Kat's Wildwood Birthday Run

This was a great way to kick off a Xmas party marathon weekend. I was attending the Xdog Ho Ho run on Sunday, so a long, easy trail Saturday morning was perfect. Kat ran the 30.02 miles to celebrate her birthday, and many of us joined her for different parts of that expedition. My part was around 16 was, which was perfect. At the end, Kat gave us all some of her homemade peppermint bark, and then we convened at the Stepping Stone Cafe for some man-cakes and other brunch items.

That's What She Said

This was a nice exchange, and she was a good sport, so I figured I'd publish it in its entirety.

She Said:

Hi Bryan,

Every runner knows that an MP3 player plus adrenaline-pumping tunes are essential to get that speed up and endurance flowing on any run! But when you have to stop and fuss with those pesky earbuds that keep on falling out, you’re wasting precious minutes on your time!

Introducing GROOVE hanger buds by 2XL (http://www.2xl.com/groove.html), the ultimate headphones in comfort and convenience for runners. These headphones offer non-slip adjustable grips that wrap around your ears to ensure they WILL NOT BUDGE during high intensity movements or runs. Not only that, they are offered in a variety of seven colors and unique designs…why not add a little style to those runs?

Additional features include:
• Stellar sound quality and acoustic range
• Affordable pricing – $14.99
• Adjustable grips
• A variety of colors and designs
• Non-insert in ear canals, to hear surrounding traffic or warnings

Groove by 2XL is available in select stores nationwide, as well as online at www.2XL.com. Any interest in more pictures, information or a sample set to try for yourself?

Cheers! - L.

I Said:

Yes, every runner knows that adrenaline-pumping tunes are essential to get that speed up and endurance flowing - that endurance won't flow by itself. It's great to hear that these earphones have a non-slip grip, but what we really need are those properties applied to prophylactics. Do you have condoms available in seven colors and unique designs that are designed with the ultimate comfort and convenience to ensure that they will not budge during high intensity movements?

Then She Said:

Well that definitely made me do a double take…for a second there I thought I had mixed your email with an editor at Hustler or Playboy. Perhaps the best response I have received working in PR…props.

Unfortunately, I cannot help you with condom product now…but the good news is, we plan to roll out some Trojan product for Q1 and are expecting big things…I’ll make sure to you add you to our gear review list. J

But seriously, I would love to send you some headphones…even if you choose not use them editorially. Thank you for giving me some much needed laughs today! - L.

Trail Shoe Review Redux

With the news that the Portland-based boot company Danner / LaCrosse has recently purchased Portland-based END, the Environmentally Neutral shoe company, adding to Keen,Montrail / Columbia Sportswear, and other shoe companies in the area, I wondered how the trail running shoe market has been expanding.
Apparently, the trail running shoe market has been expanding exponentially. The increasing popularity in mountain / ultra / trail running and racing has impacted the shoe industry to the point that there are now no less than sixty (60) companies that design and market trail running shoes. A trip to a sporting goods store revealed trail shoe brands such as Coleman (the people who make stoves and coolers), BearPaw, Hi-Tec, Itasca, Nevados, Ocean Pacific, Wrangler, Outdoor Gear, and Denali "hiking boots" (which look like running shoes and not boots at all.) I decided to try out a few shoes recommended by local running stores, and report on those that gave the best performance.
Nike shoes based on Kenny Moore's prototypes usually fit me, since we have similar feet. However, Nike is apparently no longer creating trail-specific shoes. Their Kyotee is no longer being made, and the designer who made that now works for Montrail. Nike had a Trail S+, which is a trail version of a Zoom Elite or Pegasus, but they cancelled that. The adidasSupernova Trail was comparable to the Kyotee as an all-around trail shoe, but their latest version has too much cushion. Their new Supernova Riot, however, is about the best fit around. It's very light, and has a great design - not too much support, and not too little. These would be great for training or racing.
A close second would be the Montrail Streak. In the past, many of Montrail's shoes have felt just a bit clunky, as the extra sturdiness is important when hiking or climbing with a pack or lots of gear. Now, along with lots of hybrid shoes, Montrail has shoes focused specifically for running, where the heel fits lower to the ground for good control, yet there's plenty of sturdiness and flexibility for running over rocks. The only negatives about the Montrail Streak would be the laces that tend to slip a bit, and a long, narrow section on the tread connecting the heel to the toe box (where the Trail Shield is not covered with Gryptonite) that tends to slide on rocks, logs, or man-made surfaces if you happen to step sideways.
Additional great finds were the Brooks Cascadia 4, Perl Izumi Peak XC, and the Flyroc by INOV8. Brooks shoes fit me a bit differently, and I was weary of the solid, level sole in the Cascadia. However, this is a great fit, and the Pivot Posting sytem, the change in density in the arch, actually works. It may be a bit heavy for racing, but it's an overall very sturdy trail shoe. The Perl Izumi Peak XC is on the other end of the spectrum, a light, Sock- influenced trail training / racing shoe. The stretchy top mesh takes a little getting used to, but the weight and stability is just about perfect, with a flexible sole with solid tread. The European INOV-8 is the first company to design shoes made for parkour or free running. The Flyroc fits a bit like a Montrail, and since INOV-8 designs their shoes to mimic running barefoot, there is maximum support with minimal bulk.
Some other great trail shoes that didn't exactly fit my personal tastes in fit were the MizunoAscend, Saucony Xodus, and END 10oz. The Ascent was just too supple, with less support on the upper. Similarly, the Stumptown 10oz was very comfortable, but didn't quite have the quick response time I needed. The Saucony Xodus, featuring a Vibram sole, was also a wonderfully built all-around trail shoe, but the overall fit was a bit too soft. The proper fit of a shoe is a combination of the shape (and size) of your foot and personal taste, so you may find a perfect pair in any of the above.

