15 in 1 Million

If I tri'd right now, I suspect I'd be one of these 15:

Study: Triathlons can pose deadly heart risks

By Marilynn Marchione, AP Medical Writer | March 28, 2009

ORLANDO, Fla. --Warning to weekend warriors: Swim-bike-run triathlons pose at least twice the risk of sudden death as marathons do, the first study of these competitions has found.

The risk is mostly from heart problems during the swimming part. And while that risk is low -- about 15 out of a million participants -- it's not inconsequential, the study's author says.

Triathlons are soaring in popularity, especially as charity fundraisers. They are drawing many people who are not used to such demanding exercise. Each year, about 1,000 of these events are held and several hundred thousand Americans try one.

"It's something someone just signs up to do," often without a medical checkup to rule out heart problems, said Dr. Kevin Harris, a cardiologist at the Minneapolis Heart Institute at Abbott Northwestern Hospital. "They might prepare for a triathlon by swimming laps in their pool. That's a lot different than swimming in a lake or a river."

He led the study and presented results Saturday at an American College of Cardiology conference in Florida. The Minneapolis institute's foundation sponsored the work and tracks athlete-related sudden deaths in a national registry.

Marathon-related deaths made headlines in November 2007 when 28-year-old Ryan Shay died while competing in New York in the men's marathon Olympic trials. Statistics show that for every million participants in these 26.2-mile running races, there will be four to eight deaths.

The rate for triathletes is far higher -- 15 out of a million, the new study shows. Almost all occurred during the swim portion, usually the first event.

"Anyone that jumps into freezing cold water knows the stress on the heart," said Dr. Lori Mosca, preventive cardiology chief at New York-Presbyterian Hospital and an American Heart Association spokeswoman. She had no role in the study but has competed in more than 100 triathlons, including the granddaddy -- Hawaii's Ironman competition.

Cold water constricts blood vessels, making the heart work harder and aggravating any pre-existing problems. It also can trigger an irregular heartbeat. On top of this temperature shock is the stress of competition.

"It's quite frightening -- there are hundreds of people thrashing around. You have to keep going or you're going to drown," Mosca said.

Swimmers can't easily signal for help or slow down to rest during swimming as they can in the biking or running parts of a triathlon, said Harris, who also has competed in these events. Rescuers may have trouble spotting someone in danger in a crowd of competitors in the lakes, rivers and oceans where these events typically are held, he added.

For the study, researchers used records on 922,810 triathletes competing in 2,846 USA Triathlon-sanctioned events between January 2006 and September 2008.

Of the 14 deaths identified, 13 occurred during swimming; the other was a bike crash. Autopsies on six of the victims showed that four had underlying heart problems. Two others had normal-looking hearts, but they may have suffered a fatal heart rhythm problem, Harris said.

A search of the Minneapolis registry and the Internet found four other triathlon-related deaths from 2006 through 2008 beyond those that occurred in the officially sanctioned events.

"While not a large risk, this is not an inconsequential number," Harris said.

Fundraising triathlons have enticed many runners to try to expand into areas like swimming, which they may not have learned to do very efficiently, to benefit particular charities, Mosca said.

"They're really recruiting people to do these events," she said. "It can be a recipe for disaster."

Doctors offer these tips to anyone considering a triathlon:

--Get a checkup to make sure you don't have hidden heart problems.

--Train adequately long before the event, including open-water swims -- not just in pools.

--Acclimate yourself to the water temperature shortly before a race, and wear a wetsuit if it's too cold.

--Make sure the race has medical staff and defibrillators on site.

----

On the Net:

Heart meeting: http://www.acc.org

American Heart Association: http://americanheart.org

Registry: http://www.suddendeathathletes.org

No. 300

A busy, busy month.

Bought the new goat. She's an Alpine, giving us about two quarts of milk every day. Will loves the stuff. John hates it. I saved up enough milk to make a two-pound wheel of goat's milk cheddar over the weekend that's ready for aging. I'll provide a report when it's ready.

Garden worked out OK. The corn was flattened by what was left of Hurricane Ike, but we have more than 100 pints of tomato sauce canned and ready to go. We've got about 50 pints of salsa verde with tomatillos and onions from the CSA. We've got about 50 pints of carrots and about 50 pints of green beans. We've got onions, scallions, blackberries, blueberries, peaches, nectarines, celery, broccoli, bell pepper, herbs and pesto in the freezer. We'll soon have 50 broilers -- they're getting huge -- and three pigs.

I'd say we're ready for winter, but not quite.

The chainsaw blew a piston, and fixing it ran about $200. I took a few days of vacation from the Day Job to finish up this week. The blade was getting a bit dull -- that'll happen when you pinch it in a tall beech tree, like I did -- so I took it to the shop for a quick sharpening. Turns out the replaced piston now needs replacing. Ack. Anyway, at this rate, I'll have our winter wood done by April or so.

We're certainly not ready for the Greater Depression.

But it's not winter just yet, nor has the Greater Depression totally kicked off. And it is gorgeous. The leaves are peaking in southern Vermont this week:





A nice story from this week's WSJ that reminds me I need to get off my ass:

• OCTOBER 7, 2008, 9:52 A.M. ET

Crash Survivor Scores Rare Triathlon Invite

Wall Street Exec Trains for Legendary Ironman Race

• By JEN MURPHY

A.C. Morgan will line up among 1,800 other racers to test his body's physical and mental limits in Kona, Hawaii at the Ironman World Championships Saturday. The grueling race is the Super Bowl of triathlons, consisting of a 2.4-mile swim, 112-mile bike ride and 26.2-mile run in crosswinds that can reach 60 miles per hour and temperatures that can reach 95 degrees with 90% humidity.

A.C. Morgan

A.C. Morgan, seen during a triathlon in Rhode Island in July.

Ten years ago Mr. Morgan wasn't even sure if he'd ever walk again. A plane crash left him with two broken vertebrae in his neck and 30 percent of his body covered in burns. "I had a 50-50 shot at life," Mr. Morgan recalls. "I had to learn everything all over again -- how to brush my teeth, walk, go to the bathroom." Mr. Morgan's entire left arm was burned except for one spot. "I have a complete outline where my Timex Ironman watch was. It is the only spot on my arm where I have hair." The outline reminded Mr. Morgan of Timex's old ad, "It takes a lickin' and keeps on tickin'." He called the company to pitch himself as the subject of its next ad only to discover the campaign had been discontinued. But company representatives said if he ever wanted to do the Ironman he should call back. Mr. Morgan recalls thinking, "I can't even go to the bathroom by myself."

Before the accident Mr. Morgan had competed in sprint triathlons. After physical therapy he returned to the gym five or six days a week to lift weights and ride the Lifecycle bike for 30 minutes. In 2006, Mr. Morgan found himself listening to a client describing how he had competed in the Ironman and it made him remember the Timex offer. He wrote the company to retell his story of the plane crash and his watch "tattoo." In June 2007 he received a surprising call from Herbie Calves, Timex's vice president of sports marketing, asking whether he wanted an Ironman World Championship number for 2007 or 2008. He opted for 2008.

The 38-year-old Mr. Morgan, who co-manages U.S. equity sales trading at J.P. Morgan in New York, has since reprioritized his life to focus on training. He lives in Darien, Conn., and is married with two children. He stands 6-foot-1 and weights 180 pounds.

The Workout
Sponsorships allow many Ironman competitors to train full time. Mr. Morgan doesn't have that luxury. Before he began training for the race, he awoke at 4:30 a.m. to catch the 4:50 a.m. train to midtown Manhattan. Now, he wakes up at 3:20 a.m. three days a week to ride, run or swim for an hour before work. In January, Mr. Morgan hired a personal trainer who creates workouts he can download to his Blackberry. He can call her any time he has questions or needs motivation. "The other day I wasn't feeling the 22-mile run and she tells me, 'Think 22 miles plus 100% humidity on black lava.' I pay for that," he says. In addition to his morning workouts, he sometimes tacks on an additional run or bike ride after work, depending on what his trainer recommends.

On weekends, Mr. Morgan swims at his local YMCA and bikes 100 to 120 miles, followed by a 30- to 40-minute run. In bad weather, he puts his bike on a trainer so he can cycle inside while watching episodes of the HBO comedy "Entourage." According to the Ironman media guide, the average competitor trains between 18 and 30-plus hours per week: about seven miles per week swimming, 225 miles per week biking and 48 miles per week running. Mr. Morgan says his typical week sees him swim five miles, bike 150 to 170 miles and run 30 miles. To prepare himself for race day, he competed in two half-Ironmans, one in May and one in June.

