Another Barefoot Day

Saturday dawned and I planned to have another full barefoot day.  The weather wasn't freezing so I had a good chance of success.  Also, I wasn't planning on going anywhere special, just the local grocery store where I haven't had any issues yet.

First thing I had to do was reattach my dryer vent.  it had fallen away from the wall and I wanted to put some screws in a connection that kept falling apart.  You would think this would be a simple job but it ended up taking several hours to reconnect the pipes and -get a couple of screws through both pipes.  Glad I had self tapping screws.  But while I was doing this project I would hop up onto the nearby washer to access the dryer pipe, it was nice to do it in bare feet.

Ended up going to the grocery store twice.  Once for my grocery run and then my daughter got her Raddish package in.    Raddish provides recipes, cooking items (this time we got a purple rubber coated whisk), shopping lists and a few fun things to do.  She decided to make the salad and the chocolate moose.  So we went shopping for her items.  She had to find and pick everything out and I had the honor of paying for everything.  My daughter isn't a salad eater, but she loved the salad she spent a lot of time and effort making, she even commented on how much work it was.  The foster boy helped cut up some of the stuff, so it was a joint effort.  The chocolate moose tasted great, though it was a little runny.  I told her she will just have to try again.  Later this month we will be making some rock candy and a pasta dish.  If you want to try Radish for your kids, use code h3rwph to save $20.  Visit http://www.raddishkids.com and check them out.

Ran barefoot and managed 1.5 miles and still working on picking up the feet and not pushing off.  I pushed a little too hard if you look at my heart rate (146 average) but my average cadence was 159, with the end of the run dragging down the average.   At one point, for a quarter mile, my cadence was over 164, right where it should be.  So I have to believe that this picking the feet up has improved my cadence and I'll eventually get to where I should be all the time.  The wind chill temperature was 34ºF and my hands got a bit chilled, but my feet were once again fine.

Improving Cadence with Form

Last week I started concentrating on my form and lifting my legs up instead of pushing off and I noticed a slight improvement in my cadence; which previously had stubbornly refused to improve no matter what I did.  I took a run on Saturday and once again my cadence was improved as I focused on lifting the leg up.  Not a lot, just the a few steps, but my maximum cadence was 169, definitely a good sign.  This run also had a lower average heart rate, since I'm purposely trying to go slower to focus on the form.  I'm also comparing this run to another run on the same route.  My cadence on this run was higher the at the beginning and then drops back down at the end.  Makes me wonder if I started to lose form or focus, maybe both.  Something to think about on my next run.

Next I compared my average pace to two previous runs with about the same average pace.  One run has my cadence way lower and the other run my cadence is all over the place, but shows an average of a few steps less.  My new cadence is much more consistent, even when it dropped towards the end it stayed much more constant.  You can check out my runs on mapmyrun or garmin connect.  Find me under hikerdana.

Lift Foot Up - Don't Push Off = Improved Cadence

FORM
Today I found out what lifting the foot up and not pushing off felt like.  I tried to run slower, keep the heart rate lower and focus on lifting the foot up.  Definitely uses different muscles and my toes seem to like it better as well.  I think I'll need to continue focusing on this technique, but I liked it while running.  Though it felt a bit like I was marching, but that might smooth out with more practice.

CADENCE
I'm often a geek and almost always run with my heart rate monitor and GPS.  I don't always pay attention to the numbers while running, unless I have something specific I'm working on.  But I still wear it to keep a record of my activities.  Today after my run I glanced at the numbers and was surprised to see a lot of little green cadence dots (cadence of 160 or greater) in the beginning of my run, before I slowed my pace down.  My cadence has always been low so to see so many green dots was very encouraging. Even after I slowed down my cadence was higher than normal with a few rare green dots showing.  Even going up hill I got no red dots (cadence below 152).  My cadence held to a pretty straight line. My stride length has also decreased from 80+ meters to 70 m.

I am now very anxious to see if this trend holds, while I continue to learn this new method of running.  It could be the breakthrough I have been seeking for a long time.  Now it is harder then ever to keep my miles down and take it easy.  I'm even more excited then ever to get out and run.