Installment # 29

I’ve been going to the YMCA gym quite faithfully for the past few years, and have developed some good lean muscle mass, but the affect is ruined by the bulging belly.  I tell people I feel great as long as I don’t look in the mirror or step on the scale.  In any case, I am very grateful that I kept the weight off for as long as I did (say, 1978 to 2005).  I would be in much worse shape today had I continued the life style I was leading at the time that I read that book from the Stanford Heart people.  It appears from observation that people over 75-80 are just not physically able to be active enough to get excess weight off.  I am so glad I kept it off for most of my adult life (age 34 to 65) and don’t have a major problem now.  The belly is, however, inconsistent with my longevity goals.  We really do not see fat people making it into the mid 90s, which is my goal.  Actually, my goal is 100+, though I am not on track for that with this belly.

Sandy is a real motivator with her “tough love.”  The folks at the gym keep telling me how good I look for my age.  Sandy is not so easily impressed, and it’s her approval that I need.  I don’t think I will ever reach her ideal, but I sure want to go in that direction, and not the opposite direction.  Of course she would love me regardless, but it would make us both happy if she could be a little more satisfied with my body and appearance.  In October 2013 X-rays indicated significant degenerative disc disease in my low back.  I decided to run as much as it would allow, but in January 2014 accepted the reality that even slow jogging is causing too much pain.  I’m back to walking and this time really do not expect to ever run again.

We have recently heard about two different instances where male relatives of ours have been severely injured by careless falls.  One is close to my age; one is much younger.  Both are on the obese side and neither exercises.  The younger one “has no time” because he is in mid-career, raising kids.  The other has never exercised, because he “doesn’t like to exercise.”  I thought about what I am physically able to do, and how I would be able to protect myself from a fall.  My muscles are automatically recruited to help where needed, because I am in relatively good shape.  A corollary of an old saying came to mind.  The old saying is, “The man who does not read is no better off than the man who cannot read.”  I thought, “The man who does not exercise is no better off than the man who cannot exercise.”  We know that the man who can read, but hardly ever does, can still get information from road signs, restaurant menus, price tags, etc.  But the man who does not exercise loses the ability to exercise as he gets older until, in our 60s it is virtually impossible.  So literally, “The man who does not exercise becomes the man who cannot exercise.”

I was a little late to the party with respect to the first running boom, generally considered to have started after Frank Shorter won the 1972 Olympic marathon.  He was the first American to win it since 1908. It is estimated that 25 million Americans took up some aspect of running in the 70s and 80s.  I remember when a co-worker told me he had run a race the previous weekend from a pier in Santa Cruz to a pier in Capitola, an odd distance in those days of just under 6 miles (They’ve since made it exactly 6 miles).  My first reaction, of course, was why?  He said that there were hundreds of people out there participating, and it was really fun, it was a sight to see, and it was good exercise on a beautiful day along the coast.  I admit I was intrigued.  It wasn’t long before I asked about running shoes.  He said my old gym shoes from high school would not do at all, and he loaned me a few back issues of Runner’s World Magazine, including the annual shoe-rating issue.

My first reaction to that was, “A monthly magazine devoted to nothing but running?  What is there to say? Put one foot in front of the other, left, right, left, right, etc.”  What could they possibly find new to write about to fill a whole magazine each month?  This of course opened a whole new world to me.  There were articles about training, goal setting, pacing, how to get started, how to approach racing at various distances.  I read about the top runners in the U.S. and around the world; learned about the Boston Marathon and the duels between Frank Shorter and Bill Rogers (known as Boston Billy in those days because of his multi-year dominance in winning the marathon there – 1975, 1978, 1979 & 1980).  There was mile-by-mile coverage of the big races, the pre-race favorites, the upsets, etc. I was enthralled.  There was also plenty about diet, health and fitness, weight control.  I was motivated!

One of the attractions of running, at least to certain types of people, is that it is inexpensive.  One guy said in the early 1980s that a runner could buy every kind of running clothing and equipment that was available and still not spend as much as he would spend in one weekend of snow skiing.  Having never been a snow skier, I could only take his word for it.  These days there are a lot more and a lot more expensive things that a runner could buy if he wanted to really perform at his best and look his best while doing it.  I’m sure the clothing issues came about thanks to women.  In the early days of my running, plain white t-shirts and old gym shorts were “good enough” for a lot of us.  Once the women started showing up in their clean, bright colors and fancy materials, with no holes or rips, the men began to “get a clue” about appearances.

