Category: multi-sport mind

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Burbathlon Lives!

You may remember me talking about Burbathlon before and the unusually mild weather we’ve had this past week let me get out and give it a try again.  I decided to do live tweets with photos as I went along (though I wish I had turned on the Add Location feature).  I had written up various exercises with links in a Memo on my Blackberry so I could cut and paste the tweets; still it took up time I should have been putting into working out harder.  I don’t apologize for the fun I had, though.  I’ve marked the exercises I did on the map from Endomondo at their approximate locations.  Have a look at the descriptions below.

1.) The trail is gravel till here, but I run up the hill to get into the more forested area.  See the tweet.

2.) I did a balance beam routine down this log.  See the tweet.

3.) Our company running group uses this for hill training.   See the tweet.

4.) This pic didn’t turn out so well (maybe next time I’ll bring a real camera instead of my Blackberry), but it’s Incline Pushups against the fence.  Not the most challenging but I had done a 100 Pushups workout (Week 4, Day 1) prior to heading outside so there!  See the tweet.

5.) Next I did Single Leg Squats while holding onto the lamppost.  This area has benches and tables and little fences that I use for Box Jumps, Squats and other exercises.  Maybe next time, more.  I realized I was running long with all the tweeting and picture taking, so I started to head back from here.  See the tweet.

6.) This tree looks climbable with a good run-up and jump.  It is not, at least to me.  #FAIL.  See the tweet.

7.) The trail seems to be used by mountain bikers/BMXers.  That doesn’t stop me from jumping off or over these on foot!  See the tweet.

8.) I found a tree I could climb (it was leaning at an angle against another tree.  As any cat can tell you, the hard part is getting back down! See the tweet.

So that was a successful (albeit short and sweet) Burbathlon.  With the new snow, it’s going to be a little challenging to do these, but I hope to post more of them in the future.

By the way, this was done on the Etobicoke Creek Trail and I had the pleasure of doing a write-up for Loving the Run’s Unpaved Trail Series..

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Race Bucket List

Bucket lists seem to be all the rage these days, but I’ve always found the idea daunting – how could I list everything I ever wanted to do?  My list would be something like: 1.) Live Forever and do everything.  Yet, if I focus on the idea that there are endurance/athletic events I would like to participate in, then maybe I can come up with something.

These races will be in the ‘Bucket List’/Pipe Dream category for one or more of the following reasons (in increasing order of likelihood):

  1. Conditioning.  I’m too far out of the shape I’d need to be in to complete
  2. Skill/Equipment.  One or more of the disciplines involves a skill I don’t know how to do
  3. Geography/Logistics:  Getting there with equipment won’t work while taking care of my family at the same time

All of these are fixable or will change with time, and so will the list as I find out new possibilities and opportunities… so let’s get started!

    • Pentathlon Des Neiges.  I was going to put the Ottawa Winterlude Triathlon here but I just happened to stumble across this event in IMPACT magazine. Both events include skating, cross-country skiing, and running, but the Pentathlon des Neiges adds snow-shoeing and cycling.  The latter discipline can be done with mountain or cyclo-cross bikes and actually takes place first (followed by a run, then ski, then skate, then snow-shoe).  There are short (9+4+6+6+4=29km) and long (15+6+9+9+6=45) distance races and it all takes place on the historic Plains of Abraham in Quebec City.

    • Men’s Health Urbanathlon What I like about this obstacle course is it seems focused on the fitness aspects needed to complete while leaving out the fear factor/bravado and quite frankly, mud involved in mud runs, Warrior Dashes and Spartan Races and the like.  If they bring one to the Toronto area, I’m as good as signed up, but I wouldn’t mind travelling to one of the fine cities that are currently offered when my schedule would allow it.
      • Ski 2 Sea what if a race included even more of the Canadian Multi-sport experience, enough to span all seasons?  And what if it was a journey with an end destination that was far away from the start?  What if you started on top of a mountain, downhill skied 2km, switched to cross-county skis for another 8km, jumped on a mountain bike and rode 28km out of the mountains only to hit the road with your road bike for 36km.  Now jump off the bike and run for nearly 15km and get in your canoe/kayak so you don’t get wet because there’s another 8km before the finish line.  It’s a lot of distance to cover, and the logistics are quite intimidating so people often do this as a team relay, but it seems like such a dream journey (and it is a net downhill, after all) that I can’t help but be tempted by this one.

