Training Like The Pros: The Gold Standard

When you train for a significant event, like a marathon or, I’m assuming, an Ironman or the like, suddenly “train like the pros” is a phrase that seems to pop out everywhere. This is partially because it’s one of the multibillion-dollar fitness industry’s ploys to get you to buy a bunch of crap you don’t need. The reality is, the pros may or may not use that special diet, they may or may not use whatever absurd ab-crunch-wiz-meister-machine they’re responsible for touting as one of their endorsements, and they may or may not train with a particular type of endurance drink, energy gel, or other product…at least not exclusively. One part of their reality you can virtually guarantee is their coaching.

What sets the pros apart from the rest of us “athletes”, aside from muscular structure some of us would literally kill for, kitchens outfitted with scales measuring down to 1/32 of a pound for properly controlling their food intake, and the best of the best of the best—and their choice among those—training equipment under the sun, is their coaching. They’ve got anything from one to several to a small army of individuals goading them, riding along their routes with them when they want them to, leaving them alone when they want them to, cajoling, wheedling, barking orders at the, well, basically, doing whatever it takes to get—and keep—them in peak condition. Think about Lance Armstrong, well, the guy’s an athletic idol and should be worshipped properly, but standing ever so slightly in his shadow is his coach, and Lance would be nowhere without Carmichael. He’d still be riding dirt roads in Plano, Texas and Americans would still never know the great sporting event known as the Tour de France as anything more than, “What? That bike race?” And it’s a symbiotic relationship; nobody’d know Carmichael without Lance either, but at some level or another, behind every great athlete is some great coaching mechanism, whether it’s a nutritionist, a strength trainer, a training strategist or all of the above. If it’s all of the above AND they’re getting up with you to do your eight-mile route at six o’clock in the morning with a car full of sport drink, water and Balance bars, well, then, they’re a coach. Or at least they’re part of a coaching mechanism. Most of these coaches get paid very well to do these kinds of things, in part because even the world’s greatest athletes don’t have friends good enough to do this kind of stuff for them, in part because the athletes can afford it and in part because, well, because they bring along a lot of other helpful information as well…like maximizing use of your heart rate at certain stages of your race, gait analysis, approaches to nutrition, research into injuries, stuff mortal men—or mortal athletes—can’t be bothered with.

As a pseudo-athlete, as I refer to myself with a wry grin, I have neither the financial capacity nor the skill set to require such a person, or set of people, in my life. My boyfriend recently hired some “help” in his Ironman training, a person he won’t refer to as a coach but whose role mimics that kind of support structure, but he’s much more an athlete than I am. If you look at our calves, you see what I mean: his are cut, defined, well-shaped and perfectly toned, and mine are…well, they’re getting there. That’s a good enough measurement for me, and though Gregory laughs, it’s rather telling as well. Gregory functions as my sort of coach; when he’s here he provides good motivation for me to work out (kinda hard to back out of a four-mile run when your boyfriend is taking on a three-hour bike ride followed by two hours of pace running), assistance in analyzing and treating minor injuries, advice on nutrition and training plans and whether or not I’m going to be able to actually do this thing. With him a zillion miles away in France, however, and myself now on vacation at my father’s house, I’ve become so spoiled rotten in the last two days of training alone that I’m not so sure drop bags or even the luxury of using Greg’s condo as a water/Accelerade/snack stop are going to do it for me when I get back to Boulder.

Visiting my father has always meant him having to adjust his work schedule to try to get as much vacation time off as possible as well as, generally, a decent amount of time on my own at his house, kind of left to my own devices. Since his diagnosis with leukemia a year and a half ago, and subsequent battle with/recovery from the cancer, rendered him first on full-time disability and now only able to do work from home, things around here have changed a lot. I haven’t been out to visit since Dad’s diagnosis, and a few things hit me with some degree of shock: the fact that the kitchen has been turned into a half-kitchen, half-pharmacy, the five times a day my dad has to take massive amounts of medication to keep the bone marrow transplant in check as well as the cancer in remission, the catheter implanted in my father’s chest…it all came as a huge shock especially to me, as my only experience of his disease has been through him telling me about what’s been going on, and that has been largely censored. While I appreciate my father’s trying to shelter me from the harsh realities of his battle, it all kind of culminated in a tearful first night for me, crying with my dad over everything that had changed.

