How I am Achieving New Levels of Speed in Running This Spring With Less Effort - And Race Report

So let's start with a quick recap of last weekends Credit Union Lung Run in Halifax. This is a 5K quite flat course that is great for setting PB's. Not quite as good as a track event due to the many corners, but for a road race that isn't out and back, very nice. Needless to say it gets quite packed at close to 700 runners/walkers.

My first "A" race goal this Spring had been to run a sub 19 minute 5K at this event, with the work I did here carrying on to the basis for my half marathon and that leading to a marathon. To get to this point I took part in a program called Running Economy 201 which I will explain in a bit. How did I do?

Well it was a snowy wet morning that luckily turned into a damp misty but clear afternoon for a race. I set a goal of running the first half of the race on a sub 3:40 km/min pace which would have put me just around the 18:30 mark. That should have allowed me a good buffer zone for getting a sub 19 min run. We set off, I found my pace around the 3:30 mark for the first km and basically held that as best I could. The hardest part of the race was nearing the end when it switched a very curvy wooden boardwalk. Not only was it curvy but it was very slippery. Still, my pace was good. As I approached the last 500 meters, I looked to see my time was getting close so I found every last little bit of speed I could and ran across the line at 18:26 for a 3:41 min/km pace. The best race so far this Spring for me and just what I wanted. But the most exciting part? Normally that effort level would have meant I was limping around for days afterward and done for the day at least. Instead I recovered within minutes of the run, did a 7.5 km easy recovery run the next day and 27 km run the day after. How you ask?

So back in January Luke at Aerobics First mentioned that he and some others were forming a group called Running Economy 201. This was going to be a program designed to take runners (new / old / novice / veteran) to the next level. The philosophy is that through proper equipment, training and exercises you can become the best runner that you were designed to be. And to this end they declared that if you followed the program, after  8 weeks you would run your best (recent) 5km race. All this would be achieved through a program designed around running to your heart rate zones.

First off, I spent 2 days getting assessed. My choice of shoes, my running gait, my running cadence, a full physio assessment to find muscle imbalances, and full health workup including body fat, resting bp/hr, etc.... It was full time and was capped off with a Blood Lactate test and Maximum Heart Rate test. From all this information I was given a binder full of useful stuff. Exercises to address muscles weakness, exercises for warming up prior to runs, and most important the Heart Rate Training Zones. These Zones would dictate how fast I was to run, not some arbitrary pace number.

A quick run down of the Zones is: Zone 1 - Active recovery / warmup / cooldown and fat burning. Zone 2 - Aerobic Threshold,  fat burning and the main zone used to build endurance. Zone 3 - the odd zone between fat and carb burning. Often used in races, but as a training tool minimum benefits. Zone 4 - Anaerobic Threshold, full carb burning, used to help you build endurance at speed. Zone 5 - speed / hill work zone. This zone promotes strength, speed and power. Basically this zone hurts and the work done here is hard and fast but also short. Which is the same as Zone 6, though zone 6 is all out maximum effort (you know Usain Bolt territory). Okay that is a really brief run down - want to know more? Contact Jeff @ Kinesic Sports Lab .  My personal zones were interesting. They showed, as Jeff had suspected, that most of my training had been done in Zone 3. And Zone 3 brings with it a host of potential issues, including higher risk of injury, which I certainly had seen my fair share of. My Zone 3 had a huge heart rate range, which meant as Jeff told me, that I would have to learn to run really slow and really fast to compensate for it and retrain my body.

My training program has consisted of 80-85% Zone 2 training with one day a week devoted to Zone 4 (or the Tempo run) and one day devoted to some form of Zone 5/6 training to develop top end speed and help push that Anaerobic barrier further up.

In the beginning, wow, I had to run so slow. Some 40 second a kilometer slower than my usual slow run. And even my "fast" runs were slow. But what I noticed was that I came home from my workouts feeling good, not burned out. And as the weeks progressed, the feeling of ease remained along with easy recovery, but the speeds started to grow. Eventually within 4-5 weeks I was running my usual paces again, just without being tired or worn out. And I also wasn't getting injured.

So by the end of that my training, I had one 5 km race win (see the last blog post) and a PB by over 40 seconds in another 5 km run. All without getting burned out or injured and all while growing my weekly running distance to (for me) the unimaginable amount of over 60 kms a week. And I still run and swim every week as well.