        • Ironman 70.3 Laguna Phuket Thailand  I’m a little wary of iron or half-iron distance racing and it’s not only the daunting training schedule and training volume.  Races with the Ironman brand don’t exist in everybody’s back yard, and most people who have done one turn it into a trip with overnight accomodation, meals and maybe a little vacation time… if you’re going to drop that kind of cash and time, why not make it a more once-in-a-lifetime experience?  I love Thailand (from having honeymooned there) and I can’t picture a better destination for a ‘destination race’ than the land of smiles.  So far, you don’t even have to qualify!  This race took place this past Sunday, in fact.

        • Berlin Marathon   My wife and I both have a lot of friends and family in Germany, and Berlin has become a bit of a home away from home for us.  The Berlin marathon is also considered the fastest course there is so there’s my motivation to beat my previous, pitiful marathon time.  What really put this marathon into my dream file was a conversation I had with a gentleman who had done more than 50 marathons all over the world, but when I asked him his favourite, he said it was the Berlin Marathon, during the year of German re-unification.  He had run through part of the city that were inaccessible to him growing up, and attempting to leave those parts in the East had gotten people shot and killed over the course of the Cold War.  By the time he ran through the Brandenburg Gate (below), he was blind with tears in his eyes and needed the guidance of a friend simply to find his way through the pillars.  So many Big City Marathons have a lot of historical draw, but none like this, at least not to me.
        Runners going through the Brandenburg Gate
        • XTERRA Canada (Canadian Open Championship) I already like taking my running “off-road”,  and it’s my honest intention to get a mountain-bike for cross-training purposes and to participate in some non-navigational adventure races (like Logs, Rocks and Steel) and off-road triathlons.  From the latter category, XTERRA is pretty much the biggest and baddest.  This race takes place in beautiful Whistler, BC which only adds to the draw.  Until that time, maybe I’ll get to do the Mine Over Matter as my introduction to off-road tris…

        This list is long enough for now, but I’m always up for recommendations… dream big!

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          Multi-sport mind: Cyclo-Cross

          “Cyclo-cross (‘cross) mixes the best of road, mountain, cross-country running, steeplechase and endurance cycling.” from the Midweek Cycling Club’s Cyclo-Cross 101 Handbook.

           
           As soon as autumn rolls around, triathlon training in most of Canada gets more difficult.  I think this is most felt in cycling, since it is the most time consuming of the three disciplines, and you feel the cold more when your zooming along that fast.  Somebody came up with the sport of cyclo-cross as a kind of end of season training for road and mountain bike cyclists.

          At first glance, you might have trouble telling the difference between Cyclo-cross and mountain biking (at least, I did).  Indeed they both involve getting muddy – in fact, Cyclo-cross can be performed with a mountain bike.  While I’m no expert, I don’t think mountain bikers dismount and carry their bikes over obstacles in most circumstances, whereas this is fundamentally part of Cyclo-cross.  Overall, it struck me as a little less ‘extreme’ and more friendly to novices since even an old road bike would have been acceptable (though a little tricky).  I’m getting ahead of myself by giving my impressions, first I want to tell you the story of how I ended up trying this out.

          A Cyclo-Crosser jumps a barricade, carrying his bike.  I have a bunch of photos like this.  I have a lot to learn about settings on my camera – especially those dealing with low-light and action photography.

          In spite of (or perhaps because of) a local climate (both physical and cultural) that isn’t the most bike friendly in the world, there is a strong local community of Cyclo-cross enthusiasts.  It wasn’t too hard to track down some riders from the Midweek Cycling Club at Centennial Park one Tuesday to check it out.

          What I saw was a course sketched out with police tape and little flags that went up, down and alongside the less steep parts of the ski-hill and some 40cm barriers to be hopped over.  I apologize for the poor quality of pictures; photography is not my strong suit, and never will be. 

