Year: 2015

racing · running

The cost of races, or the ice cream 5 km that wasn’t (for Sam anyway)

Sam B8 Comments

One of the things runners always say in running’s favour is that it’s cheap and easy. Unlike cycling, there’s no expensive bike required. Unlike swimming, it needn’t be the exact right temperature and you don’t have to have access to a pool or a body of water.

Just running shoes and some suitable clothes and off you go.

Or in my case add Garmin running watch, running hat, iPod, and fancy socks. But that’s just me, being princess-y, as Nat might say.

So I’m good with the line that running is cheap and easy. But racing? Racing is not. I’m often shocked at the price of running events. After all, it’s not like they take very long. The range for a local 5 km fun race is probably 20-40 minutes. That’s barely the time it takes to watch ads and trailers before a movie.

But they’re not cheap.

I said that if my knee wasn’t bothering me after Kincardine which was 6 km of running that I might do a local race or two this summer to focus my attention on speed. Mallory said she might even do it with me.

In the end I decided not to. Here’s my status update from Facebook this weekend, “So I was going to do the ice cream 5 km on Sunday but it’s $40 and while it’s all you can eat ice cream, that’s a lot more than I can eat. Also, it’s not for charity. And there’s a heat advisory. So that’s a lot of money when I could run 5 km by myself earlier in the cooler part of the day and buy myself an ice cream cone later. Might have just talked myself out of it.”

Who is behind the ice cream run? It’s Run The District | I Run For Ice Cream, part of a series organized by the Western Fair. I liked the look of it. It’s nearish to my house and the races sounded fun.

Western Fair District is excited to launch a new road race series titled RUN THE DISTRICT, presented by New Balance London and Investors Group that will appeal to all ages and all abilities.

The five race series takes place throughout 2015, with each race beginning and ending in the District. The five races are tied to themes relevant to activities in the District, in hopes of expanding the District’s sports entertainment products and develop new running opportunities for racing enthusiasts or those just looking to have some fun in London and surrounding communities.

The Run the District Race Series is designed to be fun, entertaining and encourage sports and fitness in the communities the District serves. Each race will provide food, prizes and a chance to be entertained.

Men will have the opportunity to participate in four races, while the ladies will have five races. Fun Runs are available at select dates.

To be clear, this isn’t a complaint that private companies are running races. Go for it! More power to you! I did the Warrior Dash and loved it. I’ve ridden more than my fair share of pricey Gran Fondo rides. But this doesn’t feel worth it.

And this isn’t a complaint against people who made a different decision, presented with the same facts.

It’s also not about the all you can eat ice cream. That didn’t even register since I can’t ever eat more than one ice cream cone. I love ice cream. It’s one of my favourite summer foods but it’s also one of those foods that has its own limit built it. I feel done after a small cone.

And I’m not worried as many people are about the Colour Runs, that this was trying pass itself off as a charity run. It’s not and they’re clear about that. See Nat’s post Philanthropy and Fitness about doing your background work before running for a cause.

This is me being frugal, thinking about cost and about accessibility and about value for money.

I started to wonder too about how odd it sounded to me to say that a race was too pricey. It’s not as if I don’t have the money. But we all have to make choices. For some people though those choices are more serious than others. We don’t do anyone any favours by keeping quiet about cost and finances. So in light of that, I hereby resolve to talk more openly about money and about how the fun things we do that we talk about on the blog cost. Money matters to lots of people and to not mention it is to participate in a weird kind of income/class privilege. So when I’m blogging about triathlons and Gran Fondos etc, I’ll talk price. Not sure I’m quite ready to talk about bike costs. Baby steps!

To that end, let me give a huge shout out to MEC for their local race series: “We are hosting five inexpensive running races at different locations throughout London’s beautiful park system. The MEC Race Series is designed to keep costs low for runners in our community. A registration fee of $15 gets you a measured and certified route, professionally-timed results and fun times at the finish line! Custom medals will be awarded to top finishers in each category. This year we have two half marathons in both Road and Trail options!” You had the option of doing all 5 races for $60.

No colours, no costumes, no mud, no ice cream, just your standard issue vanilla race. And that’s okay with me.  (See my past musing on trends in racing, Mud, zombies, and brightly coloured dye: Are the days of the vanilla 5 km over?)

I think come Halloween I’ll do the MEC race. See you there!

And I’m curious, what’s the most you’ll pay for  5 km race?

Weekends with Womack

Bibs vs. bike shorts for women: no contest, the bibs have it

catherine w13 Comments

This week I got my newest bibs in the mail and tried them out.

No, I don’t mean the ones to minimize baby meal mess.

I mean something like these:

bibs-mine

In nature, with a person in them (in this case, me) complete with jersey, helmet and bike, they look like this:

me-in-bibs

Many readers of this blog who are cyclists or triathletes no doubt already own cycling shorts. And if you ride a bike often but haven’t taken the spandex plunge, I can’t recommend it highly enough. Wearing spandex shorts makes cycling so much more comfortable in lots of ways. They provide coverage and a smooth and tight fit without seams, chafing, flapping, etc. And of course the chamois inside provides a bit (but not too much) padding to make extended saddle time comfortable.

Well, if you liked cycling shorts, you’ll love bib shorts. I bought my first pair a couple of years ago and almost never wear my regular cycling shorts anymore.

