Boston or Big Sur?

When it comes to hometown races, marathoners on the Monterey Peninsula are really quite spoiled.

We have one of the most beautiful marathons in the world right outside our front doors – one whose scenery, challenging course, and outstanding race organization make it a top rated event year after year. The Big Sur Marathon frequently gets ranked at or near the top of “must do” marathons from various publications and websites.

So why would any of us here decide to skip such a world-class event? It would take a race of extraordinary character and history to justify the extra time, money, and effort of travelling out of the area. The list of such races is remarkably short – but the Boston Marathon is definitely at the top of it.

The primary downside (besides being 3000 miles away) of Monterey County runners participating in our sport’s greatest rite of passage is that the Boston Marathon is usually only six days before Big Sur. Therefore, we’re faced with a decision each year: should we run Boston, or Big Sur?

The question is the topic of the latest Monterey Herald article, co-written with my friend Mike, which follows below.

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Running Life 04/9/09 “Boston or Big Sur”

As soon as the calendar turns to April, the dreams of marathon runners take flight. Springtime marathons are marquee events in all the greatest cities in the world: Boston, London, Paris, and of course, Carmel.

Yes, our hometown event ranks right up there with the most highly respected marathons in the world. Runners from every state and all corners of the globe come to the Monterey Peninsula to run the Big Sur Marathon on the last Sunday in April.

Likewise, it’s nearly every marathoner’s dream to run the famed Boston Marathon, traditionally held on Patriot’s Day, a Massachusetts holiday observed on the third Monday of April. In 2009, as most other years, the Boston Marathon is a mere six days before Big Sur. Therefore, local runners face a dilemma each spring in deciding which marathon to attend.

Honestly, you can’t go wrong with either choice – and for a handful of hardy (feel free to substitute crazy) local runners, the decision is too agonizing, so they just do both. This year the two of us are doing split duty: Mike will join about 15 other Central Coast runners who are running at Boston on April 20th, and Donald will stay home to run Big Sur six days later. Although both races are world-class events, the experiences we will take away from each will undoubtedly be quite different.

Big Sur will always be our favorite. It’s our hometown marathon. We know how much time is donated by local volunteers and how hard everyone involved with the race works to ensure its success. It’s an opportunity for friendly competition with our friends on one of the most challenging courses in the world. The scenery is breathtaking, and it’s the only day of the year that it’s safe to run on Highway 1. Big Sur has been voted the best marathon in North America by several publications.

No other marathon can compete with the sights and sounds of the Big Sur Marathon (as we’ll describe in two weeks) – so why would locals go anywhere else? Only the allure and history of Boston can occasionally take us away from home.

Simply put, Boston is the most famous and prestigious marathon in the world. Running there is like playing baseball in Yankee Stadium, golf at Augusta National, tennis at Wimbledon, or driving at the Brickyard – while competing right alongside the professionals. Boston has more history - over 110 years worth – and attracts more talented runners than any other footrace. Runners are required to meet qualifying standards in order to enter, so participation in the race is considered an honor by all marathoners.

Best of all, the entire city goes marathon crazy and treats every athlete like a star for the entire weekend.

In addition, Mike has extra incentive to travel east: his son lives in Boston and will also be running the marathon. It’s going to be a father-son dual for family bragging rights.

The choice between Boston and Big Sur is always tough – and next year, the temptation to do both races will be greater than ever. For Big Sur’s 25th presentation in April of 2010, there will be a special “Boston to Big Sur” challenge. Any runner who does both marathons will receive a special award, jacket, and recognition on race day. If you’re someone who likes to experience the best of both worlds, maybe you can join them.

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Panic Naps

“Do you step in line or release the glitch?
Can you fall asleep with a panic switch?”
- Silversun Pickups, “Panic Switch” (after post)
**

You know what sounds great right now? Taking a little spring break.

Between training and writing and testing products (many reviews to come, trust me) and family activities and preparing for races and, you know … actually holding a job, things have become pretty hectic recently. There’s definitely a sense that life has shifted into a higher gear, and the only thing that can be done is to hang on and enjoy the ride.

