I took the new Suunto X10 on a trip to Portalón, Costa Rica. The trip was one one-part real estate recon and one-part adventure travel. The watch was useful for both. For the adventure travel part of the trip, I traveled on horseback through the rain forest near Manuel Antonio National Park. It was the perfect place to run the watch through the paces. What follows is a review of this watch with pictures of the Google Earth integration. This Fall Suunto debuted their new flagship GPS product – the X10. The X10 is the replacement for the X9i.  This is proo positive that GPS technology has come a long way in a short time. It is now commonplace in the lives of so many people, and Suunto is leading the way in the GPS watch segment. Just a few years ago, the GPS watches that were out there were expensive and the quality was poor.

Suunto X10 Specs:

1. GPS Route Planning
2. 50 Routes, 500 Waypoints
3. Syncs with powerful Suunto Trek Manager Software as well as Google Earth
4. Altimeter, Barometer, Compass

TEST 1: Accuracy
Could it acquire and maintain a good satellite connection? Would this connection be compromised by the dense cover in the rainforest? I must tell you, it did not disappoint.  I was able to maintain a good connection throughout my entire ride.  There are three modes that determine how often the watch seeks a GPS satellite signal: Manual, 1 minute, and 1 second. Battery life is reduced correspondingly. The owner’s manual estimates a battery life of 16 hours, and 6 hours for 10 minutes and 1 minute respectively. I operated in both modes repeatedly and battery life exceeded these limits by 20% or more in all cases.

TEST 2: Interoperability
My favorite feature, by far, is the interconnection with Google Earth. The process was a super-easy, plug-and-play interface. With the press of a button, my entire trip was uploaded from the watch into Google Earth. See below. Aside from the map data, the watch also maintained time series data on speed, elevation change, distance traveled, etc. Any feasible data relating to my trip was captured and available through the Suunto Trek Manager software. This is, by far, Suunto’s best attempt at software design.

SYNOPSIS: Useful
A GPS wrist top computer has traditionally been a tool used by mountaineers. The X 10 has taken a large technological leap that brings it well within the realm of the casual fan of any outdoor activity: cyclists, trail runners, kayakers…the list goes on. The Google Earth interface makes it extremely easy to share via email, facebook, or your own personal blog or website. User-populated sites such as Mapmyhike/mapmyride/mapmyrun etc. are the perfect venue for these new Google Earth files. Information such as topographical data as well as distance, and elevation gain becomes easy and fun to share with others. Ohh, and don’t just take our word for it, this watch won the Gear of the Year Award by  National Geographic Adventure.

OTHER REVIEWS

Check out the pictures below for GPS maps of the trek — pretty cool!

The video is from my friends in Jackson Hole at Mountain Athlete. Thanks to Pere for sending this video our way. Keep it up guys!

Neal and I took a break last weekend from all the current economic chaos to relax and refocus. 

What better way to recapture this perspective than to climb to the top of the second highest peak in the Continental United States?  Mt. Elbert (14,440 ft.) is 65 feet shorter than the tallest peak in the continental US, California’s Mt. Whitney (14,505 ft.).

It was an amazing weekend mountain climb.  We arrived at the trailhead at around 10 AM on Saturday morning.  Neal had planned the route on his Garmin and in our Suunto watches, so we were set to go.  The sky was total bluebird and it was unseasonably warm (45F).  We started out in base layers and packed 2 extra layers in our 30-pound packs.

We hit the tree line around noon and ran into a solo climber who had summited and was making his way back down.  He gave a very positive report of the terrain and weather as well as what turned out to be an overly optimistic estimate on our time to summit.  He guessed we were about 2 hours from the summit.  It turned out to be 4!

As someone who has climbed the 7 Summits and made a living as a climber, Neal was very patient with the skinny kid from Ohio who was making his first summit.  We reached the summit shoulder to shoulder.  It was amazing to stand at the top and absorb the 360 degrees of panoramic beauty.  That being said, there wasn’t much time to absorb it.  Wind speeds were 20-40 mph on the summit, and wind chill temps were in the single digits.

Special thanks to Suunto, Gu Nutrition, Eider Apparel, Deuter Backpacks and dear mother nature!

