May 22, 2017 • 56 mins
For the show notes, to WIN a copy of each of Mark Remy's books and get the full transcript to this episode head over to:
https://www.healthynomics.com/32
None to Run Plan (for real beginners):
http://www.nonetorun.com/challenge
Today's show
Mark Remy is a runner and writer based in Portland, Oregon. He has been a columnist and writer at Runner’s World since 2007. Mark has been running since 1994 and has run 27 marathons, including Boston eight times.
In 2015, Mark launched Dumb Runner, which is a website for runners who enjoy laughter and pie (his words!). Most of the online advice for beginner runners make running too complicated. Dumb Runner, well, "dumbs" everything down because Mark believes running should be simple.
If that wasn’t enough, Mark has also written four books on running and one training journal. Keep reading because I am giving away a copy of each to one lucky person.
I highly recommend you check out Mark’s writing. Here a few articles/posts that I recommend you start with:
The Only 3 Things You Need to Know to Begin Running (Really)
5 Stretches You Should Never Do
Mark’s Newsletter– Entertaining and educational. Sign up!
In this episode we talk about:- How running has impacted Mark’s life.
- The shower beer (try it).
- Stretching – was it only cool in 1981?
- The only 3 things you need to know to begin running (Really)
- How to pick a training plan.
- And more!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Mark Kennedy (00:00):
Hello, everybody. I'm Mark Kennedy, and this is
the Health podcast episode 32with guest Mark Remy. Greetings,
everybody. What's happening inyour world? If you're new to the
Health Anomalyx podcast, this istypically an interview based
show where I talk to some of thebest minds in running from
coaches to physiotherapists tonutritionists, even athletes
themselves.
(00:20):
As a token of appreciation tolisteners of this episode with
my guest, Mark Remy, I'm givingaway a copy of each of Mark's
books. His books include c isfor chafing, the runner's rule
book, everything a runner needsto know and then some, runners
of North America, a definitiveguide to the species, the
runner's field manual, atactical and practical survival
(00:42):
guide, and the dumb runnertraining journal. If you want to
win a copy of each of thesebooks, simply leave a comment at
the bottom of at the pagehealthenomics.com/30two. In the
actual interview with Mark, Imade a mistake and gave the
wrong link. The correct link ishealthinomics.com/32 and not
(01:02):
/30one.
Go there, leave a comment by05/31/2017 and I'll select one
random winner to receive a copyof each book. Before we get to
today's interview with MarkRemy, I wanted to see if
anyone's tried the popular couchto five k program and found it
too challenging. If so, I puttogether a free plan that
addresses the flaws I see in thecouch to five k. If you wanna
(01:24):
check out the plan, go tononetorun.com and then click on
the none to run plan button atthe top onto today's interview
with Mark Remy. Mark Remy is arunner and writer based in
Portland, Oregon.
He's been a columnist and awriter at Runner's World since
02/2007. Mark has been runningsince 1994 and has run 27
marathons including Boston Eighttimes. In 2015, Mark launched
(01:47):
Dumb Runner, which is a websitefor runners who enjoy laughter
and pie, His words. Most of theonline advice for beginner
runners makes running too hard,too complicated. Dumb runner,
well, dumbs everything downbecause Mark believes running
should be simple and so do I.
In this episode we talk abouthow running has impacted Mark's
life, the shower beer, give youa hint, you should try it,
(02:10):
stretching, was it only cool in1981? The only three things you
need to know to begin running,really, how to pick a training
plan, and much more. The shownotes for this episode will be
at Healthenomics.com/30two.There, you'll also be able to
download the transcript of thisepisode. Please enjoy my chat
with Mark Remy.
Mark Remy (02:30):
Welcome to the Healthenomics podcast.
Mark Kennedy (02:41):
Welcome to the Healthenomics Podcast. Mark,
happy to have you on the show.
Mark Remy (02:45):
Thanks. Thank you for inviting me.
Mark Kennedy (02:46):
Yeah, no worries. Excited to chat. I've been
following your sites online and,reading some of your articles in
Runner's World, for quite sometime now. Excited to, finally
chat and, I'm sure our listenersare excited as well to hear you
and hear about some of yourstories and some of your
(03:07):
information with regards torunning and helping beginner
runners which is what Iprimarily focus on helping out
beginner runners. Anyways, whydon't we start by can you tell
us a little bit about maybewhere you grew up and your
journey into running and thenwhat you're up to today with
regards to running and work etc.
Mark Remy (03:31):
Right. Taking those in order if I can. First of all,
someone questioned whether I'vegrown up at all but to the
extent that I have grown up ordid grow up, it happened in
South Central Ohio here in TheStates and lived in a pretty
small town, pretty rural andstarted out actually as a
(03:54):
cyclist, a road cyclist backthen in high school.
Mark Kennedy (03:57):
Did you
Mark Remy (03:57):
get into road I'm sorry?
Mark Kennedy (04:00):
How did you get into road cycling?
Mark Remy (04:03):
That's enough. So I'm afraid we're already going go on
a tangent. I'm terrible aboutgoing off on tangents. The short
version is that there was ahuge, huge two day, two hundred
mile bike ride that went kind ofby my hometown every Mother's
Day weekend. It's still goingon.
It's called the Tour of theSoyra River Valley.
Mark Kennedy (04:23):
Okay.
Mark Remy (04:23):
And I kind of caught into that and some friends and I
decided to, guess you would callit the equivalent of abandoning
when you're before I knew anybetter. So we kind of hopped on,
we didn't do the whole thing butwe hopped in with the writers
and did like half of one of thedays, you know, in our
department store junky bikes andit trashed us and everything
(04:45):
else but you know, we loved itand I certainly stuck with it
and that's kind of got mestarted with that. So I got
better bikes and got better andfaster and rode longer. So I did
that for a lot of yearsactually, dabbled in racing but
mostly century rides, hundredmile rides. And that kind of
laid the foundation I guesslooking back for my running
(05:06):
life.
And I kind of got into runninglater as kind of cross training
for cycling. So I kind ofstumbled into it I guess. You
know, for most folks it worksthe other way around. They start
out running and then, know, dueto injury or whatever, you know,
they wind up in their olderyears turning to cycling a bit
(05:26):
more, but I did it backwards.That's I do things I guess.
But yeah, it's been good. I'vealready forgotten, I've already
forgotten your other twoquestions. You had like at least
a three part question.
Mark Kennedy (05:38):
Yeah, know, I threw too much at you so
apologies but
Mark Remy (05:41):
No, no, no.