Why, you might ask?

On principle of not reinventing the wheel here, another cyclist blogger has already made the general case for bib shorts here.  However, my favorite reasons for wearing them are the following:

Advantage 1): They are very well-behaved and stay in place—no tugging, hitching, or pulling needed.

Advantage 2): They help provide full coverage during a ride, even if your jersey rides up or moves around, because they are higher waisted (with no waistband, just continuous fabric through the suspenders).

Advantage 3:) They feel smoother, sleeker (perhaps even a teeny bit faster), because they’re a little tighter and hold you in place. For me, bibs on the bike make me feel like a speedo does in the pool—sleek and smooth, rather than flappy or scrunched or wadded up. The fabric is taut and held in place by the suspenders, and the jersey lies flatter against it.

Advantage 4): Some bibs even come with a little radio pocket. And if you’re not busy using it to for your race radio to get tactical advice from your team manager, you can use it to stow your phone. That’s handy.

In fairness to opponents of bib shorts, though, here are some standard objections to them, along with my replies.

Objection 1): Bibs make bathroom breaks a big pain.

Reply 1): In some ways, yes—you have to take off your jersey (which may not have a full zipper, as most women’s jerseys don’t, for reasons which passeth understanding). But you get used to it, and honestly, the no-waistband feature makes them easier to get smooth when putting yourself back together.

Objection 2): Bib shorts are hotter than regular shorts because of the extra fabric for the suspenders and higher waist.

Reply 2): Honestly, when I’m cycling, I sweat a bunch anyway, so I can’t really tell that bibs are any hotter than shorts. I’ve even mountain biked in the summer in them, when one gets maximally hot, and they seem about the same. Pro cyclists wear them, and even wear an under layer beneath their jerseys, and they don’t seem to mind. So there…

Objection 3): Bibs often cost twice as much as regular cycling shorts.

Reply 3): Yep, that’s a fact. But if you’re into cycling, this shows that you’re already willing to lay down some serious money for a recreational sport. Take heart—at least cycling gear and equipment costs less than polo, Formula one/Grand Prix auto racing, and yachting. That’s something. Besides, they do go on sale—I got a deal on two pairs last week.

Objection 4): So if you like bibs so much, how do you account for all those sex-kitten photos of women wearing them topless?

Reply 4): You know, not everything is my fault. Besides, bibs don’t exploit women; stupid cheesecake photographers and misogynistic marketing people exploit women.

One last bib shorts etiquette note: if you’re likely to be photographed wearing bibs (and about to cross the finish line, triumphant), make sure to zip up your jersey first.  Don’t let this happen to you:

jersey unzipped

So readers:  do you wear bibs?  Do you hate bibs?  Do you wish all your pants had suspenders?  I’d like to know.

Sat with Nat · swimming

Swimming with friends

natalieh (she/her)3 Comments

11709521_10155775162830113_6323445869823567017_nI’ll let you in on a little secret, I probably haven’t done lane swimming with friends in over 20 years. Sure, back in Royal Military College circa 1994, I did laps with the triathlon club under the guidance of our most awesome coach Jake. Looking back though, I’ve mostly done laps alone or with my partner Michel. I love swimming but the whole face in the water thing makes it the least social of all the cardio activities I do. Cycling can offer occasions to chat. Running, well, with running I mostly listen and try to keep my asthma at bay.

I’m a moderately competent swimmer who hasn’t had coaching or training in nearly twenty years but, as I’ve said before I love to swim! This summer the evening lane swim at my neighbourhood pool was cancelled but it turns out the pool in Old South (near Phyllis, Samantha, Mallory and Tracy) has a great swim at 8 pm every night.

I put the call out on facebook and a few friends have joined me in the evening. Some are more skilled swimmers than me and others are looking for some ideas on how to move through the water. It’s a bit weird to be offering ideas to my athletic friends but also fun because I like fostering the joy of swimming in others.

I don’t do speed work when I’m in the pool with friends, I focus on technique, drills and discussing strategies for triathlons. I especially work on feeling comfortable in the water regardless of stroke or technique. I think sometimes, for the sake of efficiency, triathlon training focuses almost exclusively on front crawl to the athlete’s detriment.  I get it. Pool time is in short supply and there’s all those other things like running, cycling and weights to do.But I remember Jake’s sage advice “Train all the strokes, you never know when you’ll need them.” He taught me that breast stroke can be a recovery stroke if you cramp, a competent side stroke can save you from the worst waves and that learning the butterfly stroke improves shoulder strength and flexibility, making you a better swimmer.

So I’ve rediscovered group swimming this season and I really like it. Samantha pointed out it is a way for all speeds and abilities to still be together and she’s right, the hanging out in the lane and encouraging each other is great. I also meet new folks as they nottice my race number on my body from last weekend or ask if they can offer some tips. There was a lovely lady named Alice who helped Bev and I out Thursday night. She really knew her stuff and helped us bring our swimming up a notch with a few key insights.

So, especially if you find swimming challenging, try it with some friends. Sure, go some times on your own, get lessons, join a training group, whatever you need to feel good and safe and maybe you want to blog about it! Right Bev?

