How soon we forget the pain of the last marathon

Posted on November 7, 2014 by Christopher Cudworth

Running conversationI run and ride with people who are both conservative and liberal. Always have. Always will. Sometimes politics comes up in conversation. Sometimes it doesn’t. The run or ride is what’s important at the time.

Here’s the interesting aspect of all this however. It was once said by Olympic marathon champ Frank Shorter, and I paraphrase, that the only reason you would ever do another marathon is because you’ve forgotten how badly the last one hurt.

Of course there are people who are gluttons for punishment. Who run marathons every weekend and live happily ever after to tell about it. But I doubt they race at the level at which Frank Shorter competed.

Marathoning has become commodified, part of a cult of accomplishment that in many ways confuses completion with quality.

70s-era marathoner Bill Rodgers once branded much of what he saw in the burgeoning marathon boom “graceless striving.” He later walked that statement back a bit because it was perceived as elitist. Perhaps he even changed his mind upon realizing marathoning benefited people in ways that at first seemed useless to a man capable of winning. I was with Bill Rodgers one day when a man ran up to the vehicle in which we were riding and asked him for a bit of advice for a 4-hour marathoner. “You can run for four hours?” Rodgers asked incredulously. He makes an interesting point. It takes more guts to be slow (or even stupid) sometimes than it does to win.

That reminds me that our current electoral process has become a similarly protracted process for choosing public officials. Two years out from the 2016 Presidential election we are already debating the candidates and outcome. American politics has become one long, stupid marathon. It hurts everyone to proceed this way.

Let’s call it for what it really is. Graceless striving. Here we sit with the results of the 2014 election in which millions of Americans voted for a party that absolutely trashed the nation’s economy by 2008 and six years later they have forgotten the pain and suffering the nation felt due to unbudgeted wars, unregulated financial shenanigans and corporate and religious zealotry driving the party in power. But people are all too happy to sign up for another run with the Republicans. It makes no sense. But neither does marathoning if you think about it.

Apparently they used the last six years to forget painful recovery it took to get over the marathon of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney in office. It’s a comedy, really, in which the real people who control the nation’s destiny never really show their faces at all. The moneyed few and the CIA pull the strings. The rest is just theater.

My conservative friends are crowing at the supposed triumph. But one wonders what they’ll think when America inevitably hits the wall again at 20 miles. The incoming party wants America to run on nothing. They’ll slash budgets and even shut down the government to get their way. It’s happened before. It will happen again.

It will hurt to run the nation on nothing. We haven’t even completely recovered from the last race. In cycling we call it a bonk when someone runs out of energy during a ride. Often you feel great up to that moment when the juice runs out.

Those of us who run and ride should be smarter than this. We know how it works. Yet we watch in wonder as the politicians keep on running away with our hopes and dreams.

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It’s time for all people of good conscience to take “the treatment”

Posted on November 6, 2014 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

My father was never one to harbor much in the way of complaint from my mother. Whenever she would bitch of some ache or pain of any nature, dad would wave a hand at her and tell her, “Go out and take the treatment.”

See, “the treatment” was my father’s way of telling my mother to go outside, get ready to run and head smack into a tree.

“That way,” he’d tell her. “Whatever was hurting before won’t hurt by comparison to the pain you feel when you’ve just run into a tree.”

Was this the act of revenge by chipmunks for my long ago crimes?

Which perhaps explains why I did just that this past summer. I ran my bike smack into a fallen tree. And let’s be honest. I should have seen it there. There was no real curve concealing it’s presence. Just a big, fat tree lying across the trail. It was a thick tree. With bark and leaves and branches sticking up so that I could sufficiently scrape the skin off my chin resulting in four badly sewn stitches by a doctor who frankly seemed grossed out by the entire experience of treating me.

The dude never even looked at the side of my body, which turned out to have far more damage inside than my bloody chin. I’m still going to a massage therapist who grinds on the thick lump of scar tissue hiding underneath the skin. It hurts like hell.

Bruises t00So the treatment continues for me. First I ran smack into a tree and now the pain is still echoing through the fiber of my flesh. My dad would be proud of me. I took the treatment well.

But now that the results of the November 2014 election are in, I’m very much considering a new dose of “the treatment” to make the pain of all this blind idiocy go away. There are plenty of trees in my yard. I don’t even need to ride my bike to find one. There’s a big maple out back with a sign that says MIRACLES HAPPEN on it. That one would work just fine for “the treatment.”