Mark Kennedy (05:42):
What did we talk about? We talked about where you
grew up, how you got in intorunning and what are you running
now? What's like or whatdistances did you start running?
Did you like you know one ofthose people who said I'm just
going to do a marathon or didyou start with five Ks? What's
your running journey been like?
Mark Remy (05:59):
Yeah. I was about to say I that dumb to jump right
into the marathon, but I
Mark Kennedy (06:04):
thought something happened. I
Mark Remy (06:06):
was fairly I was dumb enough even back then. All
kidding aside, for one thing,I've been biking fairly
seriously and pretty longdistances for, gosh, nine, ten
years, I guess, before I gotinto running. I had a pretty
good aerobic base, cardio base,and I was lean and healthy and I
(06:29):
was also 20 years old and thatgoes a long way. You're a lot
more resilient when you're thatyoung. So my first race My first
actual race might have been a 15miler if memory serves.
I remember it was a Valentine'sDay race. It was cold. I was
wearing tights. I remember doingfairly well and that looks
(06:51):
better than I expected and Ithought, well, there might be
something to this. So you know,that kind of was another rung on
the ladder.
So you know, it wasn't longafter that that I decided, you
know, a, I think I'm better, I'mbetter at running, you know,
naturally, just physically.Better at running than I am at
cycling and you know, and bythat time, like I said, I've
(07:14):
been biking pretty steadily,pretty seriously for about ten
years almost. So after a whileyou kind of get, even if you
still enjoy it, you kind of geta little burned out, know. So
the combination of those twothings just you know, gradually
turned me from cyclist whosometimes runs into a runner who
sometimes bikes and then youknow, just pretty much a runner
who keeps telling himself heshould get back on the bike more
(07:36):
but really doesn't. Although Iam more now but more for
transportation.
Yeah. So I basically I went, ifmemory serves, I think I went
for that 15 mile race. My nextrace you know, per se actually
might have been the marathon.But that's only because there
weren't a whole lot of races, atleast that I knew about in South
(08:00):
Central Ohio back then. So infairness, I do recall actually
training for the marathon.
Maybe not very smart or veryintelligently but I certainly
did put the miles in and so Idid my first marathon at age 25
and did reasonably well I guessand just kept going from there.
Mark Kennedy (08:18):
So how many I know you've done a lot of marathons.
How many marathons total haveyou run?
Mark Remy (08:23):
I ran marathon number twenty seven two days ago at
Boston.
Mark Kennedy (08:28):
Oh, you ran Boston? Congratulations.
Mark Remy (08:30):
Yeah, did. Thanks.
Mark Kennedy (08:31):
How did go?
Mark Remy (08:32):
It good. I never intended to do Boston twenty
seventeen. To be honest, I neverreally planned. I no plans on
really doing a marathon againever for the indefinite future,
not that I was totally againstthe idea but I just had no
plans. And then you know monthsago, a fellow Canadian,
(08:55):
Sullivan, a Facebook friend ofmine, just shot me an email and
said, hey, would you beinterested in possibly guiding
me at Boston?
Tim is blind, you know, he'svisually impaired Okay. And
legally blind. So I I said,yeah, because how can you say no
(09:16):
to an offer like that? So Iwound up guiding him. That was
my first time guiding a blindrunner And it went okay.
There were no major calamities.We we were lucky enough to have
another more experienced guidewith us. So there were two two
of us guiding and Tim kind ofrunning in between us and we
(09:40):
actually hooked up with a thirdguide whose whose runner had
unfortunately had to drop outduring the race. So by the time
we finished the race, were youknow, three guides for one
runner.
Mark Kennedy (09:51):
So lots of support for him. It was a warm day. Was
it a bit too warm for themarathon?
Mark Remy (09:57):
Yes. It's the short answer.
Mark Kennedy (10:01):
Yeah.
Mark Remy (10:01):
So yeah, there was a lot of yeah, it was rough. Let
me put it this way, I don'tthink I spoke with anybody after
I haven't spoke with anybodysince the race who had told me
like, Yeah, had an awesome race.I had a really good time at PR.
I felt great. You know, everyoneI've talked to including ones
(10:21):
who are really in shape andreally ready for it.
Just you know, it was a slog foreverybody I guess.
Mark Kennedy (10:28):
Yeah. Do you know Mario Frioli at all?
Mark Remy (10:32):
Yeah, sure.
Mark Kennedy (10:33):
Yeah. He was a guest on my podcast a few weeks
back and yeah, just sort offollowed his updates on his race
and he said it was his worstmarathon time ever.
Mark Remy (10:46):
Yeah, but we still went like a 2.3 or 2.4 or
something ridiculous or so. It'slike, yeah.
Mark Kennedy (10:51):
Oh yeah. I had no sympathy but I think he ran a
2.45 or 2.47 or something.
Mark Remy (10:58):
I think I think I think it's around there, you're
right. Yeah. But I mean, I, youknow, I I joke. I mean, it's all
relative and, you know, a badrace for one runner is it it
would be a, you know, afantastic race for another and
it's just it all depends on onwhere you are and what your
goals are. But yeah, everybodywas adjusting their expectations
down on Monday, I think.
Mark Kennedy (11:18):
Yeah, for sure. Through all those numerous
races, you've done marathons andother races, any favorites that
stand out for some reason oranother?
Mark Remy (11:27):
Well, you know, a related question that I get
sometimes, what's your favoritemarathon? And you know, it
sounds like a kind of a glibanswer or maybe even a cop out
but I always, you know, I alwayssay Boston automatically just
because it, you know, it'sBoston. You know, there's really
Mark Kennedy (11:45):
Yeah.
Mark Remy (11:45):
You know, I've kind of run out of ways to describe
it without sounding completelytrite but it's a pretty special
race, know, it's the BostonMarathon and it's just, you
know, I struggle for words todescribe those emotions when you
make that final left turn onBoylston. You know, I mean it's
emotional every step of the way,don't get me wrong, know,
(12:05):
there's, you know, through allthe towns and the crowds are
great and Wellesley's great andthe fire station in the Newton
Hills, it's just, you know, it'sjust, it's crazy, you know, like
the same literature sometimes,like the marathon itself is like
a character in the story, youknow?
Mark Kennedy (12:23):
Absolutely.
