Today was a good day. I was able to run again! I overdid it last weekend and my ankles decided to give me what fer. The majority of my evenings for the week were spent with my feet elevated, ankles wrapped and ice packs set to stun. That, as well as a regiment of ibuprofen, seems to have done the trick. I ran my beefed up week three of Couch to 5K out at the Big Dam Bridge, specifically the ‘shortcut’ that runs through the woods. It’s something like 1.8 miles the full way around. I also added in another 6 minute run at the end. I had a minimum amount of pain at first but once my ankles got a bit stretched out they fell in line and got happy. I’m using a program called JogStats on my Palm Pre, it captures the full route and gives me loads of fun graphs and data points.

What’s that you say? “OMG! I love graphs and data points!” Oh, well then, here’s a map of it.

It seems I ran/walked the 2 miles in 18 minutes flat. I’m thinking that’s a pretty good pace for me, especially since I just came off of two ankle injuries and a week where my only training was a  single 3 mile walk. I’m definitely going to run this course again. The trail run segment was a blast! It really makes me wish I had some Vibram Treks. My Classics performed like champs though, so I really can’t complain all that much. Besides, I’m really waiting for a pair of Bakilas. I want to pick up a pair on release (which should be any day now) but I have a feeling I’ll be waiting a little while until I can pick them up local. I’m right in the middle of wearing either a 42 or 43, I feel like it’s too risky to order one or the other without trying them both on to see which works best. Not to mention there have been quite of few accounts of folks whose feet have shrunk slightly from barefooting. Most figure it has to do with the muscles tightening up in your feet and subsequently shortening the foot. We’ll see.

Running is like anything else I get interested in, I’ve thrown myself wholly into it and have done a ton of research and reading.

Previously I’ve mentioned:

I bought another couple of books this weekend.

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I picked these up Saturday afternoon and I’ve already read about half of the Murakami book. It’s really quite wonderful. I’ve loved Murakami’s fiction for a while now and was happy to hear that he was not only a runner but had written a memoir of sorts on running and writing! (see below for recommendations on his fiction)

He goes into great detail about how and why he started running and how it’s shaped his life in the intervening 25 or so years. This book is well worth the read but one of the best nuggets of wisdom comes on page 43 where he’s talking about having the type of body that if he is sedentary he’s sure to gain weight. Instead of being jealous of people who are naturally thin and can eat whatever they want without gaining weight he actually feels bad for them. He figures the need to exercise in order to stay at a healthy weight is a big advantage. The amount of exercise needed to keep at his optimal weight has so many added benefits that it will likely extend his life 20 or more years over someone who is sedentary. The folks who don’t have a need to exercise to maintain a healthy weight are likely not going to. Why go through the pain and effort if it’s not needed? Sure they can eat all the desert they want but they’re probably going to die 20 years earlier! In the same vein he figures that folks who don’t have to work at writing don’t have to develop their tools like those who do. Subsequently when a wall is hit, the ‘natural’ writer is going to find it a lot harder to get back at it. His final thought on this is great and applies to so much.

“In other words, let’s face it: Life is basically unfair. But even in a situation that’s unfair, I think it’s possible to seek out a kind of fairness. Of course, that might take time and effort. And maybe it won’t seem to be worth all that. It’s up to each individual to decide whether or not it is”

The second book looks at running from a biological and anthropological perspective. It examines running, ultraendurance and ideas about our evolution. Heinrich is a runner himself, he’s competed in a number of marathons and ultramarathons.

I’m hoping I can stick with this. I have a tendency to get bored with things and drop them. I’m trying my best to make this one of the things I stick with.

On another note, I spent most of Saturday morning working on this.

It’s.. alright.  It will probably end up being the cover of the first Loose Wires mini. Wait, I haven’t talked about that yet. So, basically, I initially planned on doing 50 page collections of Loose Wires but I think I might instead do 20 or 16 page chunks. I’ve also changed the orientation and page size to a standard comic book form. Mostly to make printing easier. Hopefully the comic should launch soon, as in a month or so. It’s way delayed but I really wasn’t comfortable with the art and have been spending a lot of time to get the look and feel right. I think I’m near it. We’ll see.

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Murakami Mania.

Right, I’m off.

