Caveman Diet for Runners

My unhealthy breakfast (on left). Healthy caveman breakfast (right)

A remarkable number of my teammates have adopted the "caveman (Paleo) diet" in recent months, touting its fat utilization benefits for endurance events.  The idea is that you teach the body to use fat by adopting a high fat diet, and then during a race you rely less on carbohydrates. Reducing the body's reliance on carbohydrate stores will delay fatigue.  The other piece of this, which you are probably familiar with, is the argument that humans existed as hunter gatherers much longer than as farmers and we are more genetically adapted to the diets consumed during the paleolithic era.

So I am lectured about my high carbohydrate meals. My Paleo teammates criticized my choice of breakfast: “How can you eat that unhealthy, sugary, high carbohydrate breakfast of muesli, fruit and yogurt!  You should be eating bacon and sausage."

Really?

Granted the caveman diet does not seem totally unreasonable to me in general -- eating less processed food would be an improvement on all the breakfast cereal and sports bars I eat. Plus eating less calories is good for anyone, even me, a person not at all concerned about their weight.

But seriously, eating bacon (lots of bacon at that) is more healthy than eating fruit?

And eating this enormous quantity of bacon and sausages at a single meal is justified by the argument that cavemen would have gorged on a wild pig or woolly mammoth after hunting and killing it, implying that this is a natural and healthy pattern of eating?

Above is a shot of my teammate's caveman breakfast consisting of an order of bacon plus an order of sausage (one of several)  vs. my "less healthy" fruit/muesli breakfast.

Chiang Mai Half-Marathon

I return to defend my title in the Chiang Mai half marathon.  In 2011, I finished first overall in 1:22:00 on a 22k course.

I feel I am in about the same condition as a year ago, so a repeat victory would depend on what caliber of field materialized on race morning.  Sure enough, it took only minutes for a dozen guys to burst out ahead of me.  Within a kilometer the flashing lights of the lead pace car were far in the distance.  I run with teammate Arnaud and young Bangladeshi, Omar, and we overtake 7 of the guys by the 3k mark running 4-minute per kilometer pace.  At that point I decide to take a shot at the leaders - on the remote hope that they might fade.  I pick up the pace to around 3:50 and do manage to catch a couple other young guys, but at the halfway turnaround I see the 2 leaders are still light years ahead of me.  I manage to hang on for 3rd overall and 1st in 40-49 age group, in a time of 1:28:11 (for 22.6k course).

Here is Arnaud and I with trophies for 1st and 2nd in age group:


The Chiang Mai event is great fun and one I would recommend despite the organizer's continued indifference about the precise course measurement (an issue we bring up with the race director after the race, telling him that an accurately measured race would draw runners from all over South-East Asia seeking a PB in the cool weather on a flat course).  




This year the half marathon was primarily an excuse for low-budget backpack journey to Mae Hong Son for trekking (last year the race was an excuse to travel to Laos).  Very low budget as you can see from adjacent picture of our accommodations.



Also the trek is fine triathlon cross-training as you can see in this picture of me swimming in the waterfall near the Burmese border

Laguna Phuket Triathlon

I think it was the mango I received in my breakfast box that did it.  After waking up hungry and eating a few slices at 2am I felt queasy, and by 4am I was heaving into the hotel toilet.  When I threw up again at 5am I was doubting I could even walk to the starting line (let alone race).  But right around this time my mates, Jenny and Chris knocked on my room asking if I was ready to go and I felt for the moment that I had purged my system and was getting stronger.

However by the time we gathered on the beach for the swim start an hour later I felt nauseous and rushed into the bushes to throw up yet again and then used the toilets.  Again I felt slightly better afterwards.  I was debating in my mind whether to start the race.  Common sense suggested I go lie down and rest.  But I had come so far and the warm, clear Andaman Sea looked so beautiful and inviting at sunrise - perhaps I could just do the ocean half of the swim segment then drop out?  I was still undecided as my wave gathered for the start and I was surprised and unready when the gun went off.  I stood there frozen for the longest time trying to assess my condition to swim (throwing up in the water would be gross and disgusting and unpleasant, but drowning seemed improbable).  Suddenly the crowd of hundreds of supporters lining the beach-start noticed me standing there alone, the other 200 guys in my wave having already sprinted into the sea.  I must have looked like such a sad and pathetic figure—pale, shivering with cold, staring anxiously at the ocean—and I am sure they all presumed it was my first triathlon and I was absolutely paralyzed with fear and scared to death to enter the open water.  The spectators next to me erupted with shouting, trying to exhort me on: "you can do it!" "c'mon, it will be OK, you will make it".