Mark Remy (12:23):
It's really something else. And you know, as far as
like my best or my mostmemorable race ever, this might
sound like a bit of an easyanswer too, but you know,
Monday's race was prettyamazing, you know, just because
it was my first time ever, notonly my first time ever guiding
a blind runner, it was the firsttime that I've ever really run
(12:46):
for anybody else but myself,period. Yeah. You know? You
know, I've been at this, youknow, twenty some years now and
it encouraged me like, wow, I'venever, you know, I was I was
never one to to go the charityrunning route.
Yeah, I have great respect andadmiration for those guys but I
just never went down that pathmyself Yep. For a reason and I
(13:08):
never really ran even like insomeone's memory or anything as
simple as that. You know, when Iwas running and really racing,
it was just pure competition andwanting to see how well I could
run and you know, how PRs Icould set, all that kind of
inward focused stuff. So runningwith this outward focus was, it
(13:32):
was brand new to me and it waspretty incredible, you know, I
gotta say. And you know, mybuddy Tim who I was guiding was
having a bit of a rough day, notjust because of the heat but he
had an injury flare up fairlyearly into the race.
And for a while there I thoughtit was kind of touch and go,
like I was wondering to my,know, strictly to myself of
(13:54):
course, like I'm not sure ifwe're gonna finish today, you
know. Yeah. But I tried to stayas positive as I could and Tim
was just a champion. He's asuper positive guy and he, you
know, we took plenty of walkbreaks and got lots of fluids
and just got it done, know. Wefinished and he ran all the way
down Boylston, so
Mark Kennedy (14:15):
That's awesome.
Mark Remy (14:15):
So, you know, we got it done, yeah. So that was that
was pretty that was prettymemorable, you know. Probably
number two would have been alsoat Boston, but you know, my
first Boston because you youonly get one first time and that
was a pretty special day.
Mark Kennedy (14:29):
Yeah, well that's great. Thanks for sharing that.
And then today, so you're awriter, is that what you do for
a living primarily?
Mark Remy (14:38):
I ask myself the same thing quite often. My wife asked
me, you're just for a living?
Mark Kennedy (14:44):
Wait, wait, who are you? What do
Mark Remy (14:45):
you do? Yeah. Who are I anewis really, know? Not to
get all existential. Yeah, yeah,I'm a writer.
So my background is strictly inpublishing. I started out, you
know, at first in newspapers,believe it or not, if you
remember what those are. And Idid that for a while and still
(15:09):
have deep affection and love fornewspapers, like the actual
print physical, you know, smudgykind.
Mark Kennedy (15:17):
As do I.
Mark Remy (15:18):
Yeah. It's good stuff. So I I started with that,
and then from there, got got myfoot in the door at Rodale. Back
then, it called Rodale Press,which is based in Eastern
Pennsylvania. And of course,Rodale Rodell Inc, as it's
called today, is the parentcompany of not just Runner's
World, but bicycling and men'shealth and prevention and all
(15:40):
these other healthy crunchy kindof titles.
So working there was literally adream come true for me. I
dreamed about working at Rodalesince high school really. I used
to read Backpacker Magazine,which back then was a write up
title. So I kind of againstumbled into a job at Rodale
(16:01):
and was fortunate to do that.That, man, you know, more than
any other single thing in myprofessional life, I think that
was probably the single biggestevent that kind of shape the
rest of my adult professionallife was getting that first job
at Rodale.
So it wasn't in Runner's World,but it was in the company. I was
(16:24):
close enough and eventually Idid make my way to Runner's
World and worked at Men's Healthfor a while, that kind of thing.
Then bounced around a bit in NewYork City and then came back to
Rodale and back to Runner'sWorld actually. Edited their
website for a few years, becamean editor at large and just kind
of a general utility player typewriter slash editor there. Then
(16:49):
three years ago, my wife and Idecided to pull up stakes and
move.
So we got to Portland and havebeen here ever since.
Mark Kennedy (16:56):
That's great. And so you're still working with
Runner's World today?
Mark Remy (16:59):
I am, yeah. I was fortunate enough to be able to
bring most of my job at the timewith me, minus the benefits and
so on because there were variouslegal and tax reasons for that,
but I essentially became acontractor. And since then, my
work with Runner's World hasbeen kind of narrowed down and
(17:22):
focused. I took the initiativeto do that, so I was doing, I'm
doing a little bit less forRunner's World now and that
freed up time for me to launchmy own website, which is
dumbrunner.com, and that wasback in the fall of twenty
fifteen, So ever since then,I've been, you know, continuing
(17:45):
my work for Runner's World,which includes McCollum and Matt
in the print magazine four timesa year, a feature article here
and there, and various otherduties along with other, you
know, whatever other freelanceeditorial work I can scrounge
up. And also a lot of time, I'mfunneling into Dumbrunner, know,
(18:06):
trying to cultivate that andbuild a readership and have some
fun with that.
So yeah, I kinda got a lot oflot of things going at once
here, it's fun.
Mark Kennedy (18:16):
Well, I wanna come back to Dumb Runner for sure
because Yeah. I I love yourwriting there. Thanks. With
regards to Runner's World, itseems like it comes up every
podcast I'm with, but AlexHutchison who writes Runner's
World actually lives in myneighborhood, seen with the
butcher periodically. I've yetto have him on the podcast but
I've been for beers with him butyeah, he actually grew up in
(18:38):
this neighborhood randomly.
Anyways, love his writing aswell.
Mark Remy (18:42):
Oh, Alex is a great guy. Yeah. I've only met him in
person a few times but we'vewe've corresponded quite a bit
via email and Facebook and stuffand I have tremendous respect
and admiration for Alex, know,because not like is he like a
bonafide, like you know, reallysuper fast runner, but he so
knows his stuff. And he, know,Alex has this super rare talent
(19:06):
for taking what is, you know,let's face it, a pretty dry
topic which is exercisephysiology and exercise science
and all this in the research andthat kind of stuff and kind of
translating it for a massaudience in a really smart
readable way, you know, withoutwithout dumbing it down. And
(19:28):
that's that's a really fine lineto to to walk and he does it in
a way that I never could becauseit's just not my thing.
He's smart guy, smart funny guy.
Mark Kennedy (19:39):
Yes, smart guy and often times, I studied
kinesiology in university andstuff so I get the science
aspect but often this questioncomes up and more often than
not, I'm like, I know Alex haswritten about this somewhere, I
just search for his answer andsend it to people because I
Mark Remy (19:55):
know it's
Mark Kennedy (19:55):
simple, easy to read, easy to digest and it's
not too science y.