 

Guest Post

Finally Using a Standing Desk (Guest Post)

Michelle Lynne Goodfellow4 Comments

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For nearly a decade I’ve been doing something that is shortening my life, if I’m to believe the spate of studies and articles in the past few years, including these Fit is a Feminist Issue posts here, here and here.

I have a sedentary job. I sit all day at a computer or in meetings. Or drive between work locations and meetings. All day.

I’ve been wanting to try a standing desk for a long time, but never managed to overcome my inertia and actually do anything about it until recently. I had a lot of excuses. The office furniture at my company was very new, and I didn’t want to make a fuss by asking for something else. I also didn’t want to stick out among my colleagues (although one of our managers had successfully (and uneventfully) made the switch to a standing desk).

I tried a few temporary, do-it-yourself solutions (putting my laptop on my filing cabinet, and stacking a couple of boxes or bins on my regular desk), but those had been really unsatisfactory because I couldn’t get the height just right, and couldn’t get enough space to use my mouse, which tired my mouse hand. I do a lot of document editing and desktop publishing, and need to be able to move my mouse hand freely and ergonomically to avoid making my chronic carpal tunnel syndrome worse.

Then I started working from home, and realized that I had a lot more flexibility to create a work space that was healthier and more varied.

A couple of weeks ago I watched a video from Mark’s Daily Apple (below) about his company’s standing-friendly office space, and seeing the variety of solutions that they used inspired me to start playing around.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6j6ms3NtvjI&w=560&h=315%5D

 

Rather than messing around with more boxes or bins on my home desk, I simply set up my laptop on top of a high chest of drawers in my living room (see photo). I’ve been working there ever since. Turns out it’s the perfect height for me to work at, with plenty of sideways room for a mouse and papers if necessary. I tend to like a minimalist work surface, and I can put any extra paperwork that I’m not currently using on my nearby dining room table, or leave it in my home office/studio (in what was originally my home’s master bedroom).

I love the standing arrangement for a lot of reasons. I’ve always preferred changing my position frequently whenever I had the choice, and now I have an even larger range of options. I can shift from leg to leg every few minutes, take a temporary seat on a high stool from time to time, rest one of my feet on a low stool, or move to one of my other nearby chairs to do work on my phone (like read an e-book, post to social media, or use one of my iPhone apps).

If I’m thinking or watching a video on my computer (I watched a 2-hour webinar this week using the new arrangement), I’ll move around a lot – pacing, sweeping the floor, doing squats, calisthenics, dance warm-ups, stretches, or aikido basic movements. Then when I need to use the keyboard or mouse again, I just move back to the laptop.

The only downside to the long-term standing that I’ve noticed so far is that my feet and ankles get really fatigued. I’m dealing with a sports injury to my right ankle, and I have to watch that the swelling doesn’t get too bad. I think all the frequent changes in position are good for my leg injuries overall, though – I’ve noticed that I don’t get stiff the way I used to when I sat in a desk chair all day.

In addition to my work I’ve also started doing some of my extracurricular visual arts (drawing) at my “standing desk” too, and I absolutely love that! I can quickly move in and out to get different perspectives on the piece I’m working on, and my dominant arm definitely doesn’t get as fatigued as when I used to do work on my lap, or at a regular table.

All in all, I regret that I waited so long to try to work standing. Now I just need to wrap my mind around standing at meetings…

You may also be interested in:

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Michelle Lynne Goodfellow works in nonprofit and small business communications by day, and also enjoys writing, taking photographs, making art and doing aikido. You can find more of her work at michellelynnegoodfellow.com. Michelle has also written about her breast cancer journey on her blog, Kitchen Sink Wisdom.

competition · fitness · Guest Post

Part 1: Getting ready for my first sanctioned boxing match! (Guest post)

Sam B8 Comments

by Rebecca Kukla

As some readers of this blog might remember, I had been hoping for about a year to box competitively, but I thought it would never happen because I was too small (102 pounds) and too old (45) to find an opponent. I really thought it was a pipe dream, so it was easy to talk big about how much I wanted it. Also, my dream, such as it was, was to fight in some sort of local unsanctioned exhibition – nothing major, just a chance to actually fight competitively in front of people. After all, I didn’t start boxing until I was 43, well past most fighters’ retirement age.

So despite all my public bravado, I was utterly caught off guard when my trainer told me that he had found me a match, that I would be going to Brooklyn for a sanctioned amateur bout, and that I needed to hurry up and get registered as an actual amateur boxer with USA Boxing, get ready to make weight, and kick into high training gear. Once I fought, I’d have an actual official record. Seriously, this was not even on the radar for me as a thing that might happen. My opponent would be Debbie Strauss, a 98-pound fighter in her early fifties with four fights under her belt.

Oh, and for extra kicks: The bout was in nine days. NINE DAYS. And I’d be spending five of those nine days on a trip to Scotland for a conference I’d agreed to speak at months ago, and then taking an international flight with a five-hour time change just a couple of days before the fight. My body takes flying hard; these were not ideal conditions. I had been training pretty intensely already – my normal weekly routine includes five group boxing workouts plus one private coaching session and two to three sparring sessions. Still, I was nothing like ready to jump in the ring.

