We Run and Ride

Running and riding to the beach

Posted on July 12, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

In my very early 20s, I was offered a chance to have a free week on Assateague Island if I drove a family’s car down from Illinois to their cabin on the shore.

Problem was, the car was a Toyota Supra with a stick. And I didn’t know how to drive a stick. Not very well anyway.

Stalwart

So it was strange that they let me leave their house with my bag full of running clothes and other crap stuffed into their car… when I could barely back the damn thing down the driveway. I stalled it again on the road in front of their house. But they stood in the driveway and waved just the same. They must have figured I’d figure it out.

Things went pretty well until the first toll booth on the Illinois expressway. Coming into the toll booth hot at about 45 miles an hour, I accidentally shifted from 5^th gear to 1^st. The engine whined and the transmission groaned, but it definitely slowed the car down.

Arriving at a stop in Pittsburgh provided no relief. That hilly damn down was tough to negotiate with a stick shift and little skill to operate it. Luckily I put on every parking brake I could find, or else the car likely would have rolled all the way to the Monongahela. As it was, a few years later my own stick shift car rolled down a hill and hit a tree. Some lessons once learned can be lost.

The pits

In Pittsburgh I went for a run in the hot June air and the pollution counts were high. The hills were also fearsome bad, steep and unforgiving. I arrived back at the house where my prim and proper aunt from Birmingham stood waiting while I walked up the drive of her Pittsburgh home (thanks to a transfer with US Steel) with sweat soaking my entire body and me smelling like the bad food I’d eaten the day before while on the road. She politely turned her Southern head and ignored the stench as I headed for the shower.

Hayseeds

Our particular branch of the family on my father’s side was the seediest of the bunch. With four brothers and a harried mother we were always sweaty and stinking from playing one sport or another. I knew this was our heritage and tried to keep my clothes organized in the room where I was staying. But somehow they always seemed to escape. My running shoes stank like an unwashed recycling bin and my shorts hung on the chair like a rag full of disease. I felt guilty scooping up all that the next morning and tossing it in the car.

My gracious aunt was sweet and forgiving, giving me a big hug. I did not understand that the child of a brother or sister is nearly as dear as your own even (or especially) if you only see them every 5 years. It’s still a tangible connection. So I hugged her back, best I could.

Rolling southward

The drive across Pennsylvania and into Delaware was uneventful, but rain started up in southern Delaware just as I was headed onto the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel. If you’ve never driven that stretch of terrifying highway it is a combination of underground tunnel below the bay waters and a bridge that pops up over the ocean a couple hundred feet. Or so it seemed.

The rain pounded the car and puddles gathered on the low spots. Suddenly the car began to hydroplane. I steered into the swerve and got control, but barely, and the Toyota Supra was going slowly enough by then that 5^th gear felt like the engine was made of clay. Frantically I downshifted and found some common ground between the car and the road at the same time. Traffic was swinging up from behind and it was scary to be sitting broadside on a blank road far above the gray bay waters.

The approaching cars did not even slow. They just tore by shedding rain sheets as they went. The Toyota groped its way back into gear and we proceeded on.

Slowly. I didn’t drive over 45 the rest of the way across the bridge.

Arriving in Assateague after running the guauntlet of towns named Thiskill and Thatkill, I wondered if everything down the seaboard really needed to be named “kill,” or was it just my imagination?

Welcome home

When I arrived the skies had cleared and the ocean at Assateague was bright and blue and bold. Brilliant waves broke on the shore and I shed my shoes in the parking lot and ran down to dive into the surf, throwing my shirt off along the way. It was like a homecoming. The salty ocean. The smell of sea breeze. Gulls floating overhead. Willets calling from the angled beaches, shining from the arrival and departure of wave after wave. I sat on the edge and let the clear water wash up and over me.

I didn’t have a girlfriend at the time, but wished I did. The surf and shore are meant to be shared by someone else whose skin shines in the sun. That you can touch. Watching the other couples playing in the surf made me feel lonely and sad. So I cleaned up and drove off to find the house where I’d be staying.

Blackbeard’s Ghost

The house was tucked into a pine woods on the edge of an inlet. That night another major rainstorm blew in from the ocean and I should have known better, but was reading a scary book about Blackbeard the Pirate, who used to hang out around Assateague and waltzed about with lit candles in his hair and beard, if I recall correctly.

About the moment the book describe his fellow pirates burying him up to his neck in sand as the tide came in, a windblown pine branch slammed against the window and I jumped clear off the couch. I thought Blackbeard’s Ghost had come to revenge his drowning death.

Still Life with Cowgirls. Or even woodpeckers get the blues.

So I switched attention to another book, this one by Tom Robbins, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues. It was a sexually provocative book, just like the Robbins book I’d read the previous summer, Still Life with Woodpecker.

I read Cowgirls in a hammock. On the beach. Sitting in the car outside a restaurant. It was a book about traveling, and hitchhiking, and a girl with big thumbs who was really good at hitchhiking. Who got laid a lot. I wished she was real.

The naked shore

The next morning was a great day for running with a big breeze coming off the ocean to keep things cool, and the beach curled away miles to the north. So I set off running and let the minutes roll away. 10. 20. 30. 40 minutes I ran along the hard ocean edge. Then I slowed to a jog and peeled off a shirt. Then shorts. Then shoes. And went swimming naked in the surf.

Paddling around the big waves was liberating and fun. My legs weren’t yet tired from running because I was in 32:00 10K shape and there were days it felt like I could run forever.

Crawling out of the surf, I looked up to see a young couple naked by the shore. Perhaps they’d been camping in the woods and came down for a swim. Not wanted to intrude, I sat down with my butt cheeks sinking into to the hot sand and watched them through the haze of gathering heat. Her bright white breasts shone like seashells, and his butt cheeks looked the same.

“This is the way it should be,” I said aloud.

New inspirations

I still believe that. And we should engage in such fresh freedoms at any age. Take your bike if you like. Go ride hills and get lost. Stare into the haze over the ocean until something genuine appears. Listen to the gulls. Then you’re not so lonely after all. Everything has a purpose if you listen carefully enough. Everything comes to you if you let it.

I spent the rest of the week on similar runs, and birdwatching and sunbathing and generally avoiding reality. Even Cowgirls Get the Blues was all the company one needed. Tom Robbins knows his way around a vacation.

Surfer dude and blueberry daquiris

Then I met a surfer dude who lived with two other languid women in a beachside pole house and got drunk with them on blueberry daiquiris till 4 in the morning. The next morning I was scheduled to fly from Assateague to Charleston, SC in a Piper Aztec to catch a commercial flight home. The pilot flying the Piper Aztec at 6 a.m. wryly said, “I hope we have enough runway.” The when we took off and just before we rose from the ground you could hear the sand on the tires.

I didn’t have my contacts in. Just trusted what he was doing. And I was drunk. And free. And young. And stupid. But it was a tremendous flight even though I wanted to throw up the entire first hour. Blueberry daiquiris will do that to you.

Bringing home a tan and a bunch of sand in your shorts pockets is a pleasure at any age. Not having to drive the Toyota Supra home was also, really good.

There’s still a lot of summer left, people.

May you find a good book, a few good runs or rides and maybe get a little sand in your shorts. But only if you’re running back from the beach.

Sand in your shorts and cycling lube do not go together. Trust me on that one.

Posted in We Run and Ride Every Day | Tagged assateague island, assateague national lakeshore, Assateague virginia, chincoteague, Christopher Cudworth, monongahela, pittsburgh, toyota supra, toyota supra stick, Virginia, we run and ride | Leave a comment

Share the Road. Who, me?

Posted on July 11, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

Share the Road comes with a dose of smarts on the part of cyclists.

I have an ugly little confession to make. No, it’s not that I look dopey in this picture.

It’s that I hate sharing the road with some kinds of cyclists as much as you do.

C’mon, admit it. Even if you’re a cyclist or a runner, sharing the road is a total pain in the ass. Especially if those with whom you are sharing the road have no clue how to do it. And those people are plentiful.

Transitions

We’re in a huge societal transition, it seems. Bicycles are demanding more of the road but people aren’t ready or willing to give it. In some cases, they aren’t able. They suck as car drivers, frankly. They don’t know the first thing about separating hazards so they blast on through hoping they don’t hit anything, and that nothing hits them.

Just 2 weeks ago a cyclist very near my home was struck from behind by a driver who flat out did not see the rider. They were in a line of cars, the first of which got around the rider, but the last car ran smack into the back wheel of the cyclist. Who was wearing headphones. And no helmet. He was declared dead on arrival at a local hospital.

The driver got a ticket for failure to slow speed in order to avoid an accident. Not really much of an incentive to change a bad habit of driving like a pig, now is it? That’s the tarsnake of our current road laws. There’s not much penalty for running down cyclists.

But you have to question what that cyclist was doing too.

Algebra finally makes sense

So we’re almost almost stuck in some sort of wordplay algebra test in which segments of society are heading toward each other at different speeds and it’s up to us to figure out whether they can avoid killing one another. Cars simply don’t want to slow down for anyone. Cyclists simply want the right to go their own speed.