It’s not necessarily a bad situation; in fact, it seems like any path to ultramarathon (or, for that matter, ironman) success has to travel through Crazytown at some point along the way. Truth be told, it’s not such a terrible place to be – I’d much rather face the burden of being overstretched than the bane of having nothing to do.

And yet, I occasionally long for more idyll times, especially when my kids are out of school and enjoying beautiful spring days without me. Times when they can spend an afternoon drawing signs for me on our driveway:


I’m not sure whether to feel flattered that they were thinking of me, or bewildered that they made me look like such a freak. Because I don’t really look like that stick figure, you know; if you'll recall from a post last September, I actually look like this.

I love getting reminders that sometimes it’s best to chill out for a while, even if it’s just for brief moments in an otherwise chaotic existence. I don’t really plan on dialing the intensity back between now and the end of June, but I’ll try to steal little moments here and there to recharge my batteries as needed.

It’s kind of like taking a nap with a panic switch.

**

It was almost exactly one year ago that I posted a video by a band who seemed to be an unknown commodity to just about everybody except a handful of Southern California hipsters. Clearly, the Silversun Pickups aren’t going to sneak up on people anymore. “Panic Switch” is the first video from their new album, which picks up the distortion-rock groove right where the old one left off. Click and enjoy:

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Drymax Rocks!

Continuing on the product review theme mentioned in yesterday’s post, I wanted to take a slight detour to promote one of my favorite companies again. Actually, it's not so much a review as it is an update.

It’s not exactly breaking news that I’m a huge fan of Drymax socks – that information is fairly well-established. What you might not know, however, is how easy it is for anybody else to fall in love with Drymax as well. A friend of mine found this out recently, and the story is a good illustration of a company that is doing all the right things.

After hearing me rave like a lunatic about Drymax for about eight months, one of my training partners finally decided to give their trail running socks a try. I figured he would be amazed; to my shock and dismay, he was only disappointed.

He asked if I wanted to buy the socks from him - which I would have done in a flash, if I didn’t suspect there might be a larger story to unfold. So I told him about Drymax’s money back guarantee, and put him in contact with a Drymax rep to offer his feedback.

Giving my friend's money back would have been good enough, but Bob at Drymax went two steps further: he let my friend keep the socks he already had to pass along to someone else, then offered to send samples of other styles that my friend might like better. The two of them are working back and forth on that one as we speak; I’m totally confident that those kids will work something out.

In a time when every kind of business is struggling to stay afloat, when companies are using any means necessary to wring every possible dime out of its employees and customers alike, when corporate greed and deception trump service and honesty by a mile, it’s refreshing to see a company that not only plays by the rules, but routinely goes the extra mile to make its customers happy.

Anecdotally, I know their methods must be paying off, as Drymax socks are becoming more and more prevalent at ultras and triathlons all over the country. Their grassroots outreach and promotional efforts are becoming a groundswell in the community of endurance athletes.

Here's the coolest part of the story: while the Drymax business model is one worth boasting about, the company doesn’t do a lot of trumpeting (although I’m probably a couple of blog posts away from applying for a per-diem marketing stipend) in comparison to their larger competitors. That’s because the product speaks for itself.

If you haven’t tried a pair yet, check out these trail socks from Amazon.com or these options from ZombieRunner and select a style you like. If they’re not your thing, just return them and get your money back. You've quite literally got nothing to lose - except maybe a blister or two.

One more note: my review last fall was for the version 3 Drymax socks; the current models on sale online are version 4. I'm hoping to get my hands on - or, more accurately, my feet in - some updated models in the near future, and of course I'll post an update on the new style.

I can pretty much predict how that one will turn out, but I'll let you know for sure when it happens.

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Zappos Review

Over the next several weeks, this place is going to get pretty crazy with product reviews.

