My weekly totals

First, let’s review summary of this week’s training: weekly mileage 40.02 km, weekly steps 99’758 (14’251 steps daily average), total weight loss so far 6.7 kg and this week’s weight loss 1.5 kg.

About my weight loss

In regards to my weight loss, I am happy that I made my weekly goal of 1 kg/week and even a bit more. My total weight loss so far (6.7 kg) is also pretty close to what I desired (7.0 kg). In fact in the middle of the week on Thursday (25/06), I made my desired weight loss for the the end of the week by losing 7.1 kg but again for some temporary reasons I gained back a bit of that weight loss.

As I mentioned last week, I was a bit concerned about my diet on week 7 because last year at the beginning of week 7, I burned out due to my strict diet and had a week of rest. Fortunately this year by taking more reasonable steps, I successfully made my goal for up to the end of week 7. Based on my last year’s experience, after passing week 7, my weight loss journey should be OK up to the end of week 10 so I expect to have an easy/moderate job for losing weight for the next three weeks, but let’s see what will happen in practice.

Summary of this week’s activities

First, let’s review my activities during this week. I had 4 run activities in this week. On Tuesday (23/06) I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.01 K, 5:36 min/km, 167 bpm, 25m elevation gain). On Wednesday (24/06) I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.01 K, 5:26 min/km, 173 bpm, 22m elevation gain). On Friday (26/06) I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.00 K, 5:54 min/km, 145 bpm, 28m elevation gain). On Saturday (27/06) I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.00 K, 5:50 min/km, 163 bpm, 30m elevation gain).

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Total
22	10K Run	10K Run	25	10K Run	10K Run	28	40.0 km
12271	16406	15756	5400	16500	16459	16966	99,758
81.5 kg	80.9 kg	81.7 kg	80.4 kg	81.1 kg	81.3 kg	80.8 kg

About my weekly mileage

Starting from June 5 2020, I changed my training plan to two 10K runs one day rest. I had difficulty to keep up with the new plan for the first week because of getting injured and being tired, but since June 14 2020, I have been successfully committed with the plan and my average weekly mileage increased from 28 km to 47 km since that time. Therefore it’s my second week that I have stayed with the new plan and I have to continue with this plan for at least two more weeks before I make any changes to it.

VO2Max and Comparing activities to see my improvement

My VO2Max this week in my (Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday) activities were (49, 49, 50, 50) ml/kg/min respectively. In order to see my improvement this week, I want to compare two activities, one on Friday 26/06 which was (10.00 K, 5:54 min/km, 145 bpm, 28m elevation gain) and the other on Wednesday 10/06 which was (10.01 K, 6:18 min/km, 145 bpm, 24m elevation gain).

As we can see, all factors of both runs (my effort, distance and terrain) are the same and the only factor which varies in those two runs is the average pace. I had 00:24 min/km improvement which is a 7.55% improvement in 16 days that I am pretty happy about it.

My lactate threshold pace and heart rate

On Wednesday (24/06), my watch updated my lactate threshold pace (5:25 min/km) and my lactate threshold heart rate (175 bpm).

About individual runs

This Wednesday (24/06) was the first day in the new session that I had my run with just a T-shirt because the weather was warm enough. On Friday and Saturday runs, I was trying to have my 10K runs with average pace 6:00 min/km because I wanted to save my energy for a hard effort 10K run next week i.e. a run with average heart rate 178 bpm or so. I also had a notable improvement in my running cadence on Saturday’s run where I was successfully able to have my average cadence over 180 spm for all of the 10 laps of the run.

2020)

June 21, 2020November 21, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Activity Details in Google Sheets

Activity Schedule in Google Docs

My weekly totals

First, let’s review summary of this week’s training: weekly mileage 50.02 km, weekly steps 104,094 (14871 steps daily average), total weight loss so far 5.2 kg and this week’s weight loss 0.9 kg.

About my weight loss

In regards to my weight loss, 0.9kg for this week is pretty OK and close to my 1 kg weekly weight loss goal. Also my total weight loss this week is at least 5.7 kg, as on Tuesday and Friday this week, my total weight loss was 5.7kg but for some reason immediately after both of those days, I was gaining weight. Those gain weights are mainly due to body water, full stomach or other short term factors so I don’t care about them. I have seen it a lot that my body weight would decrease suddenly. For example this Monday, I suddenly lost 1kg compared to the day before that.

My weight loss for the first 6 weeks was pretty straightforward, but my last year experience tells me that the second 6 weeks is way more challenging so I am mentally making myself ready for that. As a reminder I have to say that I was looking at the first 6 weeks of my diet as a long term project, so I didn’t push myself that much. Therefore if I start getting not appropriate results in the second 6 weeks, I am ready to push myself a little bit more. In anyways, lets see what will happen in the future.

Summary of this week’s activities

First, let’s review my activities during this week. I had 5 run activities in this week. On Monday (15/06) I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.00 K, 5:41 min/km, 163 bpm, 15m elevation gain). On Wednesday (17/06) I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.01 K, 5:21 min/km, 178 bpm, 28m elevation gain). On Thursday (18/06) I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.00 K, 5:42 min/km, 161 bpm, 20m elevation gain). On Saturday (20/06) I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.00 K, 5:56 min/km, 148 bpm, 19m elevation gain). On Sunday (21/06) I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.01 K, 5:54 min/km, 171 bpm, 57m elevation gain).

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Total
10K Run	16	10K Run	10K Run	19	10K Run	10K Run	50.0 km
16263	7397	15763	16059	10523	16572	21517	104,094
82.2 kg	81.8 kg	82.7 kg	82.3 kg	81.8 kg	82.3 kg	82.3 kg

About my weekly mileage

This week, my weekly mileage was 50.02 km which was the highest weekly mileage in my new set of 2020 trainings. However I switched to the new training plan of two days 10K run and one day rest, but due to getting injured and being tired, I couldn’t complete my desired training plan last week. I have increased my weekly mileage by 47.7% this week compared to last week.

That was a safe movement because I stayed on the 30K weekly mileage long enough (five consecutive weeks) and at the same time I kept my total activities (my total weekly steps) constant (always around 100,000 steps). That means my body just changed the way it was burning calories from walking to running.

VO2Max and comparing activities to see my improvement

My VO2Max this week in my (Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday, Sunday) runs were (48, 47, 48, 50, 48) ml/kg/min respectively. In order to see my improvement, I want to compare my activity on 17/06 i.e. (10.01 K, 5:21 min/km, 178 bpm, 28m elevation gain) with my other activity on 05/06 i.e. (10.00 K, 5:33 min/km, 179 bpm, 29m elevation gain).

As we can see, all of the features of those two runs are the same (distance, my effort and terrain) except my pace. I had 00:12 min/km i.e. 3.6% improvement in 12 days which is pretty impressive. Indeed I had reduced my 10K time by 01:52 min in 12 days which is pretty good. I am really happy about it for two reasons, first because I am getting close to 10K sub 50 min. record and second I am doing it while I am still very overweight.

My lactate threshold pace and heart rate

On Wednesday (17/06), my watch updated my lactate threshold pace (5:25 min/km) and my lactate threshold heart rate (175 bpm). Again on Sunday (21.06), it updated my lactate threshold pace (5:31 min/km) and my lactate threshold heart rate (174 bpm).

About individual runs

After my hard effort Wednesday’s run (ave. heart rate 178 bpm), I still had a relatively fast run on Thursday (ave. pace 5:42 min/km ave heart rate 161 bpm) but after Thursday, I was really tired on both Saturday’s and Sunday’s runs. Fortunately, I did both of them in under 60 minutes without too much effort.

