Rubriik: Trenn

Tartu Novembrijooks 5K 23.11.2013

Published on by Margit ParteiLisa kommentaar

The last race of this year was on the 23rd of November 2013. It was a 5K run at Tartu Novembrijooks (Tartu November Run). Prior to the race I got a little nervous but I really didn’t have time to think about too much since I was busy with school etc. But when Heidi made a post about her goals for this race on her blog I got to thinking what my goals were…

 

Friday night I figured that it would be pretty nice if:

  • my time was under 35 minutes, ideally under the magical 30 minute line (not realistic)

  • my average pace was at least under 7 min/km like in Tartu Tudengimaraton 10K, ideally under 6 minutes per kilometre (unrealistic, my fastest ever 6:52 min/km)

  • the weather was nice

That was pretty much about it for my goals or dreams for that race.

I woke up at 8.30 AM. On Saturday the weather was OK: really foggy but no rain which made me so happy. I ate regular breakfast, nothing special. Then I decided to walk to the race place and back, it was about 4,5 km there. Not so bad. I left my house at around 10 AM and got there around 10.45 AM. Waaay to early. I jut had to stand there, be bored and get cold. And as a not so pleasant surprise, it started to rain a little.

 

IMG_1154
Regular breakfast: 3 eggs, bacon, sesame seeds and cheese. Plus a large chuck on raw cabbage.

The start was at noon. By then, the rain had gotten even stronger. The more we ran, the stronger it got. My face was dripping in water and I had no mascara left on my eyes (I thought some would be nice since there would be pictures taken… not one of my wisest ideas).

IMG_1158 IMG_1161 IMG_1162

First kilometre was pretty good, I was fast (6:01 min/km). Then the second and third kilometres were also pretty decent, still fast for me as my average pace at those points were 6:22 min/km. At the end of the 4th kilometre my average pace was 6:21 min/km.

God knows what happened then but at the end of the race my average pace was 6:26. That means that I must have slowed down without even noticing it.. The splits show that I was indeed slower at 6:38 min per km but note that it’s still fast for me! 

Photo by Reigo Teervalt
Photo by Reigo Teervalt

Overall results were great actually. I can be satisfied with myself because I managed to get my fastest average pace at running and I felt good after the race. I even felt I could have pushed myself a bit more and probably gotten under the 30 minute mark but well… It didn’t happen this time, maybe next time it will 🙂

This race showed me that running shorter distances can be fun and useful. I should try running under 5K distances more often and try to get my speed up. It’s a nice change to my regular 7–10 kilometre runs.

After finishing we quickly took a picture with Heidi and then her friend gave us a lift to town again. I originally planned to walk but I was soaked, started to get cold and was actually happy I didn’t have to walk another 45 minutes.

Big thanks to Heidi for sending me the picture and Katrin for taking it! 🙂

You can watch a video summary of the race. You can see my back for half a second at 1:21 😀

Results:

  • My official time: 32:22,4

  • My RunKeeper time: 32:34

  • Average pace: 6:25 min per km (fastest ever!)

  • Average speed: 9,35 km/h

  • My postition: 283rd (out of 300 that finished)

  • My position among women: 113th (out of 124)

  • In my agegroup: 55th (out of 62)  

 

Tartu Novembrijooks was the last race of this season and also my third ever sports competition. Can’t wait to see what happens next year. I’m already planning my races and competitions… And I have interesting things coming up! Excited as hell for 2014 🙂

Workout app review: RunKeeper

Published on by Margit Partei3 kommentaari

Today I’m going to review the RunKeeper workout tracking app. I’m using the free version but you can upgrade to a more advanced version.

I use it for running, cycling and walking at least a couple of times a week. 

 

What does it do?

 

On your phone:

  • “Start” aka tracking your activity.

 

Start page on my iPhone

On the front page of the app you can choose what type of activity you’ll be doing. Your options are: running, cycling, mountain biking, walking, hiking, downhill skiing, cross country skiing, snowboarding, skating, swimming, wheelchair, rowing, elliptical or other.

Then you can choose a workout program. There are 3 options here: training plans, one offs, target pace. 

