Alameda Runners – Get After It!

I went out to take some pictures for the nice ladies at Picnic Dash productions this morning.  The race was held in Golden Gate Park which is always a great place for an event.  The flowers are always out in Golden Gate Park where the chilly, damp, winter air gives the place a wonderful smell.  Most of the other Picnic Dash races are held by the warming hut in Crissy Field, under the Golden Gate Bridge.  It does not matter which location you pick for a run, they all feel like family picnics.

Today’s race was a chilly affair with a good turnout of about 100 people.  Not all races are all day events with thousands of people.  There are plenty of events that are happy to have 100 people show up for the race.  I encourage everyone to try both types of events.  Today’s race was a family friendly event in the park, complete with cupcakes at the finish line.  I did not race but I mooched a cupcake anyway.  It is very difficult to put on a race of any type.  The race organizers usually do this as a labor of love.  When you see the race organizer, thank them for putting on the event.  In the one of the above pictures, the event organizer is delivering a cupcake with a birthday candle to a participant who is celebrating a birthday on race day.  That is so cool.

Did I mention that I was there to take pictures?  The pictures are in chronological order.
Album 1
Album 2
Album 3
Album 4

The bamboo bottle is a really nice bottle.  I don’t know who came up with the idea of using bamboo to insulate a glass bottle or why it took so long but it is a great idea.  I like to use it as a coffee cup or a protein shake glass.  The nice thing about glass is that is cleans so well there is no taste carry over.  The glass is heavy enough to use as a weapon if someone gives you a hard time.  Here are my thoughts.  The sippy straw is not shown out of contempt.
Good:

• The glass liner does not change the taste of my drink
• The glass liner cleans very well
• The lids form a tight seal without the use of an O-ring
• Three lids – one for drinking hot stuff, one for cold stuff and one for sealing
• It is made in the most environmentally responsible way possible with our current technology
• It looks good
• It has a sippy straw

Bad:

• It will make you feel dumb when you put it in the dishwasher with the bamboo insulator attached
• You can’t carry it in a bike carrier or a runners pouch
• The sealing lid does not seal very well without using an O-ring that you have to find yourself
• It is small
• The bottles are hard to find
• It has a sippy straw conspiracy
• There are 3 lids to keep track of.

I like the Bamboo bottle.  Sure it is heavy, bulky, hard to find, needs to be taken apart to clean and you have to find your own seals for the lids but it is nice.  The glass does not change the flavor and is the most environmentally friendly , insulated bottle on the market.

Back in the early days of triathlons, “PowerBar” was the name for sports nutrition just as Gatorade was the name for sports drinks.  With the popularity explosion of endurance sports in the 90’s, new players entered sports nutrition and raised the level of quality by leaps and bounds.  The new companies started out small with a customer first mentality while PowerBar acted like a big corporation treating customers like consumers.  For whatever reason, PowerBar decided to bring out some new products that people like and try a comeback.

When I received a package from PowerBar to try, I wondered how I was going to try the products.  I remembered the old nutrition paste product that I would stick to my bike for a triathlon.

I decided to go all in with PowerBar for a 20-mile run.  I took a picture of my three gel packs, energy blast pack and lone energy bar.  It is a bit more calories than I usually consume in a 3-4 hour run but it is always good to practice consuming calories for long distance days.

After running for about an hour, I started munching on the Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip energy bar.  I had no problems digesting the bar and it tasted good.  It is always easier to eat something that tastes good.  I think the bar is designed for people who are not running and eating.  I had some problems with breathing while running and eating a product that breaks apart.

When I ran for about two hours, I tried a couple Strawberry Banana Energy Blast chews.  These things were extraordinarily good.  I’ve tried many chews that left me on the side of the road miserably ill.  These things tasted good, went down and stayed down.

I tried a Raspberry Cream gel a little while after the chew.  I usually choke down gels and hope they don’t make me sick.  The PowerBar gels are thin, tasty and go down really well.  I really liked the taste of the Raspberry cream.  I kept mooching the chews to help with the boredom of a long run.

