Zack Perry

My weekly highlight came in San Francisco while doing usability testing. I had a series of wireframes that illustrate a process we’ve been working on. Between the story writer, product manager, and myself we were iterating constantly up until our deadline to hand over to our usability vendor. On the last series of wireframes I came up with a simple 3 step process that required 3 illustrations to match. Let’s just say I’m no professional artist so I through some hand art work together and scanned the artifacts in and placed into the wireframe. Never really thought much of the medium tension between the two.

So on Tuesday we were wrapping up with a guy after doing card sort exercises, screen testing, and prototype reviews for an hour and half when the question came up “what do you think about the overall look of the site?” Well it just so happened that the screen that was up was my hand illustrations. Our testers response: the site looks goods and well put together but this page looks really unprofessional. All I could do is giggle and think so much for quick prototyping when you’ve established an expected experience. LESSON LEARNED. #paperprototypefail

Zack Perry Uncategorized prototyping

Despite having a horrible sinus infection, way too much work, and trying to finalize presentations for the finale of A session, I was able to pull off my first 50 mile training week. I’m even more happy that I did this over 5 days instead of my weekly 6 day training week. I’ve decided to sacrifice a day of running for more gym work. It definite seems to be paying off as my hamstring is stabilizing and my form is starting to feel really good.

During the week I typically run 7-7:15 min training miles with one day of tempo work in the 6-6:30 range. With the training for these long ultra races i’ve tried to slow down my long weekend runs. First, it’s actually harder than I thought to slow my pace down. Trying to run 7:45-8:00 minute miles is a bit difficult when you’ve got these sticks that enjoy long strides and steady tempo. Second, my stride. I’ve found my comfort spot in the long strides regardless of what that does to my body so having to slow down and shorten my stride is a bit odd and causes me a bit aggravation. But I survived a solid two days besides having a stomach bug on Saturday were I had to cut my run short a couple of miles.

Today was really exciting, I never thought I’d say this, as the temperatures were in the upper 30s. I ditched the tights and put on the shorts to run in. Man o man did it feel good. I found myself just a bit more excited for Spring time.

Looking forward to pushing it a bit this week and running 55-60 if everything goes as planned.

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Last night was sort of a mental breakthrough. For the first time, in a long time, I noticed there was more daylight after 5PM. It’s become all I know to run in the dark during the week. My exhaustion from school and work has prevented me from soaking in early morning workouts as I can barely get out of bed before 645AM. This will all change once the warmer temps arrive and I finish my first year of grad school. So running outside with a decent amount of daylight surprised me. I took off up to the North running up Ashland to Foster then down to Lake Shore Trail. There are lots of dirt path alternatives that curve the lake so I try to run these as much as possible mostly because they still have snow on them and are difficult to run. My sort of pain.

One thing that’s really cool is to see the frozen shore. Right now, in certain spots it’s easily 5-10 feet of ice up to the shoreline. Some are really impressive and beautiful. Most are dirty though. There is one bay area right off of Irving Park that looks like something out of Alaska with these 20-30 foot chunks of ice. You’d think there was a big glacier around.

Anyhoo, it appears I’m finally working through these injuries that have prevented my running goals from being achieved. Over the last week I’ve had some amazingly solid runs in the 8-13 mile range. I’m still struggling with two trigger spots on my right leg where muscle knots just won’t let go. This is a lesson learned. Going years without good strengthen and stretching habits will do lots of damage to your body. I’ve become a big believer in the foam roller. I bought the extra hard one which feels like someone beating you when you roll out your legs but I can tell it’s finally working.

I’m borderline at the point where I think I need to get a coach. I’ve got a loose written out plan for this year with three big races: Ice Age 50k, Big Horn 50, and Leadville 100. I’m approaching my racing this year as a constant stair step in hopes that each gives me more confidence and experience leading up to Leadville. I’m really fired up about racing this year even now as I go out in the bitter cold and run in the snow I realize I will have my day and these painstakingly cold days of winter will given me a solid foundation to achieve my goals for the year. I want these goals bad this year so I’m always second guessing my mileage, schedule, etc.

So yesterday was Ash Wednesday and beginning of Lent. I actually struggled this year with what to give up. I’ve prayed a bit asking God to reveal to me what I should give up. For once I didn’t do something I’ve done in the past. I decided finally to give up coffee and chocolate. I super enjoy them both. My morning coffee is my juice. I’m trying to figure out how I will wake myself up. Maybe I should start running in the mornings. I was wondering though if I started drinking tea instead am I defeating the purpose? Am I just trying to find a substitute to last me 40 days or should I just avoid any sort of warm beverage?

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I just read about this place opening up on Irving Park. After reading the Friday night challenge I decided I need to take off a Friday from school and work, run 20+ miles, and go in there and lay down the authority on taco eating.

http://www.rockintacochicago.com/menu.html

Zack Perry Food and Drink Rock In Taco

Looking forward to seeing this flick
http://showntellshow.com/post/343167078

Zack Perry Uncategorized

I’m a bit slow in getting my weekly post out from last week but here goes.

It’s official. Racing has commenced! I spent Saturday afternoon in Rockford, IL. for second race in the winter, Rock Cut Trail Series. Since the race was a short 10k race I didn’t freak out about my lack of training since I’m targeting late Spring and Summer ultra’s. Regardless, I still like to go out and compete at the top even if I fail.

