Back for another hastily written post while taking a break from work. Amid all of the folders and sketches and calculations flying around my office, I have managed to come up with something to post about to close out a very boring January.
In addition to talking about running here in my blog, which is meant more as a rambling personal journal and means to keep me focused, I often contribute (waste time on) to the running section of Yahoo! Answers, Yahoo's question and answer forum. Typically, it is a regurgitation of the same handful of questions, which at first seem helpful, but after you've done it over and over again, you start to wonder how anyone could be this dumb (you don't "loose" weight, there phrase "workout regiment" has no meaning). It is also a good opportunity to fight back against many of the prevailing myths about running and training that have persisted for years because so often people will blindly do as they are told without thinking for themselves - breathe in through your nose, out through your mouth...
Now that we're into the new year, we're at one of two critical times for young runners - preparing for high school track (the other is preparing for high school cross country). This means the same handful of questions asked over and over again with poor (or nonexistent) punctuation and grammar, getting more frantic and anxious the closer they get to the first day of practice.
The point? Oh yea, I'll get there eventually. Did I mention rambling in this blog? I often wish I had gone into teaching. If not for the lousy pay, I would have. I enjoy mentoring, and tutoring, and any opportunity I get to pass on things that I know to others (especially topics where I really know what I'm talking about). I am certain that if I ever change directions and go into teaching, I'll probably try to coach running as well. And based on the endless stream of questions and pleas for advice that I've seen on Yahoo, I think my philosophy for both will probably be similar.
Coaching, like teaching, is an exercise in psychology. You can't coach someone you don't really know. Some athletes respond well to being pushed hard, negatively reinforced, motivated by being reminded of their own failures. Others don't, and negatively reinforcing those athletes is a fast way to drain the life out of their running career. You can kill a person's love of running if you handle them improperly when they come to you, whether it be for coaching, simple advice, or even to have a single question answered. It takes time working with someone to determine if they need to be coached with a firm hand to get their best, or gently guided to keep their head and heart in the proper place so they flourish. It's hard to coach someone you don't know. You can get in the face of a professional football player and scream at them if they screw up. You can't do that to a 13 year old girl. Too many people try to do too much when answering these young runner's questions. I was guilty of this for a while. I've since learned that this is a "less is more" situation, and to save the hard blunt responses for adult runners who think they know it all (like me!).
A little update on my training. I took 5 days off. Why would I do this, when things were going well? Because I'm not as agile and graceful as I like to think I am. Thursday evening, the teapot began to whistle. I bounded through the house like a little kid (as I often do), and as I hopped up the step into the kitchen I slipped. My trailing foot caught the step right on the knuckle of my middle toe - it felt broken. I've broken pinky toes before (note the plural), you yank hard once to set the bone (TWSS), then tape it to its neighbor for a while. So I did the same for this one. It didn't hurt nearly as much as I expected, so it probably isn't broken, just deeply bruised. I tested it out each morning afterwards, and today was the first time it felt like I could push off of my right foot enough to run. So aside from my own clumsiness, training is going well, I'm still pretty consistent, I just need to get a lot faster.
I just answered a question that was phrased "Will I loose weight faster if I ran everyday or every other day?" the sad thing is that this happens more than it should (it should never happen). On one hand it is comprehensible, but on the other hand people need to write using proper grammar so that they don't make themselves look like they dropped out of school in kindergarten. Reading this post made me glad that I am not the only one who experiences these types of questions. I agree that a great part of Yahoo answers is debunking myths that people are lead to believe, because someone told them. When I was in cross country we were told to stretch while waiting for everyone to show up and 5 minutes past that, and then we would do the warm up. I was convinced that doing this was something that should be done before running. Later on, I did some research and found out that stretching before your muscles are warmed up is almost useless, and that an extensive amount of stretching can weaken the muscles for a period of time. I was pissed. Once I saw the truth, I knew what it felt like to believe something that wasn't true and wished that someone had told me that earlier. This experience motivates me to debunk people's ideas that aren't true. Also I like proving people wrong. Anyways, this was an interesting and insightful post. Hope your toe heals soon.
ReplyDeleteI agree - coaching / mentoring suits you! I totally get that section about how a coach can make or break a runner's training. I'm glad your toe feels better!
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