Mark Remy (20:00):
No, I do that myself. It's very personable writing.
Know, his voice comes throughand that's rare too for a writer
who primarily focuses onresearch and health and fitness
and stuff like that. Yeah, it'sgood stuff.
Mark Kennedy (20:18):
Yeah, exactly.
Mark Remy (20:18):
And you know, he's also, by the way, another thing,
I was trying to put this intowords and I couldn't until now,
but I think another thing Ireally like about Alex is that
he is, at least in my opinion,he's a skeptic. But he's a
healthy skeptic. He's skepticalwithout being cynical about it.
Yes. He's not afraid to pushback and ask tough questions and
(20:43):
to be honest, to call BS whenthere's BS to be called out, but
never in a mean or snarky wayand I admire that as well.
Mark Kennedy (20:53):
Yeah, exactly. Well, I got to get him on the
podcast one of these days.Again, before I get to Dumb
Runner, I want to talk a littlebit, how has running impacted
your life or made you a betterperson?
Mark Remy (21:07):
Geez, that's a big question. Where should I start?
I mean, like with a lot ofthings, think running throughout
my life So first of all, I've tosay that like I said earlier,
(21:27):
I've been running more or lesstwenty years, a little more than
twenty years now. I paid my lifeas a runner to my first
marathon, which was 1995, whichis close enough. So I've been
doing this quite a while andover that period of time, and I
(21:48):
don't think I'm unusual in thisregard, I think I'm fairly
typical, the rest of my life hasjust been a roller coaster,
know?
I know just geographically andpersonally and emotionally and
professionally and romanticallyand everything else, it's just
like everyone else, life justkind of comes at you and you
(22:12):
know, it's just this craziness.And the one kind of through
line, through all that stuff hasbeen running, know, it's been
this constant. So in that sensealone, it's helped me just
because it's, gosh, you know,it's like a, it's kind of like a
(22:35):
rope, a rope leading you throughthese tricky mountain passes and
there's this rope that you cangrab on and it's right there and
no matter what else ishappening, you still have
running. As long as you'rehealthy, God willing you are,
more often than not, you can,you know, just put your shoes on
(22:58):
and go out the door and just go.And virtually every time you do
it, you come back at leastfeeling like a slightly better
person.
You know, a little more clearheaded, little more energetic, a
little more, I don't know, youhave more perspective. It's just
this weirdly wonderful thing,know? It's almost magical. And
(23:25):
it never diminishes, you know?No matter how much you do it or
how long you do it.
Like you know, I could go outfor a run today and come back
and it would have the sameeffect, you know? And that's a
pretty remarkable thing. I can'tthink of a lot of things in life
that are like that.
Mark Kennedy (23:38):
Yeah. I like your analogy with the rope. I never
really thought of it that waybut that really resonates with
me. Just like it's always thereand you know, life throws twists
and turns at you all the time,but there's always this rope and
it's this constant that you canhold onto. Yeah, it just kind of
(23:59):
keeps you moving in the rightdirection.
Mark Remy (24:02):
Yeah, yeah. So then, apart from that, there are the I
think running, for me anyway,works on at least two levels, a
micro level and a macro leveland the macro level stuff
includes that stuff I justdescribed, you know, running is
a constant, it's always there,it's always available and just
(24:22):
knowing it's there isreassuring, you know. Yeah, it's
kind of built in stability evenwhen everything else is just
going to pieces, know, there'salways running. That's like the
macro level and on the microlevel, just day to day it helps
your mood, know, it keeps youfit and healthy. Gosh, you know,
(24:43):
it strengthens your heart andyour lungs and your soul and all
this other corny stuff and it'sjust great, know, what can I
say?
So to look at it another way,you could ask, you know, where
would I be today? In every senseof word, where would I be? You
(25:05):
know, to write off that samelist, you know, geographically
and professionally andpsychologically and emotionally
and all those other things.Where would I be today if I
didn't have running that wholetime? You know, if there's some
parallel universe out there thathas, you know, one of me in it
but without running, you know, Ithink I'd be in a significantly
(25:29):
worse place, you know?
Mark Kennedy (25:30):
Yep.
Mark Remy (25:32):
So, you know, I try to I don't dwell on those kind
of thoughts but I do think aboutit fairly often only because
important, you know, not to takethings for granted and I try not
to take things for granted.Yeah. But, yeah.
Mark Kennedy (25:46):
Well, that's great. Thanks for sharing that.
Now, your site Dumbrunner and,before I let you tell us a
little bit about it, I justwanna read a couple little,
either their titles of articlesor a couple little, segments
within, articles or posts thatjust jumped out of me today when
I was just looking through. Onewas just a question and I think
(26:08):
this is a serious question,someone went in, you can correct
me if I'm wrong. Dear dumbrunner, is it possible to freeze
my twig and berries whilerunning in shorts during the
winter months in Colorado?
Did someone write that in?
Mark Remy (26:22):
Yes. Yeah. So that is from a section of the site
called Ask Dumb Runner.
Mark Kennedy (26:29):
Yep.
Mark Remy (26:31):
Actually in the top navigation of the website, it's
called Reader Q and A, which Ithink is more clear than Ask
Dumb Runner. Yep. And that's theone section of the site that's
pretty much always serious or orabout as serious as my site
gets.
Mark Kennedy (26:46):
Okay.
Mark Remy (26:47):
Not not to get ahead of ourselves, but most of the
site is at least intended to behumorous and satirical and
little tongue in cheek. The askdumb runner part is where I take
reader questions and answerthem. And I do try to answer
everyone who writes me even ifit doesn't wind up published on
website. So everyone who writesme hopefully gets at least a
(27:10):
brief personal response. And myphilosophy with Ask Dumb Runner
is that, well first of all, Iincluded that in the site in the
first place because I didn'twant the whole thing just to be
a gag.
Mark Kennedy (27:23):
Yes.
Mark Remy (27:23):
You know, because laughter is good and necessary
and fun and all that stuff, butyou know, I just felt like the
site needed something that wasreal, I guess, and useful.
Mark Kennedy (27:37):
Yeah.
Mark Remy (27:38):
A little more substantial, I guess you could
say. Plus, I just like the ideaof helping people out, which,
know, making them laugh ishelping them too I guess, but
you know, have been doing thislong enough and have been, you
know, read enough and writtenenough and worked closely enough
(27:59):
enough really smart other peoplethat I feel like I have some
wisdom at this point to offerand I try to offer it. So long
story short, yeah, AskDumbrunner is, they're all real
questions from real readers. Youcan remain anonymous if you want
to but I'll publish the questionif I think it's publishing
worthy
Mark Kennedy (28:17):
Yeah.
