Powerade RunFire Ultra Marathon 6 Day Adventure Run - Some Photos

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Barefoot Ted Interview by Primal Lifestyle's Matt Wallden

Please Facebook or email me with your favorite quotes in this interview.  BFT

Avalon Benefit 50 Mile Run Experiment

Feet after 50 miles in Lunas.

It has been over 3 weeks since I ran the Avalon Benefit 50 Mile Run...and I am now finally getting a moment to take some time to record my thoughts on this event and share some photos...while sitting at my friends house on the other side of the world in Navi Mumbai, India.

Firstly, and most importantly, I want to point out that this run was a total experiment.  I continue to test my idea about the least amount of training that works.  Folks, I really don't train in a traditional sense anymore.  I mean that I don't have a traditional training schedule. All I do is try and move well every day. I trot to the coffee house or market.  I run the dogs.  I trot over to the Luna Factory.  I use my own two feet to power my life as much as possible and I error on the side of quality instead of quantity. My biggest inspiration to move is to see and feel natural beauty.  My running is more like surfing and play.  It's about exhilaration and joy and unexpected awesomeness and crazy gorgeous vistas (examples here). It's about freedom.

View from our rental

My working theory is to avoid turning running into a duty and instead turn it into a passion, an art of living. By listening to my body's own desire and need to move, I dance my running.  Running barefoot or in sandals automatically encourages me to stay focused on form and keeps me tuned in.  I believe that this style of running alone makes me a stronger runner and person. No junk miles along with no junk food. Running, walking and trotting between 2-5 miles a day maximum is enough to keep me fit and ready to run 50 mile plus events.  This has been my experiment.  Ultimate goal?  Health and happiness and quick recovery leading to a stronger, healthier, happier me, and so far it's working!

Ready to start

So as I got on a plane to fly to LA, I really had to wonder if this style of "training"was going to be enough to allow me to complete a tough 50 mile course on Catalina Island. I was looking forward to finding out.  Furthermore, I was going to be running in a pair of Leadville Lunas. It would be the first time running an ultra with the new ATS lacing system.  In LA I met up with fellow Lunar Monkeys Patrick Sweeney and Reese Ruhland and we all got on a ferry along with Tracy Thomas (first Luna customer ever in 2007) and her partner Laura Vossman heading for Catalina.  I had arranged for us all to share a rental house overlooking Avalon Bay. Good choice of monkeys and venue.

Race started at 5am on Saturday morning in darkness and immediately started with a long climb.  One of the first things I noticed was the sound...of runners running in normal running shoes. It is loud...real loud.  If we were a hunting party we would have been out of luck. In my Lunas, I was silent.  I love the sound of silent running...am addicted to it.  Up we climbed until we reached the ridge line.  And then the most beautiful thing happened, we were all greeted with the most spectacular sunrise I have ever seen. Photos don't do it justice.

Stunning sunrise

It was a super clear day. It seemed as if you could see San Diego to the South and Santa Barbara to the North...a huge, dark coastline with the orange of the sunlight highlighting the silhouettes of dark mountains all along the mainland. Only the lights of Los Angeles could be seen.  All else was black with the sunlight streaking across the 25 miles of ocean between us as if it were a smooth puddle. It was so inspiring, reminding me that regardless of all the baubles and gadgets humans create, nothing compares to the inspirational power of raw natural beauty of this caliber. Breathtaking.  I had to stop and take photos.  Something I continued to do for the entire 50 miles!

Mile 37's beauty

So, how does one run 50 miles on less than 25 miles a week of "training"?  One thing I don't do - I don't waste any time worrying about time.  No watch.  No planned times to here or there.  I just stay in my zone, my sweet spot. Running to me is a practice, an art of staying in the place that allows me to run effortlessly, smoothly and gently.  My breathing remains lite and is primarily nose breathing...like yoga. Because of the beauty of the course I was continuously being awed by the views all around me.  A deep sense of gratitude for being alive filled my mind. Music by Seattle composer Michael Maricle made up the background music along with wind and waves and birds and runners.  I use headphones that leave my ears open, so I can hear music and the world at the same time. Highly recommended.