Steve

I just finished day one of week 4 of Couch to 5K. Technically, I only did 2 days of week 3 but as it turns out I had the times off on my playlist and was running a couple of minutes over what was actually set in the training program! My bad! So, uh.. don’t use the playlist I posted earlier unless you want more of a challenge. I was running an extra 3 minutes after each night anyway so I figured I might as well move on.

I did pretty well I think. I only had to walk extra twice and neither time was for more than about 30 seconds uphill. I’ll probably stick with this set for maybe 3 or 4 more runs and start week 5 late next week. So if all goes to plan I should be running 2 miles straight by maybe the 19th or so. Yay!

Right, well here’s the track list and d/l link for Week 4. I’ll be creating a new properly timed Week 3 after all is said and done. I’ve pretty much determined that I’ll do all 9 weeks and put the collection up for d/l. Who knows, maybe I can even get a cease and desist letter from the music industry… because they’re dicks like that. This mix is slightly B&S centric.. in that it opens and closes with them. Stuart Murdoch is a runner, and really his video for I’m A Cuckoo cemented that track as a ‘running song’ in my head. So I use it for the final 1/2 mile run. I think the weakest track is the Magnetic Fields one, not from a musical standpoint but from a pacing standpoint. It’s one of the walk songs and it’s nearly as upbeat as the two run songs that surround it. But I guess you should be walking pretty briskly by that point anyway, so I’ll keep it in for now.

Click here to download

As an added bonus here’s that video I was talking about.

This little info graphic came through my newsfeeds today, it was posted over at The Consumerist

There’s so much wrong with this, so fucking much wrong.

And finally, though this has circulated for a while on the youtubes in really real version we now have the South Park version… because we can dammit! (via Boing Boing)

So I’ve been running for a month or two now and I can see measurable differences in my endurance. From not being able to run 50 feet to being able to do most of a mile. I didn’t really start with any plan, just run until you couldn’t and then walk a bit and run some more. That’s generally worked well but I feel like I can push myself harder, so I’m going to start the Couch to 5K program.

I figure I’m good enough to skip the first couple of weeks. I was waffling on rather to start at week 4 or week 3. I kind of think week 3 will be too easy but I’m going to err on the side of caution and start with it. If after tonight I find it’s too easy I’ll try out week 4 on Tuesday.

There are quite a few folks who’ve created podcasts to push you through the segments. I couldn’t find any with music I particularly liked, so I’ve created my own! You can have it if you want it. I’ll do one for each of my remaining weeks. If, for some random ass reason there’s a call for  weeks 1 and 2 I’ll create those… just ask.

Here’s week 3’s tracklist and their run walk cylce (note: all walks are at a brisk pace and runs are at a jog)

Overall it’s 26 minutes and should be approximately 1.3 miles (give or take depending on the pace you set)

Click here to download!

Other running things

On another running note, I’ve been barefoot running for the past month. More specifically I’ve been running in Vibram Five Fingers, the classic model. For a very long time I’ve wanted to figure out how to love running. I think I loved it when I was a kid.. I think all kids love running. Somewhere along the way I began to hate it, it was punishment in gym class and I was never fast so sprints were kind of embarrassing. But I always wanted to be good at it! I’d see these people running crazy distances, and so freaking fast! I wanted that! How were they doing it, how did they push through the wall? Why did they keep at it?

I’ve been overweight most of my life. At least since I was 15 or 16. I’ve tried tons of diets and while I’ve lost some weight, it never stuck. I knew that if I figured out how to really love running I could lose the weight that’s dogged me for 14 years and really and truly get healthy.

Around May of 2009 I was sitting at 263, my highest weight ever. I had to do something, so over year I’ve been slowly reshaping the way I live. I started with walking and weights, I didn’t mind either. I didn’t love them, but they were something I could get myself to do. On top of that I drastically changed my eating habits. Much smaller portions and a lot more fruits and vegetables. That worked out pretty well, I lost something like 15 or so pounds over the course of 6 or so months. Good loss, loss that sticks and quite a bit of muscle growth. But over the winter I really slacked off and kind of plateaued.