          I spoke briefly with Craig, who was directing the cross riders on how many laps they still had before quitting time, and got a feel for whether I would even be able to attempt this thing.  It sounded like my old mountain bike would be alright, if less than perfect for gripping and steering under some circumstances.  At any rate, I resolved to show up a week later ready to go.

          One week later, I pulled into the parking lot wearing my cycling gear, with a helmet, and an old Cateye light that drew a few laughs from more hard-core cyclists I had to purchase a one-day licence from The Ontario Cycling Association and once my admission for the night was paid, they suggested I hook up with one of the more experienced riders for tips on how to navigate the course.  The usual format for the evening is to spend time at each station in a kind of ‘lesson-circuit’ before participating in a race to finish a certain number of laps of the mile-long course, but they opted to forgo that since it was near the end of season, I suppose.

          I approached a man named Pierre and asked him to show me the ropes.  After a few jokes about how this would turn into a new obsession which would threaten my marriage, he gave my bike (an old hybrid that I use for commutes and more recreational riding with my son) the once over.

          The ‘Before’ shot… even if it is technically an ‘after cleaning’ shot.

          Then we were off on the course.  As we rode, Pierre gave me general tips on bike handling that allowed me to get traction going uphill and around the sharper turns, of which there were plenty.  Every few hundred meters he’d have us stop so he could point out specifics that I was maybe doing wrong, or specifics of the course to watch out for.  In particular, he identified a way of looking where you’re going (not where you are) that helps you balance and set up your turns.  There was one hairpin turn I didn’t make all night – it was set up in such a way as to purposely slow riders down so that they wouldn’t accidentally hit a pipe from the ski hill’s snow making equipment.

          One of the most unique features of Cyclo-cross is barricades, where you dismount, pick up the bike, and hurdle over a 40cm (a little over a foot) barrier (or two).  Apparently I’m not the first beginner to find this aspect the most exciting; good technique however, requires calm grace and not holding your breath as you hop over.

          After a couple of laps, Pierre left me to give it a try on my own, which not only amped up the adrenaline factor, but also took a bigger toll on my cardio-vascular endurance; without the pointer sessions to catch my breath, I could really feel each and every lap.

          The ‘After’ shot.  Notice the mud and grass caked everywhere.

          I found Cyclo-cross to be very different than most of my training rides that I do for triathlon.  The twists and turns demand a lot more mental attention; no more ‘zoning out’.  In fact, bike handing is much more of a priority overall as it becomes a struggle just to stay on the bike.  The slippery grass and mud keep you in the lower gears and higher cadences, while the up-and-down of hills (and the bursts of strength you use to pick your bike up and jump the barriers) make it more of an interval workout than I’ve had in a long time.

          Here’s a video from my last lap (I had my camera helmet-mounted); it’s a little dark and shaky – rest assured I could see fine.

          Describing a cyclo-cross ride in short is easy: it’s the way you used to ride your bike when you were a kid:  Without consideration for destination, appropriate terrain, keeping clean or anything but having fun.  Despite how much fun I had, and my desire to do it again soon, cyclo-cross isn’t threatening to become an obsession to me.  After all, in the multi-sport mind, everything is just cross training for something else!

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          The Multi-sport Mind: Introduction to Burbathlon

          I wanted to make a post about my ‘Burbathon’ idea a multimedia affair, with photographs, video, maybe even maps so that I could really communicate the concept and have it be well-understood enough that other who wanted to give it a try could implement a comparable workout.  Time has been very hard to come by this week, so I think I’ll try and keep it short, with a promise of follow-up posts in the future.

          I’ve often said that I seem to have fitness-ADD.  Once I had started running (and liked it), I worked my way up to the half-marathon level, and after having explained that I only did a HALF marathon for the umpteen thousandth time, I worked my way up to the full 42.2km.  While I’m proud of the accomplishment (if not my finishing time), my big problem with the whole experience: TOO MUCH RUNNING.  I love running, but following a marathon training program is about 6 days a week; and to me, it just got monotonous.  You can break some of those running sessions up with cross-training, but what if the cross training, was the sport itself? Enter triathlon, and I’ve never looked back.

