Training

When I was considering taking up karate, one of the things I told Sensei Laurie was that I was not looking to train to compete. I did not want to be fighting with someone. I didn't want to train with the intention of hurting someone. I just wanted to be able to feel the ability to protect myself if I had to and to learn the Martial Way.

Before I started karate, training was something I did by myself. When I started out in my fitness program, I trained by working out with my Bowflex and on my treadmill. I never considered anything in the way of group training. For some reason, training was something I kept to myself and did on my own. I think I was hiding from others and to some degree, myself. At that time, weighing almost 300 pounds, I felt embarrassed to go into a fitness store to look at workout gear or equipment. I bought my Bowflex online and our first treadmill from Canadian Tire.

I confess I still don't understand why I felt the way I did back then. Maybe it was like admitting in public to the fact that I was in poor condition. I was demeaning myself by this admission. It was a tough thing for me to get over. Maybe get past is a more accurate way to put it. So I hid in my basement, working out on my Bowflex and walking more than running on my treadmill.

It has been over three years now since I started out on that treadmill and two years since starting karate at Sakura Martial Arts Academy. Training is now such an important part of my life, I just couldn't imagine going without it.

On weekdays, because of work hours, my morning starts very early. I am up at about 4:50 a.m. I head for the basement and start my day with a light 20 minute workout that consists mostly of stretches along with knee, hip and abdominal exercises. By 5:20 I am on the road on my way into work. I have considered doing a bit of running during my lunch break but instead, I have chosen to use this time to lose myself in a good book for a few minutes. A little bit of escapism you could say.

When my working day ends, I am on my way home, or running whatever little errands need to be run before heading home. As soon as I am home, I change into my running gear and I am out on the road, rain or shine. Mondays and Wednesdays are karate nights so on those night my run is a bit shorter.

On weekends, or at least normal weekends (I sometimes find myself spending my Saturday at work) I don't get up so early. Sometimes, depending on how the week has gone (and whether or not I stayed up late to watch a movie) I will sleep in to 10:00. This is followed by my long run, 15K minimum, depending on what I am training for at the time.

These days I just can't imagine not training for something even though training doesn't always go as planned. Recently I had to miss participating in a Gasshuku (a gathering of Karateka for a tournament and seminars) because of obligations at work and most recently, I was quite sure I was going to be put out of my half marathon race at the Ottawa race weekend because I re-injured my knee again, but I believe I am going to be ready anyway. I just have to accept these little challenges and setbacks and move on. Sometimes it can be very frustrating and sometimes even a bit scary, but what real choice is there? You can just stop and hide or choose the best path you can and progress as best as you can.

Participating in karate tournaments and races is not what I train for. I have done both and enjoyed the experience. When participating in a karate tournament, I know no I am not there to participate in a fight, I am there to learn. At the dojo when we practice sparring, we sometimes go at it pretty hard. But I know my opponent isn't there to knock me to the floor, he or she is there to teach me. It is safe, and under these circumstances, it is quite a bit of fun. I participated in a practice sparring bout with Senpai Julie recently. Julie is a second degree black belt. We went at it for about 3 minutes. At the end of those 3 minutes I was ready to drop to the floor. If points were being counted, I am sure it would have been something like 20 to 1 for Julie. If the match had been real, I would have been on the floor to stay in a couple of seconds. As it was, I learned and I really enjoyed the experience. I have the opportunity to train with some very skilled people who know how to train, who know how to make you work for it. It's a great experience and an incredible workout.

This type of training with my karate has shown me how much a person can learn when training with others. There is just no substitute for having someone share their knowledge and experience with you. Not to mention the camaraderie of working really hard with a group of people who are doing the same thing. When I finish a karate class, I always go away feeling like I have accomplished something, feeling like I just shared part of myself with a group of like-minded people who are interested. It keeps me coming back for more as often as I can.

When I am in a race, I am not there to beat the guy next to me, I'm not there to walk away with a big trophy (not that this will happen). I'm there for the experience. At the Army Run last year there were over 10,000 people lined up at the starting line. People of all different levels of ability. People in specially designed wheel chairs. People of all different ages. The feeling of standing there among this throng of humanity and surging across the starting line was a real rush. Running through the streets of Ottawa, past the Parliament Buildings, down the Parkway with all of these people around you. WOW!

