The RunRunLive 4.0 Podcast Episode 4-306 – Jed’s Life Changes
(Audio: link)
[audio:http://www.RunRunLive.com/PodcastEpisodes/epi4306.mp3]Link epi4306.mp3
Intro Bumper:
https://www.crowdrise.com/TeamHoytBoston2015/fundraiser/christopherrussell
Holy Moley and welcome to episode 4-306 of the RunRunLive Podcast. Man it’s cold! I As I write this we haven’t been above freezing for a month and have had 6 feet of snow up here! I like winter as much as the next guy but I’m getting a bit weary of the continuous Blizzard-cane that is New England.
Since we talked last I did take trip to Atlanta and got some nice long runs in in Buckhead. I came back from dinner one night and said ‘to heck with it, I’m heading out!’ and ran from Buckhead all the way up Peachtree to midtown. I was out for a nice 1:45 minutes which is about a ½ marathon for me at an easy pace.
Everybody else was walking around in winter coats and hats and I was chugging along down the sidewalk in shorts.
Up here where I live I’ve been banished to the treadmill. It’s 12:00 noon when I’m writing this and it’s a sunny 10 degrees F with a nice stiff breeze. I have to put on so many clothes to run in that it’s like a whole load of laundry.
It’s super dangerous with the roads narrowed by drifting snow and the banks so high the drivers can’t see over them. You just have to pull out and pray. Yes I’ve been doing a bunch of treadmill running. That’s why I have a gym membership! Believe it or not, I ran over three hours on the treadmill last Sunday. It’s crazy.
Buddy’s going bonkers. I think he’s ready to revolt. As Maryro says he’s gone ‘shack whacky’!
But the days are getting longer. It will only be a couple weeks and we’ll be back out in the woods splashing through the melting mud and breathing in the good earth.
So, my friends, I see you sitting on the couch in your pajamas in front of a warm fire eating a large jar of Nutella with a spoon. You have to cut that out because we’re only months away from Beach season! Get up! Let’s go!
In today’s show we have another guest interview. Longtime friend of the show Greg Milbourne has an interview with one of his running friends Jed Carman. Jed had one of those near death exercise experiences that we all fear and turned it into fuel for his life.
There’s a lot to be learned from this conversation. Why does it take a big impact occurrence like this to get us to see how lucky we are and get us to really appreciate a life? This life is right there in front of you today (as you sit in your pajamas feeling sorry for yourself eating Nutella). We don’t have to wait for the firm touch of fate to shake us out of our reveries.
Greg and I have been corresponding since the beginning of the RunRunLive podcast many years ago. And since he’s a mental health professional, I’m pretty sure it’s part of some long term study on manic depressives.
In the running stuff section I’m going take a deep dive into some of the finer, veteran points on hydration and fueling. In the deep thinking section I’m going to talk about fierce conversations. Should be a great show.
We are 7 week’s out or so from the Boston Marathon. I’ve decided not to run another marathon in the intervening time. Too much going on. I’m not going to be the fastest runner but I’m going to have a hell of a base built up.
I have signed up for the Eastern States 20 Miler put on by Don Allison, who we’ve spoken to on the show a couple times. They fixed the bridge and we’ll be back to running the old course that starts in Maine, runs the length of New Hampshire and ends in Mass. Love that route. Let’s see if I can stay within myself and run it strongly.
Nice people among you have been trickling in donations for my Team Hoyt campaign. Keep it up! I have some ground to make up to make my goal. It matters. I give you my stunning good looks and brilliance, you give me donations for my Hoyt campaign, and Frankly, I think you’re coming out ahead on this deal! J
https://www.crowdrise.com/TeamHoytBoston2015/fundraiser/christopherrussell
It’s hard to walk in the snow when it’s this deep. I had to dig a trench for the dog to get out and do his thing. I had to dig a tunnel to my wood pile. I had to dig a tunnel around the house so the Oil guy could deliver. I’m hoping all this shoveling is good for conditioning.
The good news is that the zombies get stuck and you can just whack ‘em on the head with the snow shovel.
On with the Show!
Section one – Running Tips
Hydration Deep Dive
https://runrunlive.com/race-hydration-deep-dive
Voices of reason – the interviews
Jed Carman
Interviewed by Greg Milbourne.
