Have you used this important technique to make your race pace feel easier?

Posted on October 30, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

photo (8)Standing at the 2-mile mark of the Chicago Marathon, we watched the race leaders pass the split clock at 9:30.

You may wonder, “How do they do it? What makes it possible for those runners to race so quickly?”

The answer is surprisingly simple. They can race that fast because they’ve trained at a much, much faster pace.

This single technique seems to be the most under-appreciated method of getting faster in a marathon, half-marathon or any distance race below that. Even milers run intervals at a much faster pace than their PR if they hope to lower their times.

For all its universal applications, and many runners and cyclists do get this principle, it still helps to refresh the reasons why faster tempo running and riding really do help you run or ride at an overall faster pace.

The reasons are both physical and mental. The physical training of higher leg turnover in running or faster cadence in cycling is plain enough in purpose. But it’s the mental benefit of faster tempo that is harder to sustain over the long run. So you’ve got to rehearse the faster tempo in order to believe that the rate of return is worth it, and that you can sustain your pace over multiple miles.

The marathon mentality

photo (5)Running 26.2 miles is a rite of passage for millions of runners. While not a habitual marathon runner, it often occurs to me how long a marathon really is when I complete a certain cycling loop that happens to be, you guessed it, 26.2 miles on the button. Looking down at the cyclometer or the Strava I check the average speed and distance and think: It’s amazing someone can run that far in 2:03:23.

That’s right: The fastest male marathoner now averages 4:42 per mile for the 2:03:23 record set in Berlin. The fastest female is 2:15:25 or 5:09 pace. Those times seem ridiculously fast. But not if you break it down.

Breaking it down without breaking down

For most of us, the entire idea behind marathoning is to finish the race. But ultimately you’d also like to be able to run faster. That’s a matter of teaching your body to handle a faster tempo and convincing your mind that it’s possible.

The marathon is really two races in one. First you calculate the pace you want to run to reach your target time. That is one race. Then you train to run the number of hours required to complete the race. They are really two separate issues that add up to one problem: training long enough to finish and fast enough to PR. Marathoners can easily forget to do one or the other. 

A faster “steady state” 

photo (7)Just think: the world’s best marathoners treat 4:42 pace as their “steady state” for 26.2 miles. Here’s how they do it: these runners go much faster than that in practice. A runner capable of running 4:42 per mile will run mile repeats at 10 to 30 seconds faster than that in practice.

Without that rehearsal of quicker leg turnover, the pace of 4:42 per mile would feel fast and the tempo would seem hard to sustain. You see that in many mid-pack runners, who seldom surge or change tempos through an entire marathon. That’s an “inactive” approach to racing. You need an active approach in which your mind and body has previously been tested to handle faster or slightly changing tempos.

Think about those elite marathoners: When you’ve run 4:20 miles in practice, 4:42 feels like a jog. You might even throw in a 4:30 mile surge during the race if needed, and not feel strained.

Break the mold

As a last-minute tempo experiment, I once raced a mile on a Friday night before a Sunday morning 15K. The legs felt great and I won the race in 4:22. The next day I did a light sustained jog and by Sunday morning the effects of the mile wore off but the relative pace of the 15K still felt easy and smooth by comparison to the faster mile pace I’d run. The muscle memory of that fast tempo mile made it seem easier to run the 15K pace where I set a PR.

Taper and turn it on

Some very healthy zombies pace themselves so they won't die in the last miles of a half marathon.

 

You can do this with the marathon too. In the four weeks leading up to the marathon there tends to be so much emphasis placed on getting in that last 20-miler. Yet too many marathoners skip the benefit of up-tempo running and what it can do for your ultimate race effort. When you’re engaged in your taper for the race your legs should begin to feel less stale. That is an ideal time to do some controlled, uptempo training. You also need to add in surges of 3-5 minutes at a 2% faster pace during your longer runs over the buildup months. If you’re currently an 8:00 per mile marathoner, these surges should be done at 7:45-7:55 pace. The difference in your racing long term at that pace will result in a marathon time 2-3 minutes faster. It worked at 25K for me. It will work at the marathon distance too.

The ideal

If you plan to average 8:00 per mile in your next marathon do you have a plan to do some training at 7:30 per mile? It can really help. The 30 second rule seems to apply to racers of all speeds, in fact. You need to run tempo work that much faster to open up the body’s signals to more speed. Obviously a solid warmup and cooldown are desirable before and after speedwork.

But don’t skip it. It’s an immutable rule. If you want to race faster you have to run faster than your race pace to make it feel easy. It’s s simple trick, but one too often forgotten by the middle of the pack who stand to gain the most by kicking their own asses in practice.

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We run and ride where zombies are behind the wheel

Posted on October 29, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

timthumbGaper’s block. Rubbernecking.

Whether you call it rubbernecking or  gaper’s block, the fact that traffic can back up for miles on an expressway or other road because people slow down to look at a seeming tragedy  is proof that there really is no higher purpose among people who drive on roads rather than ride a bike or run.

Gaper’s blocks emphatically demonstrate that people are driving with priorities other than getting where they’re going on time. The prurient, vacuous gape of a driver straining to see another person being carted away on a stretcher, or even–God Forbid–actual body parts spattered over the ground is just too delicious to ignore, now isn’t it?

