MB's Gumpian Moment For The Month

'They just couldn't believe that somebody would do all that running for no particular reason.' - Tom Hanks, as Forrest Gump, "Forrest Gump" (1994)

Sometimes as we head into the university track facility, a parent or walker or jogger who has seen one of our three-times-a-week workouts asks the inevitable question, 'so what are you guys training for?' At first, I flippantly told them, 'life,' and left it at that. Now I think to preface my comment with, 'this may sound a little flippant, but...' It tends to win friends and positively influence people a little more, I guess. Perhaps I'm starting to become more coach and less athlete.

I hope not; I love being an athlete. In spite of the fact I pay for my running habit; right now I get $500 worth of Snickers Marathon Bars, a singlet, a couple of technical fiber shirts, a hat and a pair of shorts per year, my goggles, glasses, shoes, bike stuff, sports drink, race entry fees and all the other stuff comes right out of my pocket. I am 90-percent certain that I like it that way. Snickers Marathon Bar asks me to race six times a year in their gear. That's not a lot of races, unless you're a marathoner. Since I'm a 10,000-meter to half-marathon specialist, who also dabbles in multisport, with a conservative training/racing schedule I can do six races a year.

However, it's a sign of weakness around this town should you decide to be conservative in your racing. Fail to show up at every little podunk, rancid possum (approximate) 5,000-meter road race and people start to talk about injuries. Since I only have to race six events a year to please my sponsor, I can be selective on what I want to do and when I need to be ready to race. And, in order to encourage my sponsor to keep me on their rolls, I choose larger regional and national-level races outside of town. Because probably 70 percent of my races are not local, people who don't know when/where I race think I do a whole hell of a lot of running for no particular reason.

I did a local 5,000-meter road race two weeks ago as an early-season fitness test. It wasn't great, but it wasn't a bad start to a season delayed by six weeks of no running whatsoever because of injury (fractured humeri heal slower when you run at the same time they're trying to heal). I managed to stay seconds ahead of a local runner who tattooed a bulls-eye on my @$$ this summer. He told me, straight to my face that his goal this fall was to beat me - why I was his goal I have no particular clue. Actually, I do; the guy is in his early 50s and focuses strictly on 5,000-meter races, which (to paraphrase Sam Mussabini, in Chariots of Fire) is "tailor-made for neurotics." He trains strictly for local events. He's become stronger since he started training with this focus. He's also wound up like a cheap freaking watch, the way I used to be before I got married.

Last weekend, I filmed my athletes at a 'relatively competitive' 5,000-meter race. The guy who has been gunning for me ran a decent race, but was beaten soundly (a minute or more) by a runner who came from New Orleans, who drinks Budweiser like it was iced water (I had a great time the next morning as we all ran an eight-mile run on the Bayou, after which he killed off three Buds.). And boy, was the guy p!$$ed.

Hello? McFly?

It's an object lesson I've provided to my athletes in the past two years, and one thing I spoke of often with my coach in the last year he worked with me:

Sometimes you have to find a new challenge; whether it's a different location, doing races outside of your home turf, a different distance (such as going from the 5,000 meters to the 10,000 meters and up...), a different discipline (from cross-country to track or road racing), or a different sport altogether...in my own case, multisport events. A change of scenery and a change of competition is almost always a good thing. It provides you the opportunity to find out where you truly stand in comparison with the rest of humanity. Oh, sure, we all can be heroes in our hometown. But there are races where I can run a personal best and be fortunate to get third in my age group, after the top-three are awarded in the masters' division. Far be it from me to get arrogant and say I think it's not fair. If there are guys out there who are my age that are training more consistently, are blessed with better genetics, and run smarter, faster races...more power to them. I want to know what they are doing in order to see how I can improve myself.

I've started to think seriously about whether I can run for no apparent reason other than the love of the sport, the visceral pleasure that comes from propelling myself up a hill or around a track. If nothing else, perhaps to pull others along to a fast time. It doesn't seem like a lot of sense in this 'I placed fourth in my age group in this 5K race; all I have to show for it is this stupid ribbon which I'll now use to wipe my @$$ and drop in the rubbish bin' society. Beer glasses break. Medals tarnish. Ribbons fade. Tattoos can be lasered off. Sometimes all we have to show for our sport is what we show up with in the first place.

Desire.

All About Soul

Had to juggle a boatload of stuff this morning on my way out the door...of course, those mornings where I meet the man with the rubber stick mean a longer stay in bed, and a shorter window of time to get to the gym without p!$$!ng someone off because they are on the last spinning bicycle with Look pedals...and they're wearing running shoes...and there's another bike they can ride. As always, another story. Actually, it wasn't the moment of getting out the door to the car that was entertaining. It was getting from the car to the locker after the spinning workout. Clean clothes, water bottles, Snickers Marathon bars, eyeglasses, sunglasses, wallet...and the hits just keep on coming...