And just yesterday I went back to the great and mighty Jeff Zahavich and got retested to see how the training program has been treating me. Much to our mutual excitement, I made huge gains. My lactate threshold curve showed that my big ole Zone 3 had shrunk right down and overall my ability to run at much faster paces while staying in Zone 2 shot up. When I was first tested my Zone 2 was in the 5.4 - 6.2 mph range. After training my Zone speed tested at the 7.9 - 8.3 mph range. And it felt easy. And that is the general range you want to race marathons in, which will be coming up for me later this summer.

Next up for me is the Bluenose Half and I am really looking forward to it. I am also so excited about finally learning how this whole Zone training thing works and sticking to it. If you are at all serious about running and want a good long and healthy go of it, seriously check out either the Running Economy  program or the Kinesic Sports Lab with Jeff Zahavich. Chat with Luke at A1, he has also seen huge strides since jumping into the program including great weight loss, and my wife set her personal best 5 k run as well following it.

I wish I could explain things even better, but there is so much info online and so much more to be had chatting with the Running Economy guys (by the way Mike and Anita Connors are the 2 physical therapists who will find ways to make you strong and better runners from a biomechanical stand point). Chat with Jeff, follow my results and heck chat with me, I swear this is the best thing I have done since I got into running some 5 years ago and I certainly won't look back. I just need to run the speeds that are in me and check my ego at the door.

The Other Races Were a Warm Up - Oh and a Race Report

Now it begins, the start of that period of time in the Spring where there seems to be a race or event every weekend. Well at least races that I sign up for. I guess this will be my fourth race of the year but this one I was taking quite seriously.  It is one week prior to my first A race and I wanted to really test to see how my training had been coming along.

Training you say? Well yes. I mean I train every year to some degree or other. And I often try to formulate some sort of training plan to tackle it all. And I almost, sort of, kind of, almost stick to that training scheme. But of course if you have been following me on my Facebook or Twitter feed, you will know that I have been very diligent about seeing what I can achieve this year, and therefore have been following my super special training program. I will get into all of that next week though, as the annual Atlantic Lung Run 5K race will be the culmination of this current training plan. Until then, Zone 2 rules! Okay enough of that.

Okay so this was the next in the series of Mountain Equipment Co-Op community races. They have a great series of races close to town that are inexpensive and minimal, though still timed and with water and bananas at the end! This race was held at the Halifax Citadel Fort, right in the center of town. And it was going to be a hilly crazy cross country adventure. Last year I did the 10K version of this race, but opted for the 5K version this year. 5K? Sure, I have found a love of 5K races. They are fast and they are fun and the speed work is really useful for the running portions of duathlons and triathlons.

For this race the 5K and 10K runners ran together, with the 10K doing 2 laps (well more like 4 laps but you had to be there to see this course). That of course makes things difficult for the 5K racers as you can't really tell who you are racing.  Anyway, it was a great start with a Highlander from the Citadel firing a rifle to send us off.  

Last year I was so bad at pacing (like many years before) and I took off like a bat out of hell (Meatloaf knows about that). This lead to me getting slower and slower as the race progressed and falling from 1st to third to eventually 4th overall. Boo. this year I took off a little easier and slowly built up my pace.

Of course the first big task was a big hill. At the bottom of said hill you turn around and pop right back to the top. I took this as an opportunity to bridge up a little to some of the other runners, passing a few people.

I then settled in to my pace for a bit, trying to make the corner s as straight as possible (and there were many). Then the next hill arrived and I managed to catch up to another runner. We determined that we were both 5 K runners and this sent him picking up his pace a bit. I stayed on his heels, but didn't push things.

Soon we entered the dry moat or ditch surrounding the Fort proper.

My competitor picked up the pace again. But as the ground was quite spongy and full of odd footings, I decided to hold station. Oh and I was really enjoying my choice of shoes at this point. Some nice Vivobare trail shoes. A big thanks to Luke @ Aerobics First for fixing them up to my liking. By the end of the ditch you had to pop up another rather steep hill to get to the main level. I used this as another opportunity to catch back up with my friend.

By the time we headed inside the Fort walls again, I was right on his heels.

