Triple Crown Training Team

Shameless plug time for my business, Voltage Strength & Performance.

Yes, yes, yes, I know.  It's the beginning of December this week.  The Triple Crown seems like an event that is very far away.  But that perception is wrong.  The first event for this running series is the first Saturday of March.  Two weeks after that is the 10k, and two weeks after that is the 10 miler.  So really you will need to start training sometime in January.  Now THAT isn't that far away.  That is why I am forming the Voltage Triple Crown Training Team.

Beginning on January 14, we will meet at one of three local parks; Seneca, Cherokee, or Iroquois.  This program is designed to get your in the absolute best shape possible to do your very best in the Triple Crown.  This training will go all the way through the Derby Mini Marathon at the end of April.

There are 3 options of enrollment: 
Option 1 - Meet every Saturday at one of the three designated parks at 9:00 for a great training session that will include interval runs, sprints, long slow distance, time trials, and of course some strength training. Cost for this option is $50.

Option 2 - You get to meet every Saturday for training PLUS you will get daily workout emails every day from the time of enrollment until the day of the Mini. Pre/post workout nutrition will also be addressed in these emails. Cost for this option is $80

Option 3 - You can receive the same daily emails that Option 2 receives but you will not participate in the Saturday runs. This is perfect for those that cannot attend the training session at 9:00 Saturday mornings. Cost for this option is $50.

I absolutely cannot wait to get started with this program.  I have already started writing the program for the weekly runs and it's looking great!  I should have that completely done in a week or so, then I will begin writing the daily program.  This will be extremely challenging to me as coach but I feel up to the challenge.  I only hope that you are too!  

If you have any questions on this program or how to get ready for the Triple Crown, please call me or email me.  I'd love to get you involved!  

A brief note on being honest with yourself

My regular day job is being a Health Educator.  Most of my day consists of talking to people who are obese, very deconditioned, stressed, and/or eat like crap.  More often then not when I ask people what they eat, I get something along the lines of "oh I eat a lot of salads", or "I don't really eat any junk food", or "I exercise all day long with my job".  Most of those that say these things have a BMI of 35 or above, have high blood pressure, high cholesterol, high blood glucose.  These people would not have all of these issues with their health if they really did eat right and exercise regularly.

This entry is not going to be a big one.  All I want to say today is that you need honest with yourself.  If you are exhibiting any or all of these health problems and morbidities, you need to look at yourself and realize what you are doing wrong.  If you are 30+ pounds overweight and suffer from high blood pressure, you desperately need diet modification and more exercise.  Walking at work and going from regular Coke to Diet Coke isn't going to make those problems go away.  Monitoring your sodium intake and getting a minimum of 30 minutes of structured exercise with a sustained elevated heart rate is what you need.

Be honest with yourself and your situation.  Please don't lie to yourself.  Drop your ego, seek help from those that are experts at weight loss, and do something about it.  There are a lot of people that would love to help you.  You just have to ask and realize that you can do something to help your situation.

Forever an Athlete celebrates Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving is almost over and I thought I would provide a list of some of the things I am most thankful for.

• I'm thankful for my wonderful wife who is the clinical manager of a surgical center and they provided me incredible care for my rotator cuff surgery 5 weeks ago.  
• I'm thankful for my surgeon, Dr. Mike Salamon, who fixed my shoulder. 
• I'm thankful for my physical therapist, Joey, who is helping me get through this frustrating period.  
• I'm thankful for the 10 lb smoked turkey breast I was able to buy from Frankfort Avenue Beer Depot.  It was the best turkey I've ever had.  
• I'm thankful for the excitement the Iowa State football team has given me this season.
• I'm thankful the Bears don't suck as bad as I thought they would.  
• I'm thankful my sister Maureen sent me a really good book on the first three presidential assassinations. 
• I'm thankful for those that have already shown interest in my Triple Crown Training Team beginning in January.  
• I'm thankful for being the youngest of 10 children.  
• I'm thankful for making fun of my oldest (living) sister Sharna for turning 50 two days ago.  
• I'm thankful for having a job where I get to hear people's problems every single day and a lot of them make my own problems seem pretty insignificant.  
• I'm thankful that Clay finally got shot on Son's of Anarchy.  
• Finally, I'm extremely thankful for my loving and caring wife who makes me the man I am today and for my 2 loving boys who continue to drive me absolutely insane every day but I wouldn't miss it for the world.  

