Photobombing Moon

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Phil Plait is my favorite astronomer. He runs a blog called Bad Astronomy. Today he posted this article: Moon Photobombs Earth,  showing the moon photobombing the earth from the DSCOVR satellite.

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This picture was taken from about a million miles away, at the Earth-Sun L1 Lagrangian point. That means that this satellite is always between the Earth and the Sun, and always sees a full Earth. The moon is about 400,000km away from Earth, and the DSCOVR satellite is about four times that distance away at 1.5 million km. Here is a diagram from Phil’s article.DSCOVR_l1.jpg.CROP.original-original[1]

Here are two things I find very interesting from this picture and article:

  1. The Moon appears very dark here, but this is an actual picture. The Moon actually is this dark, and it only appears bright white at night because of the high contrast against the blackness of space. The Earth is more reflective than the Moon, so compared to Earth, the Moon appears darker.
  2. When the Moon photobombs the Earth like this, DSCOVR will only ever see what we call the dark side of the Moon, but DSCOVR would consider this the light side of the moon. DSCOVR’s dark side of the moon is our light side, and vice versa. The Moon is tidally locked with the Earth, so the moon rotates only one time for every revolution it makes around the Earth. Compare this to the Earth which is not tidally locked to the Sun, and makes 365 rotations for every 1 revolution of the Sun. If the Earth was tidally locked, we would have a radically different climate.

Pluto!

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It is a very exciting time in Astronomy. Two weeks ago, we had never seen Pluto close up. In fact, this was the best picture we had of Pluto:

The best picture of Pluto, prior to the New Horizons Mission

The best picture of Pluto, prior to the New Horizons Mission

Some people didn’t even realize this because a simple google search on just about any astronomical object will always pull up a nice “picture”. These pictures are usually just an artist’s rendition of what they think the object may look like. There was a time when all of the planets were nothing more than dots to our naked eyes, and small disks to a telescope. Through a telescope, Galileo discovered the four Gallilean moons of Jupiter, but I bet he never would have guessed that Jupiter has over 60 moons! Even with the power of the hubble telescope, we were only able to see Pluto and Charon as a set of a few pixels. It took an interplanetary mission to get these pictures.

Before anyone had seen Pluto in any significant resolution, I suspect they would have pictured it much like the Moon, or Mercury, a lifeless cratered dusty body. Here is a picture of mercury in greyscale. Nothing too impressive, just lots of craters and rays extending out from the craters, maybe a few cracks.

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Mercury in greyscale.

These are the best pictures we have of Nix and Hydra. I expect that we will get slightly better pictures in the months to come, but probably nothing too astounding. Their shape, orbits, rotations, and even colors are all very interesting. I’m excited to learn more about them.

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Nix and Hydra. Notice the red spot on Nix.

Pluto has blown our low expectations out of the water. It is far from a lifeless body. It has a slight atmosphere, it has snow/ice, it has mountain ranges, it has ice plains, and strangest of all, it appears to have no impact craters much like the Earth! For a planet to have no impact craters it either has to have no impacts, which is highly unlikely, or it has to be geologically active, resurfacing itself. Scientists believe that the surface of Pluto is only 100 million years old!

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Newly discovered mountain range on the edge of the heart region (ice plains).

Frozen plains of Pluto. Notice the strange troughs in the ice.

Frozen plains of Pluto. Notice the strange troughs in the ice.

Who knows what tomorrow has in store for us!

Some Thoughts on Crossfit

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FORM FIRST!
 I know there is a competitive atmosphere in the gym, but what is the real goal? To win the WOD? No, the real goal is to challenge yourself and improve. The point is to increase your work capacity across broad time, and modal domains (increase your fitness), not to “win the WOD”.  Pick a weight/scaling that is challenging to you, but still doable with proper form. If picking the correct weight means that you will not win the WOD then so be it. I have come in last place in WODs more times than I’ve come in first, because I was challenging myself. Speed is usually inversely proportional to form. Go only as fast as you can with good form. I try to make every rep as good as the one before. Do I always succeed? Of course not, I’m human, I have pride, ego, and am just as fallible as anyone else, but I try to set these aside and do the WOD in a way that will best help me improve. Forget about your arch nemesis next to you matching you rep for rep, this is YOUR workout, make it work for you. If you are going so fast or heavy that your form starts to fail, back off. Some people may ask “but what about competitions?”. Sure you might want to cut corners a little bit if you are in a competition fighting for a spot on the podium, but what is the cost of that bad form that results from those shortcuts? Is getting that spot worth having a bad back for the rest of your life? If so, then go for it, if not then just remember ITS ONLY A GAME. The real goal is improving your fitness, live to fight another day, and always remember FORM FIRST!

