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THIS WEEK:
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This Weeks Personal Postings/Releases:
We have NO personal postings this week.


This Week's Digest Article Index:

1. What To Do When Your Brain Imagines Fatigue
2. Three ways to quantify and evaluate your training
– and make sure you are achieving what your coach has planned for you
3. Kaizen Swimming - How To Improve Continuously…No Matter How Long You Swim
4. High-protein diets curb appetite
5. Joe Henderson's Running Commentary - Trial Mile
6. Sports Psychology: Exercise Addiction
7. Science of Sport: Plyometrics - A grown-up approach to youth training
8. Dr. Gabe Mirkin's Fitness and Health E-Zine
9. Improve your VO2 Max
10. Music Soothes the Savage Beast
11. Swimming: What To Look For in a Swim Coach
12. From Runner's World
13. Street Fighting Man
From prologue to Paris, DANIEL COYLE followed the reigning champ throughout the
2004 Tour and all the way to victory No. 6. Now he's
written a true-life sports thriller about how the Armstrong machine smashed the
opposition. In this exclusive excerpt from Lance
Armstrong's War, the author chronicles the brutal turning point of Lance's
greatest triumph.
14. Age Takes Its Toll on Aerobic Fitness
But exercise can help fight that decline, experts add.
15. Athletics: Beat The Heat
16. Two Exercises Help Older People Stay on Their Feet
17. Test Yourself On Eight Popular Nutrition Myths
18. Built for the race
Body mass index could be a reason why a sprinter's muscular physique differs
from that of a lean marathoner.
19. Runners Are Ahead Of The Curve
20. Brisk Bliss
FOR CENTURIES, Eastern mystics have prescribed meditation as one-stop shopping
for all that ails you.
21. Herbal cold remedy found worthless
22. How to save your favorite riding area from extinction
23. Does Hill Running Help?
24. Raise Your Marathon Plateau
Still looking for that Breakthrough Race? These strategies can take you there.
25. By Data Obsessed
Recreational athletes love the new data-driven tools that monitor exercise. Do
they really help?

Runner's Web Weekly Poll:
"Do you think it is reasonable that many Canadian athletes must pay their own
expenses to world championship events where they
represent their country?"

You can access the poll from our FrontPage as well as voting on and/or checking
the results of previous polls.
Post your views in our Forum at:
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Last week's poll was: "What is your feeling in regards to charity fund raising
involvement with a race?"
The results at publication time were:
Answers Votes Percent
1. More likely to run it 21 34%
2. Less likely to run it 15 24%
3. No effect 26 42%
Total Votes: 62

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Five Star Site of the Week: Paul Amey - UK Olympic Triathlete.
Paul Amey is one of Great Britain's most promising endurance athletes, as he
possesses the right attributes to become one of
Triathlons all-time very best competitors. Paul, or Amos as he is affectionately
known by his peers is one of the most affable
athletes in the sport of Triathlon. After considering, but turning down fully
paid athletic scholarships from a number of American
universities, Paul decided to give Triathlons a go.
Starting as an inexperienced rookie, Amey has concentrated on triathlons over
the last 6 years and has met with considerable
success, Winning the prestigious French Iron Tour in 1999, (the Tour de France
for Triathlons) and finishing Second (2000) and Third
(1998) on two other attempts, finishing Second (1998) and Seventh (1997) at the
ITU World Championships, finishing Second in the
ultra competitive French Grand Prix Series (1999) and also winning numerous
Triathlons from all over the World, from New Zealand,
Australia, to USA, and Europe.
Amey has, and still races in all types of Triathlon events, ranging from the
super fast short F1 series in Australia, the ITU
Olympic distance style of racing, American non-drafting short course and long
course races to the taxing Ironman distance races.
Clearly Amey is very versatile covering all Triathlon distances and thus an
athlete of rare ability, but now Paul's shift in focus
is to the 2004 Olympics, Paul has been very vocal in his desire to win the Gold
Medal in Athens. His unprecedented run speed and
underestimated strength on the bike has many in the Triathlon fraternity
predicting that Paul's impact at short course races over
the next few years will be devastating.....leading to Gold in Athens.
With his unassuming approachable attitude and an ever-blossoming fan club, Amey
has stamped himself as one of the friendliest, but
determined athletes in Triathlon. When he is not training, Paul enjoys other
outdoor sports like wake-boarding, and snow-boarding,
(when possible) but like most people, the things he enjoys the most, he doesn't
get much time to do, but he also enjoys just
relaxing with family and friends.
Visit his site at:
http://www.paulamey.com


Send us your suggestions for our Five Star site. Please check our list of
previous Five Star Sites available from the Five Star
Window under the link "Previous Five Star Sites" as we do not wish to repeat a
site unless it has undergone a major redesign.


If you feel you have something to say that is worthy of a Guest Column on the
Runner's Web, email us at
mailto:webmaster@... or leave your comments in one of our Forums at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/forum.html or from our FrontPage.

Our Photo Slideshow is updated on a random basis. Check it out from our
FrontPage.


Book of the Week: Triathlon Training Basics
Gale Bernhardt
This indispensable guide focuses on how aspiring triathletes successfully
complete a sprint or Olympic distance triathlon. Triathlon
Training Basics is specifically written for beginning triathletes, their
personal trainers, and coaches. It’s the cornerstone for
any triathlon training program.
Buy the book at VeloPress at:
http://store.yahoo.com/cgi-bin/clink?velogear+2Hs7fM+trtrba.html

More books from Amazon at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/amazon.html
and Human Kinetics at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/human_kinetics.html

This Weeks News:

