Run for your lives zombie 5k

Well here's an interesting race I just signed up for. It's basically a 5k kind of like 'epic mud run' or 'the warrior dash' except with a strange twist. It's called the Run For Your Lives Zombie 5k where you're given a flag football belt with three red flags on it which are your "lives" and you have to climb over and dive around obstacles in the mud and dirt all while avoiding 'zombies' which try and rip off your flags... I really want to know what happened at that planning meeting when somebody said "guys, we're going to put zombies in our 5k race, it'll be awesome."

It's something I never thought I'd do, but hey why do a normal road 5k when you can do an adrenaline filled one? It'll be fun because I'll already have the cardio from my half marathon training and all I'll need to work on it agility and explosive movements. It looks like I'll be doing a whole lot of box jumps and wind sprints. But it looks like a whole lot of fun, and lets be honest how often does a 5k race like this come along to an area close to you.

It's actually pretty cool because this race is only taking place in 8 states and Missouri is one of the lucky ones. Even luckier is that it's going to be only about 30 minutes away from my home town so that makes the commute fairly easy. And the main reason why I'm doing it is because 1. my roommate got really excited and wanted to do it really bad and 2. it's one of those things that you get to tell your kids down the road "yeah I did a 5k race where you had to avoid zombies"

Trizou coming up!

My favorite race, the TriZou is coming up here in the next 12 days, it's definitely that time where you start getting really excited because it's coming up so quickly. I say favorite because it's the only not-purely-running race I've ever done. I really encourage you to sign up even if you live in a 2 hour radius of Columbia, Missouri. Here's the website if you're interested. And if I remember, I'm going to bring a camera (or at least take pictures and video with my cell phone) because I know how much I personally like it when people post pictures and videos.

Now that I know in general how to pace myself I'm gonna push myself a bit this year. Last year was a kind of trial run to figure out how I would do with going from biking 4 gigantic hills to running 3 miles. The only two foreseeable problems will be 1. the weather has been super unreliable (raining for a few days, than really cold, then 85 degrees) 2. there's construction where the running course use to go through, so they've had to change it slightly and it now incorporates a hill. Even more unfortunate is the fact that the hill is in the last mile-ish of the race so everybody's gonna be tired. But, aside from that I'm really excited.

My time last year was 1:42 so I'm aiming for anything lower than that, even if it's only a minute or two. I realize that's not a significant goal, but considering that I only do this stuff for the fun of it and the experience I don't have the time to train non-stop and improve time significantly.

So probably for narcissistic reasons I added the video my dad took on his phone of me finishing last year. I'm the one in the dark blue shirt.  A little background behind the video is that the lady next to me passed me a little while before and me being unhealthily competitive really wanted to catch up to her.

Sign up day

The start to my Disney Half Marathon adventure has officially begun! Today was the first day of sign ups for the Disney World Marathon Weekend and I signed up my mother and myself. (She was the only one willing to go with me). For now I'm just going to focus on the TriZou triathlon and I'll think about the half when the time comes. Everybody does races for their own reasons, mine is: To prove to myself that I can. Up until now I've never run farther than 4 miles because I'm not all legs and build like a gazelle like other people. I'm going to follow Hal Higdon's training program and even though it's a 12 week training program I'm probably going to stretch mine out to 18 or 24 because I have the time, and like I said before I'm not really built for long distance running (or running in general). If you wanna take part in the family fun run 5k/half marathon/ full marathon the sign ups are here.

I since I won't officially start training till about July or August you probably won't hear a substantial amount of updates until then. But in the mean time I'll let you in on my general work outs from here unti then.

hiking the Great Smokies

This past week I went hiking in the Smoky Mountains. Specifically the section around the Gatlinburg, Tennessee/ North Carolina area. Here's just a few pictures of how beautiful the place was.

that's Mt. LeConte in the back, which we hiked up on our last day. The elevation is 6593 feet and one of the most beautiful hikes I can imagine.

This drop off on Mt. LeConte was one of the prettiest/most nerve racking parts of the whole climb. The actual part you hiked on is out of the frame on the right side with a cable to hold onto so you don't slip on the rocks.  

A tiny waterfall thing on the Mt. LeConte trail

my racing exploits

So I came to the conclusion yesterday that if I end up being able to do the Disney World Half Marathon in January, I really want to "document my efforts" for the lack of a better phrase. I figure it might be fun for both myself and the whole whopping two of you who read this blog to follow my efforts from sign up day to race weekend...that came out narcissistic sounding. But I know that at least for myself I love following stories of people who are training for a race whether that be a triathlon/marathon/half marathon etc.