Here are the details:

• Mount Elbert
• Elevation 14,440, tallest mountain in Colorado, 2nd tallest in continental US
• Hiking Distance From Trail head: 9.5 miles round trip
• Elevation Gain: 4,700 feet
• Latitude/Longitude: 39.11780 N / 106.4447 W

…Wouldn’t you like to get away?  Some times you wanna go…

5 Reasons To Train in the San Francisco Bay

1. The Bay is clean and has less chemicals than the pool.
2. Swimming allows me the feel the strength of my body.
3. Time with the people at the Dolphin Club makes me a better person.
4. Being among the ocean creatures puts me in touch with nature.
5. The colder the water the better the sauna feels at the end.

5 Reasons to Train

1. Test of my body and mind.
2. Feeling of tangible accomplishment.
3. Body feels better when I do.
4. Quality time with friends before and after.
5. Puts hardship and ego in proper perspective.

Last night I swam in black glass. We jumped into the San Francisco Bay ocean water after dark. It was so darn peaceful as the light of the Ghirardelli Chocholate Factory shone across the black glassy water. These are the nights that can make any workday worth living. It was a wonderful cold water training swim. My buddy Dave joined us for the apres-swim sauna then we all went back to a French place and talked about adventures past and adventures future. These are the days worth remembering.

Adam has been training these days too in Denver, where the temperatures have dropped down at night to the 40s, so I suspect most of his training has been on the Wilier cycles (shameless plug, sorry, but we love these guys).

Hope everyone’s training is going awesome. Take care.

1. Never Let Your Tread Wear Out: Replace your tires frequently. With fresher rubber, you’ll have fewer flats and also a better-handling bike.

2. Regularly Inspect Your Tires: Sometimes you’ll come back from a ride with small bits of glass or debris embedded in the outer casing. If you habitually clean this stuff off, it won’t have a chance to work through the tire.

3. Same Goes for Your Chain: Keep it clean and lubed and your bike will shift, and look, better. And if you replace your chain before it gets too worn out, you’ll save the expense of having to fix or replace pricier items like cassettes and chainrings, which suffer increased wear and tear from old chains.

4. Buy a Torque Wrench: Modern bike components are made of expensive materials like carbon and titanium and highly engineered to save weight. But that also means they can be damaged by overtightening. Manufacturers test their products and provide torque recommendations. Make sure you follow them.

5. Find a Good Local Bike Shop and Mechanic, and Be Loyal: The more familiar they become with your bike and your riding style, the more able they’ll be to keep everything working to your liking.

1. Bad bike fit
2. Poor nutrition regimen (racing and training)
3. Bought products based on price/brand.  Paid little attention to catering to my race needs.

Last but not least — pictures from our rest day in Nottingham. We visited the Nottingham Castle, and the local bike shop Freewheel where the head mechanic rebuilt Neal’s bottom bracket and tightened Adam’s rear cassette. Thanks guys!

I was there for less than 48 hours, and Neal and I spent a good deal of that time training. We got in two decent swims on Saturday, and then we both participated in an open-water “race” put on by the Dolphin Club. We had to check in for the race by 6:00, which meant that the alarm clock went off at about 4:30! We took a boat from the club to the San Francisco Bay bridge, and once dropped off, it was an all-out sprint back to the club. The front group was ultra-competitive, with the winning swimmer completing the 2 ½ mile course in under 40 minutes (current assisted). Neal wasn’t too far behind at around 45 minutes, and I straggled in about 3-4 minutes after that. Many thanks to all of the volunteers who rowed beside us making this event as safe and as fun as possible.

We took a few minutes to bring our core temperatures back up to human levels, and then bee-lined for the airport. It was a fast and furious weekend, but all-in-all a great time!

I moved from Philadelphia to San Francisco. I’m new here, and one of the big parts of moving for me is finding a new place to workout. I know about the Dolphin Swim Club in San Francisco, so I went there to check on their latest activities. While I was at the Dolphin Club I heard about two upcoming open water swims.