Sample Workout

Mon. – Rest day

Tues.-Thurs. – 60-minute run, bike or swim

Sat. – Bike 120 miles followed immediately by a three-mile run.

Sun. – 20-mile run; swim.

Mr. Morgan hit a hurdle last October when he developed plantar fasciitis, a painful inflammation in the foot most often felt in the heel. "I can't get rid of it," he says. "You really have to walk away from [training] for it to heal, but I can't afford to." He goes to a doctor in the city once a week for laser treatment to break down the scar tissue and has also ordered custom orthotics for his sneakers. He stretches daily to ease the pain.

The Diet
Eating more and more often is Mr. Morgan's new dietetic challenge. "I could go home and eat a pint of Ben & Jerry's every night and still lose weight," he says. Mr. Morgan estimates that he has lost 15 pounds since he started training. To maintain his energy, he tries to eat every three hours. In the morning he has Raisin Bran topped with a banana and skim milk, followed by a cup of coffee and an energy bar. After his workout he has a recovery drink. He eats lunch at his desk, usually a turkey sandwich on whole wheat, which he orders in. "I probably eat chicken, vegetables and pasta seven nights a week, 365 days a year," he says.

Many athletes drastically change their diet during training. "I don't have free time to weigh everything and I'm not a bad eater," says Mr. Morgan, who instead paid Trismarter.com, a company that specializes in designing nutrition and exercise programs for triathletes, to create a diet plan specifically focused on the two days leading up to the race and the race day. He says it recommends hydrating every 10 minutes during the cycling portion. Mr. Morgan set his watch to beep every time he needs to rehydrate or refuel, ingesting calories from Gu, an energy gel, and Fig Newtons. During the run he ingests Gu every hour and drinks water or Gatorade at every mile marker.

The Cost
Tens of thousands of athletes try to get one of the coveted 1,800 spots through a lottery or by winning a spot at one of the qualifying events held around the world. "Spots are sold on eBay for up to $60,000," Mr. Morgan says. Timex covered the majority of Mr. Morgan's costs, including the $300 entry fee, and provided him with his jersey, hats, and a Timex team Trek bike.

Since January, Mr. Morgan has bought four pairs of running sneakers, costing between $80 and $110 per pair. After his wife pleaded with him, he also bought a new pair of cycling shoes, which he wears without socks. Triathlons are a gear geek's dream sport. "It's like a different version of golf," he says. "I could come home every day and go on one of 30 sites and buy a new water bottle holder or Gu or visor." Timex supplied Mr. Morgan with his bike, which could run from $3,000 to $20,000. He spends $250 a month on his personal trainer and paid $300 for his Trismarter.com nutrition evaluation. Membership at the YMCA is about $100 a month.

The Effort
Mr. Morgan says his biggest issue is time management. Making time for family and staying on top of his game at work have been a challenge. "I'm struggling to prioritize it all," he says. "My wife is so done with this." He works out at 4:30 a.m. on weekends to get in his training before his family wakes up. Mr. Morgan started at J.P. Morgan in June. "Any time you start in a new environment you have to prove yourself again," he says. "If I had been there six years it might be easier to take more luxury, but I pride myself on my work ethic and am one of the first people there in the morning."

The Benefit
Mr. Morgan's family and friends will join him in Hawaii to cheer him on. They are staying four days after the race to enjoy Hawaii. "I may not move the first two days," he jokes. Mr. Morgan says one of the professional triathletes gave him his best advice yet: "He told me the biggest waste is running down hard that last mile to the finish line. He wasn't telling me to walk but just to slow down and absorb it because I'm proving the impossible possible."

Write to Jen Murphy at workout@wsj.com

Wowzers.

Puts my little issues into perspective, no?

August 29, 2008
U.S. Open ’08
Triathlete? Ball Girl? Amputee? All of the Above.
By JOSHUA ROBINSON

After every few dashes across Court 14, Kelly Bruno reached down to her right leg and flicked at something. It was a gesture so slight and so fleeting, she could have been swatting away a bug. It was also the only thing she did that was not in the protocol for a United States Open ball girl — nowhere does it mention popping the pressure valve on a prosthetic leg.

Bruno was born with several defects in her right leg and has been an amputee since she was 6 months old. By 18, she had turned herself into a track star among disabled athletes, with her own sponsorship deals. And as a world-class triathlete and Ironman competitor, she has raced in some of the most grueling events on the planet.

Now, at age 24, Bruno has scaled back her training for three weeks to shuttle back and forth across a courts at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center to scoop up balls at the net. In a job done correctly only by those who are barely noticed, Bruno has stood out by blending in.
“It’s definitely harder than I expected,” she said, flashing an easy smile. “For me the running is not as tiresome, but I didn’t think standing was going to be so exhausting.”

This coming from a woman who began her journey to the Open after a brutal 0.9-mile swim in jellyfish-laden waters, a 24.9-mile bike ride and a 6.2-mile run at the sun-baked New York City Triathlon in June. John Korff, the triathlon’s organizer and a member of the United States Tennis Association board of directors, suggested that she try out to be a ball girl to give disabled athletes more exposure.

I'm Not The Only One Who Thinks This Is Weird.

From today's NYTimes:

Deaths Draw Attention to Triathlon Swim

Sonny Tumbelaka/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Participants of the Indonesian Triathlon in June.

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By CHRISTIE ASCHWANDEN

Published: July 31, 2008

WHEN 60-year-old Donald Morehouse and 52-year-old John Hobgood Jr. died in different triathlon events last weekend, they became at least the seventh and eighth triathletes to die during competition this year. Those deaths came just one week after Esteban Neira, 32, died during the New York City Triathlon.

While this does not imply an epidemic — triathlon deaths remain rare — the deaths do share a puzzling resemblance: Like all of the triathlon deaths recorded by USA Triathlon at its sanctioned events in the last two years, they happened during the swim portion of the event, which also includes biking and running.

It is always striking when an athlete dies during an endurance competition, especially a young or well-conditioned athlete presumed to be at the peak of fitness. When Ryan Shay, a 28-year-old marathon champion, collapsed and died during the Olympic marathon trials last fall, even his closest friends and family were shocked. (Tests later determined his death was brought on by an irregular heartbeat that stemmed from an enlarged and scarred heart.)

But what makes the triathlon deaths more mysterious is that they all occurred during the first part of the race. Deaths during marathons tend to be more evenly distributed over the course of the 26.2 miles, with the largest grouping in the last mile, said Dr. William Roberts, a professor of family medicine at the University of Minnesota Medical School and the medical director of the Twin Cities Marathon, who has studied marathon deaths in the United States.

An initial autopsy on Mr. Neira was inconclusive, and the New York City Medical Examiner’s office is awaiting further test results. The death of Mr. Morehouse, at the Spudman Triathlon in Burley, Idaho (an event not sanctioned by USA Triathlon), was ruled an accidental drowning after an initial autopsy, said Scott Slaymaker, the chief executive of Slaymaker Group Inc., where Mr. Morehouse was a top executive. (The family did not want to pursue further tests, Mr. Slaymaker said.) Mr. Hobgood’s death, at the New Jersey State Triathlon, was also ruled an accidental drowning after an initial autopsy, said Lt. Carl Walsh of the West Windsor Township Police Department, with further toxicology results pending.

Hundreds of thousands have taken part in triathlons over the last four years, and with just 23 deaths recorded by USA Triathlon since 2004 (not including last weekend’s deaths), the timing could be a statistical anomaly. But this much is clear: 18 of those 23 deaths occurred during the swim.

“There have been some striking similarities among recent fatalities,” said Kathy Matejka, the director of event services at USA Triathlon, which does not track the number of triathlon participants. At least seven of those who died this year, she said, were men with “some measure of experience with the sport.”

Despite these similarities, a precise cause of death remains elusive in many cases. News reports suggest that at least three of this year’s deaths were linked to heart problems, but it is unclear whether those problems were primed to happen imminently or may not have happened until later without the race as a trigger.

