5k and 10k Down

Posted on by Chris

Prep Villa Alumni 5kA little backdated, but on September 24th 2011, I ran my first ever official 5k race at the Prep/Villa Alumni Race at Frontier Park. I did pretty well, coming in at 24:20 with a pace of 7:51.

On November 24th, I ran a back-to-back 5k and 10k in the Erie Runners Club Annual Turkey Trot. Only 59 people ran both races, and I placed 42nd overall (overall race results). It was grueling. I got blisters. I was sore for days afterwards, but it felt amazing to run nearly 10 miles and not die. I ran both in my Vibram FiveFingers KOMODOSPORTs, and learned that the insole liners of these minimalist shoes can come loose — making it very uncomfortable to run. Gotta make sure to secure them with a little bit of super glue before my next race.

Barefoot / Minimalist Running Shoes (Vibram Fivefingers KOMODOSPORT and SPRINT)

Posted on by Chris
From the moment I first saw the Vibram Fivefingers shoes, I was in love. Since losing over 50 lbs in the past year, I started marathon training in early June of this year and plan to run a half marathon in mid-September. So when I tried these babies on a couple of weeks ago, it totally changed the way I run.

Barefoot (or minimalist) running isn’t for everyone, but I certainly suggest trying it. It’s much harder than running in the customary and restricting cushion or stability shoes that have been the market standard for over 30 years. For starters, you have to relearn your stride and how you make contact with the ground. Today’s standard running shoes have major heal cushioning and really prevent you from using natural body mechanics.

The Vibram FiveFingers shoes force you to learn how to run properly by landing on the ball of your foot (forefoot) rather than your heel. You will use muscles in your core, calves, and feet that you don’t use otherwise. During the first week of use, my muscles were much more sore than usual, but after a few weeks of running in them, I’ve found that I’m consistantly breaking my personal best times and it feels great! CAUTION: Be sure to do some research on the proper way to run in these style of shoes, IT’S SUPER IMPORTANT so you don’t hurt yourself.

I purchased two different pairs from the FiveFingers line; the SPRINT and the KOMODOSPORT. I wear the Sprints for more casual purposes (in fact, I am wearing them as I type this) and I plan to test out the Sprints at hot/power yoga soon, but the Komodosports are definitely much more geared towards running.

If you decide to add these to your arsenal, it is most imperative that you get the correct size. They use European shoe sizes, so be mindful. I tried on and bought the Sprints ($79.99 MSRP) at the Erie Sport Store, and then ordered the Komodosports ($99.99 MSRP) from the Vibram Fivefingers website using the same size. Vibram threw in a cool Fivefingers t-shirt and Injinji toesocks for free, which was mighty fine of them!

If you have questions about them, feel free to leave a comment or shoot me an email. I’d be glad to help!

Vibram FiveFingers SPRINT

Vibram FiveFingers SPRINT

Vibram FiveFingers KOMODOSPORT

Vibram FiveFingers KOMODOSPORT

Vibram FiveFingers KOMODOSPORT and Injinji toesocks

Testing out the Injini toesocks (they are comfy)

Vibram FiveFingers KOMODOSPORT, T-shirt, Injinji toesocks

Vibram FiveFingers KOMODOSPORT, T-shirt, Injinji toesocks

Headset Blocker Widget for Android Phones

Posted on by Chris

After purchasing my Sennheiser PMX80 headphones, I ran in to a slight problem. Once I plugged them in to my HTC Droid Incredible, the phone started going bonkers. The stock music player started to randomly play, skip through songs, and seemed to have a mind of its own. It also made CardioTrainer go completely loony.

I noticed that the phone was recognizing the headphones as a headset, signified by the headphone icon plus microphone in the notifcation bar. So after scouring the Internet for a little while, I found that this has been a known issue for quite some time. Apparently many different types of headphones and other standard 3.5mm jacks, including those for car stereos, suffer from this issue. The phone interprets signals from the headphones as control queues to intiate certain remote functions such as play, skip forward, stop, etc. And it looks to be plaguing many Android devices. So a solution I needed to find!

The first solution suggested was a factory reset. Did that, with no positive end result.

The second solution was an app called “headset blocker.” It’s just a little widget you can turn on and off that blocks the phone from entering headset mode. Worked perfectly.

Technology is goofy sometimes. (most of the time)