November

[glaconman]

The main running event at RC last weekend was undoubtedley the Battle of Brighton. The 2nd round of a contest that knows no bounds and will, hopefully, stretch long into the future.

Meanwhile this RCer was preparing for another round-two of his own. A trip across the Pennines and through the Ribble valley for the 28th Preston 10 mile Road Race.

Certainly a very different event from the Bradford 10. That was a community event. Whereas here was a race made-up almost exclusively of club-runners. Not suprising given the pleasant but less-then-stimulating location (almost half the course was by the side of a dual-carriageway) and flat profile.

Here was a group of 365 or so runners pounding the pavements of suburban England with one thing on their minds: a PB.

The two-lap course was not the only thing that was different. I had fire in my blood for the Bradford 10. Partly because I was running round with an old friend. We pushed each other hard for 8 miles until he drifted off into the distance, leaving me to contemplate my 9 kilo handicap. There can be huge rivalry amongst close friends. Spoken or unspoken.

And there are enough races in the nearest 3 valleys to my home (Calder, Aire and Wharfe) to fill anybody's race calender twice over. In fact I doubt if there's anywhere in the country to compete with this corner of the West Riding as a hotspot of so much varied and interesting running. So why make the trip at all?

I wasn't sure. I could only presume I was there for the same reason as everybody else. So I took a deep breath and got on with it.

But I have to confess to liking this distance. I can just about convince myself that I'm enjoying it for around 45 minutes, until the mask slips and the mind-games are forced to begin. My splits were close to 50/50. Forcing myself into a corner seems to be the only way to find out how well I can run. It's just a question of not letting the wheels come off too soon or, preferably, not-at-all. And that takes some fine judgement.

For the record I did manage a PB: 63:21 in 49th place. I guess this won't end until I've run under an hour.

[marathondan]

Woohoo, 10 miles in 63 mins is serious bananas. Congratulations on another PB. Great to see that you think you have that extra 3:21 in you as well. So, training hard and returning next year to break the hour?

[glaconman]

Cheers Dan. Yes, I have to be pleased with that. Think it's time to park the 10 milers though for the time being and maybe have-a-go sometime next year at getting under 60. Would like to do some shorter stuff now. They shouldn't take as long to recover from

[El Gordo]

Crikey. Fantastic effort again. So your 10 mile time is about the equivalent of my current 10K time? Says it all. Mind you, I bet I beat you to the hour mark

You're in the form of your life. When sheer speed starts to drain a bit, I'd love to see you turn your attention to the longer distances. At your current rate, my trusty race time predictor reckons you could manage a sub-3 marathon.

Keep it up lad. It's great to read, and keeps us all motivated, I hope.

[glaconman]

Cheers EG.

I seem to be getting hamstring problems after running long or hard. So need to get to the bottom of that first. You've said it now though, haven't you? The thought never entered my mind that I might be able to run sub-3 for a mara. Here we go. Then again I could well end-up back on the sofa within a few months.

[El Gordo]

http://www.runningforfitness.org/calc/rp.php

[glaconman]

Made a short doco with The Mrs on one of our neighbours if anybody interested ...

Short Film

[glaconman]

Hampered with injury my running adventures have come to a temporary halt. I was crippled after Preston with sore hamstrings behind my right knee.

Ah well, I'm viewing this as what those across The Pond would refer to as a "Wake-up Call".

So it's daily stretching for me and a sudden interest in Yoga which I could never be arsed with in the past .

I'm also looking at the Pose Method of running in an attempt to change my slightly rubbish style. This vid does a pretty good explanation:

Pose Technique

Hopefully this won't last too long and it will do me some good in the long run.

[El Gordo]

Crikey GM, you're a one-man cinema. In 20 minutes, you've peddled me all sorts of ideas, and aroused curiosities I didn't know existed.

Really enjoyed 'Uncle David'.

Or did I?

What I mean is, what a remarkable fellow, but how sad that he has to do what he does. It's inspirational, or should be, but I ended up feeling slightly gloomy and annoyed with myself. Annoyed that my instinct is to regard someone with his concerns and attitude as slightly barmy, even though he's probably a lot saner than most of us. I'd like to shake his hand -- as long as he takes his condom glove off first.

Good film, and as you can see, thought-provoking. Well done to all three of you.

And the running one made me think as well. There's so much we can do to try to improve. I'll follow this up, just to satisfy my curiosity.

Sorry to hear about the hamstring. Remember that sports massage isn't just for southern jessies.

[Mid Life Crisis Marathon Man]

Made a short doco with The Mrs on one of our neighbours if anybody interested ...

Short Film

Would love to watch this but I'm not having any luck ... "content does not seem to be working" is the only message I'm getting. Do you have it online anywhere else?

