Welcome


Thoughts on fitness, health, good nutrition ... and running.


Welcome to Bald Man Running, a blog launched by Frank Murphy on January 1, 2015.

In March, 2013 I was selected as a contestant for the sixth season of Fort Wayne's Smallest Winner. Through this amazing program, I learned about good nutrition, sound exercise and accountability. By October, I would lose over 88 pounds (almost 37% of my original weight)! One of the many things I acquired through FWSW was a love for running. You can retrace my weight loss journey and discover how I became a runner by reading those entries labeled "fwsw" ...

Note: Many of the blog entries on this website predate 1/1/2015. Prior to launching BMR, I had written articles for various projects, and I have imported many of them into this blog (labeled "retro").

Thursday, January 16, 2014

Elliptical goal

Disclaimer: I realize that using the elliptical isn't the same as running outdoors. I'm not claiming these numbers are comparable, but it's still a personal best for me, and I'm inclined to share them here ...

This morning I had a elliptical session for 60 minutes with a five minute cool down (during which I didn't really cool down, but kept hitting it pretty hard). I finished with 12,218 strides in 65 minutes and burned 1087 calories.

That's an average pace of 188 strides/minute (which supposedly equals 8.56 miles for an average pace of 7:36 minutes/mile).

I definitely worked harder the second half of the session than I did the first half. At 30 minutes, I just cleared 5100 strides (roughly 3.5 miles). Thus, my last half was an average pace of 204 strides/minute (or 6:55 minutes/mile for roughly 5 miles).

Again, I realize this isn't the same as running. I'm not claiming that I ran five consecutive sub-seven miles. I've simply had this elliptical-based goal (breaking 12,000 in 65 minutes) hanging out there for a while now, and it feels like a big deal to reach that goal. One day, I'll get to 12,000 in 60 minutes ...

Setting goals and knocking 'em down ... it's a good way to stay motivated.