A day in the life

A few months a ago this video was making the rounds, and still is for all I know. In case the link ever dies, it was uploaded by Dr. Mike Evans; the title is "23 1/2 hours: What is the single best thing we can do for our health". To summarize, he advises at least 30 minutes of exercise a day to maintain basic health. No surprise here, as people have been saying as much for years. Mike Evans' contribution is perhaps better illustrating the point. That said, if you literally need someone to draw you a diagram as to why sitting for 24 hours a days is bad for you, you may be past hope. Personally I thought the video was being sarcastic. Judging from people's reaction on Facebook, apparently not.

Raising the Bar

There has been some recent debate surrounding Dylan Wykes: Should he be allowed in the 2012 London Olympic marathon given his recent quality, but not qualifying, performances? Recall his October 2011 6th place finish of 2:12:56 at the Toronto Marathon and his 2:12:39 victory in the 2010 California International Marathon. This is not meant as a rebuttal to anything I have read. My own opinion is that he should go (joining his teammates Reid Coolsaet and Eric Gillis) if Athletics Canada had the willingness to let the top three Canadians that run under 2:15 attend. Actually this is not so much my opinion as a logical fact since he is the third fastest Canadian running under 2:15. But AC cannot budge at this late stage, so the only decision that can be made now is by Dylan's legs (assuming he has another go at it). Regardless of the facts of the current situation, it bears taking in some perspective as set by other countries in the last Olympics. Are we Canadians in tandem with what others do, or are we being unduly harsh for no obvious gain? I regret the answer leans towards the latter, as I explain below.

Birthday Crossword

It's my Nana's birthday next week. As she likes doing crosswords, I made her a special one. She doesn't like the internet as much, so this probably won't count as a spoiler. Anyhow, I think she'll like it (although I made a typo in the original...).

Darwin and coaching

I remembered reading a particular passage from Darwin's Origin of Species some years ago. Darwin wrote his masterwork at the age of 50, summing up decades worth of observation. In Species, he describes just how incredibly rare it is to be a good animal breeder. He used the example to show, self-evidently- even a few generations of breeding livestock can make a difference. But he reminds us the differences are small, very small, and only a few select individuals have the talent. A breeder may see only a handful of generations of animals in his own lifetime. This passage really stuck with me; I had never thought  how hard it might be to look at dozens of animals and spot the one or two that stood out as 'special'. Here's what he wrote:

Silly spoof on Olympic standards

I was reading about various Olympic standards and people's issue with them. I wrote a sardonic piece on the subject, using women's hockey as my foil. Had nowhere to upload it at the time so now it's yours. Not particularly timely or anything. Enjoy!

Stotans

Seems like a lot of blogs are discussing philosophy these days. The word Stotan has been popping up here and there for a while now, which I suppose is reasonable given the man who coined the term, Percy Cerutty, published his ideas back in the 1950s and 60s. This post has no overreaching goal save to discuss what I think about his philosophy as far as I understand it.

Stotanism, as I have learned, is a combination of Stoic and Spartan philosophy. I was intrigued how these two philosophies were combined and why Cerutty decided to do so. This piece inspired me to try writing out my own philosophy on running (for a later post), which I will the 'cookbook philosophy'.

Cerutty certainly has some credentials to his name. He is known as the precursor to the more famous coach Arthur Lydiard, introducing some of the same ideas including 100+ mile training weeks, long runs over 20 miles and maintaining exercise in a natural environment. He was pioneer in the world of endurance sport.

Footprints

I was forwarded this CBC radio show several months ago (thanks dad). It's worth sharing. I'm tempted to highlight certain parts, but in truth the entire 54 minutes is worth listening to. The radio show is CBC Ideas. Don't listen to it in a noisy room; the quiet pauses are worth savoring, especially for the third speaker.

This episode, titled Footprints, was taped at a Sport and Society conference in May 2011 at the University of Waterloo. The discussion takes exercise -in particular running- in context with society as a whole. The idea of the conference is to understand how running integrates with the rest of people's lives. Very refreshing topic. I see all too often that sports comes with a notion of "either compete or have more social life, time to work, read, etc.". In truth they are all inextricably linked. Below is my summary of the show.