Training Log Archive: iansmith

After a somewhat productive afternoon at my office, I went to the gym for another mixed fitness session. I kept the resistance settings on the bike low - 8/20 as opposed to my usual 10 or 11/20 - to emphasize moving my legs quickly and lightly. I felt good on the bike, though after I got off, my right hamstring started hurting. After some stretching, I hopped on the treadmill for a ginger running session, focusing on form and running easily. I started at 5 mph and drifted up to 8 by the end of the session.

One lingering effect of my injury on my running form is that I don't lift my left foot as high as my right foot on the recovery. There's a mirror in front of the treadmills, so I monitored my form closely on this relaxed session (most of which was at 6.5 mph). I read Fallen Giants on my Kindle while on the bike, and watched the Patriots beat the Jets while running on the treadmill. American football is too intermittent to hold my attention usually, but with a loud treadmill and a hypoxic euphoria, it seems adequate.

Tonight, a posse of Ross + Sam, Ed, Caroline, and I went bowling at Lanes and Games. We played two games of ten pin and had a grand time. I set another PR, with a 161; my full scores:

1: 9- 7- 8/ 7/ 6/ X X 62 X 7/X = 161
2: X 8- 7/ 71 X 7- 31 71 8- 81 = 104

As at the CSU Superstars event, I had a great first game followed by a tremendous plunge. Again, Sam lost to me in the first game, but beat me with consistent play in the second (116, 110). Ed beat me overall, with (142, 135). There are odd parallels between my bowling and my O'ing; on days with two races, I tend to perform poorly on the second race. I guess I lack the stamina for two races, and my right forearm weakens after one game. I bowled with a 16 pound ball.

There were many amusing quirks in our delivery methods. Sam lines up, then shifts her body 30 cm to the left and swings the ball where she once stood. Caroline has a really strong, pendular wind up; she experimented with left handed shots for a few frames in the second game. Ed charges forward, releases the ball in a very straight, accurate trajectory, and slams on his brakes with both feet down, sliding to a halt just before the foul line. Ross releases the ball precisely and smoothly low to the ground, and compensated nicely in his first game for a right tendency. I tend to kick my right foot behind my left leg when I release the ball, I guess to compensate for the angular momentum. It's like my squirrel tail; it helps to stabilize. Ross took some videos, which may or may not appear on AP.

It is clear that we need to train more often. In the first game, we had 17 spares and 8 strikes. In the second, we had only 7 spares and 7 strikes. Interestingly, avg first shot pins (the number of pins knocked down from the first ball in each frame) was 6.36 in the first game and 6.08 in the second; our scores suffered from our poor accuracy on the second ball and a bad spare conversion rate. My first shot pin average was 8 in the first round and 7.5 in the second. I also had two humiliating falls on my releases in the second game.

On the omnibus appropriations bill currently in Congress right now:

http://thinkprogress.org/2010/12/16/omnibus-hypocr...
http://thehill.com/blogs/on-the-money/appropriatio...

One of the central points of the rhetoric against government spending is that earmarks are necessarily wasteful. Congress can allocate funds either generally to executive branch agencies - which then distribute the funds to projects according to their determination - or explicitly assign federal funds to particular projects in appropriations bills. Earmarks are widely criticized because they are piggybacked on appropriations legislation without review or public hearing.

It seems clear that the process for earmarks should be reformed, but the notion that removing earmarks will make a significant impact on federal spending is a myth. An often cited statistic in the media is that there are 6700 earmarks in this bill. Without context, this is a meaningless statistic (of course, we can infer the average number of earmarks per senator is 67...). According to Senator Tom Coburn's database, those constitute $8.3 billion of appropriations.

The FY11 Appropriations bill, according to CBO, will constitute $1.106 trillion of non-emergency budget authority (BA). (I'm not sure I understand the terminology, but I think the difference between outlays and BA is that outlays can include money allocated to pay for spending from previous years, whereas BA is stuff spent this FY). Also, note that $520 billion of the non-emergency BA spending is defense related.

While I think the earmark process should be reexamined, note that the earmarks in this bill from BOTH parties constitute 0.75% of the proposed spending bill. Everyone in the US should read this comic.

I hope the above puts commentary like that below in a new context.

http://www.redstate.com/brian_d/2010/12/15/omnibus...
http://www.patriotactionnetwork.com/forum/topics/t...
http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/demint-lets-re...

I went to the gym in my office for an "easy" pace training session, though I think my heart rate was a bit too high. In the future, I might cover up the statistics screens on the machines so I don't push for arbitrary goals (like 10 min/mile on the elliptical). As with last time, I used two machines in the hope that this will better distribute the stress of my muscles and bone while increasing the cardiovascular stress.

My left leg felt a bit stiff, and while the fracture site seemed unperturbed, I had some discomfort in my lower leg on the anterior of my tibia. I don't know if this is because of muscular atrophy, some secondary injury, or typical running discomfort.

"We took risks, we knew we took them; things have come out against us, and therefore we have no cause for complaint, but bow to the will of Providence, determined still to do our best to the last [...] Had we lived, I should have had a tale to tell of the hardihood, endurance, and courage of my companions which would have stirred the heart of every Englishman. These rough notes and our dead bodies must tell the tale, but surely, surely, a great rich country like ours will see that those who are dependent on us are properly provided for."

C • A great man. 2

Warmup.

Distance doesn't mean much. I read Fallen Giants: A History of Himalayan Mountaineering on my Kindle. The tibia felt good, but the knees were discomforted by the end of the workout.

I followed up with about 10 minutes of stretching.

Apparently British English uses the transitive verb "to post" in lieu of American "to mail."

C • Yes, but 1