Beyond Running Shoes: The Running Fool's Blog

Sorry for being so tardy

2006-02-26T18:57:00.000-05:00

Well, illness had made me slack a LOT with regards to posting Olympic updates.

Nevertheless, Canada finished up with 24 medals! That is the most medals Canada has ever earned in any non-boycotted Olympics, winter or summer.

Most people who were pegged to win medals did just that. There were only a handful of disappointments, among them: Men's hockey, Jasey-Jay Anderson, Kyle Nielssen, Denny Morrison among others.

Not to mention that outside of the 24 medals, there were a further 13 4th place and 8 5th place finishes. Canada looks very poised to contend with Germany as the #1 medal winner in Vancouver in 2010.

As it turned out, the men's figure skating results were way off with my predictions

Final results - prediction in parenthesis

1) Evgeni Plushenko (1)
2) Stephane Lambiel (2)
3) Jeffrey Buttle (5)
4) Evan Lysacek (7)
5) Johnny Weir (4)
6) Brian Joubert (3)
7) Matt Savoie (11)
8) Daisuke Takahashi (8)
9) Kevin van der Perren (-)
10) Min Zhang (-)
11) Ilya Klimkin (10)
12) Shawn Sawyer (-)

Not making the top 12: Emanuel Sandhu (predicted 6th, finished 13th), Frederic Dambier (predicted 12th, finished 18th) and Chengjiang Li (predicted 9th, finished 16th).

If you thought my men's predictions were bad, my women's predictions were worse!

Final results - Prediction in parenthesis

1) Shizuka Arakawa (3)
2) Sasha Cohen (2)
3) Irina Slutskaya (1)
4) Fumie Suguri (4)
5) Joannie Rochette (6)
6) Kimmie Meisnner (9)
7) Emily Hughes (-)
8) Sarah Meier (11)
9) Carolina Kostner (5)
10) Elene Gevedanvshilli (-)
11) Yan Liu (12)
12) Mira Leung (-)

Not making the top 12, but in my top 12 predictions: Elena Sokolova (8), Miki Ando (7), Susanna Poykio (10)

Pairs Figure skating wrap-up

2006-02-16T09:55:00.000-05:00

Here's the final standings, in parenthesis in bold is my prediction from earlier:

Totmianina/Marinin (1)
Zhang/Zhang (2)
Shen/Zhao (3)
Pang/Tong (7)
Petrova/Tiknov (4)
Savchenko/Sollokwy (5)
Inoue/Baldwin (8)
Obertas/Slavnov (6)
Zagorska/Siduek (10)
Dube/Davidson (12)
Marcoux/Buntin (9)
Volozoshar/Morozov (11)

Some Notes:

I predicted the who would be amongst the top 12 correctly

I predicted the 3 medalists in order correctly

The most I was off for a prediction was 3 places for Pang/Tong (4th vs. 7th place prediction)

We'll see how it goes with my men's predictions, but already, Frederic Dambier, Ilya Klimkin and Chengjiang Li appear to be out of it for top 12 finishes.

Early Results - Day 6

2006-02-16T09:36:00.000-05:00

Early results for Canada, not looking that great

Jasey Jay Anderson was disqualified in his semi-final of men's snowboard cross due to apparent "intentional" contact with another snowboarder. Yikes, very unforutnate.

Sara Renner did finish 8th in the women's X-C 10KM classical - not bad at all, she just didn't have the mettle to handle the ending hills. She should fare better in the sprints coming up next week. Beckie Scott struggled all day, finishing 30th unofficially, but was later disqualified for finishing in the wrong lane of ski track.

Shannon Kliebrink lost her morning curling match to Switzerland, and now sits 2-2. I think 6-3 is necessary to make the playoffs, she still has to play Rhona Martin, Dordi Nordby among others.

Day 6 - Make it or Break it Day for Canada

2006-02-16T00:28:00.000-05:00

Day 6 may prove to be quite telling if Canada is to come even close to the 25 medal total
proposed by the COA.

Check out the following athletes in the medal hunt tomorrow

Speed Skating- Men's Team Pursuit
Women's Team Pursuit

Cross Country Skiing - 10KM classical - Beckie Scott and Sara Renner

Figure Skating - Jeff Buttle - 6th after the short program
Emanuel Sandhu - 7th after the short program

Skeleton - Melissa Hollingswoth - women's

Snowboard - Jasey Jay Anderson - Men's Snowboard Cross

it would probably be a disappointment if Canada doesn't get at least 3-4 medals tomorrow. Hopefully, the medal total will double tomorrow.