Another attraction for many of us is the fact that you don’t need a partner or a reservation or an appointment, and it is an efficient use of time.  A half hour of running is way more beneficial to the body than a half hour of walking or riding a bike; and you can start and finish at your front door, if you want.  The one thing that used to irk me to no end, though, was that it was very hard in those days for a woman to get into running on her own, as I describe about my start below, because of the danger of being off by herself, usually in the pre-dawn.  A new runner needed to get up to a certain ability level before joining a group, but due to safety issues it was no simple matter for a woman to get to that level running by herself.  Nowadays there are many beginner groups, including walkers; the high school tracks are well-lit and populated with women.

I remember during the 1970s meeting women who loved running because they never had the opportunity or the encouragement to participate in sports in high school.  Their high school days were before the impact of Title IX, a federal law passed in 1972 that required public schools to devote an equal amount of money and other resources to women’s sports as to men’s sports.  More than one woman told me that she never developed the coordination or skills specific to any sport, but that running was something that every health, able-bodied person could do and enjoy doing.  This was quite true.  People enjoy running at all levels and body types.  The “back of the pack” joggers are working just as hard as the speedsters up front, and receiving as much or more physical benefit from the sport per mile and as much or more social/emotional benefit from the sport per event.  (Running a mile burns approximately the same number of calories whether you run it in 5 minutes or 10 or 15 or 20 minutes!).  Some of us look more awkward than others when we run, but it doesn’t matter, compared to sports that require specific physical skills that can only be developed over years of practice and training.

It is amazing how wrong-headed medical science can be.  Women were strongly discouraged from running the marathon or similar distances until sometime in the 1970s.  I had a chance to meet Kathrine Switzer a few years ago.  Her story was already familiar to me and to most running enthusiasts.  Knowing that women were banned, she entered the Boston Marathon as K. Switzer in 1967 and was spotted by race organizers in the early miles of the race.  They tried to physically pull her off the course, but her wrestler boyfriend defended her, and she finished the race.  Women were welcomed for the first time in the Boston Marathon in 1972, and the Olympic women’s marathon event took place for the first time in 1984.  The medical professionals had been convinced that because of their bodily structure, women could do irreparable damage to themselves by running such long distances.  The way their legs extend down from their hips at an angle different from men’s creates some kind of danger, they thought.  I wanted to mention this because young people probably can’t imagine there was ever a time when women were discouraged from long distance running because of their slightly different body structures.

Similarly, when the first person ran the Western States 100 mile race in 1974, the medical professionals said that was the limit of human endurance.  The trail race had begun in 1955 as a horse ride.  In 1974 one man, Gordy Ainsleigh, showed up on foot and ran along with the horses, finishing in just under 24 hours.  Only one person showed up in each of the next two years, and then in 1977 14 men showed up, with 3 finishing the course.  The first place finisher set a new course record, under 23 hours.  For a number of years thereafter, each time the record was broken a spokesman from the medical community opined that we had just witnessed the limits of human endurance – that no human would ever duplicate, let alone better such a feat.  But nearly every year, the record was broken again, bringing the finishing times down through the 20 hour barrier, then 18, then 16.  The fastest finishing times as of the end of 2013 are: men – under 15 hours; women – under 17 hours.   I wonder in what other areas the medical community is still in the dark ages.

Here is an interesting fact along those lines:  The half-times at NFL football games used to be quite long, allowing for lengthy and elaborate half-time shows down on the field, and allowing for lots of TV commercials, as well.  It was finally noted that more injuries were occurring in the first few plays of the 3^rd quarter, right after half-time, than at any other time during the game.  The players’ muscles were tightening up and cramping as they cooled down during the long half-time, and they were pulling muscles and tearing tendons when they abruptly resumed high-intensity activity.  They needed a little rest, but not enough to cool down too much. 

So half-times were shortened, and the players were taught how to stay warm and limber while waiting.  The coaches probably had to learn to cut their half-time speeches down, as well.  When Dad played, he said that some of the big guys could hardly get up off the locker room floor after a long “motivational” speech.  He used to tell of the time that the coach was advising how to defend against a certain opposing player who was ambidextrous.  Noting that one big guy was dozing off, he yelled the player’s name and asked if he knew what ambidextrous meant, to which the man replied with little confidence, “He runs with both feet?”

