More Jerry Morris

I have been thinking more about the article about Jerry Morris I linked-to recently and realise that I need to explain why I found it both interesting and uplifting.

The main reason is a straightforward admiration for anybody who has spent his life trying to make things better for others. Such people, who try to solve problems practically, based on knowledge and understanding, are the backbone of the country (compared to most of the people in the media who seem to float on clouds of opinion). Jerry Morris was a high level example and, from the evidence of the article, it looks as if he led a virtuous life.

Times Past

Another reason is probably nostalgia. When I read it I could almost imagine a black and white film of the forties with the central character calmly displaying determination in the face of adversity, moral strength, and practical intelligence (he would probably have to be played by John Laurie because I think it was the law at the time that all Scotsmen had to be played by John Laurie). But deeper than an internal cinema is the attraction of looking back at what has changed and what is still the same.

He worked when we were changing from a physically demanding life to the more domesticated, sedentary world we now inhabit. To be able to compare bus drivers to bus conductors was a wonderful opportunity because class, background, lifestyle, diet of both was very similar and it was possible to isolate the differences caused by exercise. This is no longer the case: there are very few conductors; there are far more differences between those who take exercise and those who don't and there are far more confounding factors.

I also found his regret at the passing of the can-do attitude of the 40s to be poignant. i am sure that it is not that we are any less practical or enterprising now but rather we have lost faith in the idea that national plans and initiatives can make things better. Our default position is cynicism and it is a shame that it is so. The post war period, up until the mid 70s, was probably the high point of optimistic thinking, ie a belief that life could be made better, planning could improve the lot of everybody and the application of science would be beneficial. It is not easy to recapture that mood but I still think there is a lot to recommend in the idea of rounding-up all the experts on a subject, sending them away to the Hebrides and not letting them back until they come up with a workable plan.

Applying the Lessons

Although he made is discovery a lifetime ago, there is now a general understanding of the importance of exercise, I am not sure the full message has been accepted. He is very clear that there needs to be vigorous exercise (gardening by itself is not enough) but a lot of the health advice offered today tones that down. We pussyfoot.

I looked at the exercise recommendations on the NHS Choices. Although it contains some sensible advice, nowhere does it mention the need to raise the pulse rate. Vigorous? The word is shunned as we cannot make even the tiniest suggestion of effort in case we scare people off. I understand the motive, and we certainly don’t want to make things seem overly forbidding, but our bodies were evolved for exercise; there is pleasure in breathing heavily. More to the point vigorous exercise is necessary and we are diluting what we know to be true in an effort to make it more palatable. That does nobody any good.

“Exercise normalises the working of the body”. I like that quote. I think it should be at the head of all the health advice.

The Necessity of Exercise

This quote says it all:

“For the first time in history,” says Morris, “the mass of the population has deliberately got to take exercise. It’s a new phenomenon, which is not appreciated.” For decades he has tried to persuade governments to make exercise easier. He was involved in the pioneering English National Fitness Survey of 1990, which found that half of women aged 55 to 64 could not comfortably walk a mile. These people were in effect disabled. The government ignored the report. Since then, British exercise levels haven’t changed much. His voice becomes high-pitched with outrage: “Just imagine, what historians in the future are going to say about the way we’ve allowed this epidemic of childhood obesity. ‘Disgrace’ is a sort of mild word.”

Embodied

Reading an opinion piece about dictionaries in CIF I found this paragraph:

There's more. We humans are embodied creatures. As philosophers put it, we are extended in space and time. That's no humdrum observation. Our intelligence depends upon it, for we feel our way through the world. Moreover, the same embodiment is intimately linked to our capacity for imagination which, in turn, has much to do with the growth of knowledge. The material world we inhabit nurtures our ability to think, as some of the synonyms used for intelligence themselves suggest: we say, "she's bright", "he's sharp", "they're quick" – metaphors all derived from the physical world.

I need add no more. It is the reason I run.

A Sedentary Life

It was a tiny moment. In some ways like glimpsing a passing reflection of yourself, in a shop window, and seeing yourself as if you were a stranger and realising you look slightly different than your normal self image.

I decided to clear my desk. Not a momentous event, just something that has to be done periodically when my effective working area becomes too reduced by piles of stuff I accumulate. Then everything has to be swept away as I have an overwhelming desire for open space. Yesterday, after I had finished, I looked with satisfaction at a worktop with only a computer screen, keyboard, mouse, notebook and pen. I sat down and felt happy. It was then that the tiny moment of insight and realised how much of my time is spent sitting down. Damn I thought, there is no way round it, I lead a sedentary life.

My self image is of being quite active, someone who enjoys a certain amount of physical challenge and the satisfaction that comes from justified tiredness. In short: someone who runs. But in terms of time this is small beer - most of the time I sit.