Both swims are open water swims. Both are relatively short (1-2 miles). And I’ll be doing both with my friend Paul who works at Facebook. I’m super stoked about both! It will be a fun way for us to mix-up workouts, and a good way for me to get in the race mindset prior to the English Channel, which is coming up SOON!

Yesterday Neal and I jumped in for a 2 hour swim. We were a little disconcerted to look down at the Suunto and see that the water temperature had risen to a balmy 63 degrees over the last week! Aakk! We’re getting coddled here in the states! Mark Robson and the rest of the gang over in the UK will have some ammo to lob at us now that they’ve been organizing Dover swims that are still in the 50’s. In our favor, though, is the fact that we were swimming up stream against a mighty current. The stone bridge supports pictured are about 10-15 yards in width. Without exaggeration, it took 2 1/2 minutes to pass the supports. I think I was moving backwards at times. I literally felt as if I was working out in one of those endless pools. Every breath I took, I was looking at the same stone as the breath before. Take that, Brits! (Disclaimer: There are no head currents during the Channel swim so this workout actually gives us no describable advantage).

Incidentally there have been several conversations across both swimming and multi-sport message boards regarding watches. My 2 cents: I love the Suunto. I have the T6. If you are looking for a simple, no-nonsense watch this is probably not the watch for you. The T6 is good because I can use it with everything. Temperature is great for the water. It syncs with an HR belt to keep track of my heart rate and can be set to keep me in zone. It syncs with my bike and measures speed/distance etc. It syncs with my GPS and can track speed/distance/altitude etc. This feature is more useful for mapping out hikes or mountain bike trips. It also syncs with a “Foot Pod” and tracks speed and distance of the run workouts. All workouts are saved to the watch and can be uploaded to a computer in seconds with a maneuverable and graphical output for easy analysis. I’ll try to put a full review together in the near future.

1. Swimming in the same direction as the waves makes you feel like you’re drowning. Waves force the legs down into the water. That provides a downward pulling sensation that caught me off-guard at first (i.e. I thought I was going to die).
2. The altitude here means I breath more – obvious and true.
3. My right hand cramped open, preventing me from scooping the water. This made me swim crooked and more slowly than usual. I kept up a 2 mph pace by kicking more. I hope the hand cramping was a one-time thing.

As always, here are some pictures to lend credibility to my crazy yarns.

Adam is driving cross-country to Denver on his way to his new home in Denver. He rode today too, in Ohio.

[Special section for history nerds] Valley Forge was the site where General Washington stationed 12,000 soldiers during the winter of 1777. The Confederates had already captured Philadelphia and the soldiers were there to protect the rest of Pennsylvania. The winter of 1777 was reportedly wicked cold, and 2,000 soldiers died of exposure and pneumonia that winter. The park service lets the fields grow fallow so we can imagine all the tents and the thousands of men who were stationed there. Seeing it now is beautiful, but I’m guessing (based on the number of deaths) that back then it probably was a real crummy place to be.

For our training here in Philadelphia these bikes have been seeing a lot more action now that the weather is sunny and warm. The river in the background is the same river that we swim.

[UPDATE] Friday April 25, At day break today we took the bikes out for a 50-mile ride. On the way back we watched a guy get struck by a car on his Kuota carbon. The guy’s shoulder and his anodized Fulcrum wheelset bore the brunt of the impact. We helped him collect his stuff and check his wheel. He was OK and biked away from the accident. Close call that one.

He who wants to find the sea should take a river for his guide.

We are training in the Schuylkill River! We’ve done it 3 of last 4 days. Today we swam for 80 minutes. And after doing those miles we plan to swim more and more. Here’s why we love it…

• It’s cold. Cold is important for us to acclimatize our bodies. The water temps in the Philadelphia’s Schuylkill River has been 58-64F, which is pretty close to the water temps that we’ll see in the English Channel which is 56-58F. So far the cold is treating us well and only our toes are cold during the swim.
• It’s beautiful. And a fun change of pace from the pool. Keeping the mind busy lets us forget about our shoulders and biceps.
• It’s clean. Despite popular belief it’s a very clean river. The Philadelphia Department of Water has a website with daily coliform/bacteria counts, water flow, and water temp. These three together form a proxy for water quality. Nothing instills confidence that the river is safe like that big green banner on the Rivercast website!