As a filler of sorts let me tell you about my current efforts in my training for my second TriZou. For those of you that don't know, the TriZou is a sprint triathlon here in Columbia, Missouri that's held on the first Sunday in May, which for this year is the 6th. Lately I've been using an indoor trainer for bike training simply because it's hard to find a good biking road here in Columbia that 1. doesn't have a million cars on it and 2. isn't filled with pot holes. But, hopefully I'll find a route soon and get out into the beautiful weather. The running is so-so; by far running is my worst discipline so I make a point to run either on trails or in very hilly places. This being because if the course is the same as it was last year than they choose a relatively flat 3 mile loop around the Vet School (as flat as you can get in Missouri). This year I know how to pace myself based on my performance last year. Last year I took everything pretty conservatively because I wasn't sure how quickly I was going to get tired. The main things I'm going to work on are:

1. The bike route is two loops, and I'm going to push myself a little bit more on the second loop.

2. The adrenaline made my swimming time much faster than normal, so now I know to line up with the 9.5 minute people (it's a 400 meter swim) instead of the 11 minute people.

3. I was actually fairly pleased with my running time at an average of a 9:40 mile, which for me is pretty darn good. Especially after swimming 400 meters and then biking up 4 giant hills for an hour. Now that I know the terrain of the running course, I'll know where I can pick up the pace a bit.

And if you wanna join me in the Disney Half Marathon. Here's the sign up page. Sign ups are April 10th at noon EST. Hopefully everything will work out and I'll be able to do it-so fingers crossed

parkour madness

Think you're in shape and agile? Well so did I until I watched this guy. There's nothing cooler than watching acrobatics like this

Brian Wansink: from mindless eating to mindlessly eating better

So tonight I went to my first legit keynote presentation. It makes me feel like somewhat adultlike (although if you'd ask my friends about that topic, they would disagree). But I figured I'd highlight some main points, because the presentation was extremely interesting. It was given by Brian Wansink with the title "from mindless eating to mindlessly eating better." I have to start off by saying that the only reason why I was going in the first place was because my nutrition teacher said she'd give us 10 extra credit points for attending, so I figured-heck yes I'll sit and listen to somebody else talk for 10 free points. It ended up being totally worth it because not only did I get extra credit, but the speaker was very funny and the topic was really interesting.

The first thing I found comical was the plethora of "introducers" (I call them that because I don't know the technical terminology of what their role was). There were 4 introducers to introduce the main speaker. Is it like that at all formal presentations? Do they often have introducers to introduce the introducer of the speaker?

Now we get to the topic itself. The gist of it is what our unconscious eating habits are, and how to improve them also unconsciously. Brian is a very well respected reacher and teacher at Cornell who has run many experiments over the years about eating habits. One of the most interesting points he made, in my opinion, was that there is statistical/research evidence to show that if you name something a more elaborate or interesting name, people are more likely to eat it. For instance they set up a research restaurant where they had a few food items on the menu that they labeled with bland names. Then a few weeks later they had the exact same food, but with more elaborate names. When this was done, the people who took part in the experiment actually gave a review of that food being of better quality and the chef having more years of experience even though it was actually the same food.

Another interesting point, although slightly predictable is that people will eat healthier if the healthy food is within reach/sight/ascetically nice. This was proved in high schools across the country when Brian went and just rearranged how the food was laid out in a school lunch line. He did this by putting sugary drinks towards the back and putting milk and H2O in the front, etc. My favorite part of the whole thing was that when schools put fruit in the front and in a pretty bowl (not a plastic one), fruit sales shot up +100%. The moral of that story was that people reach for what's most convenient and visible. If that's a cookie than they'll choose a cookie, if it's an apple than they'll pick the apple.

It was very informative and interesting, but I did have one complaint. At the end a girl asked if actively teaching students about healthy choices would be a better approach to getting kids to eat better instead of "tricking" them and their subconscious. He stated that a kid is gonna know what's healthier, but that's not gonna change their choice either way. I find this partially true and respect the girl's question. Here's my thoughts:

1. Yes, kids do know what's healthier and probably won't choose the healthy one cause it doesn't taste better. The thing that rings true especially with teenagers is that they're gonna do the opposite of what you say, no matter what it is. So continually telling them what's good and bad is kind of like beating a dead horse (I hate that saying, by the way)

2. I do believe that high schools should have nutrition classes so that they're aware of what exactly is in different foods/ what their health benefits are. That's always a good skill to know. But it should be taught as being informative as opposed to an oppressive right v. wrong.

3. I don't like the idea of solely relying on tricking people, but it seems to work as much as I hate to admit it.