1. Science of Sport: What To Do When Your Brain Imagines Fatigue:
It is possible that your brain imagines muscular fatigue when it is not really
there, manufactures muscular distress even when the
muscles are fine – just to save your muscles from potentially severe damage.
The brain, you see, probably has a built-in governor which calculates the amount
of time remaining before your leg muscles implode
as you run either very fast or very far. Once this calculation is made, the
governor then creates an overwhelming sense of conscious
fatigue which forces you to slow down before the “safe time” has elapsed,
sparing your cardiac and skeletal muscles – and perhaps
your life (one form of exercise-related muscle breakdown – rhabdomyolysis – can
be fatal). This fatigue is felt even though the
muscles themselves are still operating perfectly well at a high level of effort.
Far-fetched? Not at all: Your brain is easily capable of making such
calculations. Think about the last time you were a base runner
during a softball game, for example. As you led off first base, the next batter
rocketed the ball into the right-field corner. You
sped toward second, and you somehow knew that you could make it to third (based
on a “behind-the-scenes” calculation by your brain).
So, you turned on the juice, and you suddenly realized – even though you were
still 25 feet from second base – that you were not
going to have to change strides to hit second with your foot (based on another,
unconscious calculation by your grey matter). As you
slid safely into third, you felt like a natural-born baseball player, since the
game was coming so easily to you, with no need for
conscious thinking to make great plays.
More...from the Runner's Web at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/news/rw_news_20050729_RRN_Brain_Fatigue.html


2. Science of Sport: Three ways to quantify and evaluate your training
– and make sure you are achieving what your coach has planned for you:
Coaches are good at planning training schedules: indeed, most of the ones I know
are very thorough – even mathematical – in the
detail of their planning. Typically, a coach will plan and add up the amounts of
training at different intensity levels and modes
required to produce the ideal training schedule for a given athlete.
A training schedule, variation, progression and recovery will be planned within
or between weekly programmes to maximise the fitness
effect. For example, an endurance coach will plan how best to organise five
sessions at steady pace, three interval sessions at high
intensity, one complete rest day, three runs at threshold pace and one
conditioning session to make the best training week. No doubt
PP readers are familiar with this system of planning and training schedules
organisation.
Athletes (most of them at least) use diaries to record their training. Commonly,
these diary entries will contain session details
for each day and may include comments. For example, Tuesday am – 30 minute run
steady. Felt good. Tuesday pm – 8 x 800m, 2 mins
rest. Average time 2min 40s. Legs felt crap.’
By contrast with the rigorous planning of their coaches, athletes’ recording of
training is often subjective, lacking in particular
any information that can be used to calculate the training load of the session.
The coach will have planned exactly when the hard,
moderate and easy training sessions should take place, yet the athlete does not
record information that can be used to determine
whether this, in fact, occurred.
More...from the Runner's Web at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/news/rw_news_20050726_PPO_Training.html


3. Swimming: Kaizen Swimming - How To Improve Continuously…No Matter How Long
You Swim
After 39 years of purposeful swimming (i.e. as opposed to “doing laps”) and 33
years of coaching and teaching, I think I’m fortunate
to have achieved a rare distinction: I think I’ve become one of the best
swimmers on earth. While that claim probably sounds
staggeringly presumptuous, my definition of “best” – unlike one that applies to,
say, Michael Phelps -- doesn’t hinge on how fast I
swim. Instead I mean that, among the billions in the human race, there are
perhaps only a hundred or so swimmers on earth who use
their available energy and power as efficiently as I do, who enjoy every stroke
as fully and who practice effectively enough to keep
improving continuously.
It’s that last definition of “best” that excites me most. There’s a Japanese
term “Kaizen” which means continuous improvement;
specifically it infers “incremental improvement through cleverness, patience and
diligence.” At age 54, I feel I’m the embodiment of
Kaizen Swimming. After 39 years of swimming, coaching and teaching, after over
15 million metres of swimming (I average about
500,000 metres per year), I’m still making regular advances in my control,
efficiency and ease. I also swim 1500 meters faster than
I did as an 18-year old college freshman in 1969.
In May of 2003, while filming a Total Immersion video in Santa Barbara CA, and
training with the Santa Barbara Masters in their
50-metre pool, I swam a series of 20 x 50, interspersed with 10 x 100. (If you
train in a 50-metre pool, you can compare your counts
with mine.) On the 50s, I averaged 30 strokes per length. Two years earlier, it
required intense concentration and all the
perfection I could summon up to swim a single 50-metre lap in 30 strokes -- and
about 50 seconds. During that set I did several as
fast as 44 seconds and all 20 in 48 seconds or less.
More...from the Runner's Web at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/news/rw_news_20050725_TI_Kaizen_Swimming.html


4. High-protein diets curb appetite:
The ever-popular low-carbohydrate diets appear to work because they force people
to eat more protein, which consequently suppresses
the appetite, not because of a lower carbohydrate intake, according to new study
findings published in the American Journal of
Clinical Nutrition.
These results suggest that it's not necessary for people to cut back
carbohydrates to lose weight, according to Dr. Arne Astrup of
the Royal Veterinary and Agricultural University in Copenhagen, who wrote an
accompanying editorial.
Protein appears to encourage people to eat fewer calories overall, Astrup noted,
so if people simply increase their intake of
protein, that should help them lose weight. "You can just eat a little more lean
meat and low-fat dairy products," Astrup
recommended.
Lead study author Dr. David S. Weigle of the University of Washington School of
Medicine in Seattle and his colleagues note that
low-calorie diets rarely work. This has encouraged researchers to consider that
changing the ingredients of the diet, but not its
calories, makes a difference in people's waistlines.
More...from Reuters at:
http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=healthNews&storyID=2005-07-2\
2T010514Z_01_B341454_RTRIDST_0_HEALTH-DIETS-HIGHPROT
EIN-DC.XML
[Multi-line URL]