As I work on this post, I am one week away from the Ottawa race weekend. I am nervous, a bit apprehensive but also looking forward to the challenge. I have trained hard for this. I have had to do quite a few of my training runs at night after getting home from a long day at work. I have completely missed a few training runs along with a few karate classes because of other commitments. I have had to deal with injury again and again. But I have learned from it. Sometimes not right away. Sometimes it takes going through the emotional reaction before I can see the lesson to be learned, but once I can calm myself down, I can usually see the lesson.

At this point my main focus is to be healthy and ready for this next big race. If I can cross the finish line in reasonable condition - as in not in pain - I will start upping my training and target a full marathon for this year. Right now I am looking at the Prince Edward County marathon in October. Of course there is the Iaido seminar in June I hope to attend and I am working hard at my kata practice for my karate.

So it never ends. Training has become a way of life for me. I may be very late coming to it, but nevertheless, here I am. All I need is a little more time (there's that word again) to get it all in and to spend some quiet nights looking through my telescope at worlds far away in time and distance. I wonder how they deal with training issues?

Tunnel of Stars

For the last few months I have been very involved in big project at work. As things get closer and closer to our deadline for the project, I find myself working some very long days. This has caused me to miss a few karate classes and it makes it very hard to get my runs in. The job is very interesting and I am working with a great team of people but

I need to do what I can for myself as well.

A couple of days ago I got home just after 9:00 p.m. It had been a very long and very busy day. I was taking my breaks out on the production line, lunch was get-a-bite-when-you-can and dinner was going to be just before bedtime. Not that healthy, I know. That night I just had to go out and run. Why not? I had run in the dark a number of times during the winter, including being out on the road New Years Eve at midnight to bring in the new year. But this would be different.

The night was warm and humid. There was a strong southerly breeze blowing, the moon had still not risen but the sky was clear. So as soon as I came in the door, I changed into my running gear which included my reflective vest, my hat light and a red flashing light I wear on the back of my vest. In 15 minutes, I was geared up and heading for the door.

As soon as I was outside, I did my usual thing, I started up my Garmin watch and turned on my iPod. I thought I would listen to some old-time jazz for this run. I walked down to the end of my driveway, turned on my lights and headed down the road.

It didn't take long for me to realize just how dark it was. To compound this, the stiff breeze that was blowing was kicking up dust along the dirt road. My vision was not only limited by this little LED light on my cap, it was confounded by all the dust in the air. My eyes kept trying to focus on the dust particles that were right it front of me, glowing from the light on my cap. I could hardly even see my feet, never mind the road. But that wasn't going to stop me that night. I needed that run. Just 5K. It would feel good.

As I progressed, my eyes started to adjust to the conditions. After about 1.5 kilometres, I turned onto the paved road. The dust seemed to dissipate. My vision was getting clearer. At least I could see my feet and see the road under them reasonably well.

At 2 kilometres I began to feel a bit like I was running in a tunnel. The bush on both sides of the road was fairly thick but now it seemed like the walls of a tunnel. I looked up and saw that the tunnel had a beautiful starlit ceiling.

At this point, I thought there was no point in listening to my iPod. It was beginning to seem like a distraction, so I turned it off. I was just coming up to a spot along the road where there is small marsh. I could hardly believe my ears. The din from who-knows-how-many frogs filled the air. It seemed almost deafening. I was tempted to hold my hands over my ears. It was amazing. How many frogs could there possibly be in that little patch of wetland?

As I continued on and went around a turn, just about all of the meager light in the sky was gone. There are very few streetlights out here; during this run I would pass only two. To compound this, at this time of year there is no snow to reflect and spread any of what little light there was. Now, no snow and no moon, no streetlight, no light. The ground around me just seemed to absorb even the light from my LED cap light. I turned off my cap light for just a couple of steps to see what it would look like. Total darkness.