So all that was left by this point was to run the ramparts. Strategically I had been watching my young running mate start to lose his form and start to breath rather heavy. But him being quite a bit younger, I was unsure if he still had some more in the tank. But I knew that the ramparts are fairly hard to pass in and begin with another steep climb, this time on gravel. So i went for it and sprinted up the incline.

I dared a look at one point and found out that I had in deed shaken my competitor. He was quite far behind. Then I finally dared to look at my Garmin to see my time. I ran this event in just under 43 minutes last year as the 10K, and I had ran 20:20ish at the first MEC cross country 5K of the year, so I had really hoped with all of my training to be able to squeeze under 20 minutes here. It was afterall a nice day, though it was a course with tons of corners and such steep inclines that I knew I would be setting a personal best). But I saw that at this point I was still sub 19 minutes.

So I picked it up a little more.

 Back down the incline, across the finish line and I ran a 19:25! My Garmin showed the course a tad short at 4.9km so call it a 19:30 5K and I was darn happy. And apparently I was also the winner.

Yes sir. My first running race win on a hard technical and crazy fun 5K course. I reveled in that for a bit, hugged and fist bumped the second place runner, who was rather happy with his finish as well. I was happy to beat a teenager, he was happy to beat a "seasoned" racer. Everyone was happy, you can't beat that.

Thanks to Kevin Besner for the photos.

I Like Bread - You Can Too

Okay, so I love bread and many people do. I love making bread and these days people are regaining that skill. Sure there is great bread out there to buy, but the good stuff is costly. And well it should be as good bread takes time, and time is money. So when you see bread that is cheap, it is either old or probably not that good for you.

 So this post is for those that eat bread and make bread. I am not going to try and convince the non bread eaters to eat this stuff and I am not going to school you on making a loaf from scratch. There are a ton of internet sites and books that can already do that for you. If you are new to bread making I highly suggest you get a good book or read some of the great sites out there and start with a really easy white bread recipe. Master that and make bread that people will oo and ahh over. When you master the white loaf, then you are ready to move on and make some other interesting stuff.

I believe that homemade bread is better and more healthy for you to eat. I will not go into why. Look it up and convince yourself. Also of all the breads, the sourdough is by far the healthiest. Again, do some research. Also research how to make a starter. The info is out there, and it is easy to do. For the purposes of this blog post my starter is made with 50% water and 50% flour. That is slightly important to note. What kind of flour? At the moment I am using a whole wheat starter, though a rye or white will work just as well.

So what am I trying to accomplish with this bread recipe? Well we all want to make that healthy good for you bread, but we all like to eat that ooh so tasty bread, the kind with the crunchy crust and soft crumb (it is a term, look it up). Now the former is usually seen as those dense whole wheat loaves that are kind of blah, the later is generally a white bread. See white bread is mostly sugar, all the good parts of the wheat are removed. That makes it oh so palatable for people and it makes the crust on breads crisp up oh so well. But ideally we want some of that good stuff in there as well.

Sure we can use whole wheat flour, but getting some good less processed things into the bread is only going to make it that much healthier.  Which is why I like to use a combo of white flour and whole grains. So lets get on to the recipe.

I apologize right away that my bread making method is both science and witchcraft. But that is what I do. So get over it.

So first off you need to choose your whole grain. This can be anything really, but it is best to use something with gluten, so corn, wheat, and even barley (rye and spelt are versions of wheat so they count). If you choose something that is low gluten or non gluten (maybe quinoa) then I suggest you add some gluten flour to help it all stick together. Not necessary, but makes for a much better bread. And for the sake of actually making a healthier bread choose a grain that is the least processed. In my case I made a bread using Wheat Grouts, also called Wheat Berries. These are the whole grain with little processing and not just whole wheat flour (which frankly makes really bad breads).

To get the most out of these little kernels of happiness I first cook them down. Wheat berries are dense and require a long cooking time. Hopefully you have the cooking instructions but it is generally 3 times the water to the amount of wheat berries. I ended up with about 1.5 cups of cooked wheat berries when I was finished. You bring them to a boil then cover and reduce the heat and cook for about 20 minutes or so until you have a bit of a mash. Remove from heat and let cool. Then I added 1 cup of sour dough starter with the mash in a bowl and covered it with plastic wrap. So now I have about 2 cups of material and loads of water. It is basically a wheat soup at this point. Now let it sit over night and come back to this:

A bubbling mass of rather pungent liquid. That yeast is working overtime here folks. It is reproducing and along the way its byproduct is carbonic acid which makes bubbles and smell. Mmmm. It is also starting to help the gluten in the wheat form into long developed strands, perfect for helping bread rise. And the longer bread can develop the easier it is for you to digest, let those silly yeast life forms do the hard work I say.

