Integrity

I've been thinking about integrity a lot, recently: my integrity, the integrity of my students, the integrity of my athletic ambitions, the integrity of my artistic ambitions, the integrity of my professional and life ambitions, the integrity of the people around me.

Integrity has to do with the alignment of all the parts of your being. Here's an example. Some students at my school made some bad decisions recently. No big deal, really—they're high school students and no one ended up hurt (no blood, no foul, right?). When the story started to leak out, though, they conspired among themselves to protect each other. Their desire to tell the truth was out of integrity with the urge to protect their friends. This is a perfectly understandable situation, especially if you are, say, seventeen and thinking about what a suspension might look like on your college applications. The big issue, however, is that their conscience wanted to do one thing while their ego wanted them to do something else—two different directions=impossible to act with integrity. Integrity loathes multitasking.

I am out of integrity with some aspects of my life. This being a somewhat light athletic blog, I will spare you the nitty-gritty of my personal existence, if it can be separated at all from my athletic existence. We'll start with some basic ones.

• My core strength is out of integrity with my athletic ambitions. Despite knowing how important core strength is I continue to neglect it, thinking "It's only a half-hour of work...how important could it be? I'm training 25 hours a week, what will 2 sessions of strength work do for me? My core strength and my athletic ambitions are out of integrity.
• My weight is out of integrity with my athletic ambitions. I told Cliff, yesterday, that I'll get down to 175 by Boise 70.3. That's six pounds in three-and-a-half weeks. I've said I'll lose that weight for years, now. What part of me wants me not to be successful? I've been too light before, and I don't want to go back there, but a sensible leanness will only make me faster.
• My misgivings about the sport are out of integrity with my athletic ambitions. I hesitate to identify as a triathlete, or as a professional athlete. These things seem to be frivolous or narcissistic to people I've met before, and I've taken those things on. So when I'm training one part of my brain thinks "This is amazing—I don't ever want to do anything else. I am the luckiest man on the planet." The other part of my brain is saying: "You'll never be good enough. You're just doing this to keep the demons at bay. You're doing this because you're horribly self-centered."

Having a lack of integrity can be exhausting, even if your lack of integrity is only hurting yourself. As the best boss I've ever had once said: "When you are dishonest you get warts on your soul and those warts do not go away." I see being out of integrity with one's self as dishonesty, even if it's something like being dishonest about your commitment to get one's strength workouts done.

Whew. Heavy! Sorry, folks. We'll return with light entertainment on Friday, for the FantasyTri update!

Legitimate

No, I couldn't re-tilt the photo at left, so excuse the oddity. TJ Tollakson came in 7th yesterday, making him my best placed male FantasyTri athlete (I swerved at the last minute and benched eventual 4th place finisher Richie Cunningham for no-show Leon Griffin—didn't I say his website didn't say anything about Florida 70.3? Shucks). For a while during the race I thought I'd made a canny decision, picking the only $4100 Tollakson for my team, since he came off the bike almost 7 minutes in front, after a bike split that distanced the pack by almost 10 minutes. He got around in under 2 hours, which is rare air for 56 miles on your own. TJ's effort would place him in the ballpark of professional cyclists competing in long time trials. Toss in the fact that the Florida 70.3 bike course is by no means a straightforward affair: it isn't pancake flat and swoops and curves out in the orchards beyond Orlando.

TJ put in the effort to win his way on Sunday, for which I admire him. After a disappointing race in Galveston where he bided his time, it seems he decided to go back to his trump card, the bike. As playing that card often does, he paid for his gamble by blowing up in the Disneyworld heat. Still, he played it. As an athlete whose strong suit is also the bike (can I really say that any more? I feel more and more middle of the pack these days on the bike) I admire the gamble Tollakson made. On a few days in triathlon the cyclists have their days: Normann's had two, TJ's had one at Eagleman, Jordan's had a bunch until he showed us that, actually, he's a pretty damn solid runner, too. Triathlon is drifting towards a conservative style of racing: sit in the pack on the swim, sit in the line on the bike, save it for the run, so it's nice to see someone still making triathlon about his individual strength.

Fantasy Tri Minute 5/13—Men.

Only one race this coming weekend, but the field listed for Florida 70.3 is an interesting one. Here are the two start lists (separated by gender—why can't WTC do at least that for its website users?).

