Week 7 run 1 - confused.

[Mike_Bravo]

Hello and good evening (if in UK, and perhaps the east coast of the US)

As my housemate fancies a bike ride on Wednesday I thought I'd go for my run today as-opposed-to the usual Monday morning (so I run on Tuesday and Thursday (instead of Wednesday)) (it's due to rain tomorrow morning in Cardiff as well). I think it was my first night run, starting at around 09:10.

As usual I had no idea what Laura was to tell me we were doing, and was pleasantly surprised when she said it was 25 mins again. Started off as usual, I decided to run the other way around the park to vary things a little and did wander off down one or two roads (for a picture of the park I run around please see my 'where I run my c25k' post). I also ran around the little skate park in the middle, up and down one of the ramps. At no point did I get the inkling I couldn't go on and it felt like my pace was quicker than the last run. When Laura suggested pushing harder for the last minute I did, and when it was time to finish I felt I could have run for another 5 minutes at least.

The above is good; it's nice that I'm not having trouble running for 25 minutes and my body's adapting.

The less-good and quite confusing thing: I covered 2.6 miles. That converts to just under 4.2 kilometres and is .6km less than I covered on w6r3. I used the same Sony smartband SWR10 to measure my distance and don't think running up and down a couple of ramps looses that much distance.

So, I'm glad I got through and anticipate finishing week 7 with relative ease, but I am more than a little lost as to where .6 kilometres went when I thought I was running a faster pace.

On Tuesday I will try pushing myself a little harder (so I'm not left thinking I could go on so much) and will follow the same route I normally do, without ramps, to see if that makes a change.

Thanks for reading,

Mike

[islandrunner Graduate]

Well, on my Wednesday run last week, I'd have bet you hard cash that I'd ran further than normal. My pace felt faster and as the route was sightly different I was absolutely sure I'd run further. I hadn't, it was the exact same as the previous run. I was shocked.

Not sure what else to say !

[Mike_Bravo Graduate in reply to islandrunner]

I think technology is just manipulating us. I know my usual route around the park is 1.2km per round, so I might just try and do 2.5 km and then turn around

[Dunder2004 Graduate]

Devices using acceloremeters and motion sensors are not known for fantastic accuracy so it is likely that your Smartband has thrown a wobbly on one of the two runs you reference.

It might be an idea to install a GPS based app (Runkeeper is very popular) on your Smartphone just to compare results.

[Mike_Bravo Graduate]

My phone has just decided to say I actually covered 3 miles. Confused.org

[Debener Graduate]

If we assume that the Smartband is working properly (?), I would say that distance covered or speed of runs could vary from run to run . I wonder if that's why C25K incorporates 4 runs of 25 minutes. The priority is to get running and to practise endurance so my suggestion is that you should not infer too much from one run. ( I am due to do R1 W7 tomorrow ( in Cape Cod!) and may be in same boat as W6 R3 was for me quite fast.) Good luck with the next run.

[misswobble Graduate]

Oh don't get caught up with the tech. Just do the runs and go home. End of

Run/walk from A to B. How is that confusing? Trust human beings to make it complicated. Miss Wobble walks off shaking head

You can get so engrossed in your technology that you lose sight of what your goal is

I know, I know. I'm old fashioned and a nag. LOL

Well done Mik. You keep on running, slow but sure, ticking off each run and you'll be Graduated in no time. Take care

[andrewhagger Graduate in reply to misswobble]

shouldn't that be "Miss Wobble walks/runs off shaking her head :)"

[qobsmith Graduate]

Same happened to me, even the exact same distance! I did a bit of speed play during w7 so maybe that wore me out, but I was baffled too! Maybe it's because it's a bit harder on our bodies than the runs before w6r3, so the first time we ran 25 mins continuously our bodies were quite happy to go for it, but now that we've upped the game and are regularly doing more 25 min runs we're wearing ourselves out more than we were before... Who knows! lets hope our w7r3's are more impressive!