A FREE WEEKLY E-ZINE OF MULTISPORT RELATED ARTICLES.
The Runner's and Triathlete's Web Digest is a weekly e-zine dealing with the
sports of running and triathlon and general fitness and
health issues. The opinions expressed in the articles referenced by the Digest
are the opinions of the writers and not necessarily
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6. The Toronto Marathon, October 15, 2006
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7. LifeSport by Lance Watson - Professional Coaching
Lance Watson has been coaching triathlon and distance running since 1987. Over
the years, Lance has coached some of the most
successful athletes in the sport of triathlon and duathlon. A Human Kinetics
graduate (sport psychology minor), Lance has had the
opportunity to work with and be mentored by numerous world-class swim, bike, run
and triathlon coaches and liaise with many top
sport professionals (scientists, psychologists, nutritionists, therapists, etc.)
Lance has coached at the 2000 Olympics, 2002 Commonwealth Games and 2003 Pan
American Games. He has been head coach at several
national-team events and coached at various Ironman, ITU World Cup and world
championship events. As well, he was an award recipient
as "Triathlon Canada Elite Coach Of The Year" four consecutive years from
2000-2003. He was the 2004 Olympic Team Head Coach
(Triathlon).
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/LifeSport.html


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TRAFFIC CONTINUES TO GROW
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Pageviews Daily Hits Total Hits

Daily
2005 2,749,670 7,753.35 14,652,389
40,143.53 45,586,536 124,894.62
2004 1,786,510 4,881.17 9,564,629
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% Increase 54% 59% 53% 54%
33% 34%

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THIS WEEK:

We are running a weekly quiz - starting Monday, March 20th - with the weekly
winner getting FREE entry into the RunnersWeb5K.com
Race for Women which will be held in Ottawa on June 24, 2006. Check it out at:
http://www.runnersweb5K.com.

Marathoner Nicole Stevenson is sending reports from the Commonwealth Games in
Melbourne Australia.
Read her articles at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/news/rw_news_20060317_Melbourne_Nicole.html

Up until April 1st (April Fool's Day!) you can get a FREE subscription to Geezer
Jock Magazine.
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RUNNER'S AND TRIATHLETE'S WEB CONTENT PARTNERS

* Sports Nutrition by Sheila Kealey.
Sheila is one of Ottawa's top multisport athletes and a member of the OAC Racing
Team and X-C Ottawa. She has a Masters in Public
Health and works in the field of nutritional epidemiology as a Research
Associate with the University of California, San Diego. Her
column index is available at:
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* Carmichael Training Systems
Carmichael Training Systems was founded in 1999 by Chris Carmichael.
From the beginning, the mission of the company has been to improve the lives of
individuals we work with through the application of
proper and effective fitness and competitive training techniques. Whether your
focus is recreational, advanced, or you are a
professional racer, the coaching methodology employed by CTS will make you a
better athlete. Check the latest monthly column from
CTS at:
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* Peak Performance Online
Peak Performance is a subscription-only newsletter for athletes, featuring the
latest research from the sports science world. We
cover the whole range of sports, from running and rowing to cycling and
swimming, and each issue is packed full of exclusive
information for anyone who's serious about sport. It's published 16 times a
year, including four special reports, by Electric Word
plc. Peak Performance is not available in the shops - only our subscribers are
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* Peak Running Performance
Peak Running Is The Nation's Most Advanced Running Newsletter. Rated as the #1
Running Publication by Road Runner Sports (Worlds
Largest Running Store) , Peak Running caters to the serious / dedicated runner.
Delivering world class running advice are some of
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Scott Tinley (2 Time Ironman Champ) Steve Scott (3 Time Olympian) and many more.
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Check out the Peak Running article index at:
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* WatsonLifeSport
Lance Watson is "Just The Winningest Coach in Triathlon". He has been coaching
triathlon and distance running since 1987. Over the
years, Lance has coached some of the most successful athletes in the sport of
triathlon and duathlon.
Check out the Lance Watson Online Article Index at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/LW_index.html

Running Research News:
RRN's free, weekly, training update provides subscribers with the most-current,
practical, scientifically based information about
training, sports nutrition, injury prevention, and injury rehabilitation. The
purpose of this weekly e-zine is to improve
subscribers' training quality and to help them train in an injury-free manner.
Running Research News also publishes a complete, 12-page, electronic newsletter
10 times a year (one-year subscriptions are $35); to
learn more about Running Research News, please see the Online Article Index and
"About Running Research News" sections below or go
to RRNews.com.
Check out the article index at:
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THIS WEEK'S PERSONAL POSTINGS/RELEASES:
We have NO personal postings this week:


THIS WEEK'S DIGEST ARTICLE INDEX:

1. Multisport by Lance Watson: Planning for Hydration
2. Athletics: Anaerobic Threshold Training
3. Science of Sport: They Keep Going To Altitude To Train - But Why?
4. Aging
Keep your Speed up as you Age.
5. A Proper Bike Fit Means a Faster Cyclist
6. Joe Henderson's Running Commentary - Giving Back
7. Sour on sweet drinks
Simply cutting back on sugary beverages can reduce body fat, researchers say.
8. Dr. Gabe Mirkin's Fitness and Health E-Zine
9. Fine Print Sends Clear Message: Stay the Course
10. Maintaining Your Machine
Which Machine Are You Talking About?
11. From Runner's World
12. Student of the Sport: Red blood cell primer
13. Exercise and weight control: Myths, truths and gender differences
14. Dietary Supplements: Do You Need Them?
15. Power training II: Every heart is different
16. Triathlon: Precautions Against Injury
From Triathlon Workout Planner by John Mora.
17. Multisport: Improving Run Cadence - Strides and Plyometrics
18. Laying the foundation for endurance training
19. You are the glycogen in the endurance event of my life
20. The Fastest Way to a Healthy Heart
21. The ultimate stress test: Working out with the boss
22. Field Testing
23. Rest & Recovery... Most Important!!
24. The 80/20 Rule: Making it work for your run training
25. Digest Briefs


RUNNER'S WEB WEEKLY POLL:
"How days per week do you run?"

You can access the poll from our FrontPage ( http://www.runnersweb.com) as well
as checking the results of previous polls.
Post your views in our Forum at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/runnersweb_forum.html
[Free Registration Required]

LAST WEEK'S POLL RESULTS:
In which of the following competitions are you interested?
* IAAF World Indoor Championships - Moscow, Russia
* NCAA I Indoor Championships - Fayetteville, AR
* Commonwealth Games - Melbourne, AUS
* World Cross Country Championships - Fukuoka, JAP

Answers Votes Percent
1. IAAF World Indoor Championships - Moscow, Russia 25 20%
2. NCAA I Indoor Championships - Fayetteville, AR 18 15%
3. Commonwealth Games - Melbourne, AUS 39 32%
4. World Cross Country Championships - Fukuoka, JAP 40 33%
Total Votes: 122

FIVE STAR SITE OF THE WEEK: Running Times Online.
Running Times magazine has revamped their website, RunningTimes.com.
"This redesign will not only result in a large increase in traffic to the site,
but offers the sport, media and runners in general a
great new resource," said Pam Balcke, the magazine's director of internet
operations, in a press release.
The revamped site offers greatly enhanced navigation, an updated shoe guide, and
access to the comprehensive race calendar compiled
by the magazine. Also, visitors will be able to search for articles by keyword,
or browse through multiple subject categories.
Running Times is based in Wilton, Conn., and is the #2 U.S. running magazine
based on audited circulation.
Check out their redesigned site at:
http://www.runningtimes.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.