No one knows why deaths are more common during the swim portion of triathlons, but researchers have some intriguing theories. Public accounts of this year’s fatalities indicate that the athletes seemed outwardly healthy, and in some cases autopsies turned up no obvious cause of death, such as blocked arteries.

The combination of apparent good health and a negative autopsy suggests a death caused by abnormal heart rhythms, said Dr. Pamela Douglas, a Duke University cardiologist who has studied triathletes.

Evidence suggests that swimming may trigger a certain type of cardiac arrhythmia caused by a genetic condition called long QT syndrome, said Dr. Michael Ackerman, a cardiologist and the director of the Windland Smith Rice Sudden Death Genomics Laboratory at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. About 1 in 2,000 people are born with a heart condition that causes a glitch in the heart’s electrical system, and the most common of these is called long QT syndrome, after the tell-tale interval on an electrocardiogram.

The long QT heart recharges sluggishly between beats, setting up the potential for a skipped beat, Dr. Ackerman said. When the problem strikes, a heart’s electrical system can go haywire, degenerating into a possibly fatal arrhythmia.

Dr. Ackerman’s research team has identified several genetic forms of long QT, and one seems especially bothered by swimming, he said. He’s not sure why, but sees clues in a Japanese study several years ago that found that irregular heartbeats occur more commonly during swimming than during the same level of aerobic activity on land.

“It’s not that swimming is horrendously dangerous and running is not,” he said.

“We know that swimming is one of those triggers,” Dr. Ackerman said, “but it’s not going to be the absolute trigger.” An expert could detect most cases of long QT syndrome on an electrocardiogram, he said.

In any type of competitive racing situation, Dr. Douglas said, the adrenaline rush at the start could aggravate conditions like long QT syndrome, because adrenaline and its related hormones can make the heart more prone to arrhythmias. Physical exertion won’t create a heart problem where none existed, she said, but it can create problems for people with underlying cardiac disease.

Sudden fainting remains the classic warning sign of an underlying arrhythmia problem. “If you faint while running a race and your heart snaps back into sync 10 or 30 seconds later, you wake up,” Dr. Ackerman said. “If it happens in the water, even if your heart regains rhythm 30 seconds later, now you’re underwater.”

Many triathletes point to the swim as a triathlon’s most stressful segment. Most swims take place in open, often cold, water with hundreds or thousands of other swimmers vying for position. “Nothing can prepare a newbie for the start,” said Russ Evenhuis, a triathlete in Olympia, Wash. “It can be like jumping into a washing machine. You will get swum over, kicked, hit and banged into.”

A triathlon’s open-water swim hardly resembles the pools where most triathletes train, said Neil Cook, a New York City based triathlete and coach. “There is no wall 25 yards away, you can’t see the bottom and the 50 to 150 people around you are more than you’ve probably swam with in total during your training,” he said. “Oh, and you are wearing this wetsuit that’s tighter than a girdle.” Raise your heart rate and blood pressure under those conditions, he said, and “any weakness you have will become apparent.”

FABIAN QUESADA, 42, of Brooklyn prepared for the New York City Triathlon by taking part in an open-water training session with the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society’s Team in Training program. Still, he had a bout of anxiety his first time in open water. “Even though the wetsuit keeps you buoyant, it’s very restrictive, and you panic because it’s tight,” he said. “It can be an overwhelming experience.”

Triathlons normally brief participants on safety procedures, some of which are standard practice. For instance, “If you’re in the water and you have a problem, you’re supposed to stop and raise your hand,” said Dr. Doug Hiller, the chief medical officer for the International Triathlon Union, the sport’s worldwide governing body.

Ms. Matejka of USA Triathlon said her organization is committed to safety and will ask its experts to look for lessons in this year’s deaths, but as of yet, the group has no major changes planned.

“Speaking as a 20-plus-year triathlete, I wouldn’t change a thing,” said Andrew Hunt, the medical director for USA Triathlon.

“Do I think open-water swimming is inherently dangerous? No I don’t,” he said. Regarding the number of swim deaths, he said last week: “You can’t just look at the numerator, you have to look at the denominator — my guess is that that number is probably in the six figures. Six out of a hundred thousand isn’t that many.”

But no one really knows what the denominator is, because USA Triathlon does not keep records of race participants. While the number of USA Triathlon members has risen from 53,254 in 2004 to 100,674 in 2007, that doesn’t account for everyone who races because nonmembers can buy a one-day license for individual events.

There’s no way to regulate away risk, Dr. Hunt said, and some triathletes say that’s part of the appeal. “We want to push the limit of our comfort zone and experience life,” said Joe Bator, 37, of Boston. “Sure we want to minimize those risks,” he said. “But when it is time to race and put on that number, we need to be willing to push just a little bit more and get just a little bit more uncomfortable. If we don’t, we will never know what we are capable of achieving.”

Vicki Vila contributed reporting.

Time for Mandatory Wetsuits?

I'm wondering. They do increase buoyancy, and if folks are going to die during triathlons, it looks like most of them will die during the swim leg. Sigh. I'm thinking I'll need a good coach before I get back into the water.

Search under way for missing triathlon swimmer

by Tony Hagen/The Times

Sunday July 27, 2008, 3:42 PM

WEST WINDSOR -- Police and rescue workers were searching Sunday afternoon for a 52-year-old township man who failed to emerge from Lake Mercer in the swim portion of the New Jersey State Triathlon.

Police revealed no other details of the West Windsor man's identity. Police said his fiancee reported him missing after the triathlon.

Martin Griff / The TimesRescuers search for missing swimmer in Lake Mercer Sunday.

The third annual Mercer County triathlon held at Mercer County Park was expected to draw 2,500 competitors from 42 states and other countries and up to 7,000 spectators.

There were two separate races in the triathlon. One consisted of a 1.5 kilometer swim, a 23 mile bike ride and a 10 kilometer run. The second, shorter race included a 500 meter swim, an 11.5 mile bike ride and a 5 kilometer run.

The missing contestant had entered the shorter race. The search was expected to resume Monday.

Martin Griff / The TimesTriathlon contestants in the swim portion work their way across Lake Mercer.

In the more challenging race, swimmers were expected to enter the water at Mercer Beach and swim a roughly rectangular course that stretched down the center portion of the lake. The shorter course followed a 90 degree angle that led from one beach to the parking area.

What began as a gala event for the county and a revenue generator ended in chaos as severe storm activity overturned tents set up for the occasion and scattered debris across the areas established for the event.

Another Swimmer

This event just wouldn't be my idea of fun: High humidity, jellyfish and 3,000 other people in the water? No, thanks.

Throw in another swimming-related death, it just seems like a spectacularly bad weekend.

July 21, 2008

Man Dies in New York City Triathlon

By KATIE THOMAS and SHARON OTTERMAN

A 32-year-old man competing in the New York City Triathlon died Sunday after being pulled unconscious from the Hudson River on a day when competitors battled heat, humidity and stinging jellyfish along the course.

Organizers did not identify the man because his family members, who live in Argentina, had not been notified. Bill Burke, the race director, said rescuers pulled the man from the river about three-quarters of the way through the 1,500-meter swim portion, which ended near the 79th Street Boat Basin. The swim is the first of the event’s three phases and is followed by a 40-kilometer bicycle ride and a 10K run that finishes in Central Park.

“Other swimmers noticed the gentleman in the water, and they were actually waving and signaling for the nearby jet boats to come assist them,” Burke said.

He added: “We did have life support on the boats that were monitoring the swim course. There’s medical staff on those boats, so if the guy had a situation in the water, he’s getting the best medical care.”

About 15 minutes elapsed between the time rescuers brought the man to the dock and his placement in an ambulance. The man was one of nearly 3,000 competitors in the nonprofessional divisions; the race also included about 40 professional triathletes.

It was not known how long he was in the water before rescuers found him, but he was pulled from the river around 8 a.m., about a half-hour after the final wave of 30- to 34-year-olds left the dock at 98th Street.

Ellen Borakove, a spokeswoman for the city medical examiner, said an autopsy would be performed Monday.

At least three other people have died during the swim portion of triathlons since early May: a 38-year-old man in the Gulf Coast Triathlon in Florida, a 46-year-old man at the Hy-Vee Triathlon in Iowa and a 45-year-old man at the Pacific Crest Triathlon in Oregon.

The death Sunday was the first in the eight-year history of the New York event. Burke said that at least four competitors were taken to local hospitals with heat-related illnesses, and that two others sustained broken bones.