I don't know what to do with this insight. I don't know whether I ought to spend more time on easy runs, cycle rides or just being outdoors or whether I ought to be more generally active. At the very least I ought to be aware of my posture, because what you do for most of the day is bound to have a great impact on you body form. I will have to look afresh at the physical component of my whole day, rather than focusing on the bits I enter into my running diary. In other words think about health in general.


Postscript

Whilst I was sitting around thinking these things I came across this article on Jerry Morris. It is based on an interview given a shortly before his death and is quite inspiring. He is an obviously great figure (though perhaps little known outside his speciality) who is important to all of us mid-pack runners and general exercisers because he was the first person to show the link between vigorous exercise and a reduction of heart disease. The piece is titled 'The man who invented exercise' and so we obviously owe him debt.

An Unexpected Reminder

Last Sunday was really dark. As everything was falling away I wondered why I spent so much time not only running but thinking about running. It was all a waste as I was achieving nothing. How could I say it was good when there was only struggle?

These thoughts were worst around half way, when it would have been easy to abandon as the course is a squashed figure of eight, and the end seemed a long way away. But as one foot followed another the distance gradually reduced and I knew I could finish and by doing so find some consolation: prove to myself that I could at least carry-on. Important because I have always believed that all the benefits of running flow from the simple act of keeping going. Consistency is everything.

So I finished and rested and as the feeling of physical weakness receded my spirits started to lift. On Saturday I read this poem in the Guardian and for some strange reason they lifted even more. I know that the metaphor of the marathon is one of the most common in the language (and applied to almost everything) but as I read it here it became inverted: I was the marathon man and the metaphor was the ageing poet. When I thought of 'the first flower in the world' or the 'original bird' I thought not of verse but of the excitement of those early days of running when everything seemed fresh and clear.

My continuing project is to try to maintain that sense of clarity. And this poem brought me back to my purpose. It also reminded me that the only way to see the flower and hear the bird is to be outside, with your senses opened up.

Oh and I also like the idea of being a rowdy at deaths door for whom the last moment is not too late

Some Older American Poets
Borders Bookstore, White Plains, NY


Tired of the accomplished young men
and the accomplished young women,
their neat cerebral arcs and sphinctral circles,
their impeccable chic, their sudden precocious surge,
their claims to be named front-runner,
I have turned to the ageing poets – the marathon men,
the marathon women – the ones who breasted the tape
and simply ran on, establishing their own distance.
Home after another funeral they walk by the pond
with a sense of trees thinning and cold in the air,
yet thrill to the dog's passionate slapstick,
his candid arse-up in the debris of last year's storms.
You sprightly mortals, you rowdies at death's door,
for whom the last moment is not too late to begin!
I can't get enough of you, bright-eyed and poetry mad
in the fields next to the cemetery, where you drop to your knees
before the first flower in the world, where you lift your heads
to that bare cry among brambles, the original bird.

Frank Ormsby from Fireflies.
Published in the Guardian 17th October

Henley Half

Enough time has passed since Sunday's race to allow me to develop a certain amount of detachment and not dissolve into a puddle of damp-eyed self-pity.

It was bad and most of the time I was my mind was completely filled with thoughts like: 'I am not enjoying this.' 'This is not fun.' 'What am I doing?' 'When will this be over?' For me the race was about survival and not quitting; rescuing a certain amount of self respect through stubbornness. It shouldn't have been that way but sometimes things conspire and all you can do is just get through.

The background is very simple. I made a late decision to run the race and although I had not trained specifically for it I was in fairly good shape and was confident I could give it a good crack. I completely ignored being surrounded by sickness and people coughing and spluttering: why should I catch anything?. On Friday I was not at all worried; in fact I so relaxed I wanted to find a butcher's dog just to compare fitness levels. However by Saturday the outlook changed as I started coughing.

I had a decision to make. Things were not too bad, I wasn't dying and I do so few races I didn't want to abandon. Once signed-up that's it. On the other hand what is the point if you are unwell? It does no good and nobody is let-down if you don't turn-up. What is more the time, if you do run, is meaningless. Common sense says no, stupidity says yes. So I, of course, went with stupidity.

Once that was decided everything else then fell into place by going wrong. All the little things multiplied until nothing was right. It started with being a little late leaving and getting stuck in the frozen traffic of Henley. Nothing was moving and it was getting nearer and nearer start time and all the time I was getting anxious so that my judgement was completely clouded as I rushed to the start to collect my number and so left the safety pins in the car and had to go back. The toilets, of course had huge queues and I was desperate for a pee but there was a hedge, so that was OK. (One of the interesting differences between races in England and Canada is that in Canada peeing outside is seen as anti-social, but they provide a lot of portable toilets. In England there is always a line of men peeing I a hedge). Anyway I managed to get to the start but found I had left my heart rate strap at home - not an essential but I like to use it in the first 20 minutes to make sure I start at an easy pace. Just another indication that it was not going to be my day.