Perhaps I’ll watch 5 minutes of Fox News this morning and head out for my collision with the tree. See, Fox News is to news what an enema is to rivers of shit. You always know what the outcome will be. Tarsnakes wait to take you down. So even though the election of November 2014 was decided on the Big Lie of corporate money, Citizens United and a whole bunch of people who bought the Fox Lie that Obama is a failure, Fox News will not let up with their river of dark-hearted shit. Oh no. They’ll spend even more time jamming political suppositories (also known as Talking Points) up their own asses to celebrate the thrilling results of what comes after. You can’t really blame them. It’s what they do. 

Vomitorium

Drawing by Ralph Steadman

Drawing by Ralph Steadman

Actually, it’s far worse than that. Even while they’re jamming shit-generating suppositories up their political asses (and there are plenty of them employed by Fox) they are simultaneously dining on the political corpses of their most hated opponents. The rotting flesh of their enemies as it does down their gullets both thrills and terrifies them. It’s like Romans in the vomitorium. They can’t eat enough of the flesh of their victims so they keep sticking their hands down their collective throats in order to make room for more.

The great political writer Hunter S. Thompson literally couldn’t take any more of their kind of bullshit. He took the ultimate treatment by blowing his own brains out. That was a preferable option to listening to the furied bullshit of idiots with more money than brains, and less brains than a hamster running on a razor wheel. They know it’s killing them, but they keep on running because it’s what they do.

Taking the treatment

So I’ll take my treatment like a man. I can admit the Democrats lost in a violent shitstorm. But actually I’m rather proud of the fact that by taking the high road, the Democrats perpetually lose important elections big time. Of course I’m a bit disappointed when liberals like me stay home from the voting booth. They only come out to vote when the IMG_8648Presidency is on the line. Here’s the problem: liberals can’t bothered when the arguments about politics center on whether humans came from monkeys or not. Arguing about anachronisms and backwards-looking politics just doesn’t motivate them like it does conservatives, who can always find an excuse to be happy even sometime in the future it will kill their own children. They’re always ready to whack Isaac if political or religious duty calls. That’s why they don’t give a shit about you or me. By comparison to killing their own kids, the rest of us hardly matter.

Shit rivers abound

That’s the level of debate we get in this modern era, and people of good intellectual conscience simply can’t be bothered with it. It’s like people say about the weather. “Everyone talks about the weather, but no one does anything about it.”

Hence, the debate as well over climate change. That’s how callow our society has become.

But in fact the Fox News Shitstorm is much like the Polar Vortex, only a lot stinkier and a lot more shallow compared to the layers of snow we got here in Chicago last winter.

Or, Fox News and the conservative movement in America is like the Platte River in Nebraska when the hog farms upriver all release their shit slop at the same time. Then it runs a mile wide and an inch deep. Then they tell you it’s the natural course of things.

The Koch Brothers got rich using hog slop politics and greenwashing their evil intentions. Now they grease the country with dark money that fuels their corporate interests.

Well, it’s only shit after all

dscn9203.jpgPeople in America seem to loooove the thrill of it all. When the shit waves come rolling their way, they like to take the long board out on the shit surf rolling across the continent because, as the Beach Boys once sang, it makes them feeling like they’re sitting on top of the world. Catch a wave.

There are plenty of shit waves to go around. That’s why people watch pro football even through it destroys the minds of the very athletes who play it. That’s why people tune into pro wrestling even though it is absolutely fake. People want to be stimulated by power and a sense of good and evil, right and wrong, black and white and Democrat versus Republican. Catch a wave and you’re sitting on top of the world. As Mark Twain once said, “All it takes is ignorance and confidence, and success is sure.”

No shit

That about describes what just happened in America. Which is why all people of good conscience should go outside and run straight into the nearest tree. The pain you feel will make you wake up to the fact that what just happened was bad, but not fatal. And if the lump on your head does not go down before the 2016 election, perhaps you’ll wade through the next shitstorm and actually go to the voting booth and put sane people back in office rather than the shitmeisters about to shove a suppository of radical conservatism up your ass and tell you that it’s for your own good.

Is that clear enough for you? Now go take the treatment. You earned it.

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Did the 2014 election reveal a holy road or a road that’s holey?

Posted on November 5, 2014 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

It all starts with an appreciation for the forces that drive the world.

It all starts with an appreciation for the forces that drive the world.

