Starling Fitness: Daily writings on Fitness, Diet, and Health

You can finally participate in the Starling Fitness walking and running Challenges whether you have a Nike+iPod or not. If you would like to compete against runners on your level, here are the links for next week’s challenges:

Level 1 weekly challenge from Starling Fitness. This level runs between 0-10 miles a week.

• Challenge: Starling Fitness Level 1 (09-03-07) – RUNNER+

Level 2 weekly challenge from Starling Fitness. This level runs between 10-20 miles a week.

• Challenge: Starling Fitness Level 2 (09-03-07) – RUNNER+

Level 3 weekly challenge from Starling Fitness. This level runs between 20-30 miles a week.

• Challenge: Starling Fitness Level 3 (09-03-07) – RUNNER+

Level 4 weekly challenge from Starling Fitness. This level runs between 30-40 miles a week.

• Challenge: Starling Fitness Level 4 (09-03-07) – RUNNER+

Level 5 weekly challenge from Starling Fitness. This level runs between 40-50 miles a week.

• Challenge: Starling Fitness Level 5 (09-03-07) – RUNNER+

Level 6 weekly challenge from Starling Fitness. This level runs between 50-60 miles a week.

• Challenge: Starling Fitness Level 6 (09-03-07) – RUNNER+

A great big shout-out to the guys at Runner+ who have worked their butts off making the challenges available to us! Yeah!

I have spent a lot of words writing about how much I love and hate Nike+. I love the gadget, but I HATE Nike’s website. Now, I don’t have to worry about Nike’s slow and lumbering website anymore. I can track my runs on Runner+.

• Join the running revolution! – RUNNER+

Runner+ automatically downloads my runs from Nike’s website, so all I have to do is sync my iPod after my run and check out my graphs on their beautiful site.

The graphs are what made me fall in love with Runner+. Here is a comparison. This is the graph of my latest run on Nike+’s website:

Here is the Runner+ graph for the SAME run:

Runner+ gets their data from the Nike+ website, so your iPod is gathering all that data, but Nike isn’t allowing you to see it. With Runner+, you get to choose how detailed you want your graph to be.

The cool thing about Runner+ is that you don’t have to own a Nike+iPod to make it work. It will work with the Garmin Forerunner 305 and 205 (and maybe even the new Garmin Forerunner 50). You can also enter your data by hand, so if you run on the treadmill and want to keep track of your data, you can.

Best of all, you don’t need a fancy Nike+ to compete with other people. With the Runner+ Challenges, you can run against people all over the world.

Tune in tomorrow for links to the Starling Fitness Weekly Challenges for next week. If you’d like to see my runs online, you can do that here:

• LauraMoncur’s Runs by Distance (Day) – RUNNER+

Fat girls never talk about inner thigh chaffing. Even when we get thin, we don’t talk about it. That’s how you can tell the naturally thin athletes from the used-to-be-fat ones. The naturally thin athletes have no problem talking about Vaseline, lubricant and clothing that prevents chaffing because they have no shame attached to it.

I wish I could be like that.

Instead, I find clothing that works and never talk about how grateful I am that my inner thighs are chafe-free. I never talk about how my gym clothes don’t ride up.

Case in point, the Women’s Pro Spirit Core Mesh Capri Pants. I found these at Target. I bought them on sale for ten bucks. I tried out one pair and was back to the store after one workout and cleaned out the store. Then I went to the Target on the south side of town and bought all of them in my size there too. I’ve been exercising with them for months.

I love them because my inner thighs don’t chafe and they don’t ride up.

Why is it so hard for me to say that?

I saw this ad at the mall the other day and didn’t realize it was an advertisement for Nike.

I have a love-hate relationship with Nike. I hate that they only carry uber-small clothing sizes. I hate their website. I love their watches. I love their advertising. I love Nike+.

There’s nothing better than a motivating Nike Commercial to get me running:

My new mantra is: someone who is busier than you is running right now. No excuses for skipping my workouts.

SLB+ and I have run many challenges together on Nike+. I had noticed that his mileage had dropped and then he stopped running altogether. Finally, I know why now:

• Quadrathon: The Road to Recovery…Pt 1

“I had a long consult with my Physical Therapist on Monday; essentially I have; through running with insufficient cross training, unbalanced my quadriceps with my hamstrings. My IT Band is so tight it is pulling my kneecap off alignment by about 40 degrees.”

The race he was going to participate in is on hold, but he still has hope for one in October. He has decided to focus on riding his bikes until he is in better health.

It’s times like these when I wish the Nike+ worked with bicycles, because then SLB+ could still participate in the challenges.

Two minutes. That’s all I ask. Two minutes of research. Really, is that all that much?

This article from the Wall Street Journal failed to do the two minutes of research that would have told us a completely different story.

• A Weeklong Tribute To Rock ‘n’ Roll King – WSJ.com

One of the paragraphs stated:

“Runners looking to tour their next destination on foot can check out Westin Hotels & Resorts Running Concierge, part of the company’s RunWESTIN fitness program. At 26 Westin locations around the globe — including Beijing, Boston and Melbourne — guests can take a three-mile morning run led by a concierge. After a round of warm-up stretches, the guide will take participants past the city’s notable sites. Jogging strollers are provided for parents. Runners of all levels are welcome.”

Not only was it shoddy reporting because they didn’t include a link to the Westin Hotels:

• Starwood Hotels & Resorts – Ready, Set, RunWESTIN

It was shoddy reporting because a two minute search of their website would have shown that very few cities have this program at their hotels and the cost for the rooms that do, end up being so overpriced that you could BUY a year-long gym membership if you stayed at a cheaper hotel.