The race started and immediately I knew it would be difficult. Although I could keep my legs going, they had no strength. Right from the beginning I started to wonder whether I could finish. In one ear was the siren voice telling me to give up and in the other was the voice of duty telling me to resist temptation and not give in. My only tactic was to keep a rhythm but not push anything: circle the legs and just keep moving forward. This worked for the first half but at 8 miles there is a hill that goes on and on and on. It is tough and I could not run it at all. I knew it was beyond me and so I had to trudge slowly to the top. After that the downhill was fun and the run to the end flat but all my energy reserves were completely spent.

It was a slow time, slower than the halfway point in any marathon I have run but at least I finished. In terms of my self esteem that was ridiculously important. I had to prove to myself that I could finish what I had started. I took consolation from the fact that I did.

Since then I have been ill, coughing continually, throat torn and sore, head achy and dull, with time passing in a muzzy haze (which is the main reason I haven't written this report sooner). I think it will be a couple of weeks before I attempt any type of exercise. I will ease back with some slow easy runs to remind myself that running can be enjoyable and life enhancing. Then I will take myself to one side to tell myself that just because I run it does not mean I have to be stupid as well. After which the experience of Sunday will then have been assimilated and I will move on.

I might even do the race again next year because, paradoxically I would recommend the Henley Half. It might not be a course for a PB, because of the hill, but the scenery is pretty, the course interesting, I love the river and the challenge of the hill is character building.

Waiting for the Weekend

At the moment I am busy doing almost nothing, or to put it another way: I am in the middle of a half-arsed taper. Yes I have a race coming up, with little or no sensible planning and certainly no schedule to bring me to a peak of physical perfection, I can at least I can do the right thing and take it easy in the last week.

It was ever thus with my races: either a total lack of planning or schedules falling apart due to injury or illness! Sensible people plan their racing calendar, know well ahead where they are going to be so that they can train properly and perform at their best. Others are less disciplined and wake up one morning knowing that if they don't do something quickly the year will disappear without a single medal or memento. Dear reader that disorganised person is me.

Last week I decided it would be a nice idea to try a race on the same day as my sister, the 11th, when she is once again running the Victoria Half Marathon (my account of running that marathon last year are ,here, here, and here). The Henley half marathon had places available and so with a click of a button I was in, on a whim. Apparently it is mainly flat but with a hill at mile eight. Hmm that will be interesting. I have not been doing much hill training: another example of being slightly under prepared.

My sister and brother-in-law, on the other hand, are both very methodical in their training, know what they are doing and encourage each other to keep on track. They will run well and I am sure they will feature well in their age categories. Alongside them I feel rather haphazard but not at all downhearted. I run fairly consistently so should not be in too bad a shape (even if not in tip top form I should be able to get round OK) and there is something about doing things on the spur of the moment that I like.

So bring on Sunday and good luck to anybody else doing a race that day (especially the Royal Parks half).

The House as an Expression of Identity

Yes I know that we all display our identity in all sorts of ways: the clothes we wear, the products we buy, the places we go; and I also know that most of us devote a lot of time to fixing up our houses so that they reflect our tastes and aspirations. But you have to tip your hat to someone who will boldly decorate the outside of their house to demonstrate their interests to the passing world.

Yesterday I discovered this rather wonderful house when out cycling. I love the moulded panels. They look so much like illustrations from a Victorian comic I can imagine the way a line drawing would be embedded in a story of sporting valour (probably involving a public school and self sacrifice for the sake of the team). I have no further information about them - there was no one about to ask and I have found nothing on Google. I don't know if they are original or added more recently. I don't know if they were a one off or there are more houses like this. I know nothing apart from what I can see from the road.

It is however something I can add to my list of Hertfordshire curiosities. I can put an X on the map at Bricket Wood (which deserves another mention because it is the home of the UK's oldest nudist resort: Spielplatz).

P.S. Until I wrote the last sentence I had no idea I had a list of Hertfordshire curiosities but if I worked on it, such a list might even bare comparison the Anthology of Huntingdonshire Cabmen

It can hardly be claimed for the newly published Anthology of Huntingdonshire Cabmen that it is, in the words of an over-enthusiastic critic, 'a masterpiece of imaginative literature'. The Anthology consists of the more striking names (with initials) from each of the three volumes. It is a factual and unemphatic work, and the compiler has skinned the cream from the lists. Here are such old favourites as Whackfast, E.W., Fodge, S., and Nurthers, P.L. The index is accurate, and the introduction by Cabman Skinner is brief and workmanlike.

A Sunny Autumn Day

September might just be the best month for running as there is always the chance of perfect weather. Today was spectacular: sunshine, deep blue sky, a very slight breeze, warm but not too hot. Nothing could be improved. On such a day it very easy to remember the joy you felt when you first took up running and it was new and fresh.