Experiencing “Cardiovascular Drift”

As I explained in my Sunday’s run (21/06) here, on Sunday, I experienced something strange called “Cardiovascular Drift”. That’s what I haven’t experienced during all of my 4000+ km runs so far and therefore I am a bit concerned about it. I am going to see a physician in this regards and I’ll update this post after that in future.

Update: I talked to a physician over a virtual care talk the day after. He told me if it happened again contact us but for one time we cannot do anything. I also asked him if I can resume my training after 48 hours of rest and he said yes. Like always talking to doctors is not helpful that much, but I just wanted to do it in order to make sure I am on the safe side.

2020 Training Week 5 (08/06/2020 to 14/06/2020)

June 14, 2020November 21, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Activity Details in Google Sheets

Activity Schedule in Google Docs

My weekly totals

First, let’s review summary of this week’s training: weekly mileage 33.87 km, weekly steps 101378 (14483 steps daily average), total weight loss so far 4.3 kg and this week’s weight loss 0.4 kg.

About my weight loss

About the weight loss, I am pretty disappointed with the result as up to Thursday (11/06), my total weight loss and this week weight loss was 5.2kg and 1.3kg respectively, but after that it worked reversely and I was gaining weight instead of losing it, however my training, daily steps and my diet was the same as before. I guess it’s a temporary negative change and in long term the result would be as desired.

Summary of this week’s activities

First, let’s review my activities during this week. I had 4 run activities in this week. On Tuesday (09/06) I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.02 K, 5:53 min/km, 161 bpm, 13m elevation gain). On Wednesday (10/06) I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.01 K, 6:18 min/km, 145 bpm, 24m elevation gain). On Friday (12/06) I had an incomplete 4K run with the following averages: (3.83 K, 5:22 min/km, 159 bpm, 23m elevation gain). I stopped the run due to a severe pain I felt in the very upper part of my left leg. On Sunday (14/06) I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.01 K, 6:14 min/km, 169 bpm, 63m elevation gain).

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Total
08	10K Run	10K Run	11	4K Run	13	10K Run	33.8 km
5,650	16,232	16,997	10,715	16,195	18,479	17110	101,378
83.8 kg	83.2 kg	83.5 kg	82.3 kg	83.9 kg	84.0 kg	83.2 kg

About my weekly mileage

My weekly mileage this week was 33.87 km, almost the same as my past four weeks’ weekly mileage. This is very good that I stayed on the 30K weekly mileage for five consecutive weeks particularly because I’m at the beginning of my new set of trainings and that would reduce the chance of getting injured. Lots of the time people would go too far at the beginning of their trainings and that would cause them to get injured.

VO2Max and comparing activities to see my improvement

My VO2Max this week in my (Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, Sunday) activities were (49, 49, 49, 47) ml/kg/min respectively. Also this is the first week (together with the two 10K runs of last week) that I am measuring my heart rate using Garmin’s HRM Run heart rate monitor, not my Fenix 3 HR wrist heart rate monitor. While usually there is a 10-15 beats per minute difference between those two measurements (obviously the HRM Run measurement is more accurate), it’s not reasonable to compare activities of this week with past four weeks’ activities. Another reason that I can’t compare activities of this week with any of the first four weeks’ activities is the fact that in the first four weeks, I had 5K runs where this week I had 10K runs so it’s not straightforward to compare those kind of activities with each other.

My lactate threshold pace and heart rate

On Tuesday (09/06), My watch updated my lactate threshold pace (5:28 min/km) and my lactate threshold heart rate (172 bpm).

About my injury on Friday

I got injured on Friday (12/06) so to be on the safe side I took Saturday off (instead I had 14+km of walk i.e. 18479 steps) and then resumed my training with a very slow pace on Sunday.

Now let me explain my injury. On Friday, I was supposed to have a 10K run and I started it good. Fortunately now I am able to keep my cadence around 180 spm no matter what my pace is. After the first km of run when my pace was 5:34 min/km, I noticed in order to improve my pace, I should increase my stride length. I did it and it was OK up to the end of the 4th km when I suddenly had to stop running due to a severe pain I felt in the very upper part of my left leg.

After searching about it, I found that it was possibly my “Obturator Muscles”. To find more about it, you can see the following youtube video:

At first I thought it’s about my bone but later during the day (and the day after) I noticed it might be my muscle. On Saturday, I felt much more comfortable compared to Friday.

The problem of increasing my running stride length

As I explained above, my main problem on Friday was about increasing my running stride length that I guess in my opinion, I did it too harsh. I took two steps back and now I try to improve it very gradually. Fortunately my other running dynamics specifically my running cadence is pretty good in different paces but I still have to work on it when I am tired during the run.

My injury and my run on Sunday

Fortunately on Sunday, my injury was way better than Friday in a way that I was able to complete the 10K run, but not a totally comfortable run. About my injury, the pain moved first to the inner part of my thigh and then to the top front part of my thigh. During the run particularly at the beginning, I was just able to take very short strides, therefore my pace in the first few laps was too high compared to the rest of the run.

During all of this run, due to the limitation that I had in my stride length, I was just focusing on my cadence and that’s why my total ave. cadence was 178 spm which is very good. After the first three laps, my stride length gradually and slowly got longer and therefore my pace slowly decreased from around 6:30 min/km in the first half of the run to around 6:10 min/km (or a bit faster) in the second half of the run.

After the run, I didn’t do my regular stretchings due to my injury. Also the overall difficulty of my run (how I felt) was 4/10 but T.E. was 4.6 and ave. heart rate was 169 bpm. They were both unreasonably high to me.

I am trying to cope with the new changes that I made in my daily training plan (increasing daily and weekly mileage) but that takes time and my body requires time to cope with the new changes.

2020 Training Week 4 (01/06/2020 to 07/06/2020)

June 7, 2020November 21, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Activity Details in Google Sheets

Activity Schedule in Google Docs

My weekly totals

First, let’s review summary of this week’s training: weekly mileage 30.01 km, weekly steps 80218 (11460 steps daily average), total weight loss so far 3.9 kg and this week’s weight loss 0.8 kg.

About my weight loss

About my weight loss, I guess 0.8 kg for a week is pretty close to my 1 kg/week goal plan even though my weight loss in the middle of the week on Thursday was 1.2 kg but after that my body weight increased a little bit.

Summary of this week’s activities

First, let’s review my activities during this week. I had 4 run activities in this week. On Monday (01/06) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.00 K, 5:24 min/km, 155 bpm, 17m elevation gain). On Tuesday (02/06) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.01 K, 5:16 min/km, 157 bpm, 16m elevation gain). On Friday (05/06) I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.00 K, 5:33 min/km, 179 bpm, 29m elevation gain). On Saturday (06/06) I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.00 K, 5:46 min/km, 167 bpm, 48m elevation gain).

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Total
5K Run	5K Run	03	04	10K Run	10K Run	07	30.0 km
10,615	10,605	14,254	0	15,718	16,147	12,879	80,218
83.8 kg	83.3 kg	84.3 kg	83.2 kg	83.6 kg	83.8 kg	83.6 kg

About my weekly mileage

My weekly mileage this week was 30.01 K which was the same weekly mileage as what I had in the first three weeks. It’s very good to stay long enough on 30K weekly mileage (at least four weeks) because it would help me avoid getting injured due to overtraining.