In one way, though, at least, his leukemia did benefit me, or at least me the marathoner-in-training. Not to say I wouldn’t give anything, including my legs and/or my ability to run ever again, for my father to be healthy, but in light of present circumstances, my dad’s illness, in restricting his ability to work outside of home, has become a boon to my training. As Dad’s been going a little stir-crazy, the opportunity to go out and help train me has helped fill the time a bit for him.

For me, it’s meant that I am getting the absolute gold standard in training. Every half-mile or so I run, Dad’s waiting for me in his Kia Sportage, hazards flashing in the early morning or dusk twilight. The hazards have become what I look for, what encourages me and pushes me forward, as well as the driver’s side window rolling down and Dad’s head popping out, asking, “What do you need? Do you need water? The stuff?” (“The stuff” being his phrase for a metabolic booster beverage that tastes absolutely awful but enhances my stamina like nothing else.) Sometimes he gets out of the car—with the protective mask he now sports covering his mouth—and holds out water bottles, “the stuff” in one hand, Gatorade in another, my Camelbak filled with icy water hanging from his elbow. Sometimes I run right by, but a lot of the time I take full advantage of the luxury treatment I’m receiving and stop for a dousing of water, or sport drink, or on longer runs, a bite or two of an energy bar.

Training here is probably going to come with its setbacks as well…mostly, these will manifest when I get back to Colorado and have to return to high-altitude, meaning low-oxygen, training in the arid heat of early August. On the up side, I definitely won’t miss the humidity or the oppressive heat it brings, beating down on a runner’s body at all sides. I will miss the soundtrack of the Carolina outdoors, though, as so many crickets, katydids, birds, bugs and other creatures create an amazing racket that just completely fills the ears like prairie dogs’ whistles—my usual Colorado soundtrack—cannot. Most of all, though, I’ll miss my training buddy sitting out there in his car, hazards flashing, encouraging me with water, sport drinks, and most of all, an ear-to-ear grin that tells me how happy he is that I’m here. Nothing quite motivates like that kind of spirit, and that I will certainly miss the most.

Papaki

This post has been a long time coming. I've kind of been waiting for awhile to write this, ever since I found out my ex-boyfriend, Bob, would be moving to San Francisco at the end of this month. Call it denial or call it...well, denial, there's really no other word for it. This is what happens when the most monumental force outside of your family is suddenly gone.

To be fair, we haven't hung out regularly in over two years, when our relationship ended with a fight every five minutes. At the same time, I could pick up the phone and call him anytime. We had a relatively amicable break-up...well, we had a dozen relatively amicable break-ups and a couple that weren't so friendly, but the final one, the doozy, was pretty friendly, and we've stayed on good terms ever since. As much as we'd been through in the nearly four years we were together, I kind of felt like he'd never be really too far out of my reach. I guess that shows my age well. I'm only twenty-three, and Bob is thirty-four, though he is more like a thousand and one intellectually and twenty-five socially, emotionally and physically. He's absolutely great-looking, he works out like a maniac and has ripped pecs, abs and arms to show for it. He's one of the smartest people I've ever known. He was almost the one, almost Mr. Right, almost the perfect boyfriend. He was sweet and brilliant and funny and romantic and head-over-heels in love with me.

And sometimes he was cynical, cngry over nothing, negative, and would bitch over absolutely anything. His friends used to call him "The Preacher"...need I say more? It's not that he didn't have anything smart to say, or that he hated life...quite the opposite. Bob existed in that paradoxical realm where he loved life but hated the people he had to share it woth. Fellow students, jocks, sorority girls ("sorostitutes", we'd joke), rich kids, basically anyone who wasn't foreign or anti-society. The foreigners and the punks, that's who we wanted to hang out with. People who had culture and people who desperately wanted to. And sometimes succeeded.

I was, of course, as smitten with him as he was with me. He wasn't my first love, but he was my first adult love. He showed me that relationships don't have to end just because a couple breaks up, that you really can be "just friends" even when your past leaves something to be desired. He taught me that the amount of fighting is directly proportional to the amount of making up, times three whenever possible. He was the first--and only!--man I've ever spent an entire weekend in bed with, just curled up under the covers, venturing out only for sustenance and then, rarely. He's the only person outside of my parents to give me a bath. He taught me the meaning of compromise, and he showed me how to be myself...and even though that is what drove me away in the end, I can never thank him enough for it. He taught me never to settle for less than what I expected and to push for more if that's what I really wanted. He introduced me to punk rock, Japanese hardcore and the Beatles. Also reggae, ska, surf, trip-hop and psychedelia, as well as the coolest drum & bass I've ever heard. Through him I was introduced to David Cross, George Carlin and other funny, angry comedians.