I immediately adjusted my plans as well as I could. I quit powerlifting immediately, to give my legs and shoulders time to get as fast and limber as possible. I found a serious boxing gym in Edinburgh and arranged to work with a trainer each day I was in town. I cancelled my flight back from New York to Washington and arranged to stay in the Brooklyn YMCA for the two days before the fight so that I could try to get over jet lag and use their gym without distractions. I bought myself a ton of high-nutrition, low-volume, high-quality ‘food’ – spirulina bars, organic elk jerky, nuts and dried fruit, that sort of thing – and packed it, settling in for nine days of very boring and micromanaged eating. If I weighed in over 105 I’d be disqualified. My walking weight had crept up to 107, and I bloat after long plane rides. I had a week to discipline the fuck out of my body.

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One week before the fight (above) and then on fight day (here) - the difference one week of training and dehydrating can make!
One week before the fight (above) and then on fight day (here) – the difference one week of training and dehydrating can make!

So that was how I found myself, still confused and rather scared by the entire turn of events, training in a dirty gym down by abandoned docks in Edinburgh, with a now-portly but still very intense former pro middleweight champion whose accent was utterly incomprehensible to me. He shouted directions at me that I couldn’t understand, but four days later he had revolutionized my left hook, which is now about ten times as powerful as it was two weeks ago. I worked with him for an hour and a half each day, guiltily sneaking out of the conference with my bag full of gloves and other gear and walking the 4.2 miles each way in order to cram in extra exercise, nibbling on spirulina bars. I skipped all the conference social activities to run 5k each night and sleep long hours. On the second and third days, the coach had me spar five rounds with an 86-pound little blond girl who was thirteen but still looked like she was ten, and was about to have her first sanctioned fight. As far as I could tell she more or less lived at the gym and trained in exchange for helping with its upkeep. She was terrifying and shockingly aggressive, and took pleasure in trying to get away with breaking rules. She told me she generally only liked to fight boys, and they all laughed at my desire to use headgear. She beat the crap out of me, and when I left she and her brother and the coach and his girlfriend all kissed and hugged me and wished me luck, or at least I think that’s what they said as I still couldn’t understand those accents at all, as hard as I tried.

The video above is of Mitts with the amazingly intense 86-pound little girl who beat me up in Scotland.

Then it was on to Brooklyn, where I checked myself into a spare and mothball-ridden but clean room at the Y. If anything was going to make me feel like a real boxer, staying there would do it. The other residents were mostly older, poor black men living there medium-term, or very fit, very adventurous-looking college-age kids passing through New York from around the world. I spent two and a half days doing nothing but trying to get over jet lag, working out lightly but for hours at a time, getting massages, keeping to myself, and for the last day and a half dehydrating myself, which is about my least favorite thing, especially during a muggy New York summer.

During this time I weighed myself probably five times a day, and measured out each calorie and nutrient. I almost surely did not need to do this. I ended up weighing in at 102, safely under the limit. But I am an ex-anorectic. I am also a huge foodie. I normally, and with determined conscious intent, ignore calories and micronutrients and just try to eat what is most yummy in non-excessive but enjoyable quantities. I do this because it is how I like to live, and because I know that my disordered, anorectic self lurks in me, ready to leap out if it’s given any opening. Getting ready to make weight is not a psychologically healthy affair for me. I become extremely obsessive. Concerns about my weight and (more pointedly perhaps) concerns about my ability to discipline my intake, to push through hunger and thirst, almost immediately co-opt my mind and metastasize. I obsess about weight and consumption to the point where it takes time away from obsessing about my athletic training. Luckily for me, if I go overboard on weight loss it compromises my competitive performance and that keeps me back from the brink, if only barely.

The day before the fight, I hopped on the subway and went over to Gleason’s – the legendary, world-champion-producing boxing gym where the fight would be – to check it out and get a feel for the place. The people there treated me like an honored guest and invited me to stay and use whatever I wanted. My trainer strictly disallowed me from any intense exercise that day, but I did some rounds of shadow boxing and hit the bags for a while, trying to register that I would actually be stepping into their blood-stained ring the next day – there to do my best, in front of a large crowd, to inflict damage on another person who would be doing the same to me. It didn’t seem even slightly real; surrounded by glistening bodies twice my size and half my age, I was riddled with the worst impostor syndrome of my life, though also tingling from head to toe with excitement.

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kukla4

My body felt good – limber and light and fast and energetic. Frankly I looked great too; lightly dehydrated, my abs and other muscles were popping everywhere. I stayed for a couple of hours and walked back to the Y, under the Williamsburg bridge and past the warehouses and Jewish delis, with the sun setting behind the Manhattan skyline off to my left. I had nothing left to do but go back to my room and rest. I had been almost completely on my own for many days, but my partner, Dan, was taking the train up to meet me first thing the next morning, and by now I couldn’t wait to see him. The only thing I still needed was a huge hug and the kind of proud, enthusiastic reassurance that only he can offer me.

kukla5

Next up: fight day and the big event. Go to Part II: the Fight.

diets · weight loss

Losing Weight and Keeping It Off…

Tracy I12 Comments

diets2This topic has come up for me again lately because of (1) a barrage of email from Precision Nutrition asking me if I want to do it again (no thanks; see here for why) and (2) another excellent post from Ragan Chastain over at Dances with Fat talking about the ridiculousness of our obsession with weight loss. See her post “Even if Weight Loss Would Solve Every Problem.”

