Tuesday, February 01, 2005

Treadmills

I was revisiting some older parts of my training log at lunch, and I happened across something I wrote a little bit under a year ago. At the time, I was living in Atlanta and working out at a gym in the building where I worked. The building was on a slope and the gym was one floor up from the street on the "uphill" side and two on the "downhill" side. This was my opinion of treadmills:

Advantages:
1. Safety--It would be very difficult to get run over by a car, especially when your gym, like mine, is on the second or third floor above street level.
2. Convenience--The treadmill is always there and often available.
3. Temperate--You don't have to worry about rain, snow, ice or wind when you're on the treadmill.
4. Pace Running--You can learn to run at a precise pace, since the treadmill goes at a constant speed.
5. Amusement--It's possible to listen to music or even watch television from a treadmill.

Disadvantages
1. Chopped Stride--The running surface of the treadmill is too short, even for one of my modest stature. I can't imagine the difficulty someone 6'2" or taller would have on one of these machines.
2. Pace--The fastest a treadmill (at least all of the ones in my gym) will go is 10 mph, or 6:00/mile pace. I enjoy sprinting for portions of my runs, particularly the last half mile. It would not be unusual for me to run the last half mile in 2:40 or less, and that's impossible on one of these treadmills.
3. Convenience--All of the treadmills in the gym might be in use at any time, making it impossible to get a run in if you won't go outside. In addition, you can only use your gym's treadmills when the gym is open (of course if you've got enough disposable income to be able to afford a really good treadmill...) At least the street is literally always available.
4. Dizzyness--I can't be the only one who experiences dizzyness after stepping off the treadmill, can I?
5. BORING!--It is neccessary to bring music or have access to a television in order to keep interested. Next time, I'm bringing a cd player with me to keep myself going.
6. Almost forgot--that stupid emergency stop--It's there for a reason--to keep you from going off the end of the belt--but the cord must be too short or something, because it seems to be too easy for me to pull the cord and stop the whole thing.

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