"This life isn't fair; it's gonna get dark, it's gonna get cold. You've gotta get tough, but that ain't enough; it's all about soul..." - Billy Joel, "All About Soul" (1993)

TLC's spin-off to Miami Ink featuring Kat Von D, LA Ink, started this last week. Great program. One of the artists Kat recruited to work her shop - Corey Miller - is an absolute genius...not that the other two artists are that bad in their own right. However, Miller's work is completely original. He did a design on a guy's arm, sketching with a ball-point pen and working forward...then with the tattoo gun. No xerox machines, computer-generation, light tables for this guy, no sir. I marveled as I watched this man work, comparing his craft to the advertising campaign of a local tattoo parlor (touting computerized designs, templates, and the like). In comparison, Miller's work is so soulful - the man's essence was put into the labor.

I couldn't help but think about the similarity between tattooing and coaching. Each person has a background story, a reason for coming to me. I can use the myriad of tools available to everyone (computer programs, books, calculators), but if I don't put my soul into it I'm doing no more than a tracing of someone else's work. All the research, prior workouts, races (both good and bad) and life experience will have gone for naught. In the same vein, an athlete who comes to the track with strong preconceptions of how their training should go (usually based upon something they've read in Runner's World, "Galloway's Great Big Honkin' Book o' Stuff," etc.) usually has missed a big portion of the story.

It's like going to a tattoo artist with a photo of something you've seen on someone and asking for the same d@mned thing.

As the late runner-philosopher/author George Sheehan said, we are all an experiment of one. Taking a cookie-cutter approach to training may - or may not - be effective. Downloading a list of workouts, paces, distances and times can be all well and good, but it's all in a vacuum. While I may write a training plan (in macro) weeks or months in advance, the last two hours leading into the workout are fraught with deep thought: How do I (or my athletes) feel today? What are the weather conditions? Is there a race in the coming weekend? As always, if I had a dollar for every time I've planned a workout and did something completely different once I got to the track, I'd have enough for at least another coaching book...ha, ha, ha...

The training plan, writ large, months in advance may be the heart, but the two hours of thought spent on the couch, walking through the kitchen, and especially the last half-hour during the drive to the track...are the soul of coaching.

Bigger Than My Wallet Gives Me Credit For

...and since there are less triathlons here than there are running events, even the average guy has to travel farther to get beat. But we can solve this problem, given enough time and a job. This is a reprint of an earlier blog posting I had on another site. Forgive me. I'll do better next time...

I've been a runner for nearly 15 years and an athlete for nearly 10. Outside of my senior year at The University of Tampa, every expense related to running or triathlon; shoes, clothes, travel, entry fees, rehabilitation, and so forth, has come directly from my own pocket. I consider the $500-1,000 spent each year on running alone as an investment into my own well-being. However, I'd be lying if I said I never wanted to have someone else pay for my habit.

I will say I've been fortunate to be employed by the federal government in one way or another for nearly 20 years. This provides a secure income, liberal vacation and sick time, reasonably-priced health insurance (although I could complain about my dental coverage...), a 401K-like retirement plan, and - most importantly - tenure. As long as I don't break any laws or kill someone (I've fantasized about doing my boss in more than once, but we're all better now...in many ways...), show up to work in clothing other than my Speedo within a time zone of when I'm supposed to be there, I'm good to go. The new pay-for-performance system might not provide any pay raises, but I can keep the wolf away from the door.

My coach has told me (to a degree) that having someone pay for you to do what you like to do is something akin to prostitution. Mekhi Pfifer told Eminem in the movie "8 Mile" that '...free comes with a (graphic reference to sodomy).' But I still envision the fantasy about just how cool it would be to be a professional athlete, especially in the endurance sports.

Since I'm not independently wealthy I still have to pay for all the things to keep honey, hound, house and 'hoopty' happy or copacetic. That J-O-B stuff keeps otherwise driven, motivated, and (nearly) physically-talented persons from becoming professionals at whatever sport they love. In order to get better you have to train, in order to train you need time and resources, in order to get time you have to steal from other things in that small 24-hour stretch (that ideally includes sleeping) otherwise called a day, and resources, well...there I digress.

So, where do you go to find opportunities to use, as Tim Cahill wrote about the joy of adventure travel, other people's money? If you're a regular user of an on-line race registration web site, sometimes the opportunities find you, via the siren call of e-mail. In the past I've filled out on-line applications for sponsorship, to no avail. After several years of consistent, strong performances at races from the 5K to the half-marathon, I felt I was unjustly being ignored because I live far from other major metropolitan cities.

Since I began coaching this year, I got a little more aggressive in applying. I would love to have a team supported by sponsors. Another option would be to earn a sponsorship, kick @$$ and take names for a season, then tell the sponsor, '...hey, I have a team full of people like me; let's make a deal.' My decision to explore different distances, moving up to the marathon in the fall, dabbling in triathlon, plus the fact I was going to run lots of out-of-town events this year, this racing schedule had to show I wasn't just a little fish with a big name in a much bigger pond of marketing opportunity.

I was selected for the Snickers Marathon Team, who provide me with racing kit for running and expect I will go out, market and do well. Ah, here comes that sudden sodomized feeling. Since they won't let me place my club logo on their gear, I cannot represent my club at the same time.

It puts extra emphasis on my own training and desire to do well at events, since there are incentives built into the agreement. Not that I needed much incentive beforehand, but if there's a chance for money and perhaps a little recognition I can step up the energy level.