September | 2010 | Run Luau Run

Archive for September, 2010

The Power of Many

Posted in boston marathon, motivation, racing, training, tagged friends, marathons, running, Smuttynose Marathon on September 30, 2010| 16 Comments »

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In a few days I will be traveling up to Hampton Beach, New Hampshire to run the Smuttynose Rockfest Marathon. I have worked hard this summer, following a proven plan, hoping that it will translate into a Boston Qualifying time. During this week I have actually been surprisingly unfidgety with my taper. In previous marathons I have dreaded this week before a marathon, but with every workout on the Pfitz 12/55 plan planned right up to Marathon Day, I have had a sense of calm I have not experienced in the past. That’s not to say that I’m not very excited.

But as excited as I am about running this thing and hopefully achieving my goal, I am just as excited, if not more so, about running Smuttynose with two friends, Pete and Brendan. The interesting part about this though is that I have only met Pete once and I have never met Brendan. Still, I plan on putting much of my Smuttynose experience in their hands.

Our plan is to run together for as long as we are able. We have agreed that if someone falls off the pace (7:38/mile) we will not all slow down for them, but we do plan to try to carry each other to a sub-3:20 finish, which would be a PR for all three of us (Pete’s PR is a 3:24, Brendan a 3:27 and mine is a 3:30). Unfortunately for Pete, he’s a bit younger than Brendan and I, so a 3:20 doesn’t qualify him for Boston. I won’t blame him if at some point he is feeling it mid-race and takes off. In the meantime, we will run together – strangers in the real world, good friends within our online running community.

I feel lucky that I live in an age where a site like dailymile exists. The three of us have become friends because of dailymile (and to some extent Twitter). Pete (of Runblogger fame) was the first person in the ether to reach out to me a year ago when I was stumbling blindly on Twitter looking for advice on the Manchester Marathon. Through him I was introduced to dailymile. On dailymile (a social site for active people) I was able to connect with many, many other people who, like me, found joy in regular physical activity. I eventually connected with Brendan, who just might be one of the most positive people on dailymile that I have ever interacted with (which says a lot because as a whole, the people you find on dailymile are a very positive bunch!).

Over the past few months, the three of us have encouraged each other through good runs and bad, through health and injury. This Sunday will be the first time I go into a marathon with a solid plan to run with friends. Hopefully we will draw strength from our numbers when we all inevitably hit the wall at around mile 20. Regardless of what happens, I know that the experience of running together will be a positive one and will help us run faster than had we been alone.

Wish us luck…hopefully there are 2, maybe even 3 BQ’s waiting for us on the other side of this weekend!

Stay tuned!

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No Longer Waiting for Greatness

Posted in boston marathon, motivation, training, tagged 3:20, BQ, Foxnews, Hampton Rockfest, marathon, Oprah, Random House, running, Smuttynose Marathon, training on September 27, 2010| 16 Comments »

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Since 1992 I have been waiting.

Waiting for what you say?

I can’t specifically say. To be discovered? To be handed fame and fortune? To win the lottery? I have been waiting. As a youngster, I always felt I was destined for something big, but I never did anything about it. In 1992 I said to some friends I wanted to go to New York, become a soap opera regular and become a star. My friends were all for it. I did eventually go to New York, but not until 1996, and only for a job as a paralegal at a midtown law firm. I did finally make it on to a soap opera, but only as an extra and only because a dear friend of my sister-in-law happened to be the head writer and was kind enough to get me on (Thank you Lil’ Jess and Tom!).

Yup, that's me in the background...

Still, I waited. Waited for greatness, for fame, for fortune.

***

It’s not coming, is it? There is no Justin Bieber fairytale waiting for me, is there? (part of that may be because I don’t sing…details.) Random House is not going to stumble upon my blog and decide they MUST have a book written by Luau. Foxnews is not going to decide that they MUST talk to me about the minimalist movement and make me a media darling. Oprah is not about to come calling, asking me to talk about how we can get America healthy again…is she?

No.

