Refurbished Garmin Forerunner 645 available for sale

Since I didn't learn about the free warranty extension on the Garmin Forerunner 645 lug breakage until after I bought a Forerunner 745, I now have its replacement and no use for it. So my loss is your gain, if you are interested you can pick it up for cheap on eBay.

Auction Link. 

5/19/2022 Sold!

In loving memory of my broken Garmin Forerunner 645

 The poor bastard lasted exactly 800 days. Sadly it was out of its extended warranty by three months, so the next one is on me.

Left is what the lug should look like, right is what's left of the other lug. 

The other "good" lugs aren't looking much better:

The 645 came down to about 32 cents/day, not including the two replacement bracelets and the replacement charging cable. I screwed up by only buying the warranty extension for two years, I won't make that mistake again and already ordered a 745 with a three year warranty extension. These are great watches, but you may want to check out these lugs before your warranty expires to avoid having to eat the replacement cost like I just did. 

Update 8/3/2023: Garmin sent me a refurbished unit even if I was already out of warranty. This applies to other watches, like the 245. Here's the link to the 645 version of the program: https://support.garmin.com/en-US/?faq=fWW1dV4Y3O9RufIvQqEyG7

260 days

 It's been 260 days since my type A aortic dissection on 5/16/2021 at 50 years old. I drove myself to the ER early on the 17th, the ER docs quickly figured out what was wrong with me, they put me in a medevac helicopter and flew me to a large cardiac center about 11 miles away, they wouldn't risk the ambulance ride. I was wheeled into the OR within 4 hours of my arrival to the ER. I had an open heart surgery and a total aortic upper arch reconstruction. I was awake some 8 hours later, on my feet the next day and back home on day six.

From looking at my Strava training calendar and Garmin Connect, I was back walking around my condo on June 1st, with my wife keeping an eye on me every step of the way. By June 19th I was walking alone and by June 30th I was up to 5 miles at a time. I eventually made it to 9 miles per walk, but along the way I had to slow down and take some time off courtesy of the non-stop heat waves. Once Virginia cooled off I was able to start stretching my distances again.

And 8 months later I had a CT scan that allowed my cardiologist to clear me for slow running. For the past week I have been doing what is basically Galloway runs, a mix between walking and running. So far I have been able to keep at least a 3:1 ratio between the running and walking parts, and I am slowly getting my leg muscles back. My chest (even healed, a full sternotomy hurts like hell) actually bothers me less when I am running than when walking. Even with single digit temperatures, what's slowing me down is the legs, not my lungs or my heart.

In terms of Strava's relative effort score, I am able to hit at least in the 100s without feeling much strain, sadly my VO2 max and my Fitness & Freshness chart took a really nasty dive which will take forever to recover. 

There are other adjustments. No more Motrin, since I am now on an Aspirin regime. Aspirin is a blood thinner, which is used to prevent blood clots, which also means you can't take any other NSAIDs. Weird thing is that I am not feeling any different in terms of knee discomfort, so either I had developed a tolerance for Motrin, or that Aspirin regime (plus the Tylenol I am already taking for the rib pain) is also working a bit on the knee pain. 

And I found that one bottle of Gatorade per day doesn't have enough Sodium to derail my blood pressure control drugs. Caffeine, on the other hand, is a problem, seems that my hard limit is one regular cup per day, anything higher than that and it screws up my blood pressure for the next 2-3 days. At least I found a drinkable decaf, Starbuck's House Blend. Too bad that also means no more caffeinated energy gels. 

And just like that, the runger is back.

Background: I had a type A aortic dissection back in May 2021 (at 50 years old, no family history of heart disease). I should have dropped dead, but a combination of 5+ years running my ass off and losing over 100 pounds, combined with having the dumb fucking luck of living 3 miles away from one of the top trauma ERs in the area and 11 or so miles away from one of the top cardiac institutes in the country really saved my ass. And I mean really, the mortality rate is 1% per hour delay to see a doctor, after two days half of the people die if they don't see a doctor. I drove myself to the ER, it took them less than an hour to figure out what was wrong with me, they put me on a medevac helicopter and flew me to the cardiac institute, where they wheeled me straight into the OR. About 8 hours later I woke up to find out that they had performed an open heart surgery and did a full replacement (artificial) of my aorta's upper arch. I was on my feet the next day and back home on day 6.

Running saved my life, and I couldn't wait to get back to it. The problem is that my cardiologist said nope, first you walk, then you run.