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


BOOK OF THE WEEK: Bowerman and the Men of Oregon : The Story of Oregon's
Legendary Coach and Nike's Co-founder
by Phil Knight (Foreword), Kenny Moore
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
The University of Oregon's running coach Bill Bowerman had revolutionary ideas
for his time (the 1950s, '60s and early '70s). He
instituted rest days, researched training methods and experimented with runners'
clothing; his runners repeatedly broke the
four-minute mile. Moore, a former Olympian and Sports Illustrated writer,
trained with Bowerman, and he writes of his mentor with a
veneration that frequently crosses into hagiography. For example, Bowerman hazed
his new runners by urinating on them in the shower
and branding them with a hot set of keys, a practice Moore calls "an initiation
rite, not unlike the ritual circumcision some
African tribes use to make men out of boys." Bowerman was a central player in
the building of Nike, although, despite the subtitle,
this is just a small part of his story. The focus is on running. Bowerman was at
many important moments of running history; he
trained Steve Prefontaine, coached at the Munich Olympics and developed Nike's
waffle-soled shoe. Moore's writing distinguishes his
book from others in the running genre; even smaller races are grippingly
recounted. While far from objective, Moore's work is an
inspiring and touching look at the man who made Eugene, Ore., the running
capital of the U.S. Photos. (Apr.)
Book Description
The first biography of the legendary track coach, and founder of Nike, who had
an unparalleled impact on the sport of running
During his tenure as track coach at the University of Oregon from 1949 through
1972, Bill Bowerman won 4 national team titles,
trained dozens of milers to break the 4-minute barrier, and his athletes set 13
world and 22 American records. Single-handedly he
helped turn the college town of Eugene, Oregon, into the running capital of the
world.
In Bowerman: The Wings of Nike, Kenny Moore, a world-class marathon runner and
one of Bowerman's Oregon men, tells the story of his
mentor and hero, drawing on years of taped interviews and the full cooperation
of the Bowerman family and Nike, the company that
Bowerman helped to found through his invention of the waffle-soled running shoe.
Whether providing a fresh look at the tragic siege at the 1972 Munich Olympic
Games, where Bowerman coached the track and field
team; offering a close-up view of the coach's relationship with runner Steve
Prefontaine (subject of the movie Without Limits,
co-written and co-produced by Moore); or exploring Bowerman's role as a Nike
innovator, this illuminating portrait is compelling
reading throughout-ample evidence of why Bowerman's widow, noting how well the
author understood her husband, said: "If anyone
should write Bill's life story, it's Kenny Moore."
Buy the book from Amazon at:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1594861900/runnersweb/002-5900425-8820043\
?v=glance&s=books


THIS WEEK'S NEWS:

1. Multisport by Lance Watson: Planning for Hydration:
Many triathletes underestimate the importance of proper hydration while training
and racing. After only 1-2% of a persons body
weight is lost through sweating their performance will be affected negatively.
Dehydration is a major cause of fatigue, poor
performance, decreased coordination and muscle cramping. All active people can
increase performance and delay fatigue or muscle pain
by staying properly hydrated. How can you keep track of how well hydrated you
are or figure out if you are dehydrated? We all know
what thirst feels like, and in exercise, if you feel like you are dehydrated
then it's way too late.
Most people are familiar with the standard hydration plan: drink eight glasses
of water a day. While this advice is useful, athletes
and active people need a plan that is tailored to their training needs.
The most basic way to start to figure out hydration begins in the morning. When
you first wake up and use the washroom take a peek
at your urine. If it is clear or slightly yellow then you've done a good job;
you kept yourself hydrated throughout the previous
day. You took in as many fluids as your body eliminated through sweat and urine
and that kept you hydrated. This means you can
consume fluids at the same rate that you did the previous day, taking into
consideration your duration and intensity of exercise. On
the other hand, if your urine is bright yellow then you are likely dehydrated.
Think back to what you did the previous day. Did you
have a long workout in heat and how much and how frequently did you drink? If
your urine is very yellow in the morning then you just
didn't get enough fluids the day before and you must increase the amount and
frequency that you drink.
More...from the Runner's Web at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/news/rw_news_20060311_LW_Hydration.html


2. Athletics: Anaerobic Threshold Training:
Anaerobic Threshold Training or anaerobic turnpoint running is usually the third
element for preparing to race at 5-K or longer. You
will usually run some base mileage, and then add hill running before running a
series of sessions to stimulate your anaerobic
threshold to rise. You'll be running some hill sessions during this phase too.
According to Jack Daniels Ph.D., researcher, coach of the State University of
New York at Cortland cross-country team, "Anaerobic
Threshold is the pace or intensity beyond which blood lactate concentration
increases dramatically, due to your body's inability to
supply all its oxygen needs."
"Physiologically, threshold training teaches muscle cells to use more oxygen -
you produce less lactate. Your body also becomes
better at clearing lactate."
Threshold pace running conditions your muscle fibers to a faster pace. You build
leg strength and improve running biomechanics by
testing the limits of your aerobic system. You become an expert at using or
getting rid of your lactic acid. (Lactic acid is
converted to glucose, which is the most desirable fuel for your muscle and brain
cells.)
Because you're running at a fast pace for a moderate distance, you develop speed
endurance by bringing in more of your fast twitch
muscle fibers and teach motor responses to more of the fibers used in racing.
Anaerobic threshold pace training means running at 10 to 20 seconds per mile
slower than current 10K racing speed. It will teach you
to stride rhythmically at good pace and improve your ability to race faster.
Threshold is also the pace which you can sustain for about 50 to 60 minutes. For
some of you it will be 10K or 5 mile race pace. For
the elite, it's close to half marathon pace. For this web page we will assume
it's 15K or 10 mile race pace.
More...from the Runner's Web at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/news/rw_news_20060314_Holt_AT.html


3. Science of Sport: They Keep Going To Altitude To Train - But Why?
By Owen Anderson, Ph. D. (Copyright C 2004-2005)
Many high-level runners still venture to altitude in hopes of improving their
performances. The question we have to ask is: Why are
they doing so?
One answer is that Meb and Deena do it. Meb took silver in the Athens Olympic
Marathon, and Deena captured bronze; both spent
significant amounts of time before the Olympics training in Mammoth Lakes,
California at altitudes of over 8000 feet. Hey, if Meb
and Deena do it, it must be optimal, right?
That darned scientific research is not kind to the idea, though (trust science
to spoil everything). A full training bag full of
scientific inquiries dating back to the 1980s reveals that endurance-trained
athletes lose aerobic capacity when they go to altitude
and end up training more slowly than usual. That hardly seems to be the way to
reach one's true potential.
The latest incarnation of this kind of research was carried out in excellent
fashion recently by Jon Peter Wehrlin and Jostein
Hallen of the Norwegian School of Sport Sciences in Oslo. Wehrlin and Hallen
asked eight well-trained endurance runners to run at
107 percent of vVO2max at six different, simulated altitudes - 300, 800, 1300,
1800, 2300, and 2800 meters above sea level.
This landmark Norwegian study showed that at just 800 meters (about 2500 feet)
VO2max was already significantly lower, compared with
300 meters (1000 feet). In addition, the rate of decline of VO2max in the
runners between 300 and 1300 meters (1000 and 4000 feet)
was exactly the same as the rate of fall in aerobic capacity between 1800 and
2800 meters (5500 feet and 8500 feet). Overall, VO2max
dropped by around 6.3 percent for each 1000-foot increase in altitude (above the
baseline of 1000 feet). As VO2max declines,
workouts at high-quality paces become much-more difficult to handle.
More...from the Runner's Web at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/news/rw_news_20060315_RRN_Altitude.html


4. Aging:
Keep your Speed up as you Age
Jack Nicklaus said it. So did 1960s running great Jack Bachelor. It's not the
desire to race at a world-class level that wanes,
rather it's the fact that the body loses the ability to do so.
There's more to capturing all that your body still has to give than just getting
out the door for your daily run. Running is one of
the sports that obviously has a good side; but it also has a dark one. Here are
some essential strategies to help keep aging--and
running's dark side--in check.
Maintain Your VO2 Max
Those who lose huge helpings of their VO2 max are either not training enough, or
not training at all. Aerobic capacity is measured
by that most exulted of figures, VO2 max. Here's what happens if you're
sedentary: By the time you're busy rolling through your 30s,
you can expect to dribble away about one percent of your body's maximum ability
to use oxygen every year. Ouch.
Action plan: Being a runner is a powerful remedy, thanks to the application of
the use-it-or-lose-it principle. By stressing your
VO2 max with good ol' consistent, hard training, VO2 max losses will diminish
accordingly. This is why runners 40 and over have
clocked sub-four minute miles. Occasional bouts of high-intensity running and
racing will do a nice job of keeping your VO2 max high
up off the ground. For many aging runners, the problem here isn't motivation.
They'd run 140 miles a week if they could. It's the
annoying injury problems that seem to creep up more and more as you get older.
More...from Metro Sports NY at:
http://www.metrosportsny.com/story.cfm?story_id=11835&publicationID=211&pageID=4\
802