KNOW WHEN TO QUIT!
 When you are going for a max in any respect, it will get progressively more difficult to maintain proper form as the weights increase. Just because you completed a lift, doesn’t mean you should load up more weight and try again. When I complete a lift and it feels good, I continue. If the lift feels bad, such as my back starting to round, I stop. People usually get hurt doing that “one more lift” that they knew they shouldn’t have done. Why did they do it? Pride, ego, adrenaline? Who knows, but remember why you are in the gym. You are in the gym to increase your fitness. If you stop after a lift that didn’t feel so great will it decrease your fitness? No. If you get hurt after a lift that you knew you shouldn’t have done will it decrease your fitness? Yes. Finding your max doesn’t have to mean finding the most weight you can lift without bailing, it should mean finding the most weight you can SAFELY lift without bailing. Know when to quit.

LISTEN TO YOUR BODY
 Knowing when to quit doesn’t just apply to maxes, it can also apply to WODs. Listen to your body. Some days your body just isn’t up to the task of completing a WOD. If you feel nauseous, light headed, dizzy, completely and utterly exhausted, etc. think twice about your next move. Your body may be telling you something is wrong. On several occasions I have decided to “quit” the WOD. Sometimes it was stomach cramps, sometimes it was dizziness, sometimes it was during a rope climb challenge and I had no skin left on my shin, and sometimes I just had this weird feeling that if I continued something bad was going to happen. Put your pride aside, and listen to your body. You won’t be helping anyone if you get hurt and have to take several weeks to recover. No one will be high-fiving you for the effort you exerted in hurting yourself. The box is a humbling place, be humble or be humbled.

KNOW WHEN TO REST!
 Rest days are important. Without them, all that hard work you put in during the prior days would go to waste. We break ourselves down, then we heal up stronger than we were before. You have to take rest to allow your body to heal. I’m sure we’ve all been guilty of working out one too many days in a row, or working out when we weren’t 100% or ill. The point is to break yourself down, then heal up. If you are already broken down, there is little point in subjecting yourself to another grueling WOD. When your body is broken down, your workouts will have less intensity and it will be more difficult to maintain proper form. Workouts without intensity lack results and poor form promotes injury. Crossfit recommends a 3 on 1 off cycle. This doesn’t always fit in well with the 7 day week, so I make an effort to rest 2 days every week. This could be 3 on 1 off 2 on 1 off, or 4 on 1 off 1 on 1 off, or at worst 5 on 2 off. Know when to rest.

The Crossfit “US VS THEM” Mentality
 There is an element of hubris in crossfit that gives us a bad name. Some crossfitters look down upon people who attempt to find fitness through avenues other than crossfit. Let me tell you something, fitness is ALWAYS evolving. Right know crossfit is a hot topic, but ten years from know it may be old news. There may be some new workout regimen that is even better than crossfit was. The fact that a person is attempting to be fit should always be applauded. The avenue they take should be one that has the following attributes: safety and results. Crossfit works for us, but that doesn’t mean that it works for everyone. I know plenty of people who are as fit, or more fit than I am and work out at globo gyms, weightlifting gyms, pools, etc. They are very disciplined people and it WORKS FOR THEM. I don’t ever tell people that crossfit is the only way. I tell them to find what works for them. If you’ve found a path to fitness that works whether it is crossfit or not, then I’m happy for you. For me, I need a constantly varied group fitness environment. Does that group fitness environment need to be crossfit? Not necessarily, but I find that I enjoy crossfit, and it WORKS FOR ME. Exercise some humility when talking about crossfit to others. Remember that as proud as you are of being a “crossfitter”, what works for you may not work for them.

Warming up isn’t just for muscles!

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  When people hear the word “Warmup” they always think of the body. Warming up doesn’t just include the body, it also includes the mind. When warming up the body, we generally wait until we are within 30 or 40 minutes of the wod/race/physical challenge. If we begin warming up too early we will either tire out or cool down again before the event happens. I believe that our mental game requires the same warmup. If you start thinking about the challenge too early you will tire out mentally. If you fail to warm up mentally you may be unprepared for the task ahead. I recommend getting your mental game/attitude/excitement together about 30 minutes before the challenge. Plan your game. Visualize your success as vividly as possible. Decide how you will break up reps and when you want to rest. How long will your rests be? What is your goal? Why are you doing this? Have realistic yet challenging goals. Create the game plan in your head and try to stick to it. When you finish the workout/race/challenge according to your plan be proud of yourself! Some people may have very active minds and will have difficulty saving their mental warmup until 30 minutes prior. In the case of a WOD, I recommend not looking at it. Just sign up and show up. When you walk in the gym you can look at the board and start strategizing and psyching yourself up. For competitions and races etc. enjoy the company of your friends, listen to music, grab a foam roller and roll out. Whatever you have to do to relax until it is time to warm up both mentally and physically. Just remember, warming up isn’t just for muscles!