My housemate, who’s starting a running club at school…
Wait, I can’t start there. My housemate is Glenn Peison, and this summer he’s running from Salem to Salem — from Winston-Salem, NC to his hometown of Salem, Ohio — to raise money for MS.
MS is Multiple Sclerosis — a degenerative nerve disorder. Over time, it interferes with motor control and causes fatigue, tremors, speech problems and other ailments. It’s an issue that’s close to Glenn and his family.
Glenn plans to make the 500 mile run in a little over two weeks. Why so quickly, I’m not sure, but the thing about Glenn is that he does what he says. If both his feet break off in West Virginia he will hobble into Salem on his ankle stubs, because that’s kind of what he does.
His blog is Running for Walking, if you’d like to follow his progress or get involved.
Anyhoo.
He started a running group at school, which I’m joinin’. But despite many days of cross-country, track, and dawn runs (TIP West Campus Holla!), I’m having a hard time thinking of running activities a diverse group of runners can enjoy together.
I got
- Indian Runs — Where you jog in a line, and the person in the back sprints to the front and leads. Immediately the new person in the back does the same, and so on. I’m confident “Indian Run” is a racist term, so any suggestions as to a new one would be highly welcome. Very tiring.
- Fartleks — My understanding is generally this means intervals for arbitrary distances. F’rinstance, you race pace for 40 seconds, then jog for 20. These will break your ass in a very short period of time — with a warmup and cooldown, the perfect 1/2 hour workout. Also, name is highly giggle-inducing.
- Tennis ball — As you jog in a group, you, ah… toss around a tennis ball. DIdn’t really need an explanation for this one.
- Ministry of Silly Walks — Skip, goose-step, lunge, and other activities back and forth across a field. Very silly. Will make you dead sore.
Any suggestions? Supremegoddess — you have said that the only time you would run is from a predator, but you are hot with ideas alla time anyway.
