Introduction

Introduction

I'm 62 years old. Correction. I was 62 years old. Now, I'm getting younger. In the past few months, I lost 28 pounds, and now I'm at the same weight I was when I graduated from the Air Force Academy in 1975. I've been walking for years, and I put almost 5,000 miles on my Fitbit since Feb 2014. I thought I was in good shape, until I started running with what I call an old man's shuffle. Where did my fitness go in the last 30 years?

The answer is it left me one step at a time for each step I didn't take. Now, I'm determined to bring my running fitness back one step at a time in my own way. My own way draws on my experience and reading about the experiences of many others. If my own way wasn't unique, there would be no reason to share it.

Maybe I should post a before video, and hopefully, I'll do that before my before becomes an after.

It's time to start from here.

What is Maximum Daily Output?

The body adapts every day to the amount of work we do each day. I've defined the combination of distance and pace a person can do every day without days off and without feeling fatigue or experiencing injuries as The Maximum Daily Output. If a runner's output is less than The Maximum Daily Output, the body will adapt to do less work the next day. If the runner's output is more than The Maximum Daily Output, they are on their way to cumulative fatigue or injuries.

I'm defining these two conditions as sub-maximum output and super-maximum output.

The Big Picture

The northwest point on the line is the distance and pace an individual runner feels they can currently repeat every day with no days off. The southeast corner is based on the time the runner can devote to running every day with few exceptions and an extreme estimate of the distance and pace they might achieve.

I can eventually devote two hours a day to running. I started with 6.1 miles a day and a terribly slow pace I won't admit until tomorrow. My goal is 15 miles every day at an eight-minute pace. This is clearly at the edge of impossibility. No problem, as my progress will simply stall at some point. I've given myself a minimum of 555 running days to achieve my goal. This will be adjusted by setbacks along the way.

The Mechanics

In order to be reproducible, the controlling factors must be accurately measurable. I'm using stride rate and distance.

I use a click track on an mp3 player to adjust my stride rate by a few hundredths of a step a day. You can create an mp3 with a click track by downloading the program here. [url]http://sourceforge.net/projects/audacity/[/url]

I use  the GPS on my Fitbit Surge to measure the distance.

Each day, I increase my stride rate by a few hundredths of a step/minute and increase my distance by 9/555ths of a mile. (Difference between current daily miles and final daily miles divided by the number of days to achieve my goal.)

I have a spreadsheet with the stride rates and distances.

Safeguards

If the runner misses a day for any reason, they will back up to the previous day's stride rate and distance goal for the next run. If they miss multiple days, they will back up multiple days.

If the runner's average heart rate for the run exceeds the maximum target, they will take a day off.

The runner will take a day off for even minor pains in critical systems that if allowed to progress could result in a serious injury. Examples are knees, tendons, feet, back pain, etc.

The runner may use good judgment to violate these safeguards.

First Conclusion

This experimental method should maximize the number of miles a person can run over time by maximizing daily output and eliminating cumulative fatigue and injuries. In later posts, I'll show how it can self-adjust to meet these parameters.

First Training Day Post

I'm starting this blog a week into my training. These are my results from yesterday. Future posts will use this format. I'll add more theoretical information along the way.

11/12/15 (Run 7)
Temperature: 27
Wind Calm
Distance: 6.20 miles

I use a Fitbit Surge to track my heart rate during the run. I've set my target maximum to 128. In a future post, I'll explain why this is my personal maximum.

 

These are the splits for each mile. I didn't include values for the pace this time, but I will in the future. The line is yesterday's run. The numbers in the legend are my heart rate for each run.

This is a magnified area of the chart above showing my daily runs, my heart rate for each run and my pace. In tomorrow's post, I'll include the pace.

One of the safeguards is to take a day off if my heart rate averages above 128 bpm. I violated this the first day it happened as there were 40 mph winds and it was rainy and cold. I am taking today off after the second occurrence.

Conclusion

I hope this process of minuscule daily advancement will lead me to my flexible goal. A similar process can be used for achieving any goal. The reward is according to the trivial daily efforts. (Pirkei Avot: 5:27)