Happy Thanksgiving to all.  I hope you all have your own list of things you are thankful for this and every year.  

36 reasons to forever be an athlete

Today, November 9, was my 36th birthday.  I celebrated it with my arm in a sling from a rotator cuff surgery performed almost 3 weeks ago.  I'm not exactly the happiest person in the world right now but I know it's a means to an end.  I know that I will be good as new in no time as long as I rest it, let it heal, and do my PT exercises as rx'd.  Last year for my 35th birthday I did 5 rounds of 35 burpees and 35 kb swings with a 2 pood kb.  I was pretty spent at the end of it.  I wanted to do the same for this year except make it 36 reps.  Obviously that can't happen so I'm going to do 5 rounds of 36 lunges each leg and 36 flutter kicks each leg.  I know, not too crazy but I'm kind of limited right now.  But I have to do something.  I will always stay true to the way I am programmed and the way all humans have been bred, active.

Sometimes we lose track of why we move, exercise, compete, or simply play.  Sure, we always remember  that we enjoy it.  But there are so many other reasons why we NEED to be this way.  That brings me to my point for today.  I'm going to list 36 reasons why everyone should forever be an athlete.

1. The need for competition
2. The release of endorphins
3. Muscles are sexy
4. Camaraderie in the gym
5. Healthy bones
6. Mobility is good
7. Stability is good
8. Age gracefully
9. Strong heart
10. Increase testosterone production...
11. ...leading to increased sexual drive
12. Lower risk of cancer
13. Lower risk of heart disease
14. Lower risk of diabetes
15. Lower risk of osteoporosis
16. It's cool to say you've run a marathon
17. It's even cooler to say you've done an Ironman
18. Being able to deadlift 2x my bodyweight is fun
19. Increases confidence
20. Increases attention to detail
21. Increases mental strength
22. Teaches goal setting
23. Feeling young is good
24. Teenagers misjudge you on the basketball court
25. Set a good example for your own kids
26. Increased energy
27. Lower body fat
28. Increases mental focus
29. Reduces depression and anxiety
30. Helps with insomnia
31. Lowers blood pressure
32. Helps control blood glucose
33. Your strong muscles will help you move the furniture in your house
34. Improves lung capacity
35. Strengthens your heart
36. You simply feel better

Trail races, bootcamps, and more!

It's been a while since I have written and updated my happenings.  I know that my purpose for starting this blog was to chronicle my quest to never stop being an athlete and to write about my new activities I have taken up in order to prevent that crappy thought of old age set in.  Unfortunately I really haven't had a lot of events going on lately.  I did complete my first trail race and have finished up this season's Guerrilla Bootcamp.  I am also set up for shoulder surgery (again) this coming Friday so that will put a few things on the back burner.  Booooooo.  Oh well, I guess that'll allow me to rest up and get ready for some new trail runs for next year.  That's right, I plan on doing quite a few more. 

My Trail Race -- At the end of September I ran in a 5 mile trail race here in Louisville.  I say I have never run an official trail race before but I have done several mud runs.  While not exactly the same because the terrain is a bit different, I figured since I did the mud runs with varying distances of 5k to 5 miles, I figured mentally I'd be up for the challange and physically I'd just have to build a bit of stamina and hope my shoes wouldn't fall apart.  This particular race is part of the Trail Race Series in Louisville sponsored by The Trail Store.  They capped the number of entrants at ~100 so I knew that this would be something quite different than what I'm used to because most of my other races have any where from 500 (per wave with a mud run) and 19,000 (Bix 7).  For this race only 30 people registered.  While running the race I quickly discovered there were 3 groups of runners: those that run trails like I drink water (fast), those that were there simply to have fun and not really worry about how they finished (slow) and then myself.  I had to have been the only person within 100 meters in front or behind me.  That doesn't happen in other races.  But it was great though because the scenery of the trail and the terrain are very mind engaging and you don't need a whole lot of people around to provide encouragement.  About half way through the race the weather began to turn and it started to rain.  Not expecting this.  Slick terrain with old crappy shoes does not provide good traction.  But I made the full 5 miles in just under 48 minutes.  I learned 2 lessons on this day.  1: Trail shoes are very important.  2: Trails have big hills with slippery terrain that is very hard to prepare for.  All in all it was a lot of fun and I plan on participating in a lot more trail runs next year.  I even went out and bought a new pair of Brooks Cascadia 6 trail shoes.  Love 'em!