Men

Rich Allen—Racing, on the comeback trail, 14th at Knoxville and St. Anthony's. Longshot to get you points. Bargain at $2133, though.
Paul Ambrose—Racing, another relative bargain at just over $5000. He's a steady performer at 70.3 distance. He's probably a good choice.
Dirk Bockel—Racing, but expensive at $7100.
Daniel Bretscher—Not sure if he's racing; website didn't say, but he's cheap at $3900 or so. Probably a good pick.
Mike Caiazzo (NOT RACING)
Andres Castillo Latorre—He's got similar results to me, but only costs $250. If you're looking for a longshot but with some value, he might not be bad (I beat him by a couple of places in Austin last year).
Richie Cunningham—Racing. Richie's expensive, but he'll usually get inside the top five. He's a good stallion to pick for your stable. I'm going to play him this weekend.
Scott Duffy—Couldn't figure out who this person is. Nor does he have a FantasyTri listing.
Stephen Dyke—Canadian bloke, it seems. A few north-of-the-border results. Cheap.
Paul Fritzsche—Paul is just a great guy and a super-strong cyclist. His blog says he's competing, but I think this field might just be too strong for him to get into the top ten. He's good value, though, at just under $3000.
Ryan Giuliano—Part of the US Pro Tri team. Looks like a young pro. No FT listing.
Leon Griffin—Leon is a stud, but his website doesn't mention Florida...
Andrew Hodges—Website mentions nothing about Florida...I got burned by playing Andrew a few weeks ago, so I'm gonna steer clear.
David Kahn—Second year pro. No listing on FT or on his blog.
Stephen Kilshaw—Won Shawnigan Lake 1/2 IM last year, and he's only $25o. Could be a good sleeper.
Greg Kopecky—Also only $250. Young, though.
Reinaldo Oliveira—A few results. Probably pack-fill.
Kyle Pawlaczyk—13th at New Orleans 70.3. Might get you some points if you can spell his name. Only $250.
Bryan Rhodes—His website doesn't mention Florida. Coming back from injury. A little expensive, especially since we're not sure he's competing.
Daniel Schmoll—Who?
TJ Tollakson—Buy! Buy! Pretty cheap. Hungry. Fit. Only $4100.
Nicholas Vandam—Young ITU pro. Florida 70.3 is probably a little too hilly on the bike for him right now.
Matt White—His blog doesn't say anything. Sounds like he's going back to Boulder to get ready for CdA.
Maxim Kriat—Long course guy, had some success. Cheap. You might think about it. Only $2400.
Alun Woodward—I don't know who this is, but he's expensive ($5500). ITU guy?
Viktor Zyemtsev—Still classy after all these years. Won Louisville last year and just came in 10th at St. Anthony's. Not too expensive ($4700) and likely to get you some points.

Here's my team:

Cunningham, Tollakson, Ambrose, Pawlaczyk, Kilshaw.

Here's the women's start list. I'll do them tomorrow.

Women

Leanda Cave
Florence Chretien
Jacqui Gordon
Lisa Huetthaler
Heather Jackson
Tamara Kozulina
Nina Kraft
Heather Leiggi
Emma-Kate Lidbury
Kim Loeffler
Sara McLarty
Kate Pallardy
Ayesha Rollinson
Daniela Saemmler
David Sharratt
Amanda Stevens
Danielle Sullivan
Pip Taylor
Magali Tisseyre
Kelly Williamson

Strength

I'm not as despondent as I was about racing last week. 8 days of recovery and then a good first day back will alleviate the darkest doubts, although I've now come full circle and deeply regret dropping out of Ironman St. George. It was such a hard race, and I could have finished it—there is beauty in finishing any Ironman. I was just feeling a bit overconfident and poncy about the whole thing. You have to race the whole time—nothing gets handed to you, especially in long-distance racing.

OK, enough philosophizing for now. One of the things I need to address is my core and stability work. If I only suspected they needed work last week, my worst fears have been confirmed by one strength session with zen guru physiotherapist/triathlete/coach/counselor Chris Ramsey (whose name I have finally spelled correctly). Chris is a veteran of many Ironman races, pulling off a 9:10 in his career, which is nothing at all at which to sniff. Chris agreed to help me with my strength issues, and we met in the beautiful (beautiful to an athlete) gym at Portland Center for Athletic Excellence (which has the somewhat head-tilting acronym PACE to go with its name)—if you haven't been to PACE, you should go sometime. They gym floor is old-school astroturf, and there is a skull with crossed battleaxes on the wall, grinning at you through the unmistakable circle of chainring. Think Rocky crossed with Breaking Away and you're pretty much there. Don't laugh, though; there are several Stars-and-Bars jerseys on the wall and—be still, breath—a medium blue jersey enlivened by rainbow stripes. There are Olympic weight racks and buckets of foam rollers. Kettleballs and stability balls. It smells of chamois cream and chalk. That is, to anyone who loves sport, it is the most beautiful place in the world.

