How To Make Running in Paris Fun and Challenging

December 4, 2019December 4, 2019 Mina5 Comments

I’m just back from two months in Paris. Running in Paris is a challenge. The Bois de Boulogne has lots of dirt trails and is decently big, but to stay close enough to run there regularly too far from everything else I want to do. There are many other parks, but they are all small or smaller and involve a lot of loops to build a run of anything longer than 3k. We rode the Velibs (social bike system) up to the Buttes Chaumont (a fave park) one Sunday and ran 4 loops; along with a big crowd of runners and other weekenders. The Buttes is the only good place to find hills. Sure, you could run around the streets of Montmartre, but the traffic (foot, bicycle, scooter, car etc…) is not my cup of tea.

By process of elimination then, when in Paris I stay near-as-possible to the Seine and run along the banks. This is lovely, of course. Running past Notre Dame, the Louvre, the Grand Palais, the Eiffel Tower, even the mini Statue of Liberty (one of our weekend destinations for a longer run)—what’s not to like?

Well, not to be a sourpuss, but there are no hills at all, it’s concrete or, worse, cobblestone. Running on cobblestone is charming for a week and then it gets less so. I give thanks for the grace of every run without a trip-and-fall.

Still, I love running in Paris, because I have a set of fun and challenging routines, unique to that city.

First, there’s one-legged stair hopping to start and finish each run. Shortly before going to Paris a few years ago, I was at a cat circus with an eight-year-old. As we cooled our heels out front of the theatre, waiting for the house to open, she was hopping up and down the stairs. I tried to join her and discovered that hopping up a set of stairs is no joke. This was a provocation. I decided I should work on my stair-hopping, on the theory it might give me some extra spring for running. The next week, I was running in Paris, with its endless stairs up and down from the banks of the Seine. On a whim, I hopped up one of the staircases on one leg. To be clear, the first time was more of an attempted hopping. Since then, I’ve incorporated stair hops into my regular routine in Paris (though not in NYC, where I’ve never found the right staircase). It’s a mini HIIT (high intensity interval training) moment before I get into to the rhythm of the run.

The second unique-to-Paris addition is the monkey bars. On most runs, I pass a set of monkey bars, where there are usually some groups doing various strength workouts. I do a one-way pass at a hand-to-hand hanging traverse. It’s only 8 rungs. Exhausting. This year on my last run I managed, first time ever, to traverse there and back. Thrilling.

But my favourite Paris routine is the little exercise yard by the Seine, in the sculpture garden near the Jardin des Plantes. My partner and I call it our “health club.” We spend about fifteen minutes doing a circuit. The “machines” operate using body weight and the ground is covered with a slightly springy substance, making it a nice surface for pushups and such like. Then I do one more set of stair hops (topping the workout with a cherry) and run the less-than-a-kilometer home.

Stairs down to the Seine from Pont St. Louis. Mina’s hop start on runs.

The health club is what I miss most when I get back to NYC. I’m not a member of a gym, so I don’t have much chance to do formal strength training. Instead, I rely on aerial yoga, the little bit of weights in spin class, and a few lunges and pushups at the end of most runs. I long for such an exercise yard somewhere in Central Park or Riverside Park. An adult playground! If anyone reading this has clout with the New York City Parks Department …

It’s such a treat to have the special extras of my Paris running routine. I look forward to the different pace. The change recharges my energy.

I’m back on my home turf in Central Park now. Relishing how the familiar routes feel fresh and exhilarating.

What are your new routines for “away” workouts?

fitness · training · weight loss

High intensity interval training and weight loss: Yawn!

February 21, 2019February 21, 2019 Sam B3 Comments

It’s all over the fitness media this week. For weight loss, you should go for high intensity interval training over other forms of exercise.

According Runners World, “Interval training could help you lose more weight than a continuous moderate-intensity workout, according to a new review and meta-analysis published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine. Interval training may make your body more efficient at burning fat, the researchers believe.”

But why is weight loss even the question? Why not sports performance or other training goals?

I confess this was my reaction: Yawn.

I shared the story with the other bloggers and Catherine chimed in, “Also, for those who are not actively competing, there’s the issue of what we LIKE to do and what we can sustain over time. I’ve done plenty of HIIT, but these days I’m not up to it mentally. We shall see as the weather improves– hill repeats do have a certain masochistic appeal– but right now steady state is a happy place for me.”

