Finding my happy pace

Sometimes, sitting and looking back from the vantage point of four years of increasingly more demanding run training, feel like I'll never be more than a middle distance runner.

I have spent many hours analyzing run splits and heart rate data and pace. Always looking at my pace. Always trying to reconcile the fact that I ain't going to do a 50 min 10k  or a 1:40 half if I'm averaging a 6 min/km pace.

I reconciled myself by thinking about all the time and effort that happily goes into family and work and the important relationships in my life. I grudgingly acknowledged that the overindulgence in certain vices including food may be keeping me from the leanness required to run fast and long. I even fall back to the old excuse that my body type may have been more suited for rugby or shot put or perhaps, philosophy.


But then putting on my balaclava and layers of black ninja clothing, I head outdoors into the night air and I forget everything. 

And find what I forgot.


I cut through the evening streets and then onto the bike path, like I was meant to do this my whole life. 
There is a GPS computer around my wrist but, for this moment,  I just don't care what it is calculating. 
The sounds of other people's raves fill my ears and build an evolving soundtrack to the sparks and sagas that ignite and swirl and dissipate in a reawakened consciousness.

Familiar dogs sniff my air approvingly, while their walkers recognize my red strobe flash and ninja garb and smile as I lope by.
Sweat percolates on my forehead and is brushed aside by my ever-present foil, the wind, that tests and teases me from behind every shrub and snowbank. 
I wind my way out and back on the path over bridges, along banked turns, through snow dunes and, ever so gingerly, over sheet ice. 
With every step, I remember what I forgot. 
A diurnal somnambulist, the dark, cold air reawakens and reinvigorates that which is eternal within me.
And then...just then, I find my perfect pace...not measured in time or distance but in all dimensions at once.

Exiting the outdoors and into the heated indoors, I remember, albeit briefly, why I run and bike and swim and sometimes combine the three. 

I also realize that the bytes stored on my GPS watch are not just run data, they draw a map of where I have been. 

They are my touchstone to get me closer to my happy pace...the perfect pace that transcends time and space. 

 

Running Home

Squeezing in some training is not always easy. It takes lots of planning, time management and the ability to ignore all the planning and time management and just make things up.

The other day I had to get a run in. The weather was great - not the -47C like it is in the death march picture. But there was no time in the morning. Lunch time couldn't work. After work was a non-starter too.

But the plan had me running for 50 minutes! Improvisation is a much ignored component of training. Sure, when training for an Iron-distance race you have to spend lots of time sitting in the saddle and countless hours staying wet. Then there is the excessive overuse of running shoes with every stride, pace and hit of LSD.  And nutrition, can't forget planning what will get ingested and digested

But after all that. One little curve ball on race day will change the game. Mind you with the public nudity regulations,  any ball play should be avoided on race day.

A flat, too much heat, constant rain, dropping your nutrition stuff, a delay in the start, a crash, a blister - there are more adverse things that can happen in a race than can be imagined.

What's a triathlete to do? Be prepared to improvise. Change the game plan and make it up right there and then. Just keep going. Use leaves if you have to!

There is a peace of mind that comes with knowing that you can improvise and that you have the mental toughness to get through most situations. As oxymoronic as it may sound, practising improvisation in the safe and relatively easier setting of the training season is a good way to fill one's mental tickle chest with all the savoir faire and presence of mind to survive what would otherwise end a race.

So I had to run. I got a lift to work. I worked through my breaks and this little piggy ran all the way home (and around the park too).

Cross Training

For the past two off-seasons, the only thing I really concentrated on was race season.

For the past two race seasons, the only thing I concentrated on was the race...then the next race and then the big race.  This year was going to be different and it has proven itself to be.

I still have a couple of races and the big race to prepare for. But I have spent - in my estimation - more time doing stuff around the house, asserting my relevance to teenagers and a partner.

This weekend is a good example. With my partner yielding the hammer and crowbar (like that isn't normally the case!), we systematically destroyed and disassembled a perfectly good, but dysfunctional basement. The plan is to gut it, empty it, rebuild it and carry on...along with the new mortgage carrying fees. Somewhere a banker is smiling...

We must have spent more that 21 hours over three days on this project and there is more to do. My humble task was that of sorter, carrier, dumper and family cook. I took on this role with gusto. It involved filling bins or my arms with debris, then walking out of said dungeon and into the freezing outdoors, only to deposit destroyed artifacts and detritus of my life into a larger bin - being careful to pile stuff to maximize room available.