I pictured this section of road in the daytime. Yes, no wonder it seemed so dark now. The road was almost completely canopied by trees. The only light left in the world was coming from that little LED light on my hat. Nothing else. But then I heard something moving towards me from behind. It was moving fast, very fast. It was the sound of the wind coming up to catch me. It rushed around me in waves. What an amazing sound. No doubt I have heard it many times before, probably in this very spot. It just had never been amplified like that by my diminished sense of sight.

I continued around the curve and the tree-tops separated. There at the top of hill I could see the stars again. And about half way up in the sky was Mars, a beautiful little red-orange pinprick in the sky. I am an amateur astronomer so this scene just kind of jumped out at me. As I approached the top of hill, the sky just unfolded in all its beauty right there in front of me. It made me wish I could have run with binoculars. Wouldn't that have looked silly? Not that there is anyone out and about to see me.

It was about this time I noticed my Garmin vibrating. I looked down at my watch and had to shake myself a bit. I looked around at where I was and realized I was now just over 4K out on my 5K run. What the heck, I was enjoying the run and the next K would be open to the sky as well. So I looked up at Mars and kept going for another kilometre before starting back.

As soon as I turned around, there in the sky to my left was the constellation Orion and just off to the right was the brightest star in the sky. Not really a star though, it was Venus. Quite beautiful. The skies up where we live are very dark and on clear nights like this, it can be breathtaking.

As I continued back, I went back down into the area that was heavily treed. The stars began to disappear as the walls of the tunnel came back up. The other senses seemed to take over. Again, I could hear the onrush of the wind coming toword me in waves like giant waves of an ocean. The sound of frogs and insects was everywhere. It was so different from when I had run at night in the winter. There was so much life all around me, not just the sound of crunching snow and ice. At this point I was very aware of the fact that all my senses had turned on and were working. I felt like I could almost feel my surroundings because I could see very little of them.

With less than 2K to go before I reached my driveway, another sense was trying to show me somthing. There was an odour that came at me with such force. It was strong and foul like something rotting. What was it? It was so strong that it was alarming. Why hadn't I noticed this on my way out? I couldn't figure it out, I just knew I would be glad to outrun that smell. On my daytime run the following day I looked for the source of it and easily found it. There in a ditch was a dead porcupine. It looked like it was killed some time ago and certainly smelled like it.

I don't too often run without all the little bells and whistles I like to have with me and I doubt I will become a minimalist runner. I like my toys too much for that. But it was quite an enjoyable experience to be out there in the dark surrounded by the life - and death - of the area I call home. It totally cleared my mind and let me focus on the here and now and enjoy the simplicity of it. I will do this night running thing again.

Running Scared

It has been eight months now since my first (and so far, my only) half marathon. At the end of that race, I did cross the finish line running, I even beat my projected time by 12 minutes. But because of the extreme pain I was in, it took everything I had to actually be running when I crossed that finish line. My knees felt like they were ready to give out any second.

Right after I crossed the finish line I found myself caught up in the crush of people who had crossed just before me. I had to walk around the outside of this little park carried forward by the crush of people making their way out of the area.  I felt like I was going to fall to the ground any second. When I finally got to a spot where I could sit down, I collapsed. After lying there for about 20 minutes, it was all I could do to get back to my feet and hobble out of the rest area.

My injured knees affected my running and my karate for at least six months after this race. It was extremely frustrating. Part of the frustration came from the fact that I felt I was well-prepared and ready for that race. I had actually run 20K three times that summer before the race. I felt quite sure I could do it. My main challenge was going to be achieving a time that I would be happy with.

Now here I am again, only a few weeks away from my next official half marathon race, the Ottawa Race Weekend, and I am running scared. My preparation has been carefully thought out. My training program has been going well; I am actually a bit ahead of my plan. I have been seeing a sports medicine specialist and she tells me that I am ready. My knee x-rays show some arthritis but nothing else. So everything physical looks good. Now I need to deal with the mental aspect of it.

As the race gets closer, I find myself almost looking for something to wrong. At karate class, standing in shikodachi, I find myself examining every little muscle twitch. During any of my runs I am hyper alert about how my knees and hips feel. Every time I feel anything I find myself almost holding my breath for a heartbeat or two thinking, am I about to drop to the ground? So far, not yet.