VO2Max and comparing activities to see my improvement

My VO2Max calculated by my watch’s wrist heart rate monitor on Monday and Tuesday was 51 and 52 ml/kg/min respectively where my VO2Max calculated by the Garmin’s HRM Run heart rate monitor on Friday and Saturday was 50 and 49 ml/kg/min respectively. I definitely trust more on the VO2Max calculated by the HRM Run heart rate monitor as it’s more accurate.

In order to see my improvement this week, I want to compare my activity on 01/06 with the following averages: (5.00 K, 5:24 min/km, 155 bpm, 17m elevation gain) with my activity on 23/05 with the following averages: (5.01 K, 5:29 min/km, 153 bpm, 48m elevation gain). My effort in both of those runs were almost the same and they were both 5K runs. I guess the faster pace in the first run (5:24 min/km vs 5:29 min/km) would balance the harder terrain in the second run (17m elevation gain vs 48m elevation gain). Therefore I would consider the performance of both activities the same i.e. no significant improvement in my runs during the past 9 days.

As we all know running improvement comes in sudden, we train for weeks with possibly no significant improvement in our paces and all of a sudden we see a jump in our speed.

My lactate threshold pace and heart rate

On Friday (05/06) after wearing my HRM Run heart rate monitor, my watch automatically recognized my lactate threshold pace (5:19 min/km) and lactate threshold heart rate (170 bpm). Later, on Saturday (06/06), my watch updated those numbers to the following amounts: lactate threshold pace 5:25 min/km and lactate threshold heart rate 172 bpm.

About my overtraining last week

Recently I experienced a little bit of overtraining and I felt it first last Sunday (31/05) when my mind didn’t want to go for the 6K downtown walk. Due to the understanding of my body, that’s the early symptom of overtraining. That day I did the walk because socially, I really needed to go downtown as I haven’t been in public places for a complete week (since last weekend) due to the pandemic.

The reason for my overtraining was obvious. In the past few weeks, I took about 100’000 steps each week but last week I increased it by 12% to 112’306 steps. (My total weekly steps reflects how active I was during the week because it contains both my running and walking activities) Also I guess after the first three weeks of trainings, my body needed a little bit of rest so I listened to my body.

As a result, I didn’t have daily walks of Monday (01/06) and Tuesday (02/06) (decreased my daily steps just to 10’615 and 10’605 steps respectively for those days) and on Thursday (04/06) I was as tired as I even didn’t get out of home and was mainly sleeping during the day. I resumed my normal training from Friday but anyways my weekly steps for this week dropped to 80’218 steps which had a 20% decrease compared to normal weeks.

Increasing length of my daily runs to 10K

Starting from this Friday, I made another big change in my training plan and it was increasing my daily runs from 5K to 10K. I stayed on 5K runs for almost 4 weeks and I felt it’s the right time to go to the next level of training.

2020 Gear

June 5, 2020November 25, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Photo Gallery

2020 Training Week 3 (25/05/2020 to 31/05/2020)

May 31, 2020November 21, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Activity Details in Google Sheets

Activity Schedule in Google Docs

My weekly totals

First, let’s review summary of this week’s training: weekly mileage 30.22 km, weekly steps 112306 (16044 steps daily average), total weight loss so far 3.1 kg and this week’s weight loss 1.0 kg.

About my weight loss

In regards to my weight loss, I made the 1 kg/week as desired but it could be a bit even better as I lost 1 kg on Thursday but after that my weight remained the same.

Summary of this week’s activities

First, let’s review my activities during this week. I had 6 run activities in this week. On Monday (25/05) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.03 K, 5:22 min/km, 160 bpm, 24m elevation gain). On Tuesday (26/05) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.16 K, 5:35 min/km, 153 bpm, 21m elevation gain). There was an inaccuracy with the GPS of my watch for this run. It was a 5.00K run not a 5.16K run, therefore the true average pace was 5:45 min/km. I explained the issue in the activity notes on my Garmin’s website. On Wednesday (27/05) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.00 K, 5:12 min/km, 169 bpm, 20m elevation gain). On Thursday (28/05) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.01 K, 5:30 min/km, 165 bpm, 11m elevation gain). On Saturday (30/05) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.01 K, 5:35 min/km, 157 bpm, 21m elevation gain). On Sunday (31/05) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.01 K, 5:17 min/km, 162 bpm, 15m elevation gain).

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Total
5K Run	5K Run	5K Run	5K Run	29	5K Run	5K Run	30.2 km
16,762	15,270	18,351	18,243	10,402	14,933	18,345	112,306
85.4 kg	85.4 kg	85.2 kg	84.4 kg	84.1 kg	84.4 kg	84.4 kg

About my weekly mileage

My weekly mileage this week was 30.22 K and it was almost the same weekly mileage as what I had in the first two weeks of training. I have to stay long enough (at least four weeks) on this weekly mileage before changing it to a higher one to avoid any sort of injury caused by overtraining.

VO2Max and comparing my activities to see my improvement

My VO2Max this week calculated by my watch’s wrist heart rate monitor in my (Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday, Sunday) activities were (49, 50, 50, 50, 50, 50) ml/kg/min respectively. In order to see my improvement this week, I want to compare my activity on 27/05 with the following averages (5.00 K, 5:12 min/km, 169 bpm, 20m elevation gain) with my activity on 16/05 with the following averages: (5.01 K, 5:44 min/km, 170 bpm, 15m elevation gain). All of the features of both runs i.e. distance, my effort and terrain were the same with each other except my pace. I had 00:32 min/km i.e. 9.3% improvement in 11 days which is really promising.

My commitment to my training plan

A positive point that I want to mention in regards to my trainings so far, is about my commitment to it. Past three weeks, I had a schedule of four days training and one day off and fortunately I made it all for the entire three weeks, which is very promising.

2020 Training Week 2 (18/05/2020 to 24/05/2020)

May 24, 2020November 21, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Activity Details in Google Sheets

Activity Schedule in Google Docs

My weekly totals

First, let’s review summary of this week’s training: weekly mileage 25.05 km, weekly steps 100’114 (14302 steps daily average), total weight loss so far 2.1 kg and this week’s weight loss 0.9 kg.

About my weight loss

About my weight loss, I almost made my goal of 1 kg/week so I am happy about it. I was looking at my 2016 training google sheets data, and I noticed back in my prime those days (fall 2016 up to October second 2016) my weight was varying between 65-67 kg. That means if I want to get back to my prime and even faster than that, I have to lose over 20 kg of weight and get stable on that.

That’s not possible if I look at the weight loss process as a short term project. If everything goes perfect and I lose one kg per week, in the best scenario I would make my goal in 20 weeks and after that I have to get stable in that weight (not like last year that I gained back all what I lost and even 4kg more). Saying all of that, I want to remind myself that my new lifestyle (diet plus training) is my new normal for a long period of time.

Summary of this week’s activities

First, let’s review my activities during this week. I had 5 run activities in this week. On Monday (18/05) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.01 K, 6:06 min/km, 170 bpm, 15m elevation gain). On Wednesday (20/05) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.01 K, 5:39 min/km, 175 bpm, 24m elevation gain). On Thursday (21/05) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.01 K, 5:37 min/km, 122 bpm, 12m elevation gain). Of course the average heart rate calculated by my Garmin watch’s wrist heart rate monitor was not accurate (122 bpm doesn’t mean anything). On Friday (22/05) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.01 K, 5:34 min/km, 166 bpm, 13m elevation gain). On Saturday (23/05) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.01 K, 5:29 min/km, 153 bpm, 48m elevation gain)

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Total
5K Run	19	5K Run	5K Run	5K Run	5K Run	24	25.0 km
15,345	15,157	15,173	9,109	19,638	9,527	16,165	100,114
85.9 kg	85.9 kg	86.1 kg	86.8 kg	85.9 kg	85.9 kg	85.4 kg

About my weekly mileage

My weekly mileage this week was 25.05 K which was as desired. My training plan is four 5K runs one day rest and I had two days rest this week. Therefore my weekly mileage decreased to 25.05 K this week compared to last week’s 30.37 K weekly mileage. They are all good and I have to stay on this plan for at least four weeks before increasing my weekly mileage to avoid any sort of injury cause by over training.