That’s really not much of a formula for Share the Road. Not if we’re honest about it.

But I keep thinking of the example set by an entire fleet of commercial gravel trucks that rolls back and forth on one of the main roads used by cyclists west of our tri-city region. I’ve mentioned them before. These trucks never fail to separate hazards and be kind to cyclists. Ever. I have been passed or approached by dozens of these trucks over the last 8 years and they are unfailingly polite. They weigh tons and tons and yet they can control their vehicle without pause.

Yet a pickup or minivan or sedan can’t handle a cyclist on the road? We can’t buy that. Can’t settle for the poor excuse that someone else “owns the road” either. Because little kids don’t pay taxes.

The cycling factors

The real answer to all this lies with the cyclists themselves. The education of people who ride on the road is proceeding too slowly to keep pace with the number of riders on the road.

That means many lousy riders are making it bad for everyone else. And we must always account for those who have no intention of getting better on the road. Who are oblivious to all else in life, and riding a bike is no different. Unfortunately that might be 50% of the population if the math holds true from other crucial tests in life.

Unholy thinking

For example, some 50% of Americans interpret the Bible literally even though Jesus by example and the Gospel itself tells us not to do that.

The same group seems to refuses to believe in evolution.

And the value of good government.

Or government at all.

This is called cognitive dissonance.

And unfortunately, thanks to the liberty inherent to our nation, it all adds up to stupidity, motorized or not, set loose on the road.

Even Forrest Gump knew how to put one foot in front of the other. If he’d found a bike he’d have gone even farther afield.

Because, as Mark Twain once said, “All you need is ignorance and confidence, then success is sure.”

Explains a lot

I may have looked stupid but even in my early commuting days, I paid attention to traffic.

When I come up behind a group of apparently clueless, aimless riders I get as frustrated as the next person. Generally I ask aloud, “WTF?” and then creep around the rider who sits farthest out on the road. It’s a pain. And I can only imagine how people feel that do not like cyclists as a rule of existence. Road Rage is common. Share the road? Fuck that, they say. And then gun their engines as they tear buy.

It is a strange thing to believe in sharing the road and then encounter cyclists who make it impossible to do so. Should I lean out the window and give instructions on the right way to ride? Then I’m just another screaming guy in the car…Or stop the vehicle and wait for them to arrive, flag them down and give a few hints. Then I’m just a weird zealot.

Nope, the only way to instruct other riders is while you’re on the bike yourself. Everything else looks crazy and dangerous to other riders.

Hope for cyclists

There are many cyclists who really do seem to get what it means to Share the Road. They queue up into single file when a car approaches from behind. Or, if they are in a large group, they form a double line of riders that is predictable, confined and passable.

This all happened before, you know. 40 years ago when the Running Boom hit there were drivers who absolutely hated runners. They’d run you off the road. Throw things at you. Scream obscenities about your Mother.

But all that changed with time, and the runners doing stupid things on the road either died or disappeared. Now there’s very few runners you see doing stupid things. Evolution and cultural pressure has worked its magic.

The same thing will happen with bicycles soon enough. It’s too bad people have to die in the process. About 700 of them a year at the current rate in America. Land of the free and Home of the brave. But you’re not quite free to go where you want on your bike, if you’re smart enough to know that. So for know you’d best be a little brave. Instead.

But bravery doesn’t mean stupid. It takes smarts to ride a bike properly.

Posted in Tarsnakes, We Run and Ride Every Day | Tagged 3 feet of passage, 3 feet program, biblical literalism, Bicycling, Christopher Cudworth, cognitive dissonance, cultural pressure, cycling, cycling group ride, cycling safety, cyclist, cyclists share the road, evolution, large group of cyclists, mother, runners, running boom, Share the Road, sharing the road, tarsnake, tarsnakes, transitions | Leave a comment

Thinking on your bare feet

Posted on July 10, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

Of course we know there is a whole movement toward barefoot running, about which some of us are completely convinced and others, completely equivocal.

One has reason to ruminate on such subjects while walking barefoot with the dog on on a Tuesday morning in July. The asphalt was rough and my feet tender. And what should provide relief but a long strip of tarsnake? The smooth black strip of rubberized tar was the exact width of my foot. It was cool to the touch. The heat of the day had not yet reached its surface. Later on it might become the hottest portion of the road.

Tarsnake yin and yang

Was the original yin and yang actually a tarsnake?

I’ve written plenty about tarsnakes, and how they symbolize the yin and yang of life on the road. Here was an illustration of that principle, unexpected and pleasurable all at once.

When the dog kept walking and the tarsnake ran out, it was back to mincing on the asphalt. How and why would anyone really want to run on the road in bare feet? I confess to not buying in, all the way, to that notion.

Barefoot running is great. On the grass. I need to do that for a couple of reasons. My calves are stiff and short all the way from the knee to the Achilles. Not good. And my arches are spoiled from years of shoes and the addition of orthotics. I am totally dependent upon orthotics to run or my calves are tense and my knees ache. It’s all about biomechanics, of course. But also genetics. Both age and years of consistent running have made it more important than ever to focus on strength as well as endurance. The two naturally go together, people.

Cure rates

Now I know from having gone through physical therapy for a torn ACL that many of our biomechanical flaws can be cured. So there’s a part of me that retains a notion that even a pronation problem in both my right and left foot might be conquerable.

But if not, they can at least be remediated by paying attention to strength training and the resultant stretching that comes with exercising formerly weak body parts into workable shape.

The Big P’s

I’ve seen it happen with chondromalacia in my left knee. The PT cured that. And soreness in my hips? Strength work cured that too. I’ve been adding miles again, with intelligent and gradual increases, and regaining confidence. It’s about strength, not age. It’s about Personality too. Persistence. Perseverance. Perspective. Hell, through a few more “P’s” in there if you like. You get the Point.

So are people who run barefoot more persistent, perseverant and full of perspective than the rest of us? That’s a tarsnake type of question for all of us.

The anachronism of barefoot running also happens to be the most progressive thing to come down the pike in a while. No shoes? Barefoot running? Minimalism? That goes against everything the running industry has thrown at us for 35 years. I speak from experience. At one point I wore a pair of running shoes so thick they could have served as O-rings on the NASA space shuttle, and they could have used that a couple flights, as we all recall.

So it was weird, using fat shoes to make yourself skinny.

Retro toesies

But looking back, there’s really nothing new under the sun about barefoot running. A couple few decades ago we ran barefoot in college. Some of us even raced 4 mile cross country races barefoot. That seemed like a good idea until the acorn cast on the upper campus turned us all into ridiculous Dancing Bears. Hurt like hell. Turns out shoes are good for something after all.

Yet we still sensed barefoot running was good for us. Sprinting up and down the football field at twilight was both a mechanically wise and immensely pleasurable thing to do.

We were ahead of our time in being behind the times.

So it comes down to personality–and the providential gift of decent biomechanics—that make this barefoot running thing practical at all. Some people can hack it because they have good enough foot and leg structure to make it possible. They’re the fortunate ones if aiming to run, or even walk, barefoot.

Others approach the change so determinedly that nothing will stop them from running barefoot. Not heat. Not rain. Not snow. Not even bowed legs or chronic toe jam. But we all know toe jam doesn’t grow on a rolling set of bare toes.

As for little old me, walking the dog barefoot and using tarsnakes to quell the pain is about as far as I’m willing to go on the asphalt. On the grass, I’m going to add some sprints after runs to loosen up these calves of mine. And be a kid for while.

Posted in Tarsnakes, We Run and Ride Every Day | Tagged ACL tear, barefoot running, biomechanical flaws, biomechanics, grass running, minimalism, perseverance, persistence, tarsnakes, torn ACL, we run and ride | 3 Comments

The Tour de France proceeds on a flawed premise

Posted on July 8, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

In its 100^th year, the Tour de France has much to celebrate. A storied history. Literal ups and downs. Even reinventing itself after years away due to World War II. It wouldn’t do to have Hitler using Messerschmitts to strafe cyclists on the Alpe du Huez, now would it?

Yet for all its transcendence and glory, the Tour de France is still capable of massive flaws and blunt ignorance in its planning and execution.

We saw that in the first stage when one of the team buses from Orica-Greenedge got jammed under the finish line structure, puncturing its air conditioning and stopping the bus in its tracks. Around the world viewers must have been thinking of that childhood riddle in which a truck gets stuck under a bridge. Well, the way to get it out is by letting air out of the tires, right?

Who knows how the bus was finally backed out. No one really explained that to the public during the Tour broadcast. But in the time that organizers spent trying to extricate the mess they had created by creating a finish line structure that was too low for a tour bus to get through, they proceeded to announce that the finish line would be staged at the 3 kilometer mark, a spot in the stage run-in where there were video cameras to record the finish.

There was just one problem with the 3K site. It emptied into a roundabout where the road split.

Fortunately the Tour organizers got the bus backed out and removed from the course. The poor bus driver looked exasperated, sad and fearful all at once. One moment he’d been doing his job and the next minute he was the laughingstock of the ESPN Sportscenter Top 10.