Now this is where the witch craft comes into play. The most important part of bread making is the ratio of water to flour. All the rest is secondary. But in my case with cooked whole grains, it is really rather hard to determine exactly what level of moisture you have. Ideally I would weigh the wheat berries ahead of time then reweigh after they are cooked. But dang, that is crazy. So instead I take my wet mess and begin.

I add 1.5 tsps of salt (any kind will do). Less salt is fine if you need to, but some salt is necessary or you will end up with out of control yeast. I would not go less than 0.5 tsps. I find that 0.5 tsp per cup of flour is generally the max I want and this recipe is about 4 cups of flour, so 1.5 is a nice middle ground. I add 1tbsp of oil (olive or canola work fine and help develop a soft crumb) and 1 tbsp of honey. Again any sugar will do, I like to add honey. And no sugar will also do just fine. Play around with that.

Now slowly add in some flour and start stirring. I do it 1/2 a cup at a time until it gets hard to stir. Then add 1/2 cup (I use white flour because, well it makes better bread and adding more whole wheat at this point will likely just make you add more sugar to get the taste right) and start to knead the flour. It will still be quite wet and in the end I add about 2 cups of flour to this part of the recipe. I normally add close to 2 cups and keep a 1/2 cup on the bench and use it to constantly dust the dough to keep it from sticking. This will be wet dough, so dust often, but really much more than 2.5 cups of added flour will be too much. After about 5 minutes of so of good kneading you can form it into a ball and place it in a greased dish.

Now let it wait. The longer it takes to double in size, the better the flavour of the bread, so don't place it somewhere hot. As it is winter I normally keep it near a non sunny window, but you can actually keep it in the fridge as well. Check on it every hour or so until you see this happening.

Yup that has risen. So take it back out, flatten it down to get rid of the built up gas, and reform into a ball. Use a floured surface as, again, it is quite wet. Need to know how to properly form a ball? It is important at this point as it is the shape it will be for cooking. Well look up or Goole or Yuotube, boule. That's the French term for ball and that is the shape you are making.

Pretty, n'est pas?

So you take your boule and you place it in some floured parchment or wax paper, then wrap it in a tea towel, the shove it in a garbage bag. What? Yes, I use a clean black garbage bag which I keep hidden with my flours. It is cheap, it holds in moisture and warmth for the final rise and it is cheap. Did I mention cheap.

Anyway at about 45 minutes in it is time to get prepped for the bake. So you take a large dutch oven and place it on the lowest rack in your oven with the cover and and preheat the oven to 475F.  That may seem hot, likely because it is. I use a stainless steel dutch oven so it is generally warmed up when the oven is, about 15 minutes or so. If you use a cast iron one or ceramic, it will take a lot longer to preheat, so experiment. Likely it will take at least 30 minutes. But I have heard that cast iron does wonders for the crust.

Once the ovens are heated, it is time to bake. Get your loaf ready now.

So you unwrap it all, score it with a sharp knife (I use a bread knife) and place into the dutch oven. Do the oven bit fairly quickly so you don't lose heat and sprinkle some corn meal on the bottom of the dutch oven to add in the removal of the bread when you are done.

So why the dutch oven? Pro bakers use oven that inject steam. This allows for the formation of great crusts. It also allows you to bake at higher temps with the loaf drying out. And high temps do yummy things to sugar.

Again some witch craft, but bake it from 20-30 minutes with the dutch oven covered. It is hard to worry about going overboard at this step, but I aim around 25 minutes. Then after that, remove the lid and bake an additional 15-20 minutes until you end up with a nice dark brown crust. You loaf will have sprung at this point and taken on its final shape, the final round of baking is all about the crust.

Boom. Remove from oven and place on a rack for cooling. You want to get it out quickly to protect the crust and you want it to cool on a rack to, again, protect the crunchy crust.