In fact when I did then reluctantly trudge into the ocean and start swimming I felt better—somehow being vertical rather than horizontal seemed to help, the tropical water warmed me up, and my swim pace was so slow I was not exerting much effort (especially after catching a big slow guy who I drafted behind).  When the later wave in red swim caps started passing us I picked up the pace slightly, and decided to swim the lagoon swim section, but felt weak again during T1.  Again I tortured over whether to drop out or do some of the bike course.  I knew the first section of course would take us through spectacular scenery and I kept thinking about how I had dragged my damn bike on such a long, circuitous journey.  So after a languid 6 minute transition, I biked off after the stragglers.
A diligent bike marshal seemed to be constantly riding alongside me.  I found this terribly odd - 'who cares if people this far in the back of the pack are drafting?' I kept thinking, having already mentally dropped out of any "race" and still fully intending to DNF.

I have placed a high value on maintaining adequate nutrition/fueling before and during endurance events of this distance.  I am convinced that in previous events I bonked - failing to eat enough. Yet it is difficult to imagine I could have much less in my system than at this point on Sunday.  After throwing up 5 times and the several bouts of diarrhea, I must have been running completely on empty.  I did manage to ingest a single Espresso Love gel (of all things) on the bike.  I guess the gel helped.

Upon finishing the bike I decided I would jog/walk part of the run.  I ended up running all of the 12k run course in 57 minutes, which surprisingly was the 79th fastest run split on the day.

At the finish line, a friend rushed up to congratulate me and talk.  "Thanks.  I am going to be sick"  I replied.  I staggered away, desperately looking for a quiet out of the way spot.  But it was too late, my stomach was already convulsing and I could not wait.  The next thing in my path was a white tent.  Which turned out to be the medical tent.

Needless to say, throwing up on the medical tent is a good way to generate a great deal of immediate and concerned attention. An absolute army of staff descended upon me.  Doctors and nurses and people with stretchers and people with various medical apparatus. "Um, it was just a bit of bad fruit" I kept telling them.  But all the young Thai nurses were lovely.  And it was nice to get an IV - my appetite is only now really coming back as I write this two days later. One of the doctors suggested to me that generally in the future if one vomits so many times he would probably not recommend immediately doing a triathlon.

For what it is worth, my time was 3:47:10, placing me roughly in middle of pack.

2012 Run Mileage

Here is my 2012 run mileage chart from Running Ahead:

Wow, I really did not run much distance again in 2012. The 42k
marathon run during Ironman in July jumps out as a significant portion
on the bar chart.

So efforts to gradually increase mileage in 2013 is starting from a low base.

Taiwan

 I am impressed by Taiwan's network of bike paths. A local explains to me how the large domestic bike manufacturers (notably Giant) decided a few years ago that they shouldn't just be building bikes for export, and so these companies lobbyed the government to create the bike paths which has helped to fuel a huge boom in cycling within the country.

The adjacent picture is from David and I cycling a 70-km loop around the southern tip of the island on Sunday.  Then on Tuesday I cycled 80-km around the city of Taipei. I am amazed and delighted that all of my Taipei ride is on dedicated bike paths with the exception of three short stretches where I had to cycle with automobile traffic and one short stretch of path construction.  I recall my first visit to Taipei some 18 years ago when it seemed difficult to even walk a few blocks amidst broken, cluttered sidewalks and rivers of screaming traffic, let alone cycle for miles on smooth, unobstructed paths.

Saturday's ride at the Ironman 70.3 event was also enjoyable. But the triathlon run was simply a disaster. For reasons that I cannot begin to figure out I felt completely drained overall and my legs ached. I had been on pace to hit my goal times coming off the bike.  My total time at that point was about 2 hours 25 minutes.  I felt a little off in the T2 bike-to-run transition but assumed that, as always, I would start to gain strength after about 1km of running.  But then things just spiraled into darkness. I  could barely walk/run from 4k to 14km – my half-marathon run time was over 2 hours.

This was supposed to be my big "A" race for 2012.  I had diligently logged more training over the past few months including some strong brick sessions.  Plus I was coming off July's Ironman.   But I did much better last year (Vineman 70.3) off very little training (on a borrowed bike, and in worse conditions).

