The Behrens Venture

Last weekend, I forced myself to wake up around maybe 8 – 9AM and went for a run. I was trying to see what it was like, maybe run through the city streets, but when I got outside, things were already kind of busy and the sun was mostly up. Today, this Sunday, I randomly woke up at 6AM, without any intervention of the alarm clock, and just kinda went for it. I must be crazy, but I loved it.

It definitely looks like 6AM is the sweet spot. The sun has just risen, but everything is still quiet and calm, the traffic is pretty dead in NYC, and the track only has like 5 other people who are just as crazy as me, if not more so! The only downside is that all the hobos are still sleeping around, I saw like 20 on my normal path. That’s a bit of a downer.

My main goal today was to sprint a 3KM, which I did, but I wasn’t happy with my time, a 13′31″. I’ve been sprinting too much lately, I need to do a crazy 14KM run or something distance and balance myself out. My body can handle the distance physically, but I never want to prepare and bring food with me, lack of energy for running that long is always what kills me. Now maybe I can get some work done, it’s not even 8AM yet…

You can’t knock the service here in NYC, delivery food is at its finest here. Delivery.com specifically, is so awesome! I had actually gone out shopping earlier tonight, but I just wanted sushi tonight, so sushi I got. My roommate suggested Ginza and it was great. Order online, pay by credit card, full menu online, no human interaction, what more can I say? Technology creates some amazing things and this is definitely one of them! Now back to my boring diet…

I went to sleep early last night and tried to get up early at like 8AM to get away from the traffic, but didn’t get up until 8:30… I’m never up that early on a Sunday, something must be wrong with me. Anyways, I took a nice relaxing stroll down to the Williamsburg Bridge and then decided I should run to the middle of bridge like an idiot and totally exhausted myself running a mile uphill… Coming down was alot easier and I made it home fine from there, coming in just short of 9KM. Happy Puerto Rico weekend too, lots of those flags flying today.

Also a totally cool thing I found out about when I came back is that Nike has updated their Nike+ site and now you can share your profile and stats, so check to the site! This is great, even though I kinda wanted to implement it myself.

The 456 subway line is once again “having problems” due to an incident uptown and my local 6 train is like 20 mins late and probably to full to get on anyways and I only find this out after waiting 10 mins already and having paid to enter the subway already. The MTA wants to hike rates to 3$? Fuck that.

So now I’m walking home because atleast that only takes me 20 mins, but I just prefer not to usually. Whatever, time to have a party weekend!

I finally went for a run after a 6 day hiatus and it’s made all the difference! I was definitely overtired last week and not able to support myself, too many weeks without a break, pushing myself too hard, it all built up. Another positive was the use of a gym over the weekend, I was able to get some good weight lifting in and that I’ve noticed the muscle immediately on my currently skinny frame.

But the run, I finally started off slow, didn’t check my pace, and focused on my form until I got to the track. Once at the track, I just sprinted for a bit and was amazed by my energy, no muscle soreness or anything holding me. I know I sustained a 4min/km pace for few laps, which is crazy fast, like under 7 min/mile pace? I know I can keep improving, but it’s just amazing to me because this is like the fastest I’ve ever run and if I can get to a 6 minute mile, I will be damn happy.

I also bought some new shoes tonight from Banana Republic. Brown leather shoes are totally posh, I just love the swirl of color!