Running at the Mouth

Boulder, Then and Now

In the run-up (ahem) to the Bolder Boulder 10K on Monday, the Denver Post's John Meyer did an excellent piece on the legends who trained in Boulder during the '70s and '80s, what Boulder was like then, and how it is so very different today.  The gist of the piece is that the top runners of yesterday, like Shorter, Plaatjes and Flanagan, all lived together and/or trained together -- much like the Ethiopians and Kenyans do today -- which made them much better than if they would have trained on their own, the way American runners do now.  Peep this quote from Flanagan:

"It was kind of like the perfect storm," Flanagan said. "For one reason or another we wound up collecting in Boulder in '74, '75. We all trained together. We all worked hard and played hard."

Flanagan was just "a good club runner" who never made an Olympic team. But a girlfriend who was a marathoner followed him to Boulder, and their daughter is the current U.S. 5,000-meter champion. Shalane Flanagan, a 2004 Olympian, was born in Boulder in 1981.

"I ran 29:06 for 10K and wasn't even the fastest guy on my street," Flanagan said from his home in Massachusetts, where Shalane spent most of her childhood. "None of us knew how good we were. None of us knew how bad we were. We just all thought, 'If he can make the Olympic team, so can I."'

Notice also, in the historic results of the Bolder Boulder, that Frank Shorter ran just about as fast in 1981 as the last two Kenyan and Ethiopian winners.  I noticed the same thing with the historic results of the Indianapolis Mini Marathon:  Shorter and Rodgers in '77 and '78 ran as fast as this year's Kenyan winner.  If Americans could run those times in the '70s, why can't we now?

Tremendous Bob Kennedy Interview

Rogue Running has a terrific interview of Bob Kennedy up.  Kennedy began his 15 years of dominance of the American running scene at the time when I first became interested in running, so as long as I've been following running, I've been following Kennedy.  In this interview, Kennedy speaks on everything from retirement, to training with the Kenyans, to the USATF, to what it's like to run as a full-time job.  Do read it all, but my favorite bits follow.

On training and breaking through mental barriers:

One of the things I learned was levels of intensity. Our minds--we sometimes subconsciously set barriers in our mind about what is hard and what’s not hard, and I found very quickly that what I thought was hard was actually a whole other level than what I was capable of doing. That’s a personal thing, meaning that you have to find your own barriers and your own limitations, and that’s what I think all of this is all about: honestly seeking out what your limitations are.

No matter your level, what Kennedy is saying here is absolutely true.  Whether you're a 5-hour marathoner or a 2:45 marathoner.

Kennedy is also a union agitator, which, to my mind, is the only chink in his armor (I kid; what he's saying is probably a good idea at this point):

Now, [shoe companies] feel that it is good business to support track and field, and it is, along with distance running and marathoning, but it is not the shoe companies’ responsibility to do that. I think it is the responsibility of the sport. And when I say that I mean it is the responsibility of the athletes to band together. If you want to call it a union, call it a union; who cares? But athletes need to organize as a group and develop more power as a group. People make money out of this sport. The shoe companies benefit because there is more brand awareness, so they sell more product; there are meets out there, and TV.

You know. USATF, they’re making money; it was published last week in the local paper that Craig Masback (CEO of USATF) is making $400,000+ a year.  [Holy shit! -- ed.]  That’s fine; he’s actually done a great job for that organization, but it shows that there is money out there. And, like the player’s unions of the NFL and the NBA, their power is to see that it is distributed on a fair basis. The problem we have in our sport is that it is either feast or famine. If you are one of the better athletes in the world, you’re doing very, very well. If you are the kind of athlete who has a chance but you’re not quite there yet, maybe finishing 8th in the trials or 6th in the trails, then you are struggling, you’re scraping by. There is no equality there. And that support needs to come from, in my opinion, organization within the system.