Those of us who run and ride hundreds if not thousands of miles on America’s roads know the difference between a good road and a bad road. We’re intimately connected to the earth. Grounded you might say in contact with the manufactured surfaces of the various roads we ride and run.

No one knows the roads better than us. Not even the people who asphalt and pave and pour concrete. Nor the folks who come back later pouring tar into cracks to create tarsnakes. Much less the people who return even later to pour even more tar on the road and spread pebbly gravel over it in those horrendous patch and seal operations.

Cyclists and runners traverse it all. We see how roads work and how they slowly decompose. It starts the very day the road crews finish their job and drive away. Rain falls. Heat comes. Cold heaves and cracks the surface. The weight of traffic bends and stretches the road surface. Cracks form. Grooves deepen. A road is not a static thing. It is a living thing. It requires care and attention.IMG_7142The worst result of road neglect is potholes. They start small and can expand into gaping depths that vex everyone who approaches. Some roads get so badly potholed there is not much road left to travel. One must slow and steer around the deepest problems or risk a flat or a soaking wet running shoe. Among cyclists there is much bitter joking about roads such as these. “Watch out for the good road,” I’ve heard my companions jest.

The good road. It’s all so symbolic isn’t it? Truth be told there are people who seem unable to decipher good road from bad. Worse, they simply don’t care whether a road is good or bad as long as they can drive around it somehow. They’ve got other things to do than worry day to day about whether the roads we travel are good or bad.

Yet they’re the first to bitch when something bad happens to them on the road. They love to blame others for the problems. Yet they’re so busy moralizing over the fact that they have to pay for the roads and actually have to share the road with someone riding a bike that they can’t seem to understand what causes cracks and potholes in the first place.

It’s them, you see. But they seem themselves as too holy for that cause and effect.

I met one such man on a rural road who got out of his truck to yell at our group for slowing him down. “I pay taxes!” he yelled at us. As if that were reason enough for him to disobey the call to yield to cyclists signaling and turning left. He’s in a car. We’re on bikes. Somehow we’re breaking the American social contract by not acting exactly like him.

photo-120See, people can’t be expected to focus on good roads or bad when they’re convinced they have a better idea about how to use a road than you. It’s become normal in American political life to deny and ridicule people who need or want to travel roads for purposes other than those defined by selfish reasons. God Forbid a poor person should actually walk to work along one of America’s roads. You can hear the voices inside those luxury vehicles castigating the pedestrian carrying a plastic grocery bag with their lunch on the way to work.

“Get a car! Jesus, I hate poor people!”

Hence the election results of 2014. The selfish have won again. Now they’ll want to tell us the road ahead is holy, when in fact it is only holey.

Into the potholes of life will be cast the rights of those whose gender or orientation do not match their idea of a straight road. The tarsnakes of religion will vex the wheels of all those who do not abide by conservative Rules of the Road. They will even attempt to dictate the flow of traffic when it comes to who deserves to use the apocryphal roads. We’ve seen this literally happen in New Jersey with so-called Governor Chris Christie, who shut down roads to punish his political detractors. Like so many of his ilk, he thinks he’s King of the Roads. So you see how this works.

That literal event carries so much symbolism for what it will be like now that Republicans control both the House and the Senate. We’ll now be led by the likes of Mitch McConnell who swore, against his true oath of office, to undermine President Obama any way he could. Obstructionism. Blocking the road to progress.

john-boehner-cryingWe’ll see the heavy truck of John Boehner now whining down the road and trying to push the President into the political ditch.

We’ll all have to move aside for the likes of Paul Ryan who on one hand claims religious foundations for his worldview while bragging about the fiscally existential philosophy of Ayn Rand on the other.

They’re a confused, desperate and zealous lot. They hate the road you choose to travel if you disagree with them. They’ll run you over if you get in their way. They’ll cry foul if you don’t jump out of the way. They will not Share the Road.

In fact they will ignore the nation’s infrastructure needs as they have done for decades by refusing to pass legislation to repair our nation’s bridges and roads.  To them, every social or political problem that does not match up their road map of corporatism and favors for friends is a patch and seal deal. They do the bare minimum because they while they serve in government, they don’t believe in it. Essentially they’re always, eternally driving down the wrong side of the road, playing chicken with all those who dare oppose them.

Then they put up traffic signs. You had better obey them. “Let’s move on to abortion, and gay marriage. And let’s keep busy telling women they already earn enough money. Those are the real problems of society.”