Mark Remy (28:18):
And an actual response, know. And the response
might be a little fun as wellbut there's an actual answer in
there someplace. We said I tryto put one in there.
Mark Kennedy (28:26):
Well that's great and I I I like to cite the
methodology to how you set it upwith, know, the humor side, the
serious side because I mean,Runner's World already exists so
there's no point, you know, sortof rehashing another site that's
just, you know, like how to dothis, how to do this, what to do
with this. So I found it reallyrefreshing and a couple
Mark Remy (28:46):
of Oh gosh. Yeah. Sorry,
Mark Kennedy (28:49):
go ahead.
Mark Remy (28:49):
No, no, no. Was just gonna Sorry to interrupt. I was
just gonna say that, you know,yeah, you're right, of course.
And first of all, you know, therunner's world is, you know, the
800 pound gorilla, you know,let's face it. And and they're
that for a reason, you know,they're they're completely
dominant and they they do acertain thing and they do it
super well.
And, you know, yeah, tryingtrying to establish a new kind
(29:12):
of Runner's World like websitewould be not only redundant but
kind of stupid on my part. Thatthat'd beyond dumb. That'd be
stupid.
Mark Kennedy (29:25):
Yeah. Couple of other ones I like too. There's
an article called Let Us NowPraise the Shower Beer, which
really made me laugh because Ihave been guilty in the past of
bringing a beer into the showerand I don't know if it was the
morning. I hope it was in themorning, that'd be brutal. I
think it was an afternoon run,cracked a beer and then we had
(29:46):
to get somewhere and I was like,Well, you know, it's a warm I'm
not going to waste this beer soit's coming to the shower with
me.
Mark Remy (29:52):
Yeah, of course.
Mark Kennedy (29:54):
Another one too I just saw in one of your articles
for it might have been targetedto beginners but it said, When
should I stretch? And then yourfirst line was, I recommend
stretching in 1981, which isfunny but also true. Mean that's
sort of what the research saysand yeah, I tell my listeners
(30:15):
all the time, by all means ifyou want to stretch because it
makes you feel good, go for itbut you don't need to.
Mark Remy (30:21):
Yeah, that's the thing. Yeah, and you know, I
wrote a more recent bit onstretching when, I don't if you
remember this, but a while backsome research came out about
flossing, flossing your teeth,you know? They essentially
concluded that there's no Theydidn't say it was useless, but
the conclusion, if I recall, wasthat there's really no evidence
(30:42):
anywhere to suggest thatflossing is really that
beneficial as far as oral healthis concerned, despite what every
dentist out there will tell you,including my own. So that
finding was a littlecontroversial and some people
pushed back, dentists for one.But I loved reading it because
it validated something I felt inmy gut my whole life, which is
(31:05):
that I don't know how familyfriendly or I'm feeling that
your show is, but I'll try to bePG here, is flossing is BS.
I made the analogy betweenflossing and stretching.
Mark Kennedy (31:18):
Yeah.
Mark Remy (31:18):
And I think they're really similar. If you want to
do it, if it makes you feelbetter or healthier, you know,
God bless knock yourself out.But you know, don't feel that
you have to. You know, andcertainly don't admonish other
people who choose not to do it,know? Yeah.
And most important, and this isa big thing for me, most
important, don't feel bad if youdon't want to do it, you know?
(31:42):
Yeah. It's, yeah, getting backto the stretching thing,
stretching is really emblematicof this I think. You know,
running has kind of become, Iguess like a lot of things in
life, just super needlesslycomplicated, you know? You know,
(32:02):
we've been kind of trained andgroomed to overthink it and
know, agonize and analyze everylittle thing and every little
bit of research that comes alongand this and that.
If that's your thing, if thatmotivates you, worrying about
(32:23):
what you should eat at whatpoint during the run and timing
your protein intake just right.And like, there are, you know,
there are a thousand littlethings like that that just blown
up. I mean, if that's, if youlike getting into that and you
really enjoy it and you reallythink it makes your life and
your running better and happierand everything else, then again,
(32:45):
go for it. But one of mymissions in life, as I get
older, is to just pound thishome just to tell people if you
don't want to live like that,you don't have to. You know,
there's this, that's kind ofbecome like the default for a
lot of people like, you know,gosh, what running shoes should
(33:05):
I wear and you know, what sortof wearable technology and you
know, how should I fuel?
You know, the word fuel, usedlike that, is one my pet peeves.
I never refer to fuel. To meit's food. It's food and drink,
know?
Mark Kennedy (33:19):
Yeah, eating and drinking, Yeah,
Mark Remy (33:21):
you know, and you know, it goes on and on and on
and on and you just barrage, itjust beats you up after a while.
And you know, what kills me isthat people who are looking to
get into running, I'm afraidwill be so overwhelmed, so
daunted by this tsunami ofinformation and tips and advice
(33:45):
and warnings and, you know, areyou stretching wrong? Are you
stretching wrong, are you eatingwrong, you know, here are five
ways, you're sabotaging, you'retraining all that stuff.
Mark Kennedy (33:54):
Yeah.
Mark Remy (33:54):
I think they're so like daunted by just seeing all
that stuff that they might bediscouraged from even running at
all, you know, which kills me.I'm like, oh, it doesn't have to
you can safely ignore virtuallyall that stuff. Just got there
and run, know. There are a fewguiding principles.
Mark Kennedy (34:11):
Yeah, well this is a perfect actually segue right
now because this is an article Iread on your website and after
reading this because I focus onhelping beginner runners, I read
this article you wrote and saidimmediately after I read it, I
think I put a comment on yourblog and I think I emailed you a
week later and said I need thisguy on my podcast because he
(34:33):
thinks the same way I do withregards to beginners. Article
was sorry, the only three thingsyou need to know to begin
running. And you talk aboutthree different things. One,
just go. Two, be patient.
And three, pay attention. Canyou talk a little bit about each
one of those three and how howit relates to a beginner runner?
Mark Remy (34:56):
Yeah. That was a nice segue, wasn't it? Nice. That's
just my head was going to beforeyou brought it up. I'm like,
actually wrote something aboutthis.
Mark Kennedy (35:03):
Yes.
