Donald Buraglio and Michael Dove's Blog, page 31

March 20, 2011

Big Sur Marathon Re-Route; Book Review: Long May You Run

Admin note: two separate topics today, with no relation to each other except that the timing seemed right. Sometimes that's the way it goes.
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Over the weekend, a few people asked me to comment on a local breaking news item that's had ripple effects across the running community: the status of this year's Big Sur International Marathon.

If you haven't yet heard, here's the short version: the marathon normally traverses 26 miles of what's perhaps the most ruggedly beautiful stretch of road in the world on California's Highway 1. Unfortunately for runners and drivers alike, as of last week a 60-foot chunk of that road now sits in the Pacific Ocean after unexpectedly crashing down the face of a coastal cliff.

Highway 1 landslide; photo from AP
With the race less than 6 weeks away, the race committee had no choice but to come up with an alternate route, most likely a down and back affair starting from Carmel, similar to what was done in the wake of yet another landslide just before the event in 1998. Truthfully, with Highway 1, the surprise isn't that landslides happen frequently – it's that they can even maintain a road there at all. When people say this coastline is rugged and unpredictable, they mean it.

(For more details, this video from our local TV news station has good coverage of the landslide and its implications for the race.)

Almost immediately, discussion reached fever pitch on the marathon's Facebook page. Initially there was a fair amount of questioning about whether the race might offer refunds, as well as griping from folks who were disappointed to not do the "official" course, before cooler heads prevailed with the vast majority of people seemingly trying to make the best of it.

Since I'm not personally involved in this year's race, I'm not emotionally invested one way or the other, so I'll refrain from weighing in on what the right way to handle the situation should be. I do know what it's like to have your dream race go up in smoke at a moment's notice by the fickle hand of Mother Nature, and that feeling pretty much sucks. And for all those runners traveling here from very far away (including many from overseas) who have just found out that they'll only see half of the scenery they've heard so much about, I can definitely sympathize.

However, I know that if I had an option to do a full-length race using an alternate route that still included half of the original course when my goal race was cancelled 72 hours prior to start time, I would have jumped at the chance. I also happened to run the Big Sur Marathon in the one other modified course year, and the experience was as memorable and rewarding as any of my other BSIMs. The race board is a first-class organization that will do everything in their power to ensure that runners have the best experience possible under the circumstances. Whether that's enough to ultimately satisfy thousands of disappointed marathoners remains to be seen.

**

This winter I was contacted by Chris Cooper to do a review of his book, Long May You Run, which was published last October by Simon and Schuster. It actually turned out to be kind of a strange experience – because in reading Chris's background and going through his book, I was struck by a lot of similarities between the two of us.


Chris is a lifelong amateur runner with some pretty-good-but-not-fantastic accomplishments on his athletic resume. He's been a writer for many years and has a blog where he writes on a variety of running-related topics. His book is a collection of essays, stories, and observations generally written in a lighthearted tone with ample bits of humor thrown in. And every single one of those descriptions could just as easily apply to me.

So I was more than a little bit curious to see what his book had to offer. Long May You Run is an informative and well-researched overview of virtually every aspect of running you can think of. It's an extensive advice manual for new runners looking for ways to improve, energize or revamp their running. The format is such that it doesn't need to be read from start to finish; the 200 various subjects each stand alone as separate articles, so you can pick and choose subjects from the table of contents that look interesting and jump right in. The articles are also interspersed with snippets of training advice from 19 world-class runners that can be applied to everyday runners.

One main characteristic of Chris's writing is brevity: none of the articles here exceed three pages in length, and several are nothing more than lists such as favorite running songs or famous quotes about running. It's almost designed as a coffee table book that you can pick up and thumb through for a few minutes at a time until you eventually manage to see every page. His subject matter is historical – with brief profiles of many of the most famous runners through the years – as well as timely, even including a brief assessment of the barefoot running movement.

Taken on the whole, Long May You Run is a quick and easy read, and makes a very useful guide for beginning runners, with a few items that experienced runners may learn from as well. It retails for $16.39 from Amazon.com as well as other online vendors.