By 8 a.m., when most of the 3,000 competitors had begun the event, temperatures had reached 80 degrees, with high humidity in Central Park, according to the National Weather Service.

By that time, the top competitors had just completed the race. Greg Bennett of Australia won his fourth consecutive New York City Triathlon, with a time of 1 hour 46 minutes 30.9 seconds. He finished 63 seconds ahead of Stuart Hayes of Iowa.

An Australian also won the women’s race, with Liz Blatchford finishing in 1:58:34.9, nearly two minutes ahead of Becky Lavelle of California.

Brent McMahon, a member of Canada’s 2004 Olympic triathlon team, was among those affected by the heat. He was in second place in the men’s professional category when he collapsed a few feet from the finish line. He was attended to by medical personnel, then crawled across the finish line, placing fifth, and fainted. Burke said he had since recovered.

Burke said that competitors were required to attend a 30-minute safety briefing and must sign a waiver stating that they know how to swim, but they do not have to prove that they are physically fit in order to participate. Heat exhaustion or dehydration is always a risk for competitors on such a muggy day.

Cool Stuff

So I've not been posting for a while. Busy with work. Busy with children. Busy with garden and fruit trees and bushes and other life-like things. We regret the inconvenience, as they say, and to atone, here are some very cool things:

*** Dara Torres. The woman sounds like a complete emotional basket case, but good for her for making the Olympic team at 41 -- and good news for middle-aged sloggers (and we know who we are). As an aside, I'd like my abs back. It appears she stole them:


An excerpt from the story:

UPON HEARING THAT TORRES is likely to make the Olympic team at age 41, many people have the same question: How is this possible? Kinesiologists counter with a different query: Why are you so surprised? “Dara is extremely impressive, but she’s not as unique as people think,” says Michael Joyner, a competitive athlete and anesthesiologist at the Mayo Clinic who writes scholarly papers about aging and sports. “Ted Williams hit .388 when he was 39. Jack Foster did very well in the Olympic marathon when he was 40. Karl Malone earned a triple-double in an N.B.A. game at 40. Jeannie Longo won a French time-trial championship in cycling at age 47.” Torres’s events — short swims — are also well suited to competitors of advanced age. Compared to, say, running, swimming is more technique-intensive and produces fewer injuries. Sprints are also kinder to older athletes, in that strength falls off more gradually than aerobic power. In April, at 37, Mark Foster, a freestyle sprinter in England, came out of retirement and earned a spot, for the fifth time, on the British Olympic swim team. “For those of us who pay attention to this stuff,” Joyner said, “Dara’s performance is unusual but not totally unexpected.”

So why do we assume a middle-aged swimmer must be all washed up? Because for nonelite athletes, sporting achievements fall off precipitously with age. Body composition changes toward more fat and less muscle. Strength and aerobic capacity decrease as well. But a primary reason that athletic performance degrades in adulthood is changes in priorities. People tend to devote more time and energy to jobs and families than to sports. Even committed athletes downgrade their workout goals from achieving personal bests to staying in shape. Academics refer to this reduction in physical activity as hypokinesis. The phenomenon is not limited to humans. A 1985 study showed that rats with unlimited access to running wheels exercised less as they aged. “But look at people who maintain activity levels,” says Joel Stager, a professor of kinesiology at Indiana University. “It’s a different story! A lot of what we assume is aging is just progressive hypokinesis. How many people at Dara’s age have maintained their training consistently? I’m going to say there are very, very few.”

Even childbirth needn’t be a sports-career killer. In 1972, in The Journal of the American Medical Association, E. Zaharieva published a study of 13 women who were pregnant and then competed in the 1964 Olympic Games. Most resumed serious training between three and six months after giving birth. All said, Zaharieva wrote, “they became stronger, had greater stamina and were more balanced in every way after having a child.” Last September, Lindsay Davenport was back on the pro tennis tour and winning just three months after giving birth, while in November, Paula Radcliffe won the New York City Marathon less than 10 months after having a baby.

So how long can peak athletic performance last? Hirofumi Tanaka, the director of the Cardiovascular Aging Research Laboratory at the University of Texas at Austin, found that both elite and nonelite runners and swimmers could maintain personal bests until age 35, after which performance declined in a gradual, linear fashion until about age 50 to 60 for runners and 70 for swimmers. Deterioration was rapid from there. Tanaka also found that swimmers experienced more modest declines than runners and that swim sprinters, like Torres, experienced the smallest declines of all. At Yale University, Ray Fair, a runner and an economist, crunched statistics on aging and peak athletic performance and created what he calls the Fair Model. The model provides a table of coefficients that enable an athlete to take a personal-best time and compute how long he or she should expect to take to complete that same event at a specific point later in life (assuming he or she has continued to train at the same level). According to the Fair Model, a woman who swam a personal best 24.63 seconds in the 50-meter freestyle at or before age 35 should expect to clock 25.37 seconds at age 41. “I am struck by how small the deterioration rates are,” Fair wrote in a paper titled “How Fast Do Old Men Slow Down?” “It may be that societies have been too pessimistic about losses from aging for individuals who stay healthy and fit.”

*** Next. Russell Means profile in the Washington Post. Eh, Russell -- have your tribal people get with my tribal people and see who got screwed over first (and longest). And general note to the part of your frontal lobe that deals with PR issues: Don't call the white reporter a racist. At least, not before the story runs. Your Dolce and Gabbana shades will be mentioned.

At our first interview, over breakfast, Means was surly from the get-go. Within five minutes of shaking my hand, he accosted me for my "[expletive] white racist arrogance. There's only one reason you people came to this continent," he said. "Greed! We Indians have our spirituality. We have our land, but Americans have no culture except greed."

I changed the subject, asking Means how many Lakota backed his independence claim. "That's not germane," he barked. "In all my years of international relations, not once has anybody ever questioned my sovereignty. Even if I am only speaking for myself and my brother, and I'm not, my sovereignty exists. It's spelled out in the treaties."

Eventually, I'd learn that Means has only six or eight active Lakota supporters scattered throughout North and South Dakota. Many other Lakota quietly share his contempt for the U.S. government; some even long for a return to the hallowed days of Lakota independence. And, while Means won 46 percent of the vote when he ran unsuccessfully for Pine Ridge tribal chair in 2004, he has not endeared himself with his desperado-style secession.

*** Interesting Ben Stein column in the NYTimes on wage deflation and the price of oil. Wish it were all that simple, but it's a good point, nevertheless:

But the trend is dismal. The average private worker now earns very roughly $600 a week, not counting fringe benefits. For this worker, gasoline might well account for close to one-tenth of his or her earnings. If the price of gas goes up 25 percent, the effect is serious. To put it mildly, people making $600 a week do not have a lot of leeway on spending.

As I see it, the problem is not the price of oil generally. (I think that the price will decline somewhat before long, but the long-term trend is very much up.) The problem is the stagnation of wages. Please bear in mind that the numbers I gave are averages. Skilled workers make much more. Lawyers, doctors, investment bankers, accountants, dentists — they all make more. ( I just paid two dentists a total of more than $10,000 — I am not kidding — to have one poor old tooth get a root canal and a crown, and I’m not finished with that miserable tooth yet. I paid for 90 percent of it out of my own pocket. I do earn more than the ordinary citizen, but nothing by Wall Street standards.)

But, obviously, a heck of a lot of workers make less. Imagine what it means to minimum-wage workers for gasoline to surge past $4 a gallon.

What is to be done? The federal government can do little to make the price of oil fall in the short run, except, perhaps, for one basic thing: balance the budget. The world price of oil is denominated in dollars. The dollar is weak for many reasons, but a big one is the immense budget deficits run by our government. If President Bush and Senators John McCain and Barack Obama were to stand together in front of a camera and solemnly swear that they would balance the budget in four years, even if it required tax increases on people earning millions, the dollar would rise against the euro, and oil would fall in dollars.

*** Final cool things. Went by the co-op to get some cheese, and they were giving away Silk, which (I think) is basically soy milk. They were giving away a lot of it because it was close to expiration. So we got 35 gallons of free Silk. Bad news is, it's no good for cheese or ice cream. Good news is, the pigs love it.

Went by a flea market last week and found an extraordinarily sharp crosscut saw for $20. Also, a first-edition copy of "Remember the Alamo" by Robert Penn Warren. Sweet.

