More Potpourri

We had thunderstorms overnight and woke up to cool temps and cloudy skies this morning.  Following three days of maintenance runs, I did a brisk hike this morning for cross training.  That moves my long run (24 miles) to Saturday morning.  The weather should be cooperative.  The Weather Service is calling for a cool overnight low of 42 degrees and an afternoon high of 70 under sunny skies.  Winds should be light to moderate at 8-13 mph.  So, if I bonk again, I can't blame the weather.  Stay tuned.

I check out the Colorado Springs Gazette website most mornings.  I've spent quite a bit of time in Colorado Springs and I'm considering moving there within a couple of years.  I noticed a brief piece on their website this morning about the disappearance of ultrarunner Micah True while running in the Gila Wilderness in New Mexico:  http://www.outtherecolorado.com/201203309667/Running/boulder-ultrarunner-missing-after-going-for-run-at-new-mexico-resort.html 

He's only been missing for 24 hours so there's hope.  True is best known as Caballo Blanco, the gringo who lived among the Tarahumara Indians of Mexico and is featured in Chris McDougall's best-selling Born to Run. 

I saw this piece about the overwhelming odds that a Kenyan will win the 2012 Olympic Marathon gold medal on competitor.com:  http://running.competitor.com/2012/03/news/kenya-poised-to-dominate-olympic-marathon_50025  Short take: Of the top 20 marathons times in 2011, 20 were run by Kenyans including Patrick Makau's world record 2:03:38 at Berlin and Geoffrey Mutai's (even faster) 2:03:02 at Boston.  Mutai's mark is not a world record because of technical factors:  tail wind and elevation loss. 

So, the American men have scant chance to win marathon goal (or any medal) at London.  But, I'm already out on a proverbial limb in predicting a medal for American Shalane Flanagan, winner of the women's Olympic Trials Marathon back in January.

I also recently came upon this:  http://www.trackwomenoforegon.com/
It's a documentary about the University of Oregon women's track program focusing on the 1985 and 2011 squads.  The '85 team won the NCAA championship and the 2011 team was runner-up to Texas A&M.  The documentary, entitled We Grew Wings, will have its world premiere in Eugene, Oregon, at the Olympic Track & Field Trials on June 30. 

Slouching toward Beaverton

It looks like spring has sprung for good here in Hog Heaven.  Of course, this is the Upper Midwest and anything can still happen, but I'm betting that we've seen the last of ol' Man Winter, who visited only sporadically this year anyway.

Today is sunny and unseasonably mild (forecast high of 70 degrees).   And, it's not just today but as far as the (meteorological) eye can see: which is about ten days.  The ten-day forecast from the Weather Service for Hog Heaven calls for nothing but spring-time: highs in the mid-60s to the mid-70s under mostly sunny to partly cloudy skies.

Thus, it was with a smile that I went out for a one-hour maintenance run this morning.  A run that quickly morphed into a 90-minute maintenance run.  That's what spring will do.  I ordered a new (3rd generation) iPad and it's scheduled to be delivered on Friday.  It'll require a signature so I'll need to be home when it comes which could be any time from about 9:00 until 11:00.  So, I'm rescheduling my long run from Friday to Thursday.  That means cross training tomorrow.  

Phil Knight and all those folks in Beaverton, Oregon, who depend on runners forking over big bucks for running shoes made in Vietnam (and other exotic locales) for pennies a day must be breathing a sigh of relief right about now.  Trashed by author Christopher McDougall in the best-selling barefoot-running primer Born to Run, Nike, et.al. hurriedly added some minimalist shoes to their lineups.  Now, they may have found some minimal vindication in a new study out of the University of Colorado.  The full study can be read here: Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise

A quick summary of the study can be found here: http://sweatscience.runnersworld.com/2012/02/barefoot-versus-running-shoes-which-is-surprisingly-more-efficient/

For the time-challenged, here are the main points from the study:

     1.  Running in shoes takes less energy than running barefoot.
     2.  The heavier your shoes are, the less efficiently you run.
     3.  Running barefoot "offers no metabolic advantage over running in lightweight, cushioned shoes."

Born to Run

Yesterday was cross training, and considering how I felt when I set out this morning, today should have been too.  There was nothing specific wrong with me; I just didn't feel motivated.  But that's not going to get me to Ft. Collins.  So, I laced up the ASICS and headed out for what started as a s-l-o-w run and ended up as a more-than-respectable six miles.  Somewhere between miles 2 and 3, I started feeling better (and going faster), and my pace for miles 5 and 6 was two minutes faster than for miles 1 and 2.  Workouts are often funny that way.  Like famous ultra runner Forrest Gump said, "You never know what you're going to get."

Considering that running is arguably the world's oldest athletic competition, it has inspired comparatively little literary output.  If I had to recommend a single title on running, it would be Christopher McDougall's Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen.    

Journalist McDougall's spell-binding tale introduces the reader to a tribe of super-runners: the Tarahumara Indians from Mexico's remote Copper Canyons.  Intrigued by the Tarahumara's ability to run prodigious distances injury free, McDougall goes looking for the answer: an answer that he finds in mankind's evolutionary development.  Humans survived as a species because they acquired the ability to outrun their dinner.  Hence, we were born to run.

More controversially, McDougall claims that runners do not require fancy, and expensive, shoes to do what they naturally do.  In fact, he contends that modern running shoes, with their abundant cushioning, encourage unnatural heel-striking and cause, rather than prevent, running injuries.  (I doubt that McDougall is welcome at Nike headquarters.)   Following publication of the book, the debate over barefoot--or minimalist--running has raged with no definitive resolution in sight.  Interestingly, the big shoe companies have begun to hedge their bets and offer minimalist shoes along with their more cushioned, stabilized shoes.  (More on this in a future post.)

What makes "Born to Run" so much fun is not the controversy but the cast of outrageous characters--including Barefoot Ted, surfer-girl Jenn Shelton and her partner Billy Barnett, and gringo expat Caballo Blanco, who lives among the Tarahumara--and the unfolding drama of a race for the ages.

When your running's not going well and you need a little inspiration, check it out.