They’ll also attempt to defund the good roads of Medicare and Social Security, insurance programs that provide for the health and welfare of the elderly. They’ll be casting millions of everyday people to the side of the road as well. Because when it comes to health care, they answer to only one constituency: The people who pay for their election. They’ll vote to defund the Affordable Care Act. They’ve already done it about 50 times.

dscf2275sIt’s like they’re a mad trucker going coast to coast with a load of manure they’re eager to dump on the President’s desk. “Pass this or we’ll bring you even more of this shit,” they’ll say. The President will of course veto all their crap. Then they’ll blame him for raising a political stink in Washington.

During all this they’ll claim they’re on the right side of the road because their “tradition” tells them they are “doing the right thing” by slashing budgets and ignoring those in need. They’ll remain beholden to freaks who think guns are the law of the land. They do not care if thousands and thousands of people have been killed on American soil by gun violence. More Americans have been killed by gun violence than all the American soldiers killed in wars on foreign soil. Yet they’ll tell you that guns are the source of peace in America. That’s the same as running you over with a truck and then backing up to make sure the tire tracks show.

It should be clear that their so-called traditions are not on the right or holy side of the road. But in order to remind these “holier than thou” Republicans that they do a shit job of real morality, let us consider this parable from the Bible that shows us how and why it is right to act in good conscience. And how to treat others down the road.

The Parable of the Good Samaritan

25 On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

26 “What is written in the Law?” he replied. “How do you read it?”

27 He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’[c]; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[d]”

28 “You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied. “Do this and you will live.”

29 But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”

30 In reply Jesus said: “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. 31 A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. 32 So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. 34 He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, brought him to an inn and took care of him. 35 The next day he took out two denarii[e] and gave them to the innkeeper. ‘Look after him,’ he said, ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.’

36 “Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?”

37 The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy on him.”

Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.”

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Don’t blame Obamacare if the current state of health care makes you sick

Posted on November 4, 2014 by Christopher Cudworth

IMG_3668Walking into Cadence Hospital was something of a brain rush. For years I strolled those halls between the hospital walls and the cafeteria. There were surgeries and treatments. Chemotherapies and patient recoveries. It was all part of the picture of being a caregiver.

There were also many trips to the cashier and the hospital financial office to figure out bills. Some of them piled up. Others were written off thanks to the charitable arm of Cadence. Over the years we worked with HMOs, PPOs and more than a few I Don’t Knows. COBRA and finally Obamacare. Somehow most of those bills got paid one way or another.

It struck us for years how strange it was to hear people complaining about the politics of health care. Until you’ve sat there getting treatment while knowing the next bill alone might add up to $45,000, none of it really makes much sense politically. We heard stories of people bankrupted by their medical bills, and people who could not get coverage at all.

So we were thankful that somehow, someway we paid our share and insurance covered the rest.

IMG_3673It almost broke us a few times. When I lost my job the day after I informed a company that my wife had cancer it came to pass that we owed $2000 a month just in premiums to remain coverage. We turned in our certificate of “creditable coverage” whatever that means and then scraped and scrambled to earn the money to make those payments. At one point we had to take money from unemployment insurance to pay for health insurance.

It was not my wife’s “fault” that she got cancer. She ate well. Never smoked. Only drank moderately. Ovarian cancer takes women at random just like so many other types of cancer. We’re all walking around with potentially cancerous cells in our bodies. It’s our “job” you might say to try to keep cancer away. But in the end, it’s a product of chance.

As a lifelong runner and endurance athlete I like to think that I’ve put some insurance in the health bank. I realize that’s a ruse in many ways. You can protect yourself from cancer and get heart disease. You can avoid or get a flu shot and the flu comes anyway.

I used to work out so hard I’d make myself sick. There were long, deep bouts with the common cold because my resistance was so low. One time it put me in the hospital with a numb arm because I’d take Tylenol with codeine that affected the nerves in my shoulder.

IMG_3675But until I crashed my bike a couple years ago, and then picked up a sliver in my finger that led to an infection, my journeys to the hospital were pretty limited, other than to care for my late wife. Believe me, that was plenty of time spent in the hospital.

So I walked those halls thinking of the fact that last summer my companion Sue also earned a trip through the surgery room with her bike crash. Then I had surgery at a different hospital on my infected finger.

