mindplunge

And week 2 is a wrap! It was a perfect morning, low 50’s and no wind. I completed the session with ease and I’m ready for week 3! I’ll start week 3 on Saturday morning and after my run I will be camping once again at Lake Sonoma.

This time it’s a boys only trip. Jason, John and me. I’m pretty excited about both events: running and camping!

the numbers:
Distance: 2.07 mi
Duration: 28′’57″”
Pace: 13′56″

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Day 2 was much harder then day 1. I wonder if my scheduled time has anything to do with it. I start my morning runs at 5:30AM. The first day of each week is on a Sunday and normally I would start running around 10. We’ll see how I’m doing on Thursday, day 3.

The numbers:

Distance: 2.03 mi
Duration: 28′58″
Pace: 14′15″

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Awesome movie and Heath Ledger as the Joker is just phenomenal! For a long time I thought Jack Nicholson was the ultimate Joker but Heath just smashed this into pieces. Such a shame he’s no longer with us…

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From the cuil website: The Internet has grown exponentially in the last fifteen years but search engines have not kept up—until now. Cuil searches more pages on the Web than anyone else—three times as many as Google and ten times as many as Microsoft.

Now that’s a statement!

Part of their faq:

How does Cuil improve search results?

Cuil’s goals are to index the whole Web, to analyze deeply its pages and to organize results in a rich and helpful way that allows you to explore fully the subject of your search.

So we started from scratch—with a fresh approach, an entirely new architecture and breakthrough algorithms.

Our approach is to focus on the content of a page and then present a set of results that has both depth and breadth.

Our aim is to give you a wider range of more detailed results and the opportunity to explore more fully the different ideas behind your search. We think this approach is more useful to you than a simple list.

So Cuil searches the Web for pages with your keywords and then we analyze the rest of the text on those pages. This tells us that the same word has several different meanings in different contexts. Are you looking for jaguar the cat, the car or the operating system?

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On Sunday I started week 2 of my C25K program. I was using my newly created podcast and my first session was over before I knew it! Interval 4 was the hardest but in the end all was good.

Unfortunately I can’t publish the podcast (yet) since it’s loaded with copyrighted material. I have to find some songs that are podsafe. Stupid music industry… Mel McMurrin (Calypso for the gamers amongst us) offered to compose some techno songs to accompany the podcasts, so maybe I’m able to release it pretty soon.

Another blogger has joined us on the C25K program! Welcome Daisy of I/O Geek. Her link can also be found in the C25K blogroll section. Daisy is on the same schedule as I am so it’s an extra motivator to keep a close eye on her progress. She also Dutch (like me!) so I was double thrilled when she left a comment!

If you running the C25K and have a blog please let me know. I’ll put you on the list and make sure to give some motivational comments about your 5K journey.

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I found the voice-over for my C25K podcasts! Hopefully Mel McMurrin has some time this weekend to provide me with some sound bites. More about the talented Mel McMurrin:

A veteran jingle singer in the San Francisco Bay area, Mel has recorded commercials for Nations Hamburgers, Sun Microsystems, Luckys, Glidden, Harvey’s Casinos and others in studios like, Green Street Music, Michael Boyd Music, Ed Bogus Productions and Bongo Bob Productions.

His malleable voice has found it’s way on to a number of video/computer games including Sony’s Twisted Metal, and Cool Borders, Konami’s NHL:Blades of Steel, Lucas Arts’ Mortimer and the Riddles of the Medallion (for which he also co-wrote the music) and Brøderbund’s Where in Time is Carman San Diego?

He has done commercial voice-over for Schwab, Novell, Gallo, Lincoln-Mercury, Siemens and dozens of others and was a morning-drive radio host for then country-gospel format, KASA in Phoenix.

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I finished W1D3 this morning completing my first week! It was the slowest of ‘em all but I was at least moving forward. I’m shortening up my stride just to have a better control of my breath. The numbers:

Distance: 2.06 mi
Duration: 29′12″
Pace: 14′08″

Tip: Use your breathing as your guide when running. You should be able to carry on a conversation while running and your breathing shouldn’t be heavy.

I will have two days of rest, probably doing some weight training for my upper body and start week 2 on Sunday!

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I decided to give the C25K a permanent home at mindplunge. I created some pages dedicated to the C25K so readers can use it as a reference or resource: Couch to 5K

I will continue updating these pages since I find every day more information about the subject. I’m also in the process of making my own C25K Podcast! The most used podcasts for the C25K are Robert Ullrey’s C25K Podcasts and DJ Steveboy’s Podrunner Intervals: First Day to 5K. I have to be honest and both podcasts feel kinda outdated to me. They still do the job but the music is not my taste.

So there ya go! New podcasts coming soon. In the meantime I have W1D3 to run tomorrow morning. This will end my first week! More tomorrow.

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We all know about the Digg effect, the reddit effect, the Slashdot effect etc. but you rarely ever hear about the power of StumbleUpon. Today I experienced the StumbleUpon effect on a small scale.

Recently I build a few pages about the C25K program (more about this in my next post). The main page got stumbled and within two hours my Snoop app from reinvigorate went nuts. The counter went through the roof (note that I have a low ceiling so the numbers might not impress you). I was able to capture some screenshots of reinvigorate.net:

The above image is a screenshot when I came home walking my dog and noticed Snoop was producing a continuous sound.

Another snapshot 15 minutes later. The number went up for another minute and then slowly decreased. The next snapshot is a total of visitors.

I’m curious how Google Analytics is processing the numbers. More later

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I couldn’t help myself. When I came home I needed to go on a walk. I already did my workout in the morning but I’m full of energy. According to the folks at coolrunning.com:

It’s easy to get impatient, and you may feel tempted to skip ahead in the program, but hold yourself back. Don’t try to do more, even if you feel you can. If, on the other hand, you find the program too strenuous, just stretch it out. Don’t feel pressured to continue faster than you’re able. Repeat weeks if needed and move ahead only when you feel you’re ready.

I just did an easy 5K walk. Nothing too fancy:

Distance: 3.35 mi
Duration: 1:01′09″
Pace: 18′13″

It was just a beautiful late midday. Temperature was low 70’s and a lot of people were walking or biking around. I couldn’t skip this walk. I know my dog loved it! Any thoughts about ‘too much exercise’?

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