Tuesday, May 25, 2010

No baggies = Slow Pony

Written by Sal Reynolds with an Introduction by Coach Fitz

The following article 'No Baggies= Slow Pony' is a scientific look into the world of running and how we as athletes need to consider alternate training methods if we are going to compete against the best. Her findings strongly support what I have been saying about how "hard work and a rigorous training schedule can easily be substituted by other means. For example a massive weekend out on the turps coupled with a morning after diet of walnuts and turkish delight is as effective, if not more effective than a week of altitude training". Of course I have to remain impartial, but what I can say is don't just believe what Sal is saying, go out and try it for yourselves.

Coach Fitz





( Sal and Coach Fitz enjoying some time off )


To all prudes out there, I’d like to apologise for my tardiness with this paper for your schedule Coach. I’d like to report to you my findings on the effects that abstinence from Coach Fitz’s training aids has had on running performance, in particular on the female form. This study of anti-enhancing-performance aid began 18 weeks prior to recently-mentioned half marathon - January 2. January was a tumultuous month with 10km fartleks often ending in a heart-rate reading of 373bpm. Given that the average human usually max’s out in the 200’s, this was mildly disconcerting. One of two conclusions could be drawn here: 1) half-price baggies on new years cause long-lasting hallucinations, or 2) half-price baggies on new years cause rapid expansion of arteries. The verdict on this study is still out. [NB: contributions of external findings may be directed to my laboratory.]



It was upon these fartlek findings that I decided to take the ‘no-fun-reynolds-buttocks-and-nostrils-firmly-clenched’ approach to training. I believe this abstinence from fun has extended my life expectancy in equal proportions with extending the time it takes me to run 21km. What can we deduce from Thomas’s findings combined with Slow Pony theorem? BLARING at us in similar fashion to Bass in possession of trĂ© packets of glow sticks is that: no baggies does in fact, have sizeable negative ramifications on running performance. As the inaugural Shitfight to Surf approaches, I hear the the bright lights of Woodside and a little film canister in the freezer a’callin my name.



My next report will divulge my latest training method - an offspring to the world-famous ‘altitude training technique’ - the ‘dehydration training technique’. This technique involves spending periods of time when regular athletes would be sleeping; the DTT athlete is nocturnally expending large amounts of energy with their chosen friends - namely Roisin, Wes Carr (Lach), Taylor Swift - feeding the body any of a combination of well-known dehydrants ranging from big brown bottles of light beer to big brown bottles of essle. Endurance dehydration technique - the next fad.



A side note - speaking of fads - it was thoroughly disappointing that there were no signs of convenient Rodd & Gunn pop-up stalls along the half marathon course, as spotted recently at various sporting matches. I expect this to be rectified come August.



keep it real banana peel

yours truly, Slow Pony

DEEK VS OSTRICH














Running hypotheticals is totally what 'The Stables' is into right now. This weeks race is between the great Robert De Castella and an ordinary Ostrich (Struthio camelus) which by the way lays the largest eggs of any living bird. So if your looking for some protein to put in your shake, grab a couple of Ostrich eggs.

You may of picked up on the word 'ordinary' as I am trying to point to the fact that on any given day any ordinary Ostrich would be up for a race against Deek. This highlights the brilliance of Deek but it also highlights the superior physical capabiltiies of an Ostrich and what's more important it only highlights these two things. However, we must remember that no race between a man and a beast has ever been organised by the latter and therefore the outcome of such a race would go completely over it's head. So what's the point? Well as we saw when Ben Johnson raced a Giraffe, Animal vs Human racing is a great way to earn back the publics trust. Not only did Johnson show that Giraffes are much faster than man, but that Animal vs Human racing is hilarious and though maybe not equal to winning Olympic Gold medal a great way to show your running for the joy of being beaten by animals.