The lottery, both figuratively and literally, is not about to call out my numbers. My blog may be just under a year old, but at nearly 41, I’m no longer that fresh face with potential.

And yet I have waited.

***

For the last 11+ weeks I have been following a training program aimed at helping me run a 3:20 or better at the Smuttynose Marathon on October 3rd. I have not followed the program to a tee, but I have worked very hard and made re-adjustments along the way to keep me on track, both in mileage and types of workouts. Injuries and travel have required me to make some changes, but my numbers are lining up correctly and I am feeling very confident. If I don’t manage to qualify for Boston, it’s going to be very, very close.

If I do run a 3:20 or better I will have to face an ugly, brutal truth: – to achie—

-<<record stratch>> – Wait…what? Luau, um, did you just said that if you ACHIEVE your goal, you’re going to have to face an ugly truth?

Yup. That’s what I said. The ugly truth is this: to achieve your goals, most of us must work for it. If I run a BQ (Boston Qualifier), it will have been achieved through sweat and pain, hard work and determination and even a little bit of blood. There has been no “waiting” this time around for a BQ.

As much as I like to pull the “back when I was your age” card on my children and younger friends, the truth is, my generation really was the beginning of the immediate gratification/MTV society (I can’t say generation anymore because we have had children that also carry this need for immediate gratification…Video on Demand? DVR’s? 24 Hour News?).

My father didn’t raise me this way, but somewhere along the way, I lost the thread. I left the path and I got lost. Things came too easily too early for me and I got comfortable. Well, these 11 weeks have brought me a new perspective. Barring a twisted ankle on the course, I will run close to, if not achieve a BQ. Regardless, I know I will run a personal best (Providence is my current PR at 3:30:11), and it will all be because of hard work. I feel like I’ve cut away the fat, more mentally than physically. I am ready.

So Random House, Foxnews and Oprah, watch out. After I hit this BQ, I’m coming.

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Glio Blast Off 5K

Posted in race recap, tagged Glio Blast Off 5K, race recap, running on September 23, 2010| 15 Comments »

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The training schedule I’ve been following for the Smuttynose Marathon called for an 8-10K race this past Saturday. The idea being that running a race this close to the actual goal race would help me work through any pre-race jitters. The problem was that local race directors didn’t get the memo that I was in a training cycle that called for an 8-10K and all that was available close by were a few 5K’s. I picked what I thought would be one of the flatter ones and away I went.

Now I have this friend, let’s call her Teri*, who I have been trying to get to come to one of these road races with me for over a year. There was always some excuse, but she kept telling me to ask her the next time. She hadn’t run a race in a decade, so when I came across this race, an inaugural one, I thought it was the perfect opportunity for her to re-enter the road race arena. The description of the Glio Blast Off 5K was fast and relatively flat. When I showed her the website, she was hooked. She’s been running around 6 miles lately as her regular runs, so she had no excuses with a 5K.

Still, as I drove by her apartment on Saturday morning to pick her up, I was half expecting her to tell me that something had come up. I was pleasantly surprised to find her waiting for me on the curb.

She was, to say the least, a bit nervous. She had no idea what to expect from herself. I reminded her that for a first race, she should push herself hard, but know that this was simply a bar-setter. Once she got through this one, she would know what she was capable of and be able to go on from there. She thought that she would be happy simply coming in under 30 minutes. I asked how fast she had run her fastest 3 miler – 25 -26 minutes.

I thought about that for a minute and told her that I wouldn’t be surprised if she could hit a 25-handle. She looked at me like I had a screw loose.

We arrived at the race, checked in, got our numbers and began to warm up. As the start time edged closer and closer, I could see Teri getting more and more nervous. I tried distracting her by trying to pick out who we thought the winner would be. An older gentleman, in his 50’s, flew by warming up.

“There goes your winner,” I said. She laughed. It was actually good for me that she was so nervous because it kept my mind off my own thoughts about the race. Though my plan was to try to improve off of last week’s time (20:27), I essentially had no idea what kind of giddy-up I would have, having raced a 5K race and run a VO2Max interval workout in the previous 7 days.