The green banner means the water is safe.

From behind the camera the river is idealistically beautiful! Up close there tends to be more duck weed and gunk. But we still like it.

1. Hands should enter water at 1 and 11 o’clock. Do not waste energy with side-to-side movement.
2. Hand should glide right after it enters water. Pull should start within first few inches.
3. Be long in the water. No hip bend. Little knee bend.
4. Be level and stiff in water to reduce drag and increase torque.
5. Hands should exit water at hip to follow-through to stroke.

As part of my acclimitization I swam in the 45-degree Atlantic Ocean this weekend. You see, my two good friends Rick and Carla live smack-dab on the ocean, so my training was a great excuse to visit and spend some time with them in their home. I was the only swimmer on the beach and the fisherman thought I was bonkers. Truth be told, with the wetsuit it wasn’t all that bad. My core stayed warm and my cognition was clear (cold water sometimes prevents us humans from thinking straight). Here are some pictures of me and my good friends.

Next weekend I will try the same swims without the wetsuit — such swims have been done by our friend (Mark Robson) for several weeks. He is also training for the English Channel swim.

Everyone wants a healthy lifestyle. There are new trends that help a healthy lifestyle fit into our day-to-day. I put together a list of what I think are THE leading-edge fitness trends; and just for fun I put them to the ABCs. I am involved in most of these trends, but not all (there are 7 that I’m not involved in). I will let you all postulate in the comments which of the ABCs I do not do.

A for Adventure races – like 10 Degrees!
B for Balance training (taichi, yoga and pilates)
C for Creatine
D for Dry-land training for swimmers, or the reverse
E for Eating breakfast – eating early makes you thin at night
F for Fixed-gear bicycles – brakes are for flakes
G for Google map your next run
H for Halfsizes – restaurant portions are twice the FDA recommendation
I for Intense workouts trumping long workouts
J for Juice bars
K for Ketone breath avoidance
L for Lactive threshold (LT) training
M for Mind/body exercise (yoga, tai chi, and qigong)
N for Navy Seal bootcamp-style training
O for Online videoconferencing allows group training at home
P for Power meters for bikes
Q for Quest-based adventures (7 Summits, et al)
R for Recovery drinks
S for Stability balls
T for Thule roof racks to bring your kit with you
U for Underwater MP3 players for swimming/surfing
V for Video analysis packages for bike fits like Dartfish
W for Wrist computers to track workouts
X for Xtreme sports
Y for Yoga
Z for Zucchini

1. Incorporate competition and goal-setting into your routine. You don’t necessarily have to sign up for races, but aim to reach the far wall a smidgen faster than you did the day before, or try to break a minute in the 100-meter freestyle, a good benchmark for speed.
2. Swim large distances. He swims 3-5 miles per day
3. Streamline your stroke. Ryan swims 15 meters underwater after each flip turn to focus on being hydrodynamic. “I work a lot on staying high in the water, not fighting the water, moving with the water,”
4. Incorporate dry-land exercises. Before every pool session, Lochte (below right) and his Florida teammates pass around the medicine ball, do multiple sets of push-ups and 500 abdominal crunches.

A related NYT article is here: Coach’s Corner

Step 1: Organize a fan base.
20 minutes on the telephone.
Lauren asked her good friend MacLean to run with her. My Ironman friend Jonathan volunteered to ride bikes with me to setup refreshment stations and guide the runners.

Step 2: Buy supplies.
20 minutes shopping time.
1- Cap gun & noise makers
2- GU hydration/gels & dixie cups. 1 gel + 2 cups per 45-minutes
3- Face sponges (not from the sink!) in discarded Chinese delivery food container
4- Chalk for making sidewalk cheers
5- Knee brace, just in case
6- Finish line: orange crape paper, collapsible tent pole, 72 balloons, scotch tape
7- Map of event, printed using Google Pedometer. Here’s our link.
8- Ice cream for post-race party
9- Replica runner “chips”, to mimic the RFID tracking chips used at organized races

Step 3: Build finish line
2 hours assembly time.
Blow-up balloons. Find a flexible pole that works (I used a tent pole from a Mountain Hardwear tent because it is light and has a natural bend at the top). Scotch tape balloons to the pole. The result is pretty fabulous and eye-catching.