On what he's learned as a result of distance running (and, consequently, what everyone can learn from distance running):

And that’s what I’d like to communicate to others, the benefits of (number one) running in general and then (number two) the process of being successful. And I really look at it as a process or, as Billy Mills refers to it, as a journey. That, to me, is the most important lesson from all this, and that lesson can then be translated to anything…to business, school, whatever. It is just a process of thought--vision, goal setting, planning, education--developed to establish the best plan and then the discipline needed to execute. That is what it takes to be a great runner, and that’s the lesson I’d love to share from my running career.

On running as a job:

It really is more than a full time job. I’ve described it to people in the past and you know it really is a 24 hour a day job, 7 days a week, 12 months a year. Everything that you do (or don’t do) has some effect, positive or negative, on your training and as a result your competition. It is not just showing up to practice in high school or college or to your training sessions after that and doing the work out and then being done. There’s food; there’s sleep; there’s massage, ice baths; there’s core strength and flexibility. All that, and that’s 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Christmas Day, New Year’s Day, Thanksgiving Day, Saturday, Sunday…it never ends. It is a huge, huge commitment if you are going to train at that highest level.

Bob is, and always has been, as fine a representative of American track & field as we could ask for.

The NYT: Your Source for 20 Year-Old Science

The Grey Lady has just gotten around to noticing that it is not lactic acid that causes muscle fatigue, contrary to the common shorthand.  This is nothing new; coaches and exercise physiologists have known that for a long, long time.  As a bonus, not only is the material dated by at least two decades, the NYT's Gina Kolata woefully misrepresents and misinterprets it as well, which I'm sure comes as a complete shock to anyone familiar with the NYT's sterling reputation for honest, balanced reporting.

Kolata attempts to prove two conclusions:  (1) that the presence of lactic acid in the muscles has nothing to do with fatigue; and (2) lactic acid is actually good, since muscles can use it for fuel.  She fails miserably on both accounts. 

Coaches and personal trainers tell athletes and exercisers that they have to learn to work out at just below their "lactic threshold," that point of diminishing returns when lactic acid starts to accumulate. Some athletes even have blood tests to find their personal lactic thresholds.

But that, it turns out, is all wrong.

Actually, it isn't.  The presence of lactic acid in the muscles has very much to do with muscle fatigue.  Granted, lactice acid isn't the cause of muscle fatigue, but it is so strongly correllated with muscle fatigue as to be the best measure of the proper training pace.  We can easily measure lactic acid build-up.  It's not the cause -- some scientists hypothesize that the build-up of hydrogen ions or calcium during exercise causes fatigue, but we don't know.  What we know for certain is that lactic acid builds up, and we get tired.  Lactic acid is simply a convenient, easily measured marker for a process that we really don't know much about.

The understanding now is that muscle cells convert glucose or glycogen to lactic acid. The lactic acid is taken up and used as a fuel by mitochondria, the energy factories in muscle cells.

Mitochondria even have a special transporter protein to move the substance into them, Dr. Brooks found. Intense training makes a difference, he said, because it can make double the mitochondrial mass.

It is clear that the old lactic acid theory cannot explain what is happening to muscles, Dr. Brooks and others said.

Yes, it can.  And it does, at least in a shorthand way.

As for the idea that lactic acid is fuel, it is.  It's just not very good fuel.  This piece doesn't get at the relative usefulness of lactic acid as fuel v. glucose.  I am fairly sure that muscles will burn lactate in the absence of glucose, but muscles are much more efficient when burning glucose.  That's why training at the lactate threshold is so useful -- beyond stimulating increase in mitochondria, it teaches the body to operate more efficiently at higher speeds.

Gina Kolata is an ignoramus who needs to stay on the society page and away from all forms of science, which she clearly cannot get her tiny pea-brain around.

Runner Killed by Alligator

You know that old joke about the two hunters, where the one says that he doesn't have to be able to outrun the bear, he just has to be able to outrun his buddy?  That's true, apparently, with alligators, too, so always run with someone slightly slower than yourself:

MIAMI, Florida (Reuters) -- An alligator grabbed and killed a Florida woman who disappeared while jogging near a canal, a medical examiner determined Thursday.

Construction workers found the woman's dismembered body floating Wednesday in a canal in Sunrise, a northwest suburb of Fort Lauderdale.