Then Mina, “I don’t even like the phrasing “not up to it” in this context, because it implies a shortcoming or deficit. No activity is sustainable, unless we like it. In fact, I’d Kondo-ize that statement and say that maybe we shouldn’t do activities that don’t spark joy. Recognizing, that we will need to sweat a little and experience some false starts to find what activity that is. Even if our goal is competing, we better be loving the training to get there. Basically, I think we feel best when we are pursuing our personal version of excellence and when that excellence has meaning to us (which likely involves some meaning for others, too).”

What’s your response to this report?

Also, I then ran into an interesting critique of the headline version of the review’s results. Read the whole thing here.

Yoni Freedhoff writes, “Last week saw the publication of a new study in the BJSM entitled (highlighting mine), “Is interval training the magic bullet for fat loss? A systematic review and meta-analysis comparing moderate-intensity continuous training with high-intensity interval training (HIIT)“. Understandably intrigued given a prominent medical journal was suggesting there was a magic bullet for fat loss, I clicked through, and then reading the piece I learned that the amount of fat lost that the BJSM was calling a “magic bullet” was a 1 pound difference, one which the study’s abstract’s conclusion described as, “a 28.5% greater reductions in total absolute fat mass (kg)”. Duly surprised, I then took to Twitter to poke around and found that one of the study’s authors, James Steele, was tweeting out a corrective thread to his own study’s hype – hype which understandably and predictably led to an onslaught of media overreach.”

That post is worth reading. It’s totally not boring.

Crossfit · cycling · racing · Rowing · running

Puke worthy workouts

November 20, 2013November 20, 2013 Sam B4 Comments

I’ve written lots about pain and physical exertion. See here, here and here.

But now it’s time to tackle that other fun aspect of tough workouts, throwing up.

It’s a feature of almost every sport that I like that people sometimes barf. (I have teenagers at home, including teen athletes, so I know all sorts of good euphemisms but I’ll stick with “barf,” “vomit,” and “throw up.”)

CrossFit has a metal puke bucket in the corner, mostly as a joke. So too does the rowing club. And of course, the velodrome. Of course.

It’s sort of a joke but also sort of not. Vomiting does happen. It’s certainly happened to me on the bike.

“Intense exercise has a number of effects on the body. As well as raising metabolism and burning fat, it can also cause dehydration, dizziness and nausea. Whether you do cardiovascular exercise or strength training, it is not uncommon to throw up during or after a workout.” Read How to Prevent Throwing up when Exercising

I was reminded of all this this morning doing 200 m sprints x 10 on the erg, aka rowing machine, at CrossFit.

I was busy paying attention to how I felt about pain in response to commentators who think you really can’t say truthfully you enjoy painful intervals. And I’m right. At the fifth sprint, I had that silly smile on my face that makes other people question my sanity. Yay endorphins. I also had done a great job of keeping my times constant through the first five efforts.

Times ranged quite a bit, from the high 30s to the low 50s. For my first five 200 m intervals I was around 42 seconds.

But after five, my times started to go up. I stopped smiling. And by seven I was starting to think I might throw up. I didn’t. But I didn’t manage to eat again until lunch.

So, what happens to make your body feel that way? Read Why Do We Vomit After Strenuous Exercise?

High intensity interval training, in particular, brings about a bad combo. Lactic acid on the one hand, and blood going to your limbs rather than your digestion system, on the other. There are are reasons to skirt the edge of pukiness. In part, your body learns how to cope and recover and that’s important.

I’m not sure about the gallows humour around throwing up after a workout. But like the issue of peeing during workouts, I think it helps to know you’re not alone. Going hard, whether cycling, rowing, running, or swimming can bring it on and there’s no reason to be ashamed or proud about it.

“A 1992 study in the International Journal of Sports Nutrition found that 93 percent of endurance athletes experienced some type of GI symptom (e.g., acid reflux, nausea, and vomiting) during their races.” See Techniques to Prevent Nausea and Vomiting Before, During, and After Racing.

It’s an issue with any form of High Intensity Interval Training but your body does adjust. From Precision Nutrition’s All About High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT):

“Most every high intensity physical activity is a state of “crisis” in the body. It endangers oxygen supply to tissues, increases body temperature, reduces body fluids and fuel stores, and causes tissue damage.

Intense exercise creates endocrine and defense reactions that are similar to those elicited by low blood oxygen, high blood carbon dioxide, acidosis, high body temperature, dehydration, low blood sugar, physical injury and psychological stresses.

Hormonally, your body basically freaks out. Then it brings out the big guns to deal with the problem. High intensity exercise stresses the body so much that it’s forced to adapt.

As Nietzsche gasped during a 20-rep squat set, “That which does not kill me makes my quads bodacious.” (It makes more sense in German.)”