I’ve got five or six different products lined up to review, and hope to knock them out at least at the rate of one per week – or even more frequently if I can somehow manage it. However, since I’m coming up on some races between now and the end of May, there will also be nervous speculations and race reports to go along with the newspaper articles and training snippets and all the other regularly scheduled nonsense that goes on here. I guess what I’m saying is, things are starting to get pretty busy.

Today’s review is somewhat unorthodox, as I don’t have anything tangible that I’m putting to the test on the trail. Rather, I was asked to review the online shoe vendor Zappos.com – specifically, the walking shoes section of the website. I know there aren’t direct implications for runners here, so I’ll try to keep this quick.

Zappos is one of the bigger players in the online shoe market, and they actually do have a good selection of running shoes available (but I’m promising to stay on topic, so that’s the last I’ll mention it). Do a Google search on just about any shoe brand, and a Zappos offer will inevitably show up on the first page of results.

I’ve never actually purchased shoes from them, but my wife has - so once again I asked her to help with the heavy lifting in evaluating the site. Here’s what we came up with:

Strengths:

• Free shipping and free return shipping on all purchases. This is a nice touch – but as my wife explained, it’s really more of a necessity than a “perk”. Many shoppers (including my wife) need to be able to try shoes on to see how they fit, feel, and look before making a purchase – and they need to be able to return items without penalty. Zappos was one of the first shoe retailers to recognize this, but now this service seems to be the industry standard.

• Huge selection: Zappos carries just about every brand you can think of. Within each brand, they carry more models than you knew existed. Just for kicks, I looked at the men's Rockport listings on the walking shoes page (I wear Rockports at work), and there are 246 models available. Basically, you’ll never have to worry about the availability of a current model shoe.

• Customer reviews: the number of reviews for each model I looked at was fairly high – and some people (like the woman I’m married to) place a lot of stock in customer reviews for models she’s unfamiliar with. Some shoe vendors may have a handful of reviews for each model; at Zappos, the average seems more like 50 to 100. More information for the consumer is usually a good thing.

• Price: the discounts aren’t huge (more on that in a minute), but the price points at Zappos are pretty much in line with traditional retailers. Which means that if the Rockports I want aren’t available at my local Macy’s, or I don’t feel like driving 20 minutes to buy them - both very plausible scenarios - I can get them from Zappos for the same price, without paying any extra for the convenience of shopping in my pajamas.

Drawbacks:

• Price: I know, I just listed that as a strength, but my wife made an observation I hadn’t thought of – namely, that the discounts at Zappos aren’t as good as some other sites. This works in a couple of different ways: 1) the sale and clearance items are often only 10 or 15% off retail, which isn’t hard to find from most retailers, and 2) on any given day, the percentage of overall inventory in the Zappos sale section is less than on some other sites.

This was somewhat verified by my Rockport search: of the 246 men’s models available, 103 were on sale – which seems like a decent percentage, although I have no idea how that compares to other sites. However, very few of the shoes on that 103 item list were discounted more than 10%. So while you’re not getting ripped off at Zappos, you probably won’t find huge savings, either.

The discrepancy seems odd, in that Zappos excels at having so many current models available, but comes up short in moving old ones off the shelf. They carry one previous version of many shoe models, but these are typically only discounted 10%. By comparison, when I shop for Montrails (oops – I wasn’t supposed to mention running again. Sorry.) online, I frequently find old models discounted by 40 or 50%. Predictably, those cheaper sites are usually where I spend my money.

Zappos seems like a solid business that has earned its good reputation primarily with its great selection; if they could just get more aggressive with pricing their old models, their growth potential is enormous. Especially if they start marketing to runners, I suspect that they would become an online powerhouse – and they’d definitely make a customer out of me.

*
Shop for Zappos walking shoes here.


See previous product reviews on sidebar at right. If you have a product you’d like reviewed, contact me at info@runningandrambling.com.

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Extreme Shepherding

As I suspected, nobody had a problem identifying the gang of critters in the previous post, with whom I shared my sunrise during last week’s 18-mile trail run:

Herds of grazing sheep are a longtime fixture of Fort Ord, employed primarily to prevent the grasslands from growing out of control. They roam various sections of the 7500-acre open space at different times, at the discretion of a shepherd who lives in a trailer and parks atop whatever hillside the sheep are currently assigned to.

