Rising above the ordinary

"You can give a person the most sophisticated education and conditioning but nothing beats planting them in an environment with people who do what they want to do, but who are better at it than they are", David Epstein, author of 'The Sports Gene'.

The context behind this quote was a detailed look at Kenyan runners from the town of Iten, where a huge proportion of Olympic distance runners originate from and train. Often there are runners from around the world that travel to Iten to see what the secret to the success of Kenyan runners is. Like most things in life that are worthwhile, there is no 'secret' or shortcut to success. Kenyan runners don't wear GPS watches. They don't ask how many intervals or repetitions or sets they will be doing when they train. They don't wear expensive branded shoes with extra cushioning and support. They run to the point of exhaustion. They run to the edge of collapse. They run because, for them, running is the only way out of a life of poverty. 

Australian runner and blogger Ross Henderson spent four years with Kenyan athletes and his observations make for interesting reading. For example, Henderson tested the running training on himself and came up with a personal epiphany in relation to the difference between running on dirt and tarmac/concrete surfaces. 

"After three-plus months of running the dirt routes of Iten, I developed calve muscles that I didn’t know I owned, my ankles got stronger and the body learned to roll with the unevenness of the ground. As you run you are always on the lookout for that protruding rock or root, the rocks and roots that in the past, had floored me.  My alertness and reaction time had to improve by necessity and it did. It was not until I returned to running on the tarmac, after many months of running on dirt roads, that I realised how much harder the asphalt is. "

How often do our children go and train on bumpy, uneven surfaces and places that are not pitches but parking lots, parks, and sand? I have vivid recollections of my childhood playing with my brother in the driveway, where the front porch was an excellent surface for a quick one-two pass, where the goals were between my mum's pot plants and one side had an extra three meters of width due to the double car garage door.  The surface was concrete, and the ball was our oldest and most worn as were our shoes, but our imaginations ran wild as we dreamed of scoring goals in big matches. Over time, our first touch improved and our take-off and timing of the one-two also got quicker and more accurate. Although I have no empirical evidence to prove it, I'm sure that our leg muscles improved for the specific purpose of football.

One of Henderson's observations that have real significance to our school program is the travel times for athletes in regard to their training.

"There are no traffic lights in Iten, no one-hour drives to get to the park or forest to meet for a group run.  People simply leave their homes and walk or run to one of the many meeting places. Training then commences.

The warm-down in most cases is the walk home.  No time is wasted traveling to and from training venues.  This leaves more time to regenerate."

We live in a hectic society, where we are constantly looking for the best environment for our children, the best coach, the best club etc. While we drive around Melbourne looking for the golden ticket, we are losing precious time to train on our own, practice, go for a walk, read a book, or go to the local pool for a swim. Effectively, we are losing the one asset that we cannot buy. Time.

Maybe we can learn something from Kenyan runners as we fight the daily fight to find balance and equilibrium in our lives.