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I PR'd at the 2009 Las Vegas Rock N Roll Half by 27 minutes! You can read my race post-mortem at dailymile.com if you're curious.

Hella Sound now offers Gift Certificates! Priced at $5, $10 and $15, they're perfect stocking stuffers and last-minute gifts for your running buddies. Print 'em out, or let us email them directly with a note from you. Sweet, huh?

On the Las Vegas RnR tip, here's some thoughts on how I did 27 minutes better than previous outings, and things I learned:

1. A good running playlist is a good thing. If you're curious, here's what I ran to:
· Hella Sound What Are You Made Of?!? [165BPM]—my go-to running song these days
· Hella Sound As You Wish [165BPM]—transitions nicely from "What Are You Made Of?!?"
· Hella Sound How To Turn Around A Bad Day [165BPM]
· One Day As A Lion Wild International—great live drum sound, great aggro vocals; really gets me going.
· Eve & Fatboy Slim Cowboy—the lyrics are SOOOOOO crass, but the rhythm is fantastic. I love Eve. She nasty.
· Hella Sound What Are You Made Of?!? [165BPM]—finished up strong

2. Gu Chomps are cheating. They're so kick ass, and so easy to use, that it's almost too easy. I brought 2 baggies and started chomping them every so often from mile 3 to mile 11. I never once ran short on energy, never once bonked, and also never once got that gaggy "ugh I just ate a Gu" feeling. I hit every water station on the course (just drinking water, no Cytomax) and it went fantastically.

4. Losing weight helps. At racetime I was down about 20lbs from two months ago, and I believe it's really helped. Another 40 or so to go...

5. Garmin. This was my first race with a Garmin; and while I've run with the Nike+ before, I rarely had it calibrated properly to be accurate. I was shooting for 2:30:00, which turns out to about 11:20 miles, and with the Garmin, I was able to stay at pace easily.

6. In general, I think I've just become a better runner.


Be safe, have fun, and don't be a stranger!

Our Third Song is Out!

Hella Sound's third running music release, "As You Wish" is now available—go check it out!

We also have had 3 reported PRs by folks running with our music—check 'em out on our Facebook page. That makes me incredibly happy.

Good stuff!

Well Hello There!

I'm sorry to have left y'all in a lurch!

Since my last post I've been gravitating towards the fantastic dailymile.com site. It's a really well-put-together site that tracks workouts and lets you cheer on others (and receive motivation, too). Y'all probably know all this, since many of you are already on there.

(Note: dailymile.com plug is in no way sponsored—it's just an awesome site. Word.)

I guess I neglected to give the lowdown on my San Jose Rock N Roll Half experience. I was sick leading up to it, which sucked, and my sinuses were busy draining themselves all through the race, but it went okay. I finished it, and I ran the whole thing (except 2 water stations), which was my goal. I guess I was pretty disappointed with my time, but not defeated by the experience (like I was last year).

Anyhoo, I'm digging dailymile.com, so I'm going to keep on truckin' with it. If you're on there, connect with me! And if you're not, join up!

More good things comin'!

:D

I've been sweating my tweaked right leg. It feels like shin splints, and I have a couple suspects. Regardless, the season's final Fleet Feet Sunset Run got rid of some of my worries, and I'm feeling more confident for next sunday's halfie in San Jose.

It's gonna be tough. Finishing at a reasonable pace is gonna be a struggle. But at least I feel confident that I'll be doing it sans-injury. The plan for this week is to chill out some, baby my leg a bit and make sure I go into the race feeling 100%. I think that's the best I can hope for, and then tough it out where I'm missing cardio.

Again, I hope to god it's a cool morning. If it's warm and sunny, it's gonna be a long, long race.

Having said all that, it's time to start thinking about the Las Vegas Rock 'n' Roll Half Marathon in December. The original plan was to build up a base working towards San Jose, then build off that and work on speed for Vegas. I hope to start with ~15 mile weeks and keep going from there. Hopefully by Vegas I'll have quite a few long runs under my belt, and everything will be trucking along smoothly.

I do believe my little barefooting thing exacerbated my leg issue, so I'm gonna hold off on any more of that for the time being. If I feel amazing in November, maybe I'll sneak a few more barefoot runs in. There are a few other culprits, but I believe the barefooting didn't help. I have to have more miles under my belt to be able to do that regularly.

If all goes well, I also plan on incorporating some strength training and other conditioning into the mix. Ski season is coming up, and I wanna have my quads, core and hammies ready to hit the slopes.

Good times.

Photo courtesy joysaphine on Flickr.

Getting Mentally Ready

Well kids, the San Jose Rock N Roll Half Marathon is in 12 days.

Am I ready?

I'm not entirely sure. Running was going great, but I have hit a few snags along the way. This last week has been an utter trip. Running and I have not gotten along the last several days. I have some theories as to why, and I can right them, but I can't take many more bad runs like the one on Monday. A day like that in San Jose will lock out any chance I have of finishing the half marathon with my head held high.

So, I'm a bit nervous.

I have had life interfere with some of my runs, and haven't lost an ounce of weight (like I planned), but hopefully I can pull it all together in these last days and get my #$@% together.

One other thing: if it's hot again in San Jose like it was last year, I'm done. I'm toast. I can rehydrate and drink as I go, but ultimately I don't think I can hang in warm, sunny, windless weather.