It was an easy paced session, which meant I could be relaxed and look around, even smile at people as they passed (within reason of course. This is Southern England and a number of people will pass you with their eyes fixed firmly on the ground). The aim was just to be outside, how long it took to complete the route was irrelevant.

My usual habit for this route is to stop at half way, sit on a wall, drink some water, and then set-off back again: a break of a couple of moments. Today however I felt very relaxed sitting in the sun and a wave of contentment swept over me. I just wanted to sit still and look at the yellowing colours of the trees against the blue of the sky. The Old Nash Mills paper factory is decaying, the demolition on hold because of the economy, and I looked at the rust on the chimney and thought it matched the season (rust a sign of autumn in a mechanical lifecycle?). The elderberries have now gone but the hawthorn berries are fuller and deeper in colour. People were strolling and chatting, getting out before the weather turns.

I then wandered around taking photos, concentrating on what I was seeing, not thinking I was meant to be running. (Today's picture shows a tree stating to grow from ducting around the Mill. It is amazing how life can take root in the most unlikely of places). All in all I had a break of twenty minutes.

I cannot claim an 11km run, just two shorter runs, very close together, but I can claim that it felt the right thing to do.

Visualising Information

This is a bit off topic but I am going to recommend a blog/website that has very little to do with running. It is called Information is beautiful and it shows ways that data can be visualised to clarify meaning, increase its impact and aid understanding. Partly I think it is because if something looks pleasing you will want look at it more closely and when you are drawn-in you will start to ask questions. Take the example of Twitter stats and look at the comment (eg if the sample size is 100 how do some people have more than 100 followers?).

But this is a running blog so I want to draw attention to something that has some relevance. This diagram shows the calories of things in a coffee house (something that interests me as they are my second home). The drinks are surprisingly calorific and yet I barely pay them attention when I think of my total food consumption.

So now I can clearly see that 30 minutes running only equals a frappe latte, or more likely a croissant and a large cappuccino. How easy is it to run for 5k and eat for 10? Answer - very.

Why is it so difficult to loose weight and thereby become a more efficient runner? Answer - just look at the data.

Listening to Your Mind

My previous post about listening to your body had at its core the idea of the separation of mind and body but this quote from Michael Woods in the current London Review of Books makes that relationship far more interesting by pointing out the separation of mind and brain.

We could drop the metaphor of the brain or mind as a computer. This is what Aamodt and Wang recommend, because it’s ‘not really accurate . . . the brain works more like a Chinese restaurant that we know in Manhattan; it’s crowded and chaotic, and people are running around to no apparent purpose, but somehow everything gets done in the end – and efficiently too.’ What’s most interesting in this image is that we are the customers in this neuro-restaurant, not its owners or managers or waiters; and the same little allegory is at work in the conception of our brains and ourselves being different moral entities (‘Your brain lies to you a lot’).

So now when I go for a run I will picture it in terms people rushing around in a crowded restaurant giving out orders for more speed and receiving demands from more oxygen. Somehow, and I don't know why, I feel strangely happy with this idea of barely contained chaos.

Listening to Your Body

Runners talk far more about injury than they do about health.

This is almost inevitable because one of the attraction of running is the way it tests the body's capabilities. Slightly faster or slightly longer the ratchet is moved upwards to see if we can adapt and become stronger. This happens but there is always the risk of misjudgement (call it a training mistake or just plain stupidity) and something, be it knee, foot, ankle, calf or hip, breaks down. Sometimes something damaged in an instant can take an awful long time to repair, especially as there is uncertainty about the precise cause. But at other times pain and discomfort signals show us the boundaries of our capabilities and warn us that we need to back off. If we listen we can escape with a near miss and continue to get stronger.

Injury or the risk of injury is ever present but luckily damage usually not debilitating and can be repaired. With care and attention we can be better again.

'Listen to your body' is the easiest advice to give but the most difficult to follow. Within the advice is a sense of otherness: that you are different from a body, which has its own limits that have to be discovered. The problem being that the messaging systems are limited and vague. Pain is certainly the most insistent and the one that grabs our attention but even then there needs to be sifting to see whether it is a twinge that can be treated as noise or whether it is a clear signal. Listening to your body can be very confusing.

So the emphasis has to shift from the difficult 'listening' to the almost impossible ie understanding your body. Where to start?

For me it is perhaps a two pronged approach. The first is to accept that my body is governed by the normal laws of physiology and learn from the experience of others (this might seem blindingly obvious but there is still a small part of my brain that hopes it can bypass the normal course of ageing). The second is to switch my focus and look more at what makes me feel good rather than what gives me pain. For example one hill session can leave me feeling tired but satisfied whilst another can leave me just feeling weary, when comparing them I should look more at what went right rather than what went wrong.

Perhaps I should start talking more about health than about injury

Interruptions Welcomed

We spent the weekend in Manchester but getting there was something of an ordeal as we were caught in not one but two tailbacks caused by multicar crashes. A three and a half hour journey took five and there was nothing that could be done, except listen to the radio and look at everyone else as we inched our way along.