Bring the SkirtChaser 5K to Portland - vote now

I wrote about Skirt Sports and the SkirtChaser 5K a while back, and it’s time to revisit. In a previous article, I used the SkirtChaser Series as an example of how to utilize one of the most enduring elements of a race, the party after.

Some races, large or small, are fairly fine events, but then when it’s over, the participants quickly leave. Good race directors know that the longer you can get your participants to linger afterward in a fun-filled atmosphere, the more rewarding the experience will feel, and the greater word-of-mouth promotion you will have from past participants. If the race isn’t small enough to have immediate results and awards, then people tend to leave too quickly, prompting race directors to think up creative ways to reward your attendance.

Raffle prizes and give-away’s are popular, as well as food and refreshment. Beer is almost always welcome. Several races around town capitalize on this after-party atmosphere and have great reviews year after year.

What’s interesting about the SkirtChaser series is that these races basically evolved from the other direction: the 5K race is simply an excuse to hold a block party. Triathlete Nicole DeBoom won the 2004 Ironman Wisconsin wearing a home-sewn prototype skirt that she designed, and the Skirt Sports apparel company was born. Based in Boulder, Colorado, they developed the SkirtChaser 5K Series to get their product out there to other communities.

You can see the video on their website, but basically there’s an all-women’s start, a “Catch Me” wave, followed by a men’s “SkirtChaser” wave three minutes later. Women who sign up receive a running skirt, and men receive a SkirtChaser t-shirt. There’s also a $500 cash prize for the overall winner, whether male or female. Then, there’s the block party, with a “scandalous” fashion show and live music, and of course, great food and beer. First, second and third place winners will receive prizes, plus there are additional crazy awards, such as the “most likely to make out at the water station” award.

Last year they went to six cities, but nowhere near Portland. This year, however, they’re looking for six additional venues for 2010, and Portland, Oregon is on the list. All you have to do is go to www.skirtchaser5k.com and vote for Portland, Oregon. Vote now, as the deadline is just a couple weeks away, October 15^th. Voters in the cities selected will be entered to win two deluxe entries to the SkirtChaser in their cities.

For more info on Skirt Sports and their products, go to www.skirtsports.com.

Strands, moneyStrands, and a Bad Marketing Choice

There is now Strands.com, which is a new "social networking tool" self-titled a "People Powered Discovery." It looks like a combination of Facebook and active.com, where you fill out a profile, log your workouts, and connect with like-minded, fitness-minded people. So, what does it actually do? Nothing, really, but it's yet one more social networking site to glean information from you, from which they can directly or indirectly sell to third-party companies or advertisers. I assume that if you can make money from such networking, it may be a good way to connect with new clients or consumers. Or, it's possible you could find a new job, or a new friend, or a new mate. I haven't signed up for the service, so I'm just guessing at what it can do, based on the information provided on its home page.

But wait, there's more. Their sister site is called moneyStrands.com, and where they want you to sign up and give them all your financial information. They want to do your finances, so you don't have to. They even have a spokesperson, Monica, and she has a profile. You can read her profile and see how moneyStrands has worked for her. Interestingly, it's all a lie, because Monica is a cartoon. https://money.strands.com/content/monicas-profile

A spokesperson is a real person. Catherine Zeta Jones is being paid for being a spokesperson for T-Mobil. So, the whack thing about Strands is that they've set up this entire story about this spokesperson, Monica, with an actual profile describing how she graduated from a college in Oregon and moved to San Francisco, and likes sushi and yoga, etc.

I don't have anything against cartoons as mascots, etc, but when a social network that is trying to convince you that it's OK to sign in and give them all your information by giving you information about their real-live spokesperson employee, your trust in this company is going to be based on the authenticity of this person.

And, I don't know - maybe this Monica is a real person. But if so, why not show her face? You know, if Jared from Subway was a cartoon, that would be OK, except that his whole thing about losing 100 pounds on the Subway diet would then be meaningless. It's just weird that you go to the Strands site, and there's photos and a video tutorial with real people, and then if you click the tiny link to money.strands, you get Monica. When you check out what money.strands is all about, you realize that no real person would simply give away all their financial and personal data, hence the cartoon. A spokesperson is supposed to instill confidence is their company, but Monica just makes me suspicious.

