Monday, May 31, 2021

speed test

The weather was better today, so I walked home and, when I got to my apartment, took a break and then walked the park loop three times to test my walking speed.

Result: I'm already pretty close to normal. The thing I'm lacking is endurance, and the more I think about it, the more I realize it's because I was basically flat on my back for a week.

I just used the ruler function on Naver Map to roughly determine that the park loop I walked is 937.5 meters in length. I'm able to walk the loop in almost exactly 12 minutes. I started at 6:56 p.m.;,finished the first loop by 7:08, did the second loop by 7:20, and finished the final loop by 7:32 p.m. That's about the speed at which I'd walk the loop even before my stroke. With a bit of algebra, I saw that I was walking at a rate of 4.685 kph, and since my goal speed is 4.8 kph, I'm already most of the way there. Walking is a repetitive activity, so it's good to be rewiring my brain to walk.

The question now is endurance. Walking home was a sweaty affair today, and doing those three loops required some effort. But I'm surrounded by opportunities to improve my endurance, so I'll be walking the stairs in my building, the stairs along the Yangjae Creek, and plenty of other local paths. Reaching my goal of 30 kilometers at 4.8 kph looks attainable.

Tomorrow, we begin the real training.



3 comments:

Daniel said...

Very impressive stats and effort. Perhaps a small portion of one of the longer trails may even be within reach later in the year?

Kevin Kim said...

I'm still hoping to heal up enough to do the east-coast trail, but we'll see.

John Mac said...

Very impressive! This is the best news yet and demonstrates that you are on the road to a full recovery. I predict you will come out of this stronger than ever.