So what do you get? A yummy and healthy loaf. And probably one with a sour flavour (that kind of depends on the yeast). But is is also moist and fluffy. It makes great sandwiches, great toast, and a great way to eat all sorts of toppings.

Do yourself a favour and do not cut the loaf until it has cooled to room temp. Bread isn't done cooking until then and you will end up with a soggy loaf if you do. No need to ruin things at this point.

So get out there and experiment with all sorts of grain. I also just made a corn and rye mix using corn grits and rye flakes (I couldn't find whole rye kernels but will continue to search). I will next try steel cut oats. Yum. Go to your local bulk food or health food store and find all the exciting things you can use.

Hey Ian, Done Any Races?

Well as the title suggests, I haven't been very good about keeping up with my race reports so far this year. I mean what with my posts about heated cycling gloves and training with heart rate zones, you would have thought maybe I just wasn't racing at all.

Well I actually have done a few races this year already, three in fact. So instead of big in depth reports, I'll throw out some quick reviews of those three races.

My first of the season was the Tri-the-Oval event. I did this one last year and had some issues during the race, so it was good to be back.  But, alas, I went into this one with some sort of weird ankle issue that had prevented me from doing much skating practice in the weeks leading up to it. Skating, Ian? What? Yes, this is a winter triathlon done in Halifax and starts with a 5km skate on the outdoor long track speed skating oval. From there you head off for a bike ride (it was supposed to be 15 km but I will discuss that) and finish with a  run of 4.5 (4.2) km's. So the big deal about this race was that we had some stormy weather heading into it, but not wintry stormy weather. No we had a big rain storm and 4 C temperatures. So that meant that we had to cross our fingers and hope the oval wouldn't be ruined. It wasn't and the skate was fine, the bike ride though was supposed to be a great onroad / off road kind of deal on mountain bikes. Sadly we had to eliminate most of the off road stuff due to the heavy ice and slush which cut the distance down quite a bit. The run was fun though with huge puddles, mud and slush. Anyway, my last years issues were not a problem this year. My ankle seemed to hold up well during the skate, thanks to a last minute modification to my skates and I left the ice in 27th position, with a time of 13:38, which was slightly faster than last year. My bike went well after I switched out to a different tire and upped the pressure. I managed the 5th faster bike split, which I think included T1. I rode in 16:41 for the 5.5 kms. And I finished with a decent run of 20:55 for the listed 4.5 kms and the 6th fastest time of the day. I had a horrible T2, not being able to get my helmet off,  so that makes my run time even better. I had a great day and finish strong in 9th place, well above my last year's placing of 15th.

The picture of me skating looked really bad.

Now a couple of week later I signed myself up for the MEC Point Pleasant Park Winter Classic 5K. Now there was a 10K option here folks, but I opted for the 5K. Why? Well I have been doing quite a bit of work at getting a fast 5K this year already and my first A race of the year will be the Atlantic Lung Run 5K. So I figured I would see how I might fair at the distance.

All racers started together and the 10K runners did 2 loops.  I figured I would  be able to grab all the data from this race and use it to see how my heart rate training was coming along. It was a simple 5K run on trails and ice. I knew this was not going to be a PB type race for me due to the terrain, but I hoped to still get a decent result and maybe crack the 19 minute world. Sadly I was only able to get a 20:28 but when looking through the results  it was plain to see that everyone's speed was quite a bit down. The hills were steep, but it was the running on patches of ice that really did it. Still I managed to get 3rd overall and 2nd male. I have a nice medal to show for it. And when I downloaded my Garmin to see how things went I was pleased that I managed to get my heart rate up to a high level and keep it there for over 17 minutes. Great stuff. And I didn't go for broke in the last kilometer, as I was too far behind second place. So it is good to know I probably have a little more free speed to go.

And look all smiles after the race! No pain!

The last race I have done was just this past weekend. It is a classic Nova Scotia race which I have never done, the Back to Basics 8 mile road race. Due to the price of the race ($5!) I couldn't pass it up. And I knew I was once again, not at my best, but this race would replace a threshold run for the week anyway, so why not go for it. 8miles is about 12.5 kilometers. Well my Garmin says 12.71 km.

