October 5, 1987
Running Roundup
AUTUMN MEANS ROLLING HILLS AND REDWOODS
As the year tolls through autumn and toward winter, there is a cornucopia of running events offered to Northern Californians—everything from short, low-key neighborhood jaunts to national ultramarathons.
Two low-key events on the horizon are the Potrero 8K Scenic Scamper and the Valley View Run. Both come complete with something no runner should be without: hills.
The Potrero 8K is scheduled for 9 a.m. on October 10. The word “scamper” is the key to the intensity level. The race, now in its fifth year, is more a neighborhood celebration than a competition, and entrants are encouraged to run, jog, or walk the course that tours San Francisco’s Potrero area. The course has two hills, each billed as “slight.” Proceeds benefit the Potrero Hill Neighborhood House. The entry fee is $10, and should be sent to the Neighborhood House at 953 De Haro St., S.F. 94107.
Then there’s the Valley View Run at St. Helena, on the outskirts of Deer Park. The race is a 5 and 10K, with the longer distance runners doing two loops of the short course. Scheduled for November 8 (9 a.m. start), entry fee for the run is $10 for each run. Entry forms are available from Mike Foxworth, St. Helena Hospital, 650 Sanitarium Rd., Deer Park, CA 94576 or call 707-963-6467.
If you’re into something lighter, there’s Snoopy’s Young at Heart Run in Santa Rosa on October 25. The race benefits one of cartoonist Charles Schultz’s favorite causes, cardiac rehabilitation. For more information, write to Redwood Empire Ice Arena, 1667 W. Steele Lane, Santa Rosa 95401, 707-746-7147. The race features two distances: a 5K fun run that’s relatively flat, and a 7-mile loop with one “challenging grade.”
Autumn also is the time for one of Northern California’s most beautiful marathons.
The Humboldt Redwoods Marathon will be held next Sunday at the Dyersville Bridge just north of Weott. Entry fee before October 9 is $25, with late entry fee set at $30. For more information call 707-442-6464. A half-marathon is also offered.
The California International Marathon is scheduled for December 6 in Sacramento. The course runs from Folsom Dam to the Capitol Building, losing nearly 300 feet of altitude by the finish. The entry fee is $20, and entry forms are available from C.I.M., P.O. Box 161149, Sacramento CA 95816.
If the marathon distance isn’t enough, one of the best 24-hour track races in the nation is set for November 21—the Sri Chimnoy 24. The race will be held in Oakland, beginning at 8 a.m. For those interested in finding out how many times you can run around a track in 24 hours, send an SASE to S.C.M.T., 2438 16th Ave., SF 94116.
Recently two of NorCal’s longest-running short-course triathlons were held. The USTS NorCal stop, although formerly billed as “San Francisco,” had never been held within the county limits during its entire existence. This year it was held in San Jose.
Top pro male was Mike Pigg of Arcata, who finished in 2 hours, 6 minutes, 47 seconds. Top female pro was Kirsten Hanssen of Denver in 2:24:37. Walnut Creek’s Harold Robinson was second male finisher, Linda Buchanan was second female.
October 12, 1987
Fitness
SAN FRANCISCO AND BOSTON GET PHYSICAL
It was sone of those outrageous weekends New Englanders would gladly die for: a cloudless sky windswept free of pollution, temperature in the low 60s, gentle breezes.
On the Charles River, rowing teams from Harvard and Northeastern stroked gently downriver, then turned and pulled upriver. The paths on both sides of the river were lined with strollers, walkers, joggers, runner, bicyclists.
The park opposite Soldier Field was filled with families setting up Saturday morning picnics. Nearby parking lots were jammed with fans on their way to college football games. A feeling of health, fitness, and good spirits filled the air.
In Boston on business, and in need of a long run before the Humboldt Redwoods Marathon, I decided it would be difficult to order up a more perfect 20-miler.
As I ran down one side of the Charles and then up the other, the similarities between the Greater Boston Area and the San Francisco Bay Area asserted themselves as they do every Boston trip.
With San Francisco’s current mania for lining up sister cities, it occurred to me that we don’t necessarily have to look to foreign countries for sister cities. What’s wrong with sister cities separated by a continent and three time zones?