Youngest son made it to Arizona and back for the national youth leadership conference. Seemed to have a good time. Is still skeptical of adults in power. This is generally a Good Thing.

I'm off for a few days to get some serious day job stuff done.

I Don't Get Out Nearly Enough.

Duty called. Had to drive to Boston early this morning for the Day Job. Put on my coat and tie, and went out before leaving to check on the pigs. Saw three curly little tails sticking out of the hay and remembered, I needed to get them some corn.

Stopped by the feed store en route to Boston and picked up two bales of hay, two bags of chicken feed, and a bag of corn. Nothing unusual about this, other than throwing hay into the Outback while wearing a coat and tie.

Made it to the city without too much incident. Met up with a coworker who was a bit taken aback by a colleague with hay in the car. He probably doesn't live in Vermont, I thought. Stopped to get some fast-food on the way out of town (hey, I was starving). The guy at the window peered into the back of my car. "You raise cows or something?" he asked, genuinely puzzled. Certainly he doesn't live in Vermont, I thought. Stopped for gas in southern New Hampshire. Came back from grabbing a Coke to find four people standing around my car, wondering if my bike and kayak racks were somehow related to the hay in the back of the car. They confessed; they were tourists from Missouri.

Drove back into Vermont. Stopped for groceries. No one stared. Ran by the market to pick up a pig bucket -- I'm giving the local grocer a break on green eggs in exchange for a bucket of old fruits and veggies every day or two. Again, nothing unusual about a guy in a coat and tie with hay and animal feed in the back of the car (although I'm sure the pig bucket added a certain je ne sans quoi to an establishment owned by a British gentleman). Anyway, nothing to see here, folks, move along.

I guess the moral of the story is, people who don't live in Vermont are strange. Or something like that.

Speaking of people who don't live in Vermont. The blog has been getting a lot of attention from Texas, almost certainly due to the latest triathlon tragedy. One reader was concerned that I was blaming the guy who died. Well ... no. But I'm not hugely crazy about huge events. And I think it's simple math. Bigger the event, bigger the chances for trouble.

Just philosophically, I don't think everyone should be able to enter a triathlon. Or a marathon. I'm not even sure I shouldn't be banned as a menace to others for my swimming/flailing in the water. Not to be elitist, but I think the sport would mean more if there's a minimum bar. Not a hugely high, Boston Marathon-like one, mind you -- but a minimum, so nitwits like myself don't try to enter one when they're woefully out of shape and hurt themselves or others.

This is NOT to say that the Conroe triathlete who died was out of shape, or a danger to anyone. I don't know -- maybe if there hadn't been 1,000 other people in the water, something could have been done. Or not. I don't know. But I do know a lot of these events are just too damn big. That's all. I'm just sayin'.

I'll step off my soapbox now. It's hard to stay on the soapbox anyway, when the Wall Street Journal has this to say about your neighboring town:

BRATTLEBORO, Vt. -- Policeman Robert Perkins received a complaint the other day. A man was standing near the tourist information kiosk in this quaint New England village, in the nude.

Officer Perkins spotted the perp and issued a warning: Keep your clothes on, or risk a $25 ticket. The man "was unaware" that being naked in town was illegal, Officer Perkins says.

1

Shefali Anand/WSJ

On a blackboard in downtown Brattleboro in November, some residents expressed their opinions against the ban on public nudity. NOTE: Some photos in this gallery include nudity.

In fact, until just a few months ago, public nudity was perfectly legal here -- as it still is in many Vermont towns. However, over the past two years, Brattleboro, pop. 12,000, has experienced sporadic outbreaks of naked bicycling, naked hula-hooping, and nakedness in general. That, in turn, triggered a period of civic navel-gazing, both literally and figuratively.

Last month's incident by the tourist kiosk was the first report of public nudity after months of wintry weather. But now that spring is in the air, Officer Perkins says, people are starting to wear less clothing. "We'll see if they take it all off," he says.

Brattleboro's troubles started in August 2006, when three young men went skinny-dipping in a swimming hole outside of town, then decided to see what would happen if they went into town and got naked there.

So the three headed to Harmony Parking Lot -- a popular hangout for kids just off Main Street -- and took off their clothes. "It was kind of a spur-of-the-moment thing," said Chris Corry, 20 years old and a member of the group.

... Love the Journal to death. Really. But "Brattleboro's troubles?" What the hell, it's Belfast or something? Summer=People take clothes off. Winter=People put them back on. No troubles here.

Chance of snow showers tonight, wind blowing like a damn Banshee out of the north. Damn, will it never end? At least I haven't yet planted the two apple trees or blueberry bushes I got over the weekend.

Sigh.

But a cool site here, the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund. Here's hoping I never need them (and I probably won't, since I'm not selling or even producing raw milk). But knock on wood, anyway. And read Salatin's book, Everything I Want To Do is Illegal.

I'll shut up now.

Gilt Trip

So, we finally got the three little pigs. One girl, two boys. They're in a pen while we get the grounding rods straightened out -- not enough of a charge to keep them in the fence. We'll have it together tomorrow, Friday at latest. Funny little animals.

Been busy as hell this week. Trying very hard to get the garden put together, but we're interested in farming crops, not rocks. Sigh. There are a lot of them down there. Also been engaged in a ton of Will chaffeur-ing. I had to take him to Rutland for a meeting for his June youth leadership conference in Phoenix, and Lisa and I got him from Rutland again a few days later for another meeting. Fortunately, the weather has been more or less gorgeous.

More on the triathlon death in Houston (maybe a week or two ago). Awfully sad. Sometimes, these things just happen for no good reason. I'll still argue that the swimming leg is the most dangerous part of the sport, with or without heart problems.

The death of a Conroe man who was stricken while swimming in a triathlon last weekend resulted from drowning, but a heart problem also was a factor, according to an autopsy report.

Randolph Wray Parnell, 51, was competing in the 500-meter swim when he was found floating face-down in Lake Woodlands on Saturday.

An autopsy, conducted Monday by the Southeast Texas Forensic Center in Conroe, showed that Parnell drowned, but that dilated cardiomyopathy was a contributing factor, said Edie Connelly, Montgomery County Precinct 3 justice of the peace.

Parnell was one of about 900 competitors in the CB&I triathlon at Northshore Park in The Woodlands.

He had been training and competing in triathlons for 11 years, family members said, and this was his third year competing in the CB&I triathlon.

Survivors include his wife, Sharon, and son, Mason.

Again.

I don't know, but I think 1,000 people swimming together might be too many. I'm wondering if the sport might not be better off with some sort of pre-qualifications across sports. Something like, you can enter if you've run a 5K in 24 minutes or less in the past year, or swum 500m in 10 minutes or less, that sort of thing.

Here's the story from the Conroe Courier:

Conroe triathlete dies

Elliott Cochran
Courier Staff

05/04/2008

Email to a friendPost a CommentPrinter-friendly

A Conroe resident died while competing in the swimming portion of the 2008 CB&I Triathlon at Northshore Park in The Woodlands Saturday morning.

Randolph Parnell, 51, an experienced triathlete, competed among 1,000 participants in the race. He died from undetermined causes in the swimming portion of the race, according to officials at press time.

Chris Nunes, director of parks and recreation for The Woodlands, said rescue personnel were present at the time of the incident, and information and details of the occurrence are ongoing.

“We’re still collecting a lot of information and debriefing our staff,” he said. “There were personnel on site as part of the race, including between 12 and 14 lifeguards in individual kayaks and on the shore, as well as The Woodlands Fire Department on one of their rescue boats.”

The triathlon included a 500-meter swim, a 15-mile bike ride and a 5k run.

Bret Strong, a participant in the event and friend of Parnell, said Parnell appeared to be prepared for the event, and was enthusiastic.

“I talked to him a little before the race and wished him luck; he seemed happy and ready to go,” he said. “We’ve known him and his wife and their son for 18 years now. When we first moved to The Woodlands, they were one of the first families we met.”

Parnell previously competed in the 2006 CB&I Triathlon, finishing 281st overall, and 25th in the male 45- to 49-year-old division.

The body was taken to Memorial Hermann The Woodlands Hospital.