I wonder, now, after all this time, what he got out of it? I can go on listing forever the benefits and consequences-both good and bad-of being with Bob for so long. Thanks to Bob I got to go to Europe; we found a kitten there and brought her back with us and now she's my cat. I'll never look at SKataki and not think of him. Or flip thorugh my CD collection, or hear a slam on Fox News or some rude anti-Republican remark, without my brain going instantly to Bob. He is the rare sort of person who stops crowds when he opens his mouth, who thinks before he speaks, stands up for what he believes in and only backs down from fights when he's in imminent danger...and sometimes not then either. He is passionate about his beliefs and convictions and doesn't admit defeat easily. He is one of the smartest, most talented and wisest people I've ever been fortunate enough to know. Even though it pains me to see him go and I know I will miss him, I'm happy for him. Or at least, I'm trying to be. Human beings are selfish by nature and I'm no exception. I want Papaki here where I can call him up to go grab a beer anytime, or go for a hike. Or hang out and listen to records. Or watch movies. Or bitch about the general state of the world these days. Or anything. He'll read this, maybe, at some point, and think yeah, right, when's the last time we did any of that. Time is fleeting and I'm sure that once he's gone, I'll have a better sense of how much I miss him. That's how absence works...you never feel it until they're gone. For real.

Bob leaves in two days to go see his family, then I leave to go see mine, then when I'm off visiting my zillions of sibs and nieces and nephews and my dad and stepmother on the East coast, he leaves for San Fran. We're going to try to get together tomorrow night. I'd like to see him once more before he goes. It's a strange thing to think of how much you put into something, and what it is to you once it's over. I don't believe that anything in life is ever so permanent you can close the book on it and for all I know twenty years from now we'll run across each other and become close again. For now, though, it makes me sad to know he's leaving. And at the same time, I hope that his new home has more to offer than this place. Part of me doesn't want him to leave, but a greater part of me would never stop him.

Just miss him.

Hitting The Wall

After yesterday's caffeinated psychosis led to a middle-of-the-night run and a brain buzz so solid that at three a.m., feeling as if my brain was boiling, I alternately blogged away and e-mailed my boyfriend as I felt my cranium simmer in its own juices. Today I took it a LITTLE easier: one latte and two Mountain Dews only. And I finished them before two p.m. And I didn't finish the latte at all. Anyway, that plus an hour and a half of sleep last night plus a grueling day at work plus necessary trips to two grocery stores postwork all added up to one very busy, tired Dondi. On top of which, well, I've had cramps that could cripple a rhino all day and upon arriving home and readying myself for the eight-miler before me, I found that they weren't getting any better. Oh well, I decided. I had a little snack because I was starving, waited a little while so I wasn't running on a still-digesting stomach, and headed out.

Off and on for the first two miles I felt a little weird, but okay. I'd definitely eaten too soon before running and my stomach bouncing up and down along with the rest of me wasn't helping the digestive process. The cramps weren't as steady or relentless but when they DID hit it was like a ton of bricks set on fire in my lower abdomen...and then they'd subside in a few minutes. I was walking a lot but at a decent pace, and I still planned on finishing the run.

At two and a half miles, I hit a wall. Suddenly the term "bonking" that serious athletes use to describe what happens when everything either just freezes up or shuts down was completely and entirely defined for me. When I was running as a kid, I never bonked. This is an adults-only affliction. Even if kids do hit the wall it's rare, and they usually don't know it anyway. As a kid you've got the capability to push your body to the max and it's created to compensate for that. The human body has evolved, like everything else, to cope with the stress of age on the physical form. One result is that we shut things down more quickly when we're pushed too hard as adults. The last time I was a serious runner was when I was twelve years old...bonking, hitting the wall, whatever you want to call it didn't exist. Between my awesome recovery rate and the fact that because I'm a total pansy and don't want to risk an asthma attack I don't push myself unnecessarily, I just figured bonking was an experience I'd either gloss over entirely or not have to enjoy for awhile.

Boy, was I wrong. The combination of the heat, exercise, snakc, cramps, fatigue and stress at two-point-five miles all came together and formed one big, scary--though completely invisible to everyone but me--wall. It was nearly literal, in fact I think it probably would've described what was going on inside of me if I looked to the causal onserver as if I literally had run into a wall in the middle of the path, just...BAM!...and she's down and out.