What I’m saying is that I never take my health for granted. Ever. As we age new challenges arise. My group of Friday Night Dinner friends from church have to be careful not to let conversation devolve into a medical bitch session. They all kid me the most, however. For a while last summer I was always scraping my bald scalp a day or two before dinner, or cutting my hand or picking up some other visible wound for which I get a good teasing.

IMG_8648Maybe I secretly desire the attention. But that’s not it, I know. Sometimes a good scrape or two with pain or blood or even death is a good reminder that we should all be grateful for our basic, good old health.

And if not, we should be grateful for the hospitals and physicians that know how to treat us. And hopefully fix us.

Despite all the vagaries of modern health insurance, it still strikes me that we should be grateful there are people trying to figure out how to make it all work better than it used to do. You can criticize the initial iterations of the Affordable Health Care Act all you want, but the facts show that more people have health care and that insurance premiums are only scheduled to rise by an estimated 5% next year. That’s far better than the 12% per year they increased on average during the recent Bush years.

Yes there are doctors pulling away from the program because the negotiations can be ugly. And yes physicians already have a ton to deal with given regulations over insurance, liability and other medical practice standards. But that’s not strictly the fault of Obamacare. HMOs started that swing years ago, so it’s all part of the arc.

IMG_3676What really needs to take place is grand negotiation in good faith over how and what the American health system should and can do. Is it strictly the responsibility of each individual to care for their own health and pay for it? Is personal health a free market issue or is it part of the social good to provide equal access to health care for every citizen? Are there  group dynamics necessary to evolve a better overall system of providing Americans consistent, quality health care. Or is it group dynamics that got us into trouble in the first place? Is corporatized health care causing a ‘health gap’ in the American population by playing favorites with people who work for larger companies?

Ask any small company about their biggest headaches and often they pertain to providing employee benefits such as health care. What if the American system removed this burden from the backs of small business and big business alike, and made it possible for people to shop at will in a truly free market of health care plans without enrollment periods or giant groups that shrink the cost of health care for a selected few while raising the rates for those most at risk?

What if indeed? The public option for health care is necessary to make this happen. Some people who claim to be ‘free market’ advocates don’t have the courage to admit that such an approach would mess with the gravy train they already have.

But what’s the goal, to provide adequate and equal health care opportunities or to sustain a status quo that was getting so out of balance costs were skyrocketing out of control?

Those of us who run and ride and swim might wryly grin that if left to our own devices, we might have an advantage over those who smoke, drink or abuse their bodies and minds with drugs. But we don’t have a pure democracy in America where majority always rules.  Our system is based on creating and delivering equal representation, not simply power plays.

In the long run, that’s a better system even if you’re the healthiest person in the world. Because it’s fair that despite circumstance or even bad choices, all people should have equal opportunity to quality health care.

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This just in: Kids still ride bikes on dirt piles

Posted on November 3, 2014 by Christopher Cudworth

Bike JumpOne of the more annoying if partly true memes on Facebook goes something like this:

“When we grew up lightning bugs were our curfew…”

And so on. It’s a strange worldview that turns the liberal manner in which our parents raised us into a conservative mantra that “things aren’t as good as they used to be.”

Sentiments

True, things have changed in some ways. I’ve talked to people that have lived in our neighborhood for years and there was a time when household fences did not exist. Kids ran everywhere, crossing through yards on their way to play at the house of other neighborhood kids.

I too lament the fact that kids don’t seem to be as free as they once did to ram around and be stupid and free with their own time.

Have at it

Yet today I cut through the park near my house while walking the dog and found important evidence that it’s not the kids that have changed. It’s the environment they live in and how we let them live in it that has perhaps changed for the worst.

Walking past the baseball diamond it was interesting to note that two massive dirt piles dumped on the diamond by the Park District had been converted into pretty cool jumps by an ad hoc group of kids.

The older boys were in their early teens and rode their bikes up and over the dirt mounds so much there as a single track between the two dirt lumps. It was possible to catch a little air if you got going fast enough.

The other mound of dirt was occupied by a group of girls with pretty bikes. One was sitting atop the dirt mound with an apprehensive look on her face. Finally she mustered courage and went wheeling down the steep little hill without incident.

Litigious world

Sure, you could worry about risk of injury on park district property. But honestly, there’s probably greater risk of injury or illness with some of the joggers circling that park that those kids trying out their bike skills on a couple dirt mounds.