Road warriors 

gapersblock-reversebreakawayThose of us who run and ride don’t really need gaper’s blocks to see the world more clearly. Our intimate relationship with the roads on which we run and ride is food for thought every day. But in order to maintain that relationship with the world around us, we are often forced to become “road warriors” to survive, fighting through the rushed vision of a jealously guarded commuter world that crowds the roads and numbs the mind. Comfortably numb, Pink Floyd called it.

Short, sharp shocks to the mind

The antidote to any sort of numbness is shock. And that’s precisely what gaper’s blocks are all about. They hold potential to deliver shock and awe and a heavy dose of “There but for the grace of God go I…”

Gaper’s blocks are an opportunity, often for just a moment, to feel more fortunate than others, and slightly more superior in having not succumbed to tragedy. Because when you gape at a state policeman filling out a ticket there is relief that you are not the person getting “nailed.” Or when the shattered car or truck parts rest in puddles of coolant or blood you give a short shudder and realize how easy it is to lose focus for a minute and maybe die. The pull of tragedy is too strong for many people to resist. So we slow down and stare.

A question of intent

CHP-ZombieOf course gaper’s blocks are a huge inconvenience to thousands of people every day. One wonders: What makes people obsessed enough to slow down when the reason they’re on the road in the first place is to get to work on time?

Yet the gaper’s block magnifies, sometimes backing up traffic for miles and miles. Frustration mounts. Road rage ensues. Then you get past the point where the roadside attraction occurred and traffic opens up. You’re on your way while muttering to yourself, “Idiots” at the thought that so many people could not resist slowing down to look at the misfortune of another.

Ugly human nature

It happens every day. What that tells us about human nature is that people subconsciously acknowledge the value of tragedy. People need it, in fact, to shake themselves out of their personal doldrums. The nightly TV news is one giant gaper’s block if you think about it. We stare numbly at the TV as talking heads blather on about another shooting in a poor neighborhood in the city. We see the requisite crying mother and angry neighbor complaining that the cops never do anything and there are too many guns in the street. Yet we essentially drive on by. Other people’s problems barely occupy our consciousness. We are truly numb to their needs or their lives. For they are another race or gender. Another orientation. A being separate from humanity. Someone just on TV. The Other. Barely worth of a gaper’s block. We are comfortably numb. Zombies.

The supposed cure

zombie-driverReality can seem too complicated to consider, and that is why so many people enjoy fictional shows where zombies roam the streets shedding body parts and getting splatter shots in the head by people who really know how to handle their guns.

Of course that’s the same thing that’s happening on our real streets. There was even a case of a guy down in Florida somewhere trying to eat another person alive.

Zombies aren’t real, we tell ourselves. At least we think they’re fiction. But it seems like some people can’t really separate the two worlds, and hence the huge market for “reality” shows. Every one of them is a new form of gaper’s block, a glimpse into tragedy or prurient obsession that reveals…Southern idiocy. Hillbilly habits. Cops. Robbers. Child beauty pagaents.

All are roadside attractions. They offer nothing but curiosity and tragedy, and cure nothing.

Accommodation 

Yet when a motorist rolls up behind a living, breathing cyclist or runner making use of the side of the road to exercise, hardly a driver alive on this earth seems to want to slow down and separate “hazards” (the way we are taught to drive…) in order to accommodate another human being making legal use of the roadway.

We must suppose these selfish drivers do not consciously or subconsciously recognize the merit of legitimate exercise and equal rights of ownership constituted by those who use our public roads for recreation and transportation by bike or on foot. We are not behaving like proper zombies, you see. Being alive is frowned upon.

Instead a backlash has formed principally against cyclists who disobey traffic laws. That habit endangers motorists, cyclists and pedestrians alike. Valid points.

Who are the real zombies?

Screenshot_01But we’re also in need of a discussion about who the real zombies are on the roads. Because gaper’s blocks are raw evidence that the attention of many drivers is not on their intent, which is getting somewhere on time, but on finding distractions and entertainment while in the act of driving.

That might mean gaping at a roadside accident or it might mean sending a text, making cellphone calls, getting GPS readings, switching radio channels or scarfing an Egg McMuffin. These are all responses to appetites. People are like zombies feeding on human brains, only those brains are our own.

The zombie world 

See, it’s not cyclists disobeying traffic laws that are the real problem in society. It’s that society is so skewed toward motorized transportation that we’ve gutted even the need to pay attention to get where we’re going. Pretty soon we’re going to have vehicles that drive themselves, leaving us free to be road zombies as we drive to and from work or wherever else we’re going. But is that a good thing?

The question this raises is simple: If we don’t seem to need or choose to use our brains to function in tasks such as driving any more, why not turn them over to something useful, like zombie food, scientific research or watching endless hours of NFL games?

That last suggestion is a legitimate concern. If their current ad campaigns are any indication pro football apparently wants mindless devotees who think about nothing other than the sport. Live the football life. Play Fantasy Football.

Distracted drivers 

A worker laying down tarsnakes may be part of an elaborate conspiracy to turn America's roads into the flaming pit of hell.

A worker laying down tarsnakes 

But what it’s really all about is finding an obsession powerful enough to distract you from responsibility to others and caring about anything other than prurient fantasies of violence, speed and carnage. See the connections here? People that are conditioned to obsess about their own selfish interests and violent fantasies cannot possibly drive the roads with a concern for others unless, as gaper’s blocks prove, there is violence and carnage to be found there. Then it’s worth slowing down for a look. That’s the tarsnake of modern transportation.

Trick or treat

Against this stage of prurient obsessions and destructive tendencies we run and ride into a world where there is no guarantee that anyone is paying attention unless there is already a tragedy afoot, or one about to occur. It’s just like Trick or treat.