(On a strange note - since Fort Ord formally belongs to the Bureau of Land Management under the United States Department of the Interior – this shepherd and his sheep have to be about the most unorthodox federal employees you’ll ever encounter. But that’s neither here nor there in relation to this story.)

Running the trails in the dark of early mornings, we frequently hear (or, more unpleasantly, smell) the sheep before we see them. The companion sheepdogs are usually alerted to our presence far earlier than we are aware of theirs - and if they perceive the approaching runners to be any sort of threat, they bark out a warning to ensure safe custody of their charges.

Every now and then, however, it’s possible to catch the herd off-guard – and if I’m by myself when this happens, sometimes I’ll pause to say a friendly how-do-you-do. I’m never sure who is more surprised by these chance encounters: the sheep, because of the stranger trampling through their herd, or me, for somehow getting myself entangled in a mob of mutton.

The puzzled moment doesn’t last very long, however, as the loyal sheepdog inevitably comes out to chase me away. He barks and jumps and makes all kinds of commotion just so everybody knows exactly who’s in charge.


Fortunately, this guy’s not too menacing. In fact, if you ask nicely, he’ll even sit and pose for you to take his picture.

Occasionally, after the sun comes up, we can spot the sheep across a valley from us, grazing on the opposite slope of whatever trail we’re traversing. If the sheep are collectively wandering around, their movements look like splotches of color spilling across the green hillside, and can become somewhat hypnotic if you stare at them for long enough.

One day a couple of weeks ago, two of my training partners were talking about how cool it would be if someone could organize the sheep to coordinate their movements, in the same manner that a college marching band spells out words or depicts shapes during a halftime show. We all had a good laugh about the notion and then dismissed it as too far-fetched to ever happen. After all, we’re talking about sheep … and they’re certainly not the most trainable animals around.

Imagine my shock last week, then, when one of those runners e-mailed me a video featuring shepherds doing exactly what we were joking about. Check that – they weren’t just doing performance art with sheep, but doing it in a way that was about 100 times more clever and impressive than anything we’d ever imagined.

The video is by a group of Welsh sheepherders* who call themselves the Baa-Studs (great name, isn’t it?), and it’s embedded below. It’s also ample proof of two things I’ve always suspected – the first of which is, the world can never have too many creative people. As strange as it sounds, just knowing that there are people out there who come up with ridiculously amazing stunts like this gives me enormous confidence in the human race.

The second point should be blatantly obvious after watching: namely, that some shepherds have WAY too much time on their hands.

In an ideal world, our group of runners would figure out a way to convince the Bureau of Land Management to get these guys on the US government payroll and station them at Fort Ord for our permanent enjoyment; in the meantime, we’ll just have to be take our entertainment from what you see below:

* "sheepherder" and "shepherd" are interchangeable, right? I'm pretty sure that's right.

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Sunrise, Fort Ord

Midway through a long run last week, I found myself here:

This trail is part of the Fort Ord open space between Monterey and Salinas. As the sun crept over the distant hillside, I was about ten miles into my run, with another eight still to go.

Sometimes during these high-volume training weeks, I question whether it's really worth it to drag myself out of bed almost three hours before sunrise just to get some extra miles under my belt before clocking in with the rest of the working world. Other times - especially when the morning breaks like this one did - I wonder why I don't do it more often.

Truthfully, if it weren't for the specter of Western States looming over my training schedule, mornings like this would be very few and far between. Aside from everything else I gain from the sport of ultrarunning, it's these opportunities to bask in the natural beauty of this place I live that help make the whole journey worthwhile.

As luck would have it, I wasn't completely alone in Fort Ord on this particular morning - in fact, I had to share my beautiful sunrise with these guys:

The photo's a little dark, but I'm guessing you can still come up with a positive ID on the group. They're a well-known entity around Fort Ord - and I've actually got a whole separate story to tell about them, which will be the topic of my next post.

