Roads, Mills, Laps

Consider this a tete-a-tete on the couch. Turn off your TV, slide up to your Emerson 25A, and listen to this foolish pedant wax righteous. Hallelujah.
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The Finns of the 1920s were the Ethiopians of today. Back then they dominated long distance running and caused the sporting world to gape, open-mouthed in wonder and amazement at their feats.

Paavo Nurmi, “The Flying Finn” led the way for them with an astounding 20 world records. He also secured gold medals in the 10,000 track, 10,000 XC and 10,000 Team XC events of the 1920 Olympics. The Finns rounded out their domination of the distance events in those Olympics with Kolehmainien’s marathon victory.

The Finnish running code was deciphered in a book written by JJ Mikola in 1929.

What was their secret?

GPS? Inner GPS calibration? Heartrate monitors? Rigorous, meticulous schedules using abaci and alchemy?

High-altitude bazillion dollar corporate houses with knobs, buzzers, fancy swoosh clothes, and Xbox360 Nazi-killing breakrooms?

Nope.

Walking.

The Finns walked as part of their training during the brutal Nordic winters. Marathoners would do anywhere from 10 to 20 miles of walking from December to March. The last parts of the walks (2-6 miles) were run. As the Spring approached, the walking was phased out and more running was phased in.

Note that this wasn’t Gallowalking (walking during the race or in the middle of running). This was base building–Finnish style, in the knee-deep snow.

Why am I writing about this?

As with most runners, I toss and turn at night over how to improve.

I also toil with why Americans suck in world competition. Yeah, new subject right?

Though this may be controversial or perhaps jejune and overplayed, I attribute the African running success to the African lifestyle, and I attribute the American running decline to the American lifestyle.

Africans walk everywhere; Americans walk nowhere.

We drive to the track and we drive to the trails. Our progeny gets shuttled all over God’s creation from soccer games to Tai Chi practice–stimuli to stimuli without the time allocated on the Harvard entrance activity matrix to walk anywhere. Not only that, but our overall distrust in our neighbors has caused us to engage in activities requiring car shuttling and subsequently locking our McWorld doors for fear of the bogeyman child molester around the corner. Perhaps such fears are warranted, but for shame nonetheless.

For the most part, kids don’t play; kids don’t explore. Kids get zipped around in a car, stuffed with lard, and locked up.

Case in point. Warning, a horrid ‘back in the good ole’ days’ story to follow…

I grew up living in a house on top of a monstrous hill in Benicia, California. That dreadful hill, Panorama Drive, was about 15% grade for 1 mile. My parents, along with all other parents in the neighborhood, made us walk down and back up it every day. After school, the hill was full of pissed-off kids walking trudging skywards carrying saxophone cases, dungeon master guides, and pushing knock-off bikes–ah, the good ole’ days indeed.

Nowadays?

Sidewalk emptiness. A constant convoy of minivans zoom up Panorama at 50mph with soccer moms and dads ferrying their precious, but fattening children to Tai Chi practice. There’s no time to walk, and we can’t risk letting our kids walk because the bogeyman is around the corner ready to kidnap them. Plus, walking isn’t on the list of required Harvard application activities.

We’ve become a nation of embellishing overachievers–achieving in everything except fitness, and that we quixotically wish to overachieve through learned NASA science and snakeoil bullshit gimmicks. We put a man on the moon with science and we’ll be damned if we can’t win Olympic medals and world distance running accolades with corporate sponsored fundage buying computer contraptions and paying Pashamaquoddyesque Dr. Terminus snakecharmers to make up ‘running’ shit for six figure salaries.

On the contrary, fly out to Kenya or Ethiopia today. I’ve never been there, but I can imagine children and adults walking all over the place. Cars remain a luxury. I imagine in Ethiopia, cars belong with the fat Stalinesque dictators and their deathsquad cronies. Kenya, the happier and the more Disney- singing-baobab of the two countries still isn’t too far behind. Feet convey you just about everywhere. Period.

I realize that everything written above is nothing new. It’s been discussed ad nauseum out on the vast letsrun steppes where millions of 14 minute 5k tartars and cossacks indiscriminately whack the heads off of innocent 17 minute 5k posters. But it stares at all of us in the face and we do nothing about it. We invent more techno shit and we spend our time trying to find the right formula or wearing the right devices;we throw money at it while our problems continue to walk further and further away from us whistling Paul Simon’s ‘Diamonds on the Soles of her Shoes.’

Ta-nna…Ta-nna….Diamonds on the soles of them African runner’s shoes…Ta-nna….Ta-nna…

Back to me.

I’m going out on a limb now, but I believe that my drop in marathoning times and my relative running success cannot be attributed to genes or vague gifts, but rather walking.

I walked up Panorama as well as up all the hills in Benicia for 10 years. My mom or dad rarely gave me a ride anywhere and I had a huge hill in my backyard on which I was allowed to go out and play on. There was no bogeyman or Tai Chi, and paternal accountability was measured in the radius at which my mom would yell, “TIME FOR DINNER!!!!”

I also walked my ass off as an Infantry officer. My unit roadmarched 12 miles once a week–usually Thursdays. We loaded 80 pound rucksacks, carried our weapons, wore our 10lb hunks for Kevlar helmets and walked–fast. We walked out in the dreadful summer humidity of countless Fort Bragg summers on boiling roads listening to the crackling chirp of cicadas wiping our brows, and counting the days left of service. I still have golden Fort Bragg sand and crimson Kahuku Mountain soil in my boots from walking all over the fucking place.

And now?

I sit in a cube; I run at lunch; and I push my truck in traffic at 5mph.

I don’t walk for shit and that’s going to change. To quote Sasha Pachev’s excellent sub 2:30 article (staying only on running for topic there), I need to be ‘on the run.’

So do you. Walk more. Get off your ass. Move your legs. Find a way to keep moving. Go, go, go.