An autopsy showed she died of bleeding and shock from alligator bites.

It doesn't look like she was just running along and the alligator came after her:

Perper said the woman, 28-year-old Yovy Suarez Jimenez, had been very close to the canal's edge when the alligator bit her, because her body showed no signs of having been dragged.

Relatives said the victim had gone jogging on Tuesday evening along a bicycle path near the canal. Wildlife officers said no one saw the attack.

"The way it happened, we just don't know," said Dani Moschella, a spokeswoman for the Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission.

Ms. Moschella must not be a runner, because I think I know how it went down:  the unfortunate Ms. Jimenez stepped off the path to relieve herself, and the gator got her.  It's a grim way to go in any event, and my sympathies to her family.

Wildlife officers and commercial trappers were still trying to find the alligator, which was estimated to be 8 to 10 feet long, based on the woman's injuries. If captured, it will be killed, they said.

What I don't understand is why they're trying to hunt down the alligator and kill it.  Will alligator capital punishment somehow deter other 'gators from eating people?  "I want to eat that guy, but damned if I want them to do to me what they did to Ralph."  Whatever the reasons, rest assured an alligator is going to die for this, even if it's the wrong one.  Animal profiling is what it is.

Operation Shutdown

That's pretty much where I'm at right now with my running.  I haven't run hard since the Columbus Distance Classic, since I've just been tired out.  I raced a 10K a couple weeks ago, but my time was so piss-poor that I was embarrassed to post anything about it.  Let's just say it was fast enough to win, but slow enough to be humiliating nonetheless (as in, my average pace for the Classic was faster than I ran for the 10K).  'Course, I got a free Chipotle burrito out of the deal.  Mmmmmm . . . Chipotle.

I'm racing this weekend at the Indianapolis Mini Marathon, along with my good friends and former colleagues John and Jared, and 34,998 34,997 strangers.  I have no idea how I'll do, without having done any quality running in five weeks.  But that's alright.  Looking back, the goal for the race that I set back in November was 1:16:00, over two minutes slower than I ran in the Classic.  I'm fairly sure I still think I can beat that.  I'm absolutely certain that the weekend will be a good time, as it has been each of the previous five years John and I have run it.

After the Mini, I'm taking two weeks off.  This has been the most I've trained continuously since college.  The trouble is, I don't know where I'm going to go from there.  I'm still not 100% committed to running the Columbus Marathon in the fall.  There is a fast half marathon in Parkersburg, WV in August that I've heard good things about.  There's the fall cross-country season, since I so enjoy getting my ass handed to me by guys 10 years my junior.

So I don't know.  All I know is that the two weeks off is going to be pretty sweet.

Your Chance to Beat Lance

Lance Armstrong will run the New York Marathon on November 5.  Lance's roots are as a triathlete, so he's no stranger to running, but I don't think he'll qualify for the Olympic Trials or anything.  On the other hand, he seems to be unusually determined, so he could surprise with a 2:40 or so. 

In any event, Lance crossing over will be good for the event and good for the sport.  I laud the NYRRC for this coup.  Lance did in cycling what American distance runners have been unable to do -- consistently beat the world's elites.  He's like the Geb or Tergat of cycling:  the superman who made his elite competitors look like mere mortals chasing a god.  I think that Lance will make some junior high and high school kids (our future stars, in other words) think that running is cool and inspire them to try it.

Sure, he'll draw some attention away from the guys up front.  But he'll also draw attention to the event as a whole--and not as a charity runner, or a hard-luck story, but as an elite athlete saying: this is a challenge.  That's a good thing.

If You Don't Stop Laughing, I'll Give You Something to Cry About

What the hell is wrong with German people?

After joggers complained that Joachim Bahrenfeld was disturbing the peace, a German court ordered the 54-year-old accountant to stop laughing out loud in the woods.

"It's part of living for me, like eating, drinking and breathing," Bahrenfeld said, telling ananova.com that he headed to the woods after work and on weekends for a good belly laugh. "I feel much better when I laugh. It's freeing and healthy."

