Happy Independence Day to all here in the U.S., and I hope we all have a great day.

How am I feeling today?

Today is one of those sleep-in, rainy days that we all need from time-to-time, especially when you have been in the early stages of a drought. While the weather is messing with my planned time trial this morning, but at the same time I’m not all that concerned about it. You either run the weather you are given and smile, or take the day off and still smile. I haven’t decided which direction I am going to yet. However, I have decided that I am not going to go run in town and if I do run the time trial, it will be Philbrick Laps, which does get a bit boring. While I really am interested in seeing how I do with the time trial challenge, at the same time the body feels a bit more tired than usual, so I will decide which way to go sometime this morning. It isn’t a decision that I need to rush into making.

Planned Workout Description: 

Type: 

• Time Trial

Per Stryd: “Your workout today is a fitness check via a 15:00 Time Trial! Start with an easy warm up with two :30s pickups to get your body ready to run fast. Your goal for the 15:00 Time Trial is to run somewhere between 100-112% of your Stryd Auto-Calculated Critical Power. This seems like a fairly large range, but you can dial in a more specific target by going to your Stryd PowerCenter Power Duration Curve. You can toggle on the Auto-CP Model Curve and scroll over your Power Duration Curve until you arrive at the 15:00 mark. Once there, note the Model Curve projection. This should give you a relative idea of what Stryd thinks you are capable of for a 15:00 Time Trial. After the Time Trial, run an easy cool down.”

Today’s Running Focus

• Listen to the body

Why am I doing this run?

To see where I am physically. I gotta check the tolerances of the left Achilles for a little bit and also see if all the fast twitch muscles have been replaced with old man shuffle muscles. Plus, I get to check out how the Carbon X v1s do in the rain, which is important to know. Especially, if I decide that I want to use them for racing versus the RunFast v1s, which I know will do great in the rain.

What I Actually Did Today: 

I got out the door, that is the hardest part on a rainy day, getting out the door. Once out there and wet, the run becomes enjoyable, but opening that damn door is the hardest part. I didn’t look too closely at the watch during the run and ran mostly by feel during the workout. The easy stuff felt easier and I probably could have forced the issue and slowed down, but I was running well and I knew that at most it would cost me only a few seconds during the time trial. 

Whenever, I would start to whine to myself about how I was feeling, I just kept repeating “this is where you want to be, embrace the damn challenge.”

      Split                      Target                          Watts            Actual  Pace

• S:1                   10:00 Warmup             149 – 161 W     212       9:22
• S:2                   0:30 Run                      207 – 253 W    258      7:39
• S:3                   1:00 Recover               138 – 161 W     242      9:02
• S:4                   0:30 Run                      230 – 276 W    255      7:35
• S:5                   1:00 Recover               138 – 161 W     222      8:22
• S:6                   2:00 Run                      149 – 172 W     232       8:17
• S:7                   15:00 Run                    230 – 258 W    241       8:18
• S:8                   10:00 Cooldown          115 – 149 W     194      10:09
• Extra                5:35                              None                220       8:55

This workout did increase my Stryd CP from 230 to 233. Not a big increase, but probably fairly close to where I am physically right now. It just gives me incentive to keep working and moving those times lower as I get back in better shape. There is no fantastical thinking about where I am, these time trials give me the feedback I need to show me where I really am. That is why I always avoided them in the past, not doing them allowed me to believe my different reality. Now, I am firmly based in the reality of how I am running, and you know something, I am a lot more at peace with the runner that I am.

Did that workout go as planned?

Once I got going, the run went pretty much as I expected, too fast on the slower stuff and not as fast as I had hoped on the faster stuff. However, the results were encouraging, because I felt that my stride is getting closer to me running without the Achilles restricting it nearly as much as it has been lately. I am getting back in shape and while it is taking longer than it ever has to recover from this kind of injury, I am recovering.

Injuries/Niggles:

Weather: Moderate rain, 55°F, Feels like 52°F, Humidity 100%, Wind 8mph from NNE. Just a crappy day outside, but we definitely need the rain, so I can’t complain too much. It is more getting out the door and then once you are wet, it stops mattering and you can have fun playing in the rain and maybe even splash on purpose through a few puddles.

Shoes: Hoka Carbon X v1 – Finally, a pair of Hoka running shoes that doesn’t kill my right foot! I have always run great in Hoka shoes, I have had 8 different pairs, but all of them bothered my right foot so much that I gave up on running in them, until now. I knew that I could run decently in the Carbon X from that run with Sam back in 2019, but I didn’t realize how well I could run in them until this morning.

WOW! That is all I can say about them after this run in the rain. I had zero issues with the shoes and grip on the wet tar and standing water (puddles) was outstanding. I took the 180 degree turns more aggressively after I learned that the shoes were not going to slide around and that I didn’t need to worry about landing on my side halfway through the turn. I picked up the pace easily whenever, I remembered to get my arse in gear again. The Carbon X might not be a great winter shoe, but the two runs I have done in them so far have been very impressive and I wouldn’t hesitate to use them as 5K and up race day shoes. 

I am not that fast anymore to worry about a few ounces. It is better to have a bit more protection, additional pop from the carbon plate, along with the extra comfort while racing is becoming much more important than how much a shoe weighs. It will be an interesting dilemma to figure which pair to wear at my next real 5K, these or the Reebok RunFast v1. Either way I have a feeling that I will do just fine and not have any issues from the shoes (they both have their pros and cons), which is all I can ask.

Other stuff

The below document is the reason we celebrate this day. As a former History teacher, I recommend that we all need to read this and the Constitution to remember what the words actually say, not what others might tell us they do. Freedom and Independence is not just about rights or privilege; it is also about our responsibilities. Here is the link to the below document: https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/declaration-transcript

Declaration of Independence: A Transcription

Note: The following text is a transcription of the Stone Engraving of the parchment Declaration of Independence (the document on display in the Rotunda at the National Archives Museum.) The spelling and punctuation reflects the original.

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In Congress, July 4, 1776

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen United States of America, When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.–Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

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Georgia

Button Gwinnett

Lyman Hall

George Walton

North Carolina

William Hooper

Joseph Hewes

John Penn

South Carolina

Edward Rutledge

Thomas Heyward, Jr.

Thomas Lynch, Jr.

Arthur Middleton

Massachusetts

John Hancock

Maryland

Samuel Chase

William Paca

Thomas Stone

Charles Carroll of Carrollton

Virginia

George Wythe

Richard Henry Lee

Thomas Jefferson

Benjamin Harrison

Thomas Nelson, Jr.

Francis Lightfoot Lee

Carter Braxton

Pennsylvania

Robert Morris

Benjamin Rush

Benjamin Franklin

John Morton

George Clymer

James Smith

George Taylor

James Wilson

George Ross

Delaware

Caesar Rodney

George Read

Thomas McKean

New York

William Floyd

Philip Livingston

Francis Lewis

Lewis Morris

New Jersey

Richard Stockton

John Witherspoon

Francis Hopkinson

John Hart

Abraham Clark

New Hampshire

Josiah Bartlett

William Whipple

Massachusetts

Samuel Adams

John Adams

Robert Treat Paine

Elbridge Gerry

Rhode Island

Stephen Hopkins

William Ellery

Connecticut

Roger Sherman

Samuel Huntington

William Williams

Oliver Wolcott

New Hampshire

Matthew Thornton