As she points out,

Even if becoming thin would solve every single problem in every single fat person’s life (and I don’t think it would), the truth is it doesn’t matter.  Because we don’t know how to get it done. The belief that we know how to help people lose weight long term, and that weight loss leads to greater health, is a major Galileo issue of our time – widely believed, fervently defended, and unsupported by the evidence.

So we throw around this hope, this dream, that one day the research will tell us something different. But even the science team at Weight Watchers isn’t hopeful that this will happen.  Here’s the dirt:

Weight Watchers own numbers show that the average person maintains a 5 pound weight loss after 2 years (a feat I feel could be accomplished by regular exfoliation and without paying a small fortune to Weight Watchers.)  When asked by the Federal Trade Commission to do longer-term studies, representatives from WW refused because “it would be too depressing for our clients”.

No, we wouldn’t want to depress clients with…the truth.  That would be unconscionable wouldn’t it? And why would the truth be depressing? Because, as Ragan Chastain quite rightly points out, we’ve come up with the kooky idea that losing weight is a cure all for everything that is wrong.  And it’s kind of depressing to discover that the magic cure is almost unattainable.

Better to keep people hopeful and trying.  That’s the WW strategy. That’s the PN strategy. That’s the strategy for just about every weight loss program out there.  They use before-after pictures, but the small print says “results not typical.” And it’s rare to see “after” shots that are way after. Like two or more years after. Why? Because it’s really hard to see anything dramatic in a 5 pound weight-loss, which is what WW for example says that the average person maintains 2 years out. Pics from 5 years after would be an even harder sell.

So there are a couple of things going on here. First off, we need to seriously examine why weight-loss is ascribed all the magical happy-making qualities it is. What’s that all about? It’s not as if everyone who wants to lose a few pounds is facing major health risks if they don’t. It’s not as if everyone who is in the perceived “normal healthy” (ugh!) weight range is actually healthy.  And it’s certainly not as if losing weight will solve our financial problems or marital problems or make our kids give us no grief or make the boss our best friend or stop our neighbor from dying or prevent us from getting in a car accident or make airline travel a pleasant experience, give us more vacation days, better sleep, and tickets to see our favourite band. And yet so many people, large and small alike, are filled with self-loathing and despair because they can’t lose weight and keep it off.

And then, we need to even more seriously consider why we reject the evidence before us about what a futile endeavor this actually is for the vast majority of people who undertake it. Please do not start on the “if people just did what they were supposed to do they would lose it and keep it off.” When we individualize this as if it’s all the fault of the people who can’t stick to the program as presented we miss the larger issue, which is that maybe, just maybe, these programs are a waste of time and money.

Ragan Chastain:

Almost everyone who attempts weight loss fails.  Yet doctors keep prescribing the same things and blaming the vast majority of people for “not trying hard” enough or “not doing it right”. Can you imagine if Viagra only worked 5% of the time and we blamed 95% of the guys for just not trying hard enough?  It’s completely ridiculous.  But when I point this out people roll their eyes and say “everybody knows” that you can lose weight if you really try.

Let me say it again – even if weight loss would solve every problem (and I don’t think it will), it doesn’t matter because we don’t know how to get it done and my opinion, based on the research that exists, is that it is a massive waste of time, money, and resources to keep suggesting, marketing, prescribing, and pursuing weight loss.

And finally,

If people want to keep researching weight loss methods that’s fine, it’s also fine if they want to keep researching ways to help people fly like superman, but I certainly won’t be dieting or jumping off my roof and flapping my arms. Attempting weight loss to get healthier is doing something that nobody has proven is possible for a reason that nobody has proven is valid.

It’s been a long time since I built a blog post around quotes from someone else’s blog post, but this message cannot be delivered enough. We all want to think we’re exceptions. That this time we will do it and it will work because we’ll do it better, we’ll be more vigilant, we’ll be “good,” la, la, la.

But, and I hate to be a negative ninny about it but hear me now: a new diet will probably fail and even if you lose weight and keep some or even all of it off, that is not going to mean you’ll suddenly become happy.

But there are lots of other tangible things we can do to live now in the body we have today. So rather than obsess and wring our hands over the impossible, why not move on from that and live in reality?

aging · competition · fitness

The downside of competing against yourself: You can’t PR forever!

Sam B20 Comments

We have written quite a bit on the blog about competition (see Tracy’s The Competitive Feminist) and the idea that in endurance and lifting sports you don’t have to view others as your competition. Instead, you can aim to get better, to achieve a PR, and to be better than the athlete you were yesterday. In this way competition is about self improvement, not about besting others. You’re your own competition.  And that sounds lovely. It can make racing fun even for people who don’t think of themselves as competitive.  I identified my past self as my competition in the fittest by fifty challenge. You see this idea reflected in the slogans below.

 But there are at least two problems with this idea that you’re your own competition, lovely as it is.

First, this isn’t true for all sports. While some sports consist in individual effort and you can make a choice to compare yourself to others or to your earlier efforts, in other sports there’s only the comparison between you and others. Weight lifting is a clear case of measuring your individual performance. How much did you bench?What’s your max deadlift? You can consciously choose to focus your concern on comparing yourself to others of the same age and size or to focus on personal bests and getting stronger over time.