What's in a Name?

While Usain Bolt takes gold with a new world record at the 2009 T&F World Championships in Berlin, (that's five world records in five major finals so far,) Caster Semenya of South Africa rivals his publicity by taking gold in the 800 amid rumors of her being not-entirely female. The best coverage of this controversy, as well as extensive analysis of the event, itself, can be found on The Science of Sport.

Now, the guys from The Science of Sport are doing a great job with their coverage, and they are objective and professional, as always. With their pursuit of scientific understanding of the mechanics of athletic performance to their experience dealing with the politics of the South African world of athletics, perhaps no one can rival their expertise on the issue. They are spot-on in their assertion that the ASA (Athletics South Africa) are to blame for not having tested her before allowing her to compete in the World Championships. However, they may have overlooked something really obvious.

The crux of the issue is that there are rumors (and only rumors) surrounding the South African runner about her possessing secondary male characteristics, i.e. hermaphroditism. Now, the question obviously isn't whether she's male or female - that can be discerned easily enough with the Crocodile Dundee crotch-check method. The question is what makes male athletic physiology superior to female athletic physiology, which is very tricky, and if she possesses enough of these male qualities to render it unfair to compete with female athletes. Now, she does look less feminine compared to the other women she is running against, but she is nowhere near the size, muscularity or speed of elite male runners.

Since the ASA has allowed her to compete, her performances will be clouded by controversy until adequate testing can be done, and then she may have her medal taken away (with fourth place receiving bronze, third receiving silver, etc.) The only argument to defend ASA is that the rumors alone weren't enough to instigate thorough testing. And to that, I say, really? With a name like Caster? I'm not sure if Caster is a popular girl's name in South Africa, but in the world arena, it's just not going to fly. And you don't EVER name your girl Caster if your last name is Semenya.

Caster Semenya. There's a transvestite porn name for you. It's worse than Beau Breedlove. She should really go by Cassie, or even Suzy or Venus. There's just no way that the IAAF is going to let a female athlete with a name like Caster Semenya take a medal without questioning it. And so, even if Caster Semenya eventually proves to be adequately female, the response to her performance, in the meantime, is going to be as vicious as this scene from Austin Powers.

not quite everything you knew about running is wrong...

Jon Stewart interviewed Christopher McDougall, author of Born To Run, on the Daily Show. The promo promised that "everything you thought you knew about running was wrong."

It was a fairly good interview, and sounds like a good book about the Tarahumaras, but it didn't quite get to the part where "everything I thought I knew about running was wrong." I haven't read Born To Run yet, (there is a great review coming out soon in the Oregon Distance Runner), but the gist of at least part of the book is that these Tarahumaras can run for so far and for so long because they run naturally. In part, they run well not despite the fact that they wear modest sandals, but because they wear modest sandals. And so the bad guys are the giants of the shoe industry who sell these "technologically advanced" running shoes to the dim-witted American masses.

Well, that's partly right. Nike, of course, started the techologically advanced athletic shoe industry, spurred forward by Bill Bowerman's waffle iron. They wanted to design shoes with as much support possible with the least amount of weight - the better the shoe worked, the less of it you would need. Even durability was not important, as Bowerman claimed the perfect shoe would distentegrate just after finishing your race - any more would be too much, and slow you down. So, you look at shoes worn by world-class runners today, and no matter what brand they are, they will all be light, solidly built, very functional shoes designed by athletes for athletes.

The problem is that all these running shoe companies took the new material and new construction methods born in the 1970's and 1980's and started designing them for the masses - athletic shoes for non-athletic people. And that's how you get crap like Air Max. They may be OK for walking around in, but they were not designed for running. So, a large percentage of shoes put out by Nike, adidas, Puma, Saucony, New Balance, Asics, Reeboks, etc, etc, are crap - shoes designed to "correct" a person's running problems - those people who haven't yet learned how to run. The "athletes" are seen as a market, so to sell to non-athletes, (additional markets), they have to dumb-down the shoes in an attempt to get people to run, and that's where runners get achey joints and tendons.

Nike and other shoe companies have known about the Tarahumaras for years, and have designed shoes based on the Tarahumaras, and based on running barefoot or near-barefoot. There's a lot of great shoes out there, and the running shoe companies are making some really great products. But, they're also making crap. It's like car companies that make some really, really great cars, but they also make crappy cars, as well. Why? Because some people might want a cheaper alternative? Crappy shoes usually cost about the same as great shoes, and they certainly cost the same to make. And, wearing bad shoes costs much, much more in the long run.

Running barefoot is good, and I do so once in a while. But, running in good shoes is better than running in bare feet all the time. In any case, I'd rather run barefoot than run in bad shoes.