It wasn’t his fault. The bus accident had nothing to do with any of the culpability of the Orica-Greenedge organization. It was the fault of the Tour that the bus got stuck. Thus it was the fault of the Tour that the race finish line got moved back, then moved forward to the finish again. Meanwhile the peloton raced home from 10K out, which is minutes from the finish at the speed of professional bike racing.

And then, a crash. Many riders went down, but one in particular took a hard fall. American Ted King got busted up badly. He rode home in pain and then rode the next few days in pain. This is how the Velo web site described the situation.

American Ted King has been time cut from his Tour de France debut. King struggled in Tuesday’s stage 4 team time trial in Nice, three days after separating his left shoulder in a crash on the opening day of the race.

He fell behind his teammates in the first kilometer of the 25-kilometer ride through Nice and rode bravely on his own through excruciating pain. According to official time, King missed the 25-percent time limit by just seven seconds.

The race jury took no pity on King.

Race officials confirmed King’s time at 32:32.60, and Cannondale officials said they were informed he missed the time cut by just seven seconds.

The results sheet said it all: “HD, hors delai.”

Cannondale officials said they could not believe that the jury would disqualify the injured American. They challenged the decision in person and later by telephone, but were stonewalled.

“They didn’t want to listen to our explanation. Ted was racing with a shoulder injury, and he raced with a road bike. He was very brave. He did not stop fighting. Those are the qualities of cycling, yet they did not want to change their minds,” said Cannondale spokesman Paolo Barbieri. “It is Ted’s dream to race the Tour. We cannot believe it.”

No mea culpa

In other words, the Tour accepted no culpability for their botched behavior and lack of planning on the first day of the Tour. Race announcers Phil Liggett and Paul Sherwin flatly but empathetically stated that “this is the toughest bike race in the world…and it’s not fair…but this is the Tour de France.”

They also noted that other riders injured in the first stage crash had ridden with their teams and qualified.

Here’s the really ugly part of this story. The Tour apparently fined the Orica-Greenedge organization for hitting the finish stanchion in the first place.

That’s idiotic. Was there some sort of memo sent out stating that your bus could not exceed a certain height? If Orica-Greenedge had ignored such instructions they might deserve a fine. But that’s not the story. Here’s how it happened according to the UK Telegraph website:

Garikoitz “Gary” Atxa found himself back behind the wheel yesterday, while ruefully contemplating his tragi-comic role as the bus driver who wrought havoc on his first day at work at the Tour de France.

“I’m feeling terrible,” shrugged the Basque. “This was my first day driving the bus so it wasn’t a good start. What else can I say but ‘I’m sorry’? I just hope my team have faith in me.”

They do. Atxa’s Orica Greenedge employers quickly rallied around their man, even paying a 2,000 Swiss francs fine to the International Cycling Union because Atxa’s bus missed the deadline for getting to the finish.

“I was a bit late but I followed the instructions that were given to me,” he explained. “I saw the gantry was a bit low but they said ‘Avance! Avance!’ Others had passed through so I did the same, it was just bad luck that the finish had been lowered.”

It was not just “bad luck.” It was the fault of the Tour de France that they did not check the height of all the team buses, or issue a warning during the race that the finish stanchions had indeed been lowered. In other words, the Tour organizers fucked up. Not Orica-Greenedge or its driver.

Tour crashes

One could argue that bicycle crashes happen all the time in the Tour, and that the bus accident and the crash, along with the ensuing injury to Ted King, were not really related.

Which supports the decision of the Tour officials to eliminate Ted King over his failure to stick with the team during the Team Time Trial.

Decisions like this occur all the time in the business world, of course. As the case brought to trial by the work of Erin Brockovich proved, it’s pretty damned hard to pin a rash of cancer cases on the actions of a particular company dumping pollutants into the groundwater. Even when the facts all point to one cause of action, there are a thousand ways to wiggle out of responsibility thanks to the legal system and how it works. All you have to raise is the probability of doubt and it’s enough to sway a jury, or a judge.

It’s not the law

But let’s get real. The event that led to the crashout of Ted King are related in one crucial fashion. While the bus was stuck under the stanchion, the Tour organizers dispensed conflicting directions to the participants. Sure it was by necessity, but who’s at fault? The riders? Hardly.

The riders essentially forgave the Tour their blundering ways while riding their way into an apparently chaotic finish on the first stage. They could have talked among themselves and pulled the whole peloton to a halt, right then and there. Riders have done it before, when stage conditions proved too insane, or course logistics are deemed too dangerous to safely compete by the riders.

Carry on

But the riders show class despite the high risks of the situation. They completed the race despite the flawed premise presented by finishing under such strange circumstances. Sure, the Tour is not much more than controlled chaos every day. But when buses get stuck and the entire enterprise is compromised, then some sort of consideration should be given to those who might have been victimized by the mistakes at the finish line.

As it stands, Ted King was eliminated from the race for missing the 25% “less than the best” rule on the Team Time Trial.

King was interviewed and for 30 full seconds was speechless at the prospect of being eliminated. He had no words. All the work he’d put in leading up to this, his first Tour, was to no avail.

Later Jens Voigt recalled being eliminated one year under different circumstances, and he’s gone on to great Tour glory and respect, even finished 3^rd one year.

As a result, for this viewer the Tour is rolling on with a false premise: that the Tour is far greater than the individuals who pursue it. I personally don’t buy that argument in one key respect. The Tour is human too. It proved that on the finish of Stage One when that bus wedged under the finish line.

But the Tour organizers were unforgiving toward Ted King. They may have the legal right to do as they please, but morally, they fell short of an important standard. They were giving forgiveness, and had none to offer when they were placed in a similar situation.

A certain Bible passage comes to mind, Matthew 18.

The kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his slaves. 24 As he began settling his accounts, a man who owed ten thousand talents was brought to him. 25 Because he was not able to repay it, the lord ordered him to be sold, along with his wife, children, and whatever he possessed, and repayment to be made. 26 Then the slave threw himself to the ground before him, saying, ‘Be patient with me, and I will repay you everything.’ 27 The lord had compassion on that slave and released him, and forgave him the debt. 28 After he went out, that same slave found one of his fellow slaves who owed him one hundred silver coins. So he grabbed him by the throat and started to choke him, saying, ‘Pay back what you owe me!’ 29Then his fellow slave threw himself down and begged him, ‘Be patient with me, and I will repay you.’ 30 But he refused. Instead, he went out and threw him in prison until he repaid the debt. 31When his fellow slaves saw what had happened, they were very upset and went and told their lord everything that had taken place. 32 Then his lord called the first slave and said to him, ‘Evil slave! I forgave you all that debt because you begged me! 33 Should you not have shown mercy to your fellow slave, just as I showed it to you?’

Posted in We Run and Ride Every Day | Tagged Matthew 18, Orica-Greenedge, professional cycling, Ted King, Tour de France, Tour de France bus crash, Tour de France bus stuck | Leave a comment

Wondering about the Wonderlic

Posted on July 5, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

Anyone who has ever taken the Wonderlic test knows that it is a supposed measure of your general cognitive ability. And having taken it myself, and wondered quietly to myself why I still don’t “get” math under any circumstance, I am a believer of sorts not only in the Wonderlic, but a few other tests taken over the years. It’s been astounding to see how well some of these things work in assessing who you are, and what you do, and what you can or can’t do well. Yet still I wonder about the wonders of the Wonderlic. Perhaps it’s the journalist in me, but I see flaws in relying on tests to judge the human character. The real answers are ultimately found in others ways.

Checking in and checking out

The Wonderlic test is quite popular as a qualifying tool for new employees, team building and sundry other purposes concocted by human resource departments who don’t have time to actually talk to people. Too many people looking for work.

Which is why is interesting to note that the Wonderlic test is popular among NFL teams, and was first used by none other than Tom Landry, that tight-lipped, hat-wearing dude who coached the Dallas Cowboys. Of course the Cowboys were accused of playing like a silver and blue machine, which is either a credit to the Cowboys organization or an accusation of corporate soullessness in sports. But that depends on if you bet on football or not, or have a fantasy football roster. In either of those scenarios, all you want to do is win. And that begs all kinds of questions about pro sports in general, which in the end are all about artifice, and how to support the kind that attracts enough attention for people to shove buckets of money your way.

Even Cowgirls get the blues

Take that, Wonderlic.

One must wonder if the Wonderlic test is administered to the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders, who (rather ironically) are quite famous for their ability to reduce cognitive abilities in many men. That gives a whole new meaning to the term Wonderlic.

Brain squish

Perhaps the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders are an attempt to direct attention away from the league’s rather prodigious ability to grind so many great athletes into dust by the time they retire. No matter how smart a player might be (Wonderlic or not…) when they’re starting out, it has been proven that playing NFL football can squish your brain through repeated concussions that ruin your ability to think at all.

