Training Week 3 - Sunday

Got a healthy serving of whoop-ass today. We couldn't get a swimming pool, so decided to do a team bike + run. We lined up our running shoes next to a wall, got on our bikes and did a 7 mile loop. Then left our bikes next to the wall, put on our running shoes and went for a run around the track at Redwood High School. Done. Repeat.

I was able to do it 3 times.

We were able to stretch and laugh at the end of it, but man was it tough.

So that was the end of the training.

After a shower, it was off to the Gay Pride Parade on Market Street, San Francisco. Posting a Flick badge of the pictures I took below:

www.flickr.com

Training Week 3 - Thursday

I guess I am thinking too much about my running technique, which is a good thing. But it is making me a bit cautious and making me run really slowly. Today, we were supposed to have a 2 mile timed run at Kezar Stadium. I couldn't make the team run, so I went there in the morning to run on my own. I estimated how long the track was and finished my 2 miles. "Wow! I am awesome", I thought, "How fast I've built up my endurance". I had done 2 miles in about 15 minutes. Naaice!

I was walking out and thought I'd double-check my calculation with a group of hardcore athletes training there. Seems like I need a new pair of glasses, because the track distance was almost half of what I thought it was. Shit! I had done just one mile and had another to go.

The headline of this blog post is: I run a mile in 13 minutes.

That's slow. I need to improve on that. Step #1 is building endurance, and that just comes with practice.

Training Week 2 - Sunday - Tips for biking

Had a good swim and bike today. Did a few drills in the pool, and then got dressed for some biking tips and then a short bike ride (around 10 miles). Since my poor bike is a really old piece of wrought iron, I had some difficulty keeping up with the leader. But the bike pedals really help. Anyhoo, here were the tips:

• Keep your knees on top of your feet, don't let them come out while pedaling
• Anticipate the gear shifts, i.e. if you are going towards a hill, shift to a lower gear ratio before you hit the incline
• When you shift, don't just think about changing one gear at a time, think of the gear ratio. This might mean shifting both the front and the back gears at once. They showed us a chart that looked like the one below
• Let your legs tell you when you shift, if they feel heavy shift to a lower gear ratio, if you are bouncing up and down shift to a higher gear ratio
• Keep your legs turning as much as possible, even when you are coasting. Not turning them can lead to building up waste material in your legs
• The optimal cadence, i.e. pedals per minute is around 85 - 95. This also happens to be the same as the optimal cadence for running, i.e you should take 85 - 95 steps per minute. The goal is to be within 80 - 100 pedals per minute and over time build a sense of always being in the optimal range

So that's that. Looking forward to not doing anything tomorrow, Monday, the rest day.

Graph taken from: http://phys.csuchico.edu/~eayars/gearing.shtml

Training Week 2 - Wednesday

Yesterday was bike day. Had an awesome bike ride.

I was supposed to go biking for 30 - 45 minutes, with 1 - 2 periods of med-high strain. I decided to time it using my oh-so-pretty iPod Nano, in it's new Belkin sport strap. Then I used Google Earth to figure out the distances.

Below are the results:

Segment	Clock time	Time elapsed	Distance covered (miles)	Avg. Speed (miles per minute)	Avg. Speed (miles per hour)
Start - Lincoln Way at 9th Ave	19:50:00
Get to beach through Route 1 - JFK Dr at Great Hwy	20:02:00	0:12:00	3.73	0.31	18.65
Return through Route 1	20:20:00	0:18:00	3.73	0.21	12.43
Get to beach through Route 2 - Lincoln Way at Great Hwy	20:30:00	0:10:00	2.75	0.28	16.50
Return through Route 2	20:43:00	0:13:00	2.75	0.21	12.69
Get home - Lawton St at 10th Ave	20:53:00	0:10:00	0.63	0.06	3.78

So what's the pattern?

I start off with more energy maybe? Possibly, but it's more of a downhill vs. uphill story. The high speed segment are all downhill... which makes sense, since I am going from slightly above sea-level to actual sea-level.

Today is swim day. I need to practice all the drills. It's not going to be great.

Training Week 1 - Sunday

Team swim and bike day.

Went to Redwood High School in Larkspur in the morning. They have a great pool (see us swimming on the right, or the satellite image below).

We split amongst three groups (Age, Pro, Elite) by our self-assessed swim athleticism. Age was defined as: If you haven't swam before. "Hmmm, not me" I said to myself, and moved into the Pro group. Man, was I out of my league.

Here are my problems:

1. Bad technique
2. Hyperventilating, i.e. breathing too much and not getting enough good air into my lungs

I need to practice their drills this coming week and hopefully be in better shape for the team swim coming next Sunday.

Training Week 1 - Friday - Tips for running

Went for the first run yesterday, 3 rounds around Kezar Stadium (route shown below, courtesy Google Earth).