5. Joe Henderson's Running Commentary - Trial Mile:
The mile holds a special place in my memory bank. This was the first distance I
ever ran for time, in 1954. I've raced the mile more
often than all other distances combined.
But my best mile isn't one that netted me a state high school title. It isn't
one ended before 4:20 had ticked away. These times are
pleasant but ancient memories.
My best mile is as fresh as today's run. It takes twice as long to complete as
those old races and is my slowest mile of any day.
But it's the best mile because it gets me going and keeps me going.
The best mile also can be the longest one in ways other than distance and time.
Ron Clarke, the Australian who monopolized the world
records in the 1960s, once said, "The hardest step for a runner to take is the
first one out the door."
The laws of inertia state that a body at rest wants to stay resting, and one in
motion wants to keep moving. These also are basic
rules of running.
You can trick yourself into taking the first big step out the door by saying, "I
only have to run one mile; I can do that in my
sleep." It's more comforting to think this way than that you have to run five or
more miles no matter what. Once clear of the
doorway, the momentum usually kicks in and one little mile leads to many more.
How many more miles you run depends on how you're feeling. That's the second
great value of the first mile, as a simple test of true
feelings.
A profile on Kenyan Cosmas Ndeti appeared in the New York Times before one of
his Boston Marathon victories. The lines that
influenced me most read, "He runs according to the way he feels each morning,
not according to any rigid schedule. He has been known
to wake up, run for a kilometer, then climb back into bed."
More...from Joe Henderson at:
http://www.joehenderson.com/archive/519.html


6. Sports Psychology: Exercise Addiction:
By Michelle Cleere, Sports Psychology Consultant
Introduction
While so much society right now is focused on obesity and that fact that obesity
is right up there around the #1 killer of American’
s, there is another portion of the population at the other end of the spectrum
addicted to exercise. Most of these addicts are
women, ages 35-60 that are “running on a treadmill for hours, spinning out of
control or climbing stairs that lead to nowhere”1
because they have lost their physical, emotional and spiritual balance. They are
unhappy in their lives wondering whether or not
they have accomplished anything significant and are unhappy with their
appearance.
This article is going to discuss positive versus negative exercise addiction,
addiction and the brain, the personality of an addict,
and how trainers might help offset exercise addiction.
Positive versus negative exercise addiction
Exercise addiction is a psychological and/or physiological dependence on a
regular exercise program that is characterized by
withdrawal symptoms after 24-36 hours of no exercise. These symptoms may
include: anxiety, irritability, nervousness, guilt, etc
which only occurs if a person is prevented from exercise due to circumstances
beyond their control.2
More...from the Runner's Web at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/news/rw_news_20050725_SM_Addiction.html


7. Science of Sport: Plyometrics - A grown-up approach to youth training:
Plyometrics is a popular and effective training technique used by coaches whose
athletes need to be proficient in speed, power or
agility. It is also a tool whose underpinning principles are often poorly
understood, and in the wrong hands it can increase an
athlete’s injury risk. The potential consequences are particularly serious for
one group: adolescent athletes.

There is arguably a broader responsibility to be shared among health and sports
therapy professionals to help educate coaches (often
part-time and less experienced) who are working with talented youngsters, so
that they do not unwittingly increase their trainees’
injury risk. This may involve some tricky interventions, but that is no reason
for avoiding the issue.
The basics of plyometrics
In the useful definition of Wilson et al: ‘Plyometric training uses the
acceleration and deceleration of bodyweight as the overload
in dynamic activities such as depth jumping and bounding’(1). The technique
first became popular in the 1960s and 1970s when east
European coaches achieved impressive results in jumping events. Since then,
research has conclusively demonstrated the efficacy of
plyometric training in sports requiring dynamic movements.
Plyometrics provides the link that can turn strength from traditional weight
training into on-court or onfield explosive power. For
optimal results, plyometrics should be combined with strength training as part
of a periodised programme.
The exercises are performed at high velocity over short time frames and ‘promote
the ability to utilise the stretch-shorten cycle by
enhancing the use of elastic energy and the stretch reflex’(2).
Plyometric exercises for the lower limbs consist of bounding, hopping, jumping
from a height and rebounding etc; for the upper limb
they usually involve throwing medicine balls in different ways, such as rotating
or overhead double or single arm throws.
Upper and lower limb exercises can be combined for sport specificity and to
enhance neuromuscular coordination of multiple body
segments.
More...from the Runner's Web at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/news/rw_news_20050725_PPO_Plyometrics.html


8. Dr. Gabe Mirkin's Fitness and Health E-Zine:
* Slow Lifting
A technique called super-slow weight lifting can help older people become very
strong. When you move very slowly with a weight,
your muscles fatigue and weaken so that the weight feels much heavier than it
is. Moving a weight very slowly in sets of ten causes
the same amount of damage as moving a much heavier weight rapidly, and causes
the same type of muscle damage. Lifting lighter
weights slowly is far less likely to cause injuries than heavy lifting. You
can become just as strong using the slow lifting
technique, and you are more likely to stay injury-free.
However, if you are training for a sport that requires fast movements, the
super-slow training method may not be your best choice.
Training is specific. You have to exercise against resistance moving fast to be
able to use your muscles quickly. Slow lifting can
make you strong, but it is not the best way to prepare you for fast-moving
competitive sports such as tennis, ping-pong, cycling,
basketball or volleyball.

* Dear Dr. Mirkin: My teenage daughter wants to know if the exercise she does
now will help her bones stay strong when she's sixty.
I'm glad she's concerned, because if a woman lives long enough, she can expect
to have osteoporosis. Lifting weights during
adolescence can help prevent osteoporosis when women are older. A woman's bones
are strongest when she is 20, and after that, she
loses bone continuously for the rest of her life. If an elderly woman breaks
her hip from osteoporosis, she has a 20 percent chance
of dying from complications within the year. The stronger and larger a woman's
bones are when she is younger, the stronger they
will be when she is older.
A muscle can only be as strong as the bones on which it attaches. Lifting
weights when a woman is young enlarges her bones and
makes them stronger. Just exercising will not strengthen bones. Female
marathon runners who stop menstruating because they do not
eat enough food to meet their calorie requirements, develop osteoporosis even if
they run more than 100 miles per week. To help
build bone, exercise must be done against resistance. All women can gain bone
by lifting weights at any age.


