Walk, Run, Race: A Runner’s Guide to a New Life

By Burton P. Brodt

You pass by a park where hundreds of colorful, sweaty people are milling around talking excitedly in a huge gathering of mass camaraderie. You learn that this is the end of a 15.5-mile race. You overhear a woman say this is her tune-up for a marathon. You are astonished. The woman must be in her mid-40s at least. But she has the figure of a 20-year old, and her legs are fabulous. The slim man she's talking to, although he is also in his 40s, has muscles that ripple across his torso. He has just run 15.5 miles at a pace faster than you could run across the street. ‘Ridiculous!’ you say. ‘Who wants to put out all that effort?’

Later, a friend announces that he too is a runner. He describes how he went from a sedentary blob to a marathon man, how great he feels now, how endless his energy, how positive his mental outlook. Unconsciously, you sit up straighter to hide your incipient belly. You think of how many times you had to sit down and rest during a tennis doubles match, or a gardening chore. You remember how stressed you become at work or doing housework. Suddenly, you make a momentous decision. You will try it. What could it hurt?

If you are this person, or anything like him, this book is for you.

 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Austin Macauley Publishers
• Release date: Aug 31, 2021
• ISBN: 9781647509521

Burton P. Brodt

After lettering in track and cross country at the University of Florida, Brodt stopped running for twenty years. He worked as a chemical engineer and made several valuable inventions, but his health declined. He started running again using the techniques of Arthur Lydiard, and at the age of 49, he ran four miles faster than he had in college. His physical problems disappeared, and he raced successfully for another fifteen years, finishing 22 marathons and winning many distance races. He is now a track coach, a substitute teacher, and a writer.

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About the Author

After lettering in track and cross country at the University of Florida, Brodt stopped running for twenty years. He worked as a chemical engineer and made several valuable inventions, but his health declined. He started running again using the techniques of Arthur Lydiard, and at the age of 49, he ran four miles faster than he had in college. His physical problems disappeared, and he raced successfully for another fifteen years, finishing 22 marathons and winning many distance races. He is now a track coach, a substitute teacher, and a writer.

Dedication

This book is dedicated to a portly old gentleman of 75 (name unknown) who each year ran his age in miles at a pace faster than I could run across the street. He saved my life.

It is also dedicated to Bill and Mary Bryant, who convinced me I could run a marathon, and encouraged me until I did.

Copyright Information ©

Burton P. Brodt (2021)

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher.

Any person who commits any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

Ordering Information

Quantity sales: Special discounts are available on quantity purchases by corporations, associations, and others. For details, contact the publisher at the address below.

Publisher’s Cataloging-in-Publication data

Brodt, Burton P.

Walk, Run, Race

ISBN 9781647505851 (Paperback)

ISBN 9781647509521 (ePub e-book)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2021915067

www.austinmacauley.com/us

First Published (2021)

Austin Macauley Publishers LLC

40 Wall Street, 33rd Floor, Suite 3302

New York, NY 10005

USA

[e-mail]

[phone]

Acknowledgment

I want to thank my wife, Gail, who urged me to write this book and then spent many hours proofreading it. I also thank my children, Howard, Stephen, Cynthia and Phillip, who often joined me on the roads and my former wife, Fifi, who cheerfully put up with late meals and sweaty shoes.

Introduction

You drive down the street on a pleasant evening or weekend and there they are: runners. A few of them are trying to lose some extra weight, but most are slim and fit. Some are jogging, others are running, a few are clipping off the miles at an amazing pace. They go everywhere; on neighborhood streets, along highways, on downtown sidewalks. If you venture into a park or the deep woods, you see them running along the dirt trails. They’re in the mountains, running up slopes, where you might struggle even at a slow walk.

At first you wonder: what’s going on? Who are these people? Why are they doing this? But then you notice again how trim and strong they look. You watch them smoothly eating up mile after mile, and you realize you couldn’t run across the street without gasping for breath. You look down and see an unwelcome sight: the beginning of a protruding belly. Your muscles have become flabby. You would never think of walking up a flight of stairs if you could find an elevator.

You pass by an area in a park where hundreds or thousands of colorful, sweaty, half-naked people are milling around talking excitedly in the largest gathering of mass camaraderie you’ve ever seen. A few are carrying little medals or trophies around, and all of them are eating, drinking, and talking non-stop. You find out that this is the finish of a 25-kilometer or 15.5-mile race. You overhear a woman say this is her tune-up for a marathon. You are astonished. The woman must be in her mid-40s at least. But she has the figure of a 20-year-old, and her legs are fabulous. The man she’s talking to has taken his sweat-soaked shirt off and, although he is also in his 40s, muscles ripple across his torso. They are not the muscles of a weight-lifter or a steroid user; they are muscles of a slim man who has no extra fat on his body. They belong to a strong man who has just run 15.5 miles at a pace of 5:30 per mile, a faster speed than you could run for 15.5 yards. Ridiculous! you say. Who wants to put on a skimpy outfit and go running down the road toward nothing? Who wants to put out all that effort? But you leave the happy gathering in a more thoughtful mood.

Two days later, you are at a small dinner party and you mention the big gathering. Upon which one of your friends surprises you by announcing he too is a runner. Once unleashed, he expounds enthusiastically on the wonders of the sport. He describes how he went from a sedentary blob to a marathon man, how great he feels now, how endless his energy, how positive his mental outlook. Unconsciously, you sit up straighter to hide your incipient belly. You think of how many times you have had to sit down and rest during a tennis doubles match, or a gardening chore. You remember how stressed you become at work or doing housework. Suddenly, you make a momentous decision. You will try it. What could it hurt?