VO2Max and comparing activities to see my improvement

My VO2Max this week calculated by my watch’s wrist heart rate monitor in my (Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday) activities were (44, 44, NA, 46, 48) ml/kg/min respectively. In order to see my improvement this week, I want to compare my activity on 22/05 with the following averages: (5.01 K, 5:34 min/km, 166 bpm, 13m elevation gain) with my activity on 17/05 with the following averages: (5.01 K, 6:15 min/km, 166 bpm, 17m elevation gain).

As we can see, all features of both runs i.e. distance, my effort and terrain are the same except my pace. I had 00:41 min/km i.e. 10.9% improvement in 5 days which is pretty good. Usually that huge improvement in such a short period of time just happens at the beginning of our training where our body hasn’t achieved it’s full potential yet.

2020 Training Week 1 (11/05/2020 to 17/05/2020)

May 17, 2020November 21, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Activity Details in Google Sheets

Activity Schedule in Google Docs

My weekly totals

First, let’s review summary of this week’s training: weekly mileage 30.37 km, weekly steps 103223 (14746 steps daily average), total weight loss so far 1.2 kg and this week’s weight loss 1.2 kg.

Summary of this week’s activities

First, let’s review my activities during this week. I had 6 run activities in this week. On Monday (11/05) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.32 K, 8:17 min/km, 147 bpm, 83m elevation gain). On Tuesday (12/05) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.01 K, 6:24 min/km, 159 bpm, 20m elevation gain). On Wednesday (13/05) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.01 K, 6:13 min/km, 165 bpm, 18m elevation gain). On Friday (15/05) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.01 K, 6:19 min/km, 154 bpm, 22m elevation gain). On Saturday (16/05) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.01 K, 5:44 min/km, 170 bpm, 15m elevation gain). On Sunday (17/05) I had a 5K run with the following averages: (5.01 K , 6:15 min/km, 166 bpm, 17m elevation gain).

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Total
5K Run	5K Run	5K Run	14	5K Run	5K Run	5K Run	30.3 km
11,457	13,857	14,897	15,758	16,331	15,460	15,463	103,223
87.5 kg	88.1 kg	87.6 kg	87.6 kg	86.9 kg	87.1 kg	86.3 kg

About my running and weight loss goals this summer

This summer, I set up a goal of losing 1 kg/week of my body weight through running activities and I made it in the first week. The difference between my losing weight this year and last year is in my exercises i.e. running vs walking.

2019 weight loss project: weight loss through walking

Last summer, I planned to get back to running but in the first step, I decided to lose weight because I was overweight and I didn’t know if it’s possible to start training while you are overweight. Also based on what I had read before, I thought it’s hard to lose weight through running activities.

I googled “running and lose weight” right now and at least two of the first few articles (this and this) are clearly indicating that running alone is not the best option for losing weight. Also I can remember from 2016 when I was close to my prime, that I took a break during my trainings to lose weight through dieting and walking a lot for better performance.

Why walking and not running

About the question of why walking and not running: the short answer for me was when you are running, you would burn calories faster and you would get hungry faster too and it works less effective for losing weight to run compared to walking.

Although my answer was not very scientific, anyways I had that impression in my mind, that walking works better for losing weight compared to running and therefore I decided to work with “diet and walking” rather than “diet and running”.

Therefore in a very difficult diet (it was my fist diet ever) during 18 weeks, I lost 12.5 kg (27.5 lb). After that difficult first step, my motivation for running decreased a lot. I tried to run a few times but I didn’t see a huge difference in my performance before and after losing weight. I also got busy with my job so I totally forgot about running.

While preparing for running was my main reason for losing weight, I didn’t take care of my weight after I stopped thinking about running and in my mind, I didn’t believe I was going to gain a lot of weight if I stopped caring about my weight and my diet. What happened in practice was totally different.

After I stopped my diet on 09/09/2019 until I again decided to get back to training and diet this week, I gained all what I lost in summer 2019, and even 4.2 kg more. In fact, on 07/05/2019 (beginning of my 2019 diet) I was 83.3 kg and on 10/05/2020 (beginning of my 2020 diet) I was 87.5 kg.

My 2020 goal: running and weight loss

This year, the story is totally different. My absolute first priority is getting back to my physical fitness and I know it takes a long time to gain back the physical fitness I lost during the past three years. I still don’t know how much it would work to lose weight with diet and running, but even if it’s not the most effective way for losing weight, I chose this over diet and walking because this time, running is the main factor for me not losing weight.

Getting advice of a qualified exercise professional

Having all of that in my mind, I gave a call to 811 to talk to a qualified exercise professional to advise me about a training plan. I have read a lot of books about different training plans but none of them is applicable for me because I am very slow right now. In terms of numbers, my last four 10K run times were 70, 69, 67, 68 minutes.

After talking to a qualified exercise professional, he told me that I am overthinking about this matter. He said it’s better just to start training and I also have to be careful about not getting injured by overtraining because I have been away from running for a long time. Due to my long distance walks of last year, I knew my body is OK with having 100’000 weekly steps. Therefore I set that as a constraint in my trainings, for beginning no more than 100’000 weekly steps.

building my training plan with 5K runs

I started my trainings with 5K runs and had it for four consecutive days. On the fifth day I felt that I needed one day rest and therefore I built my training plan this way: four day 5K runs and one day rest. I would continue with this training plan until I see I need to change it.

2016 Training Summary

November 11, 2016November 25, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Totals: 1118.5 Km (736.6 mile) Running, 33.2 Km (20.0 mile) Swimming

2016 Training Summary (05/05/2016 to 11/11/2016)

November 11, 2016November 21, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Totals: 1118.5 Km Running, 33.2 Km Swimming