Anyway, around the time I was slacking off I started reading about running. I really, really wanted to get into it and I wanted to love it. I knew there was something there, I just didn’t now what the hell it was. I would run once every few weeks and it was agony. My back was constantly giving me troubles and every time I ran I’d have to sit out a couple of workouts because my lower back was so messed up. Finally I got to a point where I could deal with the pain but I hated it. I was wearing a pair of old Reeboks that had seen better days and figured I needed a new pair of running shoes. Better padding would probably fix my back right?

So the research started. I was going to find the best pair of shoes I could, figuring that would solve my issues and let me run enough to figure out what the hell was so special about it. Well in my research I started running into mentions of barefoot running. My interest was piqued, I’ve always been of the opinion that generally our engineering ability isn’t anywhere near as sophisticated as natures, not yet anyway. I did some more research and found a lot of talk about lower back problems and how it would all but go away when running barefoot. Well hell, I figured it had to be worth a shot right? So I decided to go for it.

I was a bit too scared to try straight barefoot on the streets around here, I didn’t want to have to get a tetanus shot after every run. Vibrams were the most widely recommended solution. Turns out there were a couple of stores around here that sold them! I went to check them out. After figuring out my size I picked up a pair of classics. They look ridiculous, they really do. Kind of like clown shoes. But, what the hell.

So, I gave them a shot. I could almost immediately tell a difference. After my first run with them, a run longer than any I’d made before (about 3/4 of a mile), I had no back pain. None. I was flabbergasted. It had to be a fluke right? Two days later I was out for my next run. Again, I was running farther and didn’t have a lick of back pain afterwards. After my third run with no pain I was sold. I can’t see running in anything else now.

OK, so no more back pain. Awesome. I kept running, and started noticing a change. It was getting easier and I didn’t really dread it. Then, one night about 3 weeks ago it happened. I was on the last leg of a mile and things just sort of melted away. In that moment there wasn’t any pain, my breathing slowed and I was just sort of flying. It was like nothing I’ve ever experienced. My body just sort of, switched. I finished that run and realized what had just happened. It was dynamite! I wanted to do it again, right then!

The next day  at work all I could think about was going for a run. I wanted to get home throw on my running clothes and go out. It didn’t matter that it was half snowy and 30 degrees. I needed to run. The best part is, that need has stuck around. I haven’t missed a run in the past 3 weeks. Generally I run Sun, Tues and Thurs but I’ve been sneaking another run in here and there. 

I’ve been steadily shedding pounds now. Overall I’m down 31 pounds from my peak weight. Probably 5-8 pounds of that has just been in the past month. My ideal weight is about 170, I figure if I keep this up I’ll be there in about a year. Maybe less. I’m hoping to hit 200 by July or August. Honestly it may be sooner, the speed of weight loss seems to be increasing.

If I can shed another 10 pounds before C2E2 I’ll be pretty stoked. I think I’ll pull it off, especially if I stick to Couch to 5K. If I don’t hit a snag on any week I should be at week 9 by that time. I figure 15K a week will have a pretty solid impact on weight loss and should greatly ratchet up the speed of my metabolism.

Also, a great book I’m currently reading Born To Run has been a ton of inspiration. The descriptions of running in that book make me want to drop everything and go for a run (I have a couple of times).

In the meantime science has soldiered on and a new study in January’s Nature (it’s a paysite but here’s a link to WebMD talking about the study) makes a pretty good evidence based case for barefoot running.

Right, I’m going for a run

I’m very fortunate to be part of a new anthology for the charity Reading With Pictures. I’ve got a 4 page story entitled “One Day with Amy”. It’s a love story!

I’ve got an amazing artist working with me, Daniel Gutowski. I’m really in love with his art and I can’t wait to see what he does with this story!

The whole book is going to be awesome. There are some amazing folks in it and Jill Thompson is doing the cover! It’ll be in the April Previews so keep an eye out. I’ll post up the order code as soon as it’s available.

Also, I’ll have a table at Wizard World Chicago (or Chicago Comiccon…..) this year! I’ll have RWP and Sequential Suicide for sell as well as two of my minicomics! If all goes well I might have the Loose Wires preview by then as well. I’ll be at C2E2, though I won’t have a table. I may have a table at NYCC, it’s up in the air right now. I should know in the next month or so.