The Running Brothers Are Back!!!

Nov 142011
 

We took a long break from The Running Brothers because my new company, Welborn Social Media was keeping me extremely busy and my brother, Rocky has been busy as well.

A couple of weeks ago, we decided that this time we were going to train properly for a marathon. We asked our Twitter followers for the best free marathon training program and an overwhelming majority of people recommended Hal Higdon’s website – www.HalHigdon.com.

The program we chose was the Novice 2 program, an 18-week training program for the marathon.  I plan on following the program as closely as I can to the actual program.  My brother is also going to try and do the same. 

Our schedule this week is to run:

  • 3 miles on Tuesday
  • 5 miles on Wednesday
  • 3 miles on Thursday
  • 8 miles on Saturday

The Los Angeles Marathon is on March 18 this year, the day I turn 31.  This time around we are going to be much more diligent in our training and can’t wait to see what kind of results we can achieve.

San Luis Obispo Triathlon – The Swim

Aug 272011
 

Before I could get into the pool, I had to wait for another competitor to finish his swim.  His wife was his counter, meaning she was counting the amount of laps he had completed.  The second he finished his 18th lap, he sprung out of the pool, ripped off his goggles, threw them at his wife, and ran to the transition area.

With that, I lowered myself into the pool and put my goggles on.  I was ready.

One of my concerns coming into this race was knowing what to wear.  I looked around and saw a bunch of people in ridiculous looking triathlon gear.  Which was much smarter than what I had decided to wear.  I was wearing soccer shorts into the pool and that’s what I planned on wearing the entire race. 

I quickly realized this was probably not the best idea.

As I pushed off the ledge of the pool to start my first lap, my soccer shorts were pulled down from my pelvic area.  I was sure I was mooning everyone who had come to watch the swimmers swim.  Nothing like showing some ass crack to a group of strangers.  But, I continued on anways. 

Every few laps or so I found myself, pulling up my shorts, but other than that, everything was going smoothly.  I was keeping a strong steady pace and in comparison to the other competitor in my lane I was flying.  I was completing two laps for every one that she was completing. 

The swim felt good and, as my counter, my Dad was yelling out the lap numbers as I completed them, always telling me to pace myself.  I must have been hauling then, considering he was contuinually telling me to slow down, but I felt good. 

I heard my Dad yell “18” as I reached the edge of the pool.  For the last lap, I gave it all I had and pushed for my last lap in the pool.  I had plenty of energy and completed my swim powerfully.  I hoisted myself out of the pool threw off my goggles and ran to the transition zone, ready to hop on my bike. 

 

 

 

My Brother Race – SLO Triathalon

Aug 012011
 

I was stuck to a bed in French Hospital and my brother was about to start the SLO Triathalon. I was going to missing my brothers Race. My sister managed to find an Application (Qik Video) for ourAndroid Smartphones which was like a video calling application and as my brother started the race I got an alert from my sister.

After acepting the alert I was pool side, hearing the  splashes and seeing my Brother completethe 36 laps in the pool. He was looking good and halling but especially when I compared him to his lane partner (an elderly lady with a good kick and medicore swimming form). To save her phones battery my sister said she would check in with me every so often as the race progressed.

It looked like such a wonderful day, I was stuck in a hospital bed and it was so great out. Zeb finished the swim and I got my next alert from Lacey. I watched Zeb on his first transition to the bike and watched him pedal off out of site to Orcutt Road.

Lacey’s phone died after that but Zeb looked good and I knew he would finish.

 After about an hour my Mom came into my room and told me my brother would be running infront of the hospital. I had an urge to get up and see if the staff would let me out the front door to watch him but, by the time I knew he was close it would have taking me a good 30 minutes to get disconnected from everything and out the front door. He passed the hospital and went on to finish the race.

He must have immediately crossed the finish line, loaded up his bike and came to the hospital. He was there very quickly with my whole family. He gave me his metal and I got to ask him about the race. He said it was tough and a lot more difficult than he expected, even slightly boring. I wish I could have ran with him to keep things more lively.

My brother did great and I am really proud of him.

Disaster Strikes the Running Brothers

Jul 312011
 

With less than 24 hours the start of the the SLO Triathalon where Rocky is going beat Zeb, Rocky is consummed with stomach pain.

After a few hours of resting with stomach pain and no fever the Running Brother Family meets and decides it would be best for me to see a doctor. My family is absolutely fantastic, they were all immediately on the phone trying to find a place for me to see a doctor without voiding my health insurance. Very quickly we determine their is no Kaiser on the Central Coast and French Hospital is the nearest facility for me to get a check and a quick dose of something to get me ready for my big race.

The CSPA workshop was having their 60 Anniversary gathering. Where my Dad and my number 1 hero was named to the organizations Hall of Fame.  My Dad, Brother and Sister go to the Anniversary and my mom and I are headed to French Hospital.

My mom and I walk into the ER doors and immediatly are talking to the check in desk folks and they immediatly get us to a bed, within 15 mins of walking in the doors our doctor was at talking to use and attempting to diagonis the problem.  He quickly orders a Cat Scan which is completed and sent to the Radiologist.

Within minutes we would have our answer and I was hoping to get a shot or parscription and be out of there. Unfortunently it was not my day… I had an appendicitis which required surgery. My race was over and hospital stay was going to be a lot longer than originally desired.

Fortunently for me the best doctor and anateialogist in the State were called in to perform my appendectomy. We had only walked into the doors about 3 hours before and they were wheeling me in to surgery. My brother, never being a person to miss a joke, gave me a, “if I never see you again….” joke. I was a little scared so while I laughed I didn’t paricularly appreciate it.