OK, enough overblown prose. Here's what Chris did to me:

Pushups on a stability ball ("the point isn't doing pushups," Chris said. "The point is holding your core in the right place while you do pushups. You've got strong arms. You can muscle out some pushups. But do you see that your hips are sagging? That means you're not working what you're trying to work. Do them from your knees.") Doing pushups from one's knees is a humbling thing. We all knew what we thought of the guys on our soccer teams long ago who did pushups from their knees. Sigh. I was able to do two sets of six before throwing in the towel.

Pullups from Olympic Rings: as cool as this sounds, this is actually a modified row exercise. You grab the rings and take about six steps backwards, so the rings' strap to the ceiling forms the hypoteneuse of a right triangle. You lean back so your arms are straight, and then you pull yourself forward, "keeping your elbows straight!" If you do this, you'll feel quite a burn between your shoulder-blades. As with the pushups, you've got to keep yourself plank straight.

Side Planks: pretty obvious, right? Still painful.

Standing Hip Abduction: Let me just say directly that I hate these. Here are Chris's directions:

1) Lift one foot off the floor (slight bend in the leg you’re standing on)
2) Lift the “up” leg out to the side
3) Slowly lower back to the start but keep the foot up in the air

Done correctly, this really, really hurts both sides of your hips. If you have "The hips of a fifteen year-old-girl, as I appear to do, this exercise really hurts.

Squats: I managed 2x12 reps at, oh, 65 pounds. I used to squat hundreds of pounds when I used to play soccer. Sigh.

Standing/Squatting Jump-Thingies: Here's how you do these.

1) Stand with knees bent, as if you're about to sit down on the toilet
2) Raise your arms in front of you, pointing straight out (unlike sitting down on the toilet)
3) Hop quickly for thirty seconds, landing "lightly" ("try not to make any sound when you land) so your quads soak up the contact. Don't aim for height. Aim for quality and speed.

Mountain Climbers: I basically couldn't do these, but Chris says the most important thing (for when I can actually do them) is not to touch one's toes to the ground at the top of the motion. Keep them in the air. It's harder.

Plyometrics: I did so many of these back in my goalkeeping days that it seems totally unfair to be doing plyos again. We did use those cool rope-ladder thingies that you see NFL players using on Nike ads on TV, the ones where each bead of sweat has been placed and lovingly photographed.

Combination Pushup-Walking with Superman: Say what? It's almost impossible.

OK, that's all for my running update for this week. Stay tuned for the Fantasy Tri minute on Friday.

Once [Never] A Runner?

I come back to John Parker Jr's running classic about once a year, mostly to remind myself that athletic success often comes with a steep price tag. You only have to read the scene in which Bruce Denton puts Quenton Cassidy through the following workout to discover if you even want to try to pay the price (actually paying the price, well, that takes even more guts).

3x(20x400 m @ race pace (55 sec/quarter) w/100 m jog between quarters and 400 m jog after every five quarters).

That's a simple equation, but for a runner of Cassidy's caliber (that's Jim Ryun or Steve Prefontaine or Adam Goucher) you're talking 15 miles at sub 4:00/mile pace with only the barest of recoveries. The whole workout works out to 19.25 miles, a brutal amount of work to be done on the track.

The thing is, you must be willing to go that deep if you actually care about winning in your sport. As I came off the bike on Saturday I felt a lot of things, rust being the predominant sensation. But more unsettling than forgetting that, in a race, you have to be prepared to work hard (how did I lose sight of that one?) was the sense that I just didn't know how to run.