Other sports can come in different flavours. Consider cycling, just because it’s the sport I know best. In a bike race that’s a time trial you can compare your pace over a certain distance to past efforts on that course, but in a road race there’s a lot of interactive strategy. What matters in a road race, the only thing that matters, is your relative place in the race. Team sports are like this too. You can’t compare your soccer performance this year to yours last year because you’re part of a team playing against other teams. The interaction matters.

But these problems aren’t the ones I’m really interested in today though I do have a special interest in the question of whether sports that involve interpersonal strategy are more interesting, more complex than ones that just measure individual effort and fitness. I like sports that include a place for “skill, cunning, and guile.” I have a soft spot for interactive sports of the sort that game theorists can model. I don’t go as far as my partner who declares endurance sports as dull as watching paint dry. I’m sure I’ll write more about this later. I teach sports ethics and I’m interested in some of the definitional issues. What makes some activities sports and others not? Can we rule out as sports those activities that a lack a “game” element? (Interested? Go read When is a sport not a sport? by Wayne Norman.)

The question that interests me today is competing against your past self and losing. That’s sad but it happens. And here’s the very sad part. It will happen to all of us. At some point we stop getting stronger and faster. We get weaker and we slow down. Tracy and I have both commented that our recent spurt of fitness activities have been extra motivating because we’re adult onset athletes. There are no high school sports trophies gathering dust in our closets. Even the relativized notion of competition–competing only against oneself–can be too demanding. Suppose I could average 32 km/hr in a time trial at 30, do you think I’ll still be able to do that at 60? Probably not.

So while the idea of competing only against your past self seems like a more gentle form of competition, in many ways it’s not. There is a time when it starts to be kinder and gentler to compare your performance to the performance of people your own age rather than to the performance of your younger, fitter self. I’ve watched friends, former competitive athletes, struggle with this. Sometimes they switch sports–from rowing to cycling–and sometimes they move on to a less competitive version of the activity–from bike racing to long distance touring. Comparing yourself to your younger self–whether it’s your 5 km time, your hair colour, the number on the scale, or your max bench–can certainly lead to sadness.

So is there a better motivational saying that reflects this? Suggestions anyone?

fitness · race report · racing · triathalon

Fun Times at the 2015 Kincardine Women’s Triathlon

Sam B6 Comments

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After last week’s group pre-race report, and a fantastic event on Saturday, we decided a collective race recap about Kincardine would be fun. Here it is:

Kristen: I love this time away with my old friends and meeting some new friends.  Every Tri I have tried it’s a warm and welcoming environment with someone always willing to lend a hand.  As an event planner and manager of volunteers I always try and remind myself that races are volunteer lead and driven events so try not and judge too harshly.  That being said I do think this group really does need to step up their pre-race talk and etiquette.  The organizing team  missed things I felt were important especially as this event is touted as being a beginner race and they have been at it for 10 years.  I found myself asking questions I knew the answer to just to make sure the many new and nervous faces got this information. Something I learned, although my fitness level is now at a point that I can do this length of a race with very little training (6 months of injuries will do that) I certainly was not happy with the results.  Maybe it’s better to say it feels like a new beginning and is wonderful to feel like I’m not longer broken so can again start to train in earnest.  Hopefully, I’ll be back next year.

Anita: Wow wow wow. Kincardine was such an amazing experience, mostly because of the fantastic spirit shared by everyone there. Of course I have to pass along special high fives to the group of women I was with: Tracy, Samantha, Leslie, Kristen, Natalie, Mallory, Susan, and Tara. We all came with different expectations and training histories but we all left with smiles. I couldn’t ask for a more supportive group of friends. My personal performance was great on the runs (I did the duathlon) but a bit of a poor showing on the bike. Guess what? That didn’t bother me one little bit. In fact I feel like I crushed it. Ya, I crushed it. And I’m coming back for more.

Sam: I went knowing I wouldn’t be fast but I went anyway. And that was okay. More than okay, I had fun. I had surgery less than six weeks ago which meant two weeks with no physical actvity at all, other than walking, then a slow return to normal. I concentrated on the friends and family aspect of this event, drove up there with my daughter, my sister in law, and my cousin in law. We had a great time together with a lovely group of bloggers, guest bloggers, and friends. My injured knee survived the 6 km of (mostly) running and didn’t hurt the next day. Victory!

I was surprised, not at how hard the running part of the duathlon would be as I knew that it would hurt given that I haven’t run much in the past month. I was shocked at how hard biking is after a tough run. I spent 78% of it in Zone 4 of my heart rate training zones. Strava had things to say about that. I also learned the bad effect of slow transitions. My Garmin had my moving bike time at 27 minutes but it was 31 on the race chip time spread sheet. Why? Because that includes getting in and out of my running shoes/biking shoes and swapping hat for helmet and helmet for hat.

I love this event, the smiling volunteers, the cheering community crowds, and the wide range of participants, all ages, skill levels, and fitness abilities. Certainly I’d recommend it to any women in the area considering their first tri. Go for it and enjoy!

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Susan, Tara, and Sam

Nat: I‘m thrilled at how the race went. I absolutely loved being there with a group of friends, new & old. It really made the race interesting to keep an eye out for each other in the bike and race loops since they were out and back courses.

