- BASIL AND SPICE FITNESS

Sunday

22Nov2009

Only 5.7% Of High School Football Players Will Play In College

Nov 22, 2009

This year our football team set a record … we were undefeated in our conference for the second consecutive year. Then it came time for our playoff game. As a #3 seed playing a #14 seed, we expected to win our first game. Most of the players and coaches were thinking ahead to the third game, where winning would begin to get difficult. Then the flu made the rounds on our football team. Then the rain … a total of four inches beginning the day prior to and ending three hours before the game. It was difficult to use our greatest assets of speed and agility in the mud, and some of our key players were still ill but trying to play. This loss ended our dreams for a state championship. After the game we made our way onto the field to say goodbye to the seniors. It broke my heart to see their tears, not knowing whether they were because we lost or because they had played their last game, or perhaps a little of both. We had watched these boys grow up, becoming not just fine athletes but also fine young men.

The fact is that most of these young men will not go on to play football in college, let alone “earn” a college scholarship. According to author Jim Thompson, only 5.7 percent of high school football players play in college. For basketball, it’s 3 percent for boys and 3.3 percent for girls. Of the young athletes who do play sports in college, only about 2.3 percent receive a scholarship, and most receive a “partial scholarship that may be just a sliver of the entire cost of college.” Most parents want to believe their young athlete has the talent to receive a scholarship, but after reading this book will set aside some money for college, realizing the “odds” are against it.

The High School Sports Parent (Balance Sports Publishing/ 2009) by Jim Thompson is a comprehensive guide, covering everything from higher goals to sportsmanship to injuries, even helping decide when it’s time to quit. Ever hear parents screaming when their kids make a mistake? Know a parent who coaches their child’s team? When my son played basketball, at practice one night the coach became very frustrated with his son and threw the basketball into his back, nearly knocking him down. The parents who observed this behavior complained to the principal, who asked him to resign. While these types of parents definitely need to read this book, every sports parent will benefit from Mr. Thompson’s advice. Some schools are even handing free copies out to parents in an effort to avoid problems later on. This book isn’t just about helping your child learn to compete; it is also a tool to help you help your teen athlete thrive, making himself, his team, and the game better.

Jim Thompson is the Founder and Executive Director, Positive Coaching Alliance. He is the author of several books: The Double-Goal Coach; Positive Coaching; Shooting in the Dark: Tales of Coaching and Leadership; Positive Coaching in a Nutshell; Positive Sports Parenting; and The High School Sports Parent. Jim Thompson is also member of the faculty in Stanford University’s Continuing Studies Program where he teaches courses in coaching, leadership and sport and spirituality. You'll find the author online at www.positivecoach.org

Lynette Fleming Is Coauthor of Lunch Buddies: Buddy Up for a Better Diet

Respiratory Guard: Positive Effect On Immune System In 48 Hrs.

Book Review: Born To Run By Christopher McDougall

Nov 20, 2009

Reviewed by David M. Kinchen

'Born to Run': Extreme Running Goes Beyond Fitness: It's a Compulsion

As I sat down at the computer to write my review of Christopher McDougall's Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen (Knopf, 304 pages, $24.95), I came across a story in the Wall Street Journal through the magic of Google about "Mega Marathoners" -- older people running multiple marathons.

Reporter Neil King Jr. describes one of them: "Some compulsives collect shoes. Others obsess over video games. Eugene DeFronzo, 73 years old, runs marathons. He clocked his 402nd here on a recent Sunday, and has three more planned this year.

"The Connecticut personal-injury lawyer cracked three vertebrae when he slipped during a race last December. He pulled a hamstring in Tampa two months later, and again in Mississippi a week after that. He nearly passed out in the parched hills of South Dakota in August, finishing last by two hours. In October, he got lost in the woods of Indiana when organizers cleared away the markers. 'It's an obsession,' he says. 'No different than gambling, drinking or doing drugs.'"