Men's Figure Skating - Olympics Predictions

2006-02-14T12:16:00.000-05:00

Alrighty,

Fearless Top 12 Predictions for the Men's Event

1) Evgeny Plushenko
2) Stephane Lambiel
3) Brian Joubert
4) Johnny Weir
5) Jeffrey Buttle
6) Emanuel Sandhu
7) Evan Lysacek
8) Daisuke Takahashi
9) Chengjiang Li
10) Ilya Klimkin
11) Matthew Savoie
12) Fredreric Dambier

I predicated who top 12 pairs would be, albeit not in the exact order (Pang/Tong was the most off, they finished 4th but I predicted them 7th).

Pairs Figure Skating Predictions - Olympics

2006-02-11T12:44:00.000-05:00

Alright, the competition begins in 15 minutes, time to make predictions

1) Totmianina/Marinin
2) Zhang/Zhang
3) Shen/Zhao
4) Petrova/Tikhnov
5) Savchenko/Sollokwy
6) Obertas/Slavnov
7) Pang/Tong
8) Inoue/Baldwin
9) Marcoux/Buntin
10) Zagorska/Siduek
11) Volzoshar/Morozov
12) Dube/Davison

Phew!! The fearless forecaster has spoken!

Tuesday, Tuesday, It was all I hope it would be

2006-02-07T22:19:00.000-05:00

Workouts today

swim - 25 min

weights - shoulders + back
abs, glutes

No running since Sunday due to those damn shins. Will try again tomorrow - probably 3 miles.

The following teams remain on Skating with Celebrities

1) Kristy Swanson - Lloyd Eisler
2) Jillian Barberie - John Zimmerman
3) Bruce Jenner - Tai Babilonia

David Cameron, you now have something in common with Belinda Stronach - congratulations!

Weekend's Over :(

2006-02-05T23:05:00.000-05:00

Brief review of today

Exercise -
10 min Elliptical warmup
5KM Run on the Treadmill
Weights - Chest/Triceps/Biceps

Shins started to act up again on the treadmill - argh. Time for the ice...

As for the Super Bowl, Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Seattle Seahawks 21-10. Bill Cowher, probably among the last in the breed of true tenured coaches, finally wins after coming up short 11 years ago.

As for other winners:
Golf: Tiger Woods, J.B. Holmes
Tennis: Elena Dementieva, Ivan Lbuicic

In memoriam - Karen Carpenter (1950-1983)

2006-02-04T19:54:00.000-05:00

As I do every February 4th, time to commemorate the passing the Karen Carpenter, who died
23 years ago (gasp!) today. It is interesting that her legacy (famous and infamous) grows more and more with each passing year. As late as last year, the Carpenters' Hit Collection "Gold" hit #4 on the UK Album chart. Quite astonishing for a deceased artist.

Much postulating has been done on what her career path would have been had she lived. I'm pretty sure she would have tried musicals, recorded more solo albums, and possibly tried movie cameos. Unfortunately, these will forever remain "what ifs".

Survivor Tonight - EXILE ISLAND!

2006-02-02T22:24:00.000-05:00

The new season of Survivor started tonight.

Some new ideas - 4 tribes of 4 this time around, organized by gender and age:
1) Older Men
2) Older Women
3) Younger Men
4) Younger Women

It appeared that the younger men were on the verge of not winning immunity, but snuck out the win over the older women. Tina, a lumberjack who seemed comfortable outdoors, was voted out by the 3 other older women. There's gotta be sub-mergers happening soon when a team is down to 2 members.

An idea re-hashed from a previous season (when Janu was exiled in Guatemala), was having a tribe member exiled for an evening. This time around, Misty from the Younger Women was the unlucky member.

We'll see what happens this season. We already have some personalities popping up - a new-age yoga instructor, and a guy who's suffering withdrawal from smoking.

Nobody wants the Liberal Leadership!

2006-02-02T14:58:00.000-05:00

Kind of hilarious that no one wants the Liberal Leadership after Paul Martin held his final meeting as Liberal leader. Look at list: John Manley, Brian Tobin, Frank McKenna. Who does that leave? Scott Brison? Belinda Stronach? Michael Ignatieff?

In the meantime, Mr. Bill Graham of Toronto Centre will be the interim leader. Oh the stories I would tell if I could about Mr. Graham, but they better be left unspoken.

That's It - No More Slacking

2006-02-02T12:32:00.000-05:00

OK OK, I know I've been slacking off a LOT, but there's good reason. I've been a busy man this winter.