9. Improve your VO2 Max:
by Amby Burfoot
All aerobic endurance activities, like running, bicycling, swimming, and
cross-country skiing, are essentially contests to see how
much oxygen your body can deliver to your exercising muscles. Increase the
amount of oxygen, and you can run, bike, swim, or ski
faster.
In running, of course, those muscles are in your legs. As you train, two things
happen to improve your muscles' ability to use
oxygen. First, your heart gets stronger and delivers more oxygen; and second,
your leg muscles get better at using the oxygen.
In their laboratory research, scientists frequently measure this delivery and
use of oxygen, calling it maximum oxygen uptake or VO2
max. They consider maximum oxygen uptake to be the most basic measure of aerobic
fitness, and they've shown that it increases as you
train more and harder. I generally reverse the letter order, since max VO2 has a
friendlier sound than VO2 max.
As your aerobic capacity increases, you can run farther and faster. All training
improves your aerobic capacity, even slow, relaxed
jogging. But some workouts improve it more than others.
The best and most efficient way to increase your aerobic capacity is to run
slightly faster (10 to 30 seconds per mile) than your
5-K race pace. Faster runners should be closer to the 10-second figure, and
slower runners closer to the 30-second figure. For
example, if you can race a 5-K at 7:40 per mile, you should run your max VO2
workouts at 7:20 to 7:30 pace. This isn't a pace that
you can maintain very long in training. You can run for distance (800 meters) or
time (3 to 5 minutes).
After each repeat, jog for four to five minutes, and then do another. The
workout is finished when you've completed three to four
repeats (for beginning and intermediate runners) or six to eight repeats (for
advanced runners).
Many runners do max VO2 workouts on the track as part of their interval training
routines because they like to measure the lengths
and times of the repeats exactly. That's fine, but it isn't necessary. You can
also do max VO2 workouts on a good trail, a grassy
field, or any other smooth surface that allows you to run at a fast clip without
fear of ankle turns. Use your watch to time the
four-minute repeats, and run at a strong and fast (but not all-out) effort.
Don't do these aerobic-capacity workouts more than once a week, and skip them on
weeks when you have races. These workouts cover
less distance than tempo workouts, but they're more taxing because the pace is
considerably harder. If you were to do several max
VO2 workouts a week or include one in your training program during the week of a
race, you might soon find your race performances
deteriorating because you'd be too fatigued to race at full strength.
From Matt Russ at the Sports Factory http://www.thesportfactory.com


10. Music Soothes the Savage Beast:
Is this title accurate? I can tell you over the years while running and cycling,
I've never used any kind of music listening device.
I remember fifteen years ago running with my old cassette suitcase, I mean
Walkman, switching it back and forth between hands
because the weight kept making my biceps go numb. Since then I only take
whatever music happened to be in my head as I stepped out
the door. God forbid it would be a rendition with the likes of Celine Dion, The
Village People, KC and the Sunshine and, or, my
kids' favorite, Raffi. Or worse, being one with yourself during a long run as a
car goes by, windows down, blaring the worst piece
of musical literature you could think of only to have it stick in your head?
Concentration gets redefined at that point as you use
every ounce of mental will to force some other song into your head.
In April I generously bought my wife an Apple iShuffle for our tenth anniversary
to run with (and, coincidentally, me too). Since
then I've learned some things. I first tried listening to music on the bike; it
didn't work. I personally like to hear the dump
trucks and semis bearing down on my butt before they blow by, spiking my heart
rate to anaerobic level in less than a second and
leaving me trembling like a beaten dog until the next one comes by. Biking with
the iShuffle is like riding in the dark without
lights or reflective garb (or writing triathlon articles) - I feel vulnerable
and naked.
More...from Bauer Tri News at:
http://www.bauertrinews.com/storyPostShower.faces.51.id


11. Swimming: What To Look For in a Swim Coach:
You may decide that after reading several swimming books, practicing drills and
workouts in the pool on your own, joining a masters
swim team, and even ordering The Complete Guide to Triathlon Swimming online,
that you need a little outside help to get your swim
where it needs to be for a tri. You're normal! Unless you have a little swimming
experience under your belt already, it may be
difficult to make the improvements you need to make without a coach.
I highly recommend hiring a coach, if you are a beginner or just looking to
become a better swimmer.
But not all swim coaches are the same!
Here are some ideas on what to look for if you do decide to hire a coach:
1. They should have experience working with adults and not just kids. Many
places have countless swim programs for kids, but neglect
the beginning or improving adult swimmer. Often, the instructors these gyms or
pools hire have very little experience working with
an adult triathlete or pre-triathlete. They know the basics but won't help you
much with a triathlon swim. They will come cheap, but
it's not worth it!
2. Look for some college swimming experience. It doesn't have to be an All
American Division 1 college swimmer, but former college
swimmers typically will understand a little more about your needs than someone
that did not compete at a high level.
3. Masters coaches are often good private coaches. Since many master's teams
consist of several triathletes, masters coaches often
will be able to help you improve for your next race.
More...from the Runner's Web at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/news/rw_news_20050725_TSC_Koskella.html


12. From Runner's World:
* Coach's Corner
Master Tip. Add some faster running to your routine. Do short runs at a pace 1
to 2 minutes per mile faster than you typically run.
This will force you to run more efficiently. The habits learned in these
up-tempo runs will transfer to your normal running. -Joe
Henderson

* Injury Prevention
The best way to protect your knees is with daily stretching and strengthening
exercises, and the easiest way to stick to your daily
program is to do the exercises at home without any special equipment.
ITB Stretch: Stand with one leg in front of and crossed over the other leg.
Exhale, and bend your body to the same side as your
front leg. Hold for a count of 20, straighten up, and then repeat the bend nine
more times. Reverse leg positions, and repeat 10
times in the other direction.
Quadriceps Strengthener: With your feet side-by-side, extend both arms forward,
and slowly lower yourself into a half-squat,
stopping before your legs are parallel to the ground. Keep your back straight.
Repeat 20 times.