I schuffled over to the opposite table and before they could tell me all their names the sleepy doctor had  worked his magic. I was out. I came to in a completely different room and they were wheeling me to my overnight room where my family joined me, here is a picture of as they were wheeling me out of surgery:

My racing goals changed there: instead of beating my brother it was now to pass gas and pee as fast as possible to get out of there and watch my brother race.  I was told I could be out of the hospital the next day if everything went well.

Well everything did not go perfect for me. My body had a difficult time whipping back in to shape. I got the passing gas thing down, but hey needed me to urinate to show I was not retaining water. Either by body knew I was supposed to be swimming or it really liked that hospital water, my body retained water like a champ. After not being able to urninate on command the doctors decided to hold me one more day, which meant I would miss my brothers race.

The Running Brothers Movie Premier

Apr 112011
 

We premiered our first Running Brothers Movie and it was a smashing success.  The release of our movie is still a few days away, but the editing and sound in the film are award worthy and while the acting may be sub-par, the story line is killer.  If you want, you can check out our screen play to the movie in a previous post.  Although we did ad-lib from time to time, for the most part we kept to the script. 

We’re excited to show you all our film, but it’s going to take us a couple of days in preparation to make sure that everything goes off without a hitch.

Learning How to Cure Runner’s Knee

Apr 092011
 

Recently, completer of 14 marathons and our uncle, Steve Jaros wrote an article entitled, “How to Cure Runner’s Knee.”  We asked him to write this article because after running my first half-marathon, my knee’s were killing me.  I knew that I would have to do something to insure that a similar situation didn’t arise again in the future.

I want to highlight the tips that he recommended so that it will help to reinforce myself in becoming a more intelligent and less likely to be injured runner.  Uncle Steve says that any injury below the waste can be contributed to wearing the wrong shoes, which I find fascinating.  If that’s the case then I definitely need to get me some new shoes.

Increases in distances and pacing should be methodically planned out and that their is no need to push yourself in training as over-enthusiasm often leads to injury.  I can definitely say that I was not ready to run the half-marathon.  He also says it takes over 6 months to prepare for a marathon, I can say that I won’t be properly prepared for that either.  Unfortunately, my brother and I became “over-enthusiastic” and know we’ll probably be hurting as a result of it. 

The substance you run on does have an impact on your body.  According to Uncle Steve dirt paths and grass parks are better than macadam and macadam is better than concrete. 

Other good ideas would be to check leg-length discrepancies with a chiropracter; doing leg work-outs at appropriate intervals between slow-long distance workouts and speed workouts; checking your heart rate every morning (if your heart rate jumps significantly it’s a good indicator that you’re training too hard); and use ice and advil anytime you feel even the slightest pain in your body.

Thank you Uncle Steve Jaros for your tips on how to cure runner’s knee.  I need to do everything I can to make sure that my knees will be ready to complete our first marathon . . . in just 24 days.

Ironman Training Week #14

Apr 082011
 

Weekly Amount:

Running = 17 miles
Biking = 58 miles
Swimming = 4000 M or 2.5 miles
Total Amount: 77.5 miles

Overall Amount:

Running = 186 miles (56 miles to Las Vegas)
Biking = 592 miles (381 miles to Seattle)
Swimming = 53,200 meters or 36.7 miles (2.6 miles to Los Angeles)
Total = 812 miles (161 miles to Seattle)

Recommend Me Some Running Shoes

Apr 072011
 

Thanks to my Uncle’s article, I’ve come to the realization that I am going to need to invest in some proper running shoes and could use the advice of our heroes.  Do you have any types of shoes that you would like to recommend?  Do you have any tips to give when looking for running shoes?  Have any of you hear of A Snails Pace running store, http://www.asnailspace.net/?

Well, I think I will be going this week sometime to check out some running shoes.  Let me know what kind you would recommend.

The Running Brothers’ Top 9 Posts of March

Apr 022011
 
  1. How to Cure Runner’s Knee – An article by Steve Jaros about how to cure runner’s knee.  Steve Jaros has over 50 years of running experience and has completed 14 marathons.  Steve also happens to be our Uncle.  http://runningbrothers.com/789/how-to-cure-runners-knee-by-steve-jaros/
  2. The Running Brothers Movie – We’re making a movie!  Here about our exploits as we are writing, filming and creating our first movie.  http://runningbrothers.com/category/the-running-brothers-movie/
  3. The Post Race Blues – The Post Race Blues hit The Running Brothers hard after their first half marathon.  http://runningbrothers.com/859/the-post-race-blues/
  4. Los Alamitos’ Race on the Base – A series of articles dedicated to our experience at the 2011 Race on the Base.  http://runningbrothers.com/category/events/los-alamitos-race-on-the-base/
  5. Ironman Training – Follow Zeb as he trains for his first marathon.  Take some time to encourage him along the way.  http://runningbrothers.com/category/zeb/ironman-training/
  6. The Integrious Project – Our cousin Beau has his own website devoted to making Integrious a word in the dictionary.  Not only that, but he wants to have people think and act integriously.  Read our article about The Integrious Project. http://runningbrothers.com/875/the-integrious-project/
  7. March 18, My 30th Birthday.  On March 18, 2011, Zeb turned 30.  Find out how his birthday went in the following article.  http://runningbrothers.com/863/march-18-my-30th-birthday/
  8. My 30 Day Plan Until I’m 30.  I had a plan to get into the best shape of my life by the time I was 30.  It didn’t work out completely, but I did get in pretty good shape . . .  http://runningbrothers.com/category/zeb/30-day-plan-until-im-30/
  9. Partying or Training – My brother and I planned on getting some training in on our trip to Vegas for Michael Nunez’s bachelor party . . . How well do you think that worked out?  http://runningbrothers.com/845/partying-or-training/
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