For example, I looked for a hotel with this running program in my hometown, Salt Lake City, Utah. This is what I found: “No hotels were found in the location you entered. Please search a different location.”

Sorry, if I’m traveling to Salt Lake City, I’m not going to change my destination just because there isn’t a RunWESTIN hotel there.

Then, I checked San Diego, California. They should have one there, right? Yes, they did! When I checked the hotel daily rates, however, it was THREE times what I usually pay at my lovely Comfort Inn.

At $200 a day over a week’s stay, I would pay $1400 for the privilege of staying at the Westin and participating in their three mile runs. I could buy year’s membership at a gym for that kind of money.

So, if that’s bad advice, what’s the good advice?

I have quite a few options when I travel. The first is the hotel gym. Most of the time, they have a treadmill that is adequate. Sometimes, it’s just a broken exercise bike and a Tony Little Gazelle glider. In that case, I move on to option two.

My second line of defense is my gym membership. I’m a member of 24 Hour Fitness, so I can usually find a 24 Hour Fitness in the town that I’m visiting and go there for the same monthly cost I’m already paying. When I visit smaller towns, however, there usually isn’t a 24 Hour Fitness there. That’s when I shoot for option three.

My third chance at exercise options is contacting my hotel to see if they have an affiliation with any of the local gyms. Sometimes I can go to the gym with no extra cost. Other times, I have to pay a nominal fee (usually about $5 a day). When compared to the extra cost of $200 a day for the WestinRUN program, that five dollar charge to go to a local gym sounds great.

If the hotel has no affiliation with a local gym, then I strap on my running shoes and go running outside or around the hotel halls. I usually ask the hotel staff if it’s safe to run in the area. I have received brutally honest replies and ended up running up and down the halls, but I have also received great advice about places to run and even local malls that offer early morning runs within their doors.

In the end, there are SO many options for running that paying the extra $200 a day for a Westin Hotel is just bad advice.

Bad form, Wall Street Journal, bad form.

Via: Introducing: The News Roundup » Complete Running Network

Two-Heel Drive has posted another beautiful hike, this time in Butano State Park.

• Two-Heel Drive: Latest hike: Butano State Park

I love what he says here:

“The Butano trail map shows a little loop called the Ray Linder Memorial Trail — I figured they wouldn’t put somebody’s name on a bad trail, so I headed in for a look. It really is a nice mile or so of trail through a stand of young redwoods (and other trees, obviously). Whoever Ray Linder was, his trail is a nice tribute.”

Next time you’re feeling reluctant to go on your usual run or walk, check out the trails in your area. Take along your camera and you’ll have a workout AND a memory to last you.

Where:

Butano State Park

Google Map

There is a theory that things don’t exist until you have a name for them. A few months ago, when I went on my walks in the city and picked up the garbage I saw on the way, I was just a hippie. Now, I’m an Eco-Runner? Come on, give me a break…

• Eco-Runner

I have been picking up garbage on my path for years, but now I’m embarrassed to say that I do. After looking at the website and all the conservationist key words, I want to hide my head. Me? Picking up garbage on my walk? No, must of been some other hippie.

You don’t need to have a sustainable lifestyle, leave a lighter footstep or even care one wit about the environment. Seriously, picking up garbage on my daily walk outside was something that I did for ME. ME and ME alone! I was selfishly picking up the things that made my neighborhood look ugly because I wanted it to look pretty. Sure, I can’t repaint the purple house down the street, but I CAN pick up the soda cans and fast food wrappers on my walk.

Wrapping the concept of cleaning up as I go with sustainable living and lighter footsteps just makes me want to stop cleaning up.

Via: What is Eco-Running?

Kitykity takes a walk every evening with her three-legged dog. A couple of weeks ago, she described her walk in vivid detail.

• Susan’s Journal » Blog Archive » Go for a walk with me.

I love her calm and almost stream of consciousness description of her walk:

“It’s really getting darker now, and though it should be cooler, it’s sticky and hot after the day’s rain. To our right is one of the parking lots for cars, and to our left is a volleyball court and a basketball court. There’s actually three basketball courts, two more are off beyond the parking lot, and they have painted the ground of them all now–red on one, green on another, blue on the last. My guess is that kids can say, ‘Meet me at the green court.’ I never was really good at basketball. Now we’re walking up towards the baseball diamonds now, and the t-ball diamonds are beyond that. To our right is the junior high school that, if we stay in town, and I hope we do, our kids will go to one day. They’ll be able to walk right out our back gate and onto the school grounds.”

Next time you go on your normal walk, run or bike ride, look at everything as if you had to describe it in this much detail the next day. You’ll find you’ll have a whole new experience.

I kept track of my exercise by writing it in my food journal for years. I never really kept good track of it. I used to just write the minutes exercised and the intensity. When I got my Nike Imara watch, I used to write down how many calories I burned.

It wasn’t until I got my Nike+ iPod that I kept detailed records of my exercise. Well, I didn’t really keep detailed track, the Nike+ system did for me.

Knowing my average pace helps me try to run faster. Every time I complete a run that’s faster than my average pace, I feel a sense of accomplishment. That’s just one small component to the tracking that the Nike+ system does for me.

There’s no way I would have ever done this on my own because I wouldn’t have seen the benefit in it, but after experiencing this, I’m so happy to have this information.

How do you keep track of your exercise?

Do you use forms?

Do you use a spreadsheet?

If you aren’t keeping track, why not? What excuses do you use?

I know I had a million excuses not to keep better track of my running stats. I really didn’t see the benefit of doing it. Now, I am addicted.