It has been two years since I took the first running step towards this dream, and three years since I went 100% raw. What a long strange trip it’s been. It always amazes me how fast time passes, and that if you don’t keep your eye on the prize it is quickly out of reach. I have learned so much on this journey, and my education never stops.
In the area of diet, I have learned that simpler is better. My performance suffers when I eat raw gourmet food. My performance suffers when I eat raw food that contain lots of nut cheeses, nut creams, nut sauces, and nut fillings. A diet of HUGE salads (with numerous veggies) and a wide variety of fruits, has given me my best results in training, races and in overall feelings of well-being. I have learned that super foods are super expensive and provide no more performance or feelings of well-being than off the shelf produce at 1/50th the price.
In the area of training, I have learned that more is not always better. That patience is a virtue. That one must listen to their body and not to the goals that their ego has set forth. That it takes your connective tissues (tendons, ligaments, fascia) much longer than muscle to adapt to training increases. I have learned that it takes more discipline to hold myself back from training too much than it does to get out and train.
I have learned that I can sustain an intense training program on a 100% raw vegan diet with no supplements – and thrive.
The Olympic Marathon Trials were held today in New York’s Central Park. Due to a year of nagging injuries, that prize has eluded me. This has been a sad day for me, but even more so for those that did make it to New York. One of America’s top marathoner’s, Ryan Shay, dropped dead of heart failure, 5 miles into the race. This was a day of no celebration. Even those that made the Olympic team would hang their heads and mourn the loss of one of America’s greats, and the loss of one of their friends.
With my marathon hopes now behind me, I have shifted my focus to the 10,000 meter race at the Olympics. The Olympic trials for events held on the track are not until late June of 2008, which is a much more generous amount of time to be fully prepared. Now this is quite a bit more ambitious than my marathon aspirations, as the qualifying time for the trials in this event is 28:15 – for 6.2 miles!! If that doesn’t sound scary enough, consider this; the American record for men age 40 and above is 30:04, and the world record for men 40 and over is 28:30. So in order for me to simply qualify for the trials in this event, I will have to smash the American record by nearly two minutes and break the world record by 15 seconds! In comparison, the qualifying time for the marathon was 9 minutes slower than the American record and 13 minutes slower than the world record. I’ve got my work cut out for me… But I believe it’s possible. Citius, Altius, Fortius.
Running Raw will be silent while I’m on the road to Chicago and Vermont. I’ve had to sell my laptop to finance the trip, so my blogs and updates will be down until late November or December when I can get to a desktop machine.
This is where I was a year ago at this time:
