Here is a movie of a short section of my balance board routine. The balance board is a disc with a hemisphere attached to the bottom. It takes a little getting used to. Once you have is mastered, it is a great strengthening exercise which can be a lot fun to do. My Mom’s bear is intently watching on!

It snowed today (Sunday) in Seattle, it was very pretty. Cam and I went to Gas Works Park with our sled to take a few runs down the hill.

During my evening run on this snowy day, I felt a sharp pain in the back part of my lower inner leg (Calf muscle?) as I was finishing run loop around green lake. I sort of walked/hobbled/ran back home. I guess I strained by Calf muscle? I iced it and took a couple of advil. The pain seems to be gone but it still feels tender. I guess I will continue Rest Ice Compression Elevation (RICE) today and hope for the best.

What can I say, it is a occupational hazard, although it looks like could have prevented it. The symptoms seem to indicate that I strained my calf muscle as I was finishing my run. I remember that I ran extra hard to finish with a good time, I did not drink enough water before I started and insufficient stretching as well. I read that these are all causes for calf injury. I will now know to be a better runner!


I ran to Green Lake Outer Loop and to Fremont for Mexican Food on Friday, Jan 13th. Carrying Burritos, Salsa, and Frijole in your jogging backpack is interesting .. No spills!

Leslie (a running/bicycle enthusiast like me, (she is a better rider/runner) rode along side me for some of the way and made me forget that I was actually running! I am sure this helped increase my average pace a bit. Here I am with Leslie with her New Year’s costume encouraging runners along the way. She was not running today as she is recovering from an injury. She was riding on her bicycle. I hope to do some of my rides/runs with her this year.

It was a low key affair compared to the fanfare of the Seattle Marathon from Nov last year. I bested my own performance by shaving off another 2 minutes from my time. I finished at 1 hour 56 minutes and 5 seconds.

Another unique feature of this run was that I used my Saucony Hattori “almost barefoot” shoes that provides virtually no support to the runner. The idea is that the foot provides critical feedback to your body when running and you automatically adjust your running style to be “light” on your feet and not to be a “heel-striker”. I have been running with these shoes a lot, but this was the first time running an “official” half-marathon. At the end of long runs wearing these shoes, the top of my feet hurt just a bit for a day or 2, but my knees, legs, joints and tendons seems to fare a lot better.

I am now back home and looking forward to a nice hot bath in our new house!

The run is organized by a “low-key” runners group call First Call Running Club and they hold marathon, half-marathon, and 50k running events throughout the year staffed by volunteer club members. You have to be a self-sufficient runner with water, food etc. for the most part. They do serve some hot food, hot chocolate etc. at the finish. I even got a medal for finishing today! My official standings are below:

Mens Half
———
Overall standing was 14th out of 38 competing. In my age group 50-55, I placed 2nd!
I did better than 14 people younger than me and got defeated by one person older.

01. 1:28:05 49 m 13.1
02. 1:31:27 48 m 13.1
03. 1:33:17 47 m 13.1
04. 1:38:02 34 m 13.1
05. 1:38:06 47 m 13.1
06. 1:40:27 45 m 13.1
07. 1:48:52 52 m 13.1
08. 1:49:27 46 m 13.1
09. 1:51:09 49 m 13.1
10. 1:52:26 36 m 13.1
11. 1:52:26 30 m 13.1
12. 1:52:34 31 m 13.1
13. 1:53:00 41 m 13.1
14. 1:56:05 50 m 13.1 Chandru Narayan
15. 1:57:23 48 m 13.1
16. 1:57:58 49 m 13.1
17. 1:58:42 45 m 13.1
18. 2:02:14 63 m 13.1
19. 2:02:26 30 m 13.1
20. 2:02:51 34 m 13.1
21. 2:03:21 31 m 13.1
22. 2:03:42 47 m 13.1
23. 2:04:48 57 m 13.1
24. 2:05:38 33 m 13.1
25. 2:08:52 45 m 13.1
26. 2:10:57 37 m 13.1
27. 2:13:49 53 m 13.1
28. 2:24:21 22 m 13.1
29. 2:24:40 43 m 13.1
30. 2:27:19 53 m 13.1
31. 2:35:55 46 m 13.1
32. 2:42:27 53 m 13.1
33. 2:46:19 38 m 13.1
34. 2:51:05 63 m 13.1
35. 2:52:40 54 m 13.1

The spices here include Fenugreek, Asafoetida, Turmeric, garnished with Neem leaves and Cilantro

Here are some other pictures of other vegan meals made recently.