So naturally in the hours right after the race I can't help but wonder why on earth I am spending the epic amount of time, money and energy lugging my wetsuit and bike so far, riding for hours, and dealing with all the triathlon logistics. (In dramatic contrast to the easy glory and simplicity of the 10k run events of the previous two weekends -- see earlier posts below..).  

But on Sunday, cruising along those bike paths around the scenic southern tip of Taiwan, I remember how great it is to experience the world on a bicycle and why I don't just run 10k races.  

     

BBQ 10k

I capture a second glorious 10k triumph in consecutive weekends -- I win the Namban BBQ 10k in a time of 38:11 last Sunday.

It was a tactical race - I hang behind 3 other guys until 8k and then surge on the final turnaround.

My triathlon teammates are horrified that I am expending energy on what they deem frivolous events with my "A" race -- the Taiwan Half-Ironman -- coming up this Saturday.  I had been concerned about this myself.  But then, (1) I don't think the taper matters that much, (2) I didn't expend 100% effort on Sunday, and (3)when I stand back and think about it - the "frivolous" races have been more gratifying than eeking out improvement on my middle-of-the-pack finishes in the big triathlon events. The events I have enjoyed the most this year (the Fussen Fun Run, Dawg Dash, Namban BBQ Run) have all been "frivolous"

That said, I do really hope to execute well at Taiwan. The half-ironman distance should be good test for me now, and it seems I could improve on my 5:17 PB to-date.

Dawg Dash 10k

I run inexplicably well at the Dawg Dash 10k last Sunday -- 36:11, first place in the 40-49 division among 110 runners and 15th out of 1,200 overall. 

I did not wear a GPS watch and I have to suspect the course was short - but in any case I felt fast and strong and believe I ran a legitimately strong time on the fast section from mile 1 to 4 -- here are the mile splits that I did manage to record --  

1st mile - 6:02 -  Uphill 

3 mile - 16:50 (5:24 per mile) - Gradual downhill

4 mile - 22:28  (5:38) - Flat

6 mile - 34:50 (6:11 per mile) - Hilly, winding, narrow, crowded 

6.2 mile - 36:11 - The last section winds through chute absolutely packed with 5k finishers 

The Dawg Dash is a popular Seattle area race on a course that winds around the University of Washington campus. As suggested by the event name, many runners brought along their dogs to run along beside them.    I decided to participate in the event at the last second pretty much entirely for social reasons -- in order to meet my friend John and his family for breakfast afterward.  As I warmed up on the freezing cold Seattle morning I was wondering why I didn't just skip the run and go straight to breakfast and save myself the $40 day-before-race entry fee.  I was dreading the prospect of struggling on a windy crowded course to run some lame time - I was expecting around 39 minutes.  

So I went out very slowly on the long, uphill start trying to take it easy and find a good pack to run with.  I found myself behind some guy with an Ironman 70.3 backward baseball cap.  Maybe it was the cap that prompted me to chase after this guy and remain with him as he picked up the pace.  After cresting the hill and hitting the mile mark we just screamed down a series of long, gradual downhills.  I kept thinking to myself that I really should just slow down, but at that point I felt committed (and not so tired).  Also I knew the course would slow us down dramatically on the last 2 mile section.  This last section winds around the campus - ostensibly to give the runners a scenic tour of the college.  Also at this point we intersected the 1,000-odd participants running the 5k. The primary challenge was dodging all the dogs straining at their leashes. I had dropped the guy with the Ironman baseball cap around 3-miles (unintentionally), and now at 4 miles I managed to tuck behind some, tall, college-aged runner who blazed a trail through the horde of slow, 5k runners by bellowing out "move to your right! move to your right!"  The college kid did not sound happy.   In contrast, at this point I was quite satisfied with my 4-mile split, the sunny weather, and the prospect of a nice breakfast. I was surprised when we reached the 6-mile marker (maybe this section was short) where we started to enter a narrow, crowded chute which made any sort-of finishing kick impossible.  So I remained 1-second behind the frustrated college kid and the 16th place guy remained only a second behind me.  I crossed the finish line and congratulated the angry college kid who exclaimed "I will never, ever, ever, do this race again, what an outrage!"  

Once again my racing performance seems to have no correlation whatsoever with any objectives, periodization, training plan or race-day strategy that I might have tried to formulate.  

And once again I find that tapering is over-rated (I was coming off a week of heavy triathlon training - 6 hours on Thursday plus spin, yoga, and swim session the day before).  

But unlike the college kid I could do the Dawg Dash again - it was fun and scenic, and my performance was encouraging after my recent mediocre triathlons.