5. A Proper Bike Fit Means a Faster Cyclist :
by Matt Russ
A competition grade bicycle is not cheap. Once fully outfitted, you will have
probably spent thousands of dollars. In order to get
the most value out of your investment your bicycle should fit you like a glove.
The three main considerations in fitting a cyclist
are comfort, power production, and aerodynamics. You must choose a balance and
proportion of these three elements in order to
achieve your optimal fit. This proportion will be based on a variety of
individual characteristics such as the type of cycling you
will be doing, competitive level and experience, muscle imbalances or previous
injuries, and your personal biomechanics and riding
style to name a just a few.
Comfort First
Comfort comes first, even for a competitive cyclist. If a cyclist is very
uncomfortable on their bicycle they can not produce power,
period. I have observed novice cyclists in very aggressive aerodynamic positions
with a low power output resulting from being so
uncomfortable in that position. By putting them in a less aggressive position
they were actually faster because they could pedal
harder. Comfort, of course, is relative. A time trialist must make sacrifices in
comfort, but they will spend a relatively short
period of time on the bike. If you are new to cycling there is a period of
acclimation as your body adjusts to spending more and
more time in the saddle. Some discomfort is normal, but cycling should not be
painful. If you are experiencing joint, back, or neck
pain it is time to look at your fit or perhaps your pedaling mechanics. Saddle
soreness or numbness should be addressed immediately.
These issues can often be relieved with a different saddle type or a simple
adjustment that allows for correct saddle to body
contact.
More...from the Sport Factory at:
http://thesportfactory.iuplog.com/default.asp?item=157203


6. Joe Henderson's Running Commentary - Giving Back:
One of the great strengths of American running is also one of its subtle
weaknesses. We rarely suffer a shortage of runners willing
to run any distance, anywhere there is a race that weekend. We often suffer from
a shortage of workers willing to help conduct the
races.
In this sport we are a nation of doers, not viewers. We would rather run in a
race ourselves than watch others run it, now matter
how fast they are and how slow we are.
Few events here are in danger of disappearing for lack of entrants. Many must
limit their fields by setting a maximum number (New
York City Marathon) or by imposing qualifying times (Boston Marathon).
The demand for space at starting lines is high and growing higher. The demand
for volunteer workers grows too, and the supply
remains short.
Race directors -- who usually are volunteers themselves -- forever beg for help.
They never seem to have quite enough of it on
raceday.
The volunteers give up a weekend day to stand shivering in the cold or baking in
the sun, delivering the aid that runners demand.
For this the workers usually receive no more than a free T-shirt.
I often go to races as a guest of the directors. This lets me follow them
through their raceday, which usually begins after a
sleepless night for them. They and their support troops arrive before the first
runner, and stay long after the last one goes home.
More...from Joe Henderson at:
http://www.joehenderson.com/archive/home.php?article=2047


7. Sour on sweet drinks:
Simply cutting back on sugary beverages can reduce body fat, researchers say.
No one nagged or hounded. No one said, "Turn that TV/computer/video game off and
go outside and play." No one took the chips away,
locked down the vending machines, or foisted carrots and broccoli on anyone.
With all the myriad theories about why children are getting fatter, researchers
in Massachusetts focused on just one piece of the
childhood obesity puzzle - sugar-sweetened drinks. Their study, published in the
March issue of the journal Pediatrics, showed for
the first time that simply cutting back on sugary drinks can reduce body fat.
The findings - along with other recent research on beverages' role in weight
gain - shed light on the importance of what Americans
swallow in liquid form.
Scientists made it easy for the teens, ages 13 to 18, who altered their behavior
for the study. They had a supermarket chain deliver
weekly shipments of the teens' preferred beverages, enough for four servings a
day for the study participants plus two extra
servings for each additional family member to avoid fights.
Half of the 103 teenage volunteers continued to drink as they normally did.
Normal for the entire group before the study began was
2.5 servings of soda, fruit juices, sports drinks, lemonade or other sweetened
drinks, or about 375 calories worth a day. The other
half got to choose any kind of noncaloric drink they wanted - water, diet sodas
or no-calorie juice drinks.
More...from the LA Times at:
http://www.latimes.com/features/health/la-he-drink13mar13,1,6852678.story


8. Dr. Gabe Mirkin's Fitness and Health E-Zine:
* Cross-Transference Keeps You Strong While Injuries Heal
Injuries upset athletes because they know their competitors are still training.
They can maintain fitness by using a training
technique called cross transference, and so can you. Exercising one leg or arm
helps to maintain strength, endurance and power in
the opposite limb. The muscles in the injured limb are not strengthened directly
because they are not being used. Cross transference
stimulates nerves in both limbs, even though only one is being exercised
(Journal of Applied Physiology, November 2005).
Each muscle is made of millions of fibers, and each fiber is stimulated by a
single nerve. When you exercise, your brain sends
messages along these nerves, telling only about five percent of the nerves to
contract at the same time. With training, your brain
learns to contract a greater percentage of muscle fibers simultaneously. The
more you practice a specific exercise, the greater
percentage of your muscle fibers you can contract at the same time. When you
stop exercising, your brain quickly loses its ability
to contract as many fibers at the same time and you lose strength, endurance and
coordination. However, if you continue to exercise
one arm, your brain retains its ability to contract the fibers in the opposite
arm.
This concept applies only to opposite limbs; you can maintain strength in an
injured arm by continuing to exercise the uninjured
one, but exercising your legs will not strengthen your arms and vice versa. So
if you are a runner who injures a leg muscle, you can
work the uninjured leg on resistance machines to keep up the strength of both
legs. If you are a baseball pitcher, you can help to
maintain strength in an injured arm by using your other arm to throw and do
resistance exercises.
* Maximum Heart Rate Formula
Many of the standard tests used to measure heart function are based on a
nonsensical MAXIMUM HEART RATE formula, that predicts the
fastest your heart can beat and still pump blood through your body. Although
this formula is the golden standard used today, it is
not based on science.
In 1970, a good friend, Sam Fox, was the director of the United States Public
Health Service Program to Prevent heart disease. He is
one of the most respected heart specialists in the world. He and a young
researcher named William Haskell were flying to a meeting.
They put together several studies comparing maximum heart rate and age. Sam Fox
took out a pencil and plotted a graph of age verses
maximum heart rate and said it looks like maximum heart rate is equal to 220
minus a person's age. For the last 30 years, this
formula has been taught in physical education and heart function course and has
been used to test heart function and athletic
fitness. In the 1960s, Sam Fox was very helpful to me when I was competing,
planning and setting up running programs, but the whole
concept of maximum heart rate and the formula that it is equal to 220 minus your
age is ridiculous.
The formula is wrong because your legs drive your heart. Your heart does not
drive your legs. Maximum heart rate depends on the
strength of your legs, not the strength of your heart. When you contract your
leg muscles, they squeeze against the blood vessels
near them to pump blood from your leg veins toward your heart. When your leg
muscle relax, your leg veins fill with blood. So your
leg muscles pump increased amounts of blood toward your heart. This increased
blood fills the heart and causes your heart to be
faster and with more force. This is called the Bainbridge reflex that doctors
are taught in their first year of medical school. The
stronger your legs are, the more blood they can pump, which causes your heart to
beat faster.
A pencil mark plotted on a graph during an airplane flight more than 30 years
ago has been the accepted formula for maximum heart
rate for more than 30 years and the medical community has accepted this dogma
for more than 30 years.
* Warming up and Stretching May Impair Performance in Competition
Have you watched football players, sprinters and other athletes warming
up and stretching before competitions? Two studies,
one from Louisiana State University and one from
Liverpool University in England, show that they may be harming their performance
(Journal of Sports Science, May 2005).
In the first study, elite college sprinters were timed in 20 meter
sprints, with and without prior multiple 30-second
stretches of their leg muscles. As was expected, both active and passive
stretching slowed them down. Many previous studies show
that you cannot lift your maximum weight after a muscle is pulled and stretched.
Other studies have failed to show that stretching
prevents injuries. This study does not tell you to stop stretching completely
because there is solid data to show that stretching
makes you a better athlete. Stretching elongates tendons and the longer the
tendon, the greater force a muscle can exert around a
joint to make you stronger and faster. However, this study suggests that
athletes should not stretch before competitions.
The English study shows that warming up limits how far you can run.
Runners alternated 30 seconds of very fast runs on a
treadmill with 30 seconds of running very slowly until they were exhausted.
They tired earlier after having their legs heated
passively and also after taking a long warm up run before testing. At
temperatures of about 70 degrees F., both active and passive
heating raised both muscle and body temperatures, which uses up muscle glycogen
faster and tires runners earlier. Since warming up
has been shown to help prevent injuries, it may be good idea to warming up
before power events of short duration, but not before
competitions that last for several hours.
* Dear Dr. Mirkin: Does an enlarged heart always indicate serious problems?
Sometimes doctors mistake a large, strong healthy heart caused by
vigorous exercise with the large, weak, sick heart of
cardiomyopathy. A report from University College London Hospitals describes the
case of a professional athlete who was prohibited
from playing football because doctors didn't order the right tests (European
Journal of Echocardiology, August 2005). In
cardiomyopathy, the enlargement is caused by the heart's inability to pump blood
through the body at rest because of poor pumping
power and inability to fill adequately with blood. A person with this condition
can die during exercise. On the other hand, people
who exercise vigorously over many years can develop a very large muscular heart
that is stronger than normal and far less likely to
suffer any disease. If this patient had an echocardiogram and treadmill
exercise tests read by a physician
experienced with athletes, he would not have been diagnosed with cardiomyopathy.
Also see http://www.drmirkin.com/heart/9228.html
From Dr. Mirkin at:
http://www.drmirkin.com