Fact 1 Most Animalls are faster than the average Human, even Wombats. This is largely because animals have adapted to out run mf's that be chasing them, and if your not being chased your chasing something and mostly because your super hungry. Therefore, not many animals run for the pleasure of it nor do they have a specialised training regime. It could be said then that running long-distances for the no other reason than to run, is stupid and totally unatural. But than there is 'folks runnin' and then there is 'folks who be runnin'. Although I'm not entirely sure what the last line meant I think what I was trying to say is that there is you and than there is guys like Deek. What are the reasons behind such awesomeness ? Firstly, DeCastella is an awesome name for running and some may want to think about jazzing their own names up a bit ( Tom Lee-Castella, Gus Amylmonteghetti) Secondly, Deek was a nugget, totally unmade for running, his legs were like VB tinnies and his stride looked like he was trying to rub-out his feet. It is very obvious than why he was such a freak... TIKKA..TIKKA,TIKKA,TIKKA. He was the the proud owner of a humungous TIKKA, so big in fact he would blow windows out when it got above 150 bpm. Knowing this we can assume that if made to race an ostrich, say over the period of a month in the desert with no one watching or providing drinks, De castella would probably loose. But throw in a Gold Medal, a finshing tape to bust through, a crowd, a book deal, potentially a parade on arrival home and you bet your balls Deek would run that fuckin Ostrich down.This is because Deek is a Long Distance runner and the Ostrich ... well he is just an Ostrich... nameless, friendless, medaless.

Deek declared WINNER!!

Coach Fitz

See Next week for 'Coaches Corner' were we discuss Death threats and how they can be employed to improve running results.

Thursday, May 20, 2010

Inspiring Running Montage #1


(Paula Radcliffe taking the tape in the 2009 London Marathon)


As if we needed any more inspiration after Tom's Sydney Half Marathon performance.
But here it is, an excellent link to video montage of Paul Radcliffe, women's
marathon world record holder ... Enjoy!!

Accompanied by some lovely music by Daniel bettingsfield "Have a Nice Day". (2008)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fWB2ofa8NZU&feature=fvst

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Coach Fitz: An Essay By Tom Lee


