Some you Win, Others Not so Much...

The urban veggie jungle

Yes, it's another garden post.  Been a while since I updated on the status of the veggie patch, and as you can see things have moved along.  The corn is now nearly as tall as me (admittedly not that difficult since I'm only 5'8"), the cucumber plants are just as tall and producing well, and the tomatoes, sunflower, broccoli, basil and parsley are doing nicely.

On the other hand, my star producers - the summer squash and zucchini - appear to have died. I'm not sure what happened to them, but when I got back from Baton Rouge they had shuffled off this mortal coil.

Oh well, at least we got to enjoy them while they lasted (along with most of the birds in the neighborhood).

A plethora of tomatoes, peppers, corn and cucumber

The wandering pumpkins, with the broccoli and the huge sunflower behind

Oh dear.  No more summer squash or zucchini for me!!!

Certifiable

After doing the RRCA coaching class back at the beginning of the month, I've been very busy and spent a lot of time on the road.  But in order to be certified, I have to take and submit the test before June 1st, so this morning I actually took the time to go and do it.  The pass mark is 80%, and happily I scored 99%.  I already have my First Aid and CPR certifications, so I am now officially an RRCA certified running coach.

But while I agree with many of the principles underlying the RRCA approach to training (like the different training phases and hard-easy approach), I do not agree with others, in particular the slow training paces.  While I have no problem with the idea of doing training runs slower than race pace, I am not a fan of slowing down to the degree that they advocate.

So when I sat down earlier this week to lay out my San Antonio marathon training plan, I simply took the bits I agreed with, allied them to things that I know work well from past experience, and discarded the rest.  The class did give me a great framework to pull the plan together though, and I now know exactly how far and how fast I should be running each training run from June thru to the race in November.

In other news, a few weeks ago I got a great deal on a new hi-definition 3D television, and today I actually got around to mounting it on the wall.  That was one item on my honey-do list that I didn't mind doing!!!  It really didn't take much work with a good stud finder, and it amazes me that people pay hundreds of dollars to have it done for them.  We've had our old projection TV for nearly 10 years, and it was definitely time for a replacement.  I also got a deal on a 3D blu-ray player, and tonight we all sat around with some funky glasses and watched some 3D movies.

It was pretty cool - and our living room looks a lot bigger.

In the Shadow of the Mighty Mississippi

Greetings from Baton Rouge. After enjoying a few days in East Texas last week, the Louisiana State capital is my base of operations all this week.  My new job is certainly getting me around a bit, and it's been a delightful trip so far. I'm staying at a really nice hotel not far from the LSU campus, and we've enjoyed cool evenings down into the 40s, and highs in the 70s all week.

Though the week didn't start off too well, as I found myself in a deserted Baton Rouge airport going on for 10pm on Sunday night, missing my luggage, and none too happy that I had to go and meet clients the next morning and all I had to wear was the cargo shorts and ratty t-shirt I was standing in. I was busy trying to figure out if any clothes stores would still be open that time of night, but I've never been anything if not lucky, and of the 5 people who lost their luggage on our tiny flight I was the only one that exited the airport happily reunited with it. I just happened to talk to the guy who had pulled my bag off an earlier flight and remembered it.

Like I say, I've always been lucky.

And it was quite a sight to fly over the swollen Mississippi by twilight. It was supposed to crest early this morning, but I really haven't heard much talk of it around town.

And I've been good today - I actually visited the hotel fitness center and ran on the treadmill.  I'd been a bit wary of hotel treadmills since I maxed out the one in Denver and broke it, but this was an altogether more substantial beast.  So I did intervals, and managed to break out two 5:30 mile splits in a row, which is super fast for me.  Truth be told though, I get so bored on the treadmill I'd do anything to push it along a bit.

Still, I was proud enough that I treated myself to a nice big supper at a local steakhouse, and even indulged in the cheesecake for dessert.

It was wonderful, though I bet it more than cancelled out the treadmill.

From Joe the Plumber to Joe the Runner

It was a very interesting weekend as I attended the 2-day RRCA coaching certification class here in Austin.  Two friends, Leah and Olga, were also taking the class which was an unexpected bonus.  The first day was a ton of theory, starting off with physiology and progressing onto nutrition, injury, psychology, coaching philosophy, skills and ethics.  The second day was much more practical as we learned about designing training cycles and progressions, then broke up into groups to design and present a training program for a fictional client - Joe the runner.

I learned a lot from the class, and it gave me a great framework to map out my training plan for November's San Antonio marathon.  Probably most useful were the tools to assign pace ranges to specific training runs and to know why I'm doing it at each stage of the training cycle (even if some of the pace translation tables reminded me of the old decompression tables from scuba 101).

So I need a guinea pig to test this out on.  Luckily, the good lady wife has been talking about getting back into running, so I may sit her down, figure out a goal race and draw out a plan for her.

It's risky, because the last time I offered my coaching advice she threw a handheld at me.

Fortunately she has a terrible aim :-)