It turns out this race is rather hilly. As in really hilly. My Garmin profile chart looks like a heart beat. No music was allowed as we were running on the roads, so I got  good song stuck in my head with a good beat (Pumped Up Kicks) and away I went. Now this race being much long than a 5K and having some really fast runners I really wanted to watch my pacing. I went out easily enough  but noticed that I was quite easily hanging with the leaders. So a quick glance said 3:30 min / km. Oh no I said to myself and began the process of slowing down. I hate slowing down as I feel like a freight train and it actually takes me 05 km or so to get down to the proper speed. Anyway, I got down to a 4:15 pace or so and felt comfortable there. By now I was close to a mile into the race and generally alone, with 2 women behind me and 8 people in front of me. I would stay there and keep a pretty decent pace for the next 5 miles  by which time the woman behind me finally caught up and passed me. Now she wasn't running so much faster than me, as I was kind of spacing out and drifting a bit. So I managed to pace right back up to her and use her as my pace bunny. It was great. I picked my pace right back up and hung in there easily. By mile 7 she said I could take off if I wanted to as she was just concerned with the lady behind us. But that lady was no where to be seen by this point. So I stayed where I was until I reached  half a kilometer to go. I felt like I had a little gas left in the tank so I thanked Erin and off I went, up the final climb and through the finish line in a time of 52:49. An overall pace of 4:09, not much off the pace I set for the MEC 5k. Great stuff I though as this was early in the season and my speed was already starting, this was the same time I ran at the end of the year 2 years back. And my heart rate data showed that I was actually slightly lower on average than my MEC race as well.

I finished the B2B  race 9th overall and 7th male. I looked at the times ahead of me and some were in the 44 min range. Yikes. I currently have no picture of this race to share sadly.

So it is really nice to see that my early season training is coming along, and thanks to training in my proper heart rate zones, I am not nearly as sore and tired as I used to be, all while getting far superior workouts.

Next up, the Lung Run. But that is a few weeks away yet, and I need to get a little distance into my feet as well, as I signed up for the Bluenose Half Marathon again.

Winter Cycling and Cold Hands - Part 2

(continued from Part 1)

So when last we left I had been through many of the cheaper options out there to try and keep my fingers from becoming iced up while riding to work, or mountain bike riding at night during the colder months.  So I now began to search for a glove that made its own heat .

At first I found a few options, though most seemed bulky and they were not inexpensive. I did find one cheapish pair of gloves, but they operated on 2 D cell batteries. Yikes! That would end up being rather pricey. And the reviews seemed to indicate that they really only produced heat in the palms of your hands, which is not what I wanted anyway. In fact many of the heated glove options I did see were similar. They really just heated your palms and it was hoped the heat would spread out.

I finally did find a site that was based around motorcyclists or ski dooers. They looked like standard winter gloves but had a decent heating element in them. At least that is what they claimed. And the price seemed okay at $100 a pair give or take. But see what I didn't notice until I read deeper was that they ran off the battery of the motorcycle. Hmmm, that was no good. You could buy a battery  kit and harness for them, but that would kick the price up significantly. And they had no user reviews. I mean I assume they probably worked, but they weren't designed for cyclists and that likely meant they were bulky. Also ordering these would mean ordering from the States and hoping they would get here some time this winter, but also realizing that the cost would be increased that much more, especially if they got hit with customs. Also dealing with a third party retailer in a  foreign country, even the USA, is annoying most times.

So my search on the good old Google went deeper. And that is when I found a nice little company in Calgary called Power in Motion . Now what first drew me to this company was that they are a electric bicycle company. So at least we were started on the right foot here, people that new what cycling was all about. Also they were located in Calgary, which frankly get really cold in the winter. And the gloves were designed in house. All good things in my mind.

A quick email to the company got me into a nice chat with Ken, one of the company founders. They didn't have an outlet for their products any further east than Ottawa. But Ken's partner John was more than willing to sell me a pair of gloves and ship them off.

Now these gloves aren't super cheap or anything. The gloves alone cost $99 and then the wiring harness and battery cost another $60. But what I would get for that price was pretty decent and dealing with a Canadian company also seemed like a good thing.

These are glove liners with a gauntlet style wrist. You get 2 options for hooking up the battery. The least expensive option (which I started with) is a single 12v lithium ion battery that you can put in a back pocket or breast pocket inside your coat, from this a wire goes down each sleeve and attaches to the glove. It is really simple and quite comfortable. The gloves have a switch on the wrist that allows you to toggle through three heat modes: 50C, 40C, and 30C. And all the heat  comes from carbon fiber heating elements, which are strong and flexible, so you can't really tell they are there. The elements run along you the fingers and across the knuckles, so the warmth goes were it needs to. Oh and they are hand washable, always a nice thing.