So it was back home and out into the open for the freedom of a run. No hold-ups no limitations apart from the frailty of my body. But then I came to this sign on the canal. Traffic control - what is this?

Beyond the sign were two men sat a couple of hundred yards apart, each dressed in a high viz yellow suit and each holding a long stop/go lollipop pole. They were just waiting for any passing barge to stop it whilst other people were working on the overhead electricity cables. I stopped and had a brief chat with one of the men, commenting on what seemed like a pretty stress free job. Controlling a boat travelling at walking pace is just a little less fraught than the M6 on a busy day. "yeah" he said "it is a bit of health and safety gone mad, though if one of those cables did slip it could whiplash back and kill you." I took my chance and passed underneath - nothing happened.

Except that in a way that interruption and a later attempt to take of photo of a heron saved my run. Before then my legs had felt very heavy. I don't know why but everything was an effort and all my attention was focussed on the struggle to keep going rather than the pleasure of being out and the beauty of my surroundings. After the first stop a I smiled internally and remembered my road trip and compared it to my peaceful surroundings. I stopped worrying about my aches. After I saw the heron I stopped and tried to stalk it. It flew away a couple of times but I eventually got a picture. I then realised that I was having fun being outside and the run was just a means of getting me there and so I looked around with more attention. Later on a jay flew across my path and my enjoyment meter ratcheted up a little more and so all in all I had a good time.

It just goes to show how much of your running is done in your head.

The Stuff that Doesn't Happen

"You ought to get a life. You know - the shit that happens while you're waiting for the moments that never come."

You have to love The Wire; it is full of such nice, shiny, nuggets of dialogue. This one makes me think about my running life - the things that never happen and what I do in the meantime.

The major thing that never happens is becoming any good - in the sense of being relatively fast, doing well in races and being able to hold my head up in age-category rankings. I could wait forever but it is not going to happen. It was never a hard objective anyway. When I started running I had vague thoughts that it would be nice if it happened - if I discovered that I had some innate ability, which could be uncovered but I soon realised that was not the case. My object has therefore never been to be a competitive runner.

This leaves the scaled down objective of trying to get better. Now this should be easy to measure by inching down personal bests. But it is not going to happen either. I was faster four years ago and nothing I do seems to change that.

So I now have to play games by making up new categories such as running more easily ,going slightly longer being slightly faster at a lower heart rate, conquering steeper hills, or running over different terrain, whatever. And now I realise that this is the shit that happens - it is my running life.

I spend my time regularly going over the same routes but always introducing subtle variations. Each week I introduce a new challenge - something to focus on. From the outside you might not even notice the difference because it looks so similar to normal, for example it might involve running to different heart rates, adding a further hill before having a breather or putting in little sprints. It might be extending the days I run consecutively or any other little plan. Sometimes it is even to do things more easily - slow down and let the world float by.

For some reason these little changes keep me disproportionately amused. I am wrapped-up in them and pay no attention to those other things, the big moments that never come.

Seasons

I have lived for most of my life in towns of varying size and my main occupations have kept me indoors for most of the time. It is possible to live my life with only the vaguest sense of changes of the seasons and life cycles. Even the weather can often be ignored as one need never be far from building or car. Some people can go through the year without needing an outdoor coat. It is possible to become almost completely disconnected from the natural world and to barely notice the horizon. It is possible but not desirable.

One of the reasons I run is to make sure this does not happen. Keeping in touch with my animal nature is more than just trying to be fit in both body and mind, it is an effort to use all the senses to feel part of the surroundings. I need to get out to see the wider sky, feel the shade or shelter of trees, be surrounded the colour green, see animals, and feel the weather on my skin. In some way it is important to notice all the subtle difference from week to week as the seasons change.

I was thinking this on yesterday's run. It felt so damn autumnal - the air, the leaves, the berries all spoke of the season. I stopped to take a picture of elder and hawthorn berries intertwining and then looked around. For some reason, in that moment, I felt more alive.

Running Barefoot - But Not On A Treadmill

This is a very small story, just an application of 'rules is rules', but it is interesting in the way shows how things are justified and how fragments of ideas can float around.

It really started with my recent post about running styles and the realisation that although I naturally midfoot/forefoot strike and I have in the past discovered the pleasure of running barefoot, I spend all my time in standard, neutral, cushioned shoes. I was thinking about this when I was pushing some weights and looking at other people of the treadmills. There was quite a lot of heavy thumping and some of the runners really slapped their feet down and my thoughts wandered to what it is that makes some people lighter on their feet than others. It has nothing to do with actual bodyweight, as the person with the loudest foot strike was quite slightly built, but must have something to do with trying to force things too hard. The essence of good style I thought must be to move along the surface as lightly as possible not to drive the feet into the ground.