Step 4: Start runners, guide runners, refresh runners and CHEER!
2 hours during the race.
The race began with a cap gun and a crape paper. Jonathan and I biked ahead and every mile or so offered refreshments and cheers. We had water and GU hydration juices. At mile 8 we offered GU and sponges to wash the salt from their faces. At the end of the race we held the balloon finish line and they broke through the crepe paper. It was all pretty rad.

Good Cheers: “Yeaaah Lauren & MacLean!”, “Looking good!”, “Yippee!”. The louder the better.

Bad Cheers (aka. cheers to avoid): “You are almost there!”, “Right around the corner!”, “Just about finished!”, “You are not going to make it!”, and booing, hissing, or cursing.

Step 5: Host post-race party
We kicked it Ben & Jerry’s style.
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In the end… Lauren and McLean finished the half-mile with 9:24 minute miles, which is pretty fast! The whole thing cost around $20 ($35 including the ice cream), which is less than the entrance price for most half-marathons.

Do different… If I had it to do over again I’d involve music from a boom box and bib numbers.

Upside… It was almost more fun to host our own event than to participate in an organized event. Organizing our own meant we could pick the best route and the best weather day.

Full resolution images are here.

10 tips to liven-up your (crusty old) swim workout:

1. Listen to music while swimming. We like the waterproof mp3 player called Swimp3.
2. Eat a mid-swim snack. I swim harder if I have a delicious mid-swim snack. We like bananas and Gu Energy Gel.
3. Bring toys. Is it just me or are swim hand paddles a ton of fun?! I feel like a speed racer when I use them. We like the stuff from Tyr.
4. Count your laps. We like this simple little $24 lap counter from SportCount.
5. Vary that workout. Here are 50 workouts to test out.
6. Bring a friend. I swim harder and longer if Adam, Lauren or Jenn is swimming with me. Or, if you’re me you can even be so lucky as to meet your girlfriend in the pool!
7. Join a team. I joined the Penn Masters Swim Club and is has been a lot of fun.
8. Go outside. There are great outdoor swim places near Philadelphia. Be mindful of the water temperatures.
9. Get a coach. Improving your technique gives you something to think about. We sought advice from the Head Coach of Penn’s Varsity Swim Team.
10. Be held accountable. Tell your significant other and family how you plan to train. They will keep you on track. I can’t tell you how many times this has been the only thing that got me out of bed at 630AM!

Hope this helps. Have a good workout!

Sure ’nuff. He’s in Alaska for 9 days heli skiing! He’d better be taking advantage of the open water swimming up there. If he can do the 38F water temps in the Prince William Sound in February, then he can certainly handle the 55F water temps in Dover in July.

One hundred 100s Workout
10 x 100 (400 warm-up, 6x 25 IM)
5 x 200 (crawl, back, breast, back, crawl)
4 x 300 (pull)
2 x 400 (kick)
4 x 500 (crawl)
2 x 400 (kick)
4 x 300 (pull)
5 x 200 (crawl, back, breast, back, crawl)
10 x 100 (6x 25 IM, 400 cool-down)
= 10,000 meters (6.2 miles)

Adam and I will leave notes in the comments when we do this workout. Meantime, a question for the comments: What are your favorite swim workouts?

He was looking at because we’re looking for some nearby open water swims. Trouble is there aren’t any organized events until summer. The water temperatures in the East are sub-50F until April, which is chilly. It looks like we might plan a trip down to Florida in March. If you have suggestions please let us know.

The family truly wants my Channel crossing to be a success. One of my major concerns has been my ability to keep weight on as I prepare my body for the 58 degree temperatures in the English Channel. Well, they can’t get in the pool and swim for me. They can’t get on the bike and pedal for me. But they sure as heck can fatten me up! My holidays were filled with feast after feast prepared by every relative who’s ever stepped foot in a kitchen. And in between the feasts, there was plenty of Christmas baking to benefit from. My goal is to put on about 20 pounds before I get in the water, and thanks to my loved ones, I’m well on my way. Here’s to keeping that weight on in the new year!