As the starter called the runners to the line, I left Teri in the middle of the pack – just run strong and slightly out of your comfort zone, I told her. I went to the front and instinctively checked out who else was there. There was the older gentleman, a 20-something year old, a larger guy in his 30’s and me. I found out in our short conversation before the start, that all of them had been long timecompetitive runners. The larger guy mentioned that he use to run 5 miles in about 27 minutes in college. Oh, boy! My strategy had been to go out with the leaders and see what happened. After our brief discussion I realized that I would be fighting for 4th place, even with a PR. The gun blared and we were off.

Right out of the gate the big guy pushed the pace, with 20-something right behind him, then me, then the older gentleman. Before the first turn I once again found myself running with the front pack of a race. After an initial flat 200 yards, the course went uphill for the next 300 yards or so. The big guy didn’t flinch and I tried to keep pace. 2 turns later and we started down a mild downhill. The big guy was about 10 yards ahead, 20-something was maybe 2 or 3 yards ahead and I could hear the older gentleman closing in.

Just before hitting the mile 1 marker, the older gentleman flew by me. I check my watch, 6:00. Phew! A little fast!

I watched as our group of 4 began to look more like 4 groups of 1. The big guy continued to pull away, with the other two hanging on. I had two choices at this point. Do I follow, push myself to the limit and possibly injure myself, or do I continue along at what I perceived as max effort? I know that sounds contradictory. Luau, if you’re already pushing at max effort, how can you push any harder? I’ve always felt that what may feel like a maximum effort isn’t always so. That said, despite my training program saying I needed to approach this race as an all out effort, to paraphrase old Obi-wan, this wasn’t the race that I was training for. I would have kicked myself if I had maxed out my legs and ended up pulling something with 2 weeks to go until Smuttynose. Having come to that conclusion, I pushed on at the effort I was putting forth.

As the other three began to pull away, I glanced over my shoulder. Nobody. I once again found myself in the position I did at Lex’s Run. Barring disaster, or a huge rally by the guys behind me, I was sitting in the spot I was going to finish. Mile 2 came and went uneventfully in 6:24. I did some quick math and realized I had 7 1/2 minutes to cover 1.1 miles and get in under 20 minutes (my stated goal). It was going to be close. I felt my legs slowing down and I began thinking of the uphill near the end of the race. I could still see the leaders.

At this point the older gentleman had passed the 20-something. I realized too late that I was closer to them than I had thought. With a little over 1/4 mile to go, I saw that I was only about 200 yard behind he big guy and a little over 100 yards behind 20-something. I had no shot, but I pressed on the gas anyway. As I hit the final hill, I could feel gravity slowing me down. I could only watch helplessly as 20-something crested over the hill and used gravity to his advantage. Once I hit the downhill, I did the same. It was too late to catch 20-something, but I still had a shot at my first sub-20. Two more turns and I saw the clock just under 200 yards away. It was just clicking over to a 19-handle. The finish line looked so far away. Physically I felt like I had left it all on the hill, but I knew, I knew, I had something left in the tank. I forced myself to sprint. I’m not sure how I looked, and I didn’t really care. I was getting that sub-20 dammit! As I closed in on the finish line, I realized that not only was I going to finish in under 20 minutes, but I had a shot at 19:30! I could hear the people gathered cheering me on as I flew through the chute. I pressed my watch and looked – 19:30. Official time: 19:27. I found the other 3 guys, congratulated them and nearly threw up.