My new job: Sales Planning I/T Analyst - Sales Division - Air Canada http://www.aircanada.ca

Other stuff

I've really enjoyed being an extra on TV shows and Movies. Here's a list of the productions I've been in up to this point.

Hades Factor (Mini-Series based on the novel by Robert Ludlow)
Untitled History Project (ABC Mini-Series about 9/11)
This is Wonderland (CBC Show - Wednesdays 8pm)
Blizhniy Boy - DVD release with David Carradine and Oleg Tartakov
Man of The Year - movie with Robin Williams, Christopher Walken and Laura Linney

A little description of one of my experiences:

3 weeks ago, I was like *this* close to Robin Williams, Christopher Walken and Laura Linney on the set of the new movie "Man of the Year", to be released later this year.

The setting was the presedential campaign offices for Robin Williams' character. They remade an old car dealership in Scarborough. Shooting went until late (2:30 AM the first night, 1:30 AM the second night). It was pretty simple, party scenes, lots of drinking, eating, dancing and talking :) .

I hope to get more gigs soon, but of course, they have fit around my work schedule.

Other great news - http://www.cafepress.com/runningcircles - BEYOND RUNNING SHOES is a hit!! This store really took off during the holiday season, with thousands of dollars in sales. I am so happy. Check out the store - featuring the 'GOT MARATHON?' tagline on all our products.

MAKE 2006 the year of the Runner!!

English Genius!! :)

2005-10-18T11:46:00.000-04:00

More updates on my life later, but here's the results of my English Test..

English Genius
You scored 92% Beginner, 92% Intermediate, 93% Advanced, and 100% Expert!

You did so extremely well, even I can't find a word to describe your excellence! You have the uncommon intelligence necessary to understand things that most people don't. You have an extensive vocabulary, and you're not afraid to use it properly! Way to go!

Thank you so much for taking my test. I hope you enjoyed it!

For the complete Answer Key, visit my blog: http://shortredhead78.blogspot.com/.

Hee hee - I've know it all along :)

Congrats Kim Clijsters

2005-09-11T07:42:00.000-04:00

As expected, Kim Clijsters finally has a Grand Slam to her name - and did it playing awesome defense no less on a fast hardcourt. In the end, she ended up frustrating Venus Williams, Maria Sharapova and Mary Pierce to no end with her relentless retrieving. A well earned Grand Slam title.

As for the running..... well last week was a week to get back into it...

Wed - 6 KM
Thursday - 12 KM
Friday - 10 KM

Half Marathon in TWO weeks - OMG!!

Latest product Sold! Women's Framed Print

2005-08-12T09:35:00.000-04:00

The latest product sold at BEYOND RUNNING SHOES: Marathon Running Gift Shop is this lovely framed print featuring the "Got Marathon?" logo - the women's version. Sales of the BEYOND RUNNING SHOES store have been somewhat slow in the month of July, but that doesn't mean the quality of products has diminished! Future Boston Marathon Runners unite! Why not show off your marathon running obsession with these products - we've got T-shirts, Mugs, Sweatshirts, tracksuits, calendars, and much much more! Check these out from above. Women's and Men's Marathon Running Clothing.

Changes, Layoffs, Future?

2005-08-12T09:23:00.000-04:00

A brief summary on what happened last week:

Amber Fleury got eliminated last week on Canadian Idol.
This week, during standards week, my TV went on the blink, so couldn't watch it - Daryl Brunt ended up being eliminated. His song choice was What a Wonderful World.

The big news personally is - I lost my JOB :o(. My company laid off 20-25% of its workforce, which is significant, yes, but it was to be expected based on recent rumours. Back to the drawing board. If you're in the Toronto area and know of jobs in business analysis, data analytics, technical writing, or software engineering, let me know! :)

The FrancoRun 10KM was not a 10KM run at all, more like a 9.6 KM. That's the only explanation as to why I finished with a time of 44 min. It was most likely closer to 47 min - if I had actually finished the whole 10KM distance :). The weather was PERFECT that morning at Ontario Place and the Martin Goodman Trail. Sadly, my sunglasses popped a lens during the race, and I can't find the lens! Argh. Unfortunately, this being the first (hopefully not last) FrancoRun ever, the attendance was rather poor - I finished 2nd out of 5(!) in my age group.

Now that I'm no longer working (for the time being), there will be no races effective until the Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Marathon and Half-Marathon which takes place on the last Sunday in September. http://www.torontowaterfrontmarathon.com

As for the workouts this week...