I then thought it would be fun to try a little barefoot running so I left my shoes by the side of the treadmill and started running just wearing very lightweight socks . I had forgotten how good it is to feel the foot moving freely - the way the forefoot spreads-out when it lands and then how the heel lightly touches the surface before it is lifted-off. I was quite enjoying myself, feeling a little bit looser and playing about running at different speeds, when one of the members of staff came over and told me to stop as it was mandatory to run in trainers.

"Why?" I asked
"Health and safety" was the reply
"What am I being protected from?"
"Things falling on your feet and you could catch your socks and be thrown off the machine."

But I think he was a bit embarrassed about these reasons and his heart was not into trying to describe the scenarios where these things might happen. He then shifted ground and suggested that running barefoot was not good for you.

I was both a little shocked and really interested by this because he was one of the trainers whose job is to advise on exercise. He ought to know better or at least have some good reasons to back up such a statement. He didn't and so I said a little about how you absorbed the forces when you landed on your forefoot and how lots of people think it is a good way to run.

"Ah forefoot running. That's Pose running and a bit different" he said
"No, all Pose runners land on their forefoot but not all forefoot runners are Pose runners."

This is really quite interesting because it shows the power of a brand name and the way it can become fixed in the mind of someone who only has a peripherally interest in the subject. I am sure that this trainer was expert in all of the machines in the gym, weight training and general fitness regimes but probably for him running is only another form of cardio vascular exercise. If so he would not pay close attention to issues within the running community but he would be aware of things that impinged on the fitness industry , so obviously Pose has a profile and has made some impact. It is more widely known than I thought. it is amazing how things can ripple out.

Anyway we started to talk a little about running styles but that was not really the point so we reverted to the main topic of me running without shoes.

I had no problems with stopping. The man was doing his job and I had no desire to give him a hard time or mount any sort of high horse. It is one of the rules of the gym that you have to wear appropriate footwear at all times (probably to stop people exercising in boots or flip flops) and that is all there is to it.

I wonder though about the thinking behind such rules. Probably it is something along the lines of:

Trainers are designed to cushion the impact of running
Therefore they are protective
We need to do everything we can to protect our customers from injury
Therefore protective footwear must be worn.

The logic might be totally flawed but at least it is coherent in an institutional sort of way.

Luckily outdoors none of this matters and running is not about thinking in an institutional way. It is about listening to the best advice you can find, hearing from other peoples experiences and then trying things out for yourself. It is about not being proscriptive.

Get Out of Jail Free Card

Whenever I have a day that is mostly futile, when everything is a bit hazy and I don't think I have achieved anything worthwhile, I often find that a run sorts me out. It is not that it clears my mind so that I return with the answer to a problem that previously had me stumped - rarely do I get any magical insights. It is something far more direct: when I am out of the door I am putting in effort and because of that I feel I am doing something good.

In a way it is my 'get out of jail free' card. The simple act of exercising, outside - seeing the world pass, looking at new things and interacting (in a limited way) with other people makes me feel better. Because of that I feel the day has not been wasted, no matter how little is done during the rest of it. But the knock-on effect is usually I approach other tasks with a renewed concentration.

If there is something in the idea of redemption through personal endeavour, the obverse is also probably true in that you slump if you don't do enough.

I recently came across a phrase that tickled me because it so precisely describes one of ways we might not do enough: 'social loafing'. It describes many group situations where people don't give of their best because they think that others will pick-up the slack and anyway everyone else is probably easing-off a bit as well. It explains why work groups are often surprisingly unproductive and brainstorming sessions are mostly futile. It might also contribute a little bit to something like Brook's Law, which states that adding manpower to a late software project makes it even later.

Just discovering the phrase has made me examine my own behaviour and it gives me no great pleasure to admit that I am also prone to a bit social loafing and there have been many occasions where I have not given of my best.

This is not the case when running. When I am out of the door there is no loafing and I am fully engaged in the activity. Whatever distance I run is the distance I run, whatever time I take is the time I take, there can be no short-cuts or cheating. I do what I can to the best of my ability and my diary is a record of honest endeavour.

That is why running is my 'get out of jail free' card - it shows me that I can be honest.

More Than Just Socks

I was looking for a new pair of socks on Wiggle and clicked on the 'Nike elite run cushion socks' and read this description of their properties:

Enhanced Stability-Nike Sensory Enhancement Technology heightens awareness of foot to help pronation and promote neutral landings

"Nooooo" I cried "you are socks, you cannot do these things. You cannot heighten my awarenes of my own foot. This is gobbledegook! How can I buy something that makes such a ludicrous claim?" So I clicked through to the 'Bridgedale X-Hale Speed Demon Socks' only to see:

The hard-working feet of distance runners taught Bridgedale how to create a sock that offers the best of two worlds: the feel of an ultralight, rapid-drying synthetic sock and the cushioned comfort of a Merino wool sock.