[El Gordo]

Made a short doco with The Mrs on one of our neighbours if anybody interested ...

Short Film

Would love to watch this but I'm not having any luck ... "content does not seem to be working" is the only message I'm getting. Do you have it online anywhere else?

Hmm, it's a BBC site so perhaps there are licensing issues similar to non-UK resident viewers not being able to see the magnificent iPlayer.

[glaconman]

[/quote]

Would love to watch this but I'm not having any luck ... "content does not seem to be working" is the only message I'm getting. Do you have it online anywhere else?
[/quote]

There's a 10min version here MLCM

[Sweder]

I very much enjoyed 'Uncle David' - beautifully made. I share his sentiments re: rubbish and people's attitudes towards it.
There's an element of OCD here; the clocks give it away. Goes to show OCD's not always a bad thing. Hugely enjoyable, timeless piece.

[Sweder]

I'm also looking at the Pose Method of running in an attempt to change my slightly rubbish style. This vid does a pretty good explanation:

Pose Technique

Very interesting series; there's one on hillrunning too. I thought about what he was showing us and realised that Stevio in our Brighton group has a similar style - very economical, he never looks like he's trying yet he's always very hard to keep up with. There's something to this, but as I found out with the barefoot experiment you need huge amounts of patience and discipline to change your style.

Bad luck on the injuries. I don't mean to sound glib when I say it was inevitable but at 'our time of life' it just is. You've made remarkable progress in a relatively short space of time. As you say time to ramp up your recovery/ prevention techniques too.

[Bierzo Baggie]

Wonderful little film that, "Uncle David". I had the same problem as MLCM and could only watch the excerpt on Youtube.

He'd have his work cut out around here. Ponferrada is full of litter, grafitti, dog shite... and it's getting worse. Sadly the illness of our consumer society and its throwaway culture is everywhere now.

Don't actually think that Uncle David is any more eccentric than us runners. And his little hobby's probably a lot more useful...

[Seafront Plodder]

....................I'm also looking at the Pose Method of running in an attempt to change my slightly rubbish style. This vid does a pretty good explanation:

Pose Technique

Hopefully this won't last too long and it will do me some good in the long run.

Well what a surprise that was. If there's something that hasn't been analysed to the flippin' Nth degree, you can be bloody sure the yanks will be onto it.

[glaconman]

Thanks for watching the film and appreciate the comments. I think his eccentricity is to be celebrated. Behind that he's trying to raise-the-bar and hope that others who feel the same will also act.

I know what you're saying SP although I think it was a Russion coach who originally put the ideas together. But there's something about it that appeals to my common-sense and tells me it's worth looking into.

Am hoping Dan will have something to say. We need a forthright engineer on this one.

[Mid Life Crisis Marathon Man]

Sorry I don't buy this at all. The guy's talking a load of illogical nonsense:

• His flat tyre analogy is actually out of context: by leaning as you run, you increase your exposure to gravity which forces you to work harder;
  
• you do *not* drag yourself forward to meet your foot fall - this is done almost completely through momentum;
  
• falling forwards for motion achieves nothing more than a fight with gravity; you need power off your forward foot as it comes under your body for forward motion. Falling is falling: downwards, not forwards.
  

Just look at Michael Johnson and Usain Bolt - they run upright, chuck their front foot right out there and just happen to be the two fastest runners ever.

Coach MLCMan.

[marathondan]

The flat tyre analogy did indeed seem a bit out of place. But I was somewhat convinced when, at around 1:50, he says "any time I land in front of a forward moving body, I'm stopping it." This seems to make sense. All forces can be resolved into an x and y component (assuming I'm running in a perfectly straight line). When my foot strikes the ground, there is a y component which reacts to gravity and my downward momentum (stopping me falling down), and an x component which, at the point of impact, is indeed reacting to my forward momentum (slowing me down). The complication comes when my hip pivots, and as I push off, that x component is no longer a backward force but a forward force.

I haven't seen the rest of the film (Uncle David is next on my watch list, and I'm going to bed in a minute), so I don't know exactly where he's going with this. But the logical conclusion would be to footfall as far back as possible, resulting in a barely controlled stumble. If you could indeed control that, would it be more efficient? It sounds like there are a lot of factors at play, and simple analysis on a whiteboard isn't going to give a true answer. Somebody must have a computer model somewhere.

MLCM, I don't think you can increase your exposure to gravity without changing your mass (F=mg). Maybe I didn't get what you meant... But I agree that gravity cannot make you go forward. Only motive force or momentum (which must be topped up by motive force) can do that.

[El Gordo]

Dan took the words out of my mouth