After taking a moment, I jogged back to the last turn and cheered runners in, encouraging them to either hold off the person behind them or catch the person in front of them. A few minutes later my friend Teri came around the corner. She was struggling – holding her own, keeping pace, but definitely struggling. As she came around the final turn, I broke into a run with her. Let’s go Teri! There’s the finish line! She wanted to stop. I wasn’t about to let her do that with just 150 yards to go. Come on! Let’s go! Look at the clock! LOOK AT THE CLOCK! The clock read 25:–. She kept moving. I started running backward right in front of her. You’ve got this! You’ve got your 25, but you can hit 25:30 Teri! Let’s go. She would later tell me that at that particular moment, she hated me and wanted to hit me. Intuitively, I stayed just out of reach, mentally trying to pull her along. At about 10 yards to go, I peeled off so she could run through the chute. 25:27. For about a minute or so she was miserable. Then she realized what she had done. You could see the pride and excitement grow in her face. She had achieved her goal and she felt great. She called her trainer to share the news. About 10 minutes later, the timekeepers put out the premiminary results. Teri had finished 30th overall (out of 185 finishers!), 10th among women, and 1st in her age group. 1ST IN HER AGE GROUP?!? She was ecstatic! I have to admit, I was just as happy for her and I was for me when I found out that I too had won my age group, finishing 4th overall.

For an inaugural event, this race was extremely well run. My only two notes of criticism would be that they didn’t have any course maps to check out (something they said would be addressed next year) and the race directors chose very odd age groups (31-40/41-50?). The course was fast and fun but challenging. Hopefully Teri and I can go back next year and defend our age group wins!

Did I learn anything? I was reminded that as a running community, we take pride in the achievements of others. I truly got a huge thrill from Teri’s age group win, knowing that in a small way I had helped push her a little harder than she was going to push herself. Hopefully this is the first of many races for Teri.

*Named changed, though not arbitrarily.

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Walking Before Running

Posted in New York City Marathon, other, tagged Autism Speaks, Boston Walk, Fund, Raiser on September 20, 2010| 7 Comments »

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Many of you know that I am running the 2010 ING New York City Marathon on November 7th. I will be able to do so because a great number of you helped me raise the required funds for Autism Speaks to get me there as a charity runner. Through your generosity I have raised over $3,000. I am deeply grateful. A few people however have asked me to remind them where to go to send donations. I would like to request that you send them to a new destination.

Before I run, I will walk.

Next Sunday, our little family will be participating in the Greater Boston Autism Speaks Walk at Suffolk Downs. I have to admit I have been hesitant in writing this post. After all that you did for my drive to run New York, I did not want you to feel that I was going back to the well too soon and too many times. That said, if you have already donated to my New York fundraiser, please know this post is not directed toward you (though please feel free). If you did not have a chance to donate to my run, but want to help, please consider donating here. It is our team’s fund raising page for this year’s walk. We are Team Umizoomi (my little Brookelet’s choice). Last year you helped us raise so much that I was allowed to throw out the first pitch at a Red Sox game – an opportunity of a lifetime.

Throwing out the first pitch on Autism Awareness Night at Fenway in 2009

I’m going to steal the wife’s letter from her page:

Because autism awareness is as important to my baby girl as any other tool we can give her.

Because she desperately needs acceptance, encouragement and understanding.

Because she deserves compassion and love.

Because with the right tools, there is nothing she can’t do.

Because 1 in 110 children is just too many.

Because no child should have to hurt.

Because there is nothing we wouldn’t do for our girl, but we can’t do this alone.

Please, donate whatever you can. Join our team. Walk with us here in Boston or join us in raising funds and walking virtually from wherever you are.

Because together, we CAN and we WILL make a better world for people with autism.

On behalf of my family and so many others like us, thank you. From the bottom of our hearts. We couldn’t do this without you.

My Little Super Brooke

Once again, if you have already given, please don’t feel like I am coming back to you, but maybe you could pass this post along. But if you haven’t donated yet, please consider giving to, joining and walking with (virtually or IRL) Team Umizoomi.

The link is —>HERE<— or click on the picture of Super Brooke!

Thank You,

Luau

PS – just let me know if you do, that way I can thank you properly!

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Sliding Doors

Posted in health, motivation, Physics, tagged Choices, Long Term Health, running, Sliding Doors on September 16, 2010| 16 Comments »

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I never saw the movie Sliding Doors. If I had, maybe I wouldn’t be writing this post. For those that have never heard of it, the plot of the movie centers around the two possible lives a woman may have had depending on whether she made it on to a subway car or not on one fateful night.