There has even been talk that the NFL, even football as a sport at all levels may not survive the wave of litigations now surfacing. The evidence shows that the sport and its helmets flatly fail to protect its participants. You’d have to be pretty dumb to deny what’s come to light, but the NFL must certainly be doing its best to avoid the courtroom over such matters. Granted, not every player who emerges from an NFL career has a squishy brain, but there’s a whole line of guys ready to file lawsuits against the league because they can no longer remember how to tie their shoes.

Football great Dave Duerson even took his own life with a shotgun blast. But he did not shoot himself in the head. He was smarter than that. A head shot would have destroyed evidence that his brain was traumatized by his football career. Instead he aimed at his chest so that his brain could be preserved for research and prove that something was going wrong up there that he could not control. Face facts: pro football was to blame, and no amount of cognitive testing could have prevented such a scenario. Junior Seau took his own life as well, and his family is suing the NFL as a result. There’s a pattern going on here, and it’s not one measured by the Wonderlic test.

True assessment

It seems like there should be a Wonderlic test or some other cognitive test administered to players at the start of their career and one given after they’ve finished. Let’s keep track of how many IQ points they’ve lost or what level of cognitive ability they’ve sacrificed. And it should be ongoing. Sometimes the damage shows up years later.

But that would be a just approach, and the NFL is all about entertainment, not justice. So don’t hold your breath on that one.

It all begs the question why employers like the NFL administer a test like the Wonderlic at all? Are people really intelligence commodities? Is the Wonderlic test the Great Predictor it purports to be?

Human nature

Apparently plenty of employers still think so. Never mind that people are adaptive creatures who employ all kinds of creative workarounds to problem solve. Or that nature imbued the human species with the ability to compensate in many ways in order to survive. Our intelligence is a pliable resource that we now know relies upon multiple types of intelligences and sensory channels that enable us to take in and process information.

The massive test that brought all that to being is called evolution, and it’s a helpful result whether you’re skinny hominoid standing semi-helpless on an open savanna or a wide receiver executing a 10-yard pass completion on the sidelines to run out time.

The only test that matters in evolution is not how others can test your abilities, but whether you succeed or not. Take that, Wonderlic. Evolution kicks your ass.

Testing, testing

People with dyslexia often learn to read and comprehend quite well. But if you start out using dyslexia as a disqualifying trait for success in academics or employment because the candidate failed a Wonderlic test, you’d lose all that potential.

People deserve better that that.

Just kidding,

Of course we must reckon as well with a curious side of human nature that avoids all sorts of tests, or questions their merit at some level. For example, what would happen if we applied the Wonderlic test people before they entered the world of world of running and riding? We might find some rather curious results.

Qualifying traits

A typical question on the Wonderlic test works like this:

When a rope is selling 20 cents per 2 feet, how many feet can you buy for 30 dollars?

Now, we all know that the way the human brain works while you’re out running is rather complex, and sometimes silly. That’s because your brain is trying to trick your body into running or riding as fast as you can. Sometimes that’s all the room you’ve got in your brain, so logic gets confused.

In facing the Wonderlic question posed above, a runner’s response to the question might go something like this,

“Let’s see: What kind of feet are we talking about? Because my feet are not exactly 12 inches. I’m a size 11, sometimes 11.5 depending on what brand of shoes I’m buying. And also the time of day can affect my feet size too. So in this case it’s really not fair to compare actual rope to actual feet, because it all depends on what brand of shoe you buy. I’m a size 11 Nike and a size 11.5 Brooks, and while both are good companies, the Nikes always look smaller even if they aren’t really smaller, and I don’t like looking down and thinking I have big feet, because it makes me feel slow. Now, what was the question again?”

And that’s how it works. When you’re out running thoughts seem to come at you like seagulls in Alfred Hitchcock’s movie The Birds. And who’s to say the runner’s answer isn’t just as legitimate as the Wonderlic version, which is based on boring things like basic facts.

And who wants to stop there? This example just proves that the Wonderlic test totally sucks because it doesn’t take all the possible variables into account when you’re talking about feet and rope and someone’s 20 cents. That’s how the mind works in the real world.

Confusing numbers

The same this goes for thinking while out riding. When cyclists encounter a typical question on the Wonderlic test, their minds might begin to assess a lot of factors. For example, here’s another Wonderlic wonder:

Which of the numbers in this group represents the smallest amount? A) 0.3 B) 0.08 C) 0.08 D) 0.33.

Now don’t tell me you have the answer already. Not if you’re a true cyclist.

Because we all know that you pretty much lose your ability to figure numbers out while you’re riding, which is the whole reason why the Strava app was invented. It does your numbers thinking for you.

Otherwise the cyclist’s brain works in weird ways when facing all those letters and numbers in the Wonderlic question. You’d first have to ask yourself, “Do these numbers pertain to my cadence, current mph or average speed?” Right away, your mind spins off into a thousand calculations, all designed to distract your brain from the pain your legs are feeling on the 9% grade you just entered.

But you keep on trying to think about cadence, mph, average speed. And think again, but it escapes you because the pain is so, so intense after 400 meters of climbing that 9% grade you’ve stumbled upon that all concepts of time and space and average speed blow up like the human body in outer space. Poof! Nothing’s left of your prior thoughts but a red mist and some new floaters in your eyes.

Real problem solving

And that’s why runners and cyclists tend to do so poorly on the Wonderlic test. Most of us have minds that operate like the hyper Genie Robin Williams character in the Disney movie Aladdin. We can’t sit still to take no stinking test, and if we do, a thousand million answers come to mind. Which explains why so many runners seem to be babbling when you hear them pass by.

Or, our mental faculties are absorbed by other important issues, like why your boobs seem to bounce more on a Tuesday in June, or whether today is a right or left day for that unit in your shorts, and how many days it is until Saturday when you can actually get out and do real distance training for once.

We runners and riders really do concentrate on all the important stuff, you see.

But if you skip the Wonderlic test and hire us anyway, we work tirelessly to find creative ways to team build, such as cutting the donuts in thirds so no one gets too fat. Now that’s a valuable career skill.

Waiting for the call

As for me, I still wonder about how I’ve actually done on the Wonderlic test at times. But they never tell you. You spend 12 minutes of your precious life scrambling to answer as many inane questions as you can and then never find out the results? Where’ the fun in that.

Too bad. Someone else owns this information about your brain. The CIA maybe, or the NSA. It’s a spooky notion these days. There’s no such thing as private information any more. In fact, I’m tracking your eyes as you read these words, and it appears you are reading them backward. So straighten up!

I admit no one has ever called me back after the Wonderlic test and said, “You’re a genius! Off the charts! Mr. E. F. Wonderlic (if he’s still alive) himself wants to talk to you about your answers. You got them all wrong, and it takes a near genius to do that.”

So I’m still waiting for that call. In the meantime, you know where to reach me and others like me. We’re out solving problems on the road. Like how to change a flat in a rainstorm, and looking for places to pee when you have a shy bladder. This is the important stuff. We all know that.

Posted in We Run and Ride Every Day | Tagged dave duerson, E.F. Wonderlic, employee testing, junior seau, Strava, Wonderlic, Wonderlic test | 1 Comment

Is it possible to overcome pain?

Posted on July 3, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

Pain can short circuit our best-laid plans.

Pain is an integral part of any endurance sport. It follows that overcoming pain and discomfort is an element of success.

But what is the actual secret to the ability of overcoming pain? Is that even possible?

You have two choices. You can either try to beat the pain outright, or you can excel within the confines pain and still try to achieve your best effort.

So which is better?

Pain tolerance

The secret of pain tolerance is not derivative of race or even culture. In fact the ability to endure pain is not even connected to raw physical talent.

Pain runs parallel to the human condition. It is the great equalizer, a humbling reminder that for all our brain power, we are still animals at a base level. Our ability to feel pain and express its impact on our lives is what makes us human. We can all identify with the unintentional grimace of pain on the face of athletes as they compete. We either empathize with the pain of others, or we are psychopaths. There isn’t really much of an in between.

Dealing with pain

Running and riding psychology is composed of two distinct methods of thought: association and dissociation. The first means you choose to accept the pain and work with it. The second means trying to forget the pain using some method of distraction.

If you associate with pain, you do not ignore it. You may try to rationalize it in some way however, in order to get through the periods in which pain is most acute. Our college cross country coach used to joke with us about how difficult a sport running could be. Seeking to replace negative thinking with positive attitude, his favorite phrase during our most difficult workouts was legendary.

“Wow! Fun! Wow!’ he’d cheer us on. You can’t beat fun!”

To which one of us would inevitably reply: “You can’t beat fun. It’s like a sore dick.”

But the fact is we generally embraced his fun approach to dealing with pain while running.

It’s only temporary

One of our teammates even came up with his own brand of mental device that caught on within the team. We all used to get us through. His phrase was, “It’s only temporary.”

That’s a very associative approach to pain management while running or riding. “It’s only temporary” helps you get through the worst points of pain until you can recover. It certainly applies to running or riding tough intervals. But it also works in a race when you are up against your own will and feeling pain from the pace. “It’s only temporary” can work wonders if you use it wisely. The reward of having made it through the pain to a better result sticks with you too. Next time around you are encouraged by your previous success.

