November 5, 2009 · No Comments

Time to start down the production line in Oxford!

It’s barely been two days since I placed the order, and already I have a VIN — this car will be built before I know it!

I had the opportunity to tour the factory this past June and it was really amazing to see firsthand how MINIs are built. Though we weren’t allowed to take pictures in the factory itself, I was able to get some photos in the reception of a few original Mini models (one of which was signed by Michael Caine) as well as a few versions of the modern MINI (including the 1 millionth MINI made and a red electrically-powered MINI that was used for the subway scenes in the remake of “The Italian Job”):

I since found out that MINI podcast "White Roof Radio" was previously allowed to take photos and record a soundseeing tour in the factory, which is almost as good as being there yourself.

 November 4, 2009 · No Comments

Today I traded in my 2008 MINI Cooper S and placed an order for a 2010 Cooper S:

It’s not really a Pepper White, it only says that since that was the MINI in the slot they modified for my order. But mine was an ‘08, so why did I trade it in? Well, the dealership was buying back used MINIs and giving 120% of trade-in value, so I did some math and even though my MINI was just over a year old, for what I was offered I was able to pay off the auto loan, pay off some other debts, and still have enough for a down payment on a new MINI. They’re estimating a 6-week build time for it, so it should arrive here in early to mid-December, and will (mostly) look just like my ‘08. :) Now to think of a good name for this one…

 October 26, 2009 · No Comments

On Saturday I did the Nike Human Race, a worldwide 10K run. There were a handful of cities where you could do an organized run with other runners, but if you couldn’t participate in any of those you could run wherever you wanted to using the Nike+ kit — there’s a sensor in the heel of one of your shoes, and a sensor you attach to certain iPods, and the two sensors are able to talk to each other to determine your pace and speed based on the amount of time your foot spends on the ground and in the air, and uses that information to determine your distance. I ended up with 10.01 kilometers and a time of 1:00:23.

The next morning I went into Washington, D.C. for the Marine Corps Marathon’s 10K run (MCM10K); this run takes place over the last several miles of the marathon trail, starting in D.C. by the Smithsonian castle, crossing over into Virginia and running through Crystal City, looping around and heading back past the Pentagon, and ends at the Navy Marine Corps Memorial in Arlington. I used my Nike+ here too just so I could track my run, and it turns out that my calibration was off; it thinks that the actual 10K I did for the MCM10K was 10.22 kilometers, so I guess that I actually didn’t run a full 10K for the Human Race on Saturday since it overestimated my distance. But what really should be noticed in that run is the time and the pace: I did (almost) 10K in 1:00:23 with an average pace of 9:22 / mile during the Human Race. But for the MCM10K?

That’s right; using the chip they use to track your time (it straps to your shoe and is triggered when you pass the starting line and the finish line so they can accurately show how long it took you to get from point A to point B), I did 10 kilometers in 56:24!! My Nike+ said I did 10.22 kilometers in 56:27, but it took me a second or two to manually press the button to start and stop tracking, so that’s a pretty accurate time even if the distance isn’t quite right. It also says that my average pace was 8:53 / mile.

So what does this mean? I ran FARTHER than what I did for the Human Race because my calibration overestimated my distance, and yet I still ran FASTER since I beat my Human Race time by almost 4 minutes! Not bad for my first official 10K since I originally estimated that I’d complete the race in 1:15:00, ran 10K in training in 1:14:47 (and again in 1:02:53), and once my times started getting that low I really wanted to complete the 10K in less than an hour, so I’m really pleased that I was able to complete it in 56:24.

It wasn’t that bad… well, there were some times when I wanted to walk, but I didn’t, I just slowed down some and kept on going. The worst part was right after I crossed the finish line and slowed down and felt like I was going to be sick because of all the exertion, but after walking for a little bit I felt much better and received my finisher’s medal and had my photo taken by the memorial and picked up my post-race goodie bag with snacks and drinks.

Dad has his photos up online already here. Mom should have her pictures up soon too, I think. I’ll update this post with the official photos once I can see those online, and I myself took a few pictures beforehand and if they turned out ok then I’ll put them up here too.