How many sliding doors do we make or miss every day in our lives?

According to some physicists, every decision we make is Sliding Doors in the making. Every decision we make creates two or more possible outcomes, with every possible outcome actually occurring in separate universes. Some of those sliding doors lead to minor, almost undetectable changes in our lives; others can have dramatic effects. It’s enough to paralyze one’s decision-making ability, which I’m sure is one of the sliding doors.

It makes you wonder what your life would be like now had you taken a slightly different path early in your life – a poetry course instead of American Lit in school; or a skiing trip instead of the beach or home for Spring Break; the drug store instead of the grocery store to pick up some Advil. Would you still be you?

What does this have to do with running?

Nothing really, except this – many of us go through life not really thinking about the sliding doors we may or may not be going through. We don’t think about what doors may be closing for good on us as we walk past them. I am making an effort to make sure that I do everything I can to maintain my health and my ability to run. I am actively looking for the sliding doors that I think will make me a better, stronger and more enduring runner and in the long run, a healthier old man.

It’s still a guessing game. You never know for sure which sliding doors lead where, but you can make educated, pro-active guesses, and do what you know is right for you. Sitting on the couch with a pint of ice cream after dinner or going for a walk? On any given day, either choice will probably not have long, rippling effects, but making the same bad choices on a daily basis certainly will.

What doors did you walk by today?

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Lex’s Run (My First 5K)

Posted in race recap, tagged Lex's Run, My first 5k, race recap on September 14, 2010| 10 Comments »

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I’m looking around at the crowd of runners gathering at the start of Lex’s Run for MDA. Like any race, there is a wide variety of runners. Every shape, size and age is represented. There are about 75 of us milling about. I’m looking to see who I think the lead runners will be. There’s my buddy Chris from Run Run Live. He’s fast, strong and experienced. There’s another, younger guy who has a team shirt on that looks pretty fast. I eavesdrop on his conversation with another fast looking kid. I’m doing the numbers in my head. I’ve got myself in 4th. That is, until I hear their conversation. They are talking about a man named Sawyer. From what I can gather, he’s 48 and he’s fast…real fast. I see them look over and nod. I follow their gaze and there he is. All 5’4″, maybe 120lbs on a day the sun and the moon are on the other side of the planet.

“There’s your winner,” I thought.

“There goes your winner,” said my friend Adam. I laughed. We would later joke that Sawyer had negative body fat and that every time he walked by, we all lost a pound.

Hmmm, okay, 5th place looks about right.

Another slender runner walked by. I would later find out his name is Jonathan. Much like the Sawyer, Jonathan is built like a your stereo-typical runner – long, lean, slender.

6th…shooting for 6th!

***

Before long, Doug called the runner to the starting line. I don’t necessarily like starting at the front of the pack, but Chris urged me to join him on the line. Sawyer and Jonathan positioned themselves to my left. As Doug blared the foghorn you could hear our four stopwatches beep just slightly out of sync with each other. We were off! Within about 400 yards, the four of us had created a gap with the pack. I had run this part of the course with Doug earlier so I acted as the navigator. Chris took the lead with the three of us following close behind.

I had no real strategy for this race. My friend Sheila had suggested running like my hair was on fire. Chris kept the pace hard as we worked our way through the first several turns. The first half mile, on a park trail, was relatively narrow, not allowing for a lot of movement, but then the course opened up a bit. It was at this point that Sawyer made his move and took the lead. Almost immediately he began to push the pace. The three of us held on for another quarter mile or so, but I got the sense that had he wanted, Sawyer could have left us completely in the dust 10 yards into the race.

