The mouse awakens, stretches out his little mousey legs, jumps on the wheel, and runs! GO MOUSE GO!
I am 5ft6in. 78kg.
Lower body: Quite large thighs and built lower legs. The result of many years playing sports requiring quick powerful use of type II fast twitch muscles, and trimmed down over many 5km runs.
Upper body: Meh. . Rubbish... quite literally rubbish.
Upper body: Meh. . Rubbish... quite literally rubbish.
Not exactly one who looks like a thin marathon runner who seemingly racks up vasts amounts of kilometers in a day with ease.
Yet last night, I decided to go for it and do 24km, today.
Having done 15km runs at the most, numerous 12km and vast amounts of 5-7km runs, this will be unpredictable.
I hate unpredictable.
However, as an experiment of the mind, I wish to test my observation, which I’ll now outline.
When you start a 6km run, you are prepared psychologically to face that challenge, this somehow translates physiologically as you complete the run without fuss, especially as you’ve done it many times.
There is what I call the one-third crisis. When you reach 1/3 of any distance you feel exhausted and psychologically feel that you cannot complete the distance. However, you remind yourself that this occurs every time, and every time you have indeed completed the distance.
The strange thing about the one-third crisis, is that it may come 2km in a 6km run, but you will fine at 2km in a 15km, because it comes at around 5km. Proving that it is, in fact, psychological.
I have 45mins until I depart, I feel physically a little tired, psychologically very nervous. I hate failing runs, however, in this occasion I will be happy with a finish anywhere beyond 12km.
I have had a big breakfast of baked beans on toast with vegemite, and a coffee. I will now take in 500ml of water and make a honey sandwich (the only sugary food I have in the pantry at the moment) and psych myself up.
To me, the awe-inspiring have always inspired awe. Stories of how human evolution hasn’t yet rid itself of the humans ability to conduct long-distance endurance physical activity, previously to hunt animals, motivate me.
There’s something deep inside that finds the image of any human, keeping a reasonable pace, constantly pursuing his/her dinner, waiting for the short-distance (very quick) creature to tire out after hours of travel, admirable.
My plan: landmarks. Get to the next one.
The hospital, halfway.
The university, 15km.
The lake, 19km.
Get to the next landmark.
This is no big accomplishment by any human, people run 20+km every day, today people even run ultramarathons up to and beyond 100km.
But this is not any human, this is me, genetics against me, body type against me, but psychologically completely for me, lets see how that weighs up.
*********2 and half hours later*************
24km, 3 more than a technical half-marathon.
There was no one-third crisis as described above, however, there was as described in the next sentence.
Instead of it occurring 1/3 into the race, it was probably there 1/3 the entire time!
Indeed, it made finishing all that more gratifying.
Now comes the 48hours of waddling around like a penguin following muscle atrophy.
On a more serious note, people often ask me why I care so much about Homeopathy, as it "does no harm to anyone and people CHOOSE" whether or not to take sugar pills laced with water (with no trace amounts of the ultra-diluted substances homeopaths will tell you are there). Well, tell that to Malaria and HIV/AIDS sufferers in remote African villages.
These people (http://www.homeopathswithoutborders-na.org/) are giving homeopathic remedies to HIV/AIDS victims in Africa and telling them that it will cure them. ... Sugar pills laced with WATER don't cure HIV/AIDS, in fact, denying them antiretroviral therapy in place of this is just plain manslaughter (and for those who KNOW that homeopathy is bullshit and continue to dish it out as treatment for disease, its murder). Malaria alone kills 1-3million people a year without the do-gooders making it worse by substituting proper medicine with bullshit in a pill.
On a happier note, big kuddos to all Egyptians who took to the streets to voice their anger at 30years of being pineappled over a barrel. Mubarak spent years keeping his people pinned down by an elaborate pyramid scheme (boom boom).
I hope the country thrives as a democracy in the future.
-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-
“Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it, you’d have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, its takes religion.”
– Steven Weinberg – Nobel Prize-winning American physicist.
A study in the UK a few weeks ago found that strippers who are ovulating earn at least twice as much as those that are at other stages of the menstrual cycle. Dr Chris Smith:
” Scientists have found that lower levels of oestrogen and higher levels of progesterone which occur towards the end of each monthly cycle can cause the vocal cords to swell slightly, and this can reduce voice pitch. And as lower pitched voices, studies have shown, tend to be rated as less attractive than higher voices, this could explain the effect.”
- - As heard on ABC Radio National – “The Science Show” 29Jan11
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/scienceshow/stories/2011/3124483.htm