My buddies and I loved finding a dirt pile or riding around a quarry when we were kids. For the most part we knew our limits and didn’t do anything too stupid. I never once broke an arm or hurt my head while riding without a helmet. If you haven’t figured it out yet, kids don’t really like getting hurt. They tend to avoid that if at all possible.

Outside of town a few miles there is a tract of woods where the kids in rural subdivisions gather to create intense jumps. The ground is worn smooth for an acre or two where kids on bikes jump and ride and tear up the dirt. The property owner must believe in the merit of letting kids have at it. I have that area of woods as a spring bird count census area each spring. It’s always fascinating to see the creativity of the jumps and trails they create. I’d be nervous to take my Specialized Rockhopper on many of those jumps. I’ve lost too much hand-eye coordination and my daring. Youth has its benefits.

Temporary beauty

Back home in town, it made me smile watching those kids go up and over the dirt piles. Surely the park district crew will show up any day soon with a Bobcat dozer to spread the dirt out on the baseball field where it’s supposed to be.

But for the time being, a time warp took place in which kids got to be kids for the day riding their bikes on a set of dirt piles.

Perception and projection

My own kids told me they did not feel like they were missing anything even though most of their play life was confined to a couple back yards in city neighborhood. They had an apple tree to climb on, a sandbox to play in and an alley in which to ride their bikes back and forth on hot summer days.

It’s best not to project our sentiments on the present when the past was frankly not all that perfect. It may have been romantic to ride a Sting Ray bike or two, but most of us did not have them. We made do with Frankenstein versions with big tall tires and the occasional found version of Sting Ray Handlebars.

Then we found a dirt pile and did our best to catch some air. Things really have not changed all that much. We just think they have. I can’t tell whether that’s a conservative or liberal opinion because it doesn’t matter. What matters is that we not project our fears into kids so that they have at least some semblance of innocence and freedom growing up. Anything else is the wrong kind of time warp.

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Everything right about the world is found in these young runners

Posted on October 31, 2014 by Christopher Cudworth

Oops! Now with a live link!

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http://www.dailyherald.com/article/20141030/submitted/141039977/

Today’s blog at We Run and Ride features a link to my story published in Illinois’ third-largest newspaper, the Daily Herald. I am proud to have been a staff member of this newspaper for 8 great years.

Today’s story chronicles the team philosophy and accomplishments of the Rotolo Middle School girls and boys cross country teams. The girls won the IESA state championship and the boys took third.

I think you’ll find a lot to admire in the kids, their coaches and running as a sport. Enjoy!

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Everything right about the world is found in these young runners

Posted on October 31, 2014 by Christopher Cudworth

10703754_10152865040451095_3933546903019467610_n

http://www.dailyherald.com/article/20141030/submitted/141039977/

Today’s blog at We Run and Ride features a link to my story published in Illinois’ third-largest newspaper, the Daily Herald. I am proud to have been a staff member of this newspaper for 8 great years.

Today’s story chronicles the team philosophy and accomplishments of the Rotolo Middle School girls and boys cross country teams. The girls won the IESA state championship and the boys took third.

I think you’ll find a lot to admire in the kids, their coaches and running as a sport. Enjoy!

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How Marathon Santa keeps me humble

Posted on October 30, 2014 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

"There could be anything in there! It could be a major award!"

“There could be anything in there! It could be a major award!”

Having been known to brag a little in this blog, it is time for me to reveal the method that keeps me humble in the long term. The story is true, and it lives on in our family lore, hanging by a thread every December on my father’s artificial Christmas tree.

Back when I was racing competitively and winning more than a few 10ks, I showed up at a race in Wheaton, Illinois knowing I had a very good chance of coming in first place. The race went very well with one notable exception. The course was extremely long. I’d been finishing 10Ks under 32:00 on a regular basis and this race dragged on well into the low 34:00 range before I gratefully but angrily crossed the finish line.

As you may know, it hurts to run or ride or swim a lot longer than you’d anticipated. We base our efforts on our training and the ability to maintain a given pace for a particular distance or time.

Lessons learned

The examples are manifold. No cyclist can sprint forever. In fact it is rather astounding that so many stage races in major cycling events such as the Tour de France come down to a sprint of just over 400 meters or less. It’s insane, if you think about it, to race more than 100 miles only to have a bunch of meatheads crash it out in a mighty sprint at the end. What’s the point, really?

Same goes with running. The current marathon world record is 2:02:57, an average pace of 4:41 per mile. So why isn’t it possible now to just dial it up to 4:35 and be done with it, go under the 2:00 hour barrier? What’s wrong with these wimps? Can’t they just go faster a little farther?

