Florida Vacation (YouTube link) and Marathon Training

Tue, 13 Jul 2010 11:47:00 -0700

Last week was a family vacation in Florida's pan handle. I took the opportunity for some flat(ish) cycling and running. I biked a 50 mile loop on my first morning there. It was windy enough that the first half was tough, but the return trip felt good. In building up mileage for the upcoming marathon training, I did one long run of 12 miles at about 7:40 per mile. I felt pretty good, probably mainly due to a pretty flat route that paralleled the beach. That is about 15 seconds slower than I'll need for a BQ. I did one more run that was meant to be a 5 mile tempo, but about halfway through the tempo part I wasn't feeling it and gave into the humidity. I still did 7.5 miles, but just slowed it down and enjoyed the scenery more. One more 32 mile bike ride and I felt the week's workouts were pretty good. Though it is not running related, I did a vacation video starring my children (with cameos by some grown-ups). The 16 week FIRST training program I am looking at using officially starts next week. For running, it calls for two days of speed (intervals & tempo) and one long run day. For cross training, I'll probably alternate between cycling and swimming two days a week. The only scheduling challenge I hope to figure out is fitting in an additional long run with a running partner who is training for the same marathon, but for a slower pace. My long run pace calls for a good 30 or more seconds faster per mile than his plan (he is using Higdon). I'm thinking I may double up on long runs instead of one of the cross-training days. He is willing to do his long runs a bit faster than the plan says, so maybe every other week I can slow up some and meet him half way. I'm taking it a bit easier this week. Sunday was an easy 11 miles. I'll do 5 or so tonight and maybe 7 on Thursday and Saturday with a bike ride somewhere in there. Good luck to everyone getting started on their training.

Camping Video

Wed, 19 May 2010 07:06:00 -0700

I just posted another video on YouTube. This is from our camping trip a couple of weeks ago. I don't want to persuade the opinions of any critics who haven't watched yet, but I think Emma steals the show again. Here is the link to watch it on YouTube. I put this on because it actually shows a little larger there than in the version below. Enjoy.

Moving into Digital Video

Sun, 16 May 2010 06:26:00 -0700

Janell and I bought a new video camera about a month ago. To test it out I took it to a playground with the kids - instant action! I had about 10 or 15 minutes of raw footage (oooh, video lingo) which I edited down to just over 4 minutes. There was not a lot of sound recorded, so I put in a song by Kenny G for the background. Learning how to fade parts in and out was fun. I even put in a little slo-mo in there. Anyway, here's the link to the You Tube page, or see it embedded below.

Matt's Blog - family

Florida Vacation (YouTube link) and Marathon Training

Camping Video

Moving into Digital Video