Running and Swimming Activity Details in Google Sheets,

Activity Schedule in Google Docs,

Photo Gallery

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Total
Easy 68 min	08/11	Easy 64 min	Easy 62 min	Easy 9 min	12/11	13/11	38.5 km Run
31/10	01/11	Easy 18 min	03/11	04/11	Easy 67 min	06/11	15.8 km Run
Steady 51 min	25/10	Steady 40 min	27/10	28/10	29/10	30/10	18.1 km Run
Steady 60 min	8 Steady runs (9K total)	Steady 27 min	20/10	Steady 81 min	22/10	Steady 63 min	56.8 km Run
10/10	11/10	12/10	13/10	14/10	Steady 1K	16/10	1.4 km Run
03/10	04/10	05/10	06/10	07/10	08/10	09/10	0.0 km Run
26/09	Steady 16K run	28/09	Warm up Tempo 13K	30/09	01/10	Long 30K run	62.0 km Run
Steady 16K run	Steady 16K run	21/09	Warm up Tempo 13K	23/09	Speed run 15×400	Long 20K run	82.3 km Run
12/09	13/09	14/09	15/09	Long 26K run	17/09	18/09	26.0 km Run
Long 26K	06/09	07/09	Speed 4×1200-400 walk	Steady 16K	10/09	11/09	55.4 km Run
29/08	30/08	Steady 16K	Easy 5K	Warm up Tempo 13K	03/09	04/09	37.1 km Run
Long 26K	23/08	Easy run	Speed 400,800,1200,1600	Steady 16K	27/08	Steady 19K	74.0 km Run
Steady 11K	16/08	17/08	Speed 4×1200-400 recovery	19/08	Warm up Tempo 13K	21/08	42.9 km Run
Easy 12K	Easy 19K	Steady 11K	11/08	Warm up Tempo 8K	13/08	Steady 22K (Fast)	74.3 km Run
Rest Week	Rest Week	Rest Week	Rest Week	Warm up Steady 8K	06/08	Easy 16K	26.0 km Run
Rest Week	SUP	SUP Fireworks	Rest Week	Rest Week	Rest Week	Rest Week	2 SUP trips
Easy 13K	Easy 16K (Failed Speed)	20/07	Easy 13K	Tempo 6K	Rest Week	Rest Week	54.8 km Run
Easy 16K	Hills Training 10×200	Easy 5K Easy 6K	14/07	15/07	Easy 16K	Easy 16K	70.1 km Run
Easy 3K 3K Swim	Easy 3K 300m Swim	Easy 15K	Easy 15K	08/07	09/07	Easy 16K	52.4 km Run3.3 km Swim
Easy 15K	Speed 4×1200-400 recovery	Easy 15K 300m Swim	Speed 4×1200-400 recovery 500m Swim	Easy 15K 400m Swim	02/07	Easy 3K 2K Swim	75.0 km Run3.2 km Swim
Tempo 6K	Easy 15K 1K Swim	Easy 15K 500m Swim	Speed 6×800-400 recovery	Easy 12K	25/06	Long 20K	90.8 km Run1.5 km Swim
Easy 12K 1K Swim	14/06	Easy 15K 1K Swim	Easy 15K 1K Swim	16K run 1K Swim	Easy 11K 500m Swim	19/06	69.8 km Run4.5 km Swim
06/06	07/06	08/06	Easy 3K 500m Swim Easy 3K	Easy 10K	Easy 10K	Easy 10K 500m Swim	38.2 km Run1.0 km Swim
Easy Run	31/05	Easy Run 2K Swim Easy Run	02/06	03/06	04/06	05/06	8.0 km Run2.0 km Swim
23/05	24/05	25/05	Easy Run	27/05	2K Swim	2K Swim Easy Run	5.4 km Run4.0 km Swim
16/05	17/05	1K Swim	19/05	2K Swim	21/05	2K Swim 50m Swim	5.1 km Swim
09/05	2K Swim	2K Swim	2K Swim	13/05	SUP	SUP	6.0 km Swim2 SUP trips
02/05	03/05	04/05	600m Swim	06/05	07/05	2K Swim	2.6 km Swim

Summer 2016 Gear

May 10, 2016November 21, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

After 2 years of training with Fenix 2, it was the exact right time to upgrade it to Fenix 3. Love every second of training with it ;)))))
Photo Gallery

2015 Marathon Training

November 22, 2015November 21, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

2015 Marathon Training (Feb-Nov 2015)
Photo Gallery
Training Excel Analyze File
Training Calendar
Part one of Training:
Period: 23 Feb 2015- 28 Apr 2015 (9 weeks)
Summary: 415.17 Km training
Part two of Training: Hiking
Period: 23 May 2015- 18 July 2015 (9 Weeks)
Summary: 226.8 Km , elevation gain 7981 m
Part Three of training:
Period: 9 Aug 2015-20 Nov 2015 (15 Weeks)
Summary: 725.44 km training,
New Half Marathon Record: 1:35:59 (6 Sep 2015)

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Total
16/11	17/11	Easy 7K	Easy 10K	Easy 5K	21/11	22/11	23.6 km Run
09/11	10/11	11/11	Easy 10K	Easy 11K	14/11	15/11	21.9 km Run
02/11	03/11	04/11	05/11	06/11	07/11	08/11	0.00 km Run
26/10	27/10	28/10	29/10	30/10	Easy 5K	Easy 5K	10.8 km Run
Easy 14K	Easy 6K	21/10	22/10	Easy 7K	24/10	25/10	28.1 km Run
Easy 13K Walk	13/10	14/10	Achilles tendon injury	16/10	17/10	18/10	0.00 km Run
Easy run	Easy 13K	Speed run 4×1200-400 recovery	08/10	Easy 14K	Long 32K	11/10	74.4 km Run
10k easy run	29/09	30/09	Tempo 13.5K	02/10	Long 35K	Easy run	62.5 km Run
21/09	9K walk	23/09	13K easy run	12.5K easy run	Tempo 15K run	Grouse Mountain-BCMC Hiking return	47.5 km Run3.8 km Hike
14/09	Speed run 4×1200-400 recovery	Easy 8K	17/09	Long 20K	19/09	5K walk	41.5 km Run
07/09	Easy 8K	Easy 11K	Tempo 5K	11/09	12/09	Long 30K	54.0 km Run
Long 12K	Test Walk	Speed run 8×600-400 recovery	Easy 9K run	Tempo 8K	Pacific Spirit Regional Trail	Half Marathon-New Record	68.3 km Run16.1 km Hike
Easy 10K	Easy 10K	Easy 5K	Long 13K	Long 13K	Easy 10K	Test Walk	62.7 km Run
17/08	Easy 10K	Easy 10K	Easy 7K	21/08	22/08	23/08	27.4 km Run
10/08	Easy 5K	Easy 5K	Easy 5K	Easy 5K	Easy 10K	Crown Mountain Hiking	30.3 km Run34.5 km Hike
03/08	04/08	05/08	06/08	07/08	08/08	Easy 5K	5.0 km Run
27/07	28/07	29/07	30/07	31/07	01/08	Easy 5K	5.0 km Run
20/07	21/07	22/07	23/07	24/07	25/07	26/07
Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday
Easy run	14/07	15/07	16/07	17/07	Panorama Ridge Hiking	19/07
1.5K Swim	07/07	2K Swim	1K Swim	10/07	11/07	12/07
29/06	30/06	01/07	02/07	03/07	04/07	05/07
22/06	23/06	24/06	25/06	26/06	Elfin Lakes Hiking	28/06
15/06	16/06	17/06	18/06	19/06	Wedgemount Lake Hiking	21/06
08/06	09/06	10/06	11/06	12/06	MountHarvey Hiking	14/06
01/06	02/06	03/06	04/06	05/06	Garibaldi Lake Hiking	Joffre Lake Hiking
25/05	26/05	27/05	28/05	29/05	Goat Mountain Hiking	Tunnel Bluffs Hiking
18/05	19/05	20/05	21/05	22/05	St Mark’s Summit Hiking	24/05
11/05	12/05	13/05	14/05	15/05	16/05	17/05
04/05	05/05	06/05	07/05	08/05	09/05	10/05
Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Total
27/04	Easy 4K	29/04	30/04	01/05	02/05	03/05	4.4 km Run
Easy 8K	21/04	22/04	23/04	24/04	Easy 7.5K	Long 25K	40.5 km Run
10K run (slow Tempo)	Speed run 6×800, 400 recovery	15/04	15K run, Tempo 8K	Easy 8K	Easy 10K	Long 16K	73.5 km Run
Easy 13K run	Speed run, 9×600, 400 recovery	Casual walk	15K run, tempo 8K	Easy 7K	Easy 10K run	Long (Tempo) 16K	76.6 km Run
Easy 7K run	Tempo 8K run	Easy 13K run	Casual Walk	Easy 2K run Speed run, 12×400	Easy 7K run	05/04	51.0 km Run
23/03	Tempo 10K run	25/03	Tempo 7K run	Easy 10K run	Easy 8K run	29/03	35.0 km Run
16/03	Easy run	18/03	19/03	Norouz Swim	Easy 10K run	Tempo 7K run	20.6 km Run1.5 km Swim
10K easy run	10/03	11/03	Easy 5K run	Easy 5K run	14/03	15/03	20.0 km Run
Easy 10K run	Easy 6K run	Easy 10K run	Easy 8K run	06/03	25K Hike & run Capilano Pacific trail	Easy 6K run	66.2 km Run
Easy 10K run	Easy 7K run	25/02	Easy 10K run	27/02	28/02	01/03	27.0 km Run