Social contracts

Well, it takes time to get faster, and lots of training. But when a race breaks that social contract by failing to measure the course properly, competitors can get rather upset.

So I was fuming the entire time between finishing the race and waiting through the race raffle for the actual awards ceremony. My late wife sat with me trying to keep me calm. Even though I’d won the race it did not feel like it. I was angry and disgusted.

Prize packages

My son Evan and daughter Emily pose with a real Red Ryder BB gun.

My son Evan and daughter Emily pose with a real Red Ryder BB gun.

The race officials started the raffle and all kinds of great prizes were being given out. Trips and vacation stays. The sponsors had gone all out for this race.

“Relax,” she told me. “You’re probably going to get something nice for winning.”

Finally the moment came. I walked fiercely to the podium when my name was called as the race winner. Then I walked proudly back to the table where my wife was sitting with a smile on her face. The award was in a small white box that had no markings on it. “It’s probably a watch!” she said.

Then I opened the box and what do you think was inside? A Christmas ornament. A Marathon Santa. It was worth perhaps $4.50. I sat there with my mouth open. Again amazed and disgusted.

Humble pie

My father still thinks this is a hilarious story. He hangs that Marathon Santa Christmas ornament on the tree each year with a flourish. Then he points to me and laughs. He mostly lost his speech due to a stroke years ago but he waves his hand in a grandiose way and says “Yeahhhh…. yeahhhh!” and he laughs some more.

At the time I opened that box during the awards ceremony even my wife could not hold back the combination of amazement and disbelief. “There must be some mistake,” she told me. “Take it back up there.” But I didn’t. I couldn’t. My own arrogance and pride had already turned the entire day into a farce. It was only suiting that I received an award that was a farce as well.

Major awards

leglampIn fact I never really worried about what I won as an award from that point on. There are trophies gathering dust on the shelves of my basement, but the Marathon Santa hangs proudly on the tree each year. Every time I watch A Christmas Story with Ralphie and his Red Ryder BB gun, I revisit the moment when my hunger for a Major Award felt just like that moment when the father in the movie opens that big crate to find a Leg Lamp hiding in the stuffing.

As it says in 2 Timothy,” I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.”  Well, a strong faith always comes packaged with a strong dose of humility. I am reminded of that each year at Christmas when the Marathon Santa shines brightly next to the holiday lights on my father’s fake tree.

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Preacher Pat Robertson runs the world’s first sub-2 hour marathon after leg pressing 2000 pounds

Posted on October 29, 2014 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

Preacher Pat Robertson claims he can leg press 2000 pounds. With that level of athletic ability, it was only a matter or time before he ran the world's first sub-2:00 marathon.

Preacher Pat Robertson claims he can leg press 2000 pounds. With that level of athletic ability, it was only a matter or time before he ran the world’s first sub-2:00 marathon.

Preacher Pat Robertson, host of the epochal television show The 700 Club, recently ran the world’s first sub-2:00 marathon in a privately held race on the confines of a park near the 700 Club studios. The 76-year old preacher with a heart of gold for anything to do with God averaged less than 4:35 per mile for the 26.2 mile distance.

Robertson’s effort came on the heels of the recent world record marathon by Kenyan Dennis Kimetto at this year’s Berlin Marathon. His time was 2:02:57, which works out to 4:41.5 per mile. Robertson’s amazing sub-two hour marathon was completed at a pace of less than 4:35 per mile.

“I was thinking about that line from 2 Timothy 7,” Robertson relates, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. If you have faith in this life, you can do anything with God. I haven’t felt this good since running for President 26 years ago. You know, back when I went on record as opposing the end of apartheid. and radically predicting the end of the world in 1982. That didn’t come true. But nothing much else Robertson has ever said and done has ever stood up to much scrutiny.

Despite these horrific gaps in credibility, Robertson credits his most recent accomplishment and world record marathon to the age-defying protein shake that reportedly also helped him leg press 2000 pounds. This despite the fact that the recognized world record for leg presses by men much younger than preacher Robertson is 650 pounds less than the weight he claims to have lifted.

One athletic trainer had this to say about Pat Robertson’s claims to amazing claims of athletic strength and fitness. “It’s amazing how much bullshit one man really can push if there are enough people stupid enough to believe it.”