          Fitness ADD could be renamed to a more politically correct Multi-sport Mind; since I made up both terms, why not?  I guess I’m always wondering what else I could be doing.  Once I was swimming, biking and running, adding strength training to the mix was inevitable.  There is a school of thought that treats strength training as a sub-optimal distraction from triathlon training, but the multi-sport mind simply ignores such opinions.  So, when you add in the occasional strength exercise into a run, you’re starting to get the right idea; I had discussed this over twitter with Andie ‘The Fit Geek’, and she says she does this in what she calls ‘fun runs’.
          You see a park bench, a picnic table, a fence, do squats so your butt touches the bench, or decline pushups.

          But that’s not all!  I’m also attracted to trail-running for the simple reasons that I like the outdoors and forest environments especially, and trails (being softer) have lower impact which is nice to keep my Achilles tendinitis at bay.  I’m lucky to have the Etobicoke creek near where I live, and part of the trail is very rough and wild (suitable for mountain biking, if only too short, I believe).  So leaping over the bumps and jumps, hopping over logs, or balancing on them adds to the fun.  It’s like ‘Parkour Lite’ – since I’m too old and have too many injuries to try the really crazy stuff.  It’s largely inspired by events like the Spartan Race, Warrior Dash (which I did in July), and the Men’s Health Urbanathlon.

          I think I’ve given you some idea as to the general gist of this kind of a workout, and I promise to elaborate in future posts.  Anybody else have fun things that they do while running to work on strength, agility or balance or just to break up the monotony?

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          Triathlon Training vs. Family or Triathlon Training WITH Family

          Disclosure: I didn’t want this post to turn into a shill-fest of promotion, but I did want to give specific examples of things I use and link to them.  All products mentioned in this post were bought and paid for by me or a loved one.  I do not receive any compensation for presenting these.

          Family is more important than anything, and certainly more-so than training. Still, you take better care of your family when you take better care of yourself. When you’re able to combine family time with training time, it’s not just good time management – it sets an example to the kids about living an active lifestyle. Some caveats:

          • First of all, I stick to sprint and Olympic distance triathlon; my biggest problem with half- and Iron distance is less about the overall volume of training time , but the uninterrupted stretches of time spent on long rides/runs. It’s simply too much to ask my wife to hold down the fort for that long (besides the time I spend at work). There are those that manage to do Iron distance and claim to balance work and family too (I hope to review David Mills’ “The Distance” soon), but I know what will and won’t work for my family.
          • Second of all, these tips and tricks can’t be *all* of your training regimen. You’ll still have to get out there on your own sometimes.

          Endurance Training with Family

          My biggest tool in balancing family and training is our Chariot Cougar 2.  Jogging strollers and bike trailers are popular with active families, but what I love about our Chariot is that it’s designed from the ground up to be modular.  If your bike trailer simply add a kit to become a jogging stroller (or vice-versa), the functionality and your experience (including that of your child) will suffer, in my opinion.

          I take my son jogging, and sometimes ride on the bike; I’m lucky in that I have a second bike beyond my racing/tri bike that I use for commuting to work sometimes (another time saver/training tip).  The earliest I’d recommend putting them in one of these things is 6 months, but it depends on their neck strength and your individual judgement as to their safety.

          We both wear helmets during the bike (he knows it’s time for fun when I break them out of storage in the basement) and the suspension system on the Chariot is adjustable according to his weight (I need to adjust mine soon, he keeps growing!).  I recommend helmets for biking as you are moving faster than while jogging; it’s the law where I live anyway.  The Chariot is designed to have enough room for the helmet as well as the child’s head, which is important to consider.  Finally, if I did take a spill, the hitch is a ball-joint, meaning the carrier would stay upright, guaranteeing safety.

          The jogging kit is a little puzzling at first, since the front wheel actually prevents steering with the wheel locked straight ahead, but I’ve realized that keeping a straight line can actually be challenging when your body is jostling at a run.  Try jogging a regular stroller (preferably without the child in it) and watch it weave all over the road – any lateral motion in your upper body translates through the handle to the stroller.  I just pop the front wheel a few inches off the ground when I need to corner.