* Performance Nutrition
Peanut butter power: It's full of protein and fiber, and it gives you a slow,
sustained release of energy. It does contain fat, but
it is overwhelmingly the preferred unsaturated fat, which makes peanut butter
good for your heart. And as a good source of protein,
it's a primary building block in muscle growth and helps speed muscle recovery.
A 2-tablespoon serving of peanut butter contains 8
grams of protein, or roughly the same amount of protein found in four slices of
bologna or 1 1/2 ounces of turkey.

* Words That Inspire
"Everybody and their mother knows you don't train hard on Friday, the day before
a race. But a lot of runners will overtrain on
Thursday if left on their own. Thursday is the most dangerous day of the week."
-Marty Stern, Villanova women's coach

* Editor's Advice
"Avoid summer thunderstorms by running in the morning, when storms are rare. If
a storm catches you by surprise, move away from
trees and poles, crouch on the balls of your feet, cover your ears with your
hands, and tuck your body into the shortest, smallest
mass you can."-Amby Burfoot, RW executive editor

* Training Talk
"The harder you run, the more recovery you need. Hard workouts are the bread and
butter of an expert runner. These are the days when
the real training is accomplished. But without recovery days, hard workouts are
worthless." -From Runner's World Complete Book of
Women's Running by Dagny Scott



13. Street Fighting Man:
From prologue to Paris, DANIEL COYLE followed the reigning champ throughout the
2004 Tour and all the way to victory No. 6. Now he's
written a true-life sports thriller about how the Armstrong machine smashed the
opposition. In this exclusive excerpt from Lance
Armstrong's War, the author chronicles the brutal turning point of Lance's
greatest triumph.
ON JULY 17, 2004, one hour before the Tour's toughest stage, Lucky 13, the
thousands of people swarming the sunny Pyrenean town of
Lannemezan were burning with the same desire: to see Lance Armstrong's face. The
fervent throng of fans gathered outside the U.S.
Postal team bus were motivated by the usual goals—a photo, a word, a touch. But
Armstrong's rivals had their own goals, summed up by
a single image that glowed in their minds: the Dead Elvis Grin.
The Dead Elvis Grin refers to Armstrong's facial expression when he's pushed to
the edge, on the verge of cracking, that tactically
useful
moment poker players call the tell. Armstrong's tell
began with the American changing positions on his bike—standing, sitting,
standing again, rooting around for more power. Then he
leaned forward on the handlebars, throwing his body weight into the pedals. His
face went red, then ashen. The furrows in his
forehead deepened, his eyes fixed, and his upper lip slowly rose over his front
teeth, unveiling the signature half snarl, half
smile.
More...from Outside Magazine at:
http://outside.away.com/outside/features/200507/lance-armstrong-book-1.html
Buy the book "Lance Armstrong's War : One Man's Battle Against Fate, Fame, Love,
Death, Scandal, and a Few Other Rivals on the Road
to the Tour de France" from Amazon at:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0060734973/runnersweb/102-0182896-9006569\
?v=glance&s=books


14. Age Takes Its Toll on Aerobic Fitness:
But exercise can help fight that decline, experts add.
There's good news and bad news for seniors in a new study: Their aerobic
capacity declines steeply with age, but regular exercise
can stave off and even reverse those declines.
"In the senior years, if you do exercise regularly, such as participating in
community-based programs, you can improve your aerobic
capacity," said Dr. Nieca Goldberg, chief of women's cardiac care at Lenox Hill
Hospital in New York City. "In some studies, the
improvement was as much as 15 to 25 percent."
In the latest study, researchers tracked more than 800 men and women and found
that aerobic capacity declined steadily with age,
with the rate of decline increasing as the participants got older. Aerobic
capacity declined 3 percent to 6 percent per decade in
the 20s and 30s, but more than 20 percent per decade after age 70, according to
the report in the July 26 issue of Circulation.
"This translates into frailty and difficulty with independent living," explained
lead researcher Dr. Jerome L. Fleg, a cardiologist
at the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. "For example, if you have to
use 75 percent or more of your aerobic capacity just
to make the bed or climb the stairs, you will be quite fatigued trying to do
these activities on a regular basis."
More...from HealthScout at:
http://www.healthscout.com/news/1/527017/main.html


15. Athletics: Beat The Heat :
You have been through it before, and it is no fun – having to cut a nice jog or
even a race short on a hot sunny day because you’ve
overdone yourself in the heat. You may feel the need to stop, sit down in the
shade, and sip some cool water for quite some time
before you feel yourself again. In extreme cases, runners may need medical
attention if they require intravenous fluids or
ice-packing to cool their overheated bodies. Why does the sun have such an
ability to zap us of our strength and energy? Though you
may have the will power to muscle through the discomfort, exercising too hard in
hot weather can be dangerous. Fortunately, you can
protect yourself against various types of heat illness with some basic
scientific knowledge. In this article, you’ll discover the
physiological effects of the sun on your body and the hyperthermia (a.k.a.
overheating) warning signs to look out for. But first,
you’ll get a crash course on the basics of thermoregulation – that is,
maintenance and control of body temperature – that occur
during exercise.
How Your Body Keeps Cool
Your miraculous body has an impressive ability to maintain a relatively constant
internal body temperature. For most people, body
temperatures do not fluctuate more than 1.8º F under normal circumstances.
Throughout life, your body stays within the range of
97.0º F to 100.0º F except in the case of extremely hot or cold conditions,
illness, or prolonged intense exercise. Lucky for us
runners, humans are able to tolerate a reasonable amount of exercise in heat
because of our well-adapted thermoregulatory power, a
power that keeps our body temperature in check.
In order to stay cool, your body keeps a balance between the heat you gain (that
which your body produces and that which you absorb
from the environment) and the heat you lose. You can lose heat from your body in
any of four ways: Conduction, Convection,
Radiation, and Evaporation.
More...from the Runner's Web at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/news/rw_news_20050726_PRP_Beat_the_Heat.html


16. Two Exercises Help Older People Stay on Their Feet:
Two Chinese exercise techniques - the ancient martial art of tai chi and
exercising by walking on cobblestones - may improve the
balance of older people and help prevent falls, according to two new studies.
In the tai chi study, published in the July issue of The Journal of Advanced
Nursing, 59 men and women with an average age of 78
were divided into two groups, one participating in a 12-week tai chi course, the
other maintaining its usual activities without
exercise classes.
The tai chi group members did 10 minutes of warm-up followed by 20 minutes of
walking while moving the hands and arms. Then they did
moderate range-of-motion exercises for the neck, shoulders, trunk, hip, knees
and ankles. The classes were held three times a week.
Rhayun Song, the senior author on the study and an assistant professor of
nursing at Chungnam National University in Daejeon, South
Korea, said that keeping joints and muscles moving was essential for older
people, and that "tai chi can do it without causing pain
and stiffness since it's slow circular movements without external impact."
More...from the NY Times at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/26/health/nutrition/26exer.html?