Guerrilla Bootcamp -- I absolutely loved providing an outlet to teach some bootcamp over the summer.  This was technically my first foray into the land of bootcamps and while I didn't grow a huge audience, I have a few loyal followers that came every week that allowed me to teach, train, and torture.  We went to Cherokee and Seneca parks, Shelbyville Community Park, Yum! Center, The Great Lawn, Waggener High School, and Fern Creek High School.  I loved it and will probably do it again.  This experience has inspired me to start a training group for the Louisville Triple Crown.  This consists of a 5k, 10k, and 10 miler.  There is an unofficial fourth race to the Triple Crown that includes the Louisville Mini Marathon, or full if you choose to go that route.  I'm thinking I might start a group for this in January.  This will get me ready to run the Oz Marathon in Kansas with my wife and my niece, Dani, who lives in Wichita.  So be on the lookout for updates on that running club.  I hope to see you there. 

Finally, I am having another shoulder surgery this week and I will be out of commission for a while.  That should give me plenty of time to blog and brainstorm how I want to attack new events for the upcoming year.  The surgery is nothing too major, just a little rotator cuff cleaning on my supraspinatus and possibly biceps.  After its done I will be officially the bionic man with 3 shoulder surgeries.  I was scheduled to do the Tap N Run 4k the day after my surgery but my wife won't let me (boooooooo).  This is a "race" in which there are 4 beer stops throughout the way and you have to chug some beer and move on with the race.  Oh well, that would've been a great experience and I really wanted to do it but my boss says no.  She knows best.  I tried to convince her to let me walk the race.  Heck I paid for the beer already I might as well drink it!  I guess when you couple that with the incredible pain meds I'll be on that is probably a recipe for danger. 

Thanks for reading with me today and I will get to updating this more often in the future. 

Trail Race Initiation & 9/11

If you recall, the purpose of this little journal/log/blog/babble is to document my quest to forever be the athlete that I thought I once was.  I documented my marathon training, my first time going snowboarding, some golf, and my overall training.  In my effort to continuously try new things, I have signed up for a trail race on Sept. 17.  It's the Morgan Conservation 5 mile race in Oldham Co.  I have never run a trail race before.  I have run a few mud runs so I am hoping these runs are similar, minus the nasty mud pits and crazy obstacles.

Because I have never run one of these things before, I reached out to a friend of mine, Suzy Goodwin, who I'm pretty sure ran her first 1/2 marathon the day she was born.  She gave me a few tips like to not wear my ipod and wear a good set of trail shoes.  While I will definitely heed her words for the ipod, I might have to simply wear my regular shoes.  I am not going out to buy a new pair of shoes for this, although I know I should.  If I like it and want to do more, then I'll head out and get some.  Those puppies are expensive (birthday/Christmas present Katie!)  I'm pretty excited to be doing something new and I will definitely report how it went.

I would be remiss if I didn't say at least something about the ten year anniversary of 9/11.  I still remember it like it was yesterday.  I remember every minute of that day.  I remember watching the news after the first plane hit in the ET shop on my ship.  Everyone kind of thought it was crazy that a plane hit one of the twin towers but we didn't think too much else about it.  Then a few minutes later I watched as the 2nd plane hit when I was in another shop on the ship.  Then we knew something was awry.  About 10 minutes later, my Weapons Officer called a meeting of the ship's security team and I was part of the first group to be sent out as extra watch while we tried to figure out what the heck was going on.  I made a call to my wife Katie, told her I was OK and that it was time for me to do my job.  Even though I was in charge of the ship's training division at the time, I was still a part of the Weapons Division on the ship and that is where my obligations and duties would come first.