Coming out of the park at 3/4 of a mile we hit “the hill”. The hill was a 154 foot climb over a quarter mile stretch. Sawyer pushed the accelerator down. Jonathan stayed closed behind him. I heard Chris yell, “Good luck boys” or something to that affect. I decided to try to run with the big boys. I was only about 3 or 4 yards behind them, but I couldn’t close the gap. 2/3 of the way of the hill, I yelled that I didn’t think I was gonna be able to keep pace. Jonathan yelled back words of encouragement, but it was no use. These two guys were simply much faster than I was. Little by little they began to pull away. As we hit the top of the hill, an EMT cheered us on. With my lungs and leg on fire, I remember thinking, I may need this guy soon!

Legs burning, lungs on fire...

As we made the turn I looked down at a glorious downhill. Nearly a mile of downhill grade. I thought maybe I could use gravity to close the gap a little with the two leaders, but they must have been thinking the same thing. Part way down the hill I glanced over my shoulder to see if Chris or anybody else was closing in on me.

Nobody.

I was sitting comfortably in third, and this is when my head started to play games with me. Barring a stumble, there really was no way I was catching Jonathan or Sawyer. Looking back, I had created about a 200 yard gap between me and the next runner.

What are you running so hard for? Ease up on the gas. You don’t need to be going this fast. You can’t catch those guys. That guy can’t catch you. These were the thoughts that drifted through my mind as I tried to push through. I got so lost in thought that I almost missed the water station. I had no intention on grabbing a drink, but I yelled at one of the kids there to throw the water in my face. She missed and hit my chest, but it was the refreshing jolt that I needed. I heard the girl and the mother laugh as I flew by.

Re-focused, I concentrated simply on finishing strong. As I hit 2 miles, the course flattened out and took a turn back toward the start. I could see both Sawyer and Jonathan in the distance and decided that I would try to, at the very least, keep them in sight. With a little over 1/2 mile to go, I glanced over my shoulder. I had stretched my lead on the next runner to about 300 hundred yards. As I went into the final turns of the race, I was aware of people cheering but could not hear them. My hair was on fire and the only way to put it out was to cross the finish line. At the final turn I saw the clock. My goal had been to run a 19-handle, but the clock had already rolled over to 20. I sprinted through the chute at 20:27. 3rd overall out of over 70 runners. Not bad for a first 5K. Initially I was disappointed with my time, but after some reflection, I realized that the course was not considered an easy one. The climb on the hill probably took more out of me than I was willing to admit, especially since most of my training this summer has been on flat roads.

After crossing the finish line, I found Jonathan. Sawyer had gone out for a cool down, but I wanted to cheer everybody in (easy to do when it’s 70+ people). Over the next 30 minute Jonathan & I (joined a few minutes later by my dailymile and twitter bud Adam) chatted and cheered everybody in. Jonathan, it turns out, had started running only recently. A few years ago, pushing 250 lbs, he had decided to change his life. He went out the door and ran 5 minutes from his house, stopped and then turned around and ran back. He slowly built up to 10 minutes, then 15. After being able to run consistently for 30 minutes, he started running for distance. The miles added up, the pounds dropped off, and now he’s running 5K’s in 19 minutes, along with running marathons and competing in triathlons. Adam actually has a similarly inspirational story you can find here.

As the rest of the racers came in, I got to meet several other runners, a lot of them with neat, interesting stories of their own. One woman, Mary McManus, had run Boston 2009 after being diagnosed with post-polio syndrome in 2006. You can find her on the web here.

So what did I learn from this race? I’m not sure yet. That a 150 foot climb over a quarter mile is hard? I don’t think I needed this race to learn that. What WAS reaffirmed was that the running community is vast and varied, and that running brings us the peace of solitude and the joys of community.

I hope that if you are relatively local, you’ll consider running Lex’s Run in 2011. Doug’s wife Lex, suffers from adult onset muscular dystrophy, and they have created this race to give back to the association that has done so much for them. You can find their homepage here.

Jonathan, Me and Adam post-race courtesy of Chris

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I Won’t Forget

Posted in motivation, other, tagged I Won't Forget, Remember, run, running poem, September 11th on September 11, 2010| 3 Comments »

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On this day,

Run to honor those whose feet no longer touch the earth,

And now run with angels.