Many of the similarities between Boston and San Francisco are readily apparent: they are similar in size (both about 45 square miles, in populations around 700,000), they are very “walkable” cities, both have a high stake in “high tech” (our Silicon Valley, their Rt. 128), both boast famous universities that are not located in downtown proper (Boston has Harvard and MIT, San Francisco has Berkeley and Stanford).
Both are port cities and are located on natural bays, and both feature distinctive urban parklands: the Boston Commons and Public Gardens in Boston and Golden Gate Park in SF. Boston has its Freedom Trail, SF has its 49-mile scenic drive.
Both have long histories in running and in athletic clubs. The Boston Marathon is the longest-running regularly-scheduled distance running event in the country. Hot on its heels are San Francisco’s Bay-to-Breakers and Marin’s Dipsea. Both cities boast their own “ancient marathoner”: we have Walt Stack, they have John Kelley the Elder.
San Francisco doesn’t boast anyone as famous in long-distance running as Boston’s Bill Rodgers, but “Boston Billy” is actually a transplant from Connecticut and not a Boston native.
But then Boston doesn’t have anyone as competent at the Western State 100 as the Bay Area’s Doug Latimer, publisher of Women Sports & Fitness magazine.
So, hey, let’s look into pitching Boston as our sister city. Besides everything else we have in common, we almost speak the same language. Almost.
October 19, 1987
Swimming
STROKKNG TO VICTORY OVER WATER
A phobia is an exaggerated and often disabling fear, usually inexplicable to the victim.
Hydrophobia is one of the most dogged phobias, considering the fact that water is the most common element on Earth. Three-quarters of the world’s surface is composed of water. Water comprises some 60 percent of our bodies. Man can survive for a month without food, but only several days without water.
The most common form of hydrophobia prevents individuals from learning to swim. The more serious forms make taking a shower a teeth-grinding ordeal for some people.
Statistically, about half of Americans can swim. The other half either never learned or have avoided water because petrifies them.
In view of this, it is surprising that few swim courses are designed for the person who is afraid of water.
During the past couple of years, however, Berkeley’s Melon Dash (“Melon” from a childhood contraction of Mary Ellen) has made great strokes in coupling water with those fearful of it in a program called Swimming for Adults Afraid of Water.
The program has been a tremendous help to some 400 former hydrophobics.
Melon’s idea for the course came from a similar course she offered some years ago in New Hampshire. As then, teaching the course provides a path to help people on a one-to-one basis, a career goal Melon’s nurtured for years.
“I don’t think it’s enough to merely teach someone to swim,” said Melon, during a break between the classes at a pool in Palo Alto. “I want people to have fun in the water, and I want them to learn something about themselves from the course that they carry over into their daily lives.”
Melon’s students come from all walks of life, but they are generally people in their 40s and 50s whose fear of water is deeply mired.
“In most cases I’ve found that people afraid of water fall into two categories,” Melon said. “They have either had one or more frightening experiences associated with water when they were young, or they had parents whose own fear of water was transmitted to their children through over-protectiveness.”
Melon’s classes are usually limited to 12 students. This allows her more time with each student.
Several distinct features differentiate her classes from the typical learn-to-swim class. First, students are not forced to progress too fast. Melon finds this allows them to learn faster than they would in a more structured class. Secondly, classes are divided into classroom sessions which are followed by in-the-water sessions. Lastly, as the instructor, Melon actually gets into the pool and teaches from the water, instead of from the side of the pool.
The fact that Melon gets into the water was a significant turning point for 47-year-old Carmen Ochoa.
Ochoa is a former Contra Costa County court clerk who cites learning to swim as something she’d always wanted to do. “She taught so differently from instructors I’d had before,” Ochoa said. “I had instructors who would not get into the water. Melon joined you in the water and you immediately felt more comfortable. She made you feel how the water felt. We never did anything wrong—she never said we did anything wrong. Whatever we did was all right.”
Ochoa’s fear of water came when she was 4 years old. She and her family lived near Sacramento, where a creek ran behind their house. One day she stood on the wooden bridge over the creek, looking into the water, and suddenly tumbled in. The creek carried her downstream, where her hair became snagged on a tree that had fallen into the water, saving her from being swept away. She was traumatized.