When I hit I was running a reasonable pace, but nothing race-paced style or crazy. Suddenly my stomach turned to a clenched fist around a core of hot lead, accompanied by a mild crunching sound. Yeah, the sound at least was probably all in my head, but that was all it took. My legs froze, my hands froze (in mid-pump, no less) and my stomach...well, my stomach boiled over. I managed to lean over to the side of the path and scramble a step or two away from it before my breakfast, lunch and snack came up all at once. Once I finished there, the bile came up next. Somewhere in the middle of it all my bowels threatened to unleash, and I at once saw a flash-frozen image of me hobbling home with a massive brown sticky spot on the back of my shorts. I at least held that much together.

I think I threw up four times. It got so bad I called Peter to ask if he was nearby and could provide a quick rescue in case I needed one. Friends in this world are hard enough to come by, but friends good enough to rescue a tired, sweat-drenched, fatigued runner reeking of sweat and bile are absolutely worth their weight in gold. And platinum. Combined. Fortunately for the sake of my pride and Peter's stomach, I was able to struggle home on my own.

The worst part, though, was that after the second or third violent purge my stomach decided to force to ensure I wasn't ever going to forget, or eat before running, run tired and fatigued, stressed out and cramped, again, I almost collapsed on the path. I sat down and put my head between my knees to stop the world from spinning. I heard rhythmic footsteps approach behind me, and turned slightly to see three real runners approaching.

I feel the same way around real runners that I do around real cyclists. Awkward, large and clumsy, I try to hide my flabby legs and poorly-shaped, slowly-coming-to-form calf muscles and avoid their glances as much as possible. (With real cyclists, I put my head down and pedal my huge cruiser by as fast as I can, ignoring the looks that could be cast in my direction.) This time, though, I was clearly in trouble, and while these two men and one woman carried the form I craved and the muscle tone I would kill for, they were apparently, aside from demi-gods of running in my mind, kind enough and human enough to stop or at least, for one of the men to jog in place and ask if I was okay. I replied that I was and smiled weakly, then scraped myself up off of the pavement and wandered on, jogging, walking, running, and puking my way home.

Later I recalled what I was thinking of when it all hit: Gregory's blog and the post he wrote on the Wildflower triathlon. He bonked on the ride and described the unpleasantness of it all succinctly, and that's when I realized that, if nothing else, I was well on my way to becoming a real runner. Hitting the wall meant if nothing else that I was hard-core enough to train regardless of really lousy, should've-caused-me-to-think-again circumstances involving the condition my body was in. Now, I don't know whether to thank my wonderful boyfriend or smack him. Fortunately for him, he's a few continents and an ocean away in France with his family and I love him too much to smack him for inspiring a healthy Dondi anew. Hey, you can't date a triathlete and be a generally unhealthy individual. You don't have to compare heart rates and VO2 maxes or even train together (especially when you can't even pace him) or share the same sports, but you do have to keep an interest in being a rather healthy individual (news flash, G: one Milky Way or donut a week doesn't make you unhealthy, hate to break it to you, babe) in general. It's just one of those things that you kind of have to have in common. I'm glad I didn't meet Gregory during my partying years.

The other very important information I remember about that particular post is that it was largely centered around the idea of mind over matter. Which was also true for me. I was completely done, strung out, gone on everything that eventually brought me, quite literally--a few times--(and I digress on further descriptions; you can all breathe a sigh of relief) to my knees, but I continued on. I continued on to purge further at times, much to my chagrin, but also to walk home and not have to rely on a good friend for a ride home in the end. I even ran a bit more. But I got there on my own. Mind over matter...even when the matter is something you'd rather not be forced to deal with.

But most importantly, I was reminded of the power inherent in a good friend. Nothing gets you back on top of your game like knowing that no matter what kind of shit shape you might be in, no matter how lousy you look and feel, whether or not you smell so badly you may make your friendretch, they'll pick you up off of the trail, haul your ass home and if you're in bad enough shape, probably stick around until you drink enough Recharge or Cytomax to at least get some fluids and electrolytes moving through you and are fully conscious again. I'm glad I reached my door by myself, mostly to make sure my good friendship with Peter was preserved through the evils of athletic smellydom but also because it really did prove mind over matter, but I am more grateful that I have a friend or two in mind--and with phone numbers plugged into my cell, which gets tucked into my Camelbak and goes with me when I run--who would come to my rescue when necessary. I have only a few, Shawn, Peter, and Kelly come to mind, but they'd give me the shirt off of their backs or at least a ride home from a terrifyingly halted run, albeit with all the windows in the car down, anytime I needed one. You only need a few, but they light up your whole world and make you smile again even when you're trudging along a bike trail at the side of a state highway, sick as a dog and ready to call it quits altogether. I think the knowledge that you have a rescue makes it easier to get home in the end...knowing that you've got that "safety net" makes it okay to push a little bit harder. So thanks, Peter. I didn't get anywhere near my eight miles but you did make it possible for me to get home by myself tonight...if for no other reason than I would feel incredibly bad for inflicting myself on you at the time. But mostly, knowing I had a safety net made it possible to try to soar again, even with a metaphorical broken wing. Thanks for that. Good friends are hard to come by, and absolutely essential to hang onto.