Of course Robertson’s worldview has also led him to otherworldly claims including the idea that major weather events have been caused America’s tolerance for sin, and that a boy’s stomach problems might have been caused by witches.

It’s hard to imagine that a man whose time is taken up by keeping up with such an active imagination has time to do the training that would enable him to lift 2000 pounds with his legs and run history’s first sub 2:00 marathon.

But according to Pat Robertson, anything’s possible with God, especially miracle healings cast out like a Bingo game at large group gatherings. So please send your money to CBN so that pathological liar Pat Robertson can afford his amazing personal trainer and plenty of protein shakes. It takes a lot of effort to pump out his brand of shit.

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10 things sure to get your ass out of bed when it’s time to train

Posted on October 28, 2014 by Christopher Cudworth

Ass In Bed In ColorLet’s face it, when it comes to getting in shape there’s nothing harder than getting your ass out of bed in the morning. Even the best intentions and pledges of fidelity to a fitness regimen fade to black when it is 5:16 in the morning and the alarm went off fifteen minutes ago.

It happens to all of us. It’s just plain hard to get your ass out of bed in the morning.

So you need strategy. Remind me why I do this again?

#10. Your actual ass really is fat. 

It’s not a pretty sight for any of us. And if your jeans don’t fit or your running shorts are see through because your ass is stretching the material too thin, that’s plenty of reason to get your fat ass out of bed.

#9. Your best friend is counting on you. 

Getting your ass out of bed is much easier if you know your best friend or training partner is standing out in the cold or dark somewhere waiting for you. Or perhaps they’re already one cup of coffee into the morning and glancing out the window of the health club wondering when your fat ass is going to roll up and work out. Oaahhh yeah, that’s what they’re actually thinking.

#8. You need an excuse to walk past the scale 

So you slept in a couple times last week and didn’t get up to run, ride, swim or lift all week. You’re three pounds up in weight and last night you had Tostitos and dip for a 9:00 snack and don’t want to think about getting on the scale. So it’s far easier to walk right past that scale and go work out.

#7. You’re out of excuses altogether 

There comes a point in every fitness routine when what you’re doing, or not doing, no longer even qualifies as a routine. You’ve used every excuse imaginable to humankind to avoid doing your workouts. So you get out of bed and stand there looking at yourself in the full length mirror with that dumb look on your face and it dawns on you: “I can’t think of a reason NOT to work out.”

IMG_8591#6. You got up yesterday. You can do it again today. 

If you’ve been in a state of fitness depression because the fall marathon and summer triathlon season is over, and you can’t muster any real reasons to get of bed when it’s dark outside, concentrate on “small streaks” to get back into some sort of fitness groove. Start with one day in a row. Work up to two. Don’t tax yourself. You can do this.

#5. You want to share your ass in bed with someone else, but being fit makes it more possible. 

Hey, getting laid is important business. That’s true whether you’re single and on the make or married and trying to keep sane. Guys and gals can both relate, a fitter ass can help you date. It doesn’t need to be a skinny ass or a perfect shape. But if you build some strength in those glutes you’ll be happy for it in a thousand ways.

#4. You actually like working out. 

Sooner or later you knew we’d get to the positive aspects of getting out of bed. One of those is found in people who actually enjoy the feeling of working out. It calls you out of bed like one of those sirens in the story of Ulysses. If so, congratulations. You’re as dedicated as a Greek hero when it comes to your fitness routine.

IMG_0242#3. There is this event or series of events you’re doing next year…

Sure it’s getting dark and cold and did we mention dark in the morning and at night? That can push your right back under the covers. But then you start to think: If I don’t work out now, come March and April I’ll be struggling to gain cardio and core fitness and those training runs, rides and swims will be massively painful and un-fun. And that’s a damn good reason to get your ass out of bed.

#2. Life is short. 

That’s right. You can sleep the rest of your life or you can do something a bit more active with your days by raising your heart rate enough to stimulate brain cells, keep your blood from stagnating or letting your body devolve in a salamander lacking cartilage, among other things. Carpe diem! Get your ass out of bed or you’ll get old too young!

Guardians Playlist#1. You just made the most awesome playlist ever. 

We all learned from the movie Guardians of the Galaxy that a great playlist of your favorite tunes can make you into something of an awesome superhero. The Chris Pratt character danced his way through difficulty and danger to some of the most worm-ear tunes of all time. Here’s a link to those tunes. Good luck getting these out of your head. But at least they’ll get your ass out of bed.

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