Articles about Jed
Speech by Jed
Section two – Life Skills
Fierce Conversations
https://runrunlive.com/fierce-conversations
Outro
Put that Nutella down. We’re at the end of another RunRunLive Podcast! This has been episode 4-306.
If you want to join us for the Groton Road Race on April 26th this year, but are unfortunately waylaid in some unfortunate place like Nome Alaska or Murmansk, it’s ok. I have set up a virtual race category so you can register, run with us in spirit and send us your time for the results. We’ll send you a bib and one of our super-popular ‘wearable art’ shirts, that are by popular demand on a high quality tech shirt this year.
The web site has all the details www.GrotonRoadRace.com
And if you’re thinking, ‘aww, shucks, Chris, you’re just shilling shirts.’ Then you’re missing the point. You need to go find a local race that you can get involved in. It’s a privilege and an honor to be able to work with the community and the high-quality people of the race committee to bring this wonderful event out each spring. It’s an opportunity for us to create something that we can be proud of that supports the things that we believe passionately in.
And that’s all I have to say about that.
Speaking of giving back I’ve got a present for you. I want to give you a copy of my new book. It’s called MarathonBQ and it’s my manifesto on qualifying for and running the Boston Marathon over the last 20 years.
I’m proud of this book and I want you to read it and enjoy it. Here’s the deal. If you want a copy you can either join my email list, Make a donation to my Hoyt fund or leave me a book review on Amazon Kindle. If you think that’s something you’d be interested in doing shoot me an email and I will send you a copy. Simple as that.
You can see all the details at my lovely website www.MarathonBQ.com.
Rules of thumb
To take you out I want to geek out a little about ‘rules of thumb’.
Our lives are filled with rules of thumb. An apple a day. 8 hours of sleep. 8 glasses of water a day. 20 mile long runs. The 10% rule. These are all rules of thumb to give you a ball park answers to complex problems.
You have to be careful because rules of thumb are not specific to you as an individual.
In optimization science rules of thumb are called heuristics. People make up heuristics to simplify complex problems. For any specific individual for example, “What is the optimal amount of sleep I should get?” is actually a very personal and complex answer that changes with time and health and age. It’s too hard to solve so we default to the rule of thumb of 8 hours.
Our brains build heuristics, or gravitate to existing heuristics to find short cut solutions to these complex problems. Heuristics are valid solution approaches. They don’t find perfect solutions or the best solution but they get an answer quickly and it’s usually a feasible answer. It works. It’s the 80% fit. It’s the ‘good enough’.
Mixed in with these heuristics are old wives’ tales masquerading as rules of thumb. They seem to make sense but there’s no evidence either way. Don’t go out in the rain, you’ll catch a cold. I don’t know if that’s true or not but I love running in the rain.
My wife is full of these old wives’ tales, (heh heh), parading as rules of thumb that she inherited from her mother and were passed down from witch doctors in the forest 50,000 years ago.
My point is that when we are spouting these rules of thumb and similar tall tales we announce them as fact and that can get you in trouble as an athlete. What works for everybody may not work for you. You need to test out those assumptions on your own machine and see what works and adjust accordingly.
Or, to summarize, as they used to say in the 60’s “Question Authority” – in all its forms.
And as you are considering whether or not what you always believed to be true may or may not be I’ll see you out there.
https://www.crowdrise.com/TeamHoytBoston2015/fundraiser/christopherrussell
http://www.grotonroadrace.com/
I can’t find your virtual race category on the website for the Groton road race. Have I misunderstood?
Thanks for the great podcast. I listen every time from here in Norway with the Downcast app on an iphone. I am busy training for Boston (for the third year in a row) together with my partner, Margaret (who is running it for the first time). We will return to Norway shortly after, but I would like to take part in the Groton road race as a virtual runner by recording a time on the same day here in Norway.
Hmmm… That should be on grotonroadrace.com…
yup – > it’s here http://www.grotonroadrace.com/races/virtual.htm
Incidentally I forgot to mention Nutella. You said you were eating it. The man that founded the company became a very rich man. He died on Valentine’s day this year, aged 89. There was an obituary in the UK weekly called “The Economist” which makes an intersting read http://www.economist.com/news/obituary/21644124-michele-ferrero-italys-chocolate-king-died-valentines-day-aged-89-sweet-secrets