People

As part of the HellaSound blog I've been doing a series of interviews with fitness experts, certified trainers and athletes.

Check 'em out!

I'm not a huge fan of Runner's World, but I will buy any running magazine that has marathon superstar Paula Radcliffe on the cover. Well, I'm a Bit, and she's our best runner, male or female.

So the March RW cover story reveals that the 2:15 world record-holder Paula was "down to" 70 miles a week by month 7 of her pregnancy. Her earlier concession had been to slow from 5:30 to 6:30 per mile. And there's a picture of her in full stride, smile on her face, running that 42-minute 10k race in London's Hyde Park 14 weeks before giving birth.

It's Only a Flesh Wound,

Nephew Joey / Uncle Mike

Yesterday my niece and nephew came over for a visit, the first one in 5 years or so. They live in Westerville, OH just outside of Columbus. I took Joey out to a Cleveland Indians (vs. the Phillies) game along with my friend Scott and we really had a ball. The tribe ended up winning 10-6 with a very exciting 8 run 6th inning. I caught Joey rooting for the home team, even though he is really an Oakland A's fan.

"What if?" That's the question Trisha Steidl didn't want her husband to be facing aged 70. Seeing him finish 12th in windswept Boston in 2:15.54 running against elite professional runners seems to have been the final straw. So she's encouraged him to take a big step. From now on science teacher Uli Steidl is going full-time: aged 35.
Full inspiring story and details of his training regime is on the Seattle PI website here.

* In November last year the Steidls pulled off a unique double; Uli won the Seattle marathon for the eighth consecutive time, and Trisha won the women's event -- for the first time.

Lately I have been selfish. I’ve been running alone. I’ve been running with my iPod. I’ve been running with my Forerunner. I’ve been running with my running group. But I haven’t been running with my dog, Kila (“key-lah”) Marie. Kila Marie and I used to run all the time together.

On Saturday I ran the Hermosa 5000. It was an inaugural event to mark the centennial anniversary of the city of Hermosa Beach, CA. I've run several 5ks here in the South Bay of Los Angeles and I have to say this was by far the best. The course was amazing, starting on the streets, moving to the strand (like a boardwalk), and the last leg took us down the Hermosa pier and back to the finish line. The event was well organized and supported, not to mention the beer garden afterward! I would have liked to run it all out for a PR, but I invited my friend who is an avid exerciser, i.e. spinning, weight training; but she has never run before. We had a lot of walk breaks, and I kept talking through the run to distract her and we finished in a commendable 37:15. She couldn't believe she did it, but I knew she had it in her.I was so happy for her and really felt great that I took the opportunity to run with her.

Duncan Larkin of EliteRunning.com has a fantastic interview with ultra-runner Scott Jurek, Spartathlon champion and former winner of Badwater and the Western States.

Read it here.

Rochelle Stevens, a member of the US 1,600-meter relay team, who won silver in 1992 and gold in '96, is coming out of retirement to bid for glory at the 2008 games in Beijing.

Stevens is now 40, and says: "There are a lot of young women still not running as fast as I used to on a bad day".

Martial arts training, forced on her as a way of staying in shape following a torn cartilage that ended her running career in 2000, got her so fit that she made an exercise DVD. And it while filming running sequances, she realised she could still do it.

Check out the full story by Ron Higgins

The Henry Rono comeback story has taken an interesting twist, as Masters world mile record-holder Nolan Shaheed (he of jazz trumpet fame), has as good as challenged the Kenyan maestro to a showdown.

"I am glad to hear that you are endeavoring to set the record in the mile", writes Shaheed on Henry's letsrun.com thread. "As you know it's my endeavor too. It would be great for us to go for the record in the same race at the same meet at the same time. Maybe there is a race promoter out there who would be interested."

I would LOVE to get in that race!