9. Fine Print Sends Clear Message: Stay the Course:
The health news of recent weeks could prompt even a stalwart defender of
preventive medicine like me to abandon hope: forget about
those hard-to-swallow tablets of calcium and vitamin D3 to stave off
osteoporosis, those capsules of glucosamine and chondroitin to
stem the pain and progress of arthritis, and a low-fat diet to protect me from
heart disease and cancer.
Why not eat eggs Benedict for breakfast, burgers and shakes for lunch, ribs and
fries for dinner? And, while I'm at it, why not give
up my daily exercise and recoup the hours spent in the gym and pool?
But wait, says my better judgment. As convincing as the new studies appear to be
on the surface, I see ample reasons to continue
with my present regimen, even if it may not afford the protections that the
Women's Health Initiative or the National Institutes of
Health were examining.
Jogging More Than Memory
To refresh your memory about the latest discouraging findings from the giant
Women's Health Initiative, a low-fat diet conferred no
overall benefit to the hearts of postmenopausal women, nor did it seem to
protect them against breast cancer. Another arm of this
"real-world" study found no overall protection against fractures and colon
cancer from daily supplements of calcium and vitamin D,
which slightly increased the women's risk of kidney stones.
And as if those counterintuitive findings were not hard enough to swallow, hopes
for quelling arthritic pain with an
over-the-counter supplement I ballyhooed nearly a decade ago seemed to be dashed
by a six-month study of 1,583 men and women with
symptoms of knee arthritis.
I'll start with the easiest of the three challenges to my current life: the
daily consumption of three capsules of glucosamine
(1,500 milligrams) and chondroitin sulfate (1,200 milligrams). I've been using
this product, more or less religiously, since it
transformed my 11-year-old spaniel from an arthritic wreck into a companion with
puppylike agility, giving him nearly six more
active years.
More...from the NY Times at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/14/health/14brod.html


10. Maintaining Your Machine:
Which Machine Are You Talking About?
Most of us are used to getting the oil changed and the tires rotated on our cars
regularly. We may also get a full tune-up every few
years, and of course we take our cars in for service when we hear strange noises
or experience body damage or other physical wear
and tear. And then some of us go further and pamper our cars by getting regular
washes, waxes, detailing, etc. Cars that get driven
thousands of miles per year need regular maintenance if we expect them to work
well for many years.
Now what about the machine that is your body? Are you giving yours the same
regular attention as your car so that it provides you
with a good experience when you are using it in your sports? "I don't have
time," you might say. Try applying that attitude to a car
and see what happens if you don't change the oil for a few years. Or don't get
that brake job when you feel the brakes not being as
responsive as you know they should be.
This article is about my experiences in maintaining my machine-my body-and my
recommendations for things you might want to consider
in maintaining yours. I think that anyone can find something in this article
that can help them take a little better care of their
machine.
Please read the Disclaimer at the end of this article, if you are interested in
my personal experiences with injury and
biomechanical issues.
Overuse?
There is a body of individuals out there that likes to call pain that we
experience during training an "overuse injury." I think
that's a misnomer. Face it, if you are running 3-5 times a week, swimming 3-5
times and biking 3-4 times (or whatever your sports
may be), you are "overusing" pretty much everything! While there are times when
pain or injury are a result of merely "overdoing it"
or acute trauma, usually something has gotten slightly out of whack, which led
to something else overcompensating for it, which led
to.that pain. And while we tend to accuse our training of being the culprit most
of the time, often it's our personal lifestyle
habits and biomechanics combined with the additional strain we put on our bodies
through training that begin the chain reaction
resulting in pain. I describe routine aches and pains as "my body is talking to
me." Much like a car making noises or pulling to one
side or not feeling like it's giving a smooth ride.
More...from TriFuel at:
http://www.trifuel.com/triathlon/endurance-files/maintaining-your-machine-001272\
.php


11. From Runner's World:
* Coach's Corner
Truly great runners are masters of balance. Ultimately, the best runners are the
ones who are willing to work very hard, but who
have a little bit of a lazy streak in them. These runners will be prone to take
a day off when they feel worn out rather than
pushing through fatigue even when their bodies cry out for them to back off
* Injury Prevention
Ingrown Toenails: Keep your toenails clipped regularly, especially those on your
big toes. Wear running shoes that are wide enough
in the forefoot to prevent pressure and friction on the nail of the big toe.
* Editor's Advice
Inspect your socks. "See how they look after running through the sloppy winter.
Throw out the rattiest pair or two and invest in
some replacements. New socks will protect your feet and make running more
comfortable." -Sean Downey, RW managing editor
* Training Talk
"One universal lesson I learned is that top athletes are not a species distinct
from you--they are ordinary people simply called to
extraordinary circumstances, regular people who have ignited, and sustained, a
driving passion for what they do. This is how they
achieve such mind-boggling physical feats. You have the same fire inside of you.
Regardless of your fitness level, background or
beliefs, you can go the distance in a triathlon." -From Triathlon Training by
Eric Harr



12. Student of the Sport: Red blood cell primer:
by Cameron Chestnut
Red blood cells (RBCs), or "shorties" as I like to call them, are our little
oxygen-carrying buddies, and they hold a special place
in every endurance athlete's heart. A major part of our training is intended to
simply increase RBC count, allowing us to carry more
oxygen to our working muscles.
Endurance training increases RBC count by putting higher oxygen demands on our
body, and other situations that put our body into
oxygen stress, such as high altitude, can elicit a similar response. Not only do
we create more RBCs as a reaction to the decreased
partial pressure of oxygen at altitude, but the biochemical nature of our RBCs
also changes.
At altitude, our RBCs express more of a compound called 2,3 BPG which decreases
the affinity of hemoglobin for oxygen. Hemoglobin is
the oxygen carrying protein of RBCs, and it seems counterintuitive that our RBCs
would decrease their affinity for what little
oxygen there is at altitude when there is an increased demand to carry it. In
reality, this apparent conundrum actually allows the
hemoglobin of the RBCs to unload their oxygen more easily once it reaches
myoglobin, the oxygen binding protein of muscle.
Since there is less oxygen to carry, our bodies create more RBCs, thus more
opportunities for the oxygen to hitch a ride. It also
puts more of its unloading mediator, 2,3 BPG, on those RBCs to make sure the
oxygen gets off at the right stop.
Once you have created those extra RBCs the hard way, through training or as an
altitude response, these wonderful little guys have a
shelf life of about four months. That's right, the benefits of increasing your
RBC count can persist long enough to get in some
quality racing and training. If that doesn't get you excited, you're reading the
wrong section.
More...from InsideTri at:
http://www.insidetriathlon.com/train/tips/articles/3181.0.html