The bus dumped us on the highway, no where near another bus stop, at first we didn’t know where we were. We walked along the highway to an exit ramp and walked back to the resort, it turned out fine, it was a pleasant walk.

For me, this has unexpectedly turned into a spa vacation with lots of running (150+ miles in 2 weeks!), time at the hot tub, sauna and steam room as well as lovely excursions in the afternoon to explore. We went to downtown Puerto Vallarta 2 more times,  here are some pictures from that trip.

One of the many favorite things about this trip was getting coconuts from the city workers who were trimming the coconut trees at various locations during our morning jogs. We drank the coco aqua right on the spot and sometimes brought extra back to the resort. Cam did this first, when she was jogging on her own and the workers gave her a coconut for ‘mister’. Here is a video when I had my turn carrying two cocounuts.

We have taken 4 excursions out of the resort so far, two to downtown Puerto Vallarta (PV). We took a bus ride to the edge of town and got onto the rickety Centro blue bus which is a bone jarring ride through the cobble stone streets. PV is a delightful (but dusty) city with a very nice sea wall or Malecon that extends the length of the town. There are musicians, street performers, food vendors, restaurants and night clubs right along the Malecon. It reminded me of Miami Beach, especially the lively nature of it. We visited the lovely church of Our Lady of Guadalupe,  listened to music and took in the atmosphere of a living city. On our second trip we walked directly uphill on city streets and precarious steps which wind around houses built into the hill all the way to the top. The view of the tiled rooftops and the Banderas Bay is just fantastic. We sat in the shade of a rubber tree and took in the lovely breeze and view for quite a long time. We had lunch at Sandy’s, a tiny local breakfast place that is the cathedral cafe or refectory. We had an omelet, toast, burrito, espresso, freshly squeezed orange juice and water all for only 81 Pesos or about $6, unbelievable!

For our next excursion together, we rented bicycles and rode to the fishing village of Bucerias. I have taken to running there (about 16 miles) on a regular basis in the mornings. We ate at the La Luna food stand built right into a grocery store. The Mom was the cook,  she made us burritos with home made frijoles (refried beans), arroz (spanish rice), queso (cheese), lettuce, tomatoes, onions and a spicy chile verde. It was just great. The only other people who ate there were local construction workers. You cannot do better that that! This was all quite Surreal to me as I had just finished reading the book “Born to Run” by Christopher McDougall. Here he talks about this secretive Mexican tribe of super runners and the time he spent with them organizing a race with white Americans. They kept eating the frijoles made by this old lady and taking bean burritos to go, which they carried in their jerseys!

For the second week, we stayed in a villa, a condo bigger than our house! There is a grand balcony which can easily hold 50+ people that overlooks the Banderas Bay, with a lovely wading pool built right into it. The living room and kitchen are very spacious and  well appointed. This is the sort of suite that will rent for a thousand bucks a night!

We enjoyed the lazy/crazy river, the water slide, going to the beach, and the spa for the sauna, steam room and jacuzzi.

Our days start early, before sunrise when we jog to Paradise Village shopping center for Starbucks coffee. Usually, Cam turns back and jogs to the public beach and pier entrance at Nuevo Vallarta. She walks on the beach back to the resort. Along the way she has fresh coconut water, the city groundskeepers used their machete to chop open a coconut for her for free daily. We have found that the Mexican people are genuinely friendly, helpful and honest.

The ride was spectacular on the winding road with fantastic views of the valley below. The ride started out on the same and infamous 21 hairpin bends leading up to Alpe-d’Huez, but I only had to ride the most difficult first 6 !  

I then peeled off this “nightmarish” climb and started on a branching delightful path toward Auris village.

I must say that this ride was very enjoyable and relaxing to me as I already had 2 of the toughest rides (Col du Galibiert and Alpe-d’Huez) under my belt already.

 It was pure bliss as you can see. Here is me looking down on the road I will be descending to!  

I then took another ride on more or less “level ground” (believe it or not!) to Allemont, a beautiful town catering to bicyclists in the summer and skiers in the winter

My overall stats for the day was about 42 miles and 4000 feet of climbing.

Here is a video of my experience. It really gives a feel of the dramatic nature of this ride. I am calling this video “Is that a muscle?”  Cam often points out what looks like muscles forming. Could it be that you can actually see a muscle starting to form?