Near the 3-hour mark, I had the vanilla flavored gel.  It tasted good and went down as easily as the raspberry cream.  About 20 minutes later, I had the double latte.  The latte flavor did not sit well with me but my run was almost over so I was not worried.  My total for the day was a 3:30 run while consuming all of the calories I carried with me.  I was tired at the end of the run but I felt nutritionally sound.

The PowerBar comeback is complete.  They came back in a big way with great products.  I have a lot of nutritional products to choose from.  The product that I grab first, are the ones I like the most.  After my PowerBar trial run, I always grabbed the PowerBar stuff first until it was gone.  The PowerBar turn around is an amazing surprise.

I am trying to make a point about gym selection.  Any gym that you use is a good gym.  Everyone has to try out different things to see what works for them.  I love going to Mariner Square Athletic Club but a gym membership is not about love.  It is about going to the gym.  One of our young readers recently joined a gym.  She did her research carefully and joined a gym close to work.

When I changed jobs, I did the same thing.  I encourage you to try things and join a gym that you will attend.  If you join and do not go, find another gym and ask yourself why you joined and did not go.  I did not go because of logistics.  It may look like I am slamming Bally’s but I am not.  I am pointing out things that were in my decision process.  I am a member of Bally’s and highly recommend the gym to anyone who works in the Fremont/Newark area.

I just cancelled my membership at Mariners Square Athletic Club in Alameda today.  It was very sad to for me to give up my gym.  Unfortunately for me, I rank logistics above quality when it comes to going to the gym.  Mariners Square adds 30-45 minutes to my morning commute.  Bally’s subtracts 10 minutes from my morning commute.  Mariners Square is more of a full service Athletic club that costs about $75 per month.  Bally’s is a meathead, no service club that costs about $25 per month.  For my life style, the price difference does not matter.  It is all about convenience.   Logistics can be the difference between using the gym and having a gym membership that is not used.

Here are the differences between my two gyms.  Keep in mind that I am only talking about Bally’s at the Fremont location.  I hear the other locations are better.

Mariners square

• Clean
• Check-in people know the names of regulars
• Pool
• Steam room
• Multiple hot tubs
• Clean sauna
• Clean showers
• Clean floors
• Clean equipment
• Towel service
• Hangars in a locker for use
• Weights are organized
• Dumbbells are organized
• Members can cycle through the equipment
• Personal trainers are available for questions
• Personal trainers know your name
• Personal trainers help with your workout routines
• Did I mention it is clean?
• Stationary bikes have foot straps
• Good free weight area
• People share equipment and weights
• People do not like to share lap lanes
• Janitors are always cleaning things

Bally’s

• Dirty – I bring alcohol to sanitize the floor where I will stand
• Great selection of machines
• Great selection of free weight equipment
• The selection of equipment encourages me to try new things
• Machines are in great condition
• The weight room is a mess
• The weights (plates and dumbbells) are never organized
• People leave weights on the machines and bars, probably because putting them away is frustrating in a dis-organized room.
• Few to no janitors
• Sauna
• Stationary bikes do not have foot straps for fear of theft
• Personal trainers are not approachable, probably because they are busy and jaded.
• Personal trainers can forget about appointments
• People camp on the equipment, spending more time resting than working.
• There is enough equipment to make up for people camping on the equipment
• Did I mention the place is dirty?
• The dumbbells are all over the place and never in order

Seeing the differences in the two gyms, it seems like I would stay at Mariners square.  If the two gyms were right next to each other, I would pay $150 per month to go to Mariners square and would not go to Bally’s if it were free.  They are not next to each other and you can’t beat location.  Bally’s is a pretty good gym.  It just looks bad compared to Mariners Square.  The guy who maintains the equipment is spectacular.  All of the equipment is in great shape.  It is not the maintenance guys fault the exercise bike straps get stolen.