Under training plans you have: 

  1. Do a race – many variations of 5K, 10K half and full marathon plans,

  2. Learn to run – beginner 5K, sub-30 minute 5K etc,

  3. Get fit plans – Quick Fix 4 week plan, Love to lift plan etc or 

  4. Lose weight plans – running 4 fatloss, first 5K in 8 weeks with runcoach and more.

Training plans

Note that some plans are free, others will cost you 9–27€.

The One Offs are interval training plans. There are 3 options available and you can always add your personalized intervals.

For intervals choose a workout or create your own

The last very useful option is setting a Target Pace.

 

You can also add routes if you map them out on the runkeeper.com webpage, music from your phone playlists or upgrade.

Last thing on the Start page is the option to manually log activitie and your weight.

Log manually
  • “Training” aka find training plans.

RunKeeper offers you traning plans to follow a schedule, made by a real coach and meet your personal goals. Training plans are the same as under Start page.

  • “Friends” aka a wall of activities.

You can add friends and then see their activities on this wall. It also has your feed, personal records and activities. I really like this page a lot to see my own records on a timeline.

 

  • Settings.

Pretty self explanatory. You can pair RunKeeper with a heart rate monitor if you have one. I unfortunately don’t, so I don’t know much about this option.

Then you can set which cues you want to get (time, distance, average speed, average pace, current speed, current pace, split pace, split speed, average heart rate, current heartrate and heartrate zone (the last 3 options if you have a heart rate monitor set up) and when (on demand, at certain time points or distances). You can also set the audio cue volume.


Then comes the primary display: choose between pace or speed. I keep it on pace. Distance units can be either miles or kilometres depending on your preference. Some people also find countdown delay and auto pause useful but I don’t need them really.

Audio cue options

Audio timing

Then there’s basic info like your name, date of birth etc.

Last you can set who can view your activities and connect RunKeeper with FaceBook and Twitter.

  • “Me” aka sum it all up.

Compare data from this and last week/month: distance, average pace, number of activities, calories burned, elevation climb and time spent. You can also view this data by different types of activites: if you only want data from running, you can check this option; if all activites, check that etc.

View all of your activities, personal records by activity types, view time until you have to reach a goal you’ve set on the webpage, workouts per weeks and insights on distances (only if you upgrade).

On the webpage:

  • Settings.

All kind of personal settings, connecting with apps like FaceBook, Twitter, ShapeUp Club, FitBit, FourSquare etc, export data into .zip files.

  • Upgrade.

The option to get RunKepper Elite. It offers you extras: broadcast workouts live, longtime insights, compare workouts side by side, premium customer support.

Elite vs Basic
  • Search.
Search for routes in your area or create your own – really useful and easy to do, find training plans (all the same as the mobile app described above), races and connected apps: fitness, nutrition, sleep, strength training and more.
 
  • Log.

Log activities manually and get heart rates from your Polar watch if you have one.

Manual logging made simple and easy
  • Me.

“Me” is the page of your profile. A rather large section. There are 6 subsections on this page:

    • Dashboard. Your overall information, add goals, see total calories burned and total distance, also completed goals and your weight.

  • Reports. By time: last 30 days, 3 months, a year, lifetime or custom and activity types. Really useful page in my opinion to get an overall  but also in detail view of your workouts.

  • Training. The same training plans again: Get Fit, Lose Weight, Learn to Run, Finish a Race.

  • Activities. View separate activites in detail. This page shows you distance, time, average speed, calories burned, your route on a map and the ability to make it a saved route, total climb, speed and climb by splits. 

  • Friends. Find your friends and see how they are doing.

  • Routes. If you have routes saved, you can compare the duration, pace and calories spent on this routes by activites. Nice to see if you are improving or making any progress.

Compare the results on the same route. Useful and I love it!
  • Feed.

Your activites all on one page. Click on them to get more of an in depth view (directs you to “Me” Activites page).

 

What does it cost?

The original version is free as I’ve mentioned. You can upgrade to RunKeeper Elite for $5 per month of  $20 a year. I haven’t found that to be that necessary but if you want even more information, you can. Personally I think the info I get for free is more than enough.

 

Would I recommend it?

Absolutely! It’s a great app and has impressed me quite the bit. On a couple of occasions it has failed me by going crazy (showing me a speed on 30 km/h while starting my walking) and I’ve had to restart but overall I’m thoroughly satisfied.