DeFronzo's compulsion is shared by the people McDougall writes about. Replete with incredible characters, amazing athletic achievements, cutting-edge science, and, most of all, pure inspiration, Born to Run is an epic adventure that began when the Pennsylvania-based author and contributing editor for Men's Health sought the answer to a simple question: "Why does my foot hurt?"

He journeyed to Colorado to run in and write about ultramarathons, races of 100 miles through the mountains. He talked to people who told him that the "best" running shoes -- footwear costing hundreds of dollars per pair from Nike or Adidas -- are actually the worse for your feet if you're an ultra runner. He goes toe-to-toe with barefoot runners and runners who use Five Fingers foot gloves, perhaps the closest thing to barefoot running.

A runner himself and a former Associated Press war correspondent, McDougall went to Mexico's Barranca del Cobre (Copper Canyon), actually a series of 20 canyons at least four times larger than the Grand Canyon of the Colorado in the U.S. At some risk to himself -- this popular tourism area of Northwest Mexico's Sierra Madre in the state of Chihuahua is in the heart of opium and marijuana cultivation -- McDougall met with members of the traditional indigenous people of Copper Canyon, the Tarahumara. Descendants of the Aztecs, the Tarahumara are known for their endurance and nonstop running for hours. They literally chase their prey until it drops.

McDougall learns about a popular Tarahumara community race called “rarahipa” played by kicking a wooden ball along the paths of the steep canyons. All players must run nonstop until the finish. It is not uncommon for a game to last for days and continue without breaks, even through the dark of night.

The superhuman talent of the Tarahumara people is matched by uncanny health and serenity, leaving the Tarahumara immune to the diseases and strife that plague modern existence. With the help of Caballo Blanco (white horse), a mysterious gringo who lives with the Tarahumara, McDougall was able not only to uncover the secrets of the Tarahumara but also to find his own inner ultra-athlete, as he trained for the challenge of a lifetime: a fifty-mile race through the heart of Tarahumara country pitting the tribe against an odd band of Americans, including a star ultramarathoner, a beautiful young surfer, and a barefoot wonder.

McDougall writes that running was the superpower that made us human, which means it's a superpower all humans possess. How else could a relatively weak creature like humans survive against much more powerful adversaries, McDougall asks.

If you're a runner, this book is a no-brainer, made to order for you. If you're not a runner and seek to learn why people punish their bodies in the compulsion that drives ultramarathoners and Iron Man triathletes you'll also enjoy Born to Run.

Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Super Athletes, and the Greatest Race The World Has Ever Seen (Knopf/ May 2009) by Christopher McDougall

Interview With Olympic Athlete Jeff Galloway

A Marathon Isn't About Running, It's About Salvation--Dean Karnazes

Kansas City Barefoot Running In 30F! Cold On The Feet!

Nov 19, 2009

Koach Karl--

All the research I have done on the subject of Barefoot running tells me that I am trying too much too soon. Not surprising! I haven't really had any ill effects aside from muscle soreness, which is common anytime you try something new. I think my nutrition is the key to my success in that department. I will get to that in a moment though, I want to tell you about the inclement weather runs I have encountered.

The temps have dipped down a little here in the Kansas City area, nothing dramatic considering it is mid November. It has been cold and wet with temps ranging from 34 - 45 degrees, all things considered not too bad. The big difference is the rain when it is in the 30s can be a little cold on the feet. I have NO trouble running in the freezing temps in normal shoes but barefoot is a game changer and we haven't even hit freezing yet. I did a 6 mile course, that is nothing but hills, earlier this week but it wasn't the course it was the weather. It was rainy and about 38 degrees, I was wearing my Vibrams so I did have a little protection.

That being said, they offer no protection from the rain. My feet were wet and cold after the first mile. Don't get me wrong it was tolerable just a little too cold. By the time I was finished my toes were numb and I had forgotten about it during the run.

