Run before the storm

Tropical storm Bill is comin' to get us!  Many businesses closed early or did not open at all because of Bill's looming threat of flooding.  I wanted to get my run in before the rains came.

I had a good run/workout today.  The time of the workout was the same as the previous one, so I am glad for consistency.  My running dynamics (recorded by my Garmin 620) are looking good, but also telling me I might focus on picking up my feet a little quicker.

While trying to extend my running distance between my recovery point and 80% HRmax, I will try to slow my pace.  In doing so, sometimes my form breaks down.  In this case, it is being too vertical causing the feet to land slightly in front of me.  The cure is simple, lean an inch forward (measured from nose, and leaning from your ankles).  It also means to concentrate on heal pickup, being centered, and where the feet are landing.

One other thing I am doing now with respect to form is doing a full arm swing.  If you have Denny Dryer's ChiRunning DVD, you will notice that he does a screen split into four.  He does this to illustrate that his cadence is the same no matter what "gear" he is in: slow, medium, fast, and race pace (he numbers them as 1, 2, 3, 4 and the gears' name corresponds to the inches of lean required).  The other thing to notice on the split screen is his arm swing.  He uses the arm swing to control cadence, and the arm swing is exactly the same no matter his pace.  It looks a little excessive in Gear 1, but reasonable in the rest.  Making the same arm swing regardless of speed is the way to control cadence, so practicing it now, when in Gear 1, is mission critical for me now.

It looks like Bill landed quite west of Houston, so it remains to be seen if I will be able to cycle and swim tomorrow.  The weather people say were are not out of the woods, yet.  Of course, they want to boost ratings, too.

Keep moving, forward whenever possible.