Yin and yang: Dissociative thinking

If you prefer not to think about the pain and want to run a marathon using some dissociative method like listening to music during the race, who’s to say you are wrong?

But here’s some good advice. You should still have a backup plan to assess and manage your discomfort level if you find yourself at a tipping point. Because sooner or later if the pain gets too bad, your brain is going to revert to associative thinking whether you want it to or not.

Being realistic

Pain is indeed the great equalizer, but some of us wind up being “more equal” than others. If all of us could simply “run through” the pain somehow we’d all be 2:03 marathoners.

We train ourselves through intervals to accept faster tempos and callous our minds and bodies to a new pain tolerance. These combined practice methods make it mentally and physically possible to run and ride through the pain.

The secret but still painful truth to overcoming pain

Teammates, coaches and competitors are also important tools in developing greater pain tolerance. Our teammates urge us on when we’re tired. Our coaches train us to accept and work outside our perceived limits. But most importantly, our competitors drive us to run harder, forcing us through pain. That may be the truth you don’t want to hear, but it is true in almost every aspect of life. Despite all our faith and morals and attempts to deny the truth, in the end we are competitive beings. Competition is the one true method for overcoming pain, as well as fear. It hearkens back to instinct for survival, for besting rivals for mates, and yes, to get the best gossip possible.

Probably it is some combination of coaches, teammates and competitors that makes us do our best and overcome the pain necessary to succeed. It also takes some good old self motivation to make us run or ride into pain and beyond.

Yet another painful truth

That last bit of reality is the incredible secret behind pain tolerance. Whether our competitor is the clock or another athlete, the best-known way to deal with pain is to recognize that losing—or failing our goals––sometimes hurts far more than the temporary pain we feel during the race. Some people will almost turn themselves inside out to achieve their goals. It’s almost as if there is an entirely separate section in our brains that motivates us to suffer positively in order to reach some abstract version of success. We athletes live in a strange world where our worst fears are both self-imposed and yet also externalized.

Life imitates the art of pain

And of course some say athletics prepares you for the pain and triumphs of life, both of which are also–only temporary. There’s certainly a lesson to be learned there.

Posted in We Run and Ride Every Day | Tagged associative thinking, being realistic, dealing with pain, dissociative thinking, driving through pain, ignoring pain, no fear, no fear of pain, overcoming pain. pain and competition, pain in athletics, pain in cycling, pain in training, pain tolerance | 1 Comment

Is there no escape from the Legendary Land of Hathead?

Posted on July 1, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

No, this is not me. This is a Hathead fail on several levels. The sunburn yes. But the rest of his head should be shaved too. Then, no hathead, hairwise.

It is my job here at We Run and Ride to expand your mind on a number of subjects related to running and riding. Today’s illuminating blog is about both a real and imaginary place called Hat Head. The real place is a village in New South Wales, where I would like to visit because I find such places interesting.

By contrast, the Legendary Land of Hathead exists only on the borders of your mind. Hathead is also frequently called a Bad Hair Day, and it feels like a place from which there is no escape, especially when you wander into Hathead unintentionally. So let us explore that imaginary place, and come to terms with living in Hathead, a real or imaginary place.

The Legendary Land of Hathead

‘Twas a land with no seeming end. For travelers could wander to and fro, through heather and gorse, fair winds and raging gales, and still find themselves on the wide moors of Hathead. Some wondered if it was actually a land you could never leave, both accursed and enchanted. Yet a merry band of wise souls did know the way out of Hathead. One was heard to mutter; ‘Tis the road of Reality and Humility you must take. Anything less will wind you back round to Hathead.”

And in recent years, it hath become a road more traveled, bare and ancient though it may be. But to the surprise of many who go there, no shame could come of riding or running on it, for it laye naked and true as a bare razor, and twice as sharp for those who knew its secrets. But it led the way out of the Land of Hathead. And those with the courage found that the road led to a place called Freedom. From shampoo. From combs. From hair dryers and gels. Some go there not by choice, and must live with the opposite of Hathead. For those people we hold admiration, for they live beyond convention in every way. But for those who live in Hathead and care not, the Legend lives on.”

It’s all true

Yes, the legends are true. There truly are paths that lead out of Hathead, the land where your hair always looks like hell from wearing baseball caps and cycling helmets, or else weird lines appear in your locks when you remove your Giro or Specialized aerodynamically grooved lid.

Hathead can also occur during the Walk of Shame, after you’ve shacked up with some fellow cyclist or runner following a mutally great performance at a race. Then the pos-tace beers take over and before you know it you’re lathering each other up in a hotel shower and piling under the sheets for…well, we digress. The point here is that Hathead comes later, while leaving the hotel with the half-sweaty stretch cap pulled down over your embarrassingly lusty-looking hair style. You pretty much wish you were invisible, yet you feel damned happy. A PR and getting laid in the same 24 hours is always good. But if you were to actually take that hat off your head, even little children would point at you in the hotel lobby and shriek, “Oh my God Mommy. That person has Hathead!”

And that would be embarrassing because you know that you look exactly like a guilty person at that point, and you didn’t really mean to take off your hat and expose your Hathead, but all that hair piled up on once side of your noggin’ was just feeling so, unever, you know? So you pulled off your cap and happened to glance in the hotel lobby mirror and wondered who that lopsided loser in the mirror really was and you suddenly realize it is you. You, with Hathead.

A reformed resident of Hathead

It’s pretty easy to prevent hathead these days.

I used to live in the Land of Hathead with some regularity. Blessed with exceedingly thick hair as a youngster, I also chose to wear a baseball cap almost everywhere I went. Well, that’s not a good combination. Thick hair does one thing when you put a baseball cap over it. If forms that weird Continental Shelf just above your ears, then it flairs out like a hairy waterfall over each ear. For the rest of the day, no matter what you do, that Waterfall Over the Ear look persists. That is called a terminal case of Hathead.

It was excusable when you were actually playing the sport of baseball. Hathead is part of the deal.. along with scratching your nuts and spitting things onto the floor of the disgusting dugout But once you leave the baseball field, Hathead is terminally uncool.

When people say these words to you: “Nice Hathead” they are seldom if ever being complimentary. So you have a choice. You can live in the land of Hathead and face ridicule, or you can try to break free in a variety of ways.

The science and politics of Hathead

Scientific studies have shown that women regard men with Hathead as less attractive, less intelligent or charming and generally less desirable.

To make matters worse, medical studies funded by the Heartland Institute show that Hathead has actually been known to result in penis shrinkage in some men. But then, all studies funded by the Heartland Institute point to the fact that men are being emasculated on every front. So you have to consider the source.

The rape and pillage of Hathead

Most men have simply learned to avoid the realm of Hathead with one simple act: They shave the hair on their head so short that Hathead is not possible.

This solution might have started with the pre-eminent athlete of the last 25 years, one Michael Jordan who, upon discovering hair loss that would have made him look too old for his role as Best Basketball Player Ever, decided to shave his dark dome completely clean. And he looked awesome. More than awesome actually.

The list of athletes who have escaped the Land of Hathead are many these days, led by pioneers like pro cycling superstars Levi Leipheimer and Chris Horner, both of whom escaped the Land of Flathead by shaving their heads. They are shorn and happy for it.

Less cushion?

Of course, there may be drawbacks to having no hair as well. Chris Horner crashed and took a straight shot to the noggin’ during the Tour de France a few years ago. He was so concussed no one knows how he rode the next couple dozen miles, because when he completed the stage, he asked, “Did I finish?”

That’s a different kind of Hathead. That’s called Crazyhead. They kept Chris in the hospital a few days while the concussion wore off and then flew him home ot recover in earnest.

It is doubtful a layer of hair would have done much to keep Horner from getting a concussion. Hockey players are some of the hairiest athletes on earth and they’re getting concussions at an increased rate it seems. Most players are going round on their 3^rd or 4^th year of getting concussions. If you shaved their heads and then showed a blue light on them, their brains would show up like fluorescent indicators of heat and stress. But man, when a hockey player without a shaved head takes off their helmet, that is some of the worst hathead styling you can ever see. Along with a playoff beard, hockey players are officially full time residents of HatHead, the place where people go because they just don’t care how they’re hair really looks.

Fortunately there are millions of men who prefer to avoid all this Hathead stuff. They’ve taken the sensible option and buzzed their heads if their hair won’t grow naturally or if they simply think they look better sans locks than having a regularly unkempt pile of flattened or unhealthily bound hair up there.

Outside Hathead

No this is not the answer to Hathead.

The condescending phrase “Bald is Beautiful” has been replaced by calculating silence, for the whole bald thing is no longer an issue. Men with self-confidence don’t buy into Hathead sub-issues such as comb overs or toupees. No more hair transplants or cornrow spots on your scalp when the transplant wears out. All of that is part of the Hathead psychology in which you’re covering up your hair out of insecurity, desperation, laziness or guilt. Or the opposite; you love your hair too much and get all insecure when a baseball cap puts a pressure ring around your noggin.