Vibrams do make a Five Finger for the cold which I will invest in soon. Yesterday it snowed and was my day to run barefoot without protection from the Vibrams. By the time I ran it was just slush and cold no real snow left. I took off running on the sidewalk the temp was about 35 degrees. I hate to admit it but I wimped out, I made it about a quarter of a mile. The combination of the cold and wet against my bare feet pounding against the concrete was too much. I got back in my truck and called myself a few different names I can't say here. What a pansy!! After about 5 minutes I decided to go to the local track and try the football field. WHAT a difference!! It was still cold but was a lot softer. I ran about a mile to start conditioning my feet to cold. I will do this over the next few weeks before I venture out on to the concrete again. It was a learning experience but the obvious discovery of the football field was incredible. I go back to my earlier recommendations to start out on the grass and build up to the streets.

Now to nutrition and my recovery ability. Most of you know that I eat about 90% organic as well as incorporating Isagenix Nutritional System. I have been using Isagenix for the last year, I have been involved in athletics and training people since 1982 and I have used just about every legit nutritional product out there. I have never used anything like Isagenix before, the quality and purity are unsurpassed by anything out there. The main thing is that my recovery has been incredible and I have made improvements in my strength and speed as well as decreased body fat at the age of 48. The results speak for themselves!! You can find my daily nutritional regime as well as the endurance foods I use here.

I will be doing a long run in the Vibrams next week, so stay tuned for a full review of this interesting product.

As a former Marine, Karl Keltner has run for almost 30 years. He has been a

personal trainer since 1982 and an endurance coach since 1999. Karl is a two-time BadWater UltraMarathon finisher and three-time Ironman Triathlon finisher. Along the way, he has completed 23 ultras and 61 marathons. He is the owner of Athlon Endurance Training, which includes the Runners In Touch Teams. In 2007, Karl started the Runners In Touch (RIT) Teams. The RIT Endurance Team trains runners and walkers for all distances. RIT Children's Team works with at-risk children throughout the Kansas City community, instilling the values of fitness and healthy eating into young bodies and spirits. To date, he has coached over 2000 endurance athletes to the finish line, be it in running or multisport. Recently, Karl has been a regular contributor to Endurance Planet and has had numerous articles related to the spirit of endurance sport published.

Barefoot Running: Completely Doable

Ultra Runner Incorporates Vibrams For Marathon

2010 Boston Marathon Entrance Closes Earlier--11/13/2009 Why?

Nov 16, 2009

Dane Rauschenberg--

The title of this post should have a question mark at the end as I have not fully decided if there really is a need or not. However, one thing is certain: one must be quick on the registration trigger to be one of the 20,000+ runners traversing the storied road from Hopkinton to Boston.

When I first qualified for Boston in 2005, it was the middle of January. Hoping to get a slightly better time, I waited another until the middle of March when I lowered my time to a 3:07 at the Little Rock Marathon. I immediately came home and registered. However, even though that was just five weeks before Boston that year, I don't think I was the last one in.

That is not the case anymore.

In 2008, I was just about the last one registered as I waited for a career change and a move across the country to get settled in before I finally submitted my registration. As I was planning a Boston double that day (running the real marathon and then heading back out to the start to do it again with the race director, Dave McGillivray) I had a few things that needed to be planned in order to do so. That planning almost kept me from registering which chocked me as it was only near the beginning of February and I had almost missed my window. Fortunately, I had a wonderful day.

Not too many chaps make me look short. Thanks, Chris!

For this year's Boston, registration closed even earlier. Sometime in mid-January the gates closed and hundreds of runners who were shooting for a late January race as their final BQ were shut out.

Now, on November 13th, 2009, Boston closed its doors for the 2010 race, a full two months faster than it ever had before. What exactly is going on?

