u/souldawg

I know the music has gone downhill, but there are still opportunities for fun class ideas.

A New Zealand radio station has been popping into my FYP for segments on the best nananana in a song, the best key change, the best intro.

The instructors have great themes on bigger topics, but would love to see a straight out silly approach. If they could I would whole heartedly endorse a random best key change class or nananana version.

What ideas for random class themes do you have?

Seeing all the Leadville 100 questions, looking at the sharing of the course, talk of pacers, it's giving me FOMO.

**editing to say, I can't even train at the moment. Just wanted general advice. I wouldn't travel to a race I didn't think I can complete. I just typically find super helpful comments from this community and wanted some thoughts. The consensus appears, this is not for me and I accept that.**

I'm a slow runner. My last 100 miler I did had 8k ft of incline and I finished it in 33:45. I had unknown internal bleeding which caused fatigue and illness, but still, not Leadville standards.

Aside from the whole entry process, and the fact I'm not healthy yet, how does a slower person actually even make this event a reality? Is there a way to train for it and make it possible?

I typically choose events with generous cut offs because of my pace. But all this chat has made me get an itch for a challenge and a goal for when I'm able to get back to fully training again. But like a 2-3 year goal, would this even be in the cards?

I'm international, but thinking also traveling for an event internationally could also be part of a fun challenge when I'm fully recovered. [I also realise this is my mind wanting to get back to training and being frustrated because my body isn't there.]

I've done a few events now with cows, lots and lots of cows. The advice from event organisers for these is to talk softly or sing a song to let the cows know you are there.

Some people just power through the fields of cows without problem. I however have a very irrational fear of getting attacked or stampeded. It stems from reading more people are killed by cows than sharks.

The 100 miler I did earlier this month had one field with close to 200 cows we had to go through. I try to give a wide berth, but in this instance you had to go through as they were just everywhere. The guys in front of me were just really going for it through them. I on the other hand was the nervous nelly.

So, how do you deal with cows during events. Are you a power through or a cautious person like me. Any tips beyond singing because my voice is terrible and might cause them to stampede. Also am I being ridiculous having a fear of cows when running. Is this also a niche problem? I was thinking about it last night, so just thought, given how ridiculous this is, would pose the question here.

Saw the same landscape designer as the other backyard reno that had the unsafe plants and ginormous sauna, and was like this is going to be a disaster. Didn't see him for a bit, but then when he came back with his zone design, and yep it was IMO a disaster.

It's a big back yard, but compressing everything and putting up those screens made the zones, to me, feel claustrophobic. Everything was compressed into one small area, made it feel smaller and less usable vs spreading out some of the areas. Then the play area? Moving from a (yes, albeit broken) jungle gym to that little house that the kid will grow out of faster? It confirmed my opinion of this designer, and actually all the designers on the show.

Jonathan is likeable, but this to me is just trading spaces design without the neighbors doing the labor. If hay is glued to a wall next week, I would not bat an eye.

**editing** I found the designers instagram, and the privacy screens, smaller tighter spaces seem to be a design approach vs a time constraint. So I wonder what the audition process or approach was to choose designers. It could work in some spaces but it's forcing his design style on everyone.

So I finished a 100 mile event last weekend, and then ended up in hospital requiring blood transfusions and a procedure. I wanted to share, not trying to show toughness, but to say that we all push through so much fatigue at events and in some instances, pushing through isn't always the right path.

The long and short of it, I didn't realise that I had severe GI bleeding. I had been recently feeling super dizzy and fatigued. Went to my GP and then a second private GP to get it sorted before the event. They did blood pressure studies and even an MRI on my head to see if there were any pressure issues. They couldn't find any and cleared me to run, saying it could be salt imbalances or my HRT. Neither did a blood test, which should have been a red flag, but I didn't know.

During the event, I was feeling pretty good until mile 50 when the fatigue was hitting. I thought my salt balance was off because I was drinking loads. Tried to correct it. By about mile 75, I got severe GI issues and saw that it was melena. Took 2 immodium and kept going not really knowing what it was, but that it was 'different'.

