Speaking of weight...Is anyone on here using this challenge as a weight loss challenge? I'm anxious to see who the "biggest loser" is as well.

One thing is for sure, Dev Paul won't be able to drop much weight.

Every Thursday morning I plan to run to work with 15-20 extra pounds....then I get to drop the 20 lbs instantly for the run home (running only with blackberry and building pass).....does this count for dropping 20 lbs on and off during the challenge? We want to see if Herbert drops out of Clydesdale after this thing is done!!!

I just normally don't worry about miles. I was only wondering if it was a necessity. I'll map it.

---

The best pace is a suicide pace, and today looks like a good day to die.-Pre

I had the same though about starting on the dreadmill, but the first night it was 16deg and a high wind advisory out. I'm all for getting outside, but a 30mph head wind on a sub 20deg night made me ok with the basement running in a hurry.

Supposed to be 24deg and light winds tonight, and I already got 40min on the treadmill today, so a 30min 'go ahead' run might be doable tonight just to prove i've not gone soft.

---

This is your life, and it's ending one minute at a time. - Fight Club
Industry Brat.

It wasn't so bad outside, though that wind did sting a bit. Its when it goes below zero f and the wind blows you realy have to suck it up ......

---

---------------------------
http://www.nunnsontherun.com

I know. I'm jsut happy to still be on the wagon on day two ;-)

---

This is your life, and it's ending one minute at a time. - Fight Club
Industry Brat.

But the important thing is that you still go outside for your run.

Treadmills are for highly polluted or unsafe cities. For the vast majority of North Americans, they have a safe and healthy place to run.

IMO, bad weather is usually just a viable excuse to skip a workout. I laugh my ass off when I read about people skipping a run because it is 0^F or "never" riding in the rain. Coming from the Maritimes, I would never have worked out if I waited for the sunny, dry days.

According to the weather network, there are three storms coming to the central part of the continent in the next week. Sounds like a good week to get outside and run. :)

Sarge

---

******************
"it's also a personal choice to remain ignorant" - Slowman

Jen, yes, if you want to to skip down the street, heck we'll count it.....we'll even count it if someone wanted to 30 minutes of continuous triple jump (hop, skip, jump).

Sweet, I'll check with the boss and see if this is OK in place of running.

---

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Jen

"In order to keep a true perspective on one's importance, everyone should have a dog that worships him and a cat that will ignore him." - Dereke Bruce

Great news! Maybe lots of people will skip a few runs and bump me up in the standings!

(btw, the advanced editor is a real piece of work trying to edit how much of a post you are quoting)

---

Jason in Truckee

I have a suggestion about mileage. Why not score the secondary challenge based on total time rather than distance? I'm pretty sure that my 5K time isn't 45min. I primarily run on trails in a hilly area so none of the online tools are accurate enough without me spending 30min mapping out my 30min run.

Sorry...there is no secondary challenge. There is just one challenge. You can view your progress by runs, minutes or distance...take you pick...but you have to enter the data in all three categories. It is the price of entering...

While I will fool you guys into logging more volume by going out often, and doing more minutes, the bottom line for any running program is getting mileage up....it is pretty well the baseline metric for every serious running program on the planet...even the letsrun.com guys might agree with that.

Bottom line on race day is the they measure things by distance....so you better get used to accepting the reality of how hard it is to cover distance...and yes some of us will get penalized cause we ran in knee deep snow, ran hills, or went to the track, but that is just the way it is.

Edit: If it is too hard for you guys to estimate distance here is something you can do. The likelihood is that you do more or less the same routes most of the time. Take you car or bike and measure out a 1 mile section. When you hit this mile section during your run, hit your watch and time it...don't change your pace.

Now you have a good estimate more or less of your minutes per mile during that run. You can test yourself out on this mile at various intensities so that you get a feel for your "Pace". This is what real runners know from the time they spend at the track (vs us triathlete wankers/geeks who need a numeric readout for everything or we seize to function...).

After a while you will be able to run for 50m and predict the mile time at that pace within a few seconds. When you get to that point, you can head out on any course and esitmate the course within 100-400m over 10K or so.

And for good measure, I did map out my "sample mile" and the two times that I ran through today were 6:45 and 6:48 which were harder sections and faster than my average run pace today which was in the 7:30-7:40 range. I have sample piece of measured tarmac on a variety of run routes that I can use to tune in the pace, since I don't run with a GPS.

Most of us can tell the diff between 1:25 per 100m, 1:27, 1:30, 1:33, 1:40, 1:50 in the pool...so here is a chance to get in tune with your running paces...and sadly the grim reality is that most of us are slower than we like to believe.