We’ve sang the praises of Cadence Cycling many times before, but in my mind the one thing that sets them apart more than any other retailer I’ve ever come in contact with, is their coaching staff. They have the most impressive collection of brain power and coaching prowess you could imagine. Yet their packages can be dumbed down for a couple of amateurs like us. They do it all, from newbies to pros, and they do it all very well. They get attention/press based on the pro cyclists and triathletes they coach, but it’s much more important to me for them to be able to turn a weekend warrior into a stronger competitor. I found it very convenient that we were located in Philly and have access to this place, but as it turns out, you can establish a coaching relationship and participate in training sessions from anywhere in the world. In early 2008 Cadence will be launching Cadence.tv. It is a completely interactive online training system that allows you to be a part of professionally-coached training sessions either live or On-Demand. If it rolls out as described it could be an awesome training tool. We’re signing up right away, and we will pass on our reviews as soon as possible with the good the bad and the ugly.

We’re really excited that Mike was willing to clear room in his schedule for us. He has an impressive professional resume and has competed and won at the top levels of road racing, mountain bike racing and cyclo-cross. Most important to us is his ability to transfer his knowledge and experience to make us better. He’s done it before, and we’re hoping he can do it again. He’s turned rookies into seasoned vets. He’s turned amateurs into pros, and he’s turned pros into champions. Seriously. We’re stoked.

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Speed = a measure of the velocity of the bike, measured in mph or kph. Speed is not a good measure of exertion or intensity while cycling because it is greatly affected by opposing forces such as wind, grade, road surface, drafting, gravity (body & bike weight), aerodynamic profile and friction (drivetrain efficiency) as well as power. It is important to remember though, that races are won by the fastest rider, not the rider with the most power. Speed = Power – Opposing Forces (aerodynamic, gravity, rolling resistance) so in the end a rider must optimize this equation by increasing power and decreasing opposing forces as much as possible to produce maximum speed.

Intensity Factor (IF) = the normalized power for a ride with respect to the functional threshold of the rider = NP/FT. Therefore an effort at 100% of threshold should equal an IF of 1.0. If the rider has an IF of over 1.05 for over an hour, their functional threshold may have increased since the last test (or their power meter needs to be calibrated)

Functional Threshold (FT) = the maximum power a rider can produce for a period of 60 minutes. This can be estimated by completing a 60 minute time trial, a 60 minute “race-type effort” with a high normalized power (commonly a difficult criterium or fast group ride), by taking 95% of the power produced in a 20 minute time trial, 90% of the power produced in an 8 minute time trial or by completing a lactate threshold test in the lab.

Normalized Power (NP) = calculated power over a given duration that better takes into account non-steady state efforts. Average power will decrease if there are significant recovery periods during warmup, cooldown or in between efforts but the stress of the ride does not necessarily decrease (think of driving a car… you can average under the speed limit but it doesn’t mean you won’t get a ticket). Therefore, average power is not a good measure of exertion for non steady state efforts such as races, hilly rides and many group rides. Normalized power should reflect the actual intensity of the effort. It is calculated by taking a 30 second rolling average of the power values, taking these values to the 4th power, averaging these values and taking the 4th route of this number. Therefore, when the power spikes very high, these spikes will be given exponential weighting. For example, a criterium may produce an average power of only 160 watts (due to the regular periods of coasting) but the same race might yield a normalized power of 280 watts (due to the many accelerations). Though normalized power is a very good measure of true exertion, because NP works on a 30 second rolling average, rides with power spikes of less than 30 seconds may not be weighted as highly as expected and likewise other rides that contain maximal efforts of 30-60 seconds may be weighted more highly than expected.

Exciting news, Adam is back from his recruiting trips in Seattle and Denver. The dude can’t stop raving about Denver. I’m just glad he’s back. While he was gone I was without a regular training partner. Now that he’s back the problem is solved, but… I’ll poke fun at him anyways.

I saw this video from Chris Prouse and it really made me laugh. I’m like Chris, in that my bicycle has been my training partner for the past days while Adam way away.

Hope your autumn training is going well out there. Enjoy the video, hope it makes you all laugh too.