A blast from the past.

Wednesday, June 30, 2010

I received one of those calls the other day that reminds me why I keep helping high school runners try to get the most out of themselves…I mean besides the fact that I just love to do it.

It was Jim Vickers. Jim was a runner I’d started helping in his freshman year. As a sophomore, he qualified to the state meet, running 4:24 for 1,600 meters – one of the top sophomores in the state. His coach, however, did not like the fact that Jim was coming to me for off-season training programs and advice during the season. He told Jim that if he continued to ask for my help, he would be kicked off the team. Though I had never spoken to the coach, I felt that it would be best to stay away and for the next 8 years, I didn’t work with any high school athletes.

We hadn’t spoken in 16 years, but it was like we’d never stopped. After catching up on family, jobs and such, Jim got serious. “I should never have listened to the coach. I know I could have done better and maybe won a state championship if I’d stayed with you. I just don’t get what he had against you.”

I did. He was a new coach and had his way of doing things, which did not include acknowledging that I might be able to help the program. It bothered me, but what could I do? I was an unpaid volunteer – just a track junkie trying to help young runners achieve high school success. Jim had gone on to have great success at the college level, running for West Virginia and turning in 800 times in the 1:48’s – very respectable.

“Well…there’s this guy I work with who has a son who’s a freshman and I told him about how you had helped so many runners in the school back in my day and that, if I knew you, you’d still be doing it. Are you?”

Clearly…Jim is not reading my blog. He may be the only person. He should be now. “Yeah…hey…it was something just like this that got me started with Eric back in 1985. It would be cool to go back to the school where it all began. What’s the coaching situation over there now?”

“Same.”

We agreed to get together and I assured him I would help the son of his friend – as long as the son called and asked. I never want to work through parents figuring that if the motivation isn’t there for the athlete, then there’s no point. We’ll see what happens.

I decided on a ride for the workout. The last one had been slow and painful, but the weather was perfect, almost too cool and so I decided to push the pace a little to see how long I could go before the wheels started falling off.

They never did. I attacked hills over the entire 40-mile ride and felt good until the last 5 miles where my lack of bike conditioning started to catch up with me. Still, I finished 15 minutes faster than I had a week ago and think, like the running, it had much to do with the weather. The good news is it should hold for a couple of more days before returning to the dreadful heat and humidity of a more typical Cleveland summer. I’ll take what I can get.

Bike duration: 2 hours and 15 minutes.

Training Heart Rate: 125.

Calories burned during workout: 2025.