-5 hour bike rides so an e-bike that assists up to 25km/h is sufficient. 

Training with Zwift

Byrichard

Two days ago I started playing/training with Zwift. I tested it on my phone, the ipad and the laptop and it worked with each. Pairing both the apple watch with the iOS app on mobile phone and ipad worked well. Pairing between the bluetooth cadence and speed sensor as well as the suunto movesense heartrate monitor worked well with the laptop.


A set time or distance limit


When you are riding loops in the real world it’s easy to plan on a one hour ride and end up taking two hours as you add additional segments because you feel good. Sometimes you get home and two to three hours have elapsed. With Zwift training programs will last for a set amount of time with set goals. 


Type of rides


Two days ago I rode around the streets of London that I have ridden around in person in recent years. Yesterday I tried the Walonia course and I tried the pre-training grand fondo program. This track is based on a location in the Solomon Islands near Mulle. They added the volcano. If you check on maps you will see that you were riding on water. Maybe I was using a pedalo. I rode for 50 minutes with 3 minute peak power output of 130-150 watts.


I used the Zwift companion app to get information about the power output. It gives a more complete appreciation of the power range you are aiming to maintain. This is a useful addition because there is a lag as you go from generating about 50 watts of power when you rest to 130 watts when you’re meant to be making an effort. 


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zEx1hVjBatc
The same workout with a different power goal. 


Previously I followed several of the indoor trainer videos made by GCN and I found them enjoyable. I was training according to feel and followed their recommendations. I had no feedback on pedalling speed or power output until I reviewed the data at the end of the ride. I also had to skip the adverts as they play during workouts. Interrupting an effort to skip an advert is not ideal. 


GCN have a complete video explaining the features of the app. 


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8fArWR-CsE


Summary


When it’s raining outdoors you can still train for an hour or more without getting bored. You can also have an enjoyable ride despite the rain outside or instead of dealing with rush-hour traffic. It is also available to you twenty-four hours a day if you set it up at home. With structured plans you can train and reach personal goals with the right level of commitment. 

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