PR, The 2 Hour Lifestyle

My mother made me run a 10k on sunday. It was fun...although highly unplanned (usually I like to target a race, build up to it, and then make it a goal to 'put the hurt on myself' during the run). Instead, I ran 13 miles and didn't eat the best of foods the day prior (damn you, Stacey's Multigrain Pita Chips). However, the Packard Summer Scamper 10k (inaugural race over at Stanford, benefiting the Lucile Packard Children's Hospital where my mom works) went quite well. I made a point to take it easy and to also reverse split --- both goals accomplished. I also set a 10k PR at 39:32, a 26 second improvement over my previous best. Discipline strikes again! I'm pretty sure that I can run a ~37-38 minute 10k given the right preparation --- hopefully there's a good one coming up soon (suggestions would be appreciated!).

On another note, I'm trying a new approach to discipline (well, I guess my entire life), which is to live it in 2 hour increments. Weird, huh? Well hear me out. I'm a very goal oriented person...and I'm also very impatient (served me well in some areas tho). Ideally, I'd be accomplishing something every second (this makes me feel good and serves as positive reinforcement to keep doing something). With something like this discipline off...results are slow. It's not glamorous and there are few events (monthly weight / body fat checks, races, etc) that show progress.

So I'm cutting my life into 2 hour chunks --- and this provides the continual push (and almost the necessary immediacy that I need to do anything). This is kind of related to a discussion in the book "The 4 Hour Workweek", which I highly recommend to anyone. Most of us are procrastinators and given no immediacy to do anything, we'll simply wait until it becomes important enough to do. By putting in artificial deadlines and short term goals, this spurs one into action (usually getting started is by far the hardest thing to do).

Here's an example of my 2 hour chunk today (from 8 AM to 10AM):

1) Drink a glass of water

2) Eat well (ate half a banana)

3) Pack my lunch for the first time ever (totally did it, so proud of myself)

4) Finish all work emails (done)

5) Blog (almost there)

And wham, I feel great that I accomplished my goals and want to keep the ball rolling for the next 2 hour's goals:

1) Drink a glass of water

2) Finish up a little work assignment (should take 30 mins)

3) Run 4 miles before lunch

4) Eat my awesomely packed lunch

And finally, the picture above has nothing to do with this post. Just found it funny.

San Diego Marathon & Church

Joey's lame-o eating posts have been real snoozers so I'll spice things up with pics of me in short shorts and pink socks (nothing screams discipline more than pink socks). You are very welcome.

This weekend I ran the San Diego Rock and Roll Marathon in 3:18:12. It was not a PR (3:15:07 in Napa in March), but I was very happy with my time. I cramped up at mile 18 and had to slug it in at ~9 minutes a mile, so given that, it was actually pretty solid (my brother ran these tough miles w/me). I was probably in the best running shape I've been in coming into the race (attributed to the discipline off and the run less run faster book), yet I didn't PR. HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE?

Something that I'm realizing (and I think Joey is too) is that we really need to calibrate how we measure progress and also understand there will always be natural variability. We've been using metrics such as weight and body fat to track fitness, and I have also been using my race times to show how I'm progressing. Time of day and a current day's eating can alter body fat and weight measurement (plus I think the body fat measuring device is a POS), and to compare races across the board isn't fair either (I'd argue Napa was easier than San Diego due to temperature and elevation). Of course, in the long run (let's define this over a yearly basis), weight, time, and body fat should be trending downward. But on a month-to-month (and race to race) basis, it may not.

I had an epic break day after the race. It included:

3 Twinkies (post race tradition)

3 Whoopie Pies (each was probably 800 calories)

5 Monster Beef ribs, fries, onion rings, and a side salad from Phils

Lots of Ginger Ale

PB&J Sandwich

A burrito from Lucha Libre Taco Shop + Champions Fries

I'm pretty sure I gained weight after running a marathon.

I'm also paying off my bet and going to Church with Joey starting this sunday. I hope it's something like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gD29mDlC3kg

A final note! I've been really inspired by Steve Job's Stanford Commencement Speech where he says "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" A lot of folks have asked me what keeps me motivated, and lately I've been using the idea that I want today (which could be my last) to be a display of me trying to better myself as opposed to an act of submission (and this applies to things outside of this discipline off). Deep? Meh, not really.