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Get Your Jurek On

Posted in other, tagged 10/10/10, Chicago Marathon, Community, running, Scott Jurek on September 10, 2010| 12 Comments »

Be excellent to each other.

-Bill S. Preston, Esq.

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You may or may not have heard of Scott Jurek. He is, in some people’s eyes (including mine), a running god – a world-class ultra-distance runner, who wins. He won the Western States 100 an incredible 7 consecutive times. He plays a big role in the book Born To Run. The guy can run far and he can do it with speed.

But as impressive as it is that he is so accomplished as a runner, it is Scott Jurek, the man, that impresses me the most. After every race, he will go back to the finish line and wait. He will wait for every runner to come in, cheering them on. Despite being a running deity, he is a nice guy. He is one of us. It is this sense of community, this sense that “we are all runners”, that I find most inspiring. And it is this feeling that I try to emulate.

I have found, for the most part, that runners are a friendly and caring lot. We support each other in our lows, and cheer each other in our highs. I think that part of the reason why we are such a supportive group, is that we tend to not take ourselves too seriously. Yes, we can be serious about our running (just ask the wife), but for most of us (myself included), we know we will never be elite runners, we will never make a living off of running, and therefore we are able to approach running with a sense of joy and fun. Whether you are a 2:45 marathoner (in my dreams!) or a 6:00 marathoner, you ARE a marathoner. Either way, you have to train, you have to put in the miles, you have to sweat. Those miles and that sweat bond us together.

So it was with great disappointment the other day that I heard that two runners I consider friends were no longer friends because one thought the other didn’t take her running seriously enough. Not only did the “more serious” person cut off communication with the other, but she retracted an offer to share a room with the other at this year’s Chicago Marathon. I understand wanting to room alone, but it’s a little difficult to scramble for a hotel room this late in the game (the Chicago Marathon is on 10/10/10). I also understand that two different runners may be in different places when it comes to intensity and focus, but I want to believe that as runners, we wouldn’t leave each other high & dry, particularly when it comes to housing before a world-class marathon like Chicago. By now, most of the hotels downtown have filled up and any vacancies are priced exorbitantly high.

The friend who has been left out in the cold has had a rough year. Running is her place to find peace. It’s a shame that something like this has to crash that sanctuary.

Admittedly, I do not know the whole story. Maybe something was said, maybe something was taken out of context, who knows? But as a person who gets totally amped for marathons, is completely “serious” about training for them, and is looking to do the best I can do, I don’t think it should matter how “serious” someone else is about running.

Am I serious about my running? You bet I am. I have trained hard this summer in anticipation of the Smuttynose Marathon on October 3rd, followed by the NYC Marathon on November 7th. I am on a mission! However, I truly believe that running should be about building each other up, not tearing each other down. If I am trying to accomplish my personal goal of a 3:20 marathon, why should it bother me if your personal goal is different?

There will always be someone who is faster than you, just as there will always be someone who is slower – it is a spectrum, if you will – but we are all runners.

We should all seek to channel our inner Jurek, doing what we can to cheer everybody across that finish line, not throwing up last minute road blocks.

Remember, running is fun.

Party on, dudes!

-Ted “Theodore” Logan

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When running on the treadmill (this week’s poll)

Posted in other, tagged poll, treadmill on September 8, 2010| 4 Comments »

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Own It

Posted in diet, health, tagged food choices, health, parenting on September 2, 2010| 6 Comments »

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I’m sitting in the audience of a stage production Katie’s camp is doing. For the past two summers, Katie has attended a 3 week drama camp and simply loved it. The productions have been what you would expect from a 3 week summer camp, attended by kids ranging in age from 7 – 18. It is NOT Broadway, but the joy on Katie’s face when she is performing is simply priceless and makes it all worthwhile. As I sit in the audience before the show, I overhear a conversation between two mothers. Normally I am not the eavesdropping type, but these two ladies are sitting right next to and directly in front of me, so it is hard not to listen to their droning. From what I can tell, their girls are probably in the 11 – 13 age range, and have been attending the camp long enough to have “graduated” from the chorus roles. These two are complaining about how there are too many little kids at this camp, that there shouldn’t be so many, how in last year’s production it seemed that too many little one missed a step here or there.