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Published on March 20, 2011 13:31

March 19, 2011

ZYM Tablet Winners; Random Shots of Beauty

Before our usual weekend photo, let's take care of business for the ZYM electrolyte tablet winners:

Mikey, Andy, and Captain Suburbia: E-mail me your address - you've each won a tube of ZYM Rival tablets. To everyone else: thanks for playing, and stay tuned for my GU Brew tablet review and giveaway within the next few weeks.

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In honor of the recent St. Patrick's holiday, I decided to make this weekend's offering a random shot of greenness:

(click to enlarge)
The hills of Toro Park, where I've been spending an awful lot of miles lately. This time of year, when winter rains turn the normally brown and yellow landscape into an emerald Eden, is probably the second prettiest season in Monterey County.

So what, you ask, is the first? That would be wildflower season, which is right around the corner.

It's a wonderful time to be an ultrarunner.


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Published on March 19, 2011 09:19

March 17, 2011

Mr. CLIFstone

Admin note: If you haven't done so already, there's still time to get in on my ZYM electrolyte tablet giveaway; leave a comment on that post to enter, and I'll announce three winners this weekend.
And now on to today's post ...

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"I used to do a little but a little wouldn't do it –
So the little got more and more and more –
I just keep trying to get a little better –
Said a little better than before."

- Guns 'N' Roses, "Mr Brownstone" (video after post)

A couple of weeks ago we were pleasantly surprised to find the following gift from our local Safeway store in our mailbox:

Inside were two samples of CLIF Builder's Bars, which I've reviewed here and have a great fondness for. The gesture would have been even nicer, if it weren't for another box that arrived at our house that same week:


A massive supply of Builder's Bars – as in 12 cases worth - purchased from the company in an attempt to keep pace with our rapid consumption. To say that my family is a fan of CLIF products is a tremendous understatement; more accurately, you could say our interest is bordering on obsessive.

Our predicament might fairly be considered the dark side of doing product reviews, because our fixation with nearly every one of the items we're now collectively hooked on started with reviews and giveaways on this website. Remember the ROKS review? They go in our kids lunches as a healthy protein snack. How about the BLOKS? They're a staple of our family hikes. The CRUNCH bars are also great lunchbox material, and CLIF C makes a healthy midday or post-dinner snack. And of course, there's the Builder's Bars, which are my wife's favorite portable breakfast when she's rushing out the door to drop off the kids before jumping into her own work day, and my preferred way of getting a midday protein boost without having to hunt down a deli sandwich.

As to why we buy these particular bars (Builder's) directly from the company – that's because our two favorite flavors are lemon and vanilla almond, neither of which are carried by our local stores (but trust me, I'm working on it). And in case you weren't yet convinced of our devotion to this company: what do you suppose we use to open all these CLIF boxes that come to our house?


Have I mentioned that we have a lot of CLIF items around our house? Or that my 9-year-old daughter wants to have her next birthday party at CLIF headquarters? Sometimes I wish I were making this stuff up.

Not to be overlooked in all of this, of course, is the product that started it all: original CLIF Bars, which continue to be my favorite items from the whole product line. I use them for post-workout nutrition if I'm away from home, and they're a favorite lunch item for my kids if we're traveling or spending all day outside the house on a hike or bike ride. They're also the products I use to share the CLIF love with lots of people around my community.


The storage compartment of my driver-side car door

Since the CLIF company makes so many charitable contributions, it seemed fitting for me to carry a stash of bars in my car and give them away to homeless people I encounter on street corners or in front of stores. This practice started as a whim, but has grown into a somewhat sizeable expense from month to month. We've even had the kids participate in making CLIF Bar distribution runs to our local homeless population. It's one of those situations where everybody wins.

Handing out CLIF bars makes sense on a lot of levels: I feel much better about giving healthy food away than I do giving money to people, and there's something rewarding about being used in the greater scheme of things to help provide daily bread for someone who needs it. From a practical standpoint, the bars are convenient enough to stuff in your pocket for later, have a weather-proof wrapper to keep them safe from the elements, and provide reasonable sustenance if you're not sure when your next meal will be. The fact that they taste pretty good is a nice bonus as well.

So yeah … it's no secret that we've gotten somewhat carried away with our CLIF infatuation, and that a little just doesn't do it for us anymore. But I'm also quite certain that our lives, and perhaps to some small extent the lives of those around us, are a little better than before we completely went off the deep end. (At least that's what I tell myself to justify all this.) And as I have further opportunities to review their products throughout the year, I'll be sure to share the love with my readers as well.