I guess my biggest fear is doing something to myself that will stop or even end all of my training. I work very hard at my karate training and I am now slowly getting back into Iaido, and of course my running - I love the simplicity of it. A long run is like an out of body experience. There are days that I just can't get home fast enough to jump into my running gear and get out on the road, to just leave everything else behind, hit the road and let it clear my mind. On my short runs I usually listen to music. Lately, on my long runs, I listen to audio books. But sometimes I don't even hear them, I just run and unwind.

This past Saturday, I went into the dojo early, donned my new training gear for Iaido, spent time swinging a sword, changed into my karate gi and spent an hour training and practicing my kata, then went home, changed into my running gear, downloaded a new book on my iPod and spent two hours on the road. It was a GREAT day. I don't want to lose this by injuring myself. But, I also don't want to give up on the challenge of the race.

Yes, I am scared by it. Am I going to do it? Yes. I have signed up for two half marathons this year and I even have dreams of running a full marathon. Crazy, I know but I have to do this.

First, I wanted to be able to call myself a runner and now I am. Next, I want to be able to call myself a marathon runner. Eventually, I want to be able to look at myself as a black belt marathon runner. What is wrong with that? When I lay it all out, it seems both a bit crazy and at the same time achievable.

I am 56 years old this year. I know I started late into this kind of thing. I am not sure in my own mind if I am pushing harder than I should to try and make up for lost and wasted time (there's that word again, TIME) or if I am just looking for the next challenge. At any rate, the result right now is that I am running scared.

I need to make it through this next race, healthy. I need this badly. So, scared or not, here I go, once more into the breech!

TIME

One of my least liked terms has to do with time. Time is precious. It only happens once and that's it. You can't get it back and you can't change it. So when someone says to me "make the time" I just want to scream! It is not possible.  Yes, we need to make the best use of the time we have but that is it. Nothing left to do. The time has passed. If only I could 'make time' or go back and change time. Man, the things I would do differently and things I would have time to do in the first place that I just couldn't find the for. But alas, this can not be done. (At least not in our time). 

Time and experience are the greatest teachers. Hopefully, we have learned by what we have done in the past. If you could go back and redo something you had done wrong, you then loose the lesson you learned from the experience and quite probably end up doing that wrong thing anyway. Now wasn't that a waste of time.

The challenge is to make the best of the time we have. How do you do that? We don't have a crystal ball to look into future to show us what the best way is. We just have to make the best choices we can and deal with it. No we can't make time, we can't go back and change time, we can't even slow it down. Time is time.

We do tend to measure so many things by time. For someone like myself, a person very time aware, the clock measures life it self. Weather we are successful or not all boils down to time, or maybe not.

I have been trying to free myself a bit from that yoke I wear on my wrist. I have taken it off, even at work. About the only time I have a watch on anymore is when I am running. Maybe that is a mistake as well.

Recently I participated in my first running race of the season. The running club I belong to put it on. It was a 5K prediction race. You won by being the closest to your predicted time for the race. You were not allowed to carry a watch. I put in an estimated time for myself of 31:15.

Come race day, I had decided that I wasn't really going to worry about the time. I am the photographer for our running club so I decided that I was going to concentrate on getting photos and video clips during the race while participating in it. I stopped a number of times, I spent time running backwards, I slowed a certain points to get what looked like good shots. I didn't really worry about making time until the last 1.5K. At that point I thought I should get a little more into the race part and start running.

When I crossed the finish line I was very surprised to see that my time was 30:33! This is actually my best time for 5K so far this year. How the heck did that happen?? Maybe I should leave the watch behind more often. Don't know if I can go that far.

I have decided that time is what we make of it. Sometimes we need to be aware of it. People may be counting on you being somewhere at a specific time or having something ready to go at a set time. But maybe, just sometimes, it doesn't matter. Time will happen no mater what we do. And maybe sometimes we just need to let it happen and let the chips fall where they may.

Milestones, Reflections & Resolutions

This  year has had a bit of a rough start. I set a few resolutions that I am going to keep but first I have to make some changes.