2015 Training Summary

November 22, 2015November 25, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Totals: 1140.6 Km (708.8 mile) Running,7981 m (26184 ft) Elevation Gain Hiking

New Half Marathon Record

September 6, 2015November 25, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

New Half Marathon Record 1:35:59
Photo Gallery
My Run On Map
I guess the whole idea of training hard 80km/6 days a week is to keep yourself mentally prepared for the last 5k/10k of the half/full marathon to keep running with your desired pace and not to give up,cause everyone knows the real race just starts at the last kilometers.

2014 Marathon Training Summary

October 11, 2014November 21, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Photo Gallery Link
Period: 5 May 2014- 4 October 2014 (22 Weeks)
Summary: 676.78 Km Running, 15.8 Km Swimming & 9 Amazing Paddle Boarding Trips
Training Excel Analyze File
Training Calendar

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Weekly Total
Easy 5K run	Easy 10K run	Long 20K run	02/10	Strength 10K run	5K run	05/10	50.0 km Run
Strength 10K run	Long 20K run	Easy 5K run	Easy 5K run	26/09	27/09	28/09	40.0 km Run
15/09	Long 26K run	17/09	18/09	Long 20K run	20/09	Easy 5K run Easy run	51.5 km Run
08/09	09/09	Speed run 4×800	Easy 7K run	Easy 4K run	Half Marathon	Paddle Boarding False Creek	36.9 km Runone Paddle Boarding Trip
Half Marathon Race	02/09	Hills Training 10×400	1.5K Lap Swimming	05/09	Long 30K run	07/09	59.8 km Run1.50 km Swim
7K run	26/08	Hills Training 10×400	28/08	29/08	11K run	31/08	27.49 km Run
18/08	12K run	20/08	Long 19K run	22/08	Long 19K run	24/08	50.3 km Run
11/08	12/08	10K run	Paddle Boarding Kitsilano	The amazing SUP trip	16/08	14K run	24.1 km RunTwo Paddle Boarding Trips
10K run	05/08	06/08	07/08	08/08	10K run	Long 26K run	45.6 km Run
10K run	29/07	SUP Fireworks 2014 day two	31/07	10K Race	SUP Fireworks 2014 Third Night	03/08	20.0 km RunTwo Paddle Boarding Trips
21/07	22/07	10K run	24/07	Fireworks 2014 day one	26/07	Strength 10K run	20.1 km RunOne Paddle Boarding
14/07	Paddle Boarding English Bay	Paddle Boarding English Bay	17/07	Paddle Boarding Jericho Beach	19/07	Half Marathon	21.1 km RunThree Paddle Boarding
10K Race	1.5K Lap Swimming	11K run	10/07	1.5K Lap Swimming	1.5K Lap Swimming	Long 19K run	39.2 km Run4.50 km Swim
Easy 3K run	01/07	1.5K Lap Swimming 10K run	03/07	1.5K Lap Swimming	05/07	06/07	12.8 km Run3.0 km Swim
1.5K Lap Swimming	5K Race	11K run	800m Lap Swimming	27/06	28/06	8K run	24.0 km Run2.3 km Swim
16/06	17/06	10K run	19/06	20/06	1.5K Lap Swimming	13K run	23.0 km Run1.5 km Swim
10K run	10/06	10K run	12/06	1.5K Lap Swimming	1.5K Lap Swimming	10K run	30.0 km Run3.0 km Swim
10K run	03/06	04/06	10K run	06/06	10K run	08/06	30.0 km Run
26/05	27/05	28/05	29/05	10K run	31/05	10K run	20.0 km Run
19/05	20/05	21/05	22/05	10K run	24/05	16K Grouse Mountain	25.0 km Run
12/05	13/05	14/05	15/05	7K run	10K run	18/05	16.6 km Run
6K run	3K run	07/05	08/05	09/05	10/05	11/05	8.8 km Run
28/04	First test 🙂	30/04	01/05	02/05	03/05	04/05

2014 Training Summary

October 11, 2014November 25, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Summary: 676.7 Km (420.5 mile) Running, 15.8 Km (9.8 mile) Swimming

Completing a sub three hours marathon

October 10, 2014November 21, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Before reading this article about how you can prepare yourself for completing a sub three hours marathon, you may ask “why three hours and where does that point come from?”. Well, there are a couple of critical point for marathoners that they are trying to reach those points and they are 4:30,4:00,3:30 and 3:00 hours. Among those times, completing a sub three hours Marathon is specially important for marathoners because it would qualify them for Boston marathon which is dream of every marathoner. Actually to be very exact at this point, being qualified for Boston marathon depend on your age and gender, and for young men runners (under age 30) qualifying time for Boston marathon is 3:05 hours.

Sub Three Hour Marathon

There are different training schedules for marathon, but most of them consist of about 18 weeks of training and in this period you would run over 1100km. After completing each marathon, you need at least two weeks of rest before start training for your next marathon in order to improve your previous record. In case you want to start training for your next marathon immediately after your previous training, you may neglect the first five weeks of your schedule which doesn’t include SOS workouts and jump into the sixth week, but in any case in order to complete the rest of your schedule, you again need to train at least 13 weeks/+1000km in order to get your goal.

Now back to our initial question “how long would it take to complete a sub three hours marathon and be qualified for Boston marathon”, the math is very simple now. Usually to have a sub 3:30 marathon, you need at least two training sets while any attempt to complete your first marathon before 3:30 hours is pretty aggressive and chances of getting injured is so high, where in that case you would not even able to complete the marathon.

After completing a sub 3:30 marathon, by each set of training, you would able to improve your previous record by usually 3% ,let’s say 7 minutes (theoretically you can improve up to 5%, but again it’s not recommended and continuing that way you would high likely get injured in a close future) Therefore in order to improve your record from 3:30 hours to 3:00 hours you need 4 sets of marathon training and therefore you need at least six sets of training in order to be able to complete a sub three hours marathon from the point that you started. As we discussed in past each training set requires at least 1000 km of running so you need to run at least for 6000 km in order to complete a sub three hours marathon and being qualified for Boston marathon which is dream of every marathoners.