Hard-working feet taught?!

I must stop this and get a grip. I must not worry about the way marketing people fulfil the rquirements of their job by talking nonsense. It is what they do and I am only buying socks. It really shouldn't be complicated. But it is.

This is because everything concerned with running is sold on its technical properties and the promise of superior performance yet there is not one of those claims we can test in any meaningful way. Only a textile scientist can judge the comparative virtues of the different materials used by the different manufacturers. The rest have trust that at least some of the claims are true and that products from trusted manufacturers will do their job. Then we somehow make a choice.

I have no idea how I make purchasing decisions. I am pretty random and perhaps more influenced by image and style than I would like to admit. Am I influenced by the performance claims? - Probably quite a lot. But am I put-off by inflated claims and stupidisms? - Almost certainly.


P.S. As a complete aside (but related to the use of language). I recently listened to someone talking about the disappearance of the Russian cargo ship after it had passed through the English Channel saying that it might represent a modification of the pirate business model.

"Pirate business model!!" I spluttered "They are PIRATES" I then remembered a comedy sketch from the 1990s, from the Million Pound Radio Show, about pirate training days. You can listen to it here if you want

Running Styles

'Can anybody tell me how they run?' asked Hauling My Carcass in a post about running technique but the more interesting question is 'should anybody change the way they run?'. More specifically sould they attempt to change their footstrike?

Do I know how I run?

To answer the first question: yes, or at least I have a fairly good idea. I like to monitor myself when running , checking my balance, sense of muscular movement, ease of movement, breathing etc, etc, and so I think about my footfall moderately frequently. One of the attractions of running is the feeling of physicality and the sense of a working body and to get this I like to pay it some attention to how things are going.

I know for example that I land on outside of my midfoot, roll over to the ball of the foot and then push off. That is what it feels like and also what it looks like on the treadmill when buying new shoes but the best evidence is the wear pattern on old trainers. They can never lie because they show the results of all your miles - the actual physical evidence. The picture above is the sole of one of my current shoes. You can see the main area of wear is (A) , where the rubber on the bottom outside-edge has worn right down to the level of the hard-plastic midfoot bridge. The outside of the front of the heel (B) also shows wear because it gets in the way as my foot comes down at a shallow angle (I do not land on my toes) and area (C) shows wear from pushing-off. The heel at the back looks almost untouched.

I did not choose to run this way, like most people when I started running my only concern was how far I could go and I certainly did not think about how my foot should land. I ran the way that came naturally and I continue in the same style. As I am not particularly injury prone (though not injury free) my attitude is that it works well enough and so there is nothing much to worry about. But if I were to worry I would not start with questions of heel strike versus forefoot strike because I think that is determined by the rest of my form (e.g. I think I land on my midfoot because I take short strides and land under my body). I would start by looking at balance.

I made this point in an earlier post about watching two people in the gym. They both had good form, were fluid in their movements, compact but relaxed they were running easily and well but one landed on the heels the other on the forefoot. Their good style had more to do with being upright (i.e. not bending from the waist), having a relaxed upper body (i.e. their arms moved easily without tension), and not landing too heavily (their leg turnover was quite high).

The thing is that all of these components of good style can be worked on independently, without having to dismantle everything and start again in a very self-conscious way. For example I think shoulders are important for your whole posture and when they are relaxed everything moves more easily. If you feel your shoulders are too tight when you run you can work on them, over time by making them your run-thought, every time you go out and gradually changes can be made. If you feel you bend at the waist, similarly you can work at keeping your hips in a straight line. You can also do strength exercises for the upper body and core to help with these two areas. In this way changes can be made to the running style - incrementally

Should runners change their style?

This brings me to the second question should you change your style? My answer is perhaps but not necessarily. If you are running injury-free and are happy with your progress then there is no reason to change. The idea that there is one perfect style is a snare and delusion. We run the way we do because of all sorts of adaptations our bodies have made over a long period of time and all of us have different relative strength in the different muscle groups. The way we run reflects that. If it is working don't mess with it.

However if there are problems with injury or lack of progress you can look at the general principles of good form and gradually work at things and if necessary switch a few running sessions to build general strength or flexibility.

But what about Pose?

But should you make a wholesale change and do something like Pose running? Of that I am less convinced. Going right back to zero and becoming a beginner once again is a hellishly difficult ask and it might not deliver what is promised. As far as I know the only systematic testing of Pose running was done at the University of Cape Town under the aegis of Tim Noakes. Conclusions from the study can be read here and here (they are part of a series of blog posts about running style (front page here), which are full of good observations). One of the more interesting findings is that Pose running does not reduce forces on the body, instead it transfers them to different parts so that whilst heel strikers typically have more knee injuries, those trained in Pose had more ankle problems.