My reason for selecting a gym is location.  You may like the amenities.  It is your choice.  Look around and pick a gym that you will attend.  I will miss Mariners Square but I will adapt to Bally’s.  I am sure that I will be praising the personal trainers in 6 months, after they get to know me.

Sports nutrition product Accelerade, from PacificHealth, is a very fine product that is excellent when used according to the directions.  Most of us are not going to follow the directions.  We are just going to go try the product and base our opinion on one trial.  I went the extra mile and followed the directions.

4:1 stands for the carbohydrate to protein ratio.  Carbs burn fast, giving you energy, and bind with the protein for faster recovery.  The protein helps the muscles rebuild and recover.

Generally speaking, cardio workouts should be followed with a 4:1 recovery drink while power or strength workouts should be followed with a 2:1 recovery drink.

This is the closest thing I have done to a clinical review.  I did before, during and after tests while maintaining a similar diet.  My base run is a 5.2 mile loop around the Coyote Hills regional park in Fremont, CA.  I always feel hot running in Fremont.  The temperature ranged from 80 to 95 degrees for my runs.  (Alameda temperatures range from 65 to 80 degrees.)

Day 1: A morning weight lifting session in the free weight room.  I did approximately 200 reps of various squats to really tear my legs up.  I mixed a generic recovery drink with 24 ounces of chocolate milk.

I drank half before the weights and half after I finished.  Then I went to work, drank 2 cups of coffee and went out for a lunch time run.  I did the base run at a pace of 8-9 minutes per mile with a heart rate of 140-150 bpm.

I was pretty miserable from the first step.  I felt sick to my stomach and I was thirsty.  I passed 3 water fountains and wanted to cry when I passed the third one.  When I finished the run, I did not want to drink any water or eat.  I was tired and sluggish for the rest of the afternoon.

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Now that I work and run in Fremont where it is hot in the summer, I find a need to stay hydrated for my lunchtime runs.

How do I know I need to hydrate more?

My main guess is because I am thirsty during and after the run.  One day, I ran for about an hour and 15 minutes then stopped to chat while I cooled down.  I reached up to brush something off my face and found it to be crusted with sodium.  When you are brushing sodium off your skin, it is a sign that you may need to replace some electrolytes.  Another sign is white streaks on your face after a run.  The electrolyte replacement got me to thinking about hydration while running.

•    Some of the questions I asked myself were:
•    Should I drink fluids before a run?
•    How much should I drink before a run?
•    What should I drink before a run?
•    How soon should I drink before the run?
•    Should I drink during the run?
•    How much should I drink during the run?
•    What should I drink during the run?
•    Should I drink after the run?
•    What should I drink after the run?
•    How much should I drink after the run?

Perhaps, I have too much time to think while I am running.  I am sure I came up with a lot more questions but they left my memory between the time I thought of them and decided to write about them.  When I was working in the Emeryville/Berkeley, California area, I did not sweat as much because I usually ran in 60-70 degree temperatures.

I always thought that when you don’t sweat, there is not as much of a need to replace the fluids that you did not lose.  One day, we had a health fare in my building.  Since we had nurses, scales and paper to document our weight, I weighed myself before and after an 8 mile run that took 65 minutes.  For me that was a difficult run.

My start weight was just less than 150 pounds.  I lost 8 pounds in 65 minutes of hard running in cool air!  Weighed myself every hour for the next four hours and only gained 4 pounds back.  I am not a doctor but I don’t think I can sustain losing that much water weight, every day, for long.

•    To start answering my question:
•    It is good to drink before a run.  If you drink before a run, you have fluids available to lose during the run.
•    I usually start my day out with coffee then drink water for most of the day.
•    Every now and then, I will drink a few ounces of electrolyte drink before a run.  Usually, I feel hot or the need for something other than water.  I don’t have a scientific formula, it is just by feel.
•    I drink right up the run and during the run.  If I am going fast for short distances, I will not slow down to run.
•    I like to stop for a drink if I am running for more than an hour.  If I am running for more than 90 minutes, I will drink constantly during the run.  If I am writing longer than 2 hours, I will carry water and make sure I count how much I drink and include electrolytes.
•    I usually drink an electrolyte or recovery drink after a run.  I have a 24 ounce shaker bottle that I usually drink most of after the run.