Most of us runners are also not “adrenaline junkies,” as I like to call them.  We don’t need the thrill of speed or danger that comes with sports like snow skiing, auto racing, downhill mountain bike racing, skydiving, etc.  I used to tease Bobby and his friends about being adrenaline junkies.  Running was too calm for them.  In the two years that I was dabbling in triathlons, Bob tried to help me with the cycling part of it.  But when it came to taking a bad fall on a bike, Bob said, “Falling is just part of it,” and I said, “I don’t do falling!” The real problem was that I started too late in life on the bike and did not have the skills to attain or maintain any real speed; and downhill scared me to death.  If you lose control at high speed downhill it could literally be fatal. 

For runners, the great thing about triathlons is the cross-training – substituting some biking and swimming in place of running.  Long distance running and racing requires high weekly mileage, which in turn leaves little or no time for other exercise activities, unless one has no other job or responsibilities.  In addition to repetitive stress and overuse injuries, a regimen of all running creates strength imbalances that can cause a number of unwanted side effects, especially as we age.  It also seems to take a toll on the internal organs from all that high-impact jarring of the body.  I am told that the life expectancy of the long distance runner is noticeably shorter than that of a life-long walker or cyclist, for example.

But for a runner to get any real physical benefit from biking you need to be able to ride hard for several hours, and the only place to do that is out on the roads where cars travel.  We joggers run opposite traffic and can see what is coming at us, and even make eye contact with the driver.  Cyclists travel in the same direction as the cars and can only try to stay as far to the right hand side of the road as possible, and count on the driver to use some caution.  After all, if you move too far to the right and hit a rut or a rock or something, you could be bounced right into the path of the car.  The knowledge that 95% of the drivers are sober and paying attention does not eliminate the fact that it only takes one careless driver to end your life.

My first “run” was about one-half mile over to Los Alamitos Elementary School, around the playground, and back home.  It took me longer to put on my old sweatpants and sneakers than to do the half-mile…but it was a start.  I eventually worked up to a one-mile loop around the neighborhood, then 1 ½, then two miles, etc.  I don’t exactly remember the progression, but my first road race was the 2^nd annual Mercury News 10-Kilometer (6.2 mile) race in March 1979, so I obviously worked up to that distance within the first six months of running.

I learned later that it is wise for a newbie to start a running program by walking around the neighborhood the first week, then maybe alternate walking two light poles with jogging one light pole for a week, then walking one light pole and jogging two, then finally seeing if you can keep jogging all the way around the course.  I didn’t know that, but I was only 34, was not terribly overweight, and had an athletic background, so I more or less got away with it, or so I thought.  The history of my running injuries, setbacks, come backs, surgeries, etc, would be a separate book.  I used to say that if I had been looking for an excuse to stop running, I would have had plenty of them.  But I had made up my mind to become a runner, and that was it.  Something like getting through jump school, which I talk about elsewhere.  It never entered my head to quit.

I had signed up for that Mercury News 10-K a couple of months before and was still working my way up to 6 miles.  I told a more experienced runner that I was thinking of starting with an all-out sprint to get away from the masses of runners and then settling in to my race pace.  He laughed but convinced me that I probably wouldn’t finish the last 5 ½ miles at all if I blasted the first ½ mile like that.  By race day I had fortunately read a few issues of Runner’s World magazine and understood about pacing.  All my racing career, however, I had a tendency to start out too fast and then try to hang on.  My problem was one of “perceived exertion.” 

The first mile or two felt so good I would convince myself that I was going to have a great race, so I would keep it up.  Around mile 4 reality would start to set in and my pace would start to fall off.  Generally, I would struggle through miles 4 and 5, then reach down and pull out a good mile #6.  It was actually a good training strategy, but not a good racing strategy.  Every experienced runner will tell you that it is best to start out conservatively and gradually pick up the pace in the second half of the race, if and as you feel good.

As I recall, I progressed to a 10-miler and then to a half-marathon (13.1 miles) during the first two years or so, and ran my first full marathon in July 1982.  I did things right, for the most part.  I set the goal and started training for the marathon at least 6-8 months ahead of time, and I had been running a good 3 years by the time I started marathon training.  One of the “don’ts” is: Don’t think about the marathon distance until you have been running at least 2 to 3 years. By then I had been reading Runner’s World for 3 years and had been running with groups that included people who had been running for many years and loved to talk about running, training, racing and accomplishments, and I was all ears.  It turns out that runners just love to talk about running for some weird reason, and to the annoyance of their non-running spouses.