17. Test Yourself On Eight Popular Nutrition Myths:
Like office rumors passed from cubicle to cubicle, a lot of what you hear "out
there" about nutrition is distortion, exaggeration or
half-truth, and some of it just plain wrong.
You try to stay on top of the latest nutrition news to help separate the whole
wheat from the chaff. But with so many conflicting
messages it's hard to know where to turn.
So, listen up! We're setting the record straight on some commonly overheard
misconceptions about what, when and how you should eat.
Don't eat after 8 p.m.
Sure, if you're mindlessly popping chips in your mouth while propped up in front
of the tube, by all means, late-night junk food
binges aren't smart. But for busy active women, skipping dinner after returning
from an evening workout will do more harm than good.
If you allow more than two hours to pass before eating after exercise you'll
store 50 percent less glycogen in your muscles. That
means less energy for the next day and your next workout.
If your evening workout or a late night at the office pushes dinner after 8
p.m., eat a moderate-sized, balanced meal of
carbohydrates and protein such as a skinless grilled chicken breast and a baked
potato, or a turkey sandwich with low-fat milk and
fruit.
Be sure to eat one or two healthy snacks between lunch and dinner to prevent
excessive hunger when you finally do sit down to
dinner. This could mean the difference between eating the whole chicken versus
just the chicken breast.
More...from IronmanLive at:
http://vnews.ironmanlive.com/vnews/topstories/1122393465


18. Built for the race:
Body mass index could be a reason why a sprinter's muscular physique differs
from that of a lean marathoner.
Compare athletes in a sprint event to those running a marathon and it's obvious
that a runner's body doesn't take one shape —
sprinters tend to have muscular builds, and distance runners are more wiry. The
key to the differences, according to a new research
study, may lie in a runner's body mass index.
Runners' abilities have long been measured via how much oxygen they can deliver
to the muscles, but that doesn't tell the whole
story of why their physiques differ so greatly.
"The trick was to figure out what matters from running," says Peter Weyand, a
biologist and assistant professor in the kinesiology
department at Rice University in Houston. He was the lead author of the study
that appears this month in the Journal of Experimental
Biology.
He and coauthor Adam Davis, a researcher at the Center for Human Performance at
Texas Medical Center in Houston, focused on the
force with which the body hits the ground. In running, the arms swing back and
forth, and the body bounces up and down.
"Once you're up to speed, those things can be done passively," Weyand says. Once
energy is loaded into the tendons, which are
elastic, they do the bulk of the work. That way, "the energy in the body can be
recycled," he adds. Like a Super Ball, once thrown,
it keeps going.
More...from the LA Times at:
http://www.latimes.com/features/health/fitness/la-he-runners25jul25,1,265926.sto\
ry?coll=la-health-fitness-news


19. Runners Are Ahead Of The Curve:
Runner's World news analysis
A new aging and fitness study made the national news headlines yesterday (More
information at:
http://my.webmd.com/content/Article/109/109179.htm) and it intrigued us, because
it relates to something we know about.
The study, conducted by researchers at the National Heart, Lung and Blood
Institute (NHLBI) in Maryland, looked at the decline in
aerobic fitness in exercisers and nonexercisers. The results were good, unless
you believe in miracles: The exercisers generally had
an aerobic fitness (vo2 max) equivalent to nonexercisers who were 10 to 20 years
younger.
Still, you do lose fitness as you age, no matter what you do. Also, things get
much worse after you turn 70. When you're younger,
your max vo2 might only decline 3 to 6 percent per decade. Between 70 and 80,
however, the rate of decline is "more than 20
percent," according to the NHLBI study.
This made us wonder if the age-group running records for 70 and 80-year-olds
also "differ by more than 20 percent." Answer: Not
quite; they're more like 17 to 18 percent, at least if you look at the men's
world records for 5000 and 10,000 meters. (Here they
are, according to information at www.nationalmastersnews.com).
5000 meters, age 70, Ed Whitlock, 18:33.38
5000 meters, age 80, Ed Benham, 21:57.88
10,000 meters, age 70, Ed Whitlock, 38:04.13
10,000 meters, age 80, Ed Benham, 44:29.4
The women's records for the same distances and ages showed a decline of 23 to 24
percent, probably because fewer older women have
competed in masters track competitions. This finding also runs counter to
another result of the NHLBI study: The researchers
concluded that men over 40 suffer a more rapid drop in vo2 max than women over
40. They didn't offer any explanations for this
finding.
By the way, if you're not happy about slowing down this much when you get into
your 70s and beyond, switch to chess. Yale University
economics professor Ray Fair, a serious marathoner with a sub-3-hour personal
best, has written about the relative performance
declines of worldclass swimmers, runners, and chess players. More
"Chess shows much less deterioration than the physical activities," he
concludes.


