Running Tour

This weekend was good for getting outdoors. Friday was disappointing as the Yankees lost a heartbreaker of a game (they came back after being down 5-0 to be up 6-5 only to lose 11-7). After the game I did a little indoor running on the treadmill - still at a slow pace but I put a little incline into it.

A short aside - before running I discovered that the exercise room (extra bedroom on the upper floor - treadmill and bike training stand are here) DVD player was brokeen. Not recognizing discs. The good news is that I spent maybe $60 on this one so no big loss. The bad news is I need to replace it because Friday night comedy is just not where it's at. Take the show I struggled through - Hot Properties.

Three gals own a real estate business but sit around talking about their sex lives (Gail O'Grady is dating/engaged to someone 17 years younger and has lied about her age, Nicole Sullivan is the desperate "can't get a date" addition, and the Latin actress is divorced from a gay man and has no "gadar" - good stuff). This must have been the pilot - another woman shows up looking for a place for her and her fiance (oh, this happens in NYC) and confesses to these women she's never met that she's a virgin - they of course cannot keep a straight face (good for business I've learned). Hilarity ensues when we discover that two of the gals have slept with the previously believed virgin fiance. Ultimately the woman dumps the dude since he's been lying and looks like she's joining the firm (after one of the gals was found making out with him...). Great stuff!

OK, that was not so short but I need my DVD player if I'm going to run/ride indoors.

Anyway - I got in a bit more than 1/2 hour run at a nice brisk pace.

Saturday - the plan was to get on the road early on the Mountain Bike that I've been refitting as a commuter bike (see "soon to come" previous post). I got my fenders installed and got out on the road. Maybe 5 minutes in I realize a weird noise coming from the front tire. I stop. It blows.

Let me back up 10 minutes which is when I was looking for my portable pump in the garage. Normally I carry air canisters (CO2) in order to quickly inflate if I have a flat but that's on my road bike which is at the repair shop. So, no air. No pump. I'm walking back home. The good ol' walk of shame.

Back home I'm barely warmed up so I head down to Seward Park for a nice run. Seward is close enough that I've run there (four miles) and I ride through there all the time as Lake Washington Blvd is a bike-friendly road that takes up ultimately up to the Burke Gilman Trail on your way around Lake Washington. The path around Seward Park is about 2.5 miles.

Afterwards I drove out to Sammamish Valley Cycle to pick up my road bike which was in for the annual tune up. Good to know that I can fit the bike in the extended cab of my truck! Great folks out there - buy a bike and get free lifetime tuneups! Oh, I also bought some new tubes (wonder why). I did put road tires on the MTN bike and may have gotten too big tubes - we'll see how these work.

Saturday night I got on the bike at home (on the trainer) for a little active recovery. Active recovery is basically working out only hard enough to get your heart rate up - not enough to tax you but enough to get blood moving through your muscles to move the bad stuff away (this is the lay explanation).

Sunday was a quick run down through Dead Horse Canyon. I described this in an earlier post.

All in all a good weekend - a nice diversion through Seward versus my usual haunts. I think I need to continue to explore other parks in the Seattle area for running. Anyone have any ideas?