They say water is fine to drink, after a workout and you will get plenty of sodium from your post workout potato chips.

That may be true but I used to get a lot of cramps before I started drinking a lot of water, electrolyte and recovery drinks.  I did not like getting cramps.  I am happy to not get them.

I am not sure if I need all of the fancy hydrations stuff or not.  I am sure that I used to get cramps before I started drinking the fancy stuff so it does work for me.  I also get to run every day.  I am starting to accumulate some drink stuff again.  Perhaps, I will do a more scientific approach to my running fluid intake.

My list of items to review is starting to back up so I decided to get out do some reviewing.  I started out with a 1 hour weight lifting session this morning followed by a glass of chocolate milk for breakfast.  This left me pretty hungry before my lunch time run.  About an hour before my run, I ate a Lemon Honey Stinger Waffle.  The first time I had a lemon waffle.  I liked it every bit as much as the honey and vanilla waffles.  I have to admit that I was pretty hungry and in the middle of a stressful morning so the peace and the lemon waffle worked magic on me.
I carried an Osmo sports drink with me for this run.

The Osmo sports drink goes down really well.  Of all the sports drinks that I have tried, Osmo is the easiest to drink, by far.  I drank it cold on a very hot day.  Within 30 seconds of taking a drink, I could feel myself starting to sweat.  It goes down well but it left me thirsty after taking a drink.  The feeling went away after a few minutes but it was odd to feel thirsty right after drinking.  I ran for about an hour and drank a 24-ounce bottle of Osmo during the run.

My thirst was satisfied and I did not feel like drinking anything after the run.  I usually toss down a 24 ounce Gatorade after a run.  Today, I left it untouched.  The Osmo sports drink is low calorie so I carried a gel with me on today’s run.  Lisa from Osmo, tells me that calories should not be consumed from liquids.  That is something that moms have been saying for years.

I carried a Honey Stinger Organic Pomegranate gel and I loved it.  I don’t know if it was because I was hungry or that it was just good.  I usually take a gel and choke it down and hope it stays down.  The Honey Stinger tasted good, went down well and stayed down.  I don’t know how the Honey Stinger will work for long efforts but it does pass the short term test where I can eat it while tired and it stays down.  It also helps that it is mostly organic.

The Osmo sports drink and the Honey Stinger gel are both worthy of a serious trial.  I will be doing 3 hour runs again in September.  I think I will put these two products to the test during a big run.  The reason I try new products on a long run day and not a big triathlon training day is the distance from my car or house if something goes wrong.  Crashing on the bike when you are 50 miles and a big hill away from your car can make for a very bad day.

I have been coming to Lake Tahoe for 10 years and must have walked by the Heavenly gondola more than 100 times without giving it a thought.  Heavenly marketing gave me a pass for a free trip on the gondola and I paid $34 for a pass for my wife.  I did not know what I was missing.  Everything about the trip was good.

At the check-in counter, I gave the clerk my secret code and $34 for my wife and away we went.  Everyone was nice.  They made sure to tell us to stop at the first stop on the way up because the gondola does not stop on the way down.  The views were stunning.  It was also cold and windy at the first stop.  The local thermometer showed 55 degrees Fahrenheit.  We jumped back on the gondola to head to the top of the mountain.  The gondola went over the peak then down into a high valley between a few peaks.  When we got off the gondola, I could not help but notice how ugly it was there.  The views were beautiful from the time we got on the gondola until we went over the peak to get off in the little valley.  To be fair, it is a ski slope and designed for winter sports.  The summer use was an after thought because the equipment was already there.