... And Busted Again

From another blog:

Top Ten Newbie Mistakes

In the military they say that all the action happens at the tip of the spear. The sharply pointed end where the winners and losers are sorted out. For us newbie and amateur Clydesdale triathletes the tip of the race is only a distant skirmish. We live and race at the other end of spear; the round curvy end which, as it happens, tends to be shaped like many of us. These are some of our some of our stories:

They say the best way to learn is to make mistakes. As a newbie and Clydesdale, in my first year of competing I've made my share of mistakes Here is my Top ten list of Newbie mistakes:

10) Wearing a black swim cap. On the face of it this one might seem a bit silly but true. "You are not gonna wear that black swim cap," the guy standing in the water next to me at the start solemnly said. "I was planning on it" I replied a bit confused. "You don't want to do that," he added with a knowing nod. "Why" I said a bit wide eyed? "Because they won't see go down when you drown," he added and swam away. I looked into the dark murky water where he had been standing and considers this, removed the cap, and threw it to the shore. Only after the race, I realize that I have dark hair.

9) Butt Burn...otherwise know as the Lack-O-Glide factor. It took me about a year to discover the joys of lubrication. The leg pain after a marathon is nothing compared to the searing pain of taking a shower with raw nipples. However, nothing identifies a Newbie triathlete like the Charlie Chaplin butt-burn wobble walk after an especially long session on the bike.

8) The Clydesdale Category. I'm a big guy 6'2 and well over 200 pounds. I've always considered myself big in a gladiator sort of way. But according to the official rules I'm big in a huge, wide-butted, beer wagon-pulling sort of way.

7) MAX, ADE, OX, GU, BOOM, GEL. There is a bewildering amount of performance enhancing drinks and supplements on the market. They have one thing in common: a fluorescent Day-Glo color. I tend to judge them by the stickiness factor. The more they make my hands stick to the handlebars of my bike, the better they must be.

6) Transitions are NOT free time. For all of the pros out there they may be free time, but for newbies they are a time of profound confusion and terror. Mistakes happen all the time. "Why am I wearing my swim goggles?" I think as I power out of the transition area on my bike?

5) A wet suit will kill. Try to remember to Valero the wet suit zipper pull leash to your wet suit. The first time I wore my wet suit didn’t know to attach the leash to the wet suit. About five minutes into the swim the leash wrapped itself around my neck like a viscous python bent on my death. The more I struggled to disengage myself from its death-like grip, the tighter it got. My flailing only seemed to encourage it. I finally did manage to free my throat and continue the swim. Five minutes latter, it was back.

4) Big girls on mountain bikes. Big girls on mountain bikes are surpassingly fast. Do not take it for granted that just because you are on a big ring, carbon fiber, aero bar out-fitted, race-tuned tri-bike that you'll easily pass that big girl up ahead. Make this mistake at your own peril and your self-esteem will suffer.

3) Du vs. Tri. Don't confuse a Du with a Tri when racing or checking the results. My first Olympic distance Tri was almost my last. I watched the awards ceremony with a mixture of terror and awe as the results and blazingly fast times were read out. I was amazed at the speedy results. Needless to say I was not the slowest triathlete in the world....just the only one at the DU awards ceremony.

2) Twelve year-old-lap counters. When competing in a pool, avoid the 12-year-old lap counters. I wondered out loud to the twelve-year-old "why do I have to swim two more laps when the other two racers in my lane are done." This seemed especially odd since "I had lapped both of them." The twelve-year-old was not moved by my logic. Math must not have been his best subject in school.

1) Beer. Avoid all triathlons that are not sponsored by a brewery. Not only does a post race beer greatly help in the recovery process, but it also helps one forget all the mistakes. Plus as a added benefit after enough beers, that big girl on the mountain bike don't seem so big anymore.

Walkabouts and Bad Dogs

Quiet Christmas. Boys got books, video games and clothes, mostly. I got Lisa a plane ticket to see her father in Florida and another Bohus sweater kit; she got me a workshop at the New England Cheesemaking Supply in Ashfield, Mass. Looking forward to it, though it'll have to wait until April. I have a feeling my shoulder's not going to be up to pulling mozarella and cutting mascarpone in time for the February class.

Been walking quite a bit lately, two and three walks a day. Don't feel like running, swimming, or biking. It's been nice outside, not too cold -- about 30 degrees or so -- and no snow, sleet or ice expected until tomorrow. Big full moon and quite a few stars. We've got about a dozen houses on our block (two full-time residents), and only a couple of families up for the holidays. Always amazes me that people will shell out hundreds of thousands for a place and never visit. Not that I'm complaining.

The good deal about the walking is that it's helped me sleep a bit better. I generally get to sleep around midnight, and my shoulder wakes me up around 430a or so. The walking put me out like a light last night -- went for three walks -- but the shoulder got me up around 5a. That, and the sound of chomping in the kitchen. Went downstairs to investigate, and the collies had managed to get on top of the kitchen island and chow down on the Christmas ham bone.

Bad dogs. Very, very bad dogs.

Went by the post office today. Seems like the garden catalogs are as bad as the Christmas ones. Probably won't see spring for another four months, and they're already flooding the mailbox. I'm pretty sure it's Seed Savers Exchange for us this year.

Lots of work to do this week. Taking vacation from the day job, but I've got a couple of book deadlines looming, a computer monitor that needs fixing, and a ton of cleaning to be done.

I also want to take some walks and not think about the shoulder.

This, That, and Some Other

Slow day today. Beautiful outside. Did some odds and ends around the house -- laundry, cleaning, grocery run for Diet Coke.

Good news, bad news on the chicken front. One of the New Hampshire Reds is sick, wheezing a lot. I put him in a separate cage and will keep my fingers crossed that he doesn't pass the crud along to the rest of the flock.

Got two eggs today, one of which is a green egg! The Aruacanas are finally coming through.

Dug out the last of the potatoes. There weren't many. Had a couple of frosty tomatoes on the vine that I tossed to the peeps as a reward for the green eggs.

Lot to do this week on the day job front. And run, bike, swim. Etc.

Whew.

Taking a brief break before diving back into the day job until ... oh, midnight, if this past week's history has been any indicator. But I'm making progress. Swear.

Miscellaneous tidbits:

*** I've moved the baby chicks out of the brooder and into the new barn. All I have to do now is add the trim and build the chicken run, and I can put everyone (except the ducks) in the new addition.

*** In another chicken-related vein, we put a light in the current coop. Hopefully, the chicks will decide it's back to summer and start laying. Chickens generally lay at 22 weeks, and the older chickens are ... 22 weeks. Lisa made me an egg basket in an uncontrollable burst of optimism.

*** Biofuels, The Good. A Charlie Rose interview with Luiz Lula da Silva of Brazil:




*** Biofuels, The Bad: A Reuters story about Jane Goodall's take:



Jane Goodall says biofuel crops hurt rain forests
Wed Sep 26, 6:08 PM ET


Primate scientist Jane Goodall said on Wednesday the race to grow crops for vehicle fuels is damaging rain forests in Asia, Africa and South America and adding to the emissions blamed for global warming.


"We're cutting down forests now to grow sugarcane and palm oil for biofuels and our forests are being hacked into by so many interests that it makes them more and more important to save now," Goodall said on the sidelines of the Clinton Global Initiative, former U.S. President Bill Clinton's annual philanthropic meeting.


As new oil supplies become harder to find, many countries such as Brazil and Indonesia are racing to grow domestic sources of vehicle fuels, such as ethanol from sugarcane and biodiesel from palm nuts.


The United Nations' climate program considers the fuels to be low in carbon because growing the crops takes in heat-trapping gas carbon dioxide.


But critics say demand for the fuels has led companies to cut down and burn forests in order to grow the crops, adding to heat-trapping emissions and leading to erosion and stress on ecosystems.


"Biofuel isn't the answer to everything; it depends where it comes from," she said. "All of this means better education on where fuels are coming from are needed."


Goodall said the problem is especially bad in the Indonesian rain forest where large amounts of palm nut oil is being made. Growers in Uganda -- where her nonprofit group works to conserve Great Apes -- are also looking to buy large parcels of rain forest and cut them down to grow sugar cane, while in Brazil, forest is cleared to grow sugar cane.

*** I'm amazed at this one. I mean, what are the Chinese doing here? Don't they know better? How can they say they made a mistake? Without spin? Or bullshit?

Clearly, they have a lot to learn from, ahem, the other side of the Pacific.