A Caffeine Binge...and a Dramatic Overhaul

When I was in high school and perhaps before that, caffeine was my friend. Between working forty-hour weeks at a grocery store in my adopted hometown, pulling a full load of high school courses and taking a class at Colorado State University, caffeine was my best friend, first in the form of NoDoz and later more subliminally, as a latte or a Coca-Cola. Collegiate years found me waiting for the bus at my dorm or later, apartment, with a cottle of Coke in hand or, if I'd pulled an all-nighter, a Starbucks Doubleshot. During my last week of finals of my senior year of college, I worked fifty hours at my job, took all of my finals, and subsisted almost entirely on java and sugar.

What the hell happens to your body between graduation and two years later? Somewhere in there I hit a wall. Caffeine, no longer a boon to my success, turned against me. If I drank coffee later than noon I'd be up all night. Life at an office rather than life sprinting around a small grocery store exacerbated these effects, and recently, I've been terrified to go down to the office cafeteria and use our extraordinarily expensive espresso machine any later than nine a.m. This is probably a good thing. Depending on what report you read, caffeine is either the worst substance known to man and can create greater devastation among the human populus than a nuclear holocaust, or is the harginer of success, fame and fortune. Taking into account my body's chemistry as well as such contrasting evidence, I tend to remain in the "moderation is key" social order and drink espresso when I am really dragging and otherwise swig a Coke or two during the day.

This is, of course, up until now whem at 2:22 in the morning, I find myself composing far-too-chatty e-mails to my boyfriend Gregory who, eight hours away in the midst of his morning in Paris hasn't the slightest clue that his girlfriend has gone off of the insomniac's deep end and, well, writing this blog. Let this be a lesson to the java-holics like myself out there: too much of a good thing IS possible, and can have dire consequences.

Late in the Fourth of July long weekend I learned that my pseudo-superior, our Pricing promotions coordinator, who I effectively work under/assist, was going to be out for the duration of this week with a family emergency. Armed with that knowledge I set out to work yesterday morning at 7:15 a.m., chugging a Starbucks Doubleshot to wake me up sufficiently for the day. Around ten-thirty I got a double-espresso latte at my office cafeteria, and throughout the day I drank two 20-oz. Mountain Dew sodas, which contain the highest consumer caffeine content available in soda form except for Jolt!, which either doesn't exist anymore or can only be found in certain areas (like the convenience-store equivalent to a video0store "back room"). Upon arriving home after nearly twelve hours at work I wrote for a bit, fed the cat, ate some dinner and went to bed. Or so I thought.

The chemicals coursed through me like a solar flare. I couldn't sleep. Tossing and turning, I finally turned to some academic reading, thinking that nothing would make me sleep like the biography of Ataturk, which is terribly fascinating to me but only if I'm in the right frame of mind. Apparently enough chemical stimulants will get you there...after three chapters (of which I believe I've retained nothing) I find myself at my computer, blogging away and writing e-mail to Gregory in France. I even went for a jog about an hour ago to no avail...blood pumping vigorously merely increases the high, and while I am starting to think a serious sedative, like the bottle of Skyy in my freezer, is going to be the only way I sleep, I dare not drink now, having to be awake and alert (or at least appearing to be alert) for my early day at work tomorrow. Today, rather.

While I've no doubt that caffeine has its benefits, both to the extremely overworked and the endurance athlete (both titles I will attain daily this week) overuse can make you miserable. So if there ARE any athletes besides Gregory reading this blog, do yourselves a favor: unless you're falling asleep at your desk, keep the java to a minimum. Say no to the neon-green beverage. And for God's sake, stay away from the Starbucks Doubleshot. You can down one in the two minutes it took me to get to work today (thank you, Gregory, and your lovely vehicle), and the effects are more potent that you want to realize.