Running Wild

After a 4 day hiatis, I did a 6 mile run on the Point Mallard trail today.  It was very nice weather today, warm and sunny, after a week that was cold and/or rainy often.  The podcast I listened to was interviewing a bunch of old guys who were in the fledgling space program when Sputnik went up and shook everything up.  One of the perspectives they shared was that the US wasn't really behind the soviets at the time.  In fact, the reason that the soviets had such large launch vehicles to use was that they couldn't make ICBM warheads as small as the US could, so they had these huge million pound thrust rockets.  Neither side was expecting the publicity and attention that Sputnik got in the press and the public eye, and it ignited the space race.  It was even put forth that without Sputnik and the uproar it caused about the soviets beating the US into space, that the lunar program wouldn't have happened.  As it was, we had the technology on hand and assembled already necessary to do it ourselves within 90 days of Sputnik.    Von Braun said he could do it in 30 days, no problem, but was talked into 90 to be conservative.  A lot of the narrative described the people and this work taking place at Redstone in Huntsville AL, just 20 miles from where I was running today. 

I got a blister on my heel running today, even though I was using the shoes I've been running in with no problems for weeks.  No explanation.

Summary Data
Total Time (h:m:s)	0:44:34	7:24 pace
Moving Time (h:m:s)	0:44:35	7:24 pace
Distance (mi )	6.02
Moving Speed (mph)	8.1 avg.	11.9 max.
Elevation Gain (ft)	+102 / -101
Temperature (°F)	62.6°F avg.	62.6°F high
Wind Speed ( mph)	WNW   5.8 avg.	WNW   8.1 max.

Started a run at Point Mallard but the blister on my heel from yesterday tore open.  I cut it short after that.

 Ran as part of a relay in the Delano 12 hour today.  Eric Schotz and Jon Elmore were race directors and did a great job.

Ran 6 miles at Point Mallard.  This was 72 hours after a 21.5 mile run, but it was noticably slower and a bit more sore in the joints than usual.

Did a run at Point Mallard again tonight.  Pace was 7:56, which is still slower than usual due to a long run on Sunday.  I was feeling some IT band pain in my right hip still.

I listened to a podcast of an interview with Carl Sagan from 2003 or so, right after he had published Pale Blue Dot.  It was a very interesting and entertaining hour long interview in which he expressed the motivation for colonization of other worlds as an insurance policy to preserve the human race in the event of a catastrophy on this planet.  This was a decades to centuries hence view, not a topic concerning the next few years.  Also discussed was the SETI program and the follow-on privately funded efforts with similar objectives.  It was a very nice day to be out on the trail.

Summary Data
Total Time (h:m:s)	0:47:40	7:56 pace
Moving Time (h:m:s)	0:47:39	7:56 pace
Distance (mi )	6.00
Moving Speed (mph)	7.6 avg.	10.7 max.
Elevation Gain (ft)	+104 / -102
Temperature (°F)	63.2°F avg.	68°F high
Wind Speed ( mph)	S   9.6 avg.	S   11.5 max.

Ran 6 miles at Point Mallard

Ran the 5k course and the 2 mile course at the 3M park after work

Ran at Point Mallard

Ran at Point Mallard

I took Abbie to the trail tonight and we did an easy, slow 3.

I had a really nice run at Point Mallard today. It was sunny and about 60 degrees and I was able to keep a pretty good pace going. I listened to a podcast that was discussing the economics of cellulosic ethanol vs corn based ethanol for gasoline supplementation. The point was primarily that producing corn takes just about as much energy as the energy content of the ethanol that you can make with it, in large part due to the energy cost of the fertilizer needed. Nevertheless, we are putting and have put legislation in place that subsidizes both the production of corn and the production of corn based ethanol to the point that it's being used to the exclusion of cellulosic sources, such as wood scrap, straw, grasses, and field waste.

Summary Data
Total Time (h:m:s)	0:48:20	8:00 pace
Moving Time (h:m:s)	0:44:51	7:25 pace
Distance (mi )	6.04
Moving Speed (mph)	8.1 avg.	12.9 max.
Elevation Gain (ft)	+104 / -103
Temperature (°F)	59°F avg.	62.6°F high
Wind Speed ( mph)	N   12.6 avg.	N   13.8 max.

Ran at Point Mallard again today.  It was a bit cooler than yesterday but sunny.  I listened to a podcast that was explaining that in addition to the BRAC1 & 2 genes that have been known since the mid 90s to indicate a predisposition to breast cancer, the human haplotype map is allowing investigators to identify additional genes that are more subtle indicators of breast cancer risk.  Also covered was a description of studies that were mapping activity in rat brains as they slept that indicated that they were replaying the days events in their sleep, repeating the sequence of neural activity in the visual and smell areas of the brain, but in reverse order to the sequence that they fired when they went through the maze.  This progressed into a discussion of the importance of sleep to memory storage in humans.  A minimum of 7 hours seems to be the magic number, which I seem to rarely get.

Summary Data
Total Time (h:m:s)	0:45:08	7:30 pace
Moving Time (h:m:s)	0:44:29	7:24 pace
Distance (mi )	6.01
Moving Speed (mph)	8.1 avg.	12.4 max.
Elevation Gain (ft)	+111 / -111
Temperature (°F)	48.2°F avg.	51.8°F high
Wind Speed ( mph)	NNW   8.8 avg.	NNW   10.4 max.

Ran the Capitol 10k in Austin TX today, followed later in the day by a 5 mile run with Mark Lettang on the Brushy Creek trail.  My GPS watch indicated a 6:56 pace, which could have been faster perhaps, but I was letting myself enjoy the run.  The Cap 10k is the largest race in Austin, with something like 17,000 runners.  They have live bands at several points on the course and lots of community involvement and many of the runners are in costume.

Summary Data
Total Time (h:m:s)	0:43:44	6:56 pace
Moving Time (h:m:s)	0:43:44	6:56 pace
Distance (mi )	6.30
Moving Speed (mph)	8.6 avg.	12.0 max.
Elevation Gain (ft)	+433 / -442