Winter, Rock Climbing and Running.

This happens to be one of those winters where rock climbing is not all that motivating. Having to work full time, does not allow me to go on climbing trips to warmer, drier locals. Plastic is cool and all, but I tend to get burned out if I have to pull on plastic too much. I used to get my winter on and hike through the snow, deal with the cold, not worry about getting wet, but this year, I think I may have lost my edge or motivation.
My lovely wife Danielle, had gotten us the Nike+ sensors for Christmas. http://nikerunning.nike.com/nikeos/p/nikeplus/en_US/
Danielle wanted to do a half marathon this fall and needed some motivation to get her through the arduous process of running as well as myself. She did some research and found that the Nike + program was very hands on and super motivating. Having to deal with nursing school and not being able to climb as much as she would like to, she thought running might help her to stay in shape while keeping her motivated. Don't get me wrong, rock climbing will aways be our main hobby, but running is a whole different world. The feeling of just putting on your running shoes and going for a run is so carefree. The really cool thing with the Nike+ program is that you can log all of your runs via the sensor and transmitter to your personal Nike web page. The Nike+ sensor goes into a special oval void in the insole of the Nike+ line of shoes. There are small velcro pouches one can buy at any running store and place on the laces of any shoe to utilize the Nike+ chip if you don't want to buy the Nike+ line of shoes. The program logs your average pace, distance, and calories burned per each run. Once your transmitter is plugged into your ipod, you can choose distances you would like to run or times you would like to run and from time to time, the program will remind you how far you have run during your work out or if you just ran your fastest mile to date, so on and so on. The program is very motivating to say the leased. It becomes almost addicting to go run because you can see progress.

Within the Nike+ program on your personal web page, their are training programs, coaches, and chat rooms to ask those oddball questions about your running. For Danielle and myself, we are actually excited to train for the half marathon this coming fall because of Nike+.
Since I have been trying to run farther, faster and more efficiently, I have signed up and ran a race or two to put the training to the test. Running races are so great to do something totally different than what D and I have been doing for years, climbing. This past Saturday, I ran the Sweetheart Classic 4 miler in Loveland. Danielle was going to run it with me, but decided she would like to watch this race until she felt she was ready. It was a really fun race with lots of mom's and dad's with their kids. There were  runners of all levels, just like climbing comps. The weather was perfect, sunny about 45 degrees. The only downer was the insane wind. It seemed like every time I came around a corner, there was a massive head wind. Mix the wind in with a couple of long hills and wow! All in all, I really enjoyed myself and beat my personal best for 4 miles. I came in 49th out of 312 with a time of 30:42 and a pace of 7:41. Not bad for never racing a 4 miler and having crazy wind and hills, I'm psyched! After the race, Danielle and walked around and ate great food, drank great recovery drinks and I personally felt as though I accomplished something. The nice thing about running is that we can go out, run 30 minutes and be totally satisfied the rest of the day. I can't wait for the next race, The Running of the Green 4 miler next month. Then we have the Boulder Boulder and the Rock and Roll Marathon.