Wasting Away to...Speed?!

I’ve been reading lots of different books and articles lately and I’ve noticed a common theme developing: Get skinnier. Run Less. Become super fast.

Really? That’s all there is too it?

Here I’ve been wasting time eating and running when both of these activities have been costing me precious speed!! What a sucker. My mother always said she only raised one idiot. I have two brothers. I kinda assumed it was one of them but, maybe, is it me?

Of course, I’m simplifying things a bit. I know I need to boil things down to a pitifully basic level for you, my reader, to understand. Go ahead, finish looking up ‘pitifully’. And ‘boil’ means “getting really ouchy hot”. There, saved you some time.

We are in the heyday of efficiency. Everything is getting smaller but more powerful and in less time. Where will it end?

The current issue of Runner’s World features a Q&A with erstwhile (+3) cyclist turned marathoner Lance Armstrong. In it, he mentions the desire to lose 10 pounds so he can be faster for the Boston Marathon and next year's NYC Marathon. C’mon, dude. Give us a break. If you are worrying about a few pounds, what the hell should I worry about? At least once a week, I wake up on my recliner to the nightly news with a friggin’ Cheeto stuck to my face. And your worried about a couple of L.B.’s?

This is not the only mention I’ve seen on weight in relation to optimal running. You’ve all read - and tried to ignore – the articles. I’m waaay to lazy to link any here. They’re out there. Trust me.

The way I see it, if Lance can lose 10 lbs and get faster by ten minutes, what can happen if I lose, say 75 lbs. I’m 159 now. If I knock that weight down to 85 or so, will I be roughly 75 minutes faster and, thus, a future marathon champion?

On top of that, there are several recent studies that suggest you can actually run faster by training less (but harder intensity). Now, I’m a BIG proponent of this approach. I had been doing this for years before the FIRST method (detailed in Run Less, Run Faster) was birthed to the world. My lawyers are, in fact, checking with their lawyers to make sure there’s nothing fishy going on. Just because the authors have fancy descriptions like “P.H.D.” and “thorough researcher” and “wonderfully honest and trustworthy” attached to their name while I enjoy common descriptors such as “unsavory appearance”, “penchant for mediocrity”, and “big asshole” does not exclude the possibility they learned this from me.

The convergence of these two streams of running wisdom set off a sort of Big Bang in my skull during one of my recent runs. If I get faster by weighing less…..if I get faster by training less albeit very hard….if I get “cleaner” by showering…how far can I take this?

Conceivably, could go on a crash diet and hole up in the corner of my house in the fetal position until it was time for my once weekly 50 yard dash? The fastest, most intense, 50 yard dash I could muster?

Would I reap HUGE benefits as I become skinnier and lighter as long as – when it was time to run – I explode down the driveway with every ounce of energy my celery-only diet could handle?? Would the whistling of the wind passing over my rippled, exposed rib cage mark the sounds of running triumph or the start of a various serious kidney disease?

It may be worth a try. The way this is going, new science may soon tell us it’s best to not run at all during training and simply visualize running a marathon while taking exorbitant amounts of crystal meth. Taper, of course, would also be known as “withdrawal”. And the GU company would have a potentially dangerous legal situation.

Lots to think about. Maybe I missed the point though. I do tend to overreact. I admit to shrieking uncontrollably and having to be restrained on my first airplane flight because, doggoneit, based on the trajectory we sure appeared to be heading to outer space. But could I have gone too far with all these new studies and their line of thinking?

I don’t know. I’m going to give it a shot and report back. Won’t have much energy to blog, I suspect. Need to save it for my lean, mean, green 50 yard driveway dash. Maybe I can get that down to 25 even more intense yards during peak training??

Happy trails.
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It’s off folks. I ate an Almond Joy prior to pressing the Publish button. Diet blown. Back to my regular training plan.

Forget all this and have a great weekend instead.