20. Brisk Bliss:
FOR CENTURIES, Eastern mystics have prescribed meditation as one-stop shopping
for all that ails you. And Western researchers have
been proving them right, showing that it can boost memory, concentration, and
even athletic performance. Dr. Herbert Benson,
president of the Mind/Body Medical Institute, in Boston, has shown that just two
20-minute sessions daily can bring about
significant reductions in heart rate and blood pressure.
Great. But who has 40 minutes a day? Well, do you have eight? Self-help author
Victor Davich—a man devoted to teaching meditation
without the drippy guru trappings—has recently published 8 Minute Meditation:
Quiet Your Mind, Change Your Life, an introductory
guide with a particularly modern bent. "It was designed to fit in the space
between two television commercial breaks," says Davich.
"If you can watch eight minutes of CSI, you can have a meditation practice."
Here's how:
1. Set a timer for eight minutes. Sit in a straight-backed chair with both feet
on the ground. Put your hands on your lap and keep
your gaze level.
2. Take a deep breath and exhale slowly, closing your eyes as you do. Take
another breath, allowing the exhalation to clear away any
tension.
3. Now focus on your breathing. Notice the place where you're most aware of it.
It may be your chest, your nostrils, anywhere. This
is your anchor point.
4. Try to focus on your anchor point for one full cycle of breathing. If you get
distracted, no problem. Simply acknowledge this and
try again. That's it. Keep on until the timer sounds—or until your boss catches
you.
From Outside Magazine

21. Herbal cold remedy found worthless:
Echinacea, the herbal supplement made from purple coneflower and used by
millions of Americans to prevent or treat colds, neither
prevented colds nor ameliorated cold symptoms in a large and rigorous study.
The study, whose results are being published today in the New England Journal of
Medicine, included 437 people who volunteered to
have cold viruses dripped into their noses. Some took echinacea for a week
beforehand, while others got a placebo in advance. Still
others swallowed echinacea or a placebo at the time they were infected.
Then the subjects were secluded in hotel rooms for five days while scientists
examined them for symptoms and took nasal washings to
look for the virus and for an immune system protein, interleukin-8, which some
had hypothesized was stimulated by echinacea,
enabling the herb to stop colds.
But the investigators found that those who took echinacea fared no differently
from those who took a placebo. They were just as
likely to get a cold, their symptoms were just as severe, they had just as much
virus in their nasal secretions, and they made no
more interleukin-8.
While some echinacea researchers say further study is needed, Dr. Stephen E.
Straus, director of the National Center for
Complementary and Alternative Medicine, which sponsored the new study, said he
is satisfied that echinacea is not an effective cold
remedy.
More...from the Daily News at:
http://www.dailynews.com/Stories/0,1413,200~20954~2984491,00.html


22. How to save your favorite riding area from extinction:
At one time or another, we all have to face the unexpected. The unexpected for
us was finding an obnoxious new sign posted with
severe warning: "No Trespassing" at our favorite mountain biking area. It might
as well have said "Punishable By Death."
It was a rude wake-up call. There we were, gathered around "The Sign" with a few
others -- some angry, some in shock. So what's a
poor rider to do? You may have had a similar experience.
Set the stage for the future
Now let's back up a bit -- a few weeks, a couple of months, maybe even a year or
two. Consider all the hours you've been riding
there: Did you encounter other trail users? Other mountain bikers? Did you ever
stop and chat, or be neighborly?
More...from Active.com at:
http://www.active.com/story.cfm?story_id=11902&sidebar=17&category=activeusahome\
page


23. Does Hill Running Help?
Running hard down hills has a bad reputation but this seems to be exaggerated,
according to a review by John Unger, D.C., C.C.S.P.,
in Montrose, Colorado. Hill running is good training as long as you begin
cautiously and build up conservatively.
Unger uncovered 12 studies of hill running and injuries, and focused on
discussions of downhill running. Reports mostly during the
1980s tended to associate downhill hill running with injuries, but there were
several flaws in these studies' designs.
More recent studies which were well designed, used controls, and evaluated
statistical significance found no association between
downhill or hill running and injury risk.
The experiences of the American Running Editorial Board Members tend to support
the value of hill running as long as it is done
cautiously. "Running hills is usually good training. The problem is the need to
be somewhat conservative in early sessions (as you
would be in any new type of training). It's probably easier to overdo downhill
running than uphill running. In other words, easier
to over-stress your landing shock systems downhill, which is not a big problem
in uphill running," says Jack Daniels, Ph.D.
"My experience and personal beliefs are consistent with this," says Douglas
Lenz, C.S.C.S. "The biggest problem with hill training
is insufficient preparation, too much volume, and/or too little recovery time,"
Lenz adds.
As well as good training, hill running can be protective. "A single bout of
controlled downhill running leads to reduced soreness
from subsequent downhill running, according to a study led by Priscilla
Clarkson, Ph.D, at the University of Massachusetts," says
Pete Pfitzinger. "This protective effect lasts for up to six months, so if you
run hills regularly the soreness will be greatly
reduced (independently of an injury)," Pfitzinger explains.
And if you don't run hills cautiously, "I see lots of patello-femoral chain pain
syndromes from hill running," says Marvin Bloom,
M.D., "So to protect you knees I say run up and walk down hills. If you have
pain you'll have to stop before you reach the full
training benefit."
There is no doubt that fast downhill running pounds your leg muscles. You don't
need a scientific study to know that, you can feel
it for yourself. You also know you become more sore after hill running than a
comparable run on the flat. But there is no reliable
evidence that this kind of soreness leads to injury, presuming that you allow
for adequate recovery before another hard effort.
Hills are good for your character and they strengthen your legs after you
recover from the soreness. Emphasize that last point; the
most important part of your training is recovery. That is the time your body
experiences adaptation to hard efforts.
(Sports Chiropractic & Rehabilitation, 1996, Vol. 10, No. 2, pp. 62-66)
Copyright, The American Running Association.