So this is the glove on. It is a spandex material, so it fits tight, and it needs to. You get the best heat when it is direct contact with your skin. This also allows you to rather easily slip another glove on top of it. This is of course essential to block the wind and water. But it also means you can get away with a  much lighter glove. Oh and notice the thumb and forefinger? They allow you to use touch screen devices like phones.

That is the whole setup. 2 gloves, batteries (I now have 2) and the wire to attach it up if you only have 1 battery. While the battery has a slight bit of bulk to it, it really isn't an issue with riding. It is under your wrist and you still have total freedom of movement. But if it is too bulky, the wired system works just fine.

I have been testing this system for a couple of week now and I am impressed so far. Though temps haven't been super cold since I go them, I have gone riding on days were it is easily colder than -10C with the wind chill. These days usually don't leave me as a happy handed cyclist.

As a test I have also been riding with only 1 glove activated but with the other glove in place, to see what difference the heating element actually makes. And I have finished my rides with one warm hand and one cold hand.  They are really great. And since they are glove liners, they should have a decent life span to them. My journey now is to find a better light weight over glove to wear with them. My current gloves are, frankly, a bit bulky. Ideally I will find something like a heavy water resistant nylon glove.

So how is the battery life in these things? Perfect for a commute. A single battery system can easily get 1.5 hours on max heat. My commute is 45-55 minutes long and it wasn't an issue. And I just throw the charger into my bag and plug them in at work. If you did drain them, it seems to take a bout 3 hours or so to get a full charge back. And when used on a lower setting or used with a 2 battery system, you get hours out them.

Was it worth it price wise? Yup. I figure anything that is a reasonable price and keeps me wanting to cycle as much as possible is a good thing. The cost of 3 tanks of gas in my car, so that is well worth it. And no sitting in traffic!

And I have been chatting with Ken about his upcoming projects. They currently have a 900 lumen light that runs on the same battery system. And you can actually hook the gloves and lights up together. I haven't had a chance to test out the light yet, but I do like the sound of it. And there is the possibility of heated socks in the pipe line as well, oh my!

So if you are like me and want to cycle as much as possible and get dang cold hands when the temp dips below zero, these are a pretty darn good investment.

I'm going to keep testing these (and by testing I mean wearing everyday) and look forward to a cold snap! check out the website for Power in Motion and specifically the heated gloves page . There is a video of the gloves and it is what sold me on exploring things further.

Update Jan 2014: I have written a new blog post about how my gloves are doing one year later (good is the quick answer). You can read it here:
http://ianloughead.blogspot.ca/2014/02/a-cycling-commuters-dream-power-in.html

Winter Cycling and Cold Hands - Part 1

So I ride a lot in the winter. Not that cool and fun, 90 km to a destination type riding or the all out time trial practice stuff, but I do ride a lot. I commute most days to work by bike and it is a 16-17 km ride each way through the heart of Halifax and over the bridge to Dartmouth.

I used to be able to just throw some stuff on in the morning and go, and cold hands and feet be damned. But over the last couple of years, well those cold hands and feet just weren't so much fun anymore.

Feet for me have been fairly easy to deal with. Feet can be bundled up and don't need any real dexterity. Thick wool socks and shoe covers (neoprene work best) were fine for years. But my favorite shoe covers were no longer available once the old ones wore out. So I bought fancy winter cycling boots for like $130 or so and have been very happy (they can go much higher in price than that). Still, when push comes to shove, you can just put on some nice warm hiking boots and be happy as well.

But hands and fingers, oh my. First I started with nice cross country ski gloves. Fine for a bit. Then I got some really great lobster style gloves. Nice, but for me, when the temp gets lower than -4C or so, they just weren't cutting it. My fingers were still getting cold, especially my thumb. So I got big fat gloves, then I got really expensive work gloves made of leather and stuff, then I went to mittens. Mittens were by far the best, but still, my thumb would get really cold when the temps were below -10C.