It wore me out. I would much rather have spent the time doing an Ironman without any training.

But what occurred to me was that this was actually amazing cross training. Think about it:

• Running up and down a flight of stairs countless times. That's all leg work (especially quad and calf work).
• Picking up at least several tons of stuff without blowing out my back. That's all core. I never do enough core work. 
• Carrying the damned, nail-and-dust infused crap. That's all arm work,. There is also significant activation of the small, stabilizer muscles throughout the body as I walked up to the outdoors and then on frozen, very slippery surfaces. 
• Then there is the nutrition and hydration. Making and consuming the right food and drink so that I'm not bloated or sleepy (although I did make a turkey leftover-surprise-kinda-thing). And ensuring I'm putting in enough to give me the energy I need. And the drinking. Well lots of coffee, but not so much that I have to keep taking off my sodden boots to go in to pee. There are course marshals throughout my neighbourhood. No public nudity!
• You want speedy transitions? How about finally feeling the urge and needing to get out of winter clothes and steel-toed boots fast? How about getting out of stinky, grimy and dusty clothing and cleaning up enough to make a nutritious, interesting and safe meal for four?
  
• Finally, the mental toughness. Going to bed on Friday and Saturday knowing that Sunday will be more of the same. Yet persevering and still going for a run after down-tooling on Sunday. Then going to bed on a Sunday, knowing that there is at least three more days of work and then potentially five years of repayment. 

This is cross training at it's best. If Ironman did anything, it prepared me for real life!

Resolution

This time of year I run into a lot of Resolutionists at the track, or gym or pool.  On one hand, it is good to see people - and sometimes families - making the effort to get off the couch. On the other, more grumpy hand, I get annoyed by the bigger crowds, the poor lane etiquette and the general lack of awareness with these occasional exercisers. They don't seem to understand that some people might be focused on hitting a certain speed or heart rate and are not that keen on stopping cold from a full sprint just because the person walking in the running lane in front of them has decided to stop, bend over, and tie a shoelace.

Whew! Got that out of my system. Besides, most of them will be gone in a few weeks, sadly. Let me start again.

This time of year I find myself thinking a lot about resolutions. I've never been one for making them. I was the kid who got the failing grade on the "what would you do if you had six months to live?" assignment. I wrote: Exactly what I'm doing right now... Now, even though that wasn't entirely truthful in that I really had no interest being in class and subjected to an overused life planning teaching module, I still believed in the essence of what I wrote. Do what you want to do and don't do what you don't want to do. 

Of course, it isn't always practical to only do what you want to do especially with family, work and other obligations. But that doesn't mean you can't find some kernel of interest or curiosity or challenge in everything you do or have to do. I plan my life in such a way that maximizes what I  want to do and minimizes what I don't want to do. And I constantly evaluate,  so that I don't become too much of an ass or ogre to the people around me - I hope.

So, living this philosophy as best as I can, why would I make a resolution? And especially why make one at the change of the year...don't even get me started about western civilization's bizarre fascination with the turning of the calendar pages.

Training for triathlons and multisports has taught me a few life lessons. One of them is to plan, prepare, practice and perform. There is no room here for an "I resolve to..." How do you enter the water and not drown? How do you get off your bike and still remember how to run? How to you coax gallons of crap down your throat and actually digest it without spewing...while running?

I find this applies to lots of other things in life, such as giving speeches, changing diapers, running a meeting, buying groceries, dealing with an irate caller, convincing a teenager to do chores, saying sorry when I mess up...

I also find that the more I consciously plan, prepare, practice and perform, the easier it gets to do it subconsciously. I have managed to internalize the process without turning into a mantra-chanting freak, not that there would be anything wrong with that, per se.

A few years back, on the morning of the longest, most important triathlon of my life, I remembered some meaningful words a very wise, virtual stranger wrote to me. I wrote them on my hand and looked at them during the 14 hours and 19 minutes it took me to finish my first Ironman.

Did these words get me through the race? Probably not. The planning, preparation and practice did. But those words were an, albeit Sisyphean, reminder of what I had to do to perform.

So as I notice resolutions get made and ignored all around me, I consider  my simple objective. From this objective, everything I will do will follow. I keep moving forward.

Beneath the skin.

What really lies beneath?

I've been thinking about this a lot lately as I've been trying to kickstart my training.