After 8 months or so my cardiologist was happy enough with my CT scan to allow me "slow jogging." I had tested myself a few times over the months and I already knew I could do it, but I also knew that I was putting weight and losing muscle, so the walking regime was actually a good thing.

When I started running again I realized that my chest is fine, but my legs aren't. It'll take a while to build that muscle again, but I forgot about glycogen stores. Each day I am able to run farther per stretch, but what stops me is the legs, not the breathing. And yeah, even in 15℉.

The final piece of the puzzle: I had stopped loading on carbs in the past few months, I was worried that with just the walking these would go straight to fat.

After most of a week of feeling the "runger" both after running and late in the afternoon, I just realized that this is my body asking me to start carbo loading again, and that my legs aren't really hurting, what I am feeling is depletion, which I have forgotten after so many years of using energy gels during my longer runs.

So yeah, time to get back on the energy gels, but sadly I'll have to switch to the non-caffeinated ones since caffeine messes with my blood pressure meds.

28 Days Later ...

It's been 28 days since my open-heart surgery for aortic dissection. Just had my first cardiologist follow up, she wants to keep me walking for at least one more month before she clears me for running. This isn't exactly the end of the world, since I lose weight faster walking than running, and losing a few pounds now will help with the running later. I am already past the 1-mile mark, my next goal is to try to score two walks per day, which hopefully means outdoors, I am not really looking forward to even looking at our treadmill.

I feel like a million bucks, except that I am still getting used to sleep near-horizontally, hard to make that transition after spending 3+ weeks sleeping sitting propped on pillows. I did get cleared to drink up to two cups of coffee per day, but the low sodium/low cholesterol diet are going to be a long-term concern, and I am guessing it's going to be interesting how to balance the low sodium intake with the sodium depletion once we head into the worst part of the summer.

BTW, that first cup of coffee was just glorious.

Action shot of what it looks when I'm not doing a damn thing

 

Had an EKG today, came out normal. It is also the first day since my operation that I have crossed the 1000-step mark and it's only 1 PM.

Finally, either my primary care doctor is 13 years old, or there's some kind of filter that kicks in after your 50th birthday and everyone looks so obviously young. But seriously, she's either 13 years old or a vampire and either way I feel lucky to have her on my corner.

The rumors of my demise have been slightly exaggerated

 

I'm the luckiest guy in the world.

Just four days ago I had open heart surgery to graft an aortic dissection. My ER doc had me flown across the county to what had to be the best level one cardiac care center on the East coast, these folks took excellent care of me and I'll be forever grateful.

Plus I got to fly in a Helo, which is cool.

I'm awed, blown away and humbled by how people rallied to help me. My mother in law Paula Lopez , my mom Gloria Vera and my aunt Rosa Perez basically raced to the airport, and I've spent so much time on video calls with Ivette Vera , Pedro Javier Vera and Mario Vera that it feels like they are camping out outside of the hospital. My running friends at Strava and Squadeasy have been absolutely incredible, and so have been my coworkers (except my boss lectured me, something along the lines of "you are not allowed to get sick like this ever again").

I know that a lot of people were praying for my recovery, thank you all and please say a good word for the folks at the Reston Hospital Center ER, the medevac air crew in and EVERYONE at INOVA Fairfax Cardiac Center.

2020 Summary

 

2,020 miles for 2020!

Shittiest run of the year and it has to be the one that crossed the 2,020-mile mark for the year. 2 long fricking hours of nonstop rain, and I was already burned out so my pace was crap. At least I made it back in one piece. 

"Leak free" my ass

If the hydration pack bladder is leak free, why the hell did I have to line the edges with gorilla tape and have to wrap the damn thing with a zip loc bag? Of course, the bag is 6 months old, and it has been used 6 days a week, but it's always been kept inside of the hydration pack, no sharp edges to poke at it, and I never let it go dry, so where did the side leaks come from? 

That said, kudos on whoever came with the design for the hose hook up, you can actually unhook the hose without emptying the bag, which is handy as hell. 

Sort of like a blood sacrifice run, except it's a tiny boo boo and the only bruises were on my pride

Landed on my ass on wet mulch, sort of a tiny little detour at a paved trail junction. Didn't hurt, all I got was a tiny scratch on my left knee, but it was unsettling to find myself sitting on the wet ground, in the dark since the headlight fell off my cap. Also a nice second adrenaline shot near Reston Hospital, courtesy of Karen. Not even us runners are safe from Karen nowadays.