I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect. The drive up to Rockford, one hour away, reveal lots of snow as I made my way up I-90. The series is being held at Rock Cut State Park, a super great place to come overnight camp and trail run. With temps in the mid 20s I wasn’t super thrilled as I had planned on sunshine and mid 30s. But that’s how it goes. After signing up I had about 30 minutes to attempt to warm up. As I started to warm up on the roads around the starting area I discovered the trails were all snow. Uck. And on top of that we are talking 4-6 inches of loose snow.

So after a brief 20 minute warm up I made my way to the starting area. Umm, exactly where do we start??? Yeah, its straight up this 30 yard hill in the snow. I could tell this race had some fast looking doods which made me pumped for good competition and the expectation of real racing finally. So we start, the mad dash up the hill begins. It’s a struggle but I find myself in second place tracking down the lead guy. I’m all over the place as we enter the trail and begin the onslaught of pain. I sure as heck wasn’t ready for this intensity. I’ve done maybe one speed workout this year on top of going through physical therapy to fix some hip strength and muscle knot issues.

During the first mile I could barely breathe. My nose immediately froze and I couldn’t breathe through it so I had to rely on my mouth for air. Cold, freaking air. I wasn’t sure the trail was marked for mileage and I just refused to look at my Garmin. So when we crossed the first mile marker my immediate thought was screw this lets drop out. But I decided to keep going. My hips couldn’t keep the intensity up trying to maneuver through the snow and sliding all over the place. This was quickly becoming one of the hardest races I’ve ever done. And so my second place position quickly fell to fifth.

I suffered through another two miles before I could finally breathe and find a decent rhythm. Then I had a freak out moment. These midwesterners are so use to cold temps and freezing they aren’t scared to leverage frozen lakes as part of the chaos. So at mile 3 we crossed a lake that had to be at last 1/3 of a mile across. WOW. That was a bit freaky and was added motivation of freaking don’t stop or look down. And so the craziness continued as the trail took us back across the lake not just one more time but twice. It wasn’t until the last time across that I decide to look down close to the end of the crossing. Yes it was then as I approached the end that I looked over and saw some mushy areas. DOUBLE FREAK OUT!!!!!

Finally off the lake and onto the last 1.5 miles. I hit the five mile mark and could just feel the burning in my hips as I struggled to pace myself up a hill. Seeing the final .5 mile I began to be thankful and question the next race if this was going to be the racing experience. But I finished in 12th by the time it was finished. Considering the terrain, weather, and my racing shape I decided to be please with my result.

Finished, I grabbed some hot chocolate and decided to walk back to my car. Let me tell you this as well. My race day wear is go minimal. When I’m in the heat of competition i’ve discovered my body will keep warm so I don’t need lots of layers. So as I walked to the car I went to get my car fob from my jacket…….Whatttttttttttt FFFFFFFFFFFFF SHHHHHHHHH*T. The ultimate please don’t ever happen to me happened. My jacket zipper wasn’t all the way up and my fob popped out!!!!! Immediately I began to freak inside. WHAT THE HECK AM I GOING TO DO. I’m easily an hour away from any friend that could help me and even then I can’t remember phone #s. The panic even escalated as I thought well maybe just maybe I left my car unlocked. No dice. Locked like Fort Knox. I bumped a cell phone off the people parked next to me and called Subaru Roadside Assistance. Thank you Subaru for this service it really got me out of a pickle. SRA located a local locksmith who could be out to the state park within 40 minutes. Quickly I thanked God for providing the resources necessary.

Did I say I barely had anything on???? That 40 minutes I almost froze. I was so happy to see that locksmith but even more impressed how she manuevered my window open. Wait. I’m almost worried seeing how a criminal mind opens a car up. Geez, nobody’s car is safe. So 10 minutes later she had my car open and to my final release of worry I’m finding the car keys and jacking up the heat immediately.

Within 15 minutes I’m back on target and getting back to Chicago. What a day this turned into be.

And for the record, I’ll be back Feb 20 for the 15k race. Hopefully in a bit better shape and with little expectations.

Zack Perry Uncategorized

So I’m officially on day 4 of sinus infection. I’m officially about to go stir crazy as I’ve been locked up in the apartment all week. My only outs have been to Trader Joes and to the physical therapist. I was hoping to run in the snow as it’s always been an enjoyable thing for me in years past but with temps in the teens I’m boycotting for at least today I think.

Anyways, I came across a cool a video from a design agency, Mind Castle, on the making of their holiday card. Really cool video to watch and be inspired.

our creative process/. 01 from Casey Warren | MIND CASTLE on Vimeo.

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Sick for the last two days, tired of running on the treadmill at the gym, and going a bit stir crazy after two days of the work week. What do you do? Take this show outside were its 15 degrees and attempt to run. Sort of surprised that I ran super strong maybe its all the incline work I’ve been doing on the treadmill. I don’t want to admit that to myself since I hate those devil machines so much.

I haven’t had a sinus infection in over 7 months. I knew it was to good to be true that moving to Chicago did the trick. I personally think its the influx of new germs at the gym since I’ve been there the last 4 days running.

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Germville has invaded my body. Sinus infection here I come.

As I desired to stay in bed this AM I realized I work from home. I guess sick vacay doesn’t really exist in my case….I don’t know the policy on that but oh well, it’s a meeting free day so I can stay focused on doing my thang.

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Something about looking out your window and seeing snow covered roofs. It almost becomes a reflective gaze that’s outward in. Add depressing music to the mix and you’ll find yourself at the border of SAD.

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