13. Exercise and weight control: Myths, truths and gender differences:
By Nancy Clark, M.S., R.D.
"For all the exercise I do, I should be pencil thin!"
"Am I the only runner who has ever gained weight training for a marathon?"
"Why does my husband shed pounds when he exercises and I don't?"
When I listen to athletes complain about their lack of success with losing body
fat, I hear abundant frustration: "Why can't I do
something as simple as lose a few pounds!" Why? Because weight loss isn't simple
and often includes debunking a few diet and
exercise myths. Perhaps this article will offer some insights that lead you to
weight-loss success.
Myth: You must exercise in order to lose body fat.
To lose body fat, you must create a calorie deficit. You can create that deficit
by adding on exercise (which improves your overall
health and fitness) or by simply eating fewer calories. For example, sick people
commonly lose body fat, but they don't exercise;
they create a calorie deficit.
Similarly, injured athletes can also lose fat despite lack of exercise. The
story "I gained weight when I was injured because I
couldn't exercise" could more correctly be stated "I gained weight when I was
injured because I was bored and depressed and I
overate for comfort and entertainment."
Myth: The more you exercise, the more fat you lose.
Often, the more you exercise, the hungrier you get, and:
the more you eat, or;
the more your believe you "deserve" to eat, or;
the more you want to eat as a reward for both getting to the gym and surviving
the workout.
But if you spend 60 minutes in a spin class and burn off 600 calories only to
reward yourself with 12 Oreos (600 calories), you'll
wipe out your weight-loss efforts in less than three minutes!
More...from Active.com at:
http://www.active.com/story.cfm?story_id=12783&sidebar=17&category=activeusahome\
page


14. The Triathlete's Holy Grail: Part II
If you missed Part I of this series, I recommend reading it at
www.pacificfit.net.
Application is the best way to understand biomechanics, so I'd like to
present three practical examples for each sport of how to
use the torque/lever arm relationship to your advantage. Logically progressing,
I'll start with the swim. Next week, in Part 3 of
this series, I'll be moving on to the run and the bike.
There are three centers of rotation in the kicking action: the hip, the
knee, and the ankle. Due to the weight of the leg and
the surface area of the lever arm sticking out from it (i.e. the entire leg),
the most torque is produced in the hip. This is why
the muscles around the hip joint are the some of the strongest in the body, and
the most well equipped to produce a resistive torque
against the downward force of the leg sinking in the water and the drag from the
water itself, as well as the upward force against
the weight of the water. Technically, the lever arm of the hip is longest when
the knee is completely straight, so in this scenario,
the hip could produce the most torque. But remember that the idea is not to
necessarily produce the most torque, but to produce
optimal torque to gain the greatest speed while minimizing fatigue. A slight
bend in the knee will accomplish two objectives: 1)
incorporation of assistive knee musculature, which can help delay hip fatigue
and 2) decreased lever arm length, to reduce torque
production at the hip, again delaying hip fatigue.
The bonus is that by decreasing the lever arm, you also decrease resistance
to angular momentum. This means that the hip not
only experiences less fatigue with a slightly bent knee, but the leg actually
gains the ability to travel faster in the water,
allowing for an increased kick cadence.
Another lever arm involved in the hip is that of the foot. The fastest swimmers
in the world just happen to have very flexible
ankles, which means they can achieve a greater toe point angle than their less
speedy counterparts. A large amount of extension in
the ankle increases the lever arm at the hip (hip to foot distance), the knee
(knee to foot distance), and the ankle (ankle to foot
distance). Therefore, by simply extending the foot, you greatly increase the
amount of torque you are able to produce with the
entire leg, without having to kick harder or through a greater range of motion.
Does this cause greater fatigue in the leg
musculature? Anyone who has done a fin workout will respond with a definitive
yes. However, the increase in speed and the reduction
in drag that results from this small biomechanical adjustment will outweigh the
increased muscular demand.
While any drill that focuses primarily on kicking will improve your kick
efficiency, I recommend incorporating fin drills. By
automatically increasing your lever arm, kicking with fins will force you to
kick from the hip with a slight knee bend, while also
extending your ankles. Try a few front and side swimming kick sets in at least
one workout of the week.
Let's move on to the pull, or what many coaches refer to as the insweep,
which is the portion of the stroke in which the arm is
pulling under and across the body. With the arm completely extended, the lever
arm is as long as possible, and maximum torque is
produced in the shoulder joint. Remember, however, that the water is pushing
just as hard against the swimmer as the swimmer pushes
against the water, so this maximum torque can prematurely fatigue the shoulder
joint. By bending the elbow, and thus shortening the
lever arm, less torque is produced in the shoulder (similar to bending the knee
in the kick) and the torque is redistributed among
the chest, upper back, and forearm muscles (the lever arm actually increases
with respect to these muscles). Just like bending the
knee in the kick incorporates the assistive knee musculature, bending the elbow
in the swim allows for use of the these assistive
muscles. In addition, bending the elbow allows the arm to move faster through
the water (decreased resistance to angular momentum)
and puts the hand in a position that is perpendicular to the direction of
travel, which actually allows the swimmer to grab more
water. Forearm angle should be at 20-40 degrees (low angles for tall, lanky
swimmers, high angles for short, stocky swimmers).
One of the best drills to encourage a bent forearm is the fist-swimming only
drill, in which the hands are kept closed. By keeping
the hands from providing the primary propelling force, a swimmer is forced to
bend the elbows in order to increase surface area of
the forearm that is exposed to the water, as well as increase torque application
from the accessory upper body muscles, to assist
the shoulder.
Finally, consider the lever arm with respect to the recovery portion of the
swim phase, in which the arm is removed from the
water after finishing the pull stroke, in preparation to be thrust in front of
the body for the next stroke. There are two ways that
torque is increased in this situation: 1) the greater the angle of the elbow,
the longer the lever arm, and the greater the torque
in the shoulder; 2) the greater the angle at which the arm is extended away from
the body (a "diagonal" reach), the greater the
torque in the shoulder. This is a common scenario in swimmers who windmill
(swimming with a straight-arm recovery), or swimmers who
do not reach forward in a streamlined position (reach at an outward angle
instead). Either way, the increased torque in the shoulder
is useless, as it simply fatigues the shoulder without achieving any additional
pull against the water (your arm is in the air).
Therefore, when the arm is withdrawn from the water, the elbow should be bent,
as if a string were attached from the elbow to the
ceiling, pulling it straight out of the water. In addition, when reaching
forward to initiate the pull-phase of the next stroke, the
arm should be thrown forward directly in front of the body, with the head tucked
between the shoulders, as opposed to reaching at an
angle away from the body. If you think about it, reaching more directly forward
(similar to an 11am/1pm clock position) is a direct
result of having a bent elbow removed from the water, because a straight arm
must swing through a greater (i.e. longer) arc, and
therefore enter the water sooner if speed is to be maintained (at more of a
10am/2pm clock position).
A great drill to incorporate more elbow flexion at water removal is the shark
fin/zipper drill. As the arm is removed from the water
and the hips are rotated to initiate the breath, the swimmer zips up an
imaginary zipper that extends along the side of the body,
then holds the elbow in a bent shark fin position for a brief 1 count, before
continuing into the front swimming position.
Whew! Time to take a break. We'll continue next week by considering how lever
arms and torque can be used to improve speed and
conserve energy in the run and the bike.
Until next time, train smart,
Ben Greenfield
NSCA-CPT, CSCS


14. Dietary Supplements: Do You Need Them?
In this month's nutrition column, Jennifer Hutchison looks into the benefits of
multivitamins and mineral supplements.
This is a topic that can certainly stir up a hornet's nest of debate. There's
one side that will stand strong on the message that
you can get all the nutrition you need from food. Then there is the extreme
opposite view that says our food supply can no longer
supply adequate nutrients, and as a result you have to invest your retirement
savings to purchase the pills and potions that will
unlock the secret to long term health and performance. It is no wonder athletes
are confused as to what, if any, dietary supplements
they should take.
Dietary supplements are defined as "compounds" that can be consumed in addition
to daily food intake. Basically it is any product
taken by mouth that contains dietary ingredients. These supplements can include
vitamins, minerals, amino acids, protein powders,
fat supplements, essential fatty acids or even carbohydrate. In addition,
dietary supplements can contain substances such as herbs,
botanicals and other chemicals extracted from certain plants along with
molecules that can be part of metabolism.
Supplements come in various forms such as pills, powders, liquids, tablets and
capsules, and health and performance claims can also
variety greatly. Currently there are no regulated systems in place to guarantee
that a supplement contains what is listed on the
label. Some manufacturers do have quality assurance programs in place to help.
It should be noted that any dietary supplement
claiming to enhance performance, or provide an athletic "edge", can also be
referred to as a dietary ergogenic aid, which will be a
topic of a future article.
So with regard to dietary supplements, the question many athletes ask is: "What
can I take that can help me stay healthy, train hard
and perform optimally?"
Since we have established dietary supplements encompass such an a broad range, I
will answer this question with respect to the most
common supplement: the general multivitamin and mineral supplement.
More...from Ironman Live at:
http://vnews.ironmanlive.com/vnews/topstories/1142438213