I then was getting mentally foggy, developed the lean, but attributed that to the GI issues exacerbating salt issues. Didn't want to eat, but forced soup and potatoes down.

By mile 93 I was done, I was leaning on my poles with the pronounced lean, but convinced myself it was only 7 miles to go and soldiered on. The final 1.5 mile push was up about 200 stairs and then a hill to the finish. I had to stop every 5 stairs because my heart rate was just sky rocketing. I thought it was a me thing not being strong enough to go on, but knew I was so close.

Finished the event, got home and then ended up going to A&E the next day. My normal hemoglobin went from 135 to 78. I was kept in hospital for 5 days with blood transfusions and a procedure to stop the bleeding.

I feel like a complete idiot for soldiering on and finishing the event, but genuinely thought it was a salt and fatigue issue. I had been cleared by 2 doctors. I thought they knew best, even though I felt like something could be wrong. I should have listened to my body and recognised something was different and wrong vs just pushing through to finish.

I'm an idiot. I can admit it. But just wanted to say sometimes when you know the fatigue and feeling is more than normal, accept the DNF vs being tough. Also always ask for blood tests even if your doctor's don't order them!

The agent put this rental on rightmove as a sale. A 1 bedroom in NW3 for £450! Even as a rental that's crazy, but no one put an offer on this - it's mine!

* I viewed the rental and it was previously £2500/month, so I think there has been a multitude of issues from the EA*

A company that is accepting applications right now requires you to do a Beat Claude challenge. They essentially gave Claude the case study for the role: strategy, operations, prompting to make the workflow more efficient, measurement, and are now requiring you do the case study before they consider you with the interview.

They are satisfied with what Claude has produced. Therefore, the only way to get an interview is to show you can beat Claude, based on their ideas, with the same challenge. They estimate it takes 15 hours and you have to provide a complete strategy, content production, measurement analysis, and also prompts for workflow improvements.

The irony is for a company so pushed to be AI forward, they don't realise AI only takes the mean. It doesn't build outliers which drives success in marketing and business. So they are working to middling vs working to excellence. I understand the rationale, and even agree with the fact they could evaluate prompting knowledge, but to require 15 hours of work before being considered for an interview is bonkers. Then knowing they think success is the median and probably won't appreciate outlier thinking that challenges the norm, is a big no.

Has anyone else had such an AI heavy task before even being considered for an interview?

With Peloton's new connected push to keep your streak going, I connected my Garmin. However, I did an ultra this weekend and it didn't track. It shows on the Garmin Connect screen as syncing to Peloton, and the activity pushed to Peloton. However, the activity did not appear in my activities and it broke my streak because it did not count.

I contacted Peloton who said they can't help because it's an issue of the activity being too long in duration to sync. Thanks Peloton! I realise I'm a slow runner, but if I run a silly ultra, even at a silly slow time, I want the said silly slow ultra to count on my silly Peloton metrics that I know mean nothing IRL.

So for others who might be tracking their other activities via connected apps, beware, it has limits and does not track all your activities.

If you need a mood lifter, Jos's 15min 80s walk from the 27th of April is THE class. (for some reason it won't let me link).

She gets the lyrics wrong in the first song and then gets them wrong again before finally getting it right in the last chorus. Her focus the entire class is just proving she knows the lyrics to songs. It's funny, relatable, unhinged, and just the best. Not a hard class, but the class you need if you just want a mental break and something to distract you.

I’m typically a music person on a run. For events, I tend to save my music until the last moment to keep me going. But typically listen throughout training runs.

That said, I chose to listen to a Search Engine episode on the best restaurant bread at the end of a self supported 50k, and it was so engaging, the last miles flew by.

Does anyone have any good non-running podcasts they listen to while running? Any genre is fine, except running related ones because when I run I don’t want to think about additional running things.

I love Heavyweight and Search Engine because I can get engrossed and it’s typically framed in a non-heavy manner.

But am just looking for any recs to try out. There are no wrong answers (except running podcasts). Just in case my music doesn’t scratch that itch in a pinch, will put a few on the list.