It makes you wonder whether our distracted, zombie-like population is now a mindless majority that would rather run us over and eat our brains. Whole segments of society who have willingly turned themselves into “dittoheads” and other anthemic devotees are hardly what enlightened leaders from Jesus to the Dalai Lama have envisioned for a better humanity.

Halloween every day

Instead it’s like very much like Halloween out there every day of the year, because the prospects of riding or running among distracted driver’s is pretty much a scary proposition. You obviously increase your odds of destruction by disobeying traffic laws, but the real problem is a world where zombies drive 2000 lb. vehicles. Isn’t that scary enough for you?

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No Stranger To Fiction

Posted on October 28, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

As I lay on the hospital operating table with my body held down with two straps and my arms extended to either side as if being readied for crucifixion, the thought occurred to me that the events leading up to the operation were surreal. A sliver. An infection in the finger. Now this.

So I did the thing I do best when faced with a piece of personal non-fiction. I made small talk. Asked what I did for a living I told the nurses working on me that I was a Writer. Then feeling the drugs kick in I was inspired to recite a poem. I remember saying two lines and then it was lights out.

I moved into a strange dream. All the runners at a race I was attending were dressed in strange costumes. Then I realized it was the Sycamore Pumpkinfest 10K. “Wait,” I told anyone that would listen. “I got 2nd in this race once. I ran 32:00. The guy in front of me cut the course.”

will closeI was stuck in what felt like a present fiction. I wanted to run but someone else was writing the script for the dream, so I could not. Perhaps you’ve felt like that before in your dreams.

It was much the same feeling as the character Harry Crick felt in the movie Stranger Than Fiction. Only in my dream the voice in my head was a form of deja vu and not predictive or present.

It is a tantalizing thing to dream about a place or situation you know so well. Your motivations transcend even your memories at times. People are strange when you’re a stranger. The Doors were most definitely right about that.

steimel 2Then I saw a scarecrow runner. His name was Jim Steimel. He grinned so hard it was hard to tell if he was the pre-or-post brain Scarecrow. There were other characters as well. Whole groups of people. They were all there to run and I was not. My strange operating room dream had landed me in limbo. So I kept on dreaming. halloween group

It’s like that when you’re dreaming or living in a fiction of your own creation. you begin to realize that Halloween is a valid commentary on reality.

And then I ran to the finish line to watch the first runners come in. The winner crosses the line and hardly anyone applauds.

The I awoke in the hospital bed. The doctors are gone and the room feels odd. A voice asks “How are you feeling?

“Like a winner,” I say. “I feel like a winner.’

“Well that’s good the nurse says. I heard you were reciting poetry in the operating room!’

“Yes,” I told her. “It goes like this. It’s a poem I wrote about a true story. About a waitress.”

“Although the saucer fit the dish

she turned too quickly, threw the cup

and watched in vain as coffee stained 

her shoes and left her morning drained,

“You’d never know,” she said to me

“I’ve been a waitress since thirteen.”

The nurse turned and looked at me.

“That’s a sad story, she told me. “I don’t like sad stories.”

And she left. My hand really hurt. But I didn’t dare hit the nurse button. She didn’t like sad stories. And what was mine if not that?

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Just what the doctor ordered: Giving a finger to the present

Posted on October 24, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

V marks the spot where the surgeon will open up the top of my finger. Notice the scars from flame-driven wart removal as a kid. I guess my left hand is jinxed.

V marks the spot where the surgeon will open up the top of my finger. Notice the scars from flame-driven wart removal as a kid. I guess my left hand is jinxed.

So, for three or four weeks now I’ve been messing around trying to get rid of an infection in my left hand middle finger that came from a sliver picked up while doing yard work. The finger has ballooned up and down over the past few weeks, at times so painful it was difficult even to tie my shoes.

Believe it or not, that level of pain and inconvenience is sufficient to cut down your will to work out. Yoga was out of the question as the pain seeped into the first joint of the palm and Down Dog would have resulted in Oh Crap That Hurts.

Riding through the pain

Cycling has been possible. Yet shifting was kind of tough because I rely on my left hand middle finger to shift into the big ring. Never really knew that before. Reminds me that during the Pumpkin Pie Ride I slipped a chain going downhill because I could not hold the shifter far enough to do a clean jump from little ring to big ring.

Just what the doctor ordered

I’ve done everything possible to fix the finger. Yet Just What the Doctor Ordered has not worked out so well. The swelling has been constant now for two weeks solid. Antibiotics did not work. Now they’ve given me stronger types and doses. The finger got feeling so much better last Sunday that I did all kinds of yard work. By Monday morning it looked like a sausage again. The doctors had warned me to rest it. I didn’t follow their orders to the letter.

What’s bugging me? 

I went to see an Infectious Disease doctor expecting to get a blood test to find out if my infection is a bacteria or a fungus but he shook his head and told me that would probably not show up at a level that small. So he called the Hand Surgery doctor and told him that surgery was the best route to figure out what the heck was going on.

Have I told you that the finger really hurts?

FingerIt’s not in my nature to complain if at all possible. But when you go to pee and it hurts so bad to touch the top of your finger with your pants that you want to skip the whole ordeal, it is time to do something.

Surgery is never a lot of fun. There’s all the prep and waiting. Tomorrow morning I can’t eat or drink a thing, which isn’t too bad. Used to that. But I also have to bathe with a special soap from head to toe, then brush my teeth with a new toothbrush and use a germ-killing mouthwash. All that prep keeps the infection rates down, the nurse told me.

