Categories
life thoughts

Attack the Hills


photo credit: OldOnliner

Once upon a time I was a member of my high school cross country team. On the last race I ran with the team (end of the season) I learned a very valuable lesson about running. We had gone over the course in advance of the race so during the race I knew where I was relative to the end of the race – I knew how much further I had to go and how much energy to put in so that I would not run out before the finish line. As I came to the last long incline before the end of the race I knew that I could push myself and I decided to attack the hill. I was a short distance behind another runner, perhaps 15 yards, and I knew that I was in tenth place overall. As I attacked that hill I quickly closed the gap and overtook him shortly before the course turned and went down a steep incline to the final flat to the finish line. As I passed him, he sped up, not wanting to lose a place. I was still ahead when I got to the edge of the hill and I stretched my stride and let gravity carry me down faster than I could have sprinted and certainly faster than I could have gone if I had tried to remain in control of my pace. I got going so fast down that hill that my momentum on the flat carried me to very quickly catch up with two more runners who had not even been in sight when I started attacking a the bottom of that last hill.

Categories
culture politics

Challenge vs Competition

I don’t recall what triggered the thought, but over the Thanksgiving break I had a little insight into the vital difference between a challenge and a competition. A competition is something like a sporting event where there can only be one winner (excluding ties). It is an event where the winner is determined as a function of relative position. A challenge is an event where there can be multiple winners because winning is determined as a function of achievement based on static criteria.

A marathon provides a good example of both. Winning a marathon is a competition. The winning time of any one race has no bearing on the outcome of other races. Your time in one race may be too slow to win while the same time in another race would constitute first place. Finishing a marathon is a challenge – any marathon runner will congratulate any other on the accomplishment of running that 26.2 mile race. Finishing a marathon in under 3 hours is a challenge – no matter how many people accomplish the feat, my finishing in under three hours does not diminish your success in finishing in under three hours.

The distinction here might seem trivial, but I believe that we can find valuable benefits from being able to distinguish between a competition and a challenge. For some non-athletic examples: getting elected to a political office is a competition (assuming you are not unapposed) while getting into heaven is a challenge.

Categories
culture life

Racing Together

We were discussing Concern for the One today in class and as we talked about how some people get lost because they grow weary one of the class members, Travis Staten, talked about a marathon that he ran recently. He talked of how weary people get running a marathon and about how everybody encourages their fellow runners. I thought of my own marathon experience and I can attest to that spirit of cooperation. Not only the encouragement from other runners, but the verbal encouragement from those spectators who are watching and cheering for all the runners passing them on the course. I suspect that the selfless instinct to bolster the spirits of all those who are racing “against you” comes from the fact that the course is so long that you are competing against yourself or against the course more than against your fellow competitors. Finishing is an accomplishment.

Travis summed it up perfectly by describing the feeling among runners as:

I’m going to make it – and so are you.

When he said that I realized that our approach to life should be exactly the same.

Categories
life

Another Running Post

It’s been quite a while since I posted about running. For that matter, it’s been a long time since anything noteworthy happened while I was running. This morning as I was starting out on my (semi-regular) morning run I heard my name called out from behind me. By the time I could turn my head my brother-in-law had passed me on his bike. I don’t know how long or how often his training takes him clear down near my area, but this is the first time I’ve seen him training while I was out running.

Thanks Dave for calling out to me, it was a fun way to start my run.

Categories
life

Running Around

It’s been a long time since I went three days in a row without a single post. There’s a lot going on in my head, and there was nothing out the that I just had to write about. Coming into today I was thinking that it was time to write about something. I woke up just before 6:00am and when I looked at the clock I decided that today would be a good day to do something else that I have been meaning to do for a while – run.

After the marathon I took time to recover and then I ran a couple of times before deciding to take some more time to recover. Then I took time to catch up on all the things that had suffered as a result of my training. Things got busy at work, and the kids went through another schedule adjustment with Savannah starting school (and Isaac deciding to wake up every night again). The kids decided to do the rounds of sickness. The result was that I have not been running at all since August. I’m hoping to run 1000 miles next year so I should go into the year running a little bit.

I felt that finally running was an excuse to write. Then I found some very compelling material for more political posts. Expect to see at least one more post today. I plan to write on the best argument against vouchers that I have ever encountered (in my opinion), and more thoughts on the brewing health care debate in the nation.

Categories
life

20 Miles

I have been looking toward this morning ever since I started training. This was the magic distance where I might hit “the wall” and really know what I was facing with my goal to run a marathon. I woke up at 5:30 full of adrenaline because I was in the middle of a dream about World War II. I got up and dressed and then drank 12 ounces of water before starting off.