Mark Remy (35:03):
Yeah. And I thought, know, so I wrote this post and I
thought it was so important thatI included a link in the, again,
in the top navigation of thewebsite, this cruise called
Running 101. And if you clickthat, it doesn't take you to
like a section about how tostart running with tips on
nutrition and gear and da da daand all this stuff. It just
(35:24):
takes you to this one article,which as you said is called The
Only Three Things You Need toKnow to Begin Running, Really.
And you're right, yeah, thefirst one, and this is not
something that I just wrote offthe top of my head, by the way.
Want to stress that. Is, a lotof stuff I write is just stuff
that kind of tickles me and it'sspur of the moment and I dash it
off and publish it and walkaway, but the information in
(35:46):
this article, I think, had beenkind of, gosh, have been kind of
fermenting in my head for yearsand years and years, you know?
And I finally just sat down andtried my best to distill all
these thoughts into one article,and then I distilled the article
(36:07):
into those three points as youmentioned. And the more I
thought about it, I thought, Ithink this is actually useful,
good advice for anybody. And bythe way, not just for beginners,
I think this applies, you know,even for veteran runners.
So basically, yeah, the firstpart, just go, gets back to what
I was saying a minute ago aboutnot, you know, shaking off that
(36:29):
paralysis that you might feelwhen you're thinking about
starting to run. You know, maybeyou watched a marathon or
something and you spectated, yougot inspired, boy, should run. I
got to do a five ks orsomething, but you know, I
haven't run since high schooland I got a few extra pounds and
this and that, and what shoes doI run? You know, like my wife
(36:50):
for example was talking tosomeone a while back and told me
that her friend wanted to knowwhat kind of running shoes to
get. She wanted to start runningand I basically told her like,
just go to a good running storeand chat with them a little bit
and just buy the shoes that feelcomfortable.
And that's it. You know, it'sreally that simple and there's
(37:12):
been a whole industry that'ssprung up around questions like
that that are working hard toconvince people just the
opposite. Like no, you need agait analysis, you have to over
point it or under it, should dothe wet test, you should do
minimal, maximal cushioning, dada da. Just try some shoes on if
(37:32):
they're comfortable, then justgo with them, know, don't beat
yourself up. And kind ofunderlying what I said before,
that the really sad part aboutthis anecdote is that as far as
I know, unless something haschanged, this same woman still
hasn't run a single step becauseshe doesn't know what shoes she
should get.
Mark Kennedy (37:50):
Yeah.
Mark Remy (37:50):
So she's been like kicking that can down the road,
you know, she has these shoesfor CrossFit or something. She's
like, Can I wear the shoes I usefor CrossFit? I'm like, This is
ridiculous, man. Know, you couldEspecially when you consider
when you're first starting, youshouldn't be running far enough
for even horrible shoes, youknow, to really mess things up.
(38:12):
You know, you could run aroundthe block in penny loafers if
you had to or whatever the shoesyou're wearing, And that's the
thing, if you're just starting,you should be running around the
block.
Know, run around the block andcall it a success and build from
there. Worry about fine tuningyour footwear later, but yeah,
(38:33):
just go. The second point isjust kind of ties in with that,
is be patient. Too many peoplejump into running and I don't
know if this is getting I getthe sense it's getting worse
over the past five, ten, fifteenyears or so as technology has
gone into hyper speed and we'reall accustomed to getting
(38:58):
instantaneous results andimmediate gratification that the
whole idea of deciding to becomea runner one day, know, running
for three or four or five or sixmonths even, just very, very
short distances very slowly, andthen maybe signing up for a five
ks, you know, and after a fewmonths of that, maybe a 10 ks,
and then eventually after ayear, year and a half, how about
(39:20):
a half marathon, and then a yearafter that maybe you'll try a
marathon. Like that would drivemost people today crazy, which
is too bad.
Know, so many people want gofrom zero to marathon in a few
In fact, I got another Ask aWetter question about that some
time ago from someone asking,you know, my son is fairly fit,
he's young, he's in themilitary, he wants to do a
(39:41):
marathon this fall. And this waslike in the summer, so he had
like three months Maybe four,was four, three or four months.
Can you recommend a trainingplan? And my response was like,
Honestly, my advice is find atraining plan for a half
marathon and do that. I don'tunderstand the urgency.
(40:04):
Why does he need to do amarathon this fall? Just be
patient, be patient.
Mark Kennedy (40:08):
Yeah, there's couch to five ks and then that
sounds like now, I mean, there'sgoing be couch to marathon.
Mark Remy (40:13):
Couch to ultra, I guess. Couch to ultra, there you
And move on to the next thing,right? It's just a shame, which
especially when you consider,and this is so paradoxical,
because one of the mostbeautiful things that distance
running can teach you if you letit is the value of patience. And
the fact that, being patient,developing that discipline to
(40:38):
delay gratification can pay offin the long run, no pun
intended, can pay off in a bigway and that's a valuable life
lesson as well. But you're nevergoing to get there if you don't
have enough patience to beginwith to stick with it and just
take one step at a time, youknow.
Again, guess I tell people itdepends on your goals. If your
(41:00):
goal is just to finish amarathon and then cross it off
your list and move on to bungeejumping or something or
skydiving, then okay, train forone in four months and risk
getting hurt and probably hateit.
Mark Kennedy (41:12):
Yeah, you won't enjoy it.
Mark Remy (41:14):
You won't enjoy it. Let's face it, even if you're
well trained and experienced,not enjoy it, you probably won't
enjoy it. That's another story,but you know, at least you won't
wreck yourself en route andyeah, it depends on your goals.
I always ask people, Why do youwant to run a marathon? Fairly
(41:34):
often, they don't have a reallyvery good answer to that, you
know?
I don't think they've everstopped to think about it. I
don't know, why don't they?Exactly. I think it's about 26.2
miles or you know.
Mark Kennedy (41:46):
And then the last one, pay attention.
Mark Remy (41:48):
Right, right, right, pay attention. So this gets a
little Well actually this worksagain on a couple levels. As I
say in the article I think, justin the here and now, you need to
pay attention to your body. Toomany people I think push
themselves too hard, too fast,too long, too soon, and you
(42:10):
know, break something or getfrustrated because they aren't
getting the results they want,and I guess that's more about
being patient. The point is, ifyou don't pay attention to your
body and adapt, then that canlead to pretty bad things.