50 Questions and Hot Nurses

She also asked my entire health history. It’s always weird playing that game, almost like something you’d do at a 7th grade party before getting to lock yourself in a dark closet to make out with a girl you really like, since you won the Truth or Dare prize.

No such luck. You don’t get to make out with nurses except in the Animaniacs cartoons or in porn movies. But I don’t think those ladies in the movies are actual nurses, do you? They wear white skirts, not scrubs. You get the picture.

nurseI have hugged a nurse once. Sort of by accident. During retina surgery way back in 1980 I hyperventilated at the sight of the big machine to which they were connecting me and woke up hugging the nurse around the waist telling her, “I love you!” I was hallucinating that she was my girlfriend at the time. She sat me back down in the chair with a stern face and said, “Now breathe!”

No chance, Buster

Tomorrow they’re knocking me out with anesthesia so none of it register in my memory. The surgeon will cut open my finger on top and bottom and clean out any gunk. He’s actually hoping to find a bit of “culprit” wood that slipped into my joint. That would make it clear why the finger is so damned irritated.

If not, they clean out any fluid and sew the thing back up.

Again, this is all four weeks into the process. Surgery is not the first option for the doctors or for me. But I made it through a complete reconstruction of a collarbone a little over a year ago. A finger may be smaller, but it’s pretty tender. I’m just praying for quick healing and no time off from work.

Back to work. And running. And riding. Swimming may have to wait. 

See, I love my job and the people I work with. You want to hold up your end of the bargain. Of course we all go through weird crap now and then. It’s part of living. But I guess with 2 weeks of stitches and recovery I won’t be starting a new swim program in November.

Whether I race as planned in the Pumpkinfest 10K in Sycamore this weekend remains to be seen. Will the hand hurt too much? Probably. But no worries. I finished as high as 2nd in that race years ago, so there’s nothing to prove.

I guess you could say that I’m giving a finger to the present. Life goes on, one bird at a time.

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The color of loyalty is purple

Posted on October 23, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

The purple LL Bean sweatshirt meets its possible green successor in my closet.

The purple LL Bean sweatshirt meets its possible green successor in my closet.

You probably have a favorite sweatshirt just like me. It has likely been in your closet for 5, 10 or even 20 years. Some sweatshirts seem to last forever while others collapse at the seams.

My most versatile and favorite sweatshirt is a purple fleece from LL Bean. When it was given to me for Christmas 20 years ago, I wasn’t keen on wearing it at first. My favorite brand at the time was Patagonia, and LL Bean had horned in on the activewear market by mimicking the styles created by the more innovative Patagonia lines.

Winning attitude 

However the LL Bean fleece top had several great features. It was light enough to wear running down to temperatures as low as 30 degrees. It was also thin enough to use as a layer under a windbreaker. Not many sweatshirts can actually make that claim. Most are too thin for an exterior layer or too thick to wear under anything. That means the weather conditions in which they are suitable to run in are fairly limited. A fall day of 47 degrees with a mild wind up to about a 56 degree spring day when it’s not raining. Otherwise, a sweatshirt is too bulky or thick to wear.

That’s why fleece was invented, to give you layers that don’t bunch up that much and can be layered for warmth and moisture wicking.

The LL Bean shirt fits those qualifications. And despite my guarded brand disgust as the thought of a copycat occupying my closet, the purple fleece “sweatshirt” became an integral part of my running and cycling wear over the years.

Miles of loyalty

We have seen a lot of things, that purple sweatshirt and I. Thousands of running miles in all kind of weather in spring and fall. It has never grown stinky or rank, the way some modern fabrics do if you let them line dry or make a mistake washing them. And speaking of drying: the purple sweatshirt has been soaked while still on my body and soon enough, with a little open air, got dry again so that I would not chafe or freeze.

The sleeves have also held up very well. Often the sleeves on a sweatshirt get stretched out if you push them up your arms when the day warms and your arms get hot. The next time you wear them the wrists are loose and the sweatshirt never feels the same again.

But not the purple sweatshirt. Its sleeves have rebounded from multiple cruel treatments and hundreds of washings. I am one thankful dude about such durability. One cannot appreciate how much a sweatshirt can bug you until the sleeves give out. Then you’re running and the wind blows up your arms or the floppiness ruins the zen of being outdoors. Flippy flappy floppy sweatshirts are not to my liking.

The purple sweatshirt is also unique in that it can be worn effectively while riding as well as running. Most cycling gear is too tight or spandexy to wear while running, while most running gear is too flappy to wear while riding. But there are garments that can cross over, and those are greatly appreciated for their utility.

Comely attractions

My purple companion has also favored me in the eyes of the opposite sex on occasion. Because it’s so comfortable, I’d often wear the purple sweatshirt to events like praise band rehearsal. One night one of the female singers turned to me and said, “I like your sweatshirt. It’s a good color on you.”

Middle-aged men do not often get compliments from beautiful young women in their 20s. Yes, I was happily married at the time and did not misconstrue the compliment for anything other than a pleasant nicety, but the compliment was great to receive just the same.

Stinky business

Sure, I’ve made the mistake of throwing on the sweatshirt when it had been worn running and was not yet washed. Suddenly you catch a waft of how you really smell and a flush of embarrassment washes over your face. “Damn,” you think to yourself. “I stink!”