As we gathered to start a few folks were uttering nervous and anxious things. It was harshing my buzz and echoing my inner doubts so I gave a pep talk to those around me. “It’s a beautiful day, the lake is calm and you get to swim surrounded by all these beautiful, strong women. That’s amazing. It will take the time it takes. Enjoy it, it won’t last very long.”

The water was very cold and I didn’t rent a wetsuit but it only slowed me down a couple minutes on the swim.

The bike portion felt amazing as I huffed along on Ethel. I actually passed some folks! Me! Passing! That felt really cool.

Zoom! Zoom! Zoom!

But the run, oh the run, it felt really harsh along the boardwalk then the course merged with the returning runners and I decided I needed some high fives. I needed them bad so I started offering “high fives of awesomeness” to anyone who looked like they could use a boost or even looked me in the eye. Totally gave me something else to focus on and I felt better. My run wasn’t much slower than my usual pace. Yay high fives!

I came in much faster than I expected and faster than I deserved as I hadn’t really trained for this. It was a PB even over a much shorter Try a Tri I did in 2011!

I can’t wait for next year!

Super Nat!
Super Nat!

Leslie: I did it! What a great feeling of accomplishment to have completed (without stopping!) the Kincardine Women’s Sprint Triathalon.  I was overwhelmed by the support and encouragement of the volunteers before, during and after the race.  Even the spectators who lined the route were amazing. A special thanks to the kid with the garden hose-man that cold water felt great on the return leg of the run.  So many smiling faces, and such positive energy.  For me the swim was the most difficult, and therefore presents the main challenge for the new goal I plan on setting down for myself for future triathlons.  I was so impressed at all the results, from all the amazing women participants.  Wow, Katie Peach 43:27 overall race time, you rock! and Jennifer Di Jong in my age category 50 – 54, with a time of 50:17-inspiring.  I had the privilege of meeting the core group of women that my race buddy and tri-mentor Tracy introduced me to.  To Anita, Sam, Kristin, Mallory and all, great to meet everybody.  Finally what had started as something that I was resistant and afraid of, “transitioned” into a positive, empowering experience. Hope to see you all next year.

Tracy in her wetsuit, bathing cap, and goggles, in an exuberant pose before the start of the swim.
Tracy feeling pretty excited that the swim didn’t get cancelled!

Tracy: I had the most fun at the 2015 Kincardine Women’s Triathlon than I’ve ever had at an event. So much so that I wonder if I’m in love with triathlon or just the KWT! It’s a well-run, high-energy event for women (and you know how I love women’s only events!). The volunteers are amazing and the race organizers have their system down to a fine-tuned machine geared at making sure everyone is having a great time.

It looked touch and go for the swim because of water temperature, which registered 8 degrees C the day before the race (minimum to go ahead with the swim is 13 degrees C). But Kincardine’s water is known to “flip” and flip it did.  By the race morning it (just) passed the minimum. Still kind of frigid but with my wetsuit and a pre-race warm-up to get used to the cold water, it was tolerable-ish — it did take me about 2/3 of the swim to find a rhythm, get my stroke under control from the flailing and desperate character it had at the beginning, and start breathing well. I took some time off of my swim from last year and had a good T1.  Swim: 8:35 TI: 2:28

Despite my general struggles with bike training, which meant that I did no training at all once the indoor trainer season ended in late March, I enjoyed the bike ride. As expected given no training, I lost all of my time on the bike. People whom I’d smoked in the swim caught up and passed me all along the route. But I felt solid on the bike and I had absolutely no difficulty with the hills, so there’s that.  Bike: 34:02 (including T2).

I felt pretty good on the run, though I started out of breath. My goal was to push beyond my comfort zone, which I did. In retrospect I could have pushed harder but that’s for another day.  Run: 19:04.

What did I love? I loved being with everyone and having a whole group of people–Sam, Nat, Anita, Susan, Tara, Kristen, Mallory, Leslie, and me. My longtime friend, Leslie, was doing her first triathlon and it was exciting to see how dedicated she was to her training and to watch the mix of nerves and excitement the morning of.  Anita was also doing her first event, a duathlon, and she loved it. And all nine of us were happy. I went into it with no huge expectations and my only real plan (besides pushing on the run) was to have fun. When I came through the finish chute and saw Mallory waiting at the side, and then everyone else started rolling in, I just had a surge of joy!  Perfect weather, perfect company, and a personal best of 1:01:40 that gives me something to work towards for next year, namely, a sub-60 minute finish. That means bike training. Meanwhile, I will bask in the glow of an exhilarating event with an awesome group of women.

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Guest Post

The therapeutic value of feminist self-defense, part 2 (Guest post)

Sam B4 Comments

For Part 1, see here.

by Grayson Hunt

Philosopher Susan Brison’s story of resistance and recovery after a violent sexual assault reveals the therapeutic significance of anger learned through self-defense training. Ten years after her attack, Brison wrote _Aftermath: Violence and the Remaking of a Self_, describing the effect sexual violence had on her capacity to think and feel at home in the world. Brison spoke of the incredible difficulty she had in learning how to be angry at the man who sexually assaulted her and attempted to kill her (an attack she calls her “attempted sexual murder”). Rediscovering that anger became a matter of re-learning how to defend her body. Physical self-defense courses taught Brison how to resent what had happened to her. Here is a quote:

“One might think it would be easier, and it certainly would be more appropriate, for victims of violence to blame their assailants…. I was stunned to discover that the other women in my rape survivor’s support group were, like me, unable to feel anger toward their assailants, and I was surprised to learn later that this was not unusual. It was not until after I had taken a self-defense course that I was able to get angry with the man who had almost killed me.”

