Birmingham half marathon - track me live
By Oliver Westmancott (Director), 25 October 2008
I’m running the half marathon on Sunday. I’m no athlete so in order not to embarrass myself I’ve taken my training quite seriously. By seriously I mean geekely…
It’s well known that I really like spreadsheets - for organising everything, and my training plan has been no exception. It’s got every 144.52 miles that I’ve run in the 19 Hours 43 Minutes and 47 Seconds of training that I’ve done. It’s also got charts showing my actual pace and formulas to calculate my normalised half marathon time from every run.
That’s all quite geeky but this may just top it…
It’s live so you’ll know where I am whenever I turn my iPhone on. After the race I’ll find a way of exporting a record of it.
GPS tracking powered by InstaMapper.com
If you happen to see this post while the race is on then please do leave a comment - I’ll obviously be otherwise engaged…
God this is extra-special geekiness - superb. I’m running on Sunday as well but haven’t tracked my training for this one. However, you can see my spreadsheets for my 2007 and 2008 London Marathon training in google docs. I may do some pre-race tweeting but can’t stretch to GPS tracking.
Best of luck for Sunday!
Dave
Love it - good luck. Don’t break yourself or your iphone.
[...] it is I’m car-sharing with some fellow runners. For a top example of running geekiness then check out Oliver from local design firm, ie design, who is using his iphone to allow others to track him though the [...]
[...] the Barton Arms for example with a pint and watching tired people run past, or for the more geeky watch as Oliver Westmancott uses his iPhone to track his progress. Interested as I am in geo-location stuff, I won’t be running with my iPhone. For top geekery [...]
waiting by the drinks station about 9.5 miles in. Leading runner just came past. Where are you.
just seen dave Harte. Looking strong. Well done mate
you’re flying - instamapper reports 46kmh!! World record looks like it will be smashed by you - unless, perhaps, the data is wrong;-) go Oliver!
Oliver. Saw you at 10 miles and again at 11. Looking invincible.
Saw Lauren and team Burdette. Just heard from dave and tim that you’ve been injured and carried across the finish line. Oh the drama! Hope you’re ok. What a way to finish.
Just heard from Oliver by text. Fear not one and all. He ran out of blood sugar and fell within sight if the finish. Sweet tea and fruit juice has rejuvenated him. This is my final communiqe on ‘The Thin Man’ - available in Penguin Classic.
Didn’t spot you Ollie! My race wasn’t half as dramatic as your colleague’s!. Race report up.
Dave
Well done to all who triumphed the marathon on Sunday! Im so proud!
Hi Oliver,
Excellent idea on this. Did it all go to plan? I’ve just got an Nokia N96 with GPS on it so I might try something similar myself soon. Any tips?