Run Happy

September 10, 2014November 25, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Photo Gallery
My Run On Map

Hills Training 10×400

September 3, 2014November 25, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Photo Gallery
My Run On Map

2014 Training Week 9 (30/06/2014 to 06/07/2014)

July 6, 2014November 21, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Activity Details in Google Sheets

Activity Schedule in Google Docs

Summary of this week’s activities

First, let’s review my activities during this week. I had 2 run and 2 swim activities in this week. On Monday (30/06) I had an easy 3K run with the following averages: (2.80 K, 5:14 min/km, 157 bpm), On Wednesday (02/07) I had a Running Room 10K run with the following averages: (10.00 K, 4:59 min/km, 168 bpm), On Wednesday (02/07) I had a 1.5 km lap swimming with average pace 2:18 min/100m (my watch says it’s a 3:43 am Wednesday swim but that’s not possible so there might be a one day inaccuracy in the time of the activity), On Friday (04/07) I had a 1.5 km lap swimming with average pace 2:11 min/100m.

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Total
Easy 3K run	1	1.5K Lap Swimming 10K run	3	1.5K Lap Swimming	5	6	12.8 km Run 3.0 km Swim

My weekly mileage

Again based on this article, my two lap swimmings are equal with a 12K moderate run. Therefore my total weekly activities are equal with 24.80 K weekly mileage run. Comparing it to the 33.21 K weekly mileage of last week, we observe a 25.32% decrease in weekly mileage this week. That means I have to be more active in future as such a huge decrease in weekly mileage in week 9 doesn’t make sense at all.

In fact the way that I am training right now is not very appropriate as I have less activities in certain weeks and too much activities in the others. I have to train slow and steady in a safe manner to avoid getting injured and achieve the best results.

Comparing activities to see my improvement

Again if I compare my run activity on 18/06 with the following averages: (10.01 K, 5:04 min/km, 169 bpm, 182 m elevation gain) to my other run activity on 02/07 with the following averages: (10.00 K, 4:59 min/km, 168 bpm, 75m elevation gain) , we see everything is the same in those two activities but average pace and elevation gain. My this week’s pace was 0:05 min/km slower and at the same time it’s elevation gain was 107m harder. I guess the elevation gain and the pace would balance each other and that means we cannot observe a significant improvement in my activities during past 2 weeks.

Buying a new Garmin Fenix 2 watch

Due to the fact that I was swimming a lot in my trainings, I decided to buy a Garmin Fenix 2 watch which was more appropriate for my training compared to Garmin FR 610. The complete description of Fenix 2 in the Garmin website is available here and a comparison between Fenix 2 and Forerunner 610 is available here and here and here.

But in short, the advantages of Fenix 2 compared to Forerunner 610 for me are as followings:

Fenix 2 records swimming activities
Fenix 2 and it’s heart rate monitor measures running dynamics (included cadence) and also VO2Max which are very important features for runners (I don’t know if it’s about Fenix 2 or it’s heart rate monitor but in any case I have these extra features in Fenix 2 where I didn’t have them in Forerunner 610)
Fenix 2 is more appropriate for hiking
The battery of Fenix 2 lasts longers

2014 Training Week 8 (23/06/2014 to 29/06/2014)

June 29, 2014November 21, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Activity Details in Google Sheets

Activity Schedule in Google Docs

Summary of this week’s activities

First, let’s review my activities during this week. I had 3 runs and 2 swims during this week. On Monday (23/06) I had a 1.5 km lap swimming with average pace 2:24 min/100m. On Tuesday (24/06) I had a 5K Race with the following averages: (5.01 K, 4:19 min/km, 183 bpm). On Wednesday (25/06) I had a Running Room 10.73K run with the following averages: (10.73 K, 5:11 min/km, 158 bpm). On Thursday (26/06), I had a 800m lap swimming with average pace 2:30 min/100m. Finally on Sunday (29/06) I again had a Running Room 8.27K run with the following averages (8.27 K, 4:56 min/km, 177 bpm). The recent run was an incomplete group run that I burned out in the middle of the run.

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Total
1.5K Lap Swimming	5K Race	11K run	800m Lap Swimming	27	28	8K run	24.0 km Run 2.3 km Swim

My weekly mileage

My weekly mileage this week was 24.0 km run and 2.3 km swim. Again based on this article, my two swimming activities are equal with a 9.2 km run therefore my total weekly activities are equal with 33.21 km run. Comparing it with the last week’s weekly mileage of 29 km, we observe a 14.5 % increase in weekly mileage which is OK.

Comparing activities to see my improvement

There are two activities that are very suitable for comparing them with each other. My run on 29/06 with the following averages: (8.27 K, 4:56 min/km, 177 bpm, 178 elevation gain) compared to my run on 11/06 with the following averages: (10.01 K, 5:05 min/km, 177 bpm, 151 elevation gain).

These two activities were both with the Running Room on the same terrain (Vancouver Stanley Park) so elevation gain in both of them were almost the same. We assume the length of activities were both equal with each other, however there is a 1.74K difference between them. Fortunately my effort in both of them were the same (177 bpm vs 177 bpm for average heart rate).

We observe my pace improved from 5:05 min/km to 4:56 min/km. That’s a 0:09 min/km improvement which is equals with 2.95 % improvement in 18 days and it’s pretty good.

Response of my body to the level of activities

As I increased the level of my activities recently, my body responded to it in a certain way. I was mainly tired and needed to sleep much more compared to past and I also needed to eat more. I was talking to Jason in the Running Room about it and he advised me just to listen to what my body tells me, if it needs more sleep just sleep more, if you feel more hungry just eat more and etc. I was thinking more about this matter and noticed that was a pretty wise advise.

2014 Training Week 7 (16/06/2014 to 22/06/2014)

June 22, 2014November 21, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Activity Details in Google Sheets

Activity Schedule in Google Docs

Summary of this week’s activities

First, let’s review my activities during this week. I had two runs and one swim activities this week. On Wednesday (18/06) I had a Running Room 10K run with (ave. pace, ave. heart rate) equals (5:04 min/km, 169 bpm). On Saturday (21/06) I had a 1.5 km lap swimming with average pace about 2:10 min/km. Again according to this article, that swim was equals with a moderate 6K run. On Sunday (22/06) I had a 13K run with (ave. pace, ave. heart rate) equals (4:57 min/km, 174 bpm).

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Total
16	17	10K run	19	20	1.5K Lap Swimming	13K run	23.0 km Run 1.5 km Swim

My weekly mileage

My weekly mileage this week was 23.0 km run and 1.5 km swim. Therefore my weekly total was equals with 29 km of running. Comparing it with last week’s weekly total activities (42 km of running), I had a 30.95 % decrease in my weekly mileage which is reasonable because last week’s weekly mileage was a little bit too much for me at this stage of my training.

Comparing activities to see my improvement

Comparing the activities to see my improvement during past two weeks is a little bit difficult at this stage due to lack of relevant information (so far I have just 5 activities with heart rate data in them).

But if we compare my activity on 11/06 which is (10K, 5:05 min/km, 177 bpm, elevation gain 182m) with my activity on 22/06 which is (13K, 4:57 min/km, 174 bpm, elevation gain 97m) we can see even though I had less effort in the second activity (174 bpm vs 177 bpm) and the length of my run was also longer in the second activity (13K vs 10K), my average pace improved by 0:08 min/km (4:57 min/km vs 5:05 min/km).

Elevation gain is the only factor which was harder in the first activity compared to the second activity (182 m vs 97 m). We can assume the last factor (elevation gain) would balance the first two factors (length of activity and average heart rate) so for comparing two activities we can just compare pace of two activities. If we do so, we can observe a 2.6 % improvement in just 11 days which is not bad.