          In addition to biking and jogging, we use our Chariot cross-country skiing, the benefits of which I’ve mentioned here.  That kit is my favourite, because I was shocked to find that skiing while towing the carrier feels so similar to skiing without it – my technique is the same, it’s just a little harder going uphill and a little faster going downhill.  I skied once with my son in a backpack carrier; it really affected my centre of gravity and made me extremely nervous.  The benefit of a backpack carrier is that the child gets some of your body heat, and it’s easier to monitor their temperature and well-being, so if you do take your child out in colder weather, please bundle them up adequately and take a break to check up on them periodically.

          I spoke with a sales rep who takes their kids inline skating (there are kits for hiking, regular walking too), but without a hand-brake (other models have this, or you can install one separately, but it looked too complicated for me), and considering my lack of skill on skates, I’ve opted to leave this out.

          Pushing/pulling your child’s extra weight requires extra strength, so I recommend using these workouts as a substitute for heavier workouts like speed or hill training.

          I haven’t found a way to include swim training in family time, but I do want to recommend swimming lessons from an early age (ours started at 6 months).  It’s a great bonding experience, and giving kids a positive attitude toward the water is the first step in a) teaching them to swim, which may save their lives at some point and b) having a family that likes spending time near the water – important for triathletes!

          Strength Training With Family

          There’s a lot of back and forth discussion as to how beneficial strength-training is for endurance athletes (as compared to whether they put that time back into swim/bike/run), but if you’re like me, multi-sport appeals because it is multi-faceted, and you want multi-dimensional fitness, so you try to address things like strength, balance and flexibility when they don’t get addressed through swim/bike/run – so here’s some strength training tips for family-oriented athletes.

          Immediately after my son’s birth, I used a book called Buff Dad to get back in shape.  Training at home was crucial, because I needed to be on hand/on call even when the baby was sleeping, so a gym or a run wasn’t a great option.  The workouts in the book can be done with a few dumbbells and a Swiss ball.  Though workouts are advertised as taking 30 minutes, I found them to be closer to 40 or 45 in practice; especially if you want to ensure good technique and stretch afterwards (you do).  Still they were strength circuits, which are quite fashionable these days since they save time, and since they also offer a simultaneous cardio challenge (in addition to the strength work) I found the workouts to be right up my alley as a triathlete.

          During his waking hours I try to find ways to get extra exercise; chasing kids is exhausting, but it doesn’t burn as many calories as you might think.  If you’re just that tired, I’ve been advised to try and structure games with ball or other toys that have them running around, and you sitting still, but if you want to keep in shape reverse that structure.

          There is a whole school of thought dedicated to natural movement and play-based exercise – so why not turn playtime into exercise?  It probably looks like I’m ‘helicopter parenting’ when I follow my boy up onto playground equipment rather than sit on the sidelines (or they just think I’m crazy) but since being a parent means being judged by strangers all the time anyway, I have nothing to lose but calories.

          I have even used my son as a weight during squats, lunges and push-ups (with him on my back), or I will adopt a crab walk position

          during horseplay (which comes with the occasional bump or bruise, so this is more of a toddler activity than an infant one) and see if he can ride on my torso.  Turning this into a structured workout isn’t necessarily possible since attention spans are even more limited than my endurance, but I do like to squeeze every ounce of potential exercise out of a given moment.

          If you ever find time when the kids are in bed or somehow not underfoot, re-connecting with your partner is important for happy family life too.  If you can’t leave the house to go for a run together, for example, there is the Fit2Touch DVD which demonstrates how to get a workout at home using your partner for assistance/resistance; the physical contact involved build intimacy.  It’s a little sexy, so be sure to do it with your partner, not a sibling/buddy!

          Integrating physical activity into the family routine is almost more of a mental exercise than a physical one; you need to flex your creativity and create flexibility in your routine but just as the effort goes beyond the physical, so do the rewards.

          UPDATE: Here‘s an article about kids, playgrounds and parental activity.