On another level, you need payattention to your surroundings
(42:32):
and that means not just trafficand other kind of threats, but
just nature or yoursurroundings, you know,
whatever. This gets a littlehippy dippy, but I'm a big
believer in it. One of the otherbeautiful things about running
is that if you let it, and thisis something you can cultivate,
(42:54):
know, if you let it, it canreally open your eyes to so much
Beauty seems like such aninadequate word, but it can open
your eyes to so much beauty outthere. And not just like the,
you know, trees and waterfallsand baby deer, that kind of
beauty, but just beauty inplaces you wouldn't expect it
(43:15):
otherwise. Because too often wewalk around, you know, staring
at our phones or in our cars onthe way to an appointment or
rushing here, rushing there, andknow, one of the most appealing
things for me about running isthat it's the time to kind of
get away from all that and justtake a breath and look around a
little bit, know?
(43:36):
So pay attention. Pay attentioninwardly too to your thoughts,
you know? Running is a wonderfulopportunity to do that as well,
and we have fewer and feweropportunities like that to
really pay attention to what'sgoing on between our ears. And
again, on a macro level, payattention and recognize how far
(43:58):
you've come. If you've beenrunning for even just a few
weeks maybe, certainly a fewmonths, you're going to see some
difference.
It can be so incremental thatyou risk not noticing it if you
don't pay attention. But ifyou're feeling frustrated that
you're not making enoughprogress fast enough, then maybe
(44:22):
try to pay a little closerattention, you know, go back in
time and remember like, wait aminute, actually I'm going
around the block, not once now,but half a dozen times, I'm not
completely winded and feel likeI'm dying. So you pay attention
and you recognize that, and thatcan be motivating as well. So
yeah, just go, be patient andpay attention. One, two, three.
(44:45):
Once you got that nailed down,if you want to make things more
complicated, you certainly can.It's easy to do, trust me. But
you don't have especially whenyou're first starting.
Mark Kennedy (44:56):
Out there today, the internet, there's so many
training plans available forrunners, especially beginners.
What's your advice on picking atraining plan?
Mark Remy (45:07):
Oh gosh, you know, I not to keep plugging Ask Runner,
but that's another question Igot for Ask Runner as well,
separate from the previousmarathon training plan question.
My answer amounted to basicallyand this might make some
seasoned actual coaches outthere cringe, but I stand by it.
(45:29):
Again, especially for beginnersor for folks who, I to say just
want to finish, but you know,quote unquote just want to
finish, which I think isperfectly fine goal by the way.
Especially for folks like that,who aren't necessarily going for
a PR or trying to run a blazingtime or something. If your goal
(45:50):
is just to get fit withouthurting yourself and just get
prepared for the distance, Ithink that within reason, with a
few obvious caveats, withinreason it doesn't really matter
what plane you pick.
And that might sound ridiculous,but I truly believe it. Of
(46:11):
course the caveats are there,the caveats being, and I would
hope this goes without saying,just use your head, you know? If
looking, if you know that you'reprobably, let's say you're
running a half marathon, you'retraining for your first half
marathon, for example. You'vebeen running five Ks for a
couple of years, you you runpretty routinely, you're fit and
(46:34):
healthy and all good stuff, youthink you're ready for a half
marathon, and you think that,let's say a two hour and fifteen
minute half marathon sounds likea reasonable goal to you, then,
you know, choose a training planthat just looks like it's about
right for a two fifteenmarathoner type runner. Mhmm.
(46:55):
You know? I mean, if it's ifit's called the, you know, the
the break one thirty halfmarathon training plan, that's
not for you. That's not going tosay it's obvious. Because
obviously, just if you look atit and think like, Woah, that's
way too much mileage and theseworkouts are too intense, then
keep looking. But don't agonize,just like with shoes, don't
(47:18):
agonize over which trainingphilosophy or approach you need,
which method, you know, how muchcross training should there be,
you know, is it a seven daycycle or a ten day cycle, is it
you know, it's just, you know,as long as you, if you look at
it and think like this looksmanageable, I could do this and
(47:41):
if I do what it says more orless, you know, can always fudge
a little bit or if you miss aday or two, it's not life or
death.
If I do what this training plantells me to do more or less
between now and race day, yeah,I will probably be okay and I'll
be healthy and happy along theway, then choose that training
(48:02):
plan.
Mark Kennedy (48:03):
Yeah, it's kind of
Mark Remy (48:04):
And I tell people too not to overthink it because
choosing a training plan isn'tlike signing a mortgage or
something. It's not like you'relocked, it's not getting
married. No, you can just, ifit's not working out after a
couple weeks, if you realizelike, wow, this is way too hard
for me or wow, is way too easyfor me or it's just too much
mileage, you can either makesome tweaks to the plan itself
(48:27):
or toss the plan and go find anew one. All these things are
allowed, so don't sweat it toomuch.
Mark Kennedy (48:35):
Yeah, read an article about diets and if
you're looking to lose weight,there's hundreds of diets that
will work for you. It's just amatter of sometimes just picking
one and having the awareness anda lot of these things will get
you to the same place. It's justa matter of just going like your
first point in that article wetalked about. You just got to
(48:56):
start.
Mark Remy (48:57):
Yeah, by the way, are you you're familiar with a
writer named Michael Pollan, thefood writer?
Mark Kennedy (49:02):
Yes, the Eat Mostly Plants. Exactly.
Mark Remy (49:09):
Yeah, yeah. So it's actually love to bring I think I
bring Bob actually anotherarticle I did for Dumbrunner.
But yeah, I love his approach,is he distills all of his kind
of advice on eating andnutrition and diet and all that
stuff into just a handful ofwords, which is eat food, not
(49:31):
too much, mostly plants.
Mark Kennedy (49:34):
Yeah, simple and so amazing.
Mark Remy (49:37):
Yeah, yeah, and to be honest, I was kind of thinking
of him in that phrase when Iwrote that three things you need
to know article. I wanted to getsomething similarly concise and
pithy and memorable thatdistilled everything you really
need to know into these threeguiding principles that you
could remember. Mean dietnutrition alone is just, poof,
(50:01):
it's just crazy. It's gotten sonuts.
Mark Kennedy (50:03):
Yeah, absolutely. And that's that's a topic for
another probably two podcastepisodes.
Mark Remy (50:09):
Oh, gosh.