I’m thinking to myself, what do they think this is, Summerstock? They go on and on complaining that it’s about time their daughters got roles that were bigger and more important (I wonder if they had ever heard the phrase “there are no small roles, only small actors”). But it isn’t this incessant droning that gets my hackles up. No, up to this point, I am simple amused by their silliness. But then one of them says this:

“You know what else I’m going to complain about? Too many snacks. They let these kids eat too much candy. It’s ridiculous. She comes home having eaten 5 packs of M&M’s. I’m going to have to make Jenny* run around the block a dozen times just to drop her weight back to normal!

Now, I agree that running is a great way to drop weight. I also agree that candy during snack time is not a great idea. But did I mention that these snacks that the camp “gave” to the kids had to be purchased BY the kids? Let that one digest for a second.

Right, candy was available for purchase. It was not given to them freely. So, although I think that maybe the camp could have provided better choices for purchase, I don’t think the blame for Jenny’s extra few pounds falls anywhere near the camp. In order for these kids to be able to purchase their snacks, guess where they had to get their money? Oh, I don’t know, maybe from you Mom? I wonder if the mom ever considered having a serious discussion about making healthy choices with her daughter before she handed over some spending cash.

Each snack cost $1.50. I would hand Katie $2 and tell her to pick something relatively healthy, but I also told her that every once in a while feel free to pick something junky. Most of the time, she chose pretzels. I would also pack both fresh and dried fruit in her lunch, which she ate 90% of the time.

My point is this. As the parent, you need to “own” the choices you give your children. There is a great commercial that aired a while back where a mom was with her daughter, making sure she did the right thing every time a choice came up. At the end of the commercial, you realize that the mom isn’t really there, it’s her presence that is there, helping the child make the proper decisions. The commercial ends saying, if you don’t talk to your children about drugs, how will they know what to do?

Well, the same goes with nutrition and food choices. If you’re gonna hand your daughter $10 everyday (a whole other topic in and of itself) and let her loose in a candy store, don’t expect the candy sellers to give sound advice to your child. That’s the parent’s job. Preventative care (talking to the child beforehand) is a lot easier than treating the results of poor choices. Some of you may say, well, how do you know your kid is making the right choices? Well, you don’t know for sure. In part you have to have faith that you if you believe you have done all you can, then your child will make the right choice. A few years back, when Katie was 7, she was at a friend’s house for a playdate, the mother called me about 30 minutes before I was supposed to pick her up. She reassured me that everything was fine, but that Katie had asked the parent to call to make sure it was okay for her to have ice cream. It’s not that we don’t eat ice cream in our house. We just generally don’t eat it shortly before dinner. Point is, she was thinking about her choices. She was 7.

We need to own the choices we make when it comes to taking care of ourselves. These two moms in the audience obviously expected their kids to simply know what was okay to do. Without talking to their children, how could they? In addition, I seriously have to wonder why they continued to line their girls’ pockets with cash when they refused to make healthier choices. Or why they simply didn’t send healthy snack with their children in the morning. I’m pretty sure the various snacks I sent Katie to camp with (including vacuum baked bananas, greek olives, a variety of fruit, even some all-natural beef jerky) cost less per day than the $10 these ladies were each spending daily.

There’s nothing wrong with indulgence. This past week, while on vacation, I’ve had more ice cream I think that I’ve had in all of 2010! Indulgence is a good thing. But what is the point of indulgence if we do it everyday? Can you even call it that if you’re doing it everyday?

I guess my point in the end is you can’t blame anybody else if you don’t give your child the tools to make the right decision when it comes to nutrition and fitness. With those tools, they will in all likelihood, make the right decision more times than not. Without those tools, you can bet, the wrong choice will be made every time.