Simon George Blog: Let’s see what I got this year!

Posted on 22nd June 2017

  • So, the best laid plans to write a regular blog haven’t quite materialised as the last one
    reviewing the ON cloud Flows was back in January! Well, I guess at least I’ll have plenty to
    write about, but I’m determined to make amends for this over the rest of this season!
    I going to aim to cover a few bases with this post, some which I’ve meaning to do for quite a
    while!
    (i) Follow up the short review of the ON Cloud Flows with a long-term perspective,
    having now put over 800km (~500miles) into the shoes
    (ii) Give some thoughts of the newest racing shoe, the ON Cloud Flash
    (iii) Give my thoughts on the Polar M200 running watch with integrated heart rate
    (iv) Give an update on my recent training and the start to the 2017 racing season
    ON Cloud Flow – Long-term Update:
    The review I posted about the Cloud Flows was based on around 100km of running, which I
    felt was enough at the time to give a decent perspective to what the shoe was all about and
    how it felt…fast forward a few months and I’ve now run over 800km in the same pair
    (although I do have another identical pair that I use for racing), which, at the time of writing
    the last review, I’ll honestly say that I didn’t think I’d get anywhere near this amount of wear
    out of them. I had already started to see the signs of wear around the heel area of the shoe,
    and with these shoes being on the ‘lighter’ side of the spectrum, the tendency would be to
    think that getting high mileage out of this type of shoe would be impossible – how wrong!
    Being total honest, these shoes have just got better and better with time. The have become
    more comfortable, the grip has improved and to say that they have been through every
    conceivable training scenario throughout this time would be an understatement, with each
    time exceeding my expectations. The wear on the heel cup did continue, but seemed to get
    to a point where it stopped and didn’t go any further, without causing any issues with
    blistering after the initial sign of wear. The issues I was experiencing with the grip in damper
    conditions also improved. Granted, this is still a slight negative with the shoe, as this hasn’t
    totally disappeared, but I am certainly a lot more confident in the handling of the shoes in
    wetter conditions than I was in the first 100km’s. I’m not at the point where in need to retire
    these shoes soon, but I really don’t want to…like an old pair of slippers, they feel so
    comfortable and matched to my feet that I just want to keep on running in them! I’ve certainly
    felt with this shoe, probably more than any of the others in the ON range, that they do take a
    little time to ‘break in’, but once you’re there, you’re left with a shoe that is probably the most
    versatile and comfortable that I’ve ever worn, and one that will also see you through a great
    deal of mileage, to boot!
    First thoughts – ON Cloud Flash:
    This is one FAST shoe! The lightest and most race orientated of ON’s range, this shoe lives
    up to its name. I’ve been wearing the flash for some quicker training sessions and also one
    sprint triathlon at Southwell. Although I came second overall this year and missed out on the
    win, I posted my fastest run split on the course ever and was beaten by one of GB triathlons
    under 23 elites. After chasing him from the first length of the swim and all the way through
    the bike, I felt like I had nothing left on the run, but somehow pulled out a 10sec run course
    PB – no small thanks to the shoes I was wearing, me thinks, as I felt like I was going
    backwards! The Flash are extremely light and they are certainly more racing designed than
    any of their shoes in the past, even the Cloud Racer (now re-named the Cloud Rush), which
    feels fairly well cushioned, by comparison! They performed well whilst wearing no socks, too,
    which is an added bonus. The biggest difference with these shoes, to any of the others is
    that the clouds on the outsole are built directly onto a rigid ‘speedboard’. This gives the
    feeling of an extremely responsive shoe that just wants to go faster! For me, these shoes will
    be for sprint and Olympic distance races. Personally, I currently feel that these are a little too
    minimal for half distance races, but this may change potentially given the experience of the
    breaking in period experienced with the Flows. I’ll follow up more with this when I have
    trained and raced more in them.
    Polar M200 GPS Running Watch with integrated, wrist based Heart Rate:
    Working in Sport Science, I feel fairly well placed to be able to offer a reasonably well-
    rounded opinion on a device such as this. I’ve used and experience a whole host of GPS
    and heart rate monitoring systems over the last 15-years (showing my age now!). Other than
    the introduction of good GPS systems over the last 5-years, probably the most contentious
    and hotly debated issues in heart rate monitoring is the use (and reliability) of wrist based
    HR sensors, which replace the more traditional chest straps found in most conventional
    units. Wrist based HR monitoring has been about now for a couple of years, and certainly in
    my experience, has been a bit hit-and-miss…Of the units I’ve used that have had this feature
    (Garmin Forerunner 225 and 735XT), I have been unconvinced at the reliability of such a
    feature – so much so that I have always overridden the wrist HR with a conventional HR
    strap. Being someone that uses HR heavily during training and racing, knowing that the data
    you are receiving is correct, to be able to execute training effectively in the desired HR zone,
    is a must and unfortunately, I never felt this was the case with either of the previous units –
    that is until I used the Polar M200, which is Polars first foray into the wrist HR monitoring
    market. I was very happily surprised to see that the data was spot on form the word go. I ran
    a number of sessions with a trusted chest based system on the opposite wrist, and each
    session the heart rate traces were almost identical. This was the case for both continuous
    steady-state sessions and also interval based sessions that involved large variations in
    pace/effort and concurrent HR response.
    All in all, I was very pleased with this side of the watch and I would be happy to use this,
    without any additional chest strap, which really would solve the issue of anyone that
    struggles with wearing a chest strap. Polar seem to have got this nailed! As for the rest of the
    watch; it is very easy to use, if a little on the basic side in some cases – but I have been
    used to some of the higher spec watches with multi-sport functionality in the past, which may
    have clouded my judgement a little I this respect. Generally, it functions really well for its
    desired purpose, of being a GPS running watch, with good quality wrist based HR. It was
    also very easy to get information off the watch, and into Strava, etc…the Bluetooth
    connection was easy to set up, and whenever in range it paired and downloaded to my
    phone via the Polar Flow app immediately, which makes visualising the data post run,
    extremely easy – great for checking PB’s on segments and K/QOM’s! The only slight niggle I
    had with the watch during my time using it was that it did take a while to connect to GPS on
    a couple of occasions, which is slightly frustrating when you’re eager to get a run started.
    This certainly didn’t detract from the overall positive experience I had whilst using the watch.
    Certainly a great option for anyone wanting to dip their toe into the world of combined GPS
    and HR, particularly without using a chest strap. Good work, Polar!
    Training and Racing update:
    Rather than regurgitating stuff that I’ve written elsewhere already, the link below contains a
    blog that I wrote in the week before OSB Events Nottingham Outlaw Half on my own blog
    site – I was getting pretty excited about that event as it was my first big 70.3 goal of the
    season;