We walked around a few dead ends before we found the open trails.  The trails were all very well marked and easy to follow.  There were signs at most scenic overlooks with instructions on where to go next and how hard it would be to get back.  The views from the trails and scenic overlooks were all beautiful.  A gentle 200-yard uphill slope felt like climbing a mountain!  After walking around for a few hours, it got a little easier to go up the hills but it sure was a shock to find that walking up a gentle slope to be so difficult.  We spent 4-5 hours at Heavenly.  I highly recommend spending a summer day at Heavenly.  It was a lot of fun.  You can add lunch to your ticket for an extra $8.  I did not get the lunch with my ticket because of a big breakfast but the food looked and smelled good.

While walking around Lake Tahoe, I told people about how much fun I had on the gondola and how I thought it was worth the $34 price tag.  Most people told me that $34 was too expensive to ride up the gondola.  A few people told me they would consider it in the same tone you use on a used vacuum cleaner salesman.

I liked the gondola ride and think it was worth the money.  I probably skip the gondola trip unless I take guests up to Tahoe.  I will take them on the gondola just to get them to go.

I don’t usually stay in ski hotels, but you can’t beat the location.  The Park Tahoe Inn is directly across the street from the Heavenly Gondola and the Heavenly Resort.  The resort is a really nice area but you can’t get a room there unless you rent a time-share for a week.

Snow plow

It is really cool when you pull into parking lot and see an old four-wheel drive truck parked in the corner with snow plow and tire chains.

The staff was really nice when I checked in.  A suite at a ski hotel is not the same as a suite in a normal hotel.  Here, a suite means you get a bigger room, king bed and a pull-out couch.  I guess you need all of the room for your ski gear but it is nice to have the extra space for a summer visit.

The king bed is a memory foam bed.  I never slept on a memory foam mattress.  It felt odd but I slept well on it.  The pullout bed was not as comfortable as the memory foam but it was one of the more comfortable pullout beds that I have tried.  The bathroom is okay with good water pressure.  It was nice to have the sink outside of the shower area.  This is probably to keep things moving along on busy ski mornings.  I did not notice a breakfast area that I would consider essential for a ski hotel.  It does not seem right to get a hotel across the street from a ski resort then have to drive to breakfast.

I did not notice if the TV had cable or a bunch of HDTV channels.  It did not matter to me because it seemed like there were plenty of channels.  There were no plug in ports for Internet connection anywhere in the room.  The hotel does have Wi-Fi but the bandwidth is pretty low.  We got a better connection to the hotel next door than we did to the one here.  There was enough bandwidth for me to check my email this morning but connecting to the Internet tested my patience after dinner.  I did not come out here to play on the Internet anyway.  I came out here to check out the sights, hike, swim and run.

The next time I go to Tahoe, I will look into staying at the Park Tahoe Inn again.  The people at check in are very friendly.  The location is great, the price is great.  The room amenities are a little light but it is well worth limited bandwidth for a clean hotel with nice people at a great rate.

I usually rent a house or condo when I go to Tahoe.  It costs more for one night than it did for three nights at the Park Tahoe Inn.  It is really nice to spend more for food than lodging.

See Jane Run was back in town for their annual half marathon through the streets of Alameda.  SJR is a fun racing series for women.  The race begins at Washington Park up by Crab Cove.  It is a great place to start a race but there is not a lot of parking in the immediate area which causes a lot of people to scramble to the start line.  If the race gets much bigger, they may have to use a shuttle service for parking.

Assuming you get to the race early, there are plenty of activities to keep you entertained before the race starts.  The have dancing, aerobics and stretching before the race starts.  The start line is a little narrow so the people who plan on placing near the top of the race have to squeeze up to the front.  Outside of the first two rows, everyone seems more interested in having fun the setting a personal record.

See Jane Run is a local sports store for women with three bay area locations and one in Boise Idaho.  They support Girls Inc. of Alameda and donate a portion of every entry to the breast cancer fund.

If you run a half marathon right by our street, someone from Alameda Runners is going to show up with a camera.  We took a lot of pictures today.  They can be found here.