Breathtaking views everywhere

Light and smooth and gentle I made my way through the course...and what a course.  Perfect for running in Luna Sandals, perfect for those who have learned how to run lightly even on the hardest surfaces.  Much of the course is on fire trails.  For many this was a bane.  For me it was pure joy. It was sandal running territory par excellence.  One long section after mile 25 had an out and back section that allowed one to see all the runners go by...over 300 of us.  It was great getting a chance to see many old friends from the Southern California running community!  Lots of smiling faces.  I was beaming the whole way.

Loved my Lunas

The mile 40 aid station was one of the finest I have ever encountered in all my running days. Indeed all the aid stations were awesome.  At mile 40, how about fresh Buffalo burgers and lobster?  How about cold mixed fruit salads and a icy beer if you want it?  How about a cool shower?  They had it and more!

The last 10 miles are perhaps the most difficult.  From 40 to 46 you are no longer on the coastline. The heat increased. But lucky me, I started picking Toyon Berries...and they happened to be the best tasting ones I had ever eaten.  I was also admiring the profuse abundance of California native plant species on this section of the course.  Most of them slightly different from the mainland varieties.  All very interesting.

Cold ocean swim = priceless

Finally the last section came.  4 miles straight down a switchback road.  After 46 miles of running, the legs are not as well prepared for so much downhill, but I was feeling good and let myself fly as smoothly as I could.  It feels so good to be nearing the end of such a long race.

Now for the best part of all.  When you are finished you are a stone's throw away from the ocean.  Nothing is finer than a nice, cold ocean swim after 50 miles of running.  Heaven on earth.

All in all a truly awesome experience.  And to make things even more interesting, my best time for a 50 miler, a PR - 9 hours and 32 minutes and 69th out of 308 finishers. 22nd out of 59 in my class. All this without "training", taking pictures and having fun the whole way. I am onto something!

Adios for now, BFT

PS.  One very cool fact is that another runner ran the race in Lunas!!! And it was his first 50 miler too.  Congratulations Rusty (see photo below).

PSS.  Lunar Monkey Patrick Sweeney wrote his own report...which will put a smile on your face to read  http://bourbonfeet.blogspot.in/2012/01/avalon-50k-2012.html

Inspired by "Born to Be Barefoot" by Christopher McDougall

Born to Be Barefoot
Article by McDougall
Download PDF here

Reading Christopher McDougall's recent article titled "Born to Be Barefoot" was a great pleasure.  His article succinctly confirms and validates for me the worthiness of the pursuit of personal understanding through self-experimentation and hints from the stories and traditions of our most ancient ancestors.

Christopher McDougall's book "Born to Run" has moved a lot of us to reexamine what it means to be human, what it means to locomote with two feet over the world.  He has reminded us that we are not broken by default and that some of our most basic primal capacities are awesome before the admixture of anything, that we embody some pretty impressive ancient technology worthy of remembering and rediscovering.

Testing the Original
Vibram FiveFingers
January 2006

Since 2004, I have been committed to rediscovering for myself the joy of running, the joy of primal movement, the joy of tuning into my own body's sophisticated and time-tested tools for survival and play.  That led me to the bare foot, but my investigation did not stop there.

I started becoming fascinated by the footwear of our ancient ancestors, footwear that has played a role in our species' ability to get to every nook and cranny of this planet on our own two feet.   I looked for modern versions of these most fundamental designs and in late 2005 hit pay dirt when I was among the first to recognize the original Vibram FiveFingers as the perfect shoe for human beings, the first modern shoe that achieved full expression of the most amazing footwear design ever...the foot itself. (see my blog article "Paradigm Shifting Trojan Horses - Vibram Five Fingers")

Tarahumara Huarache Sandals
Made by Manuel Luna in 2006

One thing the footwear of our ancient hunter-gathering ancestors share is an elegance of design, a functional simplicity based on an underlying assumption that the foot is just fine as it is and at best requires protection from the extremes of hot, sharp and cold.  Sandals and moccasins have played a role in our success from the very beginning. Go hither and thither on this planet and do some investigating...you'll find fine examples of minimalist footwear everywhere.

It is no mistake that the Tarahumara Indians of Northern Mexico happen to be among the greatest long distance mountain runners on the planet.  They have remained true to a tradition of running and sandal making that goes back into our distant past.  Simple sandals have proven themselves through the natural selection of human experience and use. The simplest, most elegant solutions that work tend to rise to the top: sandals like the Tarahumara huarache and the traditional Japanese waraji and the San people of South Africa's giraffe-hide sandal.