Gone for some, but not forgotten

If you’re a person who runs or rides and find yourself suddenly stuck living in Hathead, there are quite a few ways to get out of Hathead fast.

The quick use of a finish line water hose can help, and fast. So can a richly deserved towel. Then dry your hair and fluff up the Hathead. You may still a little bit of that dreaded loo, going on, but at least people won’t think you’re a permanent resident.

Because if you think about it, just about every homeless person you know takes up some form of residencw in the Land of Hathead. Hathead is a fashion statement for bums.

You can help the homeless, but you don’t have to walk around looking like one. Either find a way to cure Hathead when the run, race or ride is through, or else free yourself from the bonds of Hathead forever, and go shave your head, unless you’re a woman, in which case you always have the pony tail. Then all is always forgiven. Because pony tails rock. Especially under a baseball cap. Which is where we started. See, everything comes full circle if you let it.

Posted in We Run and Ride Every Day | Tagged bad hair day, hair transplant, hathead, ponytail | Leave a comment

A 50 mph descent is a bit of a rush

Posted on July 1, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

Watching the Tour de France race go through and up and over the island of Corsica has been an exciting start to the 100th Tour. Corsica from all angles is alternately rocky, woodsy and beachy. That makes it perfect for a Tour stage or three.

A bus wedgie

With the first day’s racing almost running into the back of team bus wedged under the finish line scaffolding, things could not have been more odd and tense.

Today’s stage saw some idiot trying to cross the course like it was a parade route, and a tiny little dog almost getting run over by the peloton, which was traveling nearly 40 mph at the time.

Grab your seat

But the descents were what made you grab your seat, and I mean that literally and figuratively. Cyclists cutting tight corners at very high speeds are possibly participating in one of the most dangerous sports on earth short of a UFC fight held on a hockey rink.

At one point the riders screamed through their radios to get the TV helicopter to pull away from the race because the cyclists could not hear the safety signals normally used to read the actions of the riders around them. The screeching of brake pads on rims, for example, is a key device to know who’s going faster or slower.

But when one rider breaks away, that’s when the risks get interesting. It’s hard to stay ahead of the peloton in any circumstance. But when you’re heading downhill at more than 50 mph on a mountain road where the wall against which you almost nick your wheels is an absolute boundary, it takes more than mere experience to handle your machine. You have to know what risks and rewards really are.

50mph barrier

Having only topped 50 mph once on my bike, I cannot speak to the rush of doing that consistently or in a race. My 50mph experiment occurred on a long steep section of road in western Pennsylvania. I was there on vacation to view the Frank Lloyd Wright creation Fallingwater. A morning opened up and the bike and I went for a 30 miler on the tight roads around a state park. It was harrowing to be a cyclist on those roads. There are no shoulders. None. Logging trucks and campers and semi trucks come whaling over the hill and around the corner. You learn quickly to ride on the defensive.

Tempting proposition

But let’s say there’s a quiet section of road and it just stretches invitingly out in front of your bike and you start to pedal with the momentum. With ease you’re up to 40 mph. Then 45. The road keeps going. Nothing is coming up behind you. Nothing ahead either. The pavement is smooth. No tarsnakes. No thumping cracks. Just smooth asphalt and a clear view for about a mile ahead.

You go for it, pedaling in the highest gear and the cyclometer seems to quiver as you inch on up, 46, 47, 48. You wonder for a moment is this is wise. 49mph. This is all new territory. You turn your head to look at the bushes rushing past on your right and the whole bike does a swerve. The grooves in your helmet suddenly have an effect on your aerodynamics. Then the cyclometer pops up with a 50. Five-Oh. You’re going 50 mph. Then 51. 52. When you hit 53 the road starts to flatten slightly and the opportunity for more speed wanes. But 53 is good enough. That’s a little more than half a hundred miles an hour. It’s quite a rush.

Wobbly perspective

I’m glad I did it. But won’t be trying again unless I swap my Mavic wheels out someday. I’m pretty sure they’re what caused my 40 mph crash last Labor Day. My original Shimano wheels that came with the bike were what handled 50 mph. I simply don’t trust the Mavics, I’m sad to say. Even crimping the top bar with my knees would not provide the assurance I need to go 50mph again.

Which makes what the Tour riders are doing all the more real to me. I could never do 1/100th of what they do in terms of riding. They are the world’s best cyclists, and I’m not even the best in my home town. Not by far.

But at least I’ve gone 50 and know what that means. It’s a rush. And that means something.

Posted in Tarsnakes, We Run and Ride Every Day | Tagged 50 mph descent, bike racing, Corsica, cycling, cycling breakaways, cycling defensively, cyclist, Fallingwater, peloton, Pennsylvania roads, Radio Shack, the peloton, Tour de France descents, Tour de France racing | Leave a comment

3 timely lessons about running and riding in the heat

Posted on June 28, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

Lessons learned are like bridges burned, you only need to cross them but once… Is the knowledge gained worth the price of the pain, are the spoils worth the cost of the hunt? –Dan Fogelberg, from the song Lessons Learned

With record temperatures becoming commonplace, we all need a heat strategy. Even Al Roker.

With a major heat wave predicted across much of the West and Midwest this weekend, and heat seeming to be on the increase thanks to global climate change, it pays to do a little thinking about your heat tolerance. Temperatures of 119 are predicted in Phoenix, Arizona this weekend, and 101 degrees in Boise, Idaho. There may be world record heat in Death Valley, with temperatures predicted to climb to 134 degrees. That, my friends, is hot as hell. No questions asked.

LESSON ONE: HOW TO RIDE THROUGH HELL, AND A LITTLE BEYOND

It was 96 degrees outside. My wife and daughter dropped me and the Felt 4C at a parking lot near the junction of Genoa Road and Interstate 90 just east of Rockford, Illinois. I planned to ride home from there.

The three of us had spent the morning in Madison, Wisconsin visiting the university and tromping around the fantastic Farmer’s Market in the square around the capitol building. I’d planned all along to ride part of the way home that afternoon and had brought my bike along in the back of the Toyota Matrix. The remaining jaunt from Rockford promised to be between between 40 and 45 miles, depending on which route I’d take.

Uh Oh. Hotter than hell.

But 4 miles into the ride, heading south into a blast furnace breeze and heat rising off blacktop in visible waves, I knew I’d chosen wrong. It would not matter which way I rode home. It was foolish and hot to ride in any direction.

Wanting to stock up on cold drinks, I stopped at a gas station in the town of Genoa. It was a tricky deal figuring out what to do, but 3 Gatorades seemed like a wise investment. I stocked two in my shirt and used a bigger bottle to fill two ice-filled water bottles.

They were melted within two miles. So this really was a form of hell on earth. The Gatorade inside my bottle was getting hotter by the minute. The two bottles stashed in my shirt, freezing cold just 15 minutes before, were now almost two warm to drink.

A deal with Beezelbub?

Then I realized I’d taken a wrong turn 10 miles into the ride. Suddenly I thought; What the hell? Where did I miss that road I know? But it was one of those circumstances where it’s just about as far to go back as it is to take a risk going forward. So I kept on rolling.

And wound up in the outskirts of Sycamore, about 5 miles off my planned route. Ooops. It was like a deal with Beezelbub. You don’t come out winning either way. One way you melt. The other way you bake.

An angelic break

At one point the only sane thing to do was stop in the shade and try to breathe smooth and slow. My skin tingled. It felt like little angels were fluttering around inside my hot noggin’.

All the fluids I had were now actually hot, not just warm. I drank anyway and glanced to see a cool blue pool behind a house where it looked like no one was home. Tempting, I thought. But the little cycling angel over my shoulder whispered in my ear that sometimes when you stop, you really can’t get going again. And then you suffer all the more.

So I sucked it up and rode on, staying just below the threshold where my body felt strain. It was kind of like riding around the edge of the fiery abyss, but not quite falling in. 14mph, I have discovered, is an appropriate speed to ride through hell. It worked for me

The tarsnakes were rising out of their road crack burrows on a hot summer day.

anyway. All the while the tires were smacking over the tarsnakes, which raised their oozing black heads slightly as I passed, hissing in the heat like Serpents of Satan. “Come down to us,” they whispered like the hissing of summer lawns, “Join us on the road.”

“Damn you to hell!” I hollered, pressing my front tire down on one of their heads. They pulled back into the crack of the road, their black souls disappointed at not winning my own.

Kept on moving. I could barely feel a breeze while moving that slow. It was hot. As hell. And humid.

Salvation at the water pump

My goal was a cold water pump at the Great Western Trailhead, 15 miles southeast. All I had to do to keep going was to focus on that cold water even though I knew it tasted like crap because of the sulphur content in local groundwater. I made it with a little energy to spare by avoiding hills where I could on the route home, just to save the legs. The last 5 miles home even felt easy. I wondered what I’d been worried about. Then I thought back to those first 10 miles through absolute cycling hell on the hot road, and remembered: Hell is really not a lot of fun. The lesson learned was that you should never ride in intense heat without a backup plan.

