History in the Making

Leave a comment June 11, 2019 drworobec

We remember moments; moments in history that define our culture and plot certain times in our lives like the points on a graph, those “where-were-you-when” moments that happen every so often. If you’re a sports fan in Canada, you’re in the midst of one of those moments right now.

Although the official viewing numbers haven”t been released yet, most of us were watching last night, and many of us living in Eastern Standard Time are bleary-eyed, nursing an emotional hangover this morning. Last Friday’s Game 4 win was the highest-ranked sports broadcast of the entire year, and I suspect last night’s game 5 ranks in that mix too. And while a Monday night game is not ideal, settle in friends, our next moment happens on Thursday.

My children have grown into avid sports fans, and although my seven-year-old tapped out after the first quarter, my ten-year old made it to midnight. He was perched on the edge of his seat, watching the final minutes of the game unfold in his pyjama pants and Raptor’s jersey. They’ve seen the excitement building; the Raptor’s days at school, the flags flying on car windows, the #WeTheNorth cupcakes and cookies and hats. And they’ve felt the energy in Burlington’s Burlassic Park and marvelled at the fans camped out in Toronto, waving cardboard Drake heads and jumping for joy. They watch the pre-game promos intently, Raptors in 30 before school, and my seven-year-old daughter can rhyme off the starting lineup and half the bench. They’ll be fans for life, officially hooked.

We’ve been explaining to them the significance of this playoff run for the past couple of months. In their short lifetimes, they’ve also seen the Jays almost get there, and they remember how our living room erupted after Bautista’s 2015 bat flip. But they definitely don’t realize the rarity of this event, and how long Toronto sports fans have been waiting for a championship.

They’ll be watching on Thursday night too, and on Sunday, if it comes to that. And we’ll go to the parade- we’ll load ourselves onto the GO train, we’ll pull them out of school, we’ll be decked out in our Raptor’s red. We’ll join the thousands upon thousands of other fans who have been waiting so long for our team to win. Why? Because this is history in the making.

And that’s the best part of all this, isn’t it? The camaraderie, the collective excitement, the coming-togetherness. We’ve united from coast to coast, all part of a common goal, all sharing a common dream. This is our time, our turn, our year.

Go Raps.

Race Report and Reflection: Mississauga half marathon

5 Comments May 15, 2018 drworobec

This post will serve as my official “race report,” nine days after the fact. For the runners in the crowd, I hope you’ll like the tactical parts of this report, and for the never-give-up-ers, I hope you’ll like the rest of it:

Thank you to Jodie for the photo. #teamtap #teamnuun

You see, I ran in the Mississauga half marathon on Sunday, May 6th, and finally met my goal of qualifying for the 2019 New York marathon. I say finally, because I’ve failed at this goal twice before, both times in spectacular fashion with lots of tears, walking, and self-doubt. In June of 2017, in my first attempt to qualify, I went out fast and the wheels came off on a 40C day. I walked a good portion of my second attempt in September 2017; another 40C day in which I got caught up in race day adrenaline and went too hard out of the gate. It’s an error that I continue to make, a lesson I can’t seem to grasp, a mistake that I’ve repeated far too many times- and going out too fast is the kiss of death for a distance runner. But with roughly twenty-five years of running and racing under my belt, and more than fifteen years of marathoning experience, it’s still so hard to follow a race plan.

The thing is, if you’re doing it right, you’re usually training on tired legs. Training plans have peaks and valleys of mileage, but endurance training requires, well, endurance. Runners are often accustomed to a certain amount leg heaviness and fatigue throughout their training cycles; in fact, a Sunday does not feel like a true Sunday if I don’t have that welcomed you-ran-damn-hard achy leg feeling all day. Masochism? Perhaps. But ask a runner, they’ll tell you: tired legs are earned. However, a few weeks out from race day, runners transition into their taper. A taper is a period of time, usually 2-3 weeks in length, whereby running mileage drops way back to allow for recovery. A taper can make or break a race, and when executed properly, it gets you to a point where you can toe the line feeling fit and fast.

For my last few races in particular, I’ve tapered really well. I’ve listened to my body, I’ve dropped my mileage, I’ve focused on rest, hydration, nutrition, and mobility. I’ve come to the line feeling great. And I’ve gone out recklessly fast. But the thing is, I’ve always done that. I’ve always been a go-out-fast runner who red lines in the second half of the race and holds on for dear life. Yet as I’ve gotten older, my body wants a different strategy; I can no longer fake a race plan and beat the system, and I’m learning that my mid-race rally and recover is not what it once was.