On The Differences Between Being Coached and Not Being Coached

This has something to do with the Queensland Reds’ loss to the Hurricanes two Fridays before the half marathon. I witnessed this loss at the North Annandale accompanied by coach Fitz. On this occasion, as on the previous Saturday and Friday, coach encouraged me to drink alcoholic beverages, there was a fairly flexible upper limit of 30 standard drinks. Coach Fitz also displayed an amazing aptitude for consuming beverages, likewise for sinking pool balls, plundering fruit displays, losing his valuables, dancing provocatively, and going about his business in a generally inappropriate fashion. I posed myself the question the following day, in the haze of a well-earned hangover: “Was coach Fitz coaching on these occasions? Is this what one calls coaching?” The question still begs asking to this day. At all events, the results speak for themselves, and whether or not coach Fitz is a coach who coaches, or a coach who does something else entirely, remains secondary; he was there to cheer on those in his stables on the day of the event, he wears the metaphorical coaches hat, I vouch that no one on this earth has the authority to claim that coach Fitz is anything but a coach. We should not seek to define what a coach does, but rather, wonder at what a coach might be. Coach Fitz embodies the wonderment available to those who choose to speculate on such questions with an open mind.
At first I was tempted to label the way coach Fitz responded to my concerns about the race as ‘radically indifferent’. By this I mean, when I made inquiries as to how I should prepare, and how I should steal myself against the sinful potentials embedded in every weekend, coach Fitz, in a way not dissimilar to the Zen masters, was not bothered in the slightest by my anxieties. In fact he set what was often a very, very bad example, and led me, not unwillingly, into the bowels of excess, where one could witness fun as an unharnessed beast. As I have come to realise, it was not ‘radical indifference’ which motivated this response, but rather, the want to have me encounter each weekend with its full potentials, unhindered by the vocational demands most professional, and some amateur athletes place on themselves. Coach Fitz did not perceive any problems with booze-fuelled weekends in the proximity of those such as mighty cornerstone of debauchery, Amylmont, or the wicket spirit of temptation, the devil with his calling cards and hotplate, Bad Ally. My confrontation with these figures, and my subsequent emergence from the energy sapping, sleep destroying practices with which they are associated, has only strengthened my vague sense of being involved in something fabulous, and this, if anything, is a reason to run like there is no tomorrow.
While some people will say coach Fitz’s methods are abstract or obscure, such comments are less revealing of coach Fitz’s deficiencies, than they are of the accuser’s ignorance. Some athletes, and pedestrians too, will simply not get the way coach Fitz approaches training, or life, in the same way sheep don’t get fences. Some people will say coach Fitz is a fraud, and that what he does has nothing to do with what coaching professional and amateur athletes requires. But have they seen coach Fitz in the garden, or witnessed him driving his lemon of a ute to work? Have they seen him eat full packets of lollie snakes, and stay up till 3am in bed researching the philosophy of athletics by watching ‘The wire’? Have they seen the chips in his beard or the egg in his beard in public? Have they seen the sock he uses for a handkerchief? No, I doubt it.
This brings me back to that fateful night the Reds went down to the Hurricanes. One week before the race I was concerned as to whether I should retreat home after the game without trace, stop the boozing at a moderate three or five schooners. Coach Fitz had already assisted me in putting money on the game so I was anxious and keen to deaden the senses with more beer. Yet the race loomed, I needed a good nights sleep so I could train in the morning, and avoid smoking the inevitable cigarette or four. I looked to coach Fitz, who, so it seemed, didn’t even have the race on his mind, his only concern in the world was, in the words of Leonard Cohen, “keeping the party going”. What coach Fitz taught me, as I reflected on his general attitude or demeanour, was that it was OK to let loose a week before the race, OK to spend unnecessary money on cabs and bottled beer in meat markets where people tend to look through you at their other friends standing around. And if you need to revisit the bottom level of the den of iniquity they call Empire one week before the race, at 4am, with a double G & T, and hopes of sleeping with an ex, then this was OK, you needed to confront your worst fears, and play what comes to hand if you plan realise your full potential in the big race.
One last thing in coach Fitz’s bag of tricks is that game we play with the old baseball in the backyard, it doesn’t even have a name, it’s pretty simple really, you just chuck the ball at various objects around the garden (including the “swanny man”, who’s made out of plastic) and get points depending on whether you hit them, making sure it’s on the full. This is right in the style of coach Fitz, who uses this game to drink more, and to ruin his vegetable patches, but that is only what happens superficially. What the game really is, is an expertly designed test of ability and lateral thinking, just the kind an athlete, professional or amateur, needs as they think about tactics, about energy conservation in competition, and about commitment to abstract, pointless targets.
Coach Fitz has strengthened my resolve in ways I’m not even sure I know, or will ever know. But one thing I am sure of is that I don’t fear training, any type of training, now I’ve been put through the first stages of his schedule, and whatever the challenge, as frivolous, wasteful, dangerous, and unnecessary as it may seem, I know that it’s all part of the training for some distant goal to which I’m gradually getting closer, but, paradoxically, somehow I’m already there.

Glorious Running Moments #1 Forest Gump


This is undoubtably, besides Steve Moneghetti's record breaking 'City 2 Surf' or De Castella's marathon victory in the 84' commonwealth games, one of the greatest displays of running in living history. In fact it is fair to say that Forest Gump is a running God. Through the power of running Forest was, at a critical point in his life, able to break free from his funny leg shackles and out run those hilly billy rednecks when he was most certainly going to get a face pounding. (See above photo; Hilly Billy's are in the Dodge truck, which he also out ran)

So instead of being be badly beaten Forest goes on to play college football, save countless lives in the vietnam war, including a majorly pissed of Lieutenant Dan and who could forget his best friend Bubba (who afterwards died due to a fatal wounding) For this awesome display of running Forest recieved a purple heart and got to meet the Presdient of the United States. It doesn't stop there as Forest's most special running is when to overcome his torturous pangs of love for Jenny he sets out on a never ending running adventure that takes him around America 7 times bringing him national and international celebrity. (He also helps that shit-out-of-luck guy invent that bumper sticker) This running is what I like to call 'zen' running, and although he was unaware, Forest Gump along with Tom Hanks revolutionised the way we think about running and how it can be used as a way of improving your life and most importantly of overcoming prejudice and other such things.