Traditional Japanese Waraji
Part of a long footwear tradition

Regaining an acquaintance with our own bodies is a first good step in getting a chance to taste what it means to be fully human.  Learning how to move well in your own bare feet directly connects you to an aspect of the human condition that is as old as time and older.  Every able bodied 21st century primate of the genus Homo can relive the magic and majesty of our species' bipedal mastery of movement in their own default equipment. It is a human birthright available to all, and when practiced well, brings health and happiness by virtue of being what our bodies and minds have evolved to crave.  We know it when we feel it and humans have been practicing this amazing art for some time now.

Sandals of the Bushmen
Among our oldest ancestors

In the end, is barefoot and minimalism for everyone?  Is it the new cure all?  Will it make me faster, better, stronger?  It has yet to be determined, after all, we as a cohort of humans in modern urban societies are the among the first who have ever been so differently-abled as to literally need therapy and coaching to reconnect to our own bodies' basic primal abilities.  With insights from evolutionary biology and the cultures of our most ancient ancestors, we can pick up on a powerful riff of movement that when played through the instrument of our own bodies is instantaneously recognized by many as being the most perfect solution.

Using health and happiness as a motivator, you will find much to gain in reconnection to the earth and your body.  10 years ago, barefoot and minimalism was barely on the palette of footwear choices available to mainstream America. Now that it is actively being rediscovered, I feel like new-old aspects of movement culture can once again flourish. Running is not just about times, distances and speed.  Running is about human exuberance and joy, about allowing the human animal to express and come alive, about mastering functional movements by moving well in one's original hardware.  All you need is your own two feet and a patch of earth, the rest is up to you.

Walt Whitman

In my own personal investigation of running and living, I have gained much inspiration from the American Transcendentalists like Emerson, Thoreau and Whitman.  In particular, I have been amazed to rediscover a similarly inspired anarchistic philosopher named  J. William Lloyd who in 1890 wrote the first treatise on running as an exercise where he suggests that health and pleasure should be our primary motivation for movement, not competition.  I plan on sharing much more about him and his insights in the future.  For the time being, here is a great tidbit he wrote in a paper on coed running clubs and games in the 1890s:

"I would advise that each runner leave shoes and stockings at home, but of course this should be optional with the individual; next to bare feet are sandals, next to sandals moccasins, next to moccasins, soft, low shoes."

Deep insights into the human condition are timeless.  Gaining access to some profound insights may be a bare foot away.  Enjoy with gusto.

BFT

PS.  And of course you can always take it one step further and run with the animal that has hung out with us from time immemorial, the loyal, loving dog ;-).  I do.

With Hiko and Edgar in front of the BTR store in Seattle

Minimalist Runner - Barefoot, Sandals, Shoes - Since 2007

Minimalist Runner Google Group
Since 2007

This group seeks to dispel the myth that you need an overly supportive, cushioned, orthopedic shoe-boot in order to push the limits of human potential in running and exploring the world.

We welcome discussions on topics brought up in Christopher McDougall's best-selling book "Born to Run". Since 2007 with over 3000 members.

Click here to learn more.

Part of my talk at Run and Become in London

LINCHPIN SERIES: Barefoot Ted of Luna Sandals

Was recently interviewed by Rachelle over at Barefoot-Running.us for their ongoing LINCHPIN SERIES.

Per usual, it is not easy to capture the torrent of words that stream out of my mouth when I start talking about Luna Sandals (McDougall captured that aspect of my character very well I think)...it flows and flows. She got the gist of my ideas, albeit, not perfectly...but my racing mind doesn't make perfect capture easy ;-)

Here are some tidbits:

"Luna Sandals is the coolest thing I could ever think about doing. It’s my passion. I’m the company’s storyteller. I’m just one of many who have had an ah ha moment, and I’m lucky to do this."

"Where we’ve been is awesome. Where we are is awesome. Where we’re going is more awesome still. It’s a beautiful organic story that is unfolding before our eyes."

"The goal is a better, more sustainable world. It’s growing happy, healthy people."

Read the whole interview here.

BFT