So with careful thought and consultation, and the 1:37 NYC qualifying time looming large, my race plan was this:

0-5km: 4:40/km pace (this is a very comfortable pace for me; my long runs are usually in the 4:50/km pace, so this is just slightly faster)
5-10km: 4:35/km pace
10-15km: 4:30/km pace
15-19km: getting progressively faster, aiming for 4:20 pace by 19km
19-21km: 4:15/km pace
Goal: progressive build, negative split.
‘A’ goal: sub-1:35
‘B’ goal: sub-1:37 (1:37 is my NYC qualifying time)

The mantras in my head were:

HAVE FUN
Start slow
Run faster, not harder
Let the hills carry you down
HAVE FUN

What actually happened:

My split times remained pretty steady throughout; a novel race strategy for me!

I ran into two training partners at the starting area who were running the full marathon, targeting a steady 4:29-4:34/km pace. I ran the first 7km with them, and they kept me hovering around 4:30/km pace. (thank you Jose and Steve, I surely would’ve gone out too fast yet again, because I was feeling great!)
I picked it up on kilometres 7-15. Much of this section is downhill, and I tried to open up my stride. I was feeling great, and had the 1:35 pace bunny in my sights. I passed him at 16km.
I started to suffer around 17km.
My pace started to deteriorate around 19km, but I was able to pick it back up at 20km.
I got really dizzy immediately after finishing and had to take a knee; surprising, since my heart rate stayed low the entire race and I did not red line at all.
My husband and kids met me at the finish line (and were able to live-track me on the raceday app!).
My dear friend Michaela also ran the half and also met the NYC standard. I saw her in the finishing chute; I hadn’t known she was running, and she hadn’t told anyone, so as not to put more pressure on me or on her. You see how running is such a mental game?
I gave it everything I had.
I HAD FUN.

Interestingly, this was the 15th annual Mississauga race weekend, and in the inaugural race in 2004, Michaela and I also ran: she came in 1st place and I came in 3rd. This year, however, I finished in 1:34:02, a full 11 minutes slower than my personal best. And yet, this race was my proudest. That eleven minute gap between my best and my present represents a husband, two babies, a career, and a life far more full and content than I ever could have imagined. Gone are my student days, my 110km/week days, my podium days. Now I’ve got two impressionable little people and a finish line full of hugs and tears, always tears.

I had tears that at that finish line too, but they were oh-so-happy tears.

The Overuse of Youth

Leave a comment April 17, 2018 drworobec

Young athletes are a big part of my practice. From sprained ankles to separated shoulders to low back pain, my goal with them, as with all my patients, is to decrease pain and increase function as quickly as possible. But with young athletes in particular, I want to try to minimize the effect that an injury has on the rest of their body long-term. Our bodies are masters of compensation you see, so if one area becomes weak or injured or dysfunctional, another area steps up to counterbalance. And herein lies the problem: where did the injury start? Can we chase the dysfunction throughout the body to find the initial culprit?

Troubling trends that I’m finding amongst these young athletes are overuse injuries. Most often, these kids are playing their primary sport nearly year-round. Summer hockey. Winter ball. Indoor soccer. In 2016, the American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine released an Early Sport Specialization Consensus Statement, which you can read by clicking HERE.

This is my favourite part:

“The primary outcome of this think tank was that there is no evidence that young children will benefit from early sport specialization in the majority of sports. They are subject to overuse injury and burnout from concentrated activity. Early multisport participation will not deter young athletes from long-term competitive athletic success.”

Please take a moment to read that again. “No evidence” of “benefit” from “early sport specialization.” And a whole lotta downside in the form burnout and overuse injury.

Make no mistake, I love youth sport. I’m a huge competitor and I was raised playing every sport around, as do my children. But remember, better movers make better athletes, and your child’s body will not learn to move well if it has only been expected to do the same thing over and over again. Multi-dimensional. Multi-sport. Multi-movement. That’s the key to a well-balanced athlete, and more importantly, a healthy human body.

If nothing else, I hope this post gives you some food for thought. Parents have thousands of choices to make throughout their children’s lives, and this one is a big one.