Another recent graduate of the program is Marty Bateman, a 26-year-old auto mechanic, who came to San Francisco two years ago from Minneapolis. Bateman has skydived, “just for the thrill of doing it,” but water has always intimidated him.
“When I was pretty young, up until the 5th grade,” Bateman said, “I went in the water a lot, and swam underwater and had fun. In about the 5th grade, though, older kids would come along and hold me under. I developed a fear of being in water, whenever I couldn’t touch the bottom.”
Bateman reports Dash’s classes begin like a group therapy meeting. Students sit in a circle and talk about their fears of water. Getting the fears out in the open makes it easier to deal with them.
“We were so tense the first night,” Bateman recalled. “Some of us compared notes and found we were having trouble breathing, even though we were only standing in the water up to our waists. She taught us to relax and experience the water.”
Melon encourages students to try and sit on the bottom of the pool. The lesson: because of air trapped in the lungs and physical buoyancy, it is impossible to stay underwater, which surprised students fearful of sinking to the bottom and staying there.
She later shows them it is possible to sit on the bottom only if you expel most of the air from your lungs, a prospect that sends chills down the backs of students in even the most heated pools.
Near the end of his course, Bateman asked Melon to show him how to stay on the bottom. “I sat on the bottom and looked around at things,” he recalled. “I knew what it feels like to be Superman.”
(Melon Dash’s winter classes are scheduled for Berkeley High School, Tuesday and Thursday evenings, 7:30-9:30, Nov. 3-Dec 15. The Albany Pool, Tuesday and Thursday evenings, 5:30-7:30, Nov. 3-Dec. 15, and Monday and Wednesday, 10:15-noon, Nov. 2-Dec. 14. The course costs $325; the phone number is 415-644-0180.)
October 26, 1987
Fitness
NORDIC SKIING—A SUPPLEMENT TO RUNNING
Frank Shorter does it. Ingrid Kristiansen and Grete Waitz do it. So do Jacqueline Gareau and Dick Beardsley.
And all of them claim that cross-country skiing makes them better runners. What benefits can cross-country skiing provide recreational runners?
# Increased upper body strength. The typical runner is notoriously weak in the upper body. A strong upper body can benefit the runner by providing additional driving force on uphills while also providing propulsion and lift in the latter stages of a long race when the legs begin to tire.
# Injury prevention. Runners who run all year without backing off tend to suffer more injuries. The muscles, joints, and tendons can sustain only so much jarring before they begin suffering from too much of the same type of use. Cross-country skiing, with its gliding motion, maintains—and even improves—muscle tone, while giving the body a vacation from accumulated impact. Damaged muscles and joints can heal and come back stronger.
# Increased flexibility. Because cross-country skiing consists of a stretch and glide motion, it promotes stretching of the big muscles in the legs (which in turn promotes a smoother, stronger stride in running), and also stretching the muscles in the trunk and the arms.
# Exercise alternative for injured runners. Because there is no jarring involved in cross-country skiing, runners can use the sport to maintain, and even improve, cardiovascular fitness while injured. More running coaches are suggesting cross-country skiing as an alternative for their injured runners.
The relationship between running and cross-country skiing has been acknowledged for some time. The aerobic benefits are similar, the techniques are not dissimilar, and it is not uncommon for a good portion of cross-country skiers to be runners in the summer and bice-versa.
Dick Mansfield, a master runner and cross-country skier from News York State, has brought two of his loves together in a very easy-to-follow, comprehensive book titled “Runner’s Guide to Cross-Country Skiing” ($10.95 at bookstores, ski shops, or from Acorn Publishing, Box 7067-9T, Syracuse, NY 13261).
The book points out the parallels between the two sports, famous runners who regularly use cross-country skiing as part of their training, the benefits of cross-country skiing can provide the runner, and how the transition can be made to cross-country skiing in the winter and then back to running in the spring.
There is a wealth of information on equipment and technique, training for cross-country, and even how to get involved in Nordic races, including marathon-length events.
For many runners who live in locales where they are forced to face winter snowstorms, Nordic skiing is almost a necessity if one is to stay in shape. Runners should explore the obvious benefits of cross-country skiing. Dick Mansfield’s book is an excellent introduction and guide to that option.