15. Power training II: Every heart is different:
Before you jump into the world of power, it's important to listen to your heart
first, or at least understand what your heart rate
can or can't tell you about your fitness and response to training. We'll explore
the inconsistencies associated with heart rate
monitoring and how you can use it to your benefit.
In the last article, Power training I, I wrote about how relying solely on heart
rate can often lead to and even encourage improper
and inefficient workouts.
Therefore, before any of my clients delve into the world of measuring watts, I
encourage them to first take the time to learn about
and understand the limitations of heart rate data and to understand the
uniqueness and idiosyncrasies of the human heart.
With that knowledge in hand, when they do incorporate wattage into the equation
they'll have an even better understanding of how
their own body responds to and recovers from training and racing.
Don't keep up with the Joneses
One of the most common complaints I hear from new riders is 'my heart rate is
too high' or 'too low.' There's no such thing.
I coach two racers in their mid 30s. I have a standard monthly five-mile road
test (hill climb) which they both complete in about 19
minutes. The only difference? One rider does it at 155 bpm and the other at 205.
Same age, similar power output, similar weight, 50
beat difference in heart rate. There's nothing wrong with either of them,
they're just different.
More...from Active.com at:
http://active.com/story.cfm?story_id=12831


16. Triathlon: Precautions Against Injury:
From Triathlon Workout Planner by John Mora
The biggest key to avoiding injury is really quite simple in concept but much,
much harder in execution-high adaptability. What does
it mean? Adaptability means that at every stage of your triathlon odyssey, from
planning to training to racing, you must be
receptive to your body's signals in order to make quick and timely adjustments.
When setting up your training plan, it's vital to plan and execute your training
defensively. You've all heard the term that the
safest drivers drive defensively, with a vigilant mindset and the wherewithal to
recognize dangerous behavior. If you want to
safeguard your body and avoid injury, planning your triathlon training with the
same kind of defensive mindset is the single best
thing you can do for yourself.
As you sit down to plan your schedule, listen for those instincts that may be
telling you you're overloading yourself or stacking
too many workouts on top of each other, which may break down your body. Besides
listening to your gut, you can use the following
tips for planning your training defensively:
More...from the Runner's Web at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/news/rw_news_20060516_HK_Triathlon_Workout.htm\
l


17. Multisport: Improving Run Cadence - Strides and Plyometrics:
By USAT Level II Coach, Mike Ricci
Focus on doing the drills and improving each week. Eventually you will go out
for a run, look down, and see that your pace has
improved, your heart rate is lower, and your cadence is over 90 rpm.
Run cadence, distance per stroke, and cycling cadence are all key factors when
determining efficiency in triathletes. In the pool we
try to lower the number of strokes we take in order to lengthen out our swim
stroke. On the bike we try to maintain a cadence of
85-95 rpm in order to keep our legs turning over quickly. Run cadence actually
closely matches cycling cadence, as the most
efficient athletes try to maintain that 90 rpm cadence.
Finding your Cadence
In order to improve your run cadence there are a few things you can do. First
off you should know what your cadence is now. Go to a
track or a long straight flat path or trail, and count off how many steps you
take in 30 seconds. This is your run cadence, or how
many run cycles you take per minute of running. Improving this number or
bringing it over 90 rpm is done by running what we call
"strides," or "pick ups."
Doing Strides for Improved Cadence
Once again find a nice long flat to downhill stretch of a path, trail or
un-congested road and run pretty quick for 20-30 seconds.
Now, walk or slowly jog back to the start and repeat this about 4-10 times. Over
time you will see your cadence will quicken, you
will be lighter on your feet, and your run times will improve.
More...from the Runner's Web at:
http://www.runnersweb.com/running/news/rw_news_20060316_D3_Drills.html


18. Laying the foundation for endurance training:
By Gary Bredehoft / CSCS, Tiger Coaching & Personal Training
It's that time of year to get ready for those summer sports competitions,
including fun runs, swimming, cycling, walking or any long
continuous activity.
Aerobic and muscular endurance training is essential for most sports to increase
your stamina. The development of aerobic and
muscular endurance is one of the main factors in improving performance for all
sports where performance time is greater than 2
minutes.
So what exactly is aerobic and muscular endurance and how does a person go about
training for it?
Let's first understand and define aerobic and muscular endurance. Aerobic
endurance is the ability of the aerobic systems to
produce a certain level of work or exercise for a prolonged period of time
without fatigue.
Muscular endurance is the proper combination of strength and endurance. In other
words, it's the ability to perform many repetitions
against a given resistance for a prolonged period of time.
More...from the Journal Star at:
http://www.journalstar.com/articles/2006/03/15/stat/doc44175753d2ba4948263012.tx\
t


19. You are the glycogen in the endurance event of my life:
By TARA PATRIQUIN / Fitness Column
PSST! CARBOHYDRATES are not the devil. Do people still think that? In fact, they
are being used in a clever way by endurance
athletes with what is known as carbo-loading. This trick, also called
supercompensation, comes from our Swedish friends, and is
based on the premise that much of our energy as exercisers comes from
carbohydrates, or its stored form: glycogen.
Unfortunately we can't store endless amounts of glycogen (but notice we can with
fat, aargh). By planning your meals and exercise
regimen accordingly, you can store extra glycogen (up to double) and increase
the body's potential to use stored fuel.
Here's the concept: The preparation starts six or seven days before a big
endurance event. On Day 1 you increase your exercise to
exhaust the specific muscles used in the sport. You will also reduce your
complex carbohydrate intake to 40-50 per cent of your
diet. You will make sure to eat more fruit, protein and good fats (we don't need
to have the fat conversation again, do we?)
This stage is designed to deplete the muscles and liver of stored glycogen. The
two most common signs of depleted glycogen are heavy
tired muscles or even complete fatigue.
More...from the Chronicle-Herald at:
http://thechronicleherald.ca/Sports/490229.html


20. The Fastest Way to a Healthy Heart:
Getting tired of your exercise bike? Try the new approach to cardio. It's fun,
quick, easy -- and could very well save your life.
Most guys who are serious about fitness these days know that interval training
is good for them. Cranking up the intensity for brief
bursts makes you a better athlete and certainly makes for a more lively gym
session than riding an exercise bike for an hour. But
did you know that it's also one of the best things you can do to protect
yourself from a deadly heart attack?
That's the implication of a recent study that's part of an important shift in
the way the medical community thinks about cardio. Any
of you still zoning out at the gym in front of CNN really need to get with the
program. Athletes swear by intervals because they
train the body to withstand the intense exertion of game conditions. Now
cardiologists are swearing by them too, because they get
the heart used to efficiently speeding up and slowing down like a finely tuned
Porsche, a Porsche that will help you steer clear of
a heart attack -- or survive a collision with one. In the study, published in
the New England Journal of Medicine last year, French
researchers measured the heart rates of 5,713 healthy men on exercise bikes,
then followed them for 23 years to see which ones died
of heart attacks. Of all the factors -- whether the guys were regular
exercisers, how long and hard they could cycle -- the most
telling was the ability of a guy's heart to rocket up through the rpms and then
quickly return to a purring idle. In fact, those
with the biggest ranges between their heart rates during intense exercise and at
rest were four times less likely to drop dead of a
heart attack than those with the smallest.
With this plan, from California performance coach Alwyn Cosgrove, you don't even
need an exercise bike. Once your doctor has cleared
you for intense exercise, test your heart responsiveness below, then start
integrating the workout into your regular routine twice a
week. Do Round 1 at a brisk clip without stopping. (It should take about a
minute; if it takes much less, add a few reps per
exercise.) Walk around for three or four minutes to catch your breath. Do Round
2, recover the same way, and repeat, pushing
yourself even harder. Add a round a week, so you're doing five in the second
week (three of Round 1 and two of Round 2), six in the
third, seven in the fourth. After a month test yourself again and see how much
you've reduced your risk of a heart attack.
More...from the Men's Journal at:
http://www.mensjournal.com/healthFitness/0604/workout_cardio.html