If you are that person, or anything like him, this book is for you. As great as the results can be for becoming a runner, there are booby traps out there if you don’t know what you’re doing. Even if you were once a serious athlete, even a runner, you must realize that what time has taken from you can be regained or exceeded only by more time and a lot of patience. But if you can summon up that patience, the rewards can be beyond anything you’ve ever imagined.

This book will walk you through the steps you need to take to safely convert you into a person you will not recognize, capable of astonishing feats of strength and endurance that you never thought possible. They will affect you not only physically, but mentally as well.

There are numerous publications out there that address the ins and outs of running. They are excellent as far as they go. But they are usually aimed at people who are already experienced runners, and often are national-class runners. This little book is aimed at you, the person who is not yet a runner, but would like to be.

My credentials for writing this book? In my early 40s, I started out road running in total ignorance and became a fairly good age-group runner by trial and error. This volume contains plenty of tips based on my experiences as I slowly transitioned from an overweight plodder to a skinny runner who finished twenty-two marathons and hundreds of other races, some of which I won. I made many mistakes along the way, and this book may help you avoid most of them.

Here’s an example of how much better the type of training described in this book is compared to the short, fast training of the 1950s—I lettered in cross country at the University of Florida. The distance of a cross country race in those days was four miles. At the age of 49, after training the modern way, I ran a four-mile race faster than my best time in college.

After retirement, I coached a high school track team for ten years, and thus learned what works and what doesn’t.

One item of interest: throughout this book, I sometimes use the generic he, him, his, etc. instead of the politically correct but awkward him/her. I don’t mean this to be sexist; it just makes the words flow more smoothly.

Chapter 1

What Running Can Do for You

If you are like most new runners, you have been doing a predominately sedentary job. You may get out occasionally to walk, play golf or tennis, fish, hunt, etc., but still you’re aware that you are not the young tiger you used to be. If you golf, you no longer think of walking while carrying your bag, the way you did in your youth. You ride a cart, thus eliminating even the pretense of real exercise. If you play tennis once a week, you make sure it’s doubles so you can minimize your effort. Maybe you don’t do even these sports. You work all day in an office, come home tired, and watch TV before and after dinner. You go to bed tired and wake up tired. You gain weight in unattractive places. If you cut the grass, you come in exhausted. And worse than the physical deterioration is the mental and emotional toll your life is placing on you. You find yourself increasingly short of patience and temper. You cannot suffer fools gladly, and your definition of fools is expanding. You begin to feel suspicious pains in your stomach. Your digestion does not bear mentioning.

If any of this sounds familiar, you’ve come to this book just in time. There is a multitude of expensive medications and other snake oils out there that promise to solve your problems. And guess what? They don’t work. But running does work, and it costs nothing but an occasional pair of shoes.

If you can convert yourself from a couch potato, or even from a cart-riding golfer, into a distance runner, the effect on your body and mind will absolutely astonish you, your family, and your coworkers. Your life will take a giant right turn, and the effects will reverberate throughout your life forever.

If you’ve never participated in an endurance activity, becoming a distance runner may sound extremely intimidating, even impossible. But the fact is that your body is built to run, and run long. Those big buttock muscles are for more than sitting on or looking good on girls. They’re primarily for running. Our ancient ancestors ran constantly. They ran many miles to get near enough to their prey to kill it. They actually outran some of the animals they needed to kill for survival. Even today, some primitive people, such as the Tarahumara Indians in Mexico, run incredible distances without a second thought. There are 100-year-old men in Turkey who work hard all day in the mountains. The event that started me on my running odyssey was observing on television a portly old man of 75, running his birthday years in miles, non-stop on a track, while his great-grandchildren handed him food and water. He was running at eight minutes/mile, faster than I could run down the block. Obviously, if you are not in shape, you will not be able to match these people, ancient or modern. But the potential is there, and if you have the will and the fortitude, you can bring out the wild animal waiting inside you, ready to spring.

One obvious effect of running is banishing fat and substituting muscle. This means you may or may not lose weight. If you are relatively slim but flabby, the change from flab to muscle may not show on the scale. In fact, you may even gain weight, because muscle is denser than fat. But it will certainly show in your figure or physique. And in fact, most people will lose weight as well as gain muscle. Your appetite may increase significantly, but the amount of energy required to run, especially for long distances, more than makes up for the calorie intake.

As mentioned in chapter 6, running when you are grossly overweight can be hazardous to your knees, hips, and ankles. But once you achieve a reasonable weight, even if it’s not what you would like, running can be valuable in achieving whatever weight goal you set for yourself.

There are various ways to lose weight, or at least to banish excess fat. The most common is to go on a diet, either low fat or low protein or low carbohydrates or low something. That is also the worst way. Often, it’s supplemented by pills, some of which suppress your appetite and also make you a nervous wreck. Another method is to purchase an expensive program that sends you small amounts of food and tells you to eat nothing else. That works, but if cutting down on the volume of food you eat is the answer, why not just do that? Or, at each meal, just eat until you are no longer actively hungry. Save what remains to eat when you become hungry again – even if it’s two or three hours later. You’ll need will power to become a runner; use that same will power to cut out the gorging.

The best way to lose fat, in addition to stop gobbling too much food, is to burn it up by running long. Once you reach the point where you can do that, you will probably be able to go back to eating big meals and still stay slim. What could be better?

Another obvious effect of running is that you get in shape to do other physical activities without tiring. You can put on a heavy backpack and hike in the mountains if you want, without fear that you’ll have to call for a helicopter to get you home. You can work in the garden, or take care of babies, or renovate a room, and still go out to dinner without falling into your soup course from exhaustion.

If you smoke, running may well help you to stop, especially when you begin entering races. The effects of smoking on your physical ability are drastic. When I ran in college, our