A footnote to my road race adventure

It occurred to me after posting my report yesterday about participating in the Run 4 Kerri that perhaps some readers might be thinking, "I can't believe this woman who wants to be a personal trainer can't jog four miles!"

So in my defense, I just wanted to mention the "principle of specificity," a principle of exercise science that says physiological adaptations to exercise are specific to the system or part of the body being worked. Or, in simpler terms, if you want to get better at an activity, you have to actually do it.

I've never liked to run. This puts me at odds with many of my friends and acquaintances, who daily log the kinds of mileage that would kill me. They run through the rain and snow, through heat and bitter cold, through injury, and sometimes right out of the lives of their significant others. They are, in a word, addicted.

In my younger days I tried running, but it never did much for me. All that pounding on the joints wasn't pleasant, and I found it kind of boring. For a while I switched to trail running, which was more interesting, but as a solo activity was also unnerving. I would find myself running from imagined dangers lurking in the woods and I would emerge with a heart rate elevated from anxiety more than anything else.

So I eventually abandoned running altogether and turned to kinder, gentler forms of cardio exercise, such as fast walking, hiking and biking. Those things I can do well, and do for hours and long distances without fatigue. And more importantly, I enjoy them. It's hard to stay motivated when you're forcing yourself to do an activity you don't like simply because you think it'll be good for you.

I consider myself to have a relatively good level of cardiovascular fitness, but all those things I've done to achieve it did not translate to the road race on Sunday. Our bodies are funny that way.

For instance, although I regularly do biceps curls with 20-pound dumbbells, I know that when my fall bowling league begins next month, I'll be feeling sore the day after picking my 14-pound ball up for the first time in months. It doesn't seem like it should be that different, but it is.

As I mentioned yesterday, in spite of my limitations, the Run 4 Kerri was a fun experience and inspired me to consider participating in some more races, if for no other reason than I like a challenge. Clearly, running is a sport in which I have a lot of room for improvement.

I'll be running in the future with the principle of specificity in mind: I'm planning to further train my sense of humor.

I pretend to be a runner for Kerri

On Sunday, my partner, Marge, and I participated in the 8th annual Run 4 Kerri, a 4-mile road race in South Kingstown to benefit a scholarship fund in memory of Kerri Bessette, whose story touched both of us.

I'll put this out there right now: I AM NOT A RUNNER — NEVER HAVE BEEN, NEVER WILL BE. I could easily improve my endurance if I chose to work on it, but as for speed, I am SLOW — ALWAYS HAVE BEEN, ALWAYS WILL BE.

But that said, Marge and I were looking forward to the race, which organizers said had drawn 980 participants on that sunny, muggy morning. Marge, due to a foot problem, had decided to walk the whole thing, and had set a goal for herself of finishing in under an hour. I had no goal, really, other than to jog as much as I could and not completely disgrace myself or end up having to be hauled away in a rescue truck.

We felt a little intimidated as we sat in a line of traffic on Matunuck Beach Road, waiting to get into the parking area before the 9 a.m. race. There were already people in low-numbered bibs running up and down the road, warming up. Warming up? I couldn't imagine it — I would need to save every once of energy for that four miles, which, by the way, would be the longest distance I've ever "run." I've participated in a few 5Ks (3.1 miles), having been goaded into them by friends, but that's been the extent of my running experience.

We managed to find a parking space, register for the race and arrive at the starting line with 10 minutes to spare. A pretty good crowd was assembled, and I wondered what Kerri would think of the turnout she inspired.

We bumped into a friend of ours, Dot Zullo, who is a racewalker (and Rhode to Fitness follower), and chatted briefly with her and did a few obligatory stretches before the gun sounded. And then we were off!

Dot walks so fast that I decided she would be a good pacesetter for me, even though I was jogging. I managed to keep Dot in sight until a little past the two-mile mark when suddenly — voilà! — I turned into Gumby. So I stopped jogging and began walking, using the break to take some photos along the way. After all, I knew you'd want photos, too!

By now the sun was beating down on us pretty ferociously, and even though the course looped past Matunuck Beach, there was no cooling ocean breeze on this day.

I never saw Dot again until the finish area, and for the rest of the distance I alternated between jogging and walking. I just had fun with it, and enjoyed the banter of the other runners and the neighborhood residents who sat on their front lawns ringing cowbells, shouting encouragement and directing their sprinklers onto the street for our benefit.

I ramped it up a little as I neared the finish, so that I could at least look like a runner, even though the clock revealed me as a fraud. As I entered the finish corral, I ran past a man who was lying on the ground being tended to, ice packs on one knee and an arm. I don't know what happened to him, but I didn't get the impression it was terribly serious, even though the rescue had been summoned. I was thankful that it wasn't me.

I crossed the finish line in 44 minutes and 27 seconds, four minutes and 27 seconds behind Dot. Marge (at bottom right, looking strong and happy at the end) met her goal by finishing in 58:50. We all felt a feeling of accomplishment, although probably nothing compared with what Patrick Tarpy of Providence must have been feeling. He finished first with a time of 19:23.

I was even more excited when I found out that my bib number had been drawn in a raffle. I lined up to collect my prize, watching as those ahead of me got such things as gift certificates to restaurants and theater tickets. So what did I win? A $15 gift certificate toward the purchase of a medical ID bracelet or necklace. Ha! Were they trying to tell me something?

And one last little indignity. Later that day I went to check the results on the Cool Running Web site and couldn't find my name. That's because I was listed as Kathy Farmous. I had to laugh. But I did finish 17th out of 55 in my division, so maybe there's a little hope for me after all.

I have to admit, as Marge and I drove away at the end of the race, we were already talking about "the next one."

"If it ain't broke, don't Fixx it"

An awful lot of people out there seem to take great joy in deriding the efforts of those who work hard to get or stay in shape. They're the people who will mock your midafternoon snack of an apple and carrots while they eat a couple of doughnuts, laugh at the fact that you get up early to run before work, or dismiss you as a musclehead if you like to lift weights.

But my all-time favorite refrain from such people is: "Keith Richards is still alive, Jim Fixx isn't."

Monday was the 25th anniversary of the death of Jim Fixx, who has been credited with starting the running and jogging craze in the 1970s with the publication of his best-seller The Complete Book of Running. According to Wikipedia, Fixx weighed 240 pounds and smoked when he began running at age 35. Ten years later, he weighed 180 and no longer smoked.

Fixx died at 52 of a massive heart attack after his daily run near his home in Vermont.

That his death would give fodder to those who make no effort to improve their own health is sad, but entirely understandable. I suppose all of us are constantly on the lookout, either consciously or unconsciously, for evidence that supports our beliefs.

But in using the death of athletes such as Fixx to sustain their own inaction, people are overlooking quality-of-life issues.

I've known people who would scornfully dismiss exercise, but then couldn't walk ten steps without sounding like they needed oxygen. Maybe they were perfectly happy in that state, but I have to think they could have been happier, and certainly healthier, with a little effort.

And it's true, they could well outlive me, because so much of our health is determined by genetic factors. Fixx's father, for instance, had died of a heart attack at age 42.

I'd just like to ask you exercise critics out there to do me a favor and stop making ridiculous comments in an effort to belittle my healthy habits or justify your unhealthy ways.

If anyone really believed that Keith Richards had the answer to health and longevity, by now we certainly would have seen a best-seller on the shelves touting the benefits of an alcohol and heroin diet.