Ultimately, Brison recounts that she was able to break the double bind of self-blame and powerlessness by performing a kind of self-empowered bodily existence. “We had to learn to feel entitled to occupy space, to defend ourselves,” Brison recounts in reference to her self-defense training, adding that, “the hardest thing for most of the women in my class to do was simply to yell ‘No!’.” The ability to refuse another person’s claim upon one’s body by yelling “No” was re-learned through talk therapy and self-defense training, taught alongside kicks and punches.

Brison’s account demonstrates the therapeutic value of feminist self-defense training. It (re)instills in survivors a sense of entitlement to occupy space in the world. Linking self-defense training to recovery and therapy also creates a positive feedback loop. Having more empowered female and feminine bodies in the world communicates the value of women’s lives and livelihood. When we measure the value of self-defense training merely by its ability to prevent an attack, we lose sight of the therapeutic and political value feminist self-defense training can have.

Resting bike face
Resting bike face

 

Grayson Hunt is a professor of philosophy at Western Kentucky University and an avid cyclist.

 

Weekends with Womack

Repeat after me: Athleticism is beauty. Athleticism is beauty. Athleticism is beauty. Athleticism is beauty…

catherine w23 Comments

Serena Williams, one of the greatest tennis players of all time, just won the women’s singles title at Wimbledon.

Again.

For the sixth time, actually.

That’s like, five times. And then again. For a total of six times.

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Serena Williams is one of the great athletes of our time, and one of the greatest tennis players ever. But alongside the story of her win, what else does the New York Times– the paper of record—see fit to print? This story.

In this story ,“Tennis’s Top Women Balance Body Image with Ambition”, many of the world’s top women players interviewed said, in effect, that having the muscular world-class athletic bodies they have makes them feel “unfeminine”, as 14th-ranked Andrea Petkovic said.

“People say, ‘Oh, you’re so skinny, I always thought you were huge,’ ” she said. “And then I feel like there are 80 million people in Germany who think I’m a bodybuilder. Then, when they see me in person, they think I’m O.K.”

Heavy sigh.

Okay, let’s deconstruct this statement to see what’s going on here. Here are some assumptions I found:

  • Being skinny is OK (read minimally acceptable).
  • Being “huge” is bad.
  • Being perceived as a bodybuilder is bad.

Let us remind ourselves that this is coming from a woman whose tennis acumen is ranked 14th ON PLANET EARTH. Despite my intense racket-sports envy of her accomplishment, I feel both sympathy and frustration at what such comments likely accurately reflect about the culture that she navigates.  And this is the culture that we navigate, too.

Serena herself is affected by such assumptions. How can this be? I mean, glorious kick-ass-take-no-prisoners-forget-wearing-all-white-I-look-fabulous-in-orange-and-pink-on-center-court Serena? The woman who wore this at the French Open while firing a bullet serve?

serena

Serena Williams is now in position to be the 4th woman in history to win the Grand Slam of tennis in singles this year (The Australian Open, the French Open, Wimbledon, and the U.S. Open).  By the way, there have only been three Grand Slam winners in men’s singles (two actually, as Rod Laver did it twice; also, my first tennis racket was a Rod Laver, but I digress…)

But this is what others are saying about her the very day she won Wimbledon:

Not all players have achieved Williams’s self-acceptance.

“That is really an important acceptance for some female athletes, that their best body type, their best performance build, is one that is not thin; it’s one of power,” said Pam Shriver, a former player and current tennis analyst.

Shriver, who cited Angelique Kerber and Sabine Lisicki as similarly powerfully built, believes Williams’s physique and confidence should serve as an example to others.

“The way Serena wears her body type I think is perfect,” Shriver said. “I think it’s wonderful, her pride.”

(taking deep breath)

Okay, let’s look at this more carefully– what assumptions lie beneath these statements?

  • Serena Williams’ body is one that requires a conscious attitude of self-acceptance, which suggests that it would otherwise be reasonable to expect her to be unaccepting of it.
  • Power in a woman’s build is in opposition to thinness– if you’re powerful, you’re not thin, and vice versa.
  • In most contexts, thin is better than powerful for women.
  • Even in professional sports, women with powerful bodies must acknowledge, justify, and defend those bodies, as well as deal with lack of acceptance by others.
  • Serena’s body type requires cultivating pride in a way that’s out of the ordinary, not automatic, but praiseworthy (albeit in a grudging and condescending way).

Note that these claims are made about a woman who wore this dress to the Oscars this year:

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I included this picture because this discourse about Serena’s body as being deviant, as

1) a woman’s body;

2) a professional athlete’s body;

3) an attractive woman’s body

is one of the many reasons why I’m glad this blog and this community exist.  We can celebrate Serena’s accomplishments and beauty in power and motion.  We can also celebrate ourselves in our own glorious athletic beauty, like this bunch of Kincardine tri- and duathletes.  Congratulations, and I look forward to reading all about it!

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