So far this year I have been running along on the edge of overload. I think what has been happening is that I had such a good year last year and was so pleased about what I had accomplished that I have piled it on a little too deep at the start of this year. There is much that I want to do but only so much time. It is time to make some tough choices and make sure what is in my plan is achievable. I want to challenge myself but it needs to make sense.

Karate is my primary focus for health and fitness. I found that through the end of last year and the start of this year, I have been so busy that I have not been allocating the proper time to practice. This needs to change. To help facilitate this, I have made a couple of small changes to the home dojo. I sold my old Bowflex. It is a great machine but my training needs are getting more focused and the Bowflex did not fit in as well as it used to, plus it requires quite a bit of room. Next, I purchased a free-standing heavy bag. This has worked out very nicely so far. There are a lot of techniques I can work on with the heavy bag.

Iaido is something that I have had to cut way back on. I have felt very guilty about this. I really enjoy this form of martial arts. Something about swinging around a big sword that gives you a real feeling of empowerment. It is not my intent to quit Iaido altogether but it will be relegated to the occasion of when I have time and I am not going to feel guilty about it.

Back in May of 2011 I got fairly serious about my running and started to log my runs. I set a goal of logging 1,000 kilometers before the end of the year. By the end of December I had logged 1,017 kilometers.

Running has become a very big thing to me. I have found that the added fitness I get from my running has helped me feel more balanced (literally) in my karate and, sometimes at the end of a hard day at work, it just feels good to come home, pull on the running shoes and go out and beat the pavement.

I have some serious goals to achieve in my running. I feel healthy now. I think I have a handle on the knee issues I have been dealing with and I have pretty much recovered from a number of small injuries. I have set up a schedule to get me to my goal. It is workable and will be stuck to.

I have not been doing as much blogging as I would like to. Blogging seems to have a way of helping me see through the things that are sometimes a bit cloudy. When I write it down, it comes clearer. It seems to be kind of therapeutic, so it only make sense to keep doing it.

Work has gotten really busy these days. It is not uncommon these days to get a phone call from work with them looking for me to come in and help them out or to fix something that I am very knowledgeable about. It had gotten to the point that I was feeling a bit resentful towards work for stealing my personal time. Work was just getting in the way of life.

Well, the truth is, work makes a lot of things I do in my life possible. I can afford to keep myself in good running shoes, I can purchase a good practice sword and I can wear a good quality gi. My wife and I have taken a number of month-long holidays touring Canada on our Gold Wing motorcycle. Tough to do these kinds of things without a good job. So, the truth of is, it is a good thing we are busy at work. The plant is doing well and I am secure in my job. Not much there to complain about.

My 55th birthday was this past October. Not a bad day at all. Did a 20K run that day. Felt pretty good to be this age and in the kind of condition I am now in. Birthdays aren’t such a scary thing. In the past, this was a signpost telling me I was not just getting older but getting slower and in worse health. I was having trouble just getting out of bed in the mornings. Especially on work days. These days, things are better. I have no more issues with birthdays. I have finally managed to just accept them as part of the process of being here. I want more, many more, so let's just work at that.

Reflections

A new year often means stopping to look back at the years that have gone by. For me this year, I am looking back through the three years I have been on my health and fitness journey. Sometimes I have a hard time seeing some of the changes I have made for myself. I have heard about people sometimes distorting their own self image. Blocking out the bad and seeing what they want to see. This was clearly the case for me. There have been times when I have said that I don't see myself any differently and I feel pretty much the same. Sara helped me with that by suggesting I go back through some of my older photos. I did this and it was a real eye opener! Truth is, I feel great.

2012

A new year and another step forward. At least that is the plan. We did something totally different for New Years Eve this year. It is called a Resolution Run. Along with making a few new resolutions for the year 2012 to emphasize our new way of life, we were out on the road RUNNING. It was just a 5K run but there we were, as the clocked ticked over to 2012, we were out there running in the new year.

Resolutions

It wasn't that many years ago that I made the ultimate cop-out resolution. That was to never make any more resolutions. Thank goodness I woke up and broke that one. Now I make a couple of resolutions every New Years Eve and then I do my best to live up to them. I have found that the trick to it is to challenge myself but to be realistic and set goals that are achievable. So what's on the list for this year?

