90-Minute Jog

Jan. 20, 2019
16.8 K: 1:36:35

After completing my training for tonight, I hopped on my motorcycle, and hit the road for about half an hour to get to the Misatodai location of McDonald's in Narita City near the Narita Airport. It's my favorite place to blog. There are outlets all over the place. Wi-fi connection is good. It's clean, spacious, and windows are large so you can look outside, and there is a feeling of freedom.

Anyway, it's six days until the Tatekayam Wakashio Marathon 2020. It's Day 2 of the last week before the race today. Yesterday I did 10 K tempo run. It's a pretty stressful activity for me, because you need to sustain the race pace for almost 25% of the actual race distance. My legs were slightly fatigued from the effort. The purpose my training tonight is to relax them by running at a comfortable pace for 90 minutes. Running at a slow pace promote blood circulation, allowing metabolic wastes to break down quickly.

Since 90 minutes is a long time, I made use of the time to study something while running. I listened to the lecture on time management by Brian Tracy based on his best-selling book "Eat That Frog". It sold 1.5 million copies world-wide, and has been translated into 42 languages. It consists of 21 keys to successful time management. I personally applied a couple in my own life, and I'm already seeing some notable changes in my productivity. This Wednesday and Friday I have 7-hour seminars with a leading electronics company. I hoped to find some useful information to share with my participants. I took mental notes of a few things, but it's hard to remember them all. I will review it again tomorrow night. Hopefully, I'll come up with some good ideas to make use of what I've learned from Brian. 

Tomorrow night I'm staying at a hotel in Kannai, Kanagawa Prefecture. I have a very early start on Wednesday morning. Kannai has easy access to the venue of the seminar. Kannai is hop skip and jump from the Yamashita Park. It's good for running. I'm going to bring along my running gear and run at night once mental rehearsal is done for the seminar. 

90-Minute Jog in Aqua Shoes

April 7, 2019

15.5 K: 1:32:53

One week to go before Kasumigaura Marathon 2019. Still roughly following former ultra marathon world best record holder Mr. Sunada's program, I jogged 15.5 K taking an hour and 32 minutes. I ran in aqua shoes below.

This pair is highly recommended for minimalist runners. It gets you results. I ran Tateyama Wakashio Marathon 2018 in them, and ran my PR of 3:43:08 (net). The sole is meshed runner, so it protects your sole from edgy pebbles, but lets moist out, and doesn't get heavy even when running in rain. The upper is spongy, so it's elastic and never hurts your foot. A pair costs 1,000 yen or so. One usually lasts for half a year. They are quite durable. 

Tonight I combined my favorite 10.5 K course and a new 5 K loop in Yukarigaoka to make it a solid 15.5 K course, perfect for a 90-minute jog.

My weight is kept around 60 kg, so I felt very light. There is no pain in any of my leg joints. There is no back pain or anything. I've never had backache in my life, and I don't think I will for the rest of my life. Backache is largely psychosomatic. I've learned some major emotional causes of back pain, and I don't think I need to deal with those emotions by relying on physical pain. 

According to Mr. Sunada's program, you give yourself a full rest following a 90-minute jog, but I already gave myself a full rest on Saturday night, so I will jog for an hour, which is recommended for the day following the rest day.