We congregated in the parking lot/field outside at 6:30 pm, and immediately went for 2 rounds around Kezar Stadium. 0.7 miles each, so 1.4 miles. Then came and did a bunch of exercises, for balance and preventing injuries. And then went for a "cool down" run, another 0.7 miles.

In total, I ran 2.1 miles yesterday... after not having run for the last many years. My legs are shot to hell today, and I hope I recover in time for tomorrow's team run.

Tips for running from the head coach:

• "I never want to see the soles of your shoes when you are running towards me": Basically, in your forward stride, don't have your toes pointing up and don't land on your heel. Two bad things happen:
1. You land on your heel and it has a big impact on a small area of your foot. This can also cause other problems since you are not in a proper form to absorb that impact.
2. The way the foot lands acts as a brake or hurdle. This hampers your momentum and your body now has to go up and over that hurdle.
• "Let your feet naturally come up behind you, using your hamstring": Simple enough.
• "And then just let your foot fall forward": Don't go for big lunges in running. Let your foot fall forward and have it so that it's underneath your center of gravity. This way you will have your leg right under your body, making it easier for the bady to absorb the impact.
• "Short light steps everyone, short light steps": Okay, got it.
• "Your arms are connected to your legs": Don't move them too much, and don't move them forward. Try and keep your elbows back. This helps your feet keep back as well (see tip #1 above).
• "When you are tired, your shoulders come up next to your ear": Your arms are moving to aid your upper body move in sync with the legs. So you should have your shoulder wide, not up, not back, just wide, and let your arms move freely.
• "Strong core helps fight strain and injury": Rather than having extra strong legs, focus on having a strong core, i.e. stomach and lower back muscles. This keeps your hips steady and keeps good running form.
• "The purpose is to get from point A to point B using as little energy as possible... while actually moving": Efficiency efficiency efficiency.

I'll be practicing these tomorrow.

Training Week 1 - Wednesday

Training officially started yesterday, with a bike ride through Golden Gate park.

Total distance: 8.6 miles

(See bike path below, from Google Earth. Click on image for big version)

Today is swimming. I still need to read up on how much I have to do. Will be heading to 24 Hour Fitness after work to get my swim on.

Team in Training kick off

Had the kick off meeting for Team in Training at the Oakland Marriot. They really put a lot of effort into it. Very well organized, everything laid out. Got a packet and everything.

After the initial session, we broke into individual team rooms. Went over what's ahead, training and fundraising. I was one of the only people to have set up my website and to have recieved a donation!  I got a Powerbar gel for it :)

I have a bunch of things to read, with special attention to my training schedule. Training starts from tomorrow, Tuesday, June 5th. Here is what it looks like:

• Mondays are rest days
• Tuesdays are Bike days
• Wednesdays are Swim days
• Thursdays are Run days
• Fridays are Swim days again
• Saturdays are workouts with the Team Captain, Run
• Sundays are workouts with the Coach, Swim and Bike

Gotta go figure out when/where/how to do my first bike tomorrow.

Getting started for the triathlon kickoff (T -14 days)

After many weeks of not doing anything, I finally started getting ready for the triathlon. The kickoff is on June 2nd (hence the T -14 days on the title), and the actual triathlon is September 9th (which is T -113 days).

So, what has been done:

1. Set up fundraising site: http://www.active.com/donate/tntgsf/abidmohsin
• Crop image using Gimp
• Upload image to Flickr to embed on page
• Create step-by-step guide using Powerpoint, and embed on page using SlideAware
• Put link to page in my Gmail signature
2. Decide to get in shape by getting a membership to 24 Hour Fitness
3. Go on a bike ride, but stop and watch the Bay to Breakers crowd

Next steps:

1. Send out emails to tell everyone about it
2. ... and ask for donations

But it's getting late right now. Will tackle that tomorrow.

-
Abid

oDesk presentation for the PC Magazine SMB Award

Here is the presentation from Slideshare (link, or see below):

Weekend has gone by 2006 10 22

IMG_1523, originally uploaded by abdmhsn.

San Francisco was pretty awesome yesterday, right now it's getting foggy.

I'm about to take off to the Thirsty Bear, where a friend is performing Flamenco. I wish I had more time to learn all these cool things. Not that the weekend was unfulfilling, there just isn't that much variety in my everyday life.

I need to start putting something good on this crappy blog. Maybe figure out a way to store my big thoughts everyday and publish them here easily.

Someone actually read my blog

oDesk is hiring! Yes, it's true. After raising the second round (lead by Benchmark, previous investors are Globespan and Sigma), we are looking to expand the business aggressively and also hiring for some pretty awesome positions.

So, we put up the Careers page, and have been looking for kick ass candidates.

In one of my phone conversations, a candidate said that she had Googled my name (typical) found my blog (uh oh) and actually spent time reading it (What the *&$%?).

Someone actually took the time to read this crappy blog. That's amazing.

Also embarrassing.

So I've decided to at least put some effort into this site. Shouldn't come off as a complete idiot.