LESSON TWO: NOT ON TRACK FOR SUCCESS IN THE HEAT

There’s nothing quite like the heat on a running track on a mid-summer day. It swelters up around the runners and can turn the air you breathe into a seemingly soupy concoction without much oxygen. But competing in the Prairie State Games, the first Olympic-style event ever in the history of Illinois, was unique enough to want to watch some of the other athletes compete.

And that was stupid, because heat saps distance runners more than any other type of athlete. Sprinters usually love the heat. It keeps their big muscles loose and flowing. But distance runners are built like thermometers, and our bodies react to the heat in much the same way. The red mercury core goes up and up until our heads are at risk to explode.

Hot enough for everyone

Adjust your pace on hot days or risking crawling home.

So by the time the 5000 meters came around at 8:00 at night, I’d probably already lost the race. Yet I felt pretty good going through 2 miles in 9:28. I had a shot for Bronze. The leader, a top distance runner from University of Illinois was half a lap ahead and looking easy. In second place was a really nice guy I’d met from the University of Chicago Track Club. 4^th place was way behind me. I figured to run a 5:10 mile and call it a day.

And then the side stitch hit. It wasn’t your average side stitch, but one that extended from my left nipple down to my waist. It almost bent me over at one point, but I kept running.

Slow going

Within the next lap my body was thinking about shutting down. Everyone could see that. The medics swooped on the track and dragged me over to a wheelbarrow full of ice and sat my very skinny little ass down in a pile of ice. And there I sat, sphincter growing colder by the second, until the spots before my eyes went away.

Heat prostration they call it. The humidity and heat from the day had caught up with me. There would be no medal, and that was regrettable, but the lesson learned was that you have to concentrate on only one thing when you’re competing in hot weather: Save all your energy for your own race. The rest simply cannot matter.

LESSON THREE: SOMETIMES YOUR SELF-PERCEPTIONS ARE WRONG

In May following my junior year at Luther College, I competed in the nationals for steeplechase but did not make the finals. It was 83 degrees outside, even hotter than that on the track. After finishing the race my stomach felt a bit queasy, but by the time dinner rolled around I was recovered enough to eat an entire 14” Pizza Hut pizza.

Puke city

That night I awoke to a raging stomach ache and proceeded to throw up more than 27 times between 11 pm and 7 am. I was already a skinny guy at 140 lbs, but when the hospital weighed me that morning while checking me into emergency, my weight was down to 133 on a 6 ft. frame. Dangerous territory. They pumped me full of fluids and electrolytes and made me eat bananas and warned me to be careful running in the heat from now on.

An overheated belief system

And for 3-4 years after that, I believed that I was destined not to be a heat runner.

Sprinters tend to like the heat. But distance runners tend to suffer in it.

Then came a July 10-miler in which the temps were in the high to mid 80s. I ran so strong and easily in the first nine miles of the race and outkicked 4-5 guys in the last mile and a half–finishing fourth overall. This was a race in which I figured to finish no better than the top 15, the competition was so good.

The experience of running so well in the heat made me re-think the hot-day steeplechase and the advice the physicians had given me the next day. I realized I’d been fine for more than 4 hours following the race and that heat had nothing to do with why I’d gotten sick that night.

Then it struck me what had happened. “Food poisoning,” I said out loud. It had been the pizza, not the heat that made me sick.

Liberation in the heat

After that there were many more summer races that went well in the heat, including one 4^th of July affair on a hilly course in Glen Ellyn, Illinois in which I battled a hometown boy for the win but came up just 10 yards short in 20:01. But the heat wasn’t why I lost. He’d bested me fair and square with a better kick.

Heat and humility

You have to be careful though not to get cocky about your heat tolerance. During last summer’s heat and drought in Illinois there was day after day where the temperature topped 80 and even 90 degrees, and I’d still get out on the bike at various times of the day. Slowly however my body wore down and then came a series of rides where I got into serious trouble from the heat. Twice I needed to stop at a store and get ice because the pace was too fast with other riders and dizziness took over during the ride.

Longer you go. Hotter you’ll get.

These lessons are more pronounced the longer you plan to go in the heat. When marathoners showed up in Chicago a few years ago and temps climbed into the 80s by race time, there was little anyone could do to prepare for that kind of heat. Hundreds of runners suffered ill effects and the race was actually stopped, a first-ever occurrence at such a major race. But it was the wise thing to do.

Dying to run

We all know people have died from racing in the heat, and many of those circumstances are tragic.

But some people just go out asking for trouble. And then some. As a course marshall at one 10K I witnessed one idiot collapse with a failed liver thanks to drinking 6 beers before the start of the race on a very hot day. He turned around and sued the race organizers for making beer available before the start.

Sum heat for all of us

The lessons learned in sum are that sometimes both our long and short term perceptions about our heat tolerance can be wrong . Our bodies can take some pretty hot conditions, but we can also get cocky and deceive ourselves into thinking we are immune to the effects of heat. Then we begin to suffer like the frog placed in a pot with the flame on low, not knowing we’re quietly cooking, especially over a period of weeks or months.

It is important to remember that the effects of heat can be cumulative over time as well as sudden. Keeping track of your body’s signals during summer heat waves and over the entire heat season can be important to safe, effective training during the summer months.

Posted in Tarsnakes, We Run and Ride Every Day | Tagged Chicago marathon, cycling in heat, distance running in heat, effects of heat on athletes, global climate change, global warming, heat prostration, heat stroke, heat wave, marathon in heat, record heat wave, riding in heat, running in heat, Satan, tarsnakes, University of Chicago track club | Leave a comment

Understanding our appetites

Posted on June 27, 2013 by Christopher Cudworth

By Christopher Cudworth

Today we’re here to talk about appetites, so a definition is in order:

ap·pe·tite. Noun. A natural desire to satisfy a bodily need, esp. for food. A strong desire or liking for something.

Appetites. We all have them, or we die.

Appetizing or not? Depends on the nature of your appetites.

Losing your appetite for something is usually not a matter of fun. When you’re sick with the flu you can lose your appetite for food, but often not for drink. Yet even that won’t stay down. Sooner or later we have to eat and drink. Or we die.

Singer Jim Morrison of the Doors once sang, “But, if, we don’t find, the next whisky bar, I tell you we must die. I tell you we must die. I tell you, I tell you, I tell you we must die…”

And he did. We know for certain life often imitates art. But we sometimes lose lives in the process

Watching our appetites

So we have to watch our appetites carefully. Otherwise they can evolve into obsessions. Then addictions. And we can die from those.

By now you’re catching onto the theme here. We need our appetites to keep us going, but you can overeat, overdrink, over-sex and overthink. All our appetites are good for us, and bad for us too.

So what to do?

Going too far

You can run and ride to keep your appetites from making you fat or depressed or suffering from high blood pressure. But your appetite for running and riding can go too far. We’ve all seen it.

One former competitor from high school decided when he reached college that 250 miles a week was a good training program. He ran a marathon a day for weeks on end. Later on in life he developed a full-on mental illness. One suspects the latter actually dictated the former. His mental illness was present, just not fully manifested in his college years. Mental illness is a serious issue that deserves respect and treatment. It should not be stigmatized or ridiculed. But the interesting aspect of mental illness is that in this circumstance it illustrates the dangers of succumbing completely to our appetites. My friend and former competitor had an insatiable appetite for running, for sure.

But it was not the healthiest thing for him, either physically or mentally.

Cross training not always the answer

A teammate in cross country once developed a love for cycling. Instead of running all summer like the rest of us harrier mopes slogging mile after mile on foot, he decided to ride his bike for training. He rode and rode. 4000 miles he rode that summer, which for a high school kid on a half-assed shifter road bike was a lot of riding.

When he showed up for cross country practice that fall, he was in great shape. For cycling. His running wasn’t for crap because he had not been doing much of it. He’d only been riding. Which for the rest of us was a lesson in the specificity of training. It’s a lesson I’ve never forgotten, for sure. Running and riding are complimentary, but they are not necessarily conducive in terms of performance enhancement in one or the other sport.

The triathlete’s dilemma

Of course triathletes have to balance all that specificity and yet get in enough training to be able to swim, ride and run well. All in the same race. That’s a tough thing to do, especially if you’re not rich or retired.

There’s not a triathlete alive who does not obsess over the tri-balance. It’s the nature of the beast, and what a beast when it comes to the Ironman distance. And as any tri-guy or tri-gal can tell you, by the time you have trained to swim two miles, ride 112 and run a marathon, there is not a whole lot of room for anything else in your life.

Loss of sexual appetite

If you can’t get it up pretend you’re Donald Trump and erect a building in your own.

Here’s a little Warning: If you’re training for a marathon or triathlon and start neglecting other “responsibilities,” (male or females, listen up) your spouse or partner could get a little edgy when you’re too tired for sex, much less a candlelight dinner on the patio. And who can blame them?

Here you’ve got this toned, probably tanned body just begging for a ruckus in the sack– and you’re consistently not available?