2014 Training Week 6 (09/06/2014 to 15/06/2014)

June 15, 2014November 21, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Activity Details in Google Sheets

Activity Schedule in Google Docs

First Let’s mention my weekly total for this week, I had 30.03 km of run and 3.0 km of swim. This is the first week that I am adding swimming to my training plan and I am very happy about it. Also from this week, I started wearing my heart rate monitor and that helps me a lot to analyze my daily activities, compare them to each other and see how much effort I put in each of them.

During this week on Friday (13/06) and Saturday (14/06), I had two 1.5 km swims and my average pace in both of them was about 2:10 min/100m. I also had three 10K runs on Monday (09/06), Wednesday (11/06) and Sunday (15/06) with (average pace, average heart rate) equals (5:11 min/km, 163 bpm), (5:05 min/km, 177 bpm) and (4:59 min/km, 171 bpm) respectively.

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Total
10K run	10	10K run	12	1.5K Lap Swimming	1.5K Lap Swimming	10K run	30.0 km Run 3.0 km Swim

I was interested in finding out my weekly total just in terms of running. I googled the matter and found this article useful where it says a moderate 1.5 km of swim with ave. pace 2:00 min/100m is equals with a moderate 6.0 km run. Therefore my weekly total this week just in terms of running is about 42 km run. Comparing this week’s total with last week’s total (30 km run) I see a 40% increase in my weekly mileage. That is still OK as I had a 35 km run weekly total in week 3 and this week’s total has just about a 20% increase compared to week 3’s total.

Apparently I see the following pattern in my weekly mileages: I would have a high weekly mileage in one week and then I would reduce my weekly mileage for a couple of weeks as my body recovers and then again I would get back to a high weekly mileage. Ideally, I should stay on a certain weekly mileage (at least 3 weeks) before I increase it to the next level. Therefore my current approach is not ideal but as long as I have enough rest in my weekly training plan, chances of getting injured would be reduced.

2014 Training Weeks 4-5 (26/05/2014 to 08/06/2014)

June 8, 2014November 21, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Activity Details in Google Sheets

Activity Schedule in Google Docs

I had 5 runs during these 2 weeks, all of them were 10K runs. On Friday 30 May I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.01 K, 5:00 min/km, 194 elevation gain). On Sunday 1 June I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.01 K, 6:07 min/km, 208 elevation gain). On Monday 2 June I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.00 K, 5:38 min/km, 237 elevation gain). On Thursday 5 June I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.01 K, 5:21 min/km, 50 elevation gain). On Saturday 7 June I had a 10K run with the following averages: (10.01 K, 5:25 min/km, 147 elevation gain).

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Total
10K run	3	4	10K run	6	10K run	8	30.0 km Run
26	27	28	29	10K run	31	10K run	20.0 km Run

Starting from the next week, I was using my heart rate monitor but during these two weeks I didn’t wear my heart rate monitor and therefore I can’t talk about the intensity of my runs and how much effort I put in each run.

On May 30th, I had my first 10K sub 50 minutes run ever and I was extremely excited about it. In the running session that I had in the Lululemon club a few weeks ago, each person had to introduce himself/herself to the group and tell one of his running goals to the others. As my running goal, I mentioned I want to make a 10K sub 40 minutes run. Therefore making a 10K sub 50 minutes run was the very first step towards my goal and fortunately I made it very fast.

In terms of my weekly mileage, last week (19/05 to 25/05) I had a 35 km weekly mileage considering the fact that the 3 km Grouse Grind hike would consider as a 10K run. The week after that (26/05 to 01/06) my weekly mileage dropped to 20 km. Considering the fact that I needed a bit of rest after a heavy week like last week and also another fact that one of my runs (on may 30th) was an intense run, my performance on this week was reasonable.

In the next week after that (02/06 to 08/06) my weekly mileage again increased to 30.02 km and all of my three 10K runs were with medium effort i.e. with average pace of 5:38 min/km , 5:21 min/km and 5:25 min/km respectively. That was good Because otherwise if I have spent too much effort in my runs during a short period of time, my chances of getting injured would be increased rapidly.

2014 Training Weeks 1-3 (05/05/2014 to 25/05/2014)

May 25, 2014November 21, 2022 ~ Ryan Montazer

Activity Details in Google Sheets

Activity Schedule in Google Docs

Beginning of my running journey

I officially started my journey of running and marathon training in summer 2014. I had the passion of running since high school and since that time on and off I was running, but I never had the experience of calling myself a runner or a marathoner. In fact I started this journey to call myself a runner and a marathoner.

Buying GPS watch and shoe from Costco

In my eyes, the very first step and one of the most important steps to start running seriously is buying a running GPS watch, if it comes with a heart rate monitor it would be great too. I purchased my first running GPS watch from Costco and it was Garmin Forerunner 610 , it came with a heart rate monitor as well.

As you can see in the above youtube videos, Garmin Forerunner 610 is a gorgeous running watch and it has a touchable screen that I love this feature of the watch. I also purchased a pair of Fila shoes from Costco for my runnings as well.

Getting injured and figuring out the reason

I turned on my watch on April 29th for the first test to see how it works and after that I had a few test runs/walks with it on May 5th, May 6th, May 16th and May 17th but non of them was a real comfortable run because of the difficulty that I had with my feet. Due to that difficulty, I was just able to walk properly and I couldn’t walk fast or run with my new watch and shoe.

I was thinking a lot about it and I was so disappointed as I never had this problem before and I finally guessed maybe it’s about my running shoe. As soon as I changed my shoe with an old one that I had since before, my problem solved. In fact this was my first running lesson about the importance of your shoe. I didn’t know Costco’s Fila shoes don’t count as running shoes. I paid the price and I found it through practice.

Finding a running club

In order to get encouraged more, I was thinking about joining a running club. I googled and found out a few running clubs in my neighbourhood in downtown Vancouver. I decided to try two of the most popular ones Running Room and Lululemon and select one of them for my primary running club.

I found Lululemon running club in Robson street is more a fun running club versus Denman Running Room club again in Robson street which was more a technical running club so I chose the Denman Running Room club. Lululemon runs was on Thursday evenings and Running Room runs were on Wednesday evenings and Sunday mornings.

Getting familiar with the concept of training plan

Through participating in Denman Running Room runs, I got familiar with the concept of training plan. Fortunately I joined their club at the right time because their new training program was due on June.

My first run with my Garmin Forerunner 610 watch

My first real run with my Garmin watch was on Friday May 23rd which was a 10K 56:54 run with 229m elevation gain. My previous 10K run before this was with Running Room and it was a 10K 60 min run. Therefore I had a 3 min improvement in this run which was pretty good. Unfortunately I didn’t wear my heart rate monitor in that run so I can’t say how intense my running was.

The Grouse Mountain Run/Hike with Running Room

My last run in this period was on May 25th which was a long distance 15K run with the Denman Running Room club with the following averages: (15.00 K, 8:01 min/km, 595m elevation gain) plus a 3K Grouse Grind hike. We started the run from the store, then through Lions Gate bridge and Capilano Pacific trail we went up to the base of Grouse Mountain. We had a short rest there and after that we climbed the Grouse Grind up to the top of Vancouver. Jason, one of my friends in the club told me however the Grouse Grind is just 3km, but because it is uphills it counts as a 10K run. We also had a 15K run from the store up to the base of Grouse Grind so this run was technically a 25K run. That’s what Jason told me.

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Total
19	20	21	22	10K run	24	16K Grouse Mountain	25.0 km Run
12	13	14	15	7K run	10K run	18	16.6 km Run
6K run	3K run	7	8	9	10	11	8.8 km Run
28	First test 🙂	30	1	2	3	4