So you surreptitiously shed the sweatshirt to a safe place and tough it out in just your tee shirt. Then you wash the purple beast one more time.

Wearing on

Finally after two decades of use the purple LL Bean sweatshirt is showing signs of dissolution. The cuffs of the sleeves are looser than they once were. That means the stretchy stuff inside is decomposing with age. Once that process is complete, the purple sweatshirt will have to be retired.

For now it commiserates with a bright green Nike running top that is perhaps the single most comfortable garment I have ever worn. It clings lightly to the skin, and has thumb holes so you can pull the sleeves down over the hands in cool weather.

It’s a winner. But it still has a long way to go before it surpasses the purple sweatshirt in sheer utility. If it were to make it two decades, I would most surely be pleased. And a bit older. But perhaps no less comfortable.

Philosophical clothing

Having seen important things come and go in my life, I have grown wise enough not to be overly sentimental about any material goods. Our lives change. Even our loved ones come and go from our lives, and some leave forever.

Which is why constancy is such an appreciated value in life. It may be the lone conservative thread in my otherwise liberal heart. But it pulls tight the garment of my soul, and keeps it close and strong.

One can only pray for such steadiness and hope in life. And pay attention when it comes around again. Because you never know how long a friendship or a love affair can last, even when it has a tinge of jealousy at the start.

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So tell me, what’s wrong with you. Part 2. Bronchitis. Yuck.

Posted on October 22, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

Somewhere in this picture the bronchial tubes are hiding so they won't be accused of making your life miserable.

Somewhere in this picture the bronchial tubes are hiding so they won’t be accused of making your life miserable.

Another reader named Jim L. shared a difficult challenge: How do you deal with bronchitis?

Here’s what he wrote in response to the original question:

Bronchitis sucks! It’s tough to ride a bike when you’re dealing with bronchitis all the time. Used to be a 2 or 3 week spell out of my riding season but last couple of years it’s been an on again, off again problem. Now I’ve always had allergies and have been doing shots for years (20+ or so), but even though they are doing better the bronchitis has decided to rear its ugly head more and more. Despite fighting it most of the year this year, I’ve been able to get in about 1,300 miles of riding. For some that’s not a lot but for me that’s a little on the low side but not bad, and definitely not where I’d like to be. So with the allergy shots, couple of inhalers, Zertec, Singular and some over the counter antihistamines (that the Doc says works with the mix) at age 61 I’d still like to get ready to be able some year do back to back centuries in a charity even I normally ride.

Dear Jim L.

You’re right. Bronchitis really sucks. But it also blows, have you noticed? Generally bronchitis is the result of extended symptoms first generated by the common cold. But not always. As you’ve noted, any significant irritation and ensuing weakness of the lung tissue can lead to bronchitis. Once irritated, the lungs and bronchial tubes seem to go into a sort of spasm mode, almost like a pulled muscle. And it hurts.

The phlegm and all that crap that goes with it is actually your body’s response to the irritation or response to the infection. The resultant inflammation can be a bitch to manage. See, there’s this thing we call breathing that you can’t avoid. And lots of things make it worse.

Pollutants can make bronchial irritations more acute. As can asthma, so you’ve noted. Then there’s the documented relationship between asthma and allergies. You’re starting to get the picture. Irritation of the lungs can be a really difficult and complex problem. Running and riding can make it even worse.

You might be interested to hear what WEB MD has to say about bronchitis:

Bronchitis is a respiratory disease in which the mucus membrane in the lungs‘ bronchial passages becomes inflamed. 

As the irritated membrane swells and grows thicker, it narrows or shuts off the tiny airways in the lungs, resulting in coughing spells that may be accompanied by phlegm and breathlessness.

The disease comes in two forms: acute (lasting from one to three weeks) and chronic (lasting at least 3 months of the year for two years in a row). 

Bronchitis: It’s a bitch

Jim, it sounds like you have a combo of acute and chronic bronchitis from how long it has lasted. That means you’re in a cycle of treatment followed by recurrence.

Here’s the bad news first. Those medications? I know they feel like they’re a good plan and necessary. But I personally have suspicions about how much good they do over the long term. The layered effect of medications is really hard to manage and sort out. But like Tom Waits once said, “I’d rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy.”

That holds pretty true for over-the-counter medications. If you take them you have side effects. If you don’t take them you get sicker. This is known as a devil’s bargain, in which you lose one way or another.

So sick it was sick

Your lungs on bronchitis.

Your lungs on bronchitis.

I once got bronchitis so bad from overtraining that it produced severe migraines along with an ice cold hacking in my chest. The doctor prescribed Tylenol with Codeine for the headaches and my arms went numb. So I went to the hospital and got an x-ray that day, and it showed a huge gas bubble in my guts but the doc just said, “Go home and rest, son. You’re sick and need rest.”

So I ignored his advice. That night, I stayed out past midnight with my brothers at a bar called Mother’s on Division Street in Chicago. The whisky seemed to clear things up and two days later I was back running again. That was a sick way to get better.

The real treatment. Sort of. 

The fact that you’ve been fighting allergies so long and that exercise seems to make your bronchitis worse shows that there is a likely relationship between your allergies (part 1) your asthma and inhalers (part 2) and your bronchitis (part 3). In other words, you’ve got a rolling set of symptoms that add up to chronic bronchitis.

Probably there is infection at work here too. Your tired little lungs are probably damaged from all that shit they’ve been through. So, is there a cure?

I once wrote online content for an interesting little company called AllergyAsthmatech. They sell a bunch of products to help you manage all types of breathing problems. I don’t have any commercial connection with them, but their products are interesting.