CHINESE officials who previously defended the giant Three Gorges Dam as an engineering and economic miracle have admitted that the world's biggest hydropower project is at risk of environmental disaster if accumulating threats are not dealt with promptly.

A forum organised by State Council, China's cabinet, on Tuesday to discuss the dam's accelerating environmental problems concluded that "if no preventive measures are taken, the project could lead to catastrophe", the official Xinhua news agency reported, quoting senior officials at the meeting in Wuhan.

Wang Xiaofeng, the director of the Government's Three Gorges construction body, said that while China had largely overcome many challenges - including funding, technology and the huge displacement of people - it now had to face up to the increasing ecological threats.

These included erosion and landslides around the dam, pollution and "ecological deterioration" caused by "irrational development" along the river, he said.

"We absolutely cannot relax our guard against ecological and environmental security problems created by the Three Gorges project," Mr Wang told the meeting. "We cannot sacrifice our environment for short-term economic prosperity."

*** A very good NY Times story about running, biking and swimming:



http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/27/health/nutrition/27Best.html?adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1190931264-nnDw5BOmGlWt5jXcOXvfmA



Here's the money graf:



The rules of physics say that distance cycling and distance running are for small people. Rowing and swimming are for people who are big. The physics is so exact that when Dr. Secher tried to predict how fast competitive rowers could go, based only on their sizes and the weights of their boats, he was accurate to within 1 percent.



Explains a lot. Although I'd still like to have seen a graf that explains lazy people who have so much going on at the day job that they haven't been able to get their act together and get back into some serious training.



I'm just sayin'.

Things Always Take Longer Than You'd Think

Worked my ass off this weekend on the chicken barn.

And all I've got to show for it are the walls. Still need to trim and roof. And since my walls are actually 8'6" apart, and the roofing panels are only 8' long, I'm going to have to get another panel and tin snips. Ack.

Aggravation.

Bottom line is, looks like it'll be another week before the chicks can be sprung from their brooder in the bathroom. I'm not too charmed by it, either.

Busy week ahead. Have to wrap up one project on Monday and start doing the heavy lifting on another. Major pending issues with job opportunity. Have to finish a book chapter this week. Must put together a PowerPoint presentation, also known as one of my least favorite things to do. Ummmm .. a few other things.

Run, bike, swim.

On a slightly different front, couldn't help noticing oil hitting $80/bbl. So here's a trivia question: What do my father, a former Rolling Stone writer, the former chief geologist for Shell, and a bestselling investment banker/writer have in common?

Try peak oil.

Jim Kunstler, who used to write for Rolling Stone, can be pretty damn mean-spirited -- it's like he's looking forward to some sort of apocalyptic scenario involving Cheetos-deprived NASCAR fans in the southern suburbs -- but makes some pretty salient points in his blog.

Colin Campbell's Association for the Study of Peak Oil has a no-frills web page. He's the former chief geologist for Shell. Strikes me as strange that someone who climbed the corporate ladder that far would be willing to do anything besides paint lipstick on this particular pig.

Matt Simmons, a Houston investment banker, has been banging the drum about peak oil for more than a few years. If you want hard facts and figures on where we're going with oil, you've got to check out his page.

And, of course, there's my dad, a petroleum geologist who's been agitating for oil to hit about $200/barrel since 1973. Dad's got three reasons for wanting oil prices to go insane. In reverse order of importance, (a) he would make a lot of money because domestic exploration would be encouraged, (b) he wouldn't have to fight so much Houston traffic, and (c) there might be enough left for his grandchildren to get two miles down the road by the time they're driving.

On a slightly weirder note:

Saying 'I'm hungry,' man rips head off St. Paul hotel's duck
Denver man, 26, arrested after domesticated bird is cornered and killed early Saturday
BY DAVE ORRICK Pioneer Press
Article Last Updated: 09/22/2007 11:45:40 PM CDT

He ripped the head off a live duck inside a hotel lobby.

That's the accusation St. Paul police made early Saturday against a 26-year-old Denver man staying at the Embassy Suites Hotel in downtown St. Paul.

The hotel's spacious lobby atrium features an ornamental pond that at one point contained eight domesticated ducks.

Shortly before 2:35 a.m., Scott D. Clark, who had told hotel employees he was in town on business, chased a duck across the area and cornered it, according to St. Paul police Sgt. John Wuorinen.

I'll admit to having similar fantasies about ripping the heads off a few of my ducks -- they do tend to be a bit obstreperous -- but I doubt I'd do it out of hunger. Duck meat, eh. And at an Embassy Suites? Maybe a slightly lower-end chain ...

Now, I'm Sacrificing.

So I'd entered to run the Bar Harbor marathon, but I think I'm going to give my entry to charity. You've got to respect the distance, and I just don't feel like I've put in the miles. I could theoretically finish, maybe even do respectably. But dammit, I want to do better.

I've also got a work-related conflict that would put me in Vermont one day, New York the next, and then Bar Harbor. Not exactly a good idea to run a marathon after driving overnight (and that's what I'd have to do) from New York to get to the starting line in time.

I could rationalize that. But dammit! there's now a meeting not too far from the house that weekend (http://www.postoilsolutions.org/) that I really wanted to make on using cold frames to extend the growing season, and I have to be in New York. And since I've been able to haul a couple of old windows from driveways, I was really looking forward to it.

Sigh.

On the plus side, an embarassment of farmer's market riches -- Brattleboro will be open through the winter!

http://www.postoilsolutions.org/2007wfm

Speaking of food, this I like:


¶
Sneaky Mac
¶
2 cups cauliflower
2 medium zucchini
1 tsp lemon juice
4 tbsp water
1 cup grated Swiss cheese
1/2 cup cheddar cheese
1/2 cup skim milk
1/2 pound finely chopped Andouille sausage
2 boxes macaroni and cheese
1 tbsp white pepper
¶
Steam the cauliflower. Mix raw peeled zucchini with the lemon juice. Add the cooked cauliflower and mix with zucchini, adding water as needed until mixture is pureed. Do not allow children in the kitchen.
¶
Use two boxes of standard, macaroni and cheese noodles. Boil, drain and rinse noodles. Finely chop, then sautee Andouille sausage while noodles are boiling. Grate 1 cup Swiss cheese and 1/2 cup cheddar. Make children leave kitchen if necessary. Throw away the cheese packets that came with the macaroni and cheese, taking care to ensure they are at the very bottom of the trash and will not be discovered. You can also hide them in the vegetable bin of your refrigerator, where they are not likely to be discovered.
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Mix macaroni noodles, cheese, pepper, skim milk and sausage in pot over low heat until cheese is melted. Check again to make sure children have left the kitchen. Add cauliflower and zucchini puree. Stir very thoroughly. Clean bowls and/or blender, and hide copy of Missy Chase Lapine's "The Sneaky Chef."
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Leave macaroni and cheese boxes on kitchen island for suspicious children. Serves four.

***

Where was I?

Oh, yeah. Spent yesterday cleaning like a banshee. We got the first floor pretty well mucked out, which was no small accomplishment. Ran out in the afternoon and bought a dozen sheets of 4 x 8 plywood for the barn walls, and a dozen 1 x 3s for the barn rafters, plus more chicken food. Rolled the plywood out to the car, which raised an interesting dilemma:

How do you put a dozen 4 x 8 plywood sheets into a Subaru?

You don't. I took the kayak rack off the top and used the Thule straps to tie down the plywood. This being Vermont, I had a good dozen helpers and assorted onlookers, including one of the hardware store clerks who must've spent 30 minutes lashing the plywood down. We spent a good 15 minutes discussing route possibilities and the likelihood of the plywood peeling off and decapitating someone. Yeesh. I could've driven 80mph into a wind tunnel, and I don't think it would've moved an inch. Anyway, got home, unloaded, did some more cleaning and threw some hay into the chicken run since it's been wet and was getting disgusting.

Got up early this morning and hauled all the trash to the dumpster, went to the hardware store and got some stain (Penofin -- it's wonderful stuff, as long as you're not interested in having any more children) for the coop panels. Came back and couldn't find my work gloves. So I puttered out to the store to get work gloves and some new jeans for Will; he was very appreciative, as always. I swung by the hardware store again and grabbed a half-dozen roof panels, plus some more 1 x 2s for the chicken run.

