A training plan, for running AND life

With a dog sled and a pack of eager huskies, a whole new
cross-training element could be added to your running this
time of year

It all started with a question about buttermilk.

Running has been going well since picking up with a true training plan a couple months ago.  Right now my approach is to run a minimum of four days per week, maximum six, and as you might expect, things tend to average out to running five days per week.  Sunday I view as the most significant run of the week, because that is when I do a run at my goal pace.  Monday night or Tuesday morning I'll just do some miles, Wednesday night I'll do a longer run with hills (to the extent that I can find them in Columbus), Thursday night I'll do some more miles, and then Saturday I'll do a slow mid-range run as I look ahead to the pace run the next day to start the cycle over again.  Friday is pretty much always going to be a day off, but Monday morning could involve a run if I really feel like it for some reason.  Although I'm trying to stick to this schedule fairly regularly, at times there will be a day when a refresher is needed, so on those days I'll do some jump rope in lieu of a run.

Hal Higdon's training plans recommend running slower than your goal pace on the Sunday run (which is the day of the week when you end up doing your longest runs), but I've found that I have to actually train at my goal pace if I'm going to then run at the goal pace on the day of the race.  Intuitively, my approach seems to make sense.  I think Higdon's perspective is that your body naturally ramps up for the day of the race due to a trained ability to conserve energy for when it's needed, but whether it's because I don't get "amped" for the day of the race or something else, this doesn't seem to work for me.  I'll feel most confident going into the day of the race believing I can run my goal pace if I've already run at that pace for significant distances in training.  The principle of starting slow and picking up the pace as you go along is sound, but running a full minute and a half slower than your goal pace while you're training?  Obviously Higdon is the expert (he's the one with the website about training plans, numerous books, and any number of disciples), but it's also important to customize with the things that work for you.

This post would be good to read at 10:00 and 2:00

The first snowfall, a yearly event closely followed by the
first complaint about people driving in the snow

The impetus for the topic of this blog post has not really come about in full force as yet, and the reason is global warming, or at least what people refer to as global warming whenever there is a relatively warm day from December through March.  As everyone knows, with a rising average temperature comes less snow year after year, because if it isn't cold, then there can't be snow.  Well, it has not yet snowed in Columbus this year.  As a result, a time-honored tradition of office conversation, social gatherings, and lone individuals talking to themselves everywhere has been put on hold.  This is the tradition of indignantly pointing out how people can't f*cking drive.

I'm sure you are familiar with this phenomenon regardless of your location, because it seems to me that everybody everywhere believes that their city, town, or village is a city, town, or village full of horrendously bad drivers.  Each year when there is a first snowfall, it is only a matter of time before someone feels compelled to point out that "there has been a first snowfall, and now we're all in for it, because when there's the least bit of snow on the ground people around here act likes it's a big deal and well, there's simply no other way to say it, people can't f*cking drive."  Usually it is the same person each year who makes this proclamation, followed by some self-satisfied laughter.

While this phenomenon is most prevalent during the winter when it snows, much like the Christmas spirit it need not be limited to just one season.  No, such statements can be bandied about year-round.  Whenever there is a bit of springtime rain, for example.  Or perhaps during the summer vacationing season when there is more traffic on the roads.  Another common occasion is when you're a bit late for work and people aren't going fast enough for your taste.  Also much like the Christmas spirit, such thoughts and feelings can be spread from person to person.  This could naturally culminate in everyone in a particular city, town, or village talking about how people in that particular city, town, or village can't drive, and everyone agreeing with each other on this point.

If you shop til you drop you have planned poorly

A hamlet such as this would be ideal,
because you could start by going uphill
and then take advantage of the downhill
later on in your shopping outing.

This evening's post comes to you from the Grandview Avenue Caribou Coffee in the lovely hamlet of Grandview, just northwest of downtown Columbus.  I am in Grandview this evening because it is one of several Columbus hamlets with a Main Street of sorts (or a main street, I suppose) with shops and restaurants all within easy walking distance of each other.  Hamlets like this are quite excellent in my view because they promote community, exercise (in the form of walking), commerce, creativity, and a host of other benefits.  I'm sure you can think of some for yourself.  Hamlets are a place where you feel good about yourself, where you feel like you're part of something special, where you want to spend time and not rush it.  This is in contrast to the world of big box, parking lot, frenzied pace, get-out-while-you-can suburbs and strip malls.  In other words, a hamlet is ideal for a little holiday shopping.

