Running Shorts

Source: Cincinnati Enquirer archive - http://www2.cincinnati.com/blogs/running/category/100-footprints/ On Thanksgiving morning in 1908, 21 men took off from the Fort Thomas Central YMCA, winding their way through Northern Kentucky and across the Ohio River into Cincinnati. 18 men reached the finish outside the downtown YMCA at 7th and Walnut streets. The winner that year -- as he was for the next four installments -- was Lovell Draper, covering the approximately 7-mile course in 37:15 and winning by over three minutes. (For some perspective, in that 7-mile race, Draper's 10k split would have been about 33:00, which would have been good enough for 11th place in last year's race , out of 14,259 total finishers.) While some cities celebrate Thanksgiving with a parade of floats, balloons, and bands, Cincinnati celebrates the holiday with a parade of runners. This is the abridged story of a local tradition. Before I go any further, the astute reader might point out that,...

I'm not a cyclist. I'm not a cycling fan. I've never ridden in a cycling race, and I couldn't name many of the top cyclists in the world. I spent no more than $250 on a used road bike, which I use more for commuting than training. For 49 weeks out of the year, I could care less about cycling. But for the other three weeks, it's all I have on TV. The Tour de France is awesome, and NBC Sports Network's coverage of it is fantastic -- enough to make a fan out of me, at least for a few weeks. For four to five hours a day, for 21 straight days, they broadcast and cover each stage live. And you're telling me we can do the same thing for two-hour footraces only three times per year? (Chicago, New York, Boston) Here's what, to me, makes the Tour so compelling to watch: 1. The commentators are incredibly well researched and knowledgeable about the race course and the riders in the field. They know everyone and their results (and they let you know), not jus...

I'm just going to come out an say it: I don't think football players are that great of athletes. Or, to put it another way, I think the amount of athletic energy they expend playing a game is way overrated. Okay, I'm a runner; so I'm biased. But when I see a guy sucking air out of an oxygen mask after a play, what am I supposed to think? I ran a marathon and didn't need an oxygen mask. What I needed was a beer. Let me just get the token running-vs.-any-other-sport argument out of the way: no timeouts, no halftime, no substitutions, etc...we've all heard that before. But hear me out here on football specifically. An average game lasts 3 hours; only 1 of which is the play clock is running and people are actually playing. But if you figure an average play lasts 5-10 seconds, and the other 30 or so seconds on the play clock everyone is just standing around, what does that leave? On the football field, the players are actually moving (and isn't motion a pre...