The problem with Pose is that it promises to reduce injuries and so evidence to the contrary is significant. A common response is to suggest that it is not the technique but the implementation i.e. the poor, injured runner was not up to the task of running properly but this causes more problems than it solves because it means the demands of the style are so high you can never be sure you are doing it properly. That uncertainty must put an almighty dent in the simple pleasure of getting out the door and running.

For many people though Pose obviously works and the sincerity and zeal of its advocates cannot be doubted. For that reason I would not want to dismiss it, I just don't think the advantages are as clear-cut and inevitable as those advocates suggest (otherwise everyone would do it and looking at the runners in the World Athletics Championships this definitely not the case). Like every other intervention related to the human body there is complexity and the outcomes are not necessarily homogenous.

The trick for all runners is to find out what works for them personally. This involves learning from the experience of others, reading, and finding people whose judgement they trust but most importantly trying things out. Running is empirical and theory is only meaningful if it shows results on the road. That is one of the reasons I like it - everything is there to be tested.

As for Pose - it seems a long haul before it is perfected and you could evaluate the benefits. I am not sure I would have the patience

A Lack of Adventure

This is another picture from my holiday: two people paddling along the great, grey-green, greasy Charente River, towing behind them, in a little inflatable trailer, their camping gear.

I imagine a holiday, with no fixed objectives except to start out each morning and either see how far you could go in a day or stop off when you reached somewhere interesting. I imagine constant exercise but not flat out, not exhausting, the sort of exercise that build strength over time. I imagine the feel of fresh air on the cheeks and the contemplation of quietness of isolated places. Above all I can imagine the two men come home to tell their friends about the miles travelled, difficulties overcome, and the satisfactions of the trip.

Then I think about myself and how my routines lack adventure : no big trips, no long stretches of open road or open waterway. Mostly what I do is run, fairly regularly, around a limited number of routes, trying to be alert to what I pass and find freshness and satisfaction. In many ways this is enough and it contributes mightily to my mental balance, but gives me no bragging rights. I have not made extended trips such as cycling coast to coast from Wales to East Anglia, as have IrunbecauseIlikeFood or Red Rocket nor have I thought of any imaginative challenges like Adele, and I have certainly never had any desire to test myself to destruction by trying to run between the 4 capitals of the UK like Eddie Izzard.

Perhaps I should extend the range of what I do? Certainly I should give it some consideration.

At the moment my only plan is to give the marathon another go - to try to find out whether the satisfaction outweighs the pain or vice verse. I would like a definitive answer but my suspicion is that there will be none and, just like before, I will find myself looking at a tangled mess of emotions. Nevertheless trying to answer the question is my current quest and that will have to be enough for the time being.

The French Paradox

The French Paradox is that whilst the national diet is high on saturated fats the rate of obesity and cardiovascular death is amongst the lowest in the western world. This does not mean of course that everybody is thin. People are all shapes and sizes and I love walking around places like this brocante looking at people as well as the now redundant objects. This man's full belly somehow adds to the character of the place.

Lately I have become more interested in variations in the human body. I started by looking at the way people moved and their running styles, making connections with different builds and then noticing how every part of the body has its own unique pattern. It is well known that hands are individual but even a simple body part like the calf can vary amazingly. Yoko Ono first made her name with a film of scores of naked bottoms, just showing how they differed so what I am saying is not new. It is just part of my ongoing project of trying to look at the world with fresh eyes.

It is a weird side-effect of running that I now look at people more closely.

Weight is part of form but it is not everything. Sometimes I wonder if we all spend too much time worrying about our own weight and tut tutting about other people's. In my gym there is a board where people post their targets and resolutions and almost all of them are about losing weight. Hardly any are physical challenges such as beating a pb or learning a new skill, which be far more interesting targets. Why is weight so often seen as the most important thing?

Probably it is a surrogate based on the assumption that we would all be happier, more vigorous, better looking and enjoy life more if we were lighter (or for some people heavier). This is may or may not be true - I don't even know if weight is a symptom or cause of unhappiness.

My feelings about my own weight are rather functional: I want to lose a little because I think it will help my running. The main aim is to try to run a marathon without feeling whipped and beaten in the second half and I am sure that the less useless weight I carry the better. However it is proving difficult and I have only lost about 4 lbs since the beginning of the year but I am not too upset because my main strategy is to run more miles and so far that is going OK.

It is interesting that I don't lose weight with increased training. Part of the reason is that I become more concerned with maintaining energy levels and refuelling than with dieting; but it is very, very difficult to eat only what the body requires, and no more. Running 5k and eating for 10k is however the easiest thing in the world. On the other hand I prefer that to under eating and then passing out as happened to President Sarkoszy.
How does one find the right balance?

Which brings me back to the French paradox, which isn't really much of a paradox because traditionally they don't snack much, they have modest sized portions, and cook things from scratch using good quality, fresh ingredients. That is all one needs to know, all one needs to do: eat well but moderately and take pleasure in food. Everything else will then take care of itself.