21. The ultimate stress test: Working out with the boss:
The long, tough workday is finally over, highlighted by two missed deadlines, a
surge of paperwork and a run-in with your
supervisor.
Before heading home, you decide to unwind at the company gym. Hopping on the
treadmill and popping in some ear buds, you settle in
for a bit of cardio and private time.
Then you realize that next to you is ... your boss.
The company fitness center, dandy perk that it is, can also be a minefield of
awkward situations, inelegant faux pas and
professional claustrophobia.
Say you fail to wipe down the elliptical trainer after leaving copious amounts
of sweat. Or you let loose with loud grunts while
training. Come promotion time, don't think your manager is going to forget that.
And if you're the boss who slips on the gym
etiquette now and then, you can bet such actions will be hot topics around the
water cooler later.
Even casual conversations in this arena can spell trouble. This isn't a time to
chat up your superior -- or your underling -- about
work or your new puppy, especially if he values his workouts like his stock
portfolio.
Craig Mutch, director of corporate staffing at Mattel Inc., learned to keep it
short and sweet with his boss, as in 30-second
updates. "For the most part," he says, "I try to leave him alone. I don't try to
press agendas."
More...from Active.com at:
http://www.active.com/story.cfm?story_id=12824


22. Field Testing:
By Joe Friel
The following is an excerpt from Joe Friel's newest book, The Threshold Heart
Rate Edge, due out in fall 2006.
The beauty of the metabolic testing done in a lab is precision. The technician
who administers the test will attempt to control all
possible variables such as temperature and humidity, standardization and
calibration of equipment, warm-up, testing procedure and
more. By controlling such things the technician can be fairly confident that
changes in results between tests are due to your
fitness changing rather than to external factors.
The downside, of course, is cost. You pay for this precision, so you probably
won't want to be tested this way too frequently. Yet
it's important that you check your anaerobic threshold heart rate and discover
your current level of fitness fairly often-about
every four to eight weeks is best. So what do you do?
The answer is field testing-tests you conduct on yourself in your normal
training environment. This could be in a swimming pool, on
a running track or velodrome, on a standard course you've selected, or indoors
using available training equipment (for example,
bicycle ergometer, rowing ergometer or treadmill). While such testing is
inexpensive, probably costing you nothing or at least very
little per test, precision may be questionable.
Not only must you control such external variables as weather, equipment, warm-up
and procedure, you must also control your internal
factors. What you eat and when you eat before testing can make a difference in
the results. For example, a couple of cups of coffee
before one test but not another may well produce two sets of heart rate numbers
and throw off the results. Your emotional state can
also have an impact on the test. If you are under a lot of stress before a test,
heart rate will be affected. Time of day for the
testing may even be a factor. And a critical variable is how well rested you are
coming into the test. If the results are to be
meaningful and give you guidance for future training, you must make the test
conditions as precise as possible.
A purpose of such testing is to discover your anaerobic threshold heart rate. If
done correctly, the results you get should be a
good approximation of this and be close to what would be discovered in a lab
metabolic test. If the test is poorly conducted-meaning
the variables described above are not controlled-the results may give you quite
erroneous information. Basing your training on such
data may be a waste of time and severely limit your growth as an athlete.
The 30-Minute Test
This a simple test-but not easy. All you have to do is complete a 30-minute time
trial on a constant course such as a flat road,
slight uphill or calm water. It may also be done indoors on an ergometer for
your sport such as a bike trainer, rower or treadmill.
Most athletes find this harder than when outdoors. If you decide to test indoors
be sure to have a fan or cool room to exercise in.
Heat will adversely affect results. This test is best done alone as having a
partner may also affect the results.
Start by warming up adequately. You should have a sense of what that means for
you since it should be about the same as what you do
before a race. Most athletes need at least 10 minutes of warm-up before this
test, but you may want as much as 30 minutes. Once
warmed up and ready to go, immediately start the test. The key to this test is
pacing. Almost everyone starts at too great an
intensity and then fades in the last few minutes. It's not unusual to hear of
athletes failing to finish the test the first time
because of starting out too fast. Tell yourself you'll hold back just a little
the first 10 minutes and continually remind yourself
of this once the test begins.
At exactly 10 minutes into the test click the lap button on your heart rate
monitor. Then when the test ends click the stop button.
You now will have three heart rate data points captured on your heart rate
monitor-average heart rate for the first 10 minutes,
average for the last 20 minutes, and average for the entire 30 minutes. The one
we are interested in is your average for the last 20
minutes. This a good estimate of your anaerobic threshold heart rate. Use it to
determine your heart rate zones as described in my
Training Bible books.
Other good information to record from this test is your average velocity or
power for the entire 30 minutes. For while your
anaerobic threshold heart rate might not change much in subsequent tests, with
improving fitness, velocity and power will change for
the better.
Joe Friel is founder and president of Ultrafit Associates and author of the
Training Bible book series and other books.
For more information go to www.Ultrafit.com.


23. Rest & Recovery... Most Important!!
Do you feel guilty when you don't get your Monday swim workout in and then make
it up on Tuesday? Do you feel bad if you don't get
your 2 hour bike ride in on Saturday? So then you go do the long bike after your
15 mile run on Sunday to "flush out the legs"
right?
We triathlete, generally a Type A personality, always strive for the best. We
strive to be the best swimmer, best
spouse/girlfriend/boyfriend, best cyclist, best co-worker and the best runner to
name a few. Most of us have a 40 hr week job,
family and friends along with many weekly hours of training. It's no surprise we
sometimes forget about ourselves. Because we tend
to be over achievers, we don't listen to our bodies as much as we should. Think
about it. How often do you go workout feeling sore,
fatigued and not really motivated but the schedule is pushing you. Even your
heart rate is above normal but you have to get that
workout in don't you?
What do we call this? As coaches, we call this over training. What is over
training? Over training can be defined as the state where
the athlete has been repeatedly stressed to the point where rest is no longer
adequate to allow for recovery. Over training is a
collection of emotional, behavioral and physical symptoms and is known as
"burnout" or "staleness."
Now don't get confused about being sore and tired after a hard workout. You will
feel as such when you are training for all three
sports. Fatigue is going to happen. Training includes getting the right type and
amount of physical stress followed by the necessary
amount of rest. The rest period is where you become stronger and recover for
your next workout. Over training is consistent
exhaustion which continues even after planned recovery periods. The most common
symptom is fatigue. The athlete may become moody,
easily irritated, experience changed in sleep patterns, loose desire and
motivation for the sport and even become depressed. Some
athletes may have decreased appetite along with weight lost. Your body needs to
recover. That's simple physiology. Listen to your
body! It is critical to allow the body to repair, either through rest or easy
recovery workouts.
More...from T3 Coaching at:
http://www.t3coaching.com/Articles/t3_Rest_n_recovery.htm




24. The 80/20 Rule: Making it work for your run training:
Running teaches us many great life lessons. For example, training is like
anything else in life--the greater your ability to focus
on what's most important, the greater your overall success. More specifically,
your ability to execute the most critical workouts
that yield the most significant benefits has the most direct and dramatic impact
on your endurance and, ultimately, your race
results. These workouts may appropriately represent only 20 percent or so of
your total regimen, but they are likely responsible for
80 percent of your fitness, stamina and power. I like to call these handful of
running sessions 80/20 workouts.
What You Can Gain
Why are 80/20 workouts so effective? Because in most cases you do them at a high
level of intensity, duration, or both, which helps
you achieve significant gains in your overall fitness and ability to perform at
your best during a race. The 80/20 workouts that
target weaknesses in your running abilities are effective because they challenge
you to shore up the flaws in your execution or
discipline that cause you the greatest amount of harm during a race.
If you frequently get passed on a hilly course, you're lacking power in your
running game.
If you are often outrun to the finish line, then you can improve your ability to
accelerate on demand.
If you lose focus during the latter miles of a marathon, there are specific ways
to overcome this mental and physical hurdle with
long runs that integrate visualization techniques.
80/20 Workouts
In all of the above examples, there are specific workouts that will help you
improve performance in these areas and more. To
determine the 20 percent of your workouts that will do you the most good, you'll
need to take a good honest look at where you can
improve.
More...from Metro Sports NY at:
http://www.metrosportsny.com/story.cfm?story_id=11851&publicationID=211&pageID=4\
798


