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| TWO RECORDS!!! |
Surprised is too tame a word. I have learned that the temperature surely makes a great impact on my speed. About 85 degrees today. Although I worked before I ran, I flew around the track (from MY point of view). Yes, I know, this may very well be a mistake. I came within .17 one-hundredths of a second of reaching my all-time so far unreachable goal of a 75 second quarter. I know, that doesn’t sound great. The guy with no legs who is in the Olympics would kick my a**. I probably would have beaten 75 seconds, but I’ve taken to looking at my time as I pass the half-way point. When I saw, in my blurry-no glasses state, that it looked like 37 seconds, I used extra energy trying to read it. I think I did well because I started from the first step really pushing it. It was back in Tirana when I shaved a couple seconds from my time after I decided that the only way to go faster was to give all my energy at the start.
I beat my previous record by more than 2 seconds! I am sticking to my story, like the 16-year-old from China, that I never used banned substances. I admit that this time might very well be a mistake. I guess I will find out in the near future. I wonder if I will be able to find a 1/4-mile or 400 meter track in downtown Moscow; maybe I’ll have to take the metro to a track somewhere. I’m a bit apprehensive because now that I have nearly achieved this goal, I will have to perform similarly every time. Ugh.
Not only did I smash the record for the 1/4, I killed my final sprint time by .2 seconds. This was amazing, too. I qued up ‘Going the Distance’ from the Rocky soundtrack and moved to about the 1:00 mark when it really gets going. I’m thinking I should play ‘The Final Bell’ next time.
Music…today brings into question it’s significance. During the fabulous quarter time, I was listening to Slate’s Political Gabfest, and at about 40 seconds, my arm clipped the cable and pulled it out of the iPod. Very distracting.
Another interesting point about today’s run is my pull-ups. I was carrying a bag of vegetables and a piece of rhubarb pie to my friend’s mother. For this reason, I was taking a detour—not by the elementary school where I usually do pull-ups. Therefore, not until the way back did I do any pull-ups. I would have time for only one set. I decided I was feeling tough, so I tried for a record in those, too. (I knew the 1/4 mile was a record). I did 12 without stopping. I rested for a second and did a few more. Fifteen. Another, another. Stop. One more. Try again—Ahhh! My arms give up. So I got 18. Pretty good. I’ve done more only once in my life. I did 21 during my Navy Physical Fitness Test days when I was 19. From this blog, July 27:
I’m increasing the number of pull-ups. I’m thinking now that I am stronger than ever. When I was 19 and doing the Navy Physical Fitness Test, I didn’t 19 pull-ups (actually 20, but they didn’t count the last one. You needed to come to still hang on the last pull-up or it didn’t count. I did 19, then 20, then came down, then went up again and dismounted without hanging. The person counting took my final no-hang pull-up as an incomplete exercise. I complained and he dismissed me with, “Don’t worry, you’ll do another one next year.” What a (opposite of prophetic) prophetic statement. A week later, I had a tractor accident and never did another Navy PFT.
Writing about tractor accident: http://jamesmartinswritings.blogspot.com/2009/02/tractor-accident-1985.html and http://jamesmartinswritings.blogspot.com/2009/03/tractor-accident-1985-2.html copy and paste the links.
Now my goal is to do 20 pull-ups and then 21. I’ll show that name-less, inattentive, Navy counting person.
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