Hell, even your dog knows better than that, following a rough day of lying on the sofa, pooping in the yard and tugging on the leash for a half mile walk, the dog still has the energy to hump your leg once in while. Or lollygag around the lawn, just a bitch in heat, begging for it like those seemingly insatiable gals on the Internets. Woof woof. Come doggie. Stay.

The whole country struggles with appetites

So despite your appetite for Ironman success, never neglect your partner’s appetites. “I’m too tired” does not fly well with those who can see our exercise appetites in fuller context.

And you know, divorce or a broken relationship is simply not that appetizing. Those with direct experience in those categories can fulfill your appetite for a reality check on that front.

Of course the genre we know as country music would not even exist were it not for cavorting lovers and the sweat-stained beds of pickup trucks. A gal I know insists it is true that country music is about much more than backwoods affairs and out of control appetites for beer and Bubbas. But it must be said that a little twang is usually good South of the Mason Dixon line. Just ask any gal you know.

A biblical perspective

Even the Good Book admits that it universally hard to control our many appetites. For example, when the bands of wandering Jews led by Moses and Abraham humped around the desert all those years, they literally got sick of munching scorpions and other crappy food.

So when God or a low flying pack of angels threw down manna from heaven, some people could not resist picking up more than they needed, just for overnight snacks. Because it looked like White Cheddar Cheese Popcorn, and who could resist?

Yet we know that God kicked their asses for being greedy and not controlling their appetites. And that suggests that whether you carbo-load or protein load, too much of a good thing is too much.

Guilt and sin

Our appetites hit us at the worst times, don’t they? Usually late in the evening when we’re going to bed. Then, it’s potato chips. Brownies. Apples and peanut butter. At least those are partly healthy.

Some people seem to avoid all that. We’ve all read about these amazing running athletes like Dean Whats-his-Ultra (starts with a K) who only eats ground up celery stalks and carrot shavings. And that’s for breakfast.

Rumor has it some cyclists only suck on wet washcloths between stages of the Tour de France climbing stages to keep their weight down.

Or perhaps that’s the mechanics, who are so stressed they can’t eat. We wonder why we can’t be just as disciplined. And you know the answer. We can’t control our appetites. That’s why ultramarathons even exist. We run and then run some more. Until we can’t. Then we blame our bodies, not our minds.

At war with our appetites

Control Your Appetite. For donuts.

If there was a Control Your Appetite App it would sell 7 billion copies, because that’s how many people there are in the world (who knows for sure?) and every single one of them has an appetite. Sadly about 1/3 of them are actually hungry. All the time. It seems have the world is lustfully pursuing more while the other half would be happy for the healthier scraps. Appetites are relative in many cases.

We also can’t know the world’s population for sure because we can’t honestly tell if China is really telling the truth or if they’re busy hiding a billion or so soldiers in the mountains,armed to the teeth in case someone is actually stupid enough to invade their nation over cheap iPhones or something of that order.

America is stupid enough to do such things. Viet Nam comes to mind. And Iraq. Afghanistan II. We supposed the Taliban or some pack of nuts last time the world invaded there. To sum it up, we’re on an unappetizing losing streak when it comes to wars. Only the first Gulf War was an exception, and that’s because we quite before taking Bagdhad. Sometimes we get lucky.

Conservative appetites no oxymoron

Our appetite for world power seems to demand these ventures somehow, and war hawks from the radically conservative Right cheer from the sidelines or the backrooms while their war profiteer buddies haul in the dough.

War dodgers like Rush Limbaugh and Dick Cheney still seem to possess enormous appetites for the fight. Their greed and not-so-quiet hatred is propped up by populist piles of pent-up political frustration, jugs of liquid racism and multiple vials of illegal prescription drugs. Dick Cheney’s appetites for control have led to a series of heart attacks, and finally a transplant. But he never had any heart to begin with.

As for Rush, four failed marriages and the recent abandonment of millions of dollars in advertising have not convinced Limbaugh he’s wrong about anything. But we can be quite sure never admits to losing a fight, yet he would most likely advocate invading China if it would drop the price on oxycontin.

If America follows the appetites of power-drunk conservatives like Rush & Cheney to lead us into war with China someday, the results might unleash a fury never before seen on the earth. Out of the mountains might come that extra billion people they haven’t been telling us about, all with very shiny bayonets and flags bearing the slogan, “We Will Kill Your American Appetites.” That pretty much what any war is about. And that really is ironic since it is the politicians, not the soldiers who do the fighting, who have any real appetite for war.

At war with yourself

So let us be clear. Short of running into the enemy, it is good to have an appetite to run and ride. But you should know better than to turn it into a war with yourself over all the other things you need to do in life.

Okay: If you’re rich as the dickens and can train all freaking day, or you’re poor as hell and need a way to recover some dignity in this sometimes ugly, uncaring world, then have at it. Let your appetite for running, riding and swimming take over if you choose. No one will question you as long as you empty your garbage and mow the lawn once a month.

As for the rest of us lurking somewhere between part-way fit and oxygenatedly obsessed, we’re stuck chugging light beers and eating guilt slices of wheat or gluten-free toast, with honey if you’re lucky.

No appetite for corruption

Let us confess: It doesn’t even help much to turn a religious scrutiny on our appetites. Jesus never seemed to have it so bad, for example. For reasons that might have had to do with being the Son of God, he appeared to have absolute control of his appetites.

Except of course when he showed up at the Temple and got pissed about the money changers and selling those doves for sacrifices. Then he went absolutely bonkers, turning over tables and chasing people around like a man possessed. And yet, he told many people to sell their possessions. Being possessed and craving possessions do seem to go together. It’s called hoarding.

Thinking back to the angry temple incident, perhaps Jesus thought the doves would have been better used in a pie? Or maybe I’m missing the point.

Just like us

The Son of God certainly had appetites if he was fully human, but he did have one unfair advantage. If he didn’t want water at the time, he simply changed it into wine.

Only have 5 fish and a few loaves? Wave a hand and feed the five thousand.

That would certainly come in handy after a 5-hour training ride. You wouldn’t even have to run out to 7-Eleven for chocolate milk, because that’s your After, or your Everafter, or even your Hereafter. With Jesus it seems it’s all the same anyway.

Jesus and Arnold apparently had a lot in common, according to some artists.

High protein savior

There are rumors Jesus was really quite an athlete, as this picture of Jesus as a muscular hunk of manhood seems to imply.

What we do know is that he hung around the Sea of Galilee quite a bit, which could be a sign that he was trying to master the open water swim. Oh wait, he did walk on water. Is that cheating if you’re a triathlete? Insert your own Tri pun here. Jesus could swim. The Holy Ghost could ride and God could probably run a pretty decent marathon. A Trinity Team Triathlon! How awesome is that? Pretty awesome I’ll bet.

Prime time for fitness

If you read the Bible literally, Jesus did seem to get from Nazareth to Bethlehem awful fast. That suggests he either ran or rode to get from point to point. No one walks that kind of distance in the Middle Eastern heat. Not sane people anyway. Oh wait, the Disciples did that all the time. That’s probably why Saint Paul saw that vision in the street. It was just the heat. He was a pretty good writer at any rate. Love that Corinthians stuff. Makes a good wedding even greater. Love is patient, love is kind. Love does not boast, like most endurance athletes do after a marathon…

A devil of an appetite

The devil even tried to tempt Jesus with all kinds of appetizing offers, but Jesus held his own on every item. World power. Riches and kingdoms. Free Nikes. Jesus told the devil Stand Down! I’m doing my Spartan thing.

It’s hard to tell you this, but he did seem to have good abs in all those religious pictures from the Middle Ages. You don’t get that fit-looking without a few runs and rides under your belt. We don’t know much about Jesus between age 12 and age 30. Was he in constant training all those years, running the Bethlehem Marathon and competing in the Jordan River Ironman.

Suspicious years of absence

The Bible doesn’t say. And neither will we speculate. But most of the greatest distance athletes consider the years from age 12 to age 30 prime time for athletic greatness.

Did anyone check the records of the Roman games, circa 12AD to 30AD? Perhaps the Jews can lay claim to an Olympic champion.

Or just a champion over his own appetites. That’s enough for the Greatest Story Ever Told. About how a man nailed to a cross thought nothing of himself, instead giving up his life and conquering the dangers of our appetites that lead to sin.

It’s a pretty good plot line, you have to admit. Especially for those with an appetite for drama, mystery and a whole lotta faith.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged appetite, biblical perspective, brownies, China, Chinese population, Christopher Cudworth, controlling appetites, country music, country music lyrics, cross country, cross-training, Disciples, fat, fat and depressed, going too far, Greatest Story Ever Told, high blood pressure, Jesus, Jesus Christ, Jesus the triathlete, loss of sexual appetite, Love it patient love is kind, marathon, marathon a day, mental illness, potato chips, ride 112, Roman games, run marathon, running and riding, Rush Limbaugh, Saint Paul, struggling with appetite, succumbing to our appetites, swim 2 miles, tri-balance, tri-gal, tri-guy, triathlon, triathlon training, ultramarathon, watching our appetites, we run and ride | Leave a comment

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