Coach 'run run as fast as you can'

See Next week for ' The Ginger Bread Man' article, where we ask "Can he be caught " ?

Steve Prefontaine



This Guy was a real big hero of mine
back in the day. Just thought
I would post a photo that may inspire
some of you to grow a 'running moustache'
and maybe buy a pine smelling thing for
your car.


"Is there a Postfontaine" ?

- Tom Lee

Monday, May 17, 2010

Proghorn - Built for Speed


This weeks Animal interest is the Proghorn   (Antilocapra americana), an awesome runner with not much interest in racing humans. However, if we are going to be the best we need to start looking at animals such as the Proghorn who have trained to become the greatest runners of all. Might I add that such incredible ability is not gifted and if you want to be as good as say a proghorn you have to train even harder than a Proghorn.  It is a scientific fact that humans are lazy and that if they are to become faster than a Cassorwary or a Proghorn they need to give up there lazy ways.  
Here is some great stuff I found on the Proghorn ENJOY!!
"It can run exceptionally fast, being built for maximum predator evasion through running, and is generally accepted to be the fastest land mammal in the New World. The top speed is very hard to measure accurately and varies between individuals; it is variously cited as up to 70 km/h,[6] 72 km/h,[5] or 86 km/h.[7] It is often cited as the second-fastest land animal, second only to the cheetah.[9] It can, however, sustain high speeds longer than cheetahsUniversity of Idaho zoologist John Byers has suggested that the Pronghorn evolved its running ability to escape from extinct predators such as theAmerican cheetah, since its speed greatly exceeds that of extant North American predators.[10] It has a very large heart and lungs, and hollow hair". ( bold and italics emphasis authors own)
Taken from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Coach "Running is not to messed with"

Tom Lee - Cream of the Crop

                   (Tom Lee striding out)
 

Massive congrats go out to all my Athletes who competed in the Sydney Half Marathon, although I hate doing this  I must single out the performance of one Thomas lee who crossed the line   in  a shit hot time of 125.35, readjusted to  122.44 (electronic) which is way faster than any other of my runners. (a full break down of the race will be published soon) Other worthy mentions go to Lachlan Lee (95 mins), Sal Reynolds (no time registered due to tagless shoes), Gus Carter ( not entered but still ran - thumbs up from coach who is 1/3 anarchist) and of course Gus "hoffer in a bottle o' " Esselmont who suprised all the pundits, by staying alive, with a more than respectable time of 1.58.54 (tikka x 20 awarded) 

The New training Schedule will be posted soon with an interesting report on the effects of the "double-baggy" phenomenon on running performance.

Coach "Running is my life"


Sunday, May 16, 2010

Managing Injuries




 At some point every Athlete is beset by injury...





TIKKA

 *TICK-ER; a person who has TIKKA

People who currently have it

Tom Lee
Lachlan Lee
Sally Reynolds
Angus Esslemont
Joel Fitzgerald
Emma Fenton
Vic Larusso (carbuddy.com)

People who currently do not have it

Nick Keys




 


HOMEMADE GATORADE: NOT FOR THE FAINT HEARTED
 The following  recipe  is gauranteed to "rock" , with very little to no scientific testing we have developed a drink not unlike gatorade and seven times more effective at handling your bodies needs. "Its unbelieveable" says a satisfied athlete, " I can't believe you guys have figured it out, I thought no one could create such a scientific drink, all those ads with the testing of those guys on treadmills  with pipes in their mouths is amazing and you guys have made it with none of that stuff".

Recipe

Salt - Punch of
Oranges- 1/2 dozen
Water - 1.5 ltr
Instructions
1. Carefully combine Salt, Oranges and Water together in a large container of water.   
2. Stir the fuck out of it.

What is the fastest long distance animal?

 Cassowary (genus Casuarius)