I didn't get home until 5p, which meant I could only spend a couple of hours working on the new barn. I got the area around the building trenched with a pickax, then cut wire and staple-gunned it to the two short sides. If I lose a chicken, it'll be one determined weasel that digs through a foot of rock and wire to get its meal.

Will be taking the next two days off from the day job to get most of the barn done. I'm hoping we can spend tomorrow staining, trenching the chicken run and assembling the chicken run panels (it'll be a 12 x 16 space with chicken wire stapled to 1 x 2 frames, and a foot of chicken wire running into the ground). I'll spend a chunk of Tuesday, hopefully, putting the walls up. It's going to be kind of tricky, since I've got to cut for two doors and two windows. If I get well and truly lucky, I might even be able to put up rafters and the roof by Tuesday, but that's really pushing it.

Bottom line, I'm hoping to have the chickens in their new home by next weekend. But there's a lot to do between now and then. Hoping for a few stray moments to run. And bike. And swim.

On the Trail Again

I'm back again, like a bad penny.

John and I had enough of civilization by Tuesday afternoon and had Lisa drop us off, back where we left off on the Long Trail. Things went considerably better this time.

First afternoon, we made it up Stratton Mountain and down a few feet before running out of daylight. You can't camp on the summit (though it would've been sweet), so we set up the tent about 200 feet below. I listened to airplanes go over for an hour or so before realizing I was listening to ... nothing.

Nice.

The next day was a bit of a haul. We made it down Stratton Mountain just fine, tooled along past Stratton Pond (biggest body of water on the Long Trail) and sat down for a rest. An older man came puttering along, and we got to chatting. He was old, had bad knees and was section-hiking, so we had that much in common.

"My 65th birthday was a dreary affair," he said. "So, my sons bet me $5,000 that I couldn't hike the Appalachian Trail. I'd get five years -- 182 days -- to do it all."

I tried to be encouraging.

"You're only about 500 miles from Katahdin."

"Oh, no," he smiled. "I've done it in bits and pieces. I've just got to hike to New York, and I'm done."

Wish I'd gotten his name, because I want to be him when I grow up.

We scooted ahead to the Spruce Peak shelter and had lunch. I sent John out for water; he came back and reported that the piped spring was "thinner than moose piss." I filtered heavily, just in case. While we were sitting around eating, a couple of southbound AT'ers came through with ... a ferret. Had a little nylon playpen, water bottle, the whole nine yards. We said, um, let's go.

John was pretty revved to be back on the trail, so I let him go ahead most of the afternoon. Told him around 3p just to wait for me at the main road and he scooted off. I walked for an hour or so and started seeing more southbounders -- none of whom had seen him. Uh-oh. Picked up the pace and made it to the main road in short order. No John.

Shit.

I figured he'd gone down a side road to Manchester that we'd passed, so I dropped my pack in the parking lot and double-timed it to the other road. Again, no John.

Double shit.

Hustled back to the parking lot, picked up my pack and ran up the mountain to the Bromley shelter, where we'd decided to spend the night. There were about a dozen Harvard kids for orientation ... and John. He'd gone down the side road, figured out his mistake, and double-timed to the shelter, figuring I'd get there sooner or later.

Whew.

The kids were noisy until about 1030p, and a couple of park rangers showed up. Turned out John had been a bit hot and crabby when he got to the shelter (and worried about me), so the orientation leader had called her supervisor to report in, and told him that there was an overheated 15-year-old at the shelter ... the supervisor called the park ranger ... who sent two people up to check. They looked at John -- who was tired and trying to go to sleep -- rolled their eyes and left. Then, the kids disappeared, and we had something resembling a good night's sleep.

We'd done almost 20 miles on Wednesday, so we slept a bit late. Got moving around 1030a, and it felt hot. We dragged our butts up to the Bromley summit, about a half-mile, and took an hour break. Came across a northbound AT'er, who told us the Harvard kids had gotten to the summit around 1130p ... and partied until 2a. He wasn't very pleased.

Puttered down the mountain to Mad Tom Notch and had a nice, long lunch. There's a great water well there, and we hated to see it go to any kind of waste at all, so we sat around until 2p or so before scrambling up Styles Peak. It wasn't supposed to be that tough ... but for some reason, we really struggled. Then it was on to Baker Peak, which was supposed to be very tough -- a 150-yard scramble up a rocky ledge. For some reason, we didn't struggle that much.

We got to the top and enjoyed the view, but it was starting to thunder and rain a bit. John grumbled.

"As much as I've been outdoors," he said, "you'd think I'd be looking more like Flava Flav."

(I may have misspelled that name.)

So we clambered down and headed for Lost Pond shelter, which had burned down in November. Moved along in the dark to Big Branch shelter and fell asleep next to a beautiful roaring brook. Woke up around midnight to find that we hadn't hung all our food, and a mouse was finishing up the last of the cashews. I hung John's pack, and went back to sleep. Heard more mouse-like sounds. Bastard found one of my Power Bars in a pants pocket. I hung my pack, and finally got back to sleep around 2a.

Enjoyed the view from the suspension bridge over the brook the next morning, then headed off into the woods. It was one of those tough days where you feel like you're fighting the entire time-space continuum just to get a mile or two, but we walked through some beautiful fir forests. Made it the Hinchey shelter just as the lights went totally out and found (wonder of wonders!) we had a shelter to ourselves. John was starving, so I put together a big fire with every intention of eating Uncle Ben's Ready Rice for dinner, when three northbound AT'ers showed up. One was the guy we'd met at Bromley summit, and the other two were a brother and sister from South Carolina we'd run into a few times. They'd had to hustle to make it to a post office before it closed, so we figured they'd be behind us. But they'd gone into town and picked up their winter gear for the final run into Katahdin.

"You made it into town, and brought us pizza! You guys are the best!" I said.

And so they had, and so they were. They had carried pizza about five miles. And shared it. Talk about trail magic.

We chatted and enjoyed the fire ("cowboy TV") for an hour before getting to sleep. Woke up the next morning feeling pretty good and headed out over some beautiful country, including the Airport Overlook above Clarendon before getting to the gorge. It was a bit early, but we figured the Clarendon Gorge just looked like a damn fine place for a leisurely ramen lunch. We enjoyed the view and laughed at some of the tourists (think people who carry poodles in sweaters out to the Long Trail) before heading over the gorge bridge and up the road.

The scenery changed quite a bit that afternoon. Lots of apple trees and a few pastures. Looked something like this:
After a few days of Power Bars and raisins, I was ready for some wild apples. We plugged along, hoping to make Killington before night. Had to stop at one stream about midway between Clarendon and Clement shelters -- some incredibly thoughtful soul had put Dr Pepper and Mountain Dew cans in the stream. Even had a trash bag for the empties.

Talk about more trail magic. I was beginning to worry that we were using all ours up in a hurry.

We made it to the Clement shelter around 530p. It's a nice enough shelter -- stone, with a fireplace, in a clearing, but it's also off a dirt road. Given that it was a Saturday night on a holiday weekend, we decided we'd best push up the road three hours to the Cooper Lodge shelter on Killington. We double-timed it up an extremely eroding ridge, over the top of Little Killington, and made the shelter around 830p with no problems. Cold as hell. I'm guessing the wind chill was about 35. The stars made up for it, though.

Made it up at a reasonable hour the next morning and clambered to the top of Killington. John looked down at Rutland. "Rows and rows of people-boxes," he said. Scooted back down and picked up our packs. Headed down some really gentle grades, through a beautiful birch forest. Stopped for lunch and watched a hawk hunt for an hour or so. Had some good talks, and made it to the Inn at Long Trail in Killington around 2p. If you've never stayed there, you should. If you've never eaten there, you should. Hell, I think everyone should give them money just for existing. They'd held one of my boxes for nearly a month, so we were able to pig out and decided what to do next.




After an hour or so, we decided we were done for the week, but not with the trail. We'll pick it back up, hopefully sooner rather than later. For a 15-year-old, John can still come up with some pretty good observations.

"It's not the destination, it's the journey," I said.

"And the ramen," he agreed.

The hike got me into slightly better shape. I dropped three pounds, so I'm down to 149, and my body fat just plunged down to 14.5 percent. I've got to get the boys ready for school, which starts Wednesday. And finish the chicken barn. And do some cleaning. And get back into the day job groove. And get myself back on the road. And the bike. And the pool.

Which is, after all, why we're all here.