26.2 Reasons Why...

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December 04, 2005

Week No. 8

REASON NO. 19 FOR RUNNING A MARATHON

Running a marathon will help inspire my 12 year old son and his friends to “GET OFF THE COUCH� and become more physically active.

I’m sure you have all heard about the results of the California Physical Fitness Tests, which came out in the local media last week. As headlined in the local newspaper, Butte County Schools failed these tests miserably, as less than 25% of our students were able to perform up to the minimum standards on all of the tests. One of the local radio stations (103.5 FM) blamed the problem on the kids, saying that they didn’t get enough exercise. The Editorial Page of the Enterprise Record blamed the problem on limited school resources, lack of funding for exercise programs, and parents buying the kids X-boxes for Christmas, rather than bicycles.

In this debate, it is very easy to blame the kids (mainly because they don’t care if we do, and they do not write letters to the Editor). But is it really the kids, or the Schools fault? I think not!!!

In my opinion, the blame for the current childhood obesity EPIDEMIC should lie squarely on the shoulders of Parents (and the society that we adults have created). Why should our kids work and train to run a minimum 12 minute mile, when they know for a fact that neither of their parents could run a 15 minute mile if their life depended on it? Why should they workout to increase their upper body strength, so they can do 3 pull-ups, when they now for a fact that their parents have not been able to do a pull-up since they got out of High School? Crunches??? Crunches are hard, and if my parents feel it is OK to get flabby and out of shape, why should I break a sweat trying to get in better shape?

We all know that our kids emulate their parent’s behavior. All you have to do is go to Hometown Buffet on a Friday night, and you can see that played out in a very graphic manner. The heavier a person gets, the harder it is to exercise, which causes them to get even heavier, and so it goes. In my opinion, much of this also is caused by a fundamental lack of education with respect to nutrition, the inherent laziness of our society, and poor, poor eating habits.

As usual, no training scheduled on Monday, to recover from my 11 mile run on Saturday. That was good, because with the Winter Storm Warning issued by the National Weather Service, I had a very long day at work. I was up at 4:00 AM, to check the weather, and to get ready to head in to the corporation yard to make sure the snowplows were ready. Luckily, the day turned out to be a whole bunch of preparation, and zero snow plowing. The snow level tried several times to extend down into Paradise, but the temperatures never dropped much below 35 degrees.

Tuesday was a gym workout. I’m trying a new AB workout called “Around the world�. It is a series of 15 different core exercises, that works both the front and side muscles http://magthree.com/Thoughts/Core_Work.htmlI’ve been doing this for a few workouts – and man, does it get the lactic acid flowing!!! Right now I’m at 10 repetions per set, I hope to advance to 15 rep’s in the next couple of weeks.

After the Ab’s, I did 20 minutes on the spinning bike, and then shifted to the treadmill for a 3 mile run. I was pushing pretty hard, as this was to be a speed workout, at 8.3 miles per hour. Around 2 miles into it, the treadmill shut off, and said that I was “pushing the belt too hard�. Great, now I have the stupid treadmill telling me how to run. I shift to the next treadmill over, and it does the same thing to me after about ½ mile. That convinced me that I need to just quit, and extend my run the next day an extra mile.

My Wednesday run was in the dark, around the orchards in Durham. Luckily, the rain slowed down, but the road edges were still really muddy. I set my alarm for 4:00 AM, and dragged myself out of bed. After a cup of coffee, a Cliff Bar, and some light stretching I was ready to go. I ran 6.5 miles, at an pretty slow pace of 10 minutes 15 seconds per mile.

Thursday was another 3 mile run around Durham, in the dark. This one was a little weird, with the high winds and all – there were a lot of things “rustling around� as I was running. Always in the back of my mind is the very, very remote possibitliy of meeting up with a mountain lion while on these early morning runs, and the wind made those thoughts just a little more prominent. Several weeks ago I bought a can of pepper spray that I now carry with me – it probably would not stop a mountain lion, but at least it would give me something to do, rather than just hitting the damn thing with my water bottle.

Friday I rested, in preparation for my long run on Saturday (12 miles). Actually it wasn’t totally a rest day, as I ran into the gym after work and got a quick 25 laps in swimming (30 minutes and 33 seconds).

Saturday was really busy, and a long run just didn’t fit into the daily plan, so I scrubbed that idea. Tried to get a bike ride in, but that didn’t work either. Ended up taking my son and one of his buddies in to the 20th Street Park later in the evening, and we played a couple hours of some really competitve tennis. It was fun playing under the lights, even if it was a little cold.

Sunday I hooked up with my Brother in Princeton for our long run. We ran from his shop, west to Willow Creek, and then north to Co. Road 60, then back again. It was a great run, as we are both pretty evenly matched pace-wise, and it was almost all out alongside the flooded rice fields. There was a nearly constant cackle of geese, and we disturbed quite a few that had landed in the rice fields. Most people that live in the bigger cities would do anything to be able to run in such a beautiful environment, with no cars or weirdo’s to worry about.. We ran 14.5 miles, with a time of 2 hours, 29 minutes and 29 seconds. The last couple of miles were a little bit of a struggle for me, as my “plan� only called for a 12 mile run. My brother, who is on some kind of an accerlerate mileage plan, continued his run after I quit – I think he was shooting for about 20 miles. I’m clearly not ready for that distance – yet…..

Posted by Dennis at December 4, 2005 11:26 AM

Comments

Posted by: Paul Lehman at December 6, 2005 12:10 AM

Posted by: Dennis at December 6, 2005 06:25 AM

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