Give me a high five, balance and a brain storm

If you have been reading along in the last few weeks you can see I am stuck on JOY! With perfect timing, Nike has made a commercial called JOY! And it is good, and rings so true! Just like this graphic that explains what we really mean when we say, "That was a fun race." And it is just in time for the Mountain Lakes 100 put on by Go Beyond racing this weekend where some of the UltraU athletes are racing, crewing and pacing and where I will be at an aid station which I have renamed the JOY STATION. I plan on filling bottles with water and joy, making ramen with joy toppings and ensuring that even if the joy is coming out of runners like vomit, there is at least some background joy!!! 

Who will I see at Mountain Lakes this year?? Come give me a high five at the Clackamas Aid Station, miles 40 and 72. If you are not in the region but are looking for an awesome 100-mile race, put this on your list for next year. The trails are SWEET, the people are the best and you won't find a better set of race directors out there. Or better yet, volunteer! You will learn a LOT about running, pretending you like running, fueling, the meaning of life and helping is awesome. 

CAFFEINE 
Caffeine can be used as a performance booster if you know how to use it and can get the dosing right. This article helps break down the science of how it can reduce 5k run times, how much to take and when. “Current guidelines recommend the ingestion of low-to-moderate doses of caffeine, ranging from 3 to 6 mg/kg of bodyweight), approximately 60 min prior to exercise to get these improvements.” A 175-pound person might need to ingest between 240 and 480 milligrams of coffee an hour before training or racing. To put this into context, an eight-ounce cup of coffee contains an average of 95 milligrams.

USING POLES
Ultrarunning Magazine has a whole article on poles in their September issue. Here are some key points: 

• Sizing: with hand in middle of grip (poles with a grip area long enough to allow you to choke up or down depending on terrain are ideal) elbow should be bent at or near 90 degrees with pole at side and tip on ground.
• Tighten pole strap so that your hand barely fits through, then slide hand into opening from beneath so that when you plant and push off with the pole you are also leveraging force from the strap around your wrist.
• The longer—and hence slower—the effort the more beneficial poles are on all terrain, especially downhills to mitigate eccentric braking load on quads.

BRAIN STORM
If you mountain bike or ski or do anything that may end in concussion (ok, we are humans that aren't always perfectly balanced, this is all of us) then this is worth a listen. This four-part podcast goes through the journey of impact, aftermath and recovery from concussion as told by mountain biker Rebecca Rusch. 

YOU ARE INVITED
Holy smokes, THIS is balance! I had no idea freestyle slacklining was a thing! If you are looking for somewhere to start getting better balance*, join me for Strength Training for Runners on Wednesday nights. Class is free, live on your screen and we spend a good part of the warm up working on stability. Learn more here. *not enough for freestyle slacklining

Happy trails everyone,
Dana
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