There is no doubting that the average times for marathon finishers has gotten decidedly slower in the past 20 years. In 1980 the average marathon time was about three and a half hours for men and about four hours for women. Today, the averages are 4:16 for men and 4:43 for women. This increase in the average time is obviously because so many more marathoners are simply out there running marathons. However, this rise in marathon runners (first timers and multiple marathoners) has been steadily increasing for over a decade. Why has Boston been filling up so fast in just the past four or five years?

Boston has always been a destination marathons. A goal race. When the numbers were getting too "large" a few decades ago, time limits were placed to try and stem the tide of runners. It had the opposite effect as runners now wanted to be part of an exclusive club and numbers soared.

Over time the qualifying standards have gotten a little softer to where they are now presently. So, have they gotten so soft that the race can close almost as soon as it opens when just a few years ago it took months and months to hit that plateau? If so, should the qualifying standards be changed? Should they reflect the changing times and be made more challenging?

A great deal of work and thought have gone into the current standards. Revisions have been proposed often and in many differing ways including age-graded tables created by the World Masters Association (WMA), which use world-record times and "age factors" to calculate "equivalent" times for all race distances for every age between 8 and 100. Regardless, it seems the time has come that something should be done.

If Boston is to remain the race that we all aspire to participate in as runners, shouldn't it be a little more difficult to get into then it currently is? Perhaps, after all the talk of the death of American long-distance running because of "walk-runners" and charity runners, Americans are once again getting faster. We have seen the rise of Ryan Hall and Dathan Ritzenhein (and to a lesser extent Brian Sell, which is in no way meant to put Sell down) who, while not having won any major races outright, have become good enough that they have to be entered into serious discussions as potential winners.

And maybe the rest of America is following suit. The numbers, especially the most recent ones involving the quick filling of the Boston marathon, seem to be pointing that way. If that is the case, why not make it just that much more difficult to make it to the place where it all starts?

Dane Rauschenberg is an extreme runner, speaker and author. His seminars and speeches are known not only as powerful, passionate and engaging but above everything else, encouraging. His first book, See Dane Run has been a surprise breakout hit for both runners of all speeds and those outside the world of running. It empowers people to set goals for themselves and use their passion and strength to reach those goals. Dane Rauschenberg currently lives in Salt Lake City. He runs and designs marathons around his speaking schedule. His book, See Dane Run, is currently available at www.seedanerun.com

Book Review: See Dane Run By Dane Rauschenberg

Dane Rauschenberg, Extreme Runner, On Purpose Of A Marathon

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Sunday

15Nov2009

Ultra Runner Incorporates Vibrams For Marathon

Nov 15, 2009

Koach Karl--

Well I am about 6 weeks in to the barefoot experience, it has been interesting. My longest run so far is 6 miles. After incorporating the Vibrams I haven't run in shoes for the past 10 days. I will give a full review on the Vibrams later as I want to run a 20 miler in them first. I have to build up to that. The longest in the Vibrams is 13 miles.

I have really enjoyed running barefoot and feel it is making a difference in my leg strength. My calves feel like they are busting out of my skin. I am stretching a lot more because of the soreness attributed to the barefoot and Vibrams running. I am being fairly aggressive with this as I am planning to run the Carlsbad marathon Jan 24 either barefoot or wearing the Vibrams. Yes my feet are sore from time to time but nothing serious. I am concerned how I will handle the colder weather which will eventually include snow. Fortunately, I conquered the the cold last winter -- check it out.

So far I really can't say anything negative about barefoot running. Since I have never experienced a running related injury I can't say it has help with that. I will say it seems natural and more efficient. I do think it is the way were meant to run. The real test is yet to come, as I am an ultra runner, I want to do at least a 50k soon. I will keep you updated.

For strength training I am doing push up and a variation of pull up after each run. For pull up, if I can't find anything else, I put my tailgate down on my truck and lay horizontal under it and basically do reverse rows. You can always find a way to workout, just be creative. You don't need a gym.

As a former Marine, Karl Keltner has run for almost 30 years. He has been a