Started the day relatively early, at least early for me these days. After an early breakfast and putzing around the house, I hauled myself up to upper NorthWhite Northwest DC to get myself tested. Specifically, I was getting a VO2Max test. This involved getting a Hannibal Lector-esque mask strapped over my nose and mouth and then running myself ragged.
It actually isn’t as bad as it sounds. They just strap you in, hook you up to a detector, then start you walking at a moderate pace on a treadmill. The pace picks up until you get to a preset one (set by the tester after talking about your pace), then they start increasing the incline. All of this happens slowly over the course of 15 minutes, until you get up to your upper limits, which I presume they could tell by the VO2 feedback. I hit 200 beats per minute before we went into cooldown mode.
I’ve not gotten the full results back yet (they’re being emailed to me), but the tester did confirm something which I’d suspected for several years now – I burn high when it comes to heart rate in exercise. I look forward to seeing what the tests show for where my heart rates are supposed to be now, as it’ll help me train more intelligently. I’ve wanted to do one of these tests for a while, but the timing never worked before now. I’m planning to follow up with another test in a month to see how training affects the numbers.
And it was wonderful getting to run after a full month down from the vertigo, even to that level of effort. Perhaps especially to that level of effort.
After coming home to clean up I zipped out to my local yarn shop to pick up some longer circular needles for the scarf I’m working on (the 16″ was getting annoying – kept catching on the cable). Their selection waxes and wanes, so I picked up several pair while I was at it, for future projects. Switching the scarf over was easily done, and the longer cable’s been much easier to knit with. Not quite halfway done with the first skein. Posted a pic on Flickr today of the progress as of this afternoon when I updated the status over on Ravelry.
Haven’t seen much of BC lately. He’s dealing with his company’s annual audit this past week and next (plus all the prep the week before last). Headed out to the movies with him tomorrow, after a run in the afternoon, I hope. Depends on his work load, but it should work. I just picked up an EZ-Pass for the mini, so I don’t have to keep popping change on the toll road to get out to his place. His parents have accepted an offer on some property to turn into a winery, and he’s going to purchase their house from them, so for the foreseeable future I’ll be driving to Herndon on a semi-regular basis. The EZ-Pass just makes it that much easier to get out there.
One last appointment with the podiatrist in a week, then I should be cleared entirely from his care, which is the last bit of anything going on. The plantar fasciitis is gone, and has been gone for several weeks now, but this is just one last appointment to milk my insurance company ensure it’s well and truly 100% gone. Until then I can still run, so that starts up tomorrow with BC, and then swimming again come Monday. I’ll keep my fingers crossed that this was it, because the long-term goal is focused on the IM now.