Murakami Triathlon 2012

Sunday I competed in the Murakami Olympic Distance Triathlon - the unofficial "gaijin triathlon championship of Japan" and ostensibly one of my key "A" races of the year.

 

Last year I did my Olympic Distance personal best at Murakami - 2:21:17.   Naturally I had a base goal of improving on my PB at this year's event, especially given all the additional training I have done in 2012.

 

Instead I finished in 2:34:03, almost 13 minutes slower than last year and I place lower in all three components of the triathlon.  Pretty bad, but not quite as bad as it sounds.

 

Swim  -- 31:45 (200th of 732)

In contrast to all my other swim races, I got out to a smooth start (13 minutes at the turnaround), then struggled coming in.  I seemed to be overtaking other swimmers on the return half of the swim but struggled to get to the outside and around all the blue caps - the slower swimmers from the first wave (meanwhile the yellow-capped faster swimmers started swimming were also trying to do the same thing and swim over the top of us) .   I don't recall ever being as exhausted coming off a triathlon swim leg as I was on Sunday.  I usually am a bit dazed as I stagger out of the water and switch into a run into T1, but on Sunday I was so tired I walked all the way to my bike.  Before the race I had tried to visualize a rapid T1.  In the actual race I was simply too tired to move quickly and plopped down and methodically stripped off my wetsuit, then plodded through the incredibly lengthy zone from my bike to the mark where we could mount and ride. 

 

Bike -- 1:17:27 (85th of 732)

I rode OK (even though this year's bike split is 7 minutes slower than my time last year).  The time-consuming transitions are included in the official bike split, and there was a stronger headwind on the outbound section.  Teammate Chris P blew past me like I was not even moving, but otherwise I was mostly passing people.  (I was in the 2nd of 5 waves and it seemed like I hardly saw any teammates on the course).

 

I was amazingly surprised by my level of dehydration.  The amazing part being that in all my previous triathlons, (the majority in warm conditions), I have never struggled with such dehydration.  I am usually like a camel. Typically I get half way through the bike ride and realize I haven't taken a single sip from my water bottle – apparently because my body temperature is so cool after the swim.  Even at Phuket Triathlon I had to force myself to slug down most of my first bottle right before the bottle exchange. On Sunday I was dying of thirst from the very start of the bike (and there was no bottle exchange, just one bike aid station with tiny cups of water and the bottle on my bike).

 

Run -- 44:51 (83rd)

At the first run aid station I inhaled 3 full bottles of water.  It took me a full 16 minutes just to get to the 3k mark. After that I settled into a roughly 4 minute per kilometer pace (my goal run pace on this day).  As usual after the event, my teammates only ask me about my run time.  They are shocked and horrified when I told them my relatively abysmal time.

 

It was a nice weekend trip.  Still I am not sure I will sign up for this triathlon next year if it is on the same weekend and we risk facing similar conditions. If I do participate I will certainly have more hydration ready.

Fussen 10k

Much more fun than a stressful Ironman triathlon - on Sunday I compete in the Fussen 10k.

The accompanying picture provides a sense for the day's frivolity - here we are having a PRE-RACE banana-split loading lunch in Fussan's charming central square.

Fussan is a postcard perfect Bavarian town at the base of the Austrian Alps.  The 10k entailed 3-loops each involving dashing through the cobblestone streets of the town followed by opening it up along a long, riverside bicycle path.

My times for the three loops were -  12:25, 12:45, and 12:42, for a total of 37:52 was good for first place in my age group  and 11th overall.

We were cheered on by the throngs of people relaxing at the outdoor cafes that line the course.  On each loop through the city's main street I got a nice boost to hear the crowd yell when the announcer called out my name and that I was coming all the way from America.

I seemed to be recovering reasonably well from the Ironman two weeks earlier and all the cycling I had been doing in between through the Bavarian countryside and along the Rhine.  And the banana split seemed to work.

Ironman Frankfurt

A week ago Sunday I did my long race of the year, ironman Frankfurt, my second full ironman event.

My start was not auspicious -  8 minutes before the gun went off for the swim, a fellow triathlete tried to zip up my wetsuit and then sheepishly handed me a broken off zipper.  It was a disconcerting sight, but I simply did not have time to be too distressed, I just ran to the official tent to see if someone could fix it - pins?  tape? but the officials merely suggested that I swim without a wetsuit which I knew with absolute certainty would not work for me.  So I plunged back in the water at the last second and begun swimming from the back of the pack with an unzipped wetsuit.  Swimming 3.8k in an unzipped wetsuit did not prove to be the end-of-the-world despite the discomfort, friction, drag (and I suppose as usual for me I looked really stupid).  The more pressing challenge was the massive wall of swimmers in front of me because I started at the back. I expected to be kicked in the face at the start, but I was battling crowds throughout, and had my goggles knocked off twice, both times in the second lap.  Somehow I passed much of field and was pretty happy with my 1:16:02 swim split. 