Case history

One of the problems I had with colds and bronchitis was forced air heating. The dry air always sucked out the moisture in my house and I got colds all the time. Now I live in a home with radiant heat and hardly ever get colds. Plus I take zinc tablets at the slightest hint of a cold. Preventing colds is the first step in combatting viral infections that take over your lungs.

But you might try a humidifier for starters. Like these.  If your environment indoors is too dry and your allergies flare up as a result, perhaps it’s not the world outside that’s killing you. It’s your house.

House_Dust_MiteThere are all kinds of possible other challenges like pet dander or dust mites that cause chronic allergies. Maybe you’ve checked all that out over the years but in case you haven’t, going “back to the source” of your allergies can sometimes eliminate the chronic aspect of your bronchitis afflictions.

It might seem nutso, but perhaps you need to put a barrier over your mouth while you ride. If you are susceptible to allergens, this allergy mask might save you some trouble. You’ll just have to get a radical helmet to go with it.

It seems like you need to go Back To the Future to get to the origins of your bronchitis before you can effectively treat it. Then adopt strategies for long term management. That may include continued medication, but some of the effectiveness might have worn off over the years.

I no longer take any cold medications because I was told by my doctor the antihistamines mess with the old prostate gland, shutting down the pee business. And that ain’t no fun.

But it’s been 20 years since I took any, so I don’t know if that’s still true. An issue for another day.

Good luck and I hope this helps you deconstruct your bronchial issues.

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So tell me, how do I fix what’s wrong with me? Part 1

Posted on October 21, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

Last Thursday I asked readers of this blog to tell me what vexes them in a piece titled “So tell me, what’s wrong with you.” If you’d like to submit your issue to We Run and Ride after reading this post, please do. We’ll crowdsource some replies and see if we can help.

My first three respondents are receiving a poster (as promised) that I designed…once I get their addresses.

Similar Issues

What we’d like to do from here is to “crowdsource” responses to each of their problems. Some of you may have had similar issues. Others may actually be physicians or others with experience dealing with the problems they express.

Like the Car Talk Guys

Behind the wheelI’m going to provide some baseline perspective on each issue. Mine is not a professional opinion other than my experience as a runner of 40 years and a cyclist for about a decade. I’ve also illustrated and helped edit a book on running biomechanics and worked in a running shop for a couple years. Our goal here is to provide a little consensus on the issue described and perhaps give our fellow reader enough information to re-approach their problem and perhaps find a cure. In the meantime, you can view my feedback much like Click and Clack on Car Talk. All advice is suspect until proven ridiculous. But if if works, who’s to complain?

Brenda Beason, an MBA who works in Real Estate for Weichart Hometown First in Florida. She responded through LinkedIn:

Brenda says:  I’m training for my first marathon and I trained up to 19 miles and got an injury to what I think is my IT Band and an MRI done only to find out I have a medial meniscus tear and in the posterior horn as well. No marathon for me. This IT band has been 2 months of agony ? Put a cortisone shot in there; however, at times it still hurts. Running aggravates it. I have been biking a little not wanting to over do anything but trying to get my physical fitness maintained. Just feeling frustrated. Biking is not the same if you are a runner but it’s something. I’m afraid the IT band issue will be chronic. I am wondering if there is a correlation between the tear and the IT band because it’s in the same leg.

We Run and Ride answers:

Brenda: It sounds like there are a few things going on at once. First, the injury sounds like it had time to build, so it likely wasn’t the result of a tear resulting from a ballistic motion as would be the case with a torn ACL. IT Band injuries are generally (and often) the result of a biomechanical problem either farther down the leg or up the side of the leg to hip drawing on muscular imbalances or weaknesses in the supporting tissues or main muscles attached to the IT band. In other words, you’re out of whack.

Opposites do not prove attractive

What you’re dealing with is a tension and weakness issue. Something strong is pulling or torquing your iliotibial (IT) out of optimal position, resulting in the stressed IT band and possibly also the meniscus tear inside your knee.

Those conditions can occur several ways. First, if you increase your mileage quickly the IT band is often forced to deal with fatigued or overstressed muscles. That can lead to stress or tightness from hip to toe. If you also have pronounced pronation in the foot of that leg or even the opposite leg, your body is trying to compensate all the time. The longer you run, the more you stress the outside of your leg. Same holds true for cyclists. If you “grind” early in the season on the big ring before your legs are accustomed to riding hard and long, you can develop serious knee problems. Progress is related to acceptable levels of increased stress. Injuries most often occur when we exceed our body’s capacity for adaptation to stress.

Weaknesses

I deal with weak hip flexors and have taken up yoga to help me strengthen those connective tissues, better align the pelvis and make up for 35 years of running without much stretching. I used to play a lot of sports like basketball and soccer, which greatly helped prevent injuries because it was great training for balance, etc.

Having torn my ACL twice, I can no longer do those sports, which means yoga is a great alternative. You are never in a position where you can’t control your actions. The stress you put on your body is by choice, not circumstance. That would be a great starting point for dealing with your IT band problems.

Meniscus tears

Shaved LegsA tear of the meniscus is a sign of something deeper in the joint that is out of line. Either you jolted your knee at some point causing a tear in the cartilage inside your knee or else it is worn down from constant bio-mechanical stress. Among women, that can occur because the angle of your upper leg from your hip is wider. That can result in an inward rotation of the leg from the hip. Sometimes you see this in gals whose legs flip out from the knee on one side or the other, or both.