I ran at a very consistent pace (25 1/2 to 26 minutes for each 3.1 mile loop) and finished the 20.6 miles in under 3 hours. If the first 20.6 miles of the marathon go like that I can run the last 5.6 miles at 10 minutes a mile and still finish in under 4 hours. Very encouraging.

Categories
life

My 5K Today

I ran in a charity 5K today – An April Run for Olivia – and found that it was very good practice for my marathon. There were 1200 people running so I got to deal with a crowded start – unlike my runs in High School. Obviously the distance was not a practice (I ran 15 miles before the race because my training called for 18 miles today), but the bib and the getting there on time were good practice. The one thing I forgot to do was look at the clock at the finish line. I honestly don’t know my time. I was hoping to finish in under 29 minutes, and I think I did based on the results of other runners I knew, but unless the results get posted online I will never know for sure.

It was fun to let the kids see me race without having to wait around for four hours while I run the marathon. The 30 minute time-frame allowed them to have fun with it and to see Daddy race. So while Savannah thought I was running for the competition (“You’ll probably win Dad”) I got to run for the distance, the time (or not), and the basic joy of getting out to run.

UPDATE 5/6/07: The race results got posted this afternoon. I finished in 26:19 – well under my goal of 29:00.

Categories
culture

Exerting Ourselves

I ran 14 miles this morning. I got past 13.1 (half a marathon) in less than half of my desired marathon time. Three things came out of this run. First, my watch rubbed the skin off a small area of my wrist. Second, my body ached within minutes after I finished running – normally I feel fine until the next day after a long run. Third, I began to think about what it means to physically push ourselves to our limits.

I don’t really think I pushed myself to the limit today, but I certainly came closer than I have for a long time if ever. As I considered this though, two ideas struck me: our limits are personal and subject to change over time and our ancestors pushed themselves much more than we usually do. That second idea seemed more profound to me than the first, perhaps because I think we should be a little more like them. I’m not sure that the security of basic necessities that we generally face in this country makes us better or stronger.

Our ancestors worked so hard because they knew that if they slackened their efforts they ran the very real risk of coming up short on their basic needs. If you plant too late in spring you might not have enough crops to last you through winter. If you stayed in your warm house all winter you would have no ice to use in the summer. Not only did they have to work hard, but they had to work smart and plan ahead.

I will not argue that their life was better than ours overall, but I am confident that there are things we could learn and apply in our lives that they just lived even if they did not consciously know those principles that we have now largely lost.

Categories
life

The Value of Objective Mesurements

When I woke up this morning the last thing I wanted to do was go running – which is why I went. Multiple times during my run I noticed that my brain told me to just give up. Fortunately my body kept going each time that signal came. I was honestly surprised a couple of times to discover that I was still running as I felt that impulse to stop. On my return portion of the first 3 mile loop I was thinking about how slow I was going – I felt that I had been running 3 miles through a knee-deep swamp. I was deciding if I would be running for time – which would mean cutting a couple of miles off the run – or for distance – which would add 20 minutes or more to my run.

When I looked at my watch at the end of the three miles I almost fainted because my watch showed that I had done 3 miles within 1 minute of my normal 3-mile pace. That really changed my perspective for the rest of my run. I still felt very sluggish but I knew that my actual performance was typical so I was not as tempted to give up.

I suspect that the same truth applies to other parts of life. There is value in our subjective measurements of performance. When I feel bad about how well I am doing at something I should look for ways to improve my performance or my attitude. On the other hand, sometimes I need to let the subjective measure take a back seat to the objective measure of performance.

If I really am not doing well it is not very useful to keep saying “at least I’m satisfied with how well I’m doing.” I need to look into ways that I can improve so that I am doing well, not just feeling good about what I am doing. If I am doing well I should take that as a sign to not rely so heavily on the subjective feelings of inadequacy or frustration that might yet begin to mar my actual performance.

Categories
life

Ten Miles

I ran a full ten miles today. That’s the first time since I was running cross-country in high school. I amazed myself with the consistency of my pace. At three miles I was on pace, at six miles I was on pace, at nine miles I was still on pace. The amazing thing about it was that I had not run more than six miles prior to today. I had done some workouts on my bike that were equal to at least eight miles running, but biking and running are very different in the way they affect your energy so I was surprised that I could be so steady. That bodes well for me as my workouts get progressively longer in preparation for the marathon in July.