And I know that many other winter cyclists have told me all sort of stories about their gloves and how this glove works for them etc.... But for me, regular gloves just aren't cutting it anymore. My fingers get cold and stay cold for a long period of time. I mean hours after I am done riding.

Next stop, adding heat. You can buy those little chemical heating pads. They work once for a few hours and give off heat. nice idea, but really, they heat your palm or the back of your hand. And they add up cost wise pretty quick when you ride twice a day at least 4 times a week. So i bought those reusable heating pads.

These things throw a ton of heat and I would shove them in my glove or mitten and off I would go. But sadly, they turn rock hard as they cool down. This means all of a sudden you can't bend your hand anymore, and again, they really only heat everything but your fingers.

Now if my ride was a flat out 17km, I might be able to suck it up and head forth. But I have to stop at every red light and sit there in windy Halifax. And the bridge is always about 10 degrees cooler with the wind it seems. And that is assuming the bridge is open and you don't have to wait for a shuttle to ferry you across.

So after a week of insane below -20C this winter, I said enough was enough. I didn't want to drive to work, but I also hated sitting at work all day with hands that never warmed up. So my search began to find something that would warm my hands as I rode, and that I could reuse easily for the ride home.

Thus began my search for heated gloves.

I'll talk about that search in the next post.

Cadence dear Cadence

Okay, so I have been really looking at my run form for the past year. Part of this has been curiosity about running better and part about running more injury free. To this end I started creating a stride that was slightly more compact and more mid to fore foot.

Now I must say that I did not change my shoes in all of this. At least not in the beginning. I started this project in NB 880's with a 12mm drop, went to NB 890v2's with a 8mm drop, then to Merrill Road Access with a 0mm drop, back to the NB 890's and now onto Brooks Ghost2's with a 11mm drop. So yeah, all over the map. What were my findings as per how shoes affect my running? Nothing. I run very similarly in all of those shoes. What I do notice is that I like some cushion, at least at this point in my running career. So for now the Ghost and NB 890's will be my shoes of choice.

So we have all heard about this cadence thing and running. How a proper cadence will turn you into an Olympian over night. Well, maybe not an Olympian, but at least a much better and more natural runner. It certainly has been shown to me that when you take away a runners shoes, they do seem to naturally increase their cadence, so that does seem to indicate that it is a more natural way to run.

Of course up until recently, I never actually bothered checking my cadence out, I just knew that it was certainly fast now and I was getting fewer running related injuries. It wasn't until I went through a  running clinic called RE:201 (Running Economy 201) and was tested that I found out my running cadence was actually fairly high, in the 170's.  Also, other than a little stiffness in my shoulders, my form was pretty good as well. So hurrah for that training I did all last year.

During the testing though, Luke from Aerobics First had me run with a metronome set to 180. As is usually the case with people, I settled in on the metronome's pace and was comfortably running at 180 (or 90 if you only want to count one leg).

Even though my current running form seemed to be suiting me well, I was curious if upping my cadence even more, to a proper 180, would be any better. So I grabbed a MP3 metronome off the web and began to run. And I was running in a slow Zone 2. It felt incredibly weird moving along at a relatively slow 5:30 min km with my feet flying. But eventually it became quite comfortable. Now I am sure that once the MP3 was over and that I kept running my cadence probably changed slightly, but my feet did keep moving and it made me realize that I have been running properly while I run fast, but in no way was I running correctly slowly. And so much of run training is running slowly. So that meant all those long 20+ km runs I had been doing I had been plodding along and getting really sore for no reason. It was the mileage, it was the impact.

See (as I have read) think of it this way. Think how much force your legs and feet would hit with if you were running with a cadence of say 2. Then think how if you covered the same distance in 180 steps how each step would be light and quick. Your body just won't have to go through as severe an impact with each foot fall if your cadence is higher.

Now I have also read plenty about how you just need to let your body find its own cadence and not force it through the use of running aids, and I believe that is true. But I find that by getting into the right mindset during training, ie starting out with a metronome to help, you can will, over time, get into your right rhythm.

Word of caution, you will spike the heart rate and you will find your legs get tired quicker at first. But if you are like me, you will notice that they aren't sore. That after the tired goes away, you feel good.

So I will continue this journey, do some testing on me, and fill you in on my findings as the year goes on. Want to read more about cadence? Just Google it and go to town on the million websites you come across. Find something good to share? Let me know!