If you have never had anyone assess your running form, now is the time. If you have been running a long time, the meniscus tear may be a warning sign that you need to address the biomechanics of your hips, knees and ankles. A good running shop can help you with this, because other than by video, it can’t be diagnosed.

I use a pedorthist, who confirmed I have a leg-length discrepancy. Okay, cut the jokes about the male anatomy for a minute and focus on the issue at hand, so to speak. What a varied leg length might mean is that my body is essentially twisted and tilted from 40,000 miles of running with slightly different length legs.

For anyone this is a problem, and issues like these can grind down the inside of your knee cartilage if you do not diagnose and address them. I suspect your meniscus tear is the result of both a high mileage increase and a bio-mechanical issue. Is may go away temporarily with rest and time, but if you don’t fix the problem it will likely come back, especially at marathon distances.

Rotating your tires

The best analogy is why you rotate your car tires. If you driving them forever in the same position, they develop wear patterns from making the same turns, etc. Rotate your tires and things become more balanced and the tires wear longer.

The human analogy is that you must increase your muscular balance and strength while determining if your bi0-mechanics are disrupting the health of your stride. If they are, you may need to consider orthotics in one or both feet.

Physical therapy is also  a great tool for rehabilitation of chronic injuries. A PT can usually do a few tests and see quite clearly where your problems start.

Dr. Cudworth may not be right

What do other readers think? That’s my take but it may not be right. What would you recommend for Brenda to fix both her IT band problem and torn meniscus? Stretching? Weight work? Surgery?

Please make your comments in the response below or send them to cudworthfix@gmail.com


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Now that would be scary. Running and riding through Halloween.

Posted on October 18, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

 

The line between reality and fantasy blurs when you're really tired.

The line between reality and fantasy blurs when you’re really tired.

I’m not much for the occult. Don’t believe in ghosts, zombies, goblins or the undead. It all seems fake to me. 

But if I did believe in all that, the world really would be a scary place.

Because let’s face it, those of us who run and ride can wind up in some pretty remote places. And then all kinds of things might happen.

Corn Zombies

On dank October days the mist often forms in the valleys in our county. Even with lights on the front of our bikes it can be hard to see, and be seen. That would be a perfect time for Corn Zombies to emerge from the fields, knock us off our bikes with one fell swipe of a rotting hand, and feast on our bodies. All the authorities would find by the highway would be shredded, bloody kits and the scattered remnants of PowerBars and water bottles emptied of Accelerade. Even Zombies get thirsty you know.

Soul Suckers

Or let’s say you are out running at night and decide to add on a few miles because you’re feeling good. But then about halfway into your extra miles something strange occurs and you begin to feel the energy drain from your body. Spinning around to look behind you, there is a shadowy shape creeping along the fenceline of the suburban neighborhood where you are running. Tired as you are, you try to pick up the pace, but the harder you try, the less your legs seem to cooperate. The shadowy shape suddenly soars over the fence and descends on your body. A Soul Sucker has caught up to you, and as it presses you to the ground you feel the last ounce of breath squeezed from your chest as the Soul Sucker plunges its murky hand in to grab your heart from its bloody, beating spot between the lungs. And that is how the police find you the next morning. Nothing but a black, charred hole where your soul and heart once rested. Not wanting to upset the public, the official Death Notice reads: Ran his heart out. At that news, you become the Poster Child for the local high school cross country team.

Workout Vampires

Triathletes are at special risk when Halloween comes around. Off season training often involves considerable time indoors swimming, running on the treadmill and doing Computrainer workouts in the vain hope to keep that slim summer shape you worked hard to attain. As the days go by, you sense a presence at the gym and then one morning you enter the locker room to come face to face with a Workout Vampire. The androgynous figure stands naked before you, fangs exposed, before sinking its shining teeth into the base of your neck. A hot flash of excitement and adrenaline surges through your body as the Workout Vampire sucks the precious blood from your veins. You can remember feeling like this somewhere around the 16 mile point of the marathon in your last Ironman, so you fight through the feelings of fatigue and exhaustion. But it’s no use. The Workout Vampire has drained every ounce of blood from your body and left you naked and withered on the locker room floor. Still, you want to finish your workout as all triathletes do. So you climb onto the treadmill for another four miles even though you are officially, legally and spiritually dead. But Strava doesn’t register your effort because you don’t give off enough heat to count as a human being.

Yes, Halloween be a scary time for all of us who work out this time of year. And while we don’t all go for the spooky stuff or believe in werewolves, it’s good to be careful out there. Staying in shape is hard enough without fighting the undead and the macabre.

But most of all, watch out for tarsnakes. They don’t care what season it is. And they’re always after you.WeRunandRideLogo

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So tell me, what’s wrong with you?

Posted on October 17, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

So tell me, what’s wrong with you?

People who run and ride often get injured.

depositphotos_3461043-Bicycle-chainSome of those injuries turn chronic. Nagging. Difficult to cure.

And you don’t know what to do.

So tell me, what’s wrong with you?

Write in a Word document, 150 words or less, and then copy and post in the comments section below. If it won’t let you do that, send it to cudworthfix@gmail.com.

This is your chance, in 150 words or so, to get it out there.

Perhaps you have a nagging biomechanical flaw that holds your training back.

Write it down and send it in.

Or, your stomach fights you whenever you attempt a fast race.

Perhaps your feet always blister, or your bike shorts rub you the wrong way.

