Foam Roller

Foam Roller

  I have just resumed running from injury, stress fracture.  However this Monday, I got injured left leg (calf).  It is probably a pulled muscle.  I had not run for 6 months due to the injury, my leg was getting weak.  I thought I did enough warm-up and stretching before training.  It happened in the 5th lap of interval.  I did slow down when I felt pain.  It's been for 4 days, it seems to be no pain for just walking, but when I just jog, I feel a little pain.  It is not really serious and it can be recovered within a few weeks.

   This week I am doing stretching and foam rolling.  I just put my leg on a plastic foam and just rolling the foam.  I feel it is very effective like getting massage. 

 Something like this, just roll the foam

  Originally, we got this foam when my wife got a pulled muscle.  It is not very expensive but it is very useful.  You can find it on the internet and can order on-line.
  It can be used other portion of the body, such as back.  It is really good. 
  It is worth to try it!

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Mt. Shasta this year

 Shade of Mt.Shasta during the sun rise

   This year snow is melting faster than a typical year.  The climbing season for Mt. Shasta is shifting earlier.   Originally I had planed to climb Mt.Shasta in May.  However we decided to sell our current home and move to other place in April.  So that we need to clean up our current house and look for a house.  I do not have time to climb Mt. Shasta.   Also, I got injured my left arm when I ran in the morning in early May.   I guess it is a sign not to go climbing this year.   I gave up to climb Mt. Shasta this year.

Climbing condition in June in 2013

I checked Mt. Shasta Climbing Advisory. It seems that Avalanche Gulch is still decent shape.  So if people who wants to climb Mt. Shasta this year.  It is better to go there now!  It is probably not a good idea to wait for July this year.  According to the site, Misery hills is free of snow already!  Last year, there was plenty of snow over there!!

Typical year

In a typical year May to July is a good season to climb Mt. Shasta.  However the past a few years, the snow condition is very different.  In 2011, even July 4th week, there was a lot of snow around Bunny flat.  However, last year, 2012, there is no snow in Bunny flat.  Some snow showed up near Sierra club lodge.  So it really depends on year.  So, whenever people plan to climb Mt. Shasta, it is better to check the condition with the web site.

Gear

Helmet, Ice axe and crampon are required to climb Mt. Shasta.   Climbing Mt. Shasta especially via Avalanche Gulch, the idea is climbing through snow.  Therefore, people need to pick a season that there is enough snow in the climbing route.  Late season in summer, it becomes hard to climb red banks without snow.  It seems there were some people who climbed Mt. Shasta very late season, but it sounds like not fun climbing.

For camping at Helen Lake, I brought a light backpacking tent, that is REI Half Dome 2, last year.  This tent uses a mesh fabric on the top half.   As long as the weather is not extreme weather that can be notified by a weather forecast before go to the mountain, it is still usable.  The bottom line is put good anchors to build a tents with fly sheet.  Many people used a similar backpacking type tents in Helen Lake area.

When I climbed there last year, the weather at Helen Lake is really mild and almost no wind.  However, once climbed Red banks, the wind was getting stronger.  It was not very bad.  However, we need to ware a jackets and over pants.   It is always better to carry extra close when attack the summit.

I have all equipments, so that I do not have to rent them.  However, I heard that people can rent them from a sports shop in Shasta City named "5th Seasons" .  When I passed by the shop, I saw many people were there to rent them.

Probably, I will post some other article for Mt. Shasta later.




 

Training plan on Garmin Connect site

   Last article, I introduced a GPS watch for running.  The new one I just bought is Garmin 910XT.  I have been using it for 2 weeks now.  I found a very good feature of the device. 

Free Training plan for 5km / 10km / Half marathon and Full marathon
   There is a web site called "Garmin Connect" that people can upload their workout activities.  I recently found that there were some free training plans on the site.  I have been using the site for a while, but I did not know the plan.
    Actually, I had stress fracture on my lower left leg late last year.   Due to the injury, I could not run outside for a while, about six months.  The primary reason I got the injury is probably over training.  Therefore, when I do recovery training, I need to be careful to plan my recovery workout.   Last months, I just did jog short distance less than 6 miles.  (less than 10km)
    Now I started next phase for my recovery.  I decided to follow one of training plan from Garmin Connect.

Time / Heart rate base training plan
   Before the injury, my training style was distance / pace base training that is a plan to set a target pace based on m target time for a race.  Then I made my own training plan based on distance and pace.  Probably the distance could be too long and target pace could be too aggressive.  That was a way I used to do when was young.  I guess it is probably all right when people are serious.  However, now my age is getting closer to 50 years old and it is different from when I was young.  
   That is a reason I try this training plan.  Heart rate is a good factor to indicate my ability, as long as I can keep the target heart rate, I think it can eliminate to push myself too much.   Also, time base training is good for many people who has limited time for training.  Whatever my body condition is I can finish a training session based on the time. 

Garmin device is a good manager to monitor a workout!

   One of good features in the Garmin device is to store all training plan to the device and it can monitor each training activity for me.  For example, the training plan says 10 minutes warmup, 40 minutes easy pace running with heart rate zone 2, then 10 minutes cool-down.   Then all steps are stored in the device and help to tell me time, out of rang for the heart rate.

   I started a full marathon program 2 days ago.  It tells me if the heart rate is out of the range with alarm and vibration.  So that I can slow down to meet the heart rate zone.  Previously, I might push me hard during a training.  It is a good limiter to avoid over training.

Efficient training?

   It is obviously good to avoid over training.  But I just wonder if it is an efficient training or not.  To check the progress, I did cooper test (12 minutes running) before staring the program.  This could be a good factor to see the progress.  The other factor I will keep track a relationship between time/distance and heart rate zone.  Then I will be able to tell how efficient this training strategy.  I will post my data in this blog.

(To be continue .....)