25. Digest Briefs:
* Water management
Have a plan for daily intake. The amount of water the body needs during the
course of a day varies from person to person. Health
issues, the amount of daily activity and where a person lives can have an effect
on how much water a person requires.
The Mayo Clinic has identified three different drinking water programs that many
people follow. They are:
Replacement approach: The average urine output for adults is 1.5 liters a day.
An additional liter of water can be lost a day
through breathing, sweating and bowel movements. Food usually accounts for 20
percent of fluid intake. Therefore, the balance of
lost fluids can be replaced, generally, if a person drinks 2 liters of water or
other beverages a day, or slightly more than eight
cups.
8-by-8 rule: Eight 8-ounce glasses of water a day (about 1.9 liters) has become
a basic rule that many people use as a guideline for
daily fluid consumption.
Dietary recommendations: The Institute of Medicine recommends that men consume 3
liters (about 13 cups) of total beverages a day and
women consume 2.2 liters (about nine cups) of total beverages a day.
Although rare, it's possible for a person to drink too much water. Drinking
excessive amounts can lead to a condition known as
hyponatremia, in which the kidneys become overwhelmed and cannot dispose of
water properly. The excess water intake can dilute the
normal amount of sodium in the blood. Marathon runners and people who are older,
individuals with certain medical conditions, such
as cirrhosis, or those taking certain diuretics can run the risk of developing
hyponatremia.
If you have questions about how much or how little water you should drink, have
your physician weigh in on the amount of fluid that
suits your body's needs.

* ZZZZZZZs Can Make a Big Difference!
Todd Whitthorne
If you listen to our radio program, "Healthy Living from the Cooper Aerobics
Center," you know we routinely discuss the importance
of nutrition, regular exercise, proper supplementation, and stress management.
All are key components to living, as Dr. Cooper loves
to say, "a long and healthy life to the fullest." Another important factor in
that recipe is sleep.
A recent guest on our program (Feb. 4, 2006) was Dr. John Debus, sleep
consultant at Cooper Clinic and a board certified physician
in both psychiatry and sleep medicine. It was the first time in six years that
we devoted an entire program just to sleep and the
response was incredible. As it turns out, many of you have questions, concerns,
and problems related to something the body demands
but unfortunately usually does not get enough of.
There are several sleep-associated problems including snoring, sleep apnea, and
restless legs syndrome but by far the most common
sleep problem is insomnia.
Here are Dr. Debus' recommendations for good sleep hygiene:
1) Keep regular hours.
2) Allow adequate hours for sleep. Most adults need 7-8 hours per night.
3) Avoid excessive caffeine, especially after lunch.
4) Avoid alcohol in the 2-3 hours before bed (especially if you snore or suffer
from sleep apnea).
5) Avoid large meals within 2 hours of bedtime.
6) Exercise helps sleep, but not too close to bedtime.
7) Take time to wind down before going to bed.
8) Keep the bedroom cool, comfortable, and quiet.
The Internet can also provide solid advice as long as you find the right
resources. One I would highly recommend is
www.sleepfoundation.org. For specific information on restless legs syndrome you
might also try www.rls.org
You might also consider finding a qualified sleep specialist in your area. Those
of you in the North Texas region can contact Dr.
Debus at Sleep Medicine Associates by visiting www.sleepmed.com or by calling
214-750-7776.
Dr. Debus' entire "Healthy Living" interview is available at
http://www.cooperaerobics.com/radio/Archive.aspx, and also available
commercial free as a download for iPods and MP3 players at
http://www.podcastalley.com/podcast_details.php?pod_id=7207
Sleep well.
Todd Whitthorne, president and COO of Cooper Concepts, Inc., is also host of
"Healthy Living from the Cooper Aerobics Center" radio show.

* Thought for the Month by Dr. Jerry Lynch
If you find yourself trying to be the best in anything you do, forget about it.
Don't be the best.be the best you can be. Being the
best at anything is something you can't control. You can control, however, being
your very best. This will relax you and help you to
achieve your greatest dreams.
Dr. Jerry Lynch is an internationally recognized expert, author and clinician in
the field of sports psychology, mental training and
peak performance. He is also a competitive national class runner and cyclist.
His mental toughness techniques have benefited
numerous collegiate and professional national champions including Travis Brown
and other cyclists, triathletes, runners and
swimmers. Go to his website (www.taosports.com) or e-mail him at
mailto:jlynch@...



THIS WEEK'S FEATURED EVENTS:
*Please verify event dates with the event websites*

March 15 - 26, 2006:

2006 Commonwealth Games - Melbourne, AUS
http://www.melbourne2006.com.au
Fox Sports Australia
http://foxsports.news.com.au/commgames/?from=FS_othersports
The Age
http://www.theage.com.au/sport/commonwealthgames

Saturday, March 18, 2006:

Canyonlands Half-Marathon, Moab, UT
www.moabhalfmarathon.org

Catalina Marathon, Catalina Island, CA
www.pacificsportsllc.com

Ford Ironman 70.3 California Triathlon - Oceanside, CA
http://www.ironmancalifornia.com

Sunday, March 19, 2006:

Bay to Bay 12K - St. Petersburg, FL
http://www.runbaytobay.com/

Ironman South Africa - Port Elizabeth, Nelson Mandela Bay, South Africa
http://www.ironmansouthafrica.com

New Bedford Half-Marathon - New Bedford, MA
http://www.newbedfordhalfmarathon.com

Shamrock Sportsfest Marathon, Virginia Beach, VA
Half-Marathon, 3-Mile, 3K, Relay
www.shamrockmarathon.com

Los Angeles Marathon, Los Angeles, CA
www.lamarathon.com

April 1 - 2, 2006:

World Cross Country Championships - Fukuoka, JAP
http://www.iaaf.org/WXC06/index.html


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/

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 email returned, please contact the Runner's Web at
mailto:webmaster@... to notify us of the problem. To update your
Runner's Web eGroups subscriber's profile, go to the web

site at
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/RunnersWeb/join , sign in and update your changes.
Forward the Runner's Web Digest to a friend and suggest that they subscribe at:
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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
Runner's Web Online Store
http://store.runnersweb.com
RunnersWebCoach
http://www.runnerswebcoach.com


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RUNNER'S WEB AFFILIATE PROGRAMS:
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Endurance Films
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SportsShoes in the UK
http://www.sportsshoes.com/index.php?id=149

Visit on AssociatesShop.com Online Bookstore for running and triathlon books:
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LX Sport - Leading Edge Sports Products for Women.
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This application was recently featured on National TV - please see the following
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TrainingPeaks.com by Wes Hobson.
Find the training program that fits you at:
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Triathlon Meetup
http://triathlon.meetup.com/r/d5n6/d5n6/0/http://triathlon.meetup.com/?a=d5n6/
Triathlon Meetups! Happening THIS month, find out when .

TriSwim Coach - The Complete Guide to Triathlon Swimming
http://hop.clickbank.net/?rhianyth/triswim1

adidas' running apparel at 15% off! All running shorts, pants, and
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If you have an accident while running or cycling, do you want your family to be
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proper medical treatment?
If so, make this cool item part of your gear -- for safety and peace of mind.
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wear ID: the SHOE, the WRIST, the ANKLE, and the NECK. Get your RoadID at:
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The Stretching Handbook:
http://www.thestretchinghandbook.com/cmd.php?af=245575
The Stretching Video in a DVD version. With the DVD version you're able to use
the convenient menu facility to:
* Go directly to a specific stretch;
* View only stretches for a specific muscle group;
* Pause each stretch to get a good look at how it is performed;
* View only the introduction and rules for safe stretching; or
* Play the entire video from start to finish.
Buy the DVD at:
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**END...OF DIGEST...**