The other day, while attempting squats atop an upside-down bosu at The Train Station, I got to thinking about balance. (Really, it was less thinking and more beseeching the stability gods not to let me faceplant into the weight bench, but that sounds way less inspired). Around the same time, some of the running blogs were abuzz with the Kara Goucher Wall Street Journal article advocating a "run more, think less" approach to training.
The WSJ article has shades of Christopher McDougall's Born to Run, but falls short. McDougall's work is a well woven travelogue-shoe company polemic-running history primer all knit into an inspirational running "guide" (perhaps tract is a better description, for as well documented as McDougall's work is, I finished the book feeling refreshed and restored, as if I had read some holistic meditation on the sport, rather than a technical guide). To my disappointment, the WSJ article treated Goucher's approach as a novelty, rather than highlighting aspects of the approach which could be distilled and adopted by your over-geared, over-planned everyday runner. Also, not surprisingly, the WSJ article had little to say about eschewing $200 running shoes and fancy gear, god forbid the name of Sponsors Almighty be taken in vain.)
In any event, both the WSJ article and McDougall's book (which is in a constant dog-eared state of re-reading, along with, ahem, the last two Harry Potters) highlight the paralyzing effect of being over-choiced and over-informed. Compared to many running friends (mainly road runners), I feel like a complete running Luddite, having only recently purchased a running watch and having never subscribed to Runners' World or Health and Fitness or Shape or whatever.
Part of that is by choice: I'm too cheap to buy expensive gear or sign up for the latest marathon training program. Programming gadgets annoys me. And when I do run with tunes, I'd rather my refurbished ipod shuffle have Cake, Me First and the Gimme Gimmes, and Austin Lounge Lizards any day over the latest top 40 hits.
Part is oddball personal traits: I don't like clunky armbands. Heart rate chest straps are itchy. Most high-tech watch faces overwhelm my wrist. The volume or ph or salt content or something about my sweat tends to induce seizures in electronics.
Part is reactionary: there is sheer joy in escaping deadlines, rules, protocol and schedules. Abiding by track Wednesdays, hill work Tuesdays, tempo run Mondays, and rest day Sundays (and fretting over missing a group run or a training day, a common side-effect of training plans) would put a damper on my fun.
Bound to a training schedule, or tethered to micro-chipped gear, or bombarded by the "ultimate ___ workout" articles that whirligig through the fitness magazines, I think I'd feel overtaxed and skip out of more workouts. But on the other hand, there are benefits to speedwork and cross training and setting and keeping goals. And while I mutter about dead lifts at The Train Station, or groan during Pilates at the Downtown Fitness Center, or whine about speedwork around the Memorial Loop, I find myself submitting to all of these, at will, signaling its the notion of discipline rather than actual discipline that's the bugaboo. And for all the free-spirited, mindless fun of my regular bayou runs, every time I read a race report, that damned running sirens' song--of conquering a longer distance, at a better pace, in thinner air, with greater elevations, surrounded by better scenery--comes calling.
I suppose some hill work is in order. Possibly some trail gaiters too.
The WSJ article has shades of Christopher McDougall's Born to Run, but falls short. McDougall's work is a well woven travelogue-shoe company polemic-running history primer all knit into an inspirational running "guide" (perhaps tract is a better description, for as well documented as McDougall's work is, I finished the book feeling refreshed and restored, as if I had read some holistic meditation on the sport, rather than a technical guide). To my disappointment, the WSJ article treated Goucher's approach as a novelty, rather than highlighting aspects of the approach which could be distilled and adopted by your over-geared, over-planned everyday runner. Also, not surprisingly, the WSJ article had little to say about eschewing $200 running shoes and fancy gear, god forbid the name of Sponsors Almighty be taken in vain.)
In any event, both the WSJ article and McDougall's book (which is in a constant dog-eared state of re-reading, along with, ahem, the last two Harry Potters) highlight the paralyzing effect of being over-choiced and over-informed. Compared to many running friends (mainly road runners), I feel like a complete running Luddite, having only recently purchased a running watch and having never subscribed to Runners' World or Health and Fitness or Shape or whatever.
Part of that is by choice: I'm too cheap to buy expensive gear or sign up for the latest marathon training program. Programming gadgets annoys me. And when I do run with tunes, I'd rather my refurbished ipod shuffle have Cake, Me First and the Gimme Gimmes, and Austin Lounge Lizards any day over the latest top 40 hits.
Part is oddball personal traits: I don't like clunky armbands. Heart rate chest straps are itchy. Most high-tech watch faces overwhelm my wrist. The volume or ph or salt content or something about my sweat tends to induce seizures in electronics.
Part is reactionary: there is sheer joy in escaping deadlines, rules, protocol and schedules. Abiding by track Wednesdays, hill work Tuesdays, tempo run Mondays, and rest day Sundays (and fretting over missing a group run or a training day, a common side-effect of training plans) would put a damper on my fun.
Bound to a training schedule, or tethered to micro-chipped gear, or bombarded by the "ultimate ___ workout" articles that whirligig through the fitness magazines, I think I'd feel overtaxed and skip out of more workouts. But on the other hand, there are benefits to speedwork and cross training and setting and keeping goals. And while I mutter about dead lifts at The Train Station, or groan during Pilates at the Downtown Fitness Center, or whine about speedwork around the Memorial Loop, I find myself submitting to all of these, at will, signaling its the notion of discipline rather than actual discipline that's the bugaboo. And for all the free-spirited, mindless fun of my regular bayou runs, every time I read a race report, that damned running sirens' song--of conquering a longer distance, at a better pace, in thinner air, with greater elevations, surrounded by better scenery--comes calling.
I suppose some hill work is in order. Possibly some trail gaiters too.
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