I’ve walked for miles, my feet are hurting

“HEY BUD! DO YOU BREATHE IN THROUGH YOUR MOUTH OR YOUR NOSE?” 
That’s the question I was asked this morning from an oncoming runner.  I responded to do what ever feels natural and don’t think about it.  For some reason it was funny enough to laugh out loud once he was out of earshot but now that I’m writing about it it doesn’t seem like it would of been funny at all.  I guess you had to see the desperation on the guy’s face, it was as if I didn’t answer him correctly he was going to suffocate. 

Both of my feet are pretty sore right now from pounding the road this winter so I’ve taken up doing some of my runs on an artificial infield.  This afternoon I did 7 of 10km on the 350m loop where my feet don’t feel a thing.  I figure it’s better than the treadmill and to pass the time I’ve started running with music during the loops. 

Bruce Deacon started a blog http://bruce-deacon-thelongroad.blogspot.com/.  Bruce was really helpful this summer before Berlin answering a slew of my own running questions, mainly about marathoning and not so much about breathing. 

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The Canadian men are doing very well in Slalom this year and it’s at the top of my must-see events next month at the Olympics.  Today in Schladming, AUT Julien Cousineau finished 5th in a World Cup Slalom.  A few days ago Mike Janyk finished 5th in the Kitzbuhel slalom leading 4 Canadians into the top 14!   Now that I don’t ski it’s really easy to watch ski racing on TV.  The races are always shown mid-day on weekends (the time when skiers are normally skiing) so it’s perfect between training runs. 

The other weekend while watching a Super Combined event the announcer said coming from the Downhill and racing the slalom was like racing a marathon and then coming back and racing a 100m.  Having been a ski racer I can tell you the Alpine ski disciplines are not as widespread as the 100m and Marathon.  In my opinion Slalom would be the 1000m, Giant Slalom the 1500m, Super G the 3000m and Downhill the 5000m.  With my theoretical match-up of equivalent events it’s very plausible for an athlete to be competitive in all four events.  At the same time many athletes only concentrate on two events because they cannot stretch from one end to the other.  Bernard Lagat is a good example of someone who can rip a 1000m and a 5000m, but no one is training for the 100m and the marathon. 

What if a big track meet set up a race where runners would have to compete in a 5000m and then a 1000m a few hours later?  They would have to come up with some sort of way to weigh both events equally and have an overall winner.  It would be pretty interesting.

I got some new NB spikes that I’m going to test out tomorrow and race with on Friday in Montreal.  After MTL 3000m I would like to race the 5000m at the Boston Indoor Games but I’m still waiting to hear if my agent can get me a spot on the line…