We had know idea what had happened that day and we had no idea of the severity of what was going one.  As more news came throughout the day we started to get more and more intel.  We started to understand the magnitude of what was going on.  My ship was on high alert, the base was shut down, the airport was grounded, and while this may sound hyperbolic, our world would never be the same again.  It wasn't until the next day that I fully realized that we were in a different world.  It was a feeling that I will remember for the rest of my life.  I walked outside on my ship the morning of September 12 and the base was completely silent.  No troops doing PT on the pier or elsewhere on base.  No cars driving.  No planes from the Norfolk Airport.  Nothing.  Complete silence.  Extremely surreal.  It was at that very moment I knew the severity of what was going on.  Again, I don't mean to sound hyperbolic, but that's just how I felt at that moment.

A lot has happened in 10 years.  We got Bin Laden, which I touched on in an earlier post.  What i do with this blog is very insignificant.  It's one goofball's ramblings of how I try to stay fit.  There are still countless men and women who give their lives every single day to make sure 9/11 never happens again.  People like Carrie Tripp, Josh Wadsworth, Matt German, Trey Goodwin, and Kyle Baker.  Seal Team 6 is currently in the wake of it's biggest loss ever.  One of my first division officers, Lt. Mike McGreevey gave his life as a SEAL in Afghanistan a few years ago.  These men and women are true heroes and I thank them every single day for carrying out the challenge I was a part of 10 years ago.  If you see a soldier anywhere, be sure to thank them.  And after you thank them, thank them again.  They deserve it.  To my soldiers still in, continue fighting the good fight.  I'm proud of you.  I will continue to do my best to forever honor the fallen men and women from that day and the soldiers who have gone since then.

The Corrections Officer

I was working out at a globo-gym the other day and I am very used to seeing plenty of meatheads.  You got the grunters that sound like they are having an orgasm.  You have Super Benchman who only does 16 sets of 3 on the bench press and nothing else.  And you have the conversationalist who spends at least 90 minutes at the gym but 80 of those minutes are spent talking to his buddies about how hard he's hitting the weights recently.  You know exactly who I am talking about and you have seen these guys at every YMCA, Urban Active, Gold's, whatever.  Well this past week I ran into a guy I knew that is a corrections officer.  This dainty fellow is about 6'6" or more and right at about 400 lbs.  He's not a big fatty, although he does have quite a bit on him, he's just a double-extra large man.  While I was completing my 4th set at the squat rack for front squats I saw him get on the bench press.  I figured it was typical of people like him.  But then I saw him do something completely out of left field that made me make a double take.  He was doing single arm bench presses with the 45 lb bar.  To say my jaw hit the floor is a bit of an understatement.

If you have never done single arm bench press with a bar, or with dumbbells for that matter, then you probably don't know how much stability is involved with this.  This exercise takes tremendous wrist strength to simply hold the bar.  Again, it's 45 lbs.  This guy didn't even load the bar at all, he was simply doing the bar for sets of 12.  I walked over to him, being the nosy mobility/stability fiend I am, and asked him why he was doing that and where he learned it.  He said his department was trying to incorporate more mobility and stability training so that they could better handle their job.  Corrections officers frequently are in very tough situations, are often off balance when detaining an inmate, and have to move in many different directions.  He said since he started doing exercises like this he was able to do his job much much better.  He was still doing some basic power lifting exercises but he was throwing these type of movements in also.  He said he had done some research on movement based training and found he was able to carry himself so much better.  Keep in mind this guy is a flippin' mountain.

My point in all of this is that mobility and stability training is moving into more than just your college and professional strength programs.  It's hitting police departments, departments of corrections, fire departments, recreational athletes, and soccer moms that simply want to move better and thwart off that impending arthritis they think is genetic.  I've already hyped MobilityWod, Gray Cook, Mike Boyle, Eric Cressey so I'm not going to beat that horse.  But the word on this training is spreading.  I am still new to the mobility/stability world and after attending a seminar a couple of weeks ago, I feel I have a ton more to learn still.  If you aren't familiar with it, research those individuals and learn.  Or contact me and I'd love to fill you in on what I know.  The bottom line is I was very proud of this monster for incorporating this type of training and am very excited that the word is getting out on this.