24. Raise Your Marathon Plateau:
Still looking for that Breakthrough Race? These strategies can take you there.
If you're a seasoned marathoner hungry for a breakthrough, by now you've
probably seen more training schedules than you can shake an
energy bar at. The recipes vary, but the ingredients are the same: long runs,
interval workouts, tempo runs, easy days,
marathon-pace (MP) runs. Buried somewhere within one of these prescriptions, you
believe, is the PR-shattering formula guaranteed to
lift you from your current performance plateau.
But in evaluating marathon-training plans, you've perhaps lost sight of a
critical practice: focusing on general guiding principles
and day-to-day strategies, not merely on executing a particular series of
workouts.
Fortunately, there's nothing complicated about solidifying your foundation.
Whether you're a marathon veteran or a newcomer to the
distance, the strategies described here can help you parlay your week-by-week
training into that performance leap you've been
looking for on race day. You'll see no mention in this article of specific
workouts or weekly training plans, because chances are
you've found one of those already. Rather, the principles touched on here will
help maximize the benefits of whatever sensible,
structured pattern of workouts you've settled on.
Hit the dirt
When a runner shifts from a typical training diet into full-scale
marathon-training mode, often the most significant change is an
increase in mileage, both in per-week totals and the weekly or biweekly long
run. Clearly, high mileage is a key determinant of
marathon success; however, it is also a common stumbling block, as many athletes
can't seem to exceed particular training volumes
without incurring injuries or succumbing to staleness or fatigue.
One way to dodge the injury bugaboo and still put plenty of miles in the bank is
to run on soft surfaces. Ask yourself how often you
really make an effort to avoid asphalt and concrete. When faced with a 15-minute
drive to a trailhead or a two-second bop to the end
of the driveway-especially after your daily commute -which are you honestly
going to choose?
I've always preferred the solace and variety of trails to the unwelcome buzz of
urban perambulation. But it wasn't until I got a dog
for a running partner and trained on trails almost exclusively out of concern
for his legs that I began to really appreciate the
benefits of running on grass and dirt. Not only did my legs feel fresher during
100-mile weeks than they had at 60 to 70 per week on
macadam, but I was reaping benefits I didn't even know about.
It's not just the diminished pounding that helps keep a trail devotee healthy.
In addition, running on slightly non-uniform surfaces
calls a variety of muscle groups into play in ways running on pavement does not.
This strengthening of the support muscles can play
an important role in forestalling aches and pains as well
More...from Running Times at:
http://www.runningtimes.com/issues/00julaug/Breakthrough.htm


25. By Data Obsessed
Recreational athletes love the new data-driven tools that monitor exercise. Do
they really help?
MY husband, son and I were about to go for a bike ride. We had heart rate
monitors. (We got them years ago.) And we had bicycle
computers, little devices that track your speed, average speed, mileage, time
and revolutions a minute. But now we were trying out
the latest gadget for the data-driven workout - power meters. These used sensors
in the hub of the rear wheel to calculate how many
watts of power we put out. They also gave us all the other data we might want -
heart rate, maximum heart rate, average heart rate,
revolutions a minute, time, speed and average speed. And after a ride you can
upload the data to a computer and see color-coded
graphs of your performance.
It's mesmerizing to see your power output. Stephen Madden, the editor in chief
of Bicycling magazine, who assiduously uses a power
meter himself, warned us not to get too obsessed.
"Don't be a watt weenie," Mr. Madden said, explaining that some people get so
focused on their wattage that all the fun goes out of
riding.
Too obsessed? Is it even possible? The world of exercise is increasingly being
shaped by data, with bicyclists, who have perhaps the
most tools to monitor themselves; runners who time themselves and monitor their
heart rates and sometimes use global positioning
sensors to measure their speed and distance; and moderate exercisers who clip
pedometers onto their belts to measure the number of
steps they take each day.
More...from the New York Times at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/28/fashion/thursdaystyles/28Fitness.html


This Weeks Featured Events:
*Please verify event dates with the event websites*

July 22-31, 2005:
World Masters Games - Edmonton, AB
http://www.2005worldmasters.com

July 29 - 31 2005:
Pan Am Junior Championships - Windsor, ON
http://www.panamswindsor.ca

July 29, 2005:
Bislett Games - Oslo, Norway
http://www.bislettgames.com/english
IAAF Site
http://www.iaaf.org/GLE05/results/eventCode=3348/index.html

July 30, 2005:
Caledon Continental Cup Triathlon - ON
http://www.c3online.ca/Races/2005/HSBC

National Capital Triathlon & Duathlon - Ottawa, ON
http://www.somersault.ca/2july31.htm

Quad-City Times Bix 7 - Davenport, IA
http://www.bix7.com

The Big Race - Mission Viejo, CA
http://www.bigrace.org

White River 50 Mile - Crystal Mountain, WA
http://www.seattlerunningcompany.com/WR50

Television - CBC
Oslo Golden League 1400-1500 EDT

July 31, 2005:
Half Vineman Triathlon - Santa Rosa, CA
http://www.vineman.com/index_main.php3?l=h
Mano a Mano at Vineman: Reid vs. DeBoom
http://www.manoamanotriathlon.com

Kingston Long Course Triathlon - ON
http://www.ktowntri.com/

Salford Triathlon ITU World Cup - Manchester, England
http://www.trisalford.info

San Francisco Marathon - San Francisco, CA
http://www.sfmarathon.net/

August 6-14, 2005:
IAAF 2005 World Championships - Helsinki, Finland
http://www.helsinki2005.fi/

For more complete race listings check out our Upcoming Races, and Calendars.
Check the Runner's Web on Sunday and Monday for race
reports on these events at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running.html

For Triathlon Coverage check out The Sports Network at:
http://www2.sportsnet.ca/tvschedule/tvsked_sport.php?region=ONTARIO&schedule_id=\
\25

Send this to a Friend:
Forward the Runner's Web Digest to a friend and suggest that they subscribe at:
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Your Feedback and Comments:
Comments, contributions and feedback are always welcome via this list at:
mailto:runnersweb@yahoogroups.com and in our Runner's Web
Forum, available off our FrontPage. If you post to the mailing list and get your
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Have a good week of training and/or racing.

Ken Parker
Runner's Web
mailto:webmaster@...
http://www.runnersweb.com/running.html
A running and triathlon resource portal


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**END...OF DIGEST...**