Sunday - 10KM Race, swimming
Monday - Weights: Back + Shoulders
Tuesday - 1KM sprints X 3 , abs + glutes, swimming
Wednesday - 11 KM run
Thursday - Weights: Chest + Arms, abs + glutes + calves, swimming

Canadian Idol - Week 3 (Songs of the 1980s)

2005-08-03T13:49:00.000-04:00

For me, there was only one across-the-board good performance and that was Melissa, who took out the potential cheese and over-the-top theatrics of "Holding out for a Hero" (something Fantasia got called on by Simon during AI 3 - to which I agreed).

The 7 others were all hit and miss....

Amber - once again, a vocally superb performance, but she has to a) stop trying to yell during a song cause it's obvious that she can't and b) get into character much more where the song requires. Needed a little more pizazz with "Just like Jesse James"
Rex - The shrill note on "baby, baby - pleeeeeeeease" during "Every Breath You Take" was just awful. A rather uninteresting performance with no uniquess and not a lot of skill shown.
Casey - Vocally, a more assured performance than last week - but the performance skills from her are just awful, and totally detract how good her actual voice was. She doesn't know how to move, how to emote, how to create energy - zippo. Sadly, I don't think she's going to be improving in that department any time soon.
Daryl - That was better than I thought he would do with "Tainted Love", but there is still not much confidence to the performance - kind of mousey and unassured
Suzi - A rather lethargic performance of "Heartbreaker" by her standards, especially when it came to the vocals. Is the schedule burning her out? Hopefully, she can come back with the goods next week.
Aaron - The theatrics just don't work with this song, I'm afraid. Vocally, he's still his competent self, but the performance was miles removed from arena rock.
Josh - Good performance-wise, but he has to learn to take out the excessive shrill-ness in his voice. You can tell the timbre he usually exudes is quite forced, because he sang in clarity (for once) in the first 2 lines.

Long Weekend Over :o(

2005-08-02T10:45:00.000-04:00

Workout for Sunday:

Weights: Chest + Arms
Abs and Glutes
Swimming - 25 minutes

Bowling for 1 hour :)
For bowling on Sunday night, I averaged a 135 over 5 games, which is a step up from my 125-ish average last month. It's all about focus, people!!

The Classic Bowl in Oakville, Ontario now has as new scoring monitors and keyboard controls - way more sophisticated and sleeker than the old technology, which was breaking down in the last year. I personally love the new look of the Classic Bowl - keep it up, you guys!

Workout for Monday:

11KM run in the morning - unfortunately, I just had to stop in the middle cause it was so freaking HOT out there (argh).

Anyways, here's the route (Mississauga):

Britannia and Terry Fox - go west to Queen Street.
Britannia and Queen Street. - go south to Eglinton
Queen Street (or Mississauga Road) and Eglinton - go east to Terry Fox
Eglinton and Terry Fox - go North to home.

25 min swim in the evening.

In other news, Michael ended up winning Hell's Kitchen over Ralph. It's interesting how customer comments/appraisals factor into the final decision(s) during this series, cause how on earth is the viewing public to be sure of the legitimacy of the customer input? Anyways, expect this series to be back as a midseason replacement for FOX.

Looooooong Weekend

2005-07-30T22:50:00.000-04:00

It's Civic Holiday weekend here in Ontario, thus a 3 day weekend - hooray!

Here's a summary of my workouts the past 2 days:

Friday - Weights - Shoulders and Back
Abs + Glutes + Calves
Swimming - 20 mins

I've decided that with all my shin splint problems, it's time to strengthen other parts of the leg - so now I've incorporated calf exercises. If there's anyone out there who has a good recommendation has to how to relieve me of my shin splint problems - please leave a note. I really need advice - pronto. I figure that the shin splints are the #1 thing holding me back on my performance.

Saturday - Running - Sprint Interval workout
4 sets of 1KM sprints

Tennis - 30 mins

This week was better for the speedwork - averaging 3:55-4:00 for all 1KM splits. Last week, my shins were really aggravating me, and I was struggling to do 4:10-4:15 on the intervals. I just have to be diligent with the
icing and the RUB A535 - otherwise, each successive running session will be even more painful (yikes).

It was great to get back into the tennis tonight - I'm still a littlr concerned about my shoulder when serving, but otherwise, I feel great to be really fit when I step on the court. I'm a little cautious running after balls, knowing about my running schedule at the back of my head.

No Working Out for Thursday

2005-07-29T12:08:00.000-04:00

I wanted to forward a movie review from yours truly....

The last movie I saw was War of the Worlds with Tom Cruise and Dakota Fanning. If you love special effects and people running for their lives for 2 hours, you'll LOVE this movie. If you're like me and need an interesting plot without ridiculous holes and non-sensical explanations, avoid this movie.