Lose that last 10 pounds that I have been trying to ignore but just won't go away by itself.

Get into good enough shape to run a full marathon and then just do it. My target for this is some time in late August or September. I am hopeful that I will have my issues with my knees resolved by then.

Run two half marathons. I am starting my training for my first half marathon in May at the Ottawa Race Weekend. My second will be the Ottawa Army Run. This was my first half marathon run. I feel committed to this run because of what it stands for. I am very proud to be part of this and to know I am doing something to help our Armed Forces.

Earn my blue belt in karate. This is always a challenge. The farther up you get, the tougher it becomes and the harder you have to work at it. This means a lot to me. To continue to improve and advance in art is my first and primary passion when it comes to my fitness plan.

I think for 2012, that's a pretty good list. I have a number of other things I would like to achieve such as getting more work done toward remodeling the inside of our house and adding to the trails that I have been cutting on the property but I don't really think these things classify as resolutions. They're just targets or things I would like to continue to make progress on. Still, it does mean not standing still or getting attached to the couch for long periods of time. It just means getting out there and moving. Being part of life instead of being little more than an observer.

So here we go! Welcome to 2012!

3 years ago

Now

Christmas 2011

'Tis the season, again. Time to run around from crowded mall to crowded mall. Time to jump in the car and race down the highway, trying to beat the traffic to get to your dinner party. Time to spend money on gifts that you have no real idea as to whether the recipient has or wants. Time to celebrate the season! (if that is what you call Christmas).

If you read my post from last year, you will know that by and large, I am no real fan of Christmas. In my last post, I did say I would try harder to find Christmas, and I have been looking.

We were recently at a friend’s house for a Christmas party. There were lots of people, lots of food, lots of Christmas carolling and lots of fun. There was no pressure, no gifts to buy, no headaches. People just enjoyed each other’s company and having the chance to make new friends and catch up with old friends. That was a great Christmas party! Thank you, Roseanna and Derek.

I guess one of the things that really bugs me about Christmas is the gifts, the money we feel obligated to spend or you’re a Grinch. I think the closest thing I have seen to what I would consider an ideal Christmas is how I see the Americans celebrate Thanksgiving. There is no big need to buy expensive gifts, no panics at the mall, it is just families and friends getting together to share a meal and to be thankful for their many blessings.

Imagine how far it would go if we were to take just one-tenth of the money we spend on gifts and put it toward our favorite charity. A few years ago at Christmas time I set up a weekly donation that I make to a charity. I continue to do this. I felt really good about that. I felt it was a gift that mattered.

I don’t consider myself a Scrooge. I very much enjoy a Christmas party. I also like those little gift exchanges where you can’t spend more that 10 or 15 dollars and the gift is supposed to make the recipient smile or even laugh out loud or a small token to show how much you appreciate someone. You don’t have to go broke doing this. It is even a good feeling.

What about the kids? Christmas is supposed to be for the kids, or so I am told. I don’t argue that at all, but I do suggest that maybe this is where we have laid the groundwork for the money-focused holiday we have now. Yes, I want my kids to have good things, and yes, I did then, and continue now, to spend money on them every Christmas. But I have also tried to share with them my feelings about the commercialism of Christmas.

My daughter is almost finished her post-graduate degree and my son is working hard to advance himself in his career. This take lots of effort, lots of time and lots of money. I have asked both of them not to spend any money at all on Christmas presents for us. We will get together and enjoy the opportunity to spend some time together as a family.

One of the nicest and most thoughtful Christmas gifts I have every gotten was given to me last year by my daughter when she took the time and effort to MAKE me a Christmas card. I keep it on my desk and it makes me feel good every time I look at it. What more could you possibly ask for from a gift?

I don't consider myself a Grinch. I enjoy getting together with friends and family and Christmas can be a great time for that. I just don't think it needs to be based on what you managed to spend money on at the mall, or what someone else has gotten for you. I just think it should be about the time spent together.

So here's hoping you have a safe and happy Christmas!!