Am I a runner with layers of procrastination and self loathing and corporal excess? Or am I just someone who wanted to fit in and painted my skin with the bleached complexion of a triathlete? Perhaps I am something else? Some atavistic nuance that I missed along the way. A philatelist? A humanist? A unicycling xenophobe on two wheels? Whatever it is, it was never stamped on me.

So I have wandered, sometimes aimlessly, trying to find my place. Focusing energy on what is important, family and all the emotional, materialistic and intrinsic intricacies integral to maintaining that organism's health. For a while this was contrary to the health of my organism.

Starting to move. Swimming, biking and running changed that. I could do both. In so doing, I found a third dimension and a spiritual calmness that may only be experienced by an endurance athlete or someone in forced isolation - both of which amount to basically the same thing.

Yesterday was the first day of winter. Things are frozen. Excesses of the past can be covered and forgotten for months, be it by the metaphor of pristine snow, or by the equally concealing layering of winter clothing.

But instead of covering, I must scrape down. Past the ice and the cold and the procrastinating excuses I must find what really can emerge from this body of flesh, bone, muscle, fat and most of all, infinitely limited time.

What lies beneath is potential. The challenge will not be swim 4k or bike 180 or run 42, but to remove the layers without breaking the core - or the spirit.

The real race will be to cross every finish line with a little more in me than what I started with.

Remembering to not forget.

Training in December, when the temperature ridicules me at -49C windchill, is all about remembering old patterns.

I forgot that. I forgot the energy I could create and the feelings I could dissipate by doing some very simple drills.

Yeah, they hurt. Yup, it is a pain to run indoors. Is it embarrassing to be goose stepping around a bunch of teenagers and elliptically committed adults? You bet! And I can't even spell machs...mocks...mawks?

Still. Remember how good it felt to finish the workouts? Remember how prepared I felt wading into the water or getting off the bike. I trained for that transition. I trained in the depths of insanely cold winter so that I can concentrate on doing the race, not worrying about whether I could finish or not!

And even when I found myself so cramped up that I wanted to cry, it was never a question of not finishing. It was always about damage control, or dealing with temperature, or how long to walk backwards until my quads came back on line.

Waking up to -49C windchill, I forgot about all this.

It took a phone conversation with an ancient friend to remind me. She reminded me that in 1976, I wanted to be just like Bruce Jenner.

She reminded me that even though I was on the fast track for field stardom, at least in shotput, the politics of amateur athletics suffocated my dreams. I wasn't allowed to defend my gold medal.

She reminded me to remember the curiosity I once had lighting fires everywhere in me and, once too often, around me.

It is that curiosity that made me relearn to swim and do a first ever sprint triathlon.

It is that curiosity that made me first ask: "what happens when I push that?"

So what will happen when I push myself to train a little harder in December to March?

I'll see the difference at the beach at Ironman, in the transitions and in the quiet moments where there is no noise but my footfalls.

I'll not forget to remember!

Finding my euphoria.

There's some words that we use around here. I can't remember who was the first to use them, but they are nonsensical to some and perfectly clear to others.

"If you want to go fast...you have to go fast".

I've been in the doldrums for a few months now. Working through various colds and the flu, struggling with a baffling calf injury, dealing with sick family and now the cold. -42 cold that grips me by the throat and doesn't let go. Even when summer finally slips in unannounced, the cold always lingers...everytime I see see gloves or balaclava or asthma medication...I remember the season that will always return.

This was the season I was going to become a marathon runner. The year that I would increase my mileage and finally consider myself a runner - as a opposed to an Ironman who's managed to get through the run.

Lots of excuses went into this abdication. But most of all, what went into it was the forgetting. The forgetting of how good, how euphoric this exercise stuff is.

Last night I remembered.

Running indoors, I did my usual 30 minutes at an unremarkable pace.
Then I stretched. 40 minutes getting out every last bit of pent up tightness in that damned calf.

I decided to remember what it felt like to go fast. Getting back on the track I did a lap, then took a deep, tentative breath and did 100 metres faster than I have run since last summer. Rounding the turn I ramped it up.

I ran faster than I've run in years. I could feel myself loosing peripheral vision...I wondered about what was deciding where my feet were landing. I saw these odd shadows where my arms should be moving to a long forgotten rhythm. There was music in my ears, but I'm not sure if it was from my ipod's playlist or not.

I ran fast, really fast for 100 metres. And nothing could wipe the smile from my face.

I'm starting to climb up from where I was.

I've found my runphoria!