I've run a lot over the past ten years. I remember the run that may have kicked off Chris Bagg's modern era of running. I had on a pair of yellow New Balance 1026s, which felt like beautiful slippers. I was a senior in college, living in a bizarre house off campus above an actress and a poli sci major named Vindhyia. I cruised out for a run on Vassar's Farm and came back feeling cracked open, as if breathing for the first time (I'd run before, but not with the same sense of timeliness and freedom). The awful year in D.C. followed, and my first marathon, and then countless half-marathons, triathlons, cycling races, open water swims, etc, etc...

But I don't think I know how to run.

You've seen people who know how to run. They run the way the Flintstones characters ran: an upper body held motionless, while legs turn in a blur below. No matter the terrain they flow up and over it, their shoes making no more than light scuff, scuff, scuff, scuff on the ground. Looking at the pictures from St. George, I see someone deeply afflicted by gravity, earthbound and irrevocably attached to the pavement. My face has none of a true runner's serenity.

I neglect a lot of the things that might make me a better runner: drills, cadence, core strength. I'm embarking, though, on a quest to become a true runner. That means losing some weight and building some strength. Look to these pages in the coming weeks to see how it's going. I'll try to keep you updated on my process.

IM St. George

IM St. George was this past Saturday, and I didn't finish. I could have trotted home in a 3:40—4:00 marathon, but I think that would have thrashed me for the next four weeks. Here's the email I sent to Cliff debriefing the race:

OK, I'm pretty disappointed, but here's my post-mortem on the race.

Swim: bright point of the day, actually. I made the second group, which was one of my goals going in. Luke Bell was way out in front (49 minutes), then there was a small group of 8 that contained Hoffman, Macdonald, Kotsegarov, Lieto, etc...I was in the second group that came in at 54:30, about three minutes back. Certainly within striking distance, since Michael Weiss and I came out of the water together.

Bike: too patient, I think. Averaging 246 watts for 112 is just way too low, I think. The wind was fierce, and I really, really don't go uphill very well if I'm being careful. I just felt like I shouldn't push too hard and I ended up putting in a 5:15 split. Feeling like one of the stronger cyclists out there, I think that's a pretty abysmal time. I felt like I was missing a gear in back, because I'd ride at, like, 95 RPM and shift up, but then not be able to turn over that higher gear (around 80 RPM). I'm pissed I rode just so far off the pace. I couldn't really go with anyone that passed me, and I was annoyed that anyone passed me at all.

Run: ugh. Within seconds of starting the run I knew I just didn't have it. My legs felt fine (after the first few hundred meters), but I just didn't...believe. My lungs felt pretty good, but I just couldn't get my legs turning. Then the hills and the wind took the rest out of me. I could have staggered home in 4:00 or so, but I didn't want to destroy my legs for the next month and post a 10+hour IM. I felt fit, but the body just wasn't ready. I feel like a car in which the engine is strong and the frame is decrepit and weak.

I'm frustrated, but I only have myself to blame. I do all the big picture training (putting in hours, working the intervals, etc...) but I'm terrible about strength training and run form. Here are a few areas I have to improve in:

Strength: I never do strength training. Part of it is not knowing what to do (so much information, so much of it conflicting) and part of it is habit/time. I'm not used to doing strength training and so I don't make it a regular part of my schedule. The guy who was working on my Achilles did some resistance tests and said: "You have the hip strength of a 15 year old girl."

Form: my form is poor. Running cadence is usually around 85-87, which I understand is just too low to run efficiently. I don't know what drills to do to improve this.

Weight: I'm too big. I look at the guys I race against and there is a definite difference. I think I could probably lose about 8-10 pounds safely. I don't have good resources about figuring out body fat, so I neglect keeping track of that.

Belief: I don't have any faith in myself as a runner. I don't feel like a runner, I don't think like a runner. When I'm on the bike I think "OK, who'm I gonna get next?" On the run I think "How far back is the guy behind me. Sigh. How many spaces will I give up on this run?"

I would really, really like to address this. If possible I'd like to go to Boise and be competitive (June 12) and then get on the podium at Pac Crest (June 26).

Frustrated, but ready to get working.

Chris

Race Week...

...It's race week. You can follow along on Saturday at www.ironman.com. Yes, the race coverage WTC tries to pass off as coverage (Anyone remember the opening scene of Sexy Beast, in which our hero's not very svelte (or sexy) hulk bakes under a pool-side sun? that's what the "coverage" WTC trots out every weekend is like: alarming and dismaying) sucks, but it least your friends and family know you're still alive.

I'll be resuming posting next Monday, since it'll be hard to walk.