Unfortunately, it's no longer a laughing matter: He faces a fine or six months in jail if he laughs out loud again.

It's not clear whether Bahrenfeld was laughing at the runners, himself, or just laughing like a loon.  I'm also not completely buying that the only thing he was doing out in the woods was laughing.

Pre at the 1973 LA Times Mile

Excellent video here, including a post-race interview, of Steve Prefontaine winning the LA Times indoor mile in 1973.  The track was 160 meters and not particularly fast (according to lore).  Many top milers of the time were there, including Marty Liquori (who finished 3rd).  Unbelievably, Pre led the entire race.  It's difficult to win a high school race when you lead the whole thing, let alone a race against the classy competition that Pre beat that day.

I was also struck by the post-race interview; that Prefontaine doesn't quite fit the "brash, cocksure rebel" image that Nike and Hollywood portray.  The Pre in that interview, and others included in the great documentary "Fire on the Track," seems humble and level-headed.  He was just being honest.  Of course, it may be that what was considered cocky in 1973 would be positively polite by today's standards, as the public hadn't been subjected to the likes of today's jackasses.

Finally, Pre's time was more than respectable.  Even today, he could more than hang with the very best in the world.  In this year's Millrose Games (same-sized track), Bernard Lagat won the mile in 3:56, with Kenenisa Bekele in second in 4:01.  At last year's Millrose Games, Lagat won in 3:52, with Laban Rotich and Alan Webb finishing second and third, respectively, in 4:00.  And, unlike Lagat and Webb, the mile was never Pre's specialty.

Since 9th grade, Pre has been a hero of mine.  This race shows why.

Had Me on the Run Just Like a Puma*

Usually, I don't run between the Columbus Marathon in October and February 1, when I start training for the Indianapolis Mini-Marathon.  This year, I trained through the winter because I hated to lose all the fitness I gained last summer, which in turn would have led to another summer of losing races to my running partner.  I concentrated on building my mileage, to the point where I'm doing 70 miles a week in singles (6 sessions, one day completely off).  It may not sound like a lot to some, but it's the highest consistent mileage I've maintained since . . . ever. 

I ran some indoor track meets this winter against college kids (in which I was the oldest participant by at least 7 years).  Then, as I spouted off here last week, I won a local 5K in the fastest time I've run since before I got married.  I got another chance to test my fitness this past weekend at The Columbus Distance Classic, and I'm pleased to report that the winter work has paid off, to the tune of a 1:13:45 half marathon, a PR by almost 5 minutes.  That was good enough for a 10th place finish out of nearly 2,700 finishers.  I even beat a guy from Malone, which is always especially gratifying.  (And as an added thrill, I got to chat a bit with the winner, Daniel Cheriyout, who is a prince of a guy and will be at the Indy Mini.

Today, I feel like hammered shit.  I jogged about 3.5 this morning, and it was all I could do.  I'm going to take it easy this week, and see if I can maintain my fitness until Indy.  I may also run a 10K race next week instead of a threshold session.  If it goes well, you'll hear about it.  If it doesn't, you won't, natch.

I Hope They're Wearing Gold-Plated Diapers

Blue Oyster Cult will be headlining the Columbus Distance Classic post-race concert on Saturday.  Really?  They were available?  I would imagine they've found someone to replace Gene Frenkel on the cowbell.  Because, I'm telling you, you're going to want that cowbell in there.

According to the article, BOC has some new material.  In other words, they won't be playing Fear the Reaper and Burnin' for You ( a.k.a. the only two BOC songs anyone's ever heard of) until the very end of the set, holding their audience helpless as they subject them to their crappy new songs and preventing the mass exodus to the doors that will certainly follow.

If you run the race, you get in free with your race number.  If you don't, it will cost you $20 to see this group of has-beens.  Or, never-wases.  Or whatever.  Let's be honest:  I would feel better about wiping my ass with a twenty dollar bill than exchanging it for a BOC ticket.

Vintage movie scene:

"Do you have any Blue Oyster Cult?"

"NO!  I don't have any Blue Oyster Cult!  I ate twenty pair last time around.   Where were you?"