Four years ago, on a sweltering Tokyo July day I read teammate Mika's Ironman Switzerland race report and I  felt so baffled and (admittedly) disdainful that she could drop out of a summer bike race because of cold.  Last Sunday I felt like I might need to drop out of the bike ride because of cold. The other 2,500 triathletes at Frankfurt however did not seem to be having too much problem with the rain and wind during the first 90k of the ride, but I found myself shaking like a leaf (and i was wearing arm warmers while most guys were just wearing singlets).  I kept wishing for uphill sections which allowed me to warm up a bit, and I kept dreading downhills.  Finally at around 90k the sun came out and my pace picked up above 30k per hour.  The countryside was beautiful, I felt great and i grew confident that I could realize my goal of breaking 6 hours.  But then somehow I slowed dramatically on the final 20k of the ride.

After that my run was just a mess.  After a weak start I picked it up to 5 minute pace around 5k to 15k, but then I just deteriorated into a death slog.  

My overall time was 11:50:28. 

I kept trying to keep in mind the advice teammate Chris always told me - "it does not matter how much you actually train, what matters is that you believe in your training".  Well, hmmm, self-delusion can only carry you so far -  in retrospect it appears that I had done good training for the short, fast running 5k time trial I did 10 days earlier.  I always intended to do minimalist training for the Ironman, but then incorporate longer bike and run training in the month or so before Frankfurt, but in the end it seems I repeatedly cut my longer workouts short.

After the race our friend Stephane emphatically said to me "for us guys after doing the Ironman distance, of course we never have desire to go back to a shorter distance like a half-ironman".  I just looked at him kind of blankly thinking, "Huh, wtf?  All I have been thinking about is how much I would prefer to do a half-ironman."

The Ironman race was really just an excuse to travel to Germany with my bike where I have enjoyed cycling up Rhine to Cologne and visit teammate Matthias, then down to Augsburg to visit teammates, Joachim and Christiane where I did interval workout with their running club and cycled through the Bavarian countryside.

Oshima Triathlon 2012

I compete in the Oshima Triathlon again this year and just like in 2011 the swim is cancelled, and just like in 2011 I capture 12th place overall and a place on the podium (5th place age-adjusted).

My time of 2:18:35 for the 5k run / 40k bike / 10k run is a full 11 minutes slower than in 2011. The slower time is due to the big theme of this year's event - a brutal headwind which slowed everyone's bike
times. In fact I seemed to have performed relatively better versus the (larger) field in 2012, an improvement which I would like to attribute to my better training in 2012. But the improvement may be largely due to my not being so ridiculously inept on the transitions this year.


Swim -
In the weeks leading up to Oshima I just presumed the swim section might be cancelled as usual. When our overnight boat pulled into the
island harbor on Saturday morning and the waters were glass calm I was a bit concerned -- "we may actually have to swim" Then, as expected,
the winds start to pick up as race time approached and the waves started getting larger. Still there was no announcement of swim cancellation and the participants all dutifully marched down to shoreline shivering in our wetsuits in the fierce pelting rain, staring at the
dark, angry roiling ocean. Only at the last second did the race officials announce the swim had been replaced by a 5k run.


Run 1 -
So I tried to follow my strategy of trying to pretend the first run is the only race of the day -- be tough and forget about the subsequent bike and 10k run. As you can see from the adjacent picture I did struggle pretty hard on this 5k run... however my time of 19:42 hardly represents a great time for me compared to numerous other 5k runs I have done in the last six months.

Bike -
I found myself struggling into the wind on each of the 4 outbound
loops of the bike course, but then passing other cyclists on the
faster return section. Maybe my silly, waste of good money, aero
helmet helped after all.




Run 2 - Then the start of the 10k run was unusually tough - my first
kilometer took close to 5 minutes. Somehow, thanks to support of
teammates, I managed to settle into a decent pace into the wind and
finish reasonably solid.


Total - 2:18:35 (12th overall out of 346)
Run 1 - 19:42 (13th)
Bike - 1:18:24 (25th)
Run 2 - 40:29 (12th)