  • https://swimbikerunsi.wordpress.com/2017/05/16/its-been–a–while–time–to–start–to–2017/
    Picking up where that left off…as it turns out, I didn’t quite have the race that I had hoped for.
    After a cracking swim, for some reason I just couldn’t get going on the bike and felt flat for
    the whole time…pretty frustrating when you can see the race disappearing up the road in
    front of you…my saving grace, it turned out in this race, was my run, which was totally
    unexpected given the poor bike. Racing properly for the first time in the Flows they
    performed excellently throughout and thankfully so did I – running to a sub 1hr 22min half
    marathon split at the end of a 70.3 tri! Not long ago that time wasn’t too far away from my flat
    out half PB, so it shows just how far my running has come, particularly since running with the
    LWAC track group over the winter. This certainly gives me confidence going forward that,
    given a decent bike leg, I can put together something pretty special in the next few races…
    here’s hoping, anyway!
    After the half I’ve had a 6-week period of training before my next big race – OSB Events
    Outlaw Half Holkham. Writing this, I’m now in my last week of heavy training at the end of a
    big 3-week block before I start to wind things down in the couple of weeks before the race.
    Again, I’m going into the race with high hopes, after an AG win and 3rd overall at last year’s
    race…Before this though I’ll be at Woodhall Spa Sprint Tri on Sunday, which is where I took
    a win and new course record last year – let’s see what I’ve got this year!