Run Commuting, Pt II

Right, then…

I took my second swing at run commuting, today. Did the same route and run/mass transit distribution as last time. I did, however, learn that my route is 0.3 miles shorter than I originally thought – a discrepancy between manual mapping and real-time mapping with MapMyRun. I understand this is quite silly to fret over, but I’m still a little bit of a data junkie.

Anyway….

I tried a couple of different things, this week. Last week, I was having problems with the shoulder straps loosening while I was running, which led to the pack wagging left and right while I was running. Also, when I got to work, my lunch salad was…well, let’s just say that all the jostling made it less than crisp.

So, for the loosening strap issue, I had to do some research as to the why. It turns out that when webbing (like what is used to adjust the shoulder straps) is too smooth, the buckles do not bite and hold it in place. To counter that, I’ve glued a small section of rough webbing to the webbing on the pack, where it laces through the buckles. It makes the shoulder straps harder to adjust on the fly, but they did hold adjustment, which was the goal.

I also loaded the pack differently. Last week, I packed the clothes at the bottom and the lunch on top, thus the bulk of the weight was down low. I switched the loading today (lunch on bottom, clothes on top) shifting some of the weight upward; this seemed to help with the wagging issue, as well.

For the zipper issue, I rubbed some soap on the zipper teeth (the things you learn from Google!), which does help them run smoother. However, I’m still having problems with the waist strap pockets. Those, I think, are a design issue: If I open them up too much, they bind when I try to close them one-handed – I’ll have to be mindful of that when I get the phone or a snack out of them. I might get some thread and sew in a stop point, to prevent me from inadvertently opening those pockets too wide.

This afternoon, I did notice that the waist belt buckle developed a crack, but that’s an easy fix. Being that this showed up after only two runs, makes me wonder about the longevity of the pack. A friend has a sewing machine and it might behoove me to buy her a bottle of good rum if she’s willing to do some upgrades for me.

The actual run was fine. While I can run longer distances BFR (2.7 to 3.0 mi, right now), I’m going to keep the running-with-backpack distance down for now as I’m concerned about running with the extra weight due to the pack. I’ll continue to increase BFR distance whilst unladen.

Finally, I came this close to getting on the train barefoot, this morning. But a few minutes before the train arrived, I chickened out and put on my shoes. Something doesn’t feel comfortable about that, just yet.

RP

Comments

There are no comments to display.

Blog entry information

Author
RunningPirate
Views
36
Last update

More entries in Community Blogs

More entries from RunningPirate