Dev

I have no trouble accepting the reality of covering the required distance. My reality is the any of the online tools sucks for measuring the trails I run. I've accepted that and have chosen to make up distances in the challenge based on how far I *think* that I ran.

I'm in. So far I'm 2 for 2: Did the first run outside with a nice arctic breeze coming in from the northwest. Then it dawned on me that I'm doing this challenge in part to lay a good foundation down for our running cruise in the Caribbean in February so I figured that I don't need to acclimate myself to the cold; I need to keep things hot. So I did Day 2's run on the dreadmill with no fans.

Since this is my first stab at this challenge, I heeded the advice of my betters and am sticking to the minimums for at least the first couple of weeks.

Should be fun. Shooting for Silver or Gold status.

John

---

===
"I eased off a bit. It never feels like you are easing off. More like you just stake out your place in the pain cave and sit there rather than venturing deeper inside..." -- Rappstar

3 runs in 2 days and swam this morning too. :-)

I am deff using it to loose weight too.............191.4 lbs to start, goal 17 lbs in like 15 weeks (100 days). Keep it posted here in LIGHTS and use the 'goal' section of the log to help as well. So i will be the biggest looser.

tfun~

Dev, you fell off our pace. We were side by side and now you are tying your shoe or got a stitch....catch up.

-Woody

I know...I was planning to do XC ski intervals at lunch time, so I held off on the morning run pace...glad I did and frankly my pace should be 20 seconds per K slower than a stud like you!

OK 98 more to go!

It never rains in Sedona .................... until the 100/100 starts. Rained yesterday and today, all day. So I begin the 100/100 with probably 2 of the worst weather days I'll see, rain and 40 degrees. Couldn't even see the mountains for all the low clouds : (

---

.
.
Paul

I am not accepting that answer :) You stated a few weeks ago that you were going to focus on the 10k races for your running. I am just trying to help.

But then pace is only important for your key workouts.....and it is kinda hard to do key workouts in the off season. I won't start anything hard until January.

I use average pace as a key 23metric on my week. Once my training is in full swing my average is between 6:45 and 7:00. If it is lower than 6:45 then I will expect to be tired the next week or I should try to back off. Mostly due to recovery runs being too fast.

I've got 3 runs in two days.. I'm sorta 'banking' a few runs since I know there will be days where it will be impossible for me to run. (Xmas party w/ open bar coming up!) I think it'll be easier to pay for days off in advance, rather than having to make them up later.

~Rob

Yep, myself and 2 other guys are doing our own weight loss challenge with it. The one guy (Bbell - my bro), doesn't have a lot to loose -10-12lbs. Me and my uncle (LBell) are going for 20+ Lbs. HE's going for 20..I'd like to go 25-30, but thats lofty..we'll see.

Rocklinwoody, I am hoping that by the end of this thing I can get my average pace down to 4:30 range...we'll see. The key is that I have to be able to do easy runs at 4:40 pace for this to become a reality. Right now 4:40/7:30 pace would not be my "day in day out pace"...more like 5:00/8:00. Last year for the 100/100 my average pace ended up at 4:49 per K for the 1000 or so K that I did.

I did a lot of speedwork in the fall and it does feel easier to run fast. My XC ski focus this winter is not on volume by on intensity. I am on the Tommy Evans winter program in the sense that I am using the XC ski season as my "short course" season to lift my theshold...I get plenty of long stuff in during the summer as my races are 4.5-10+ hours...in the winter my races are 1-3 hours and basically I hold half marathon run race instensity for 30-50K XC ski race (1.5-2.5 hours duration). So I intend to run a bit faster in 100/100 than previous years, do all my high end intervals on skis, but also no super long or big days on skis that completely drain me for 2-3 days.

But you are right, that my "A" goal for next year is to get the 10K down to 36:50 and half marathon down to 1:19.59 (there, I said it publicly) from the current 37.43 and 1:22.08 that I did in the past season, so there will be more focus on running faster aerobically as I have a good injury free base from the last few winters of 100/100 to work off. WRT to the pace metric it is only important in this order:

1. Intervals/repeats
2. tempo runs
3. long runs
4. recovery runs

and realistically probably not that important for 3 and 4 if you overdo it. So I just contradicted myself....I just said at the top of this post that I want to get my average pace lower and then also said that it is more important on intervals and tempo stuff....so I guess I really don't know what I want, other than I want it all and I want it now....can a boy be blamed for that leading up to Christmas???

Dev

Alright, so I am in, a day late and a dollar short, but I am in.

Anyone doing the 100 runs AND 100 beers challenge?

Been there, eventually they will see the light ;-)

Ewan

---

Ewan

-------------------------