SPOILERS!! Do not read if you don't want to know what happens.

Basically, I thought this movie was Steven Spielberg creating an urban version of "Jurassic Park", where, instead of dinosaurs, we have the alien "tripod" transportation machines. I understand that the "tripods" were loyal re-creations of H.G. Welles' depictions in the original novel, but I still found their "zapping" of humans still very crude CGI-wise. Also very crude was Tom Cruise's "running" from the fireballs in the opening chase scene.

I thought it was pretty pathetic to create the premise of Tom Cruise being a blue-collar protagonist. There's still a sense of pretentiousness in the acting even in this film.

Then there's Dakota Fanning. She plays victim well enough, but when it comes to line delivery, she comes off as bratty, rather than someone you can sympathize with. She's going to become the next Bette Davis, I tell you - Mark my words!

All in all, I was laughing when I shouldn't have been, and unconvinced half of the time. There's no explanation as to the why or the how - which takes away any hope of some realistic slant to the sci-fi flick. The resolution to the aliens' demise is sketchy and not given enough time. Morgan Freeman's attempts to create narrating bookends to the film are flimsy, as his discussion of the problem and epilogue are too loose to the actual film content.

A movie that I do want to see: March of the Penguins - Yay for documentaries.

Canadian Idol - Final 9 - Elimination Thoughts

2005-07-28T10:28:00.000-04:00

Yeah, Ashley Leitao did tank doing Stevie Wonder's "Sir Duke" on Tuesday night, but I still thought that she would have squeaked by past Melissa O'Neil, who I thought had the least fan support. But amongst the 3 that did end up being at the bottom of the voting (Josh Palmer was the other), Ashley probably deserved to go based on the performance this week. Melissa brought some good soulfulness in her vocal delivery, but her stage presence was stiff as a board. Josh was weaker vocally (by far), but his performance on stage was well done.

This doesn't take away the fact that Ashley did awesome the week previous, doing Amanda Marshall's "Let it Rain" during Canadian Hits Week. Personally, I had Casey Leblanc in last place in my rankings as she delivered an unbeliveably blank performance, lifeless and uninspiring (even if she technically sang better than Josh, Ashley and arguably Rex).

As for the other contestants:

My personal top 2 for the week were Aaron Walpole and Suzi Rawn. Aaron sang with versatility and confidence, while Suzi had energy and pizazz.

My personal favourite Amber Fleury really struggled with the low register doing "Lately". Even though she sang beautifully in her usual rich tone, her tendancy to over-enounciate can detract from the performance. Hopefully, she'll take care of that in the coming weeks.

Rex Goudie just wasn't fit for "Pastime's Paradise", no matter how hard he tried.
Daryl Brunt showed a little more style during "Superstition", but he ended up slurring the lyrics and getting self-conscious on stage.

Next Week is Hits of the 80s.

Tonight's Workout

2005-07-27T22:20:00.000-04:00

Tonight, just an 11KM run:

Start: Yonge and Eglinton (Home)

North on Yonge to YorkMills/Wilson
West on Wilson to Avenue Road
South on Avenue to Eglinton
West on Eglinton to Yonge St.

I'm hoping to participate in any of the following runs in August:

Festiv-ete Francophone Festival 10KM Run - Ontario Place, Toronto, Ontario - August 7, 2005

Hazel's Hope 5KM Trail Run - Erindale Park, Mississauga, Ontario - August 13, 2005

Don River Run for Recovery - Sunnybrook Park, Toronto, Ontario - August 28, 2005

Here's the runs I've competed in thus far this year:

Sat Apr 2, 2005
PowerBar Spring Run-Off 8K & Easter Seals 5K - Toronto - RESULTS and PHOTOS

Sun May 1, 2005
Sporting Life 10k - Toronto - RESULTS and PHOTOS

Bread and Honey 15 KM Race - Mississauga, Ontario - June 5, 2005

Nightcrawler 5 Miler Race - Toronto, Ontario - June 22, 2005

Fri Jul 15, 2005
The Nissan Foundation 5K at The Docks - Toronto

Hi there

2005-07-27T21:59:00.000-04:00

Just testing here.

Welcome to my new blog. I was at a previous provider, but alas nothing really came of it.

Now it's time to start anew.

I am the owner of the popular Running Apparel and Accessories store, BEYOND RUNNING SHOES, which can be found at the following address http://cafepress.com/runningcircles

An example of a product I offer is shown above: the Got Marathon? Mug

If you are (or know of) an avid marathon runner and wish to show the world your running passion, these products will surely be a perfect addition.