Mmmmm....Christmas hamlet.  So savory.

While I contrast shopping in the context of a hamlet with shopping in the context of suburban malls, I must say that my shopping approach in a hamlet is still "mission-style" shopping.  You could say that I take a very thorough approach to shopping.  This means checking every store, looking at every item, making a calculated decision, and then EXECUTE! EXECUTE! EXECUTE!.  Leave no stone unturned, because the stone you don't turn over may have the ideal gift underneath it, covered in moss and earthworms.  This isn't to say that if I do come across the ideal gift early on while shopping that I'll keep going.  I don't love shopping that much, and I'm no fool.  But I don't just pick and choose a few stores and then settle for what I can find in them.  Any store may surprise you with something you never thought you'd find, so every store deserves a look.  As you might expect, power-walking is not out of the question when mission-shopping, and it might even be essential.  I'm not an aggressive shopper, but you've got to move quickly and be efficient to get all the stores in.

Remember that all this is in the context of shops along just one to three streets in a hamlet, not striding through the vast wasteland of a mall.

Christmas hamlet.......mmmmm.......with potatoooooooes......

A freshly pressed post just for you

Tradition! Here in our little village of
Anatevka, weaaaaaaahhhhh peepperrrrr
spraaaaayy!

It is now the third day after Thanksgiving, and after hunkering down in our homemade bunker with 12 gallons of water and a shotgun during Black Friday, it's now time to come out and update the blog.  In truth, Dad and I actually ventured out mid-morning on Black Friday, but it was to get a few tools at places like the local hardware store and Sears, not to rush the gates at Best Buy and Target.  The hardware store and Sears were definitely busier than usual, but old fat guys looking at tools lends itself to more of a "milling" pace than a "rabid" pace.  And they keep their guns in the beds of their pickups trucks rather than bringing them into the store.

Black Friday shopping is not a tradition that our family has ever engaged in.  For me, it's rather unsettling to read about the latest religious-induced trampling at a temple or mosque in India or the Middle East, and then realize we have the same thing here....but for game consoles.  However, our family does participate in other standard Thanksgiving traditions, like consuming turkey, and napping, and being thankful for turkey and napping.  We also watch some football, that most celebrated of American sports, although sitting around watching TV compels us to get outside and exercise or do yard work for part of the day as well.  Because if there's a feeling that reverberates in our souls just as strongly as thankfulness, it's guilt.  Ha!

Just so you know, this blog post was made from scratch

You....want....career advice?!!!

A couple days ago I started reading a book titled Shop Class as Soulcraft by Matthew Crawford.  The basic point of the book, if I'm interpreting it correctly after the first two chapters, is that society over time has developed an unreasonable aversion to work that falls into the categories of "crafts" or "skilled trades." While students are in high school, we promote college as the better path and discourage them from actively pursuing a basic trade, believing that life will be harder and less lucrative for them if they go into a trade.  But more recently people have started realizing that "knowledge jobs" are not as secure as once believed, and even worse, the individuals pursuing those careers find that they are not only unsatisfied at work, but woefully unable to be self-sufficient.  Crawford calls for a new look at manual work, and recognition of the fact that it can be satisfying, secure, and even lucrative.

Here are a few early passages from the book so that you can read some of Crawford's own words...

The satisfactions of manifesting oneself concretely in the world through manual competence have been known to make a man quiet and easy.  They seem to relieve him of the felt need to offer chattering interpretations of himself to vindicate his worth.


Craftsmanship means dwelling on a task for a long time and going deeply into it, because you want to get it right.  In managementspeak, this is called being "ingrown."  The preferred role model is the management consultant, who swoops in and out and whose very pride lies in his lack of particular expertise.  Like the ideal consumer, the management consultant presents an image of soaring freedom, in light of which the manual trades appear cramped and paltry.