We’re here to listen. And to respond.

Most people don’t want to listen to your problems. But we do. And perhaps we’ll be able to crowdsource a solution. Or two. And wouldn’t that be fun?

Tell us your problem(s). You can keep them confidential if you like.

But let it all out. You can’t bring them up at a cocktail party because people’s eyes glaze over and they make an excuse to get more food. But we’re ready to listen at WeRunandRide.

Tell your friends too. Let’s all play true confessions. Cause it feels good to complain.

At We Run and Ride, we’re here to listen. Get that nagging problem off your chest.

It could be mental. Physical. Medical. Quizzical.

We’ll publish your feedback, anonymously if you choose.. So share your fitness challenges and hear about the challenges faced by others. This should be fun.

It should also be cathartic. And perhaps your problems won’t seem so bad when you share them and hear about the problems faced by others who run and ride and swim.

You just might get answers to what’s wrong with you. The readers of this blog and the discussions it engenders might be the way you get past your worst problems–the tarsnakes of your training and racing– when you run and ride.

I’ll start off the series tomorrow and let you mull it over the weekend. Remember to post your problems to the comments section below or send them to cudworthfix@gmail.com

Let ‘er rip.

So, what’s wrong with you?

The first three chosen respondents will receive a free signed RUNNING poster by Christopher L. Cudworth. 

Retail value $20. Available for purchase. $22.50 with shipping and handling.

Retail value $20. Available for purchase. $22.50 with shipping and handling.

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The tarsnake of a runaway infection

Posted on October 16, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

photo (1) copy 2Following a 40-mile bike ride on a beautiful fall morning, it was a pleasure to get out in the back yard to do some late summer weeding and cleanup. The garden was cleared of extra weeds by my sister-in-law and daughter. Large piles of plant stalks were gathered in heaps. Others were stuck into buckets filled with rainwater.

For the first 20 minutes I wore gloves to stuff the plants into recycling bags. Then I took the gloves off to answer a call on my cell phone and went back to work. At that moment I felt the familiar prick of a sliver in the middle finger of my left hand. Pulling my hand back reflexively, I noticed the sliver and went inside to yank it out with some tweezers. My hands were wet from the dingy water at the bottom of the weeding bucket. I washed them up and put the gloves back on to go outside to work again.

Red alert

That was a mistake. That spot where the sliver went in never healed up properly. It got red and I could not find the Neosporin right away. Turned out I had put it in the car for a Labor Day camping trip, but forgot about that.

By the time I did put Neosporin and a bandage on the sore finger things were feeling weird in there. A hard spot formed on the seam of the underside of the knuckle. The redness continued. It went on that way for two weeks.

It is interesting in a world where we work so hard to keep fit and be well that we can be neglectful when it really counts. After two weeks the finger started to swell and I regretted not cleaning it better that day. I could ride and run just fine for those two weeks, but was feeling a bit sluggish some days. It was apparent my body was fighting something. The infection probably.

Don’t mess with nature

I’d seen firsthand that you couldn’t take even small infections for granted. Years ago during a camping trip something got under the skin of my forehead and the doctor had to cut an incision and clear it up. Whatever it was, he never told me. Might have been an infection, or a worm for all I knew.

You should not mess with nature. It’s full of all kinds of nasty bugs. If you let them get past your defenses, things can get wicked bad. A nurse that I knew went to Mexico three years ago. Wanting to treat herself to a pedicure on vacation, she went to a local shop and was pleased with the result. But by the time she got home she was so sick that her body went septic and she died. From a pedicure.

Convenient Care

So I wasn’t about to piss around with a finger that was getting worse each day. That called for a visit to Convenient Care at a facility near my office. They x-rayed the finger to see if something was left inside, and then sent me to a hand specialist.

HandThe hand specialist took a look and ranked the problem a “1 or a 2” in terms of problems he’d seen over the years. “But it’s good not to mess around. We’ll put you on antibiotics and see if it helps. If it’s a bacterial infection, that will take care of it. If it’s a fungal infection, we might have to try something else.”

A thorny problem

It turns out that fungal infections often come from rose thorns. Apparently something on those thorns can get into your system and mess you up bad. A friend down the block from my house works as a greens keeper for a country club. He got a thorn in the palm of his hand and it required surgery and heavy meds to clear it up. I saw him while walking the dog the other night and told him about my finger. He flipped his hand over to show me the scar on his upper palm, right where the pain and welling on my hand is most acute.

Painful history

Injuries like this make me think back to other health challenges and injuries during my running and riding career. The answers aren’t always simple and the cures aren’t always quick.

In college the entire team developed Achilles problems after a poorly planned workout on a cambered road. I went to the school nurse who prescribed anti-inflammatories. I wandered around campus in a drugged state for three days before our coach took us up to Mayo Clinic. The doctor took one look at the pills I’d been prescribed and told me. “This is how much they give horses.”

So it’s important to get checked, and get checked again.

Scratches

I’ve got plans to run a 10K and start in mountain biking this fall. But if the hand requires surgery those plans could turn out to be impractical.

I’m no germophobe, but that’s the tarsnake of combatting infectious disease in this world. You have to strike a balance between being too clean, which can lower your natural resistance to germs and other bugs, and assuming you’ll be okay if you just wash it off with water and keep working. In that case, the bugs can and will get you. I’m learning that lesson the hard way.

It might pay to be a little smarter next time with the whole hand-washing thing, and a little medicine. The lesson here is that you don’t want infection to run away with you.

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