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Lessons From a Loser

As a writer, it’s a great thing when stories just fall into your lap.

More specifically, as a running columnist with a pop culture fixation, it’s absolutely fantastic when a story involving distance running and a reality TV star unleashes an honest-to-goodness Internet scandal. In that regard, Dane Patterson's attempted marathon last month was the race heard ‘round the World Wide Web.

When such circumstances collide, the appropriate question to my sports editor isn’t, “Should I write about that?” but rather, “How many words do you want, and when would you like it?” The answers were 1) 600, and 2) this week, and the result is the Monterey Herald column that follows.

However, since the cyber-storm had sort of blown over by the time this article saw newsprint, I wanted to refrain from piling on criticism of what went down. (God knows enough bloggers have done that already). Instead, I used the occasion to look at one particular, slightly troubling aspect of today’s distance running culture, and to offer a reminder of an important strategy for long-term fitness success.

Finally, actual footage from the episode has been removed (for obvious reasons) from the NBC website and most of the Web, but I linked to a post that contains the clip in question if you're interested.

**
Running Life 3/26/09 “Lessons From a Loser”

Of all the cardinal sins a runner can commit, the greatest is claiming to run a marathon when you really haven’t. The commandment is clear: Thou shalt not call thyself a marathoner if Thou hast not covered the entire 26.2 miles.

Dane Patterson, a contestant on this season’s Biggest Loser, learned that lesson the hard way last month, and incurred not only the wrath of God, but of thousands of angry marathoners. His is a cautionary tale that highlights a couple of vital lessons for novice runners.

First, some background. After being voted off of the show’s Feb 25th episode, the follow-up piece [video link] showed Patterson running a marathon in Arizona. Viewers saw him cross the finish line, and wear a finisher’s medal as the crowd cheered him. Meanwhile, a caption reported that he completed the race in 3 hours, 53 minutes, and Patterson’s voiceover described it as “the most amazing experience of my life to run an entire marathon.”

It was a great story, except for one problem: he didn’t actually do the whole marathon.

Patterson entered the race and ran about 17 miles before NBC producers realized that he wouldn’t make the finish line before the race finished and the sun went down. Somewhere around mile 23, Patterson agreed to ride the NBC van to the finish, where he was filmed crossing the line victoriously.

Like other scoundrels of the information age, Patterson’s undoing came via the Internet. A fellow runner wrote on her personal blog that she saw Patterson and his wife get out of the van just before the finish line, and others who were present confirmed the report. Mainstream media picked up the story, and NBC was soon apologizing for creating a staged accomplishment.

After the controversy broke, Patterson reasserted that he only rode for 3 miles in the van - but to anybody who has ever run a marathon, it didn’t matter. He became a lightning rod for an angry mob of runners accusing him of the highest form of treason.

The whole fiasco raises two interesting points – the first of which is that almost everybody is trying to do a marathon these days.

Twenty years ago, new runners targeted 10K races as incentives to get in shape; today, the marathon has become an entry-level race. Training programs - many of which are fundraisers - promise to turn sedentary people into marathoners in a period of weeks. 10Ks and half-marathons aren’t impressive enough anymore; everyone is reaching for the brass ring right out of the gate.

While the notion is admirable, this isn’t always a good thing in practice. The injury risk for a novice runner starting a marathon program is quite high – and many of those who do complete the race find the process so dreadful that they never return to it.

Which brings us to the second lesson from Patterson’s story: the importance of setting manageable goals.

A new runner would probably benefit more by building up to the marathon challenge slowly, after successfully completing shorter distances over a longer period of time. Your chance of long-term success is much greater, which should be the primary reason you start running in the first place. Besides, it’s not like marathons are going away anytime soon – your goal race will still be there for you to tackle when you’re properly prepared.

We’re glad Dane Patterson was able to run 23 miles last month. He is trying another marathon in April, and we sincerely wish him the best of luck in finishing it. Above all else, we wish him the many years of health and happiness that dedicated runners have come to enjoy.

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