I Live in Iowa: Week 44

Sorry for the later than usual update. The thing is, I have obligations and priorities above this blog. Examples are engineering, running, coaching, eating, and often enough laying on my couch qualifies too. Since I don't have Internet at home, besides on my phone, it can be a hassle writing anything more than a tweet.

In the engineering world I banged my head against the wall on the same project I was working on last week. I think I have it figured out, but I'll find out tomorrow when I get to work. I worked 42 hours on this this week. Well, perhaps a few hours were on other things. It is a project that is necessary for compliance (safety and ISO standards) so spending extra time on it while the project is still in the virtual stage will save significant hassle later. Due to the size and complexity of the model I am reminded of graduate school when I would work furiously and then wait until I knew if I had succeeded. It can be a frustrating process, but always a good learning experience.

Coaching went really well. I see myself as a positive motivator and this week I was able to interact with several athletes before their races and they turned in season and personal best performances and seeing the satisfaction in them after the races is great! I mean I like setting personal records, but coaching I can be part of dozens of PRs every weekend.

In my personal running I had a good week. I only ran 62 miles but that included a 17 mile long run with pace variation near the end (a 5:50s and 5:40s mile), a really good 3x1000 at half marathon pace, 400 at 800 pace, 2x800 at 3k pace, 2x400 at mile pace, 2x200 at 800 pace, and on Friday I set a new 800m PR! I drove up to UW Madison to run the mile at their Red and White Open. Unfortunately, I had the wrong meet schedule and they ran the mile at 4 PM not 5 PM and I arrived at 4:35 PM. So I talked to one official and suggested I run the 3k, and talk to a second official. The second official said they had already run the 3k. I asked if there were any distance races left and he said there was the 800, and plenty of room in it. So I put myself in the slow heat of the 800 assuming that at a D1 meet everyone would run away from me because I am slow.

So I did the worst warmup I can remember. I was rushed so I did a mix of jogging and strides for a mile and a half or so and then it was time to line up. We started with a two turn stagger in lanes and I was on the outside in lane five. I started and never saw another person in my race.  First 200m in 31, second in 33, third in 32, and final in 33. It was very aerobic and felt somewhat slow until the last 125 meters when I really struggled. It was pretty much a time trial, but I did get a few cheers. Anyway I ran 2:09.54 to PR by 1.8 seconds and finally become a 2:0 guy.

I cooled down in their wonderful full sized indoor turf barefoot. As I was putting my shoes on I watched what makes D1 so catered. A kid came in with an injury, it looked like pulled hamstring, and there were seven trainers around him. No lie, seven trainers to one injured kid.

Seven Trainers, Two Staff Members and One Athlete

On the investing side DHT finished closed at Friday at $1.18. So at that point we are out just the commission. However, I traded in the $1.20s range most of the week with a few hours on Tuesday the 14th above $1.30. I saw that soon after it went over $1.30 and I thought about selling it just so that I could say "I told you so", but I would rather keep it for awhile because I feel it is worth more than $1.30 a share.

On the random knowledge side of things I was watching Contagion, and that brought up the Spanish flu of 1918, which I never really learned about in school so I started reading and learned that Vitamin D can prevent getting influenza. In other words, getting sun, eating mushrooms, orange juice, and milk might keep you from getting the flu. As I continued to read I discovered Cytokine Storms, and the role that antioxidants can play in reducing such a positive feedback loop. In other words, eating your blueberries and pomegranates will likely reduce the severity of a bad fever.

I hope you had a good week as well.