I think the next step would be to start putting stuff from my Flickr account.

The coolest fan video I have seen

Pretty amazing that people spend so much time on this. Enjoy...

RYAN WIEBER VS. MICHAEL "DORKMAN" SCOTT What began as a friendly rivalry between two effects artists explodes off TheForce.Net's FanFilms Forum and into the real world in a lightsaber battle royale. Originally created for the forum's lightsaber choreography competition, this fight to the death will decide once and for all who is truly most skilled with a saber. There can be only one. See the 5 minute epic for yourself.

oDesk Tour video is kick ass

Watch it at http://www.odesk.com/tour on on YouTube.


Hmmm.... I'm thinking this blog post isn't that great. I tried pasting the YouTube HTML code in here, but it messes everything up. Maybe I should also upload to Google Video and link from there. Soemthing for tomorrow I guess.

Made my first post on the oDesk Blog (http://blog.odesk.com/)

And I thought I would put it here also.

(Click here to go to the oDesk Blog)

For the past few years, my ultimate invention candidate has been the Star Trek Transporter (illustrated on left).

"Energize!", and you can go anywhere anytime. (My previous candidate was the Star Trek Replicator, to get my chocolate shake anywhere anytime). Why? Because the best places to work are not necessarily the best places to live (due to cost of living, deminished social life, being away from family and friends).

A lot of people end up living in foreign countries to pursue the career they want (e.g. me) and it's not easy to spend time with your family (who live in Pakistan and the UK). Skype and Gmail allow us to remain in touch, but they don't allow me to play with my nephew (picture on right).

I have a good friend whose main goal is to find a career where he can travel back and forth between Pakistan and the US, while not sacrificing the big bucks (he was working as a top programmer for a US company). He started a small outfit in Pakistan and was looking to get them some programming work. Naturally, I got him into oDesk as an Affiliate. He fairly quickly got a $100K+ project, quit his regular job in the US, and is now full-time involved as the Affiliate Manager.

Let me first outline some tips I got from him:

• He found job openings where his skill set was relevant (don't blindly apply to everything)


• He applied himself, and also had his Providers apply at the same time (so they appeared together in the Candidate List)


• He clearly outlined who he was (Affiliate Manager), who else was in his team (Providers), links to the oDesk Profiles of his Providers (use oDesk Short URLs in the cover letter), and why they were good for the job


• He had a US number where he could be reached during his business hours (you can either get a VoIP box from Vonics or Vonage, or get a SkypeIn account)

But the cool thing for me was that oDesk helped him achieve his equivalent of the Star Trek Transporter. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area, has gone to his oDesk Buyer's offices in Texas, and spends time with him family in Pakistan while overseeing his (growing) Affiliate outfit. You could argue that it's better than the Star Trek Transporter. Captain Kirk always worked with the same people on his ship, and actually lost a few people in every episode (the poor Red Shirts). They should have just enjoyed their chocolate shakes in interstellar space and talked to the Klingons over Yahoo IM.

-

Abid

This is Nael

Although Rayyan is my main man, his little brother Nael is equally adept at causing women to swoon.

This cutie pie came into the world on Jan 27, 2005 @ 2:30 pm, weighing between 6 to 7 lbs. He has apparently gained a lot of wieght since then :) 

The oDesk team of old

This is the team I started with at oDesk.

The picture was taken on the last day at our old office, which was the office I started at.

We went through some changes since then, but most of us are still here

:0 <--- this I call the oFace 

This is Rayyan

My nephew is cute, no two ways about it.

He lives in London and was born on May 23, 2000, at around 4:00 pm, weighing 6.5 lb (2.75 kg). 

The oDesk Founders

Odysseas and Stratis founded oDesk.

Stratis lives in Greece and comes here infrequently. We've been scheming on how to get him to come to the US for a longer period of time, but for reasons unknown, Stratis likes the Greek air too much.

Odysseas does his best to keep in as frequent touch with him as possible. It is normal for them to have 8-10 hour continuous Skype sessions. That's insane.

They are both a little insane.

Whatever the case, we love both of them. 

Week of 2005.10.17

So things are really rumbling at oDesk (www.odesk.com)

We launched an Online Community (community.odesk.com) which is getting more traffic that we anticipated. Alex Carter is doing a lot of stuff on it, but it seems like it needs almost a full-time person dedicated to it.

Advertising is kicking my ass. We are spending more, a) on a CPC basis and b) on a budget basis. That is the industry trend, and I am still pissed I did not buy Google stock when this started to happen (Google shares went up 10-15% on this quarter's earnings)

We are overhauling our website with the help of Radiopuffin, a creative firm. The new site (still http://www.odesk.com) would be completely kick ass!! If we can make it happen, I would be immensely peased! And since I am incharge of the project, I guess I better get to work rather than writing this stuff.

Our Alexa rating continues to rise, but we need it to rise faster. With the new website, and the start of viral marketing, the hope is to exponentially increase our traffic rank, etc.