Finally, if my daughter somehow fulfills her dream and ends up working for CLIF one day, I'm pretty sure we can look back and say we know how it all started.

**

At first, the thought of a song that is mainly a tribute by a strung-out group of addicts to their favorite substance of choice seemed a little excessive here … but re-reading what I just wrote, maybe not so much.

Guns 'N' Roses, "Mr Brownstone", live at the Ritz (click to play):




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Published on March 17, 2011 13:59

March 15, 2011

ZYM Electrolyte Tablet Review and Giveaway

In the space of the past half-year or so, the market for fizzy electrolyte drinks has grown a lot more crowded.

Nuun more or less led the way in popularizing the idea of tablets that could be dissolved in water for portable electrolyte replenishment; more recently, Nathan developed a similar product that never seemed to gain widespread traction among endurance athletes. Then a couple of months ago I announced that GU Energy, one of the biggest names in sports nutrition, was jumping into the fray as well, with a product I'll be reviewing and giving away here shortly.

ZYM electrolyte tablets
In the meantime, I've also been testing a similar product that's seemingly flown under the radar - even though they've been around for a full five years - but from a performance standpoint is quite comparable to the big name entries. ZYM Electrolyte Tablets are a creation of Chicago-based BE Innovations, and comes in three different flavors, each of which has a slightly different formulation (as well as price points – more on that in a second). The brand also distinguishes itself by using all natural ingredients rather than the artificial sweeteners that some other companies use. All of their products are gluten-free and vegan-friendly for athletes with those dietary needs.

Like other electrolyte tablets, ZYM is formulated to be used in 16 to 20 oz of water, which is the standard size for most cycling-style bottles. It dissolves with effervescence and builds pressure from the inside of the bottle if it's not open to air on top, which also means that it will leak from bottles with an irregular seal. Its electrolyte balance is designed to quickly replace what your body sweats out – primarily sodium, potassium, calcium and magnesium, along with vitamins and herbal supplements to improve endurance performance. The tube cap has an internal desiccant to prevent moisture buildup in storage, and the entire tube is recyclable once you're finished with the 10 tablets inside.

Rival orange flavor
I've been testing the newest tablets, an orange flavor called Rival that is sweetened with stevia, a plant-based sugar substitute which has a negligible effect on blood glucose. There's a slight aftertaste – the website advertises a "clean finish with no aftertaste", but I disagree - but it generally tastes like your typical orange-flavored energy drinks. Each tablet has 7 calories, and provides 300mg sodium, 100mg potassium, and 150mg Vitamin C as well as an extract of Rhodiola rosea, an herbal supplement that is believed to reduce fatigue and improve mental alertness.

One confusing aspect of this product is that the three different ZYM tablets are all formulated differently, and have different price points from the company website. There's a lemon-lime formulation called Endurance, which is billed as a "pure hydration" tablet with slightly lower electrolyte levels, higher B6 levels, and no Rhodiola supplement. A pack of three 10-tablet tubes (30 tablets total) sells for $24. The berry flavor called Catapult features 100mg of caffeine from herbal Guarana as well as a super-dose of Vitamin B12 (500mcg), and retails for $27 for a three-pack. The Rival orange flavor that I tested sells for $30 for a three-pack. There's a page where you can compare the three flavors side by side before purchasing them from the ZYM website store.

At some point it would be interesting to see how the electrolyte tablets from various companies compare to each other nutritionally – and since I've already reviewed Nuun tabs and will be reviewing GU tablets later this spring, I suppose I'm the guy to put that kind of post together. Look for that comparison in the next several weeks – but in the meantime, a few of my readers will get to try out ZYM tablets to test for themselves.

The folks at ZYM have agreed to provide one tube of Rival tablets to three winners chosen at random from the comments section below. Leave a comment to enter, and I'll announce the winners this weekend. Thanks very much to ZYM for sponsoring this contest, and good luck to everybody!


*Product provided by BE Innovations
**See other product reviews on sidebar at right. If you have a product you'd like reviewed, contact me at info@runningandrambling.com.



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Published on March 15, 2011 17:24