I saw a massive wild turkey on the trail yesterday. I often see wild turkey on a trail aptly named the Wild Turkey Trail, but this was on the LoBo Trail out my back door and was the first time. I’ve seen foxes and coyotes and deer, but never before had I seen a wild turkey on LoBo. They are just sort of stunning when they are that massive.
It struck me as odd, later in the day, riding in a truck with three other men, when one of them began talking about shooting and eating wild turkey. How only one in three are edible. Why there’s a reason Americans prefer chicken. For me, the conversation was striking because it was so unusual for me to see a wild turkey on the LoBo Trail and here I was talking about wild turkeys yet again in the same day. I mentioned it at dinner with friends later that night, proving that, like airplane crashes, these things happen in threes.
Another conversation at dinner, on running, stayed with me this morning. If you want to engage me in conversation, you probably know running is a safe bet. I can talk about many other subjects, but I don’t bring them up out of fear of boring you to death. I read so much non-fiction, some on business and the economy, I’ve subscribed to the WSJ for 40 years, but mostly on tech.
Lately, on AI. I don’t think I’m alone, they call it the US of AI for a reason, it’s a prevalent news story. My most recent AI fascination is on Elon Musk’s Colossus data center in Memphis – purported to be the largest AI factory in the world. It strikes me as tremendously reckless and moronic that he would not build a second data center for redundancy. His X platform just suffered a significant outage after a day-long DDoS attack. And he thinks he’s going to run the government’s IRS and SSA operations out of a single data center. Everyone thinks the man is a genius. I think he’s a dumbass. Still, such conversations can bore my friends to death. I recall being fascinated by fax machine technology 30 years ago and sharing my excitement with friends. I’ve learned since to keep my tech talk to myself.
Somehow the specific running topic was on running form and when does one start to feel good while running. The conversation went in a couple of directions, but I think running form captures it. Karen shared how stupid some actors look while running in TV shows. She referenced a show we’re watching called Surface, where the lead actress runs with her elbows wildly swinging above her head. We believe the director is trying to show her angst, but nobody runs like that in real life. Clearly, there must be at least one runner on the set who knows this and could contribute to the authenticity of the acting, but that person is probably in a probationary period and doesn’t want to be fired for challenging the genius director.
We talked about how running form doesn’t really change just because your thoughts and emotions change over the course of the run. I responded that it takes me 2 to 3 miles to warm up, and then I don’t think I start to feel fatigue until about 20 miles. Chris said 15 miles. It would of course depend on one’s conditioning.
My fitness app gives me countless stats. My cadence not only averages about 170 steps per minute, but it only varies by a few steps. My ground contact time ranges around 200 milliseconds. My stride length varies from .7m to 1.1 meters. It doesn’t matter what’s playing in my ear buds or how I’m feeling, my form is what it is and my elbows don’t swing above my face just because I’m feeling a little angst.
If I notice any deviation in my form today, you’ll be the first to know.
A Runner's Story 