Clothing

It was a thing of beauty! Perfect in syntax and all the right things were said. I spent an hour typing away and scrolled down to hit "submit" when, what to my wondering eyes should appear, but a "DATA BASE ERROR" screen (see photo) - and with that, my masterpiece was lost in Cyberspace forever.. Oh well, I guess that's what short-term memory is for. Let me see if I can recreate it (I hear the same thing happened to Tolstoy after his first draft of War and Peace was eaten by his dog..).

I'm really not sure who the people in the picture are, but I do know that as of last night they're not on American Idol anymore! It was a bittersweet way to spend my evening, typing away on my blog only to watch the rug get pulled out from underneath these four obviously bad singers at about the same time my blog entry was pulled out from under me. : ) The moral of this American Idol story is (to quote Ryan Seacrest) - "if you have a favorite, you must vote!".. Touching words that have carryover value to everything from the presidential elections (both past and present) to "win 100 of ANYTHING Powerbar" contests - voting for the LATTER will commence on March 12th!

You may not get to run at the North Pole, but you can still benefit from the advice of those who are hoping to run there. As a spin-off to YourRunning.com's contest to find someone to run in Brad Feld's place at April's North Pole Marathon, sponsor Pixie Mate has asked the contest entrants to answer this question:

"How do you, o daring runner, plan to stay warm during your race in sub-zero conditions on the top of the Arctic Ocean?"

Oxysocks are socks which are intended to improve your max VO2, especially on long runs. Oxysocks are a compression sock which helps to prevent the blood from pooling in your legs. I have run in them for over 2 years and really like them. I feel that they keep my legs feeling fresh even on my long runs.

I have had a history of stress factors (eight of them). I have developed some expertise on stress factors, especially on how to get them (smiling). Some researchers have discovered that your muscles fatigue significantly at the end of your run especially when you run an hour or longer. What they discovered is that when the muscles fatigue more shock is delivered to the bones. Another known fact about stress to the body is that when running downhill you dramatically increase the stress to your body(bones). So many of my stress fractors have occured during long runs or races where at the end of the race or run there was a steep downhill. Since I have been wearing the oxysocks for the last two years I haven't had one stress fracture. I even have done 30 mile runs with a 2000 feet drop in elevation without any injury. I'm a 60 year old runner who runs about 100 miles a week. I believe that Oxysocks have helped me stay injury free (stress fracture free) for the last two years.