Mark Kennedy (50:10):
One, one question I want to ask you and this is
something I want to address onmy site or blog at some point
and I I I sent a survey to allthe people who sign up to my
email list and I've got about700 or so people who responded
and one of the, biggeststruggles people come back with
and I I've never reallyaddressed it, I've never seen
anyone write an article about itis a lot of people struggle,
(50:33):
especially beginners, withgetting started running because
they're shift workers. Theyeither work night shifts, or
their shifts are all over theplace, could be day, could be
night. Sometimes they work longshifts like twelve, fourteen
hours and they may work fourteendays in a row with shifts like
that and have seven days off.I'm just wondering if anyone's
(50:55):
ever asked you that type ofquestion or any tips that you
might be able to provide forpeople who work shift hours.
Mark Remy (51:02):
Oh gosh, I don't think anyone's submitted that
question to me recently, butit's certainly a question I've
seen pop up here and again overthe years in Runner's World and
so on. You know, I really, I'mafraid I don't have much really
useful advice, sad to say,except, you know, I guess my
(51:27):
advice would be, you know, beyoung and single. Because when I
was actually, because I did incollege, summers in college, I
did shift work and it wasbrutal. We did, it was this
television tube glass factory,right? And it ran twenty four
hours a day.
So we would do seven days in arow from 8AM to 4PM, have a day
(51:48):
off and then seven days in arow, four to midnight, have two
days off and then seven days ina row midnight to 8AM.
Mark Kennedy (51:54):
Yeah.
Mark Remy (51:55):
Four days off. So it was brutal. But when I was
working there, was biking a lotand that was actually the period
of my life when I won. I think Iwon like two bike races my
entire life and while I wasdoing that swing shift work was
when I won one of them, youknow? So I was obviously
(52:15):
training but my secret was being20 years old and living at home
with my parents.
Mark Kennedy (52:21):
Yeah, exactly.
Mark Remy (52:22):
So that's my advice, be young and have no
responsibilities except trainingand working. But beyond that,
gosh, that's a tough one. It'stough. I don't know.
Mark Kennedy (52:33):
I think a lot of it too, maybe go back to your
three points again. You bepatient and you really got to
pay attention because if yoursleeping patterns are messed up,
you might be more apt to getinjured and sick and you got to
be really patient because maybesome weeks perhaps you can maybe
run only once or twice and thenother weeks you can run five,
(52:55):
six times so that patient reallykicks in there too.
Mark Remy (52:58):
Yeah, yeah. I mean some questions are just really
tough questions and I'm justcurious if there's any way to
see what kind of answers youcome up with. But yeah, I I
would add at the last minutehere, don't be afraid to, and
this applies to a number ofscenarios I guess, don't be
afraid to kind of play aroundand experiment. Try different
(53:19):
approaches, know. Try trainingbefore work, try after work, try
this and that, eat this time orthat time.
Again, you be patient, if youjust go and be patient and
you're patient enough and openminded enough, I'm sure sooner
or later you're going to land ona combination of, on a balance
(53:46):
that works for you and yoursleep cycles and your own body
and your own needs.
Mark Kennedy (53:51):
Yeah, that's a good point. Yeah. So I also,
before we, I know we're movingalong in time here, before we
sign off, I want to mentionyou've also got five books or
four books?
Mark Remy (54:04):
Depends on how you define books. I'm not trying to
be coy, but really, so, my mostYeah, so I've written what you
would call, I guess, four actualbooks.
Mark Kennedy (54:14):
Okay.
Mark Remy (54:15):
And one, training journal.
Mark Kennedy (54:17):
Gotcha.
Mark Remy (54:17):
Which is book like, but not a book book, if you know
what I
Mark Kennedy (54:20):
mean. Okay.
Mark Remy (54:22):
Yeah, if anybody's curious there, you can see them
all on dumbrunner.com/store. Youcan order personalized signed
copies there as well as theirlinks to buy them on Amazon and
so on. My personal site ismarkrami.com. It has similar
information about all my books.
Mark Kennedy (54:43):
Okay, well I'll be sure to put the links to your
sites that you mentioned therein the show notes but I also
want to give away asappreciation, or token
appreciation to you and, to helpa lucky listener. I want to give
away a copy of each of, your 5or $4 plus your training
journal. So all five of them toone lucky listener and I thought
(55:05):
to enter just leave a comment onthe show notes page which will
be at healthenomics.com/31 andit may take a week or so for me
to get this post or episode up.But, leave your comment by
05/31/2017 and I'll pick, alucky winner on 06/01/2017 and,
(55:29):
I'll contact you and then I'llget in touch perhaps with you,
Mark, and maybe we can arrangeto get those signed as well and
I'll send you the money andsomeone will be a happy winner.
Mark Remy (55:39):
Oh, that's brilliant. Thanks.
Mark Kennedy (55:40):
Yeah, no worries.
Mark Remy (55:41):
Yeah, first prize is one copy of each of my books and
second prize is two copies ofeach of my books.
Mark Kennedy (55:46):
What's that? No. Oh, two copies, yeah. Yeah, that
would be good. So anyways,again, so Healthenomics.com/31
and Mark, anyways, thanks verymuch for your time and
expertise.
Anywhere else people can connectwith you online besides
dumbrunner.com andmarkrennie.com?
Mark Remy (56:10):
Oh gosh, those are the two biggies. You you can
find my columns in Runner'sWorld magazine, of course.
Eventually, they're archived onrunnersworld.com. You can also
find my older Raney's Worldonline columns, which is like
seven and a half years worth ofonline content for Runner's
World are still there someplaceif you search for them. But
(56:30):
yeah, dartrunner.com, markramiCom and you can find links on
both the sites to my socialmedia feeds as well.
Mark Kennedy (56:36):
Awesome. Well thanks again, Mark.
Mark Remy (56:38):
Thank you very much. I appreciate it. Thanks for
listening to the HealthinomicsPodcast at
www.healthinomics.com.
Hello, everybody. I'm Mark Kennedy, and this is
the Health podcast episode 32with guest Mark Remy. Greetings,
everybody. What's happening inyour world? If you're new to the
Health Anomalyx podcast, this istypically an interview based
show where I talk to some of thebest minds in running from
coaches to physiotherapists tonutritionists, even athletes
themselves.
(00:20):
As a token of appreciation tolisteners of this episode with
my guest, Mark Remy, I'm givingaway a copy of each of Mark's
books. His books include c isfor chafing, the runner's rule
book, everything a runner needsto know and then some, runners
of North America, a definitiveguide to the species, the
runner's field manual, atactical and practical survival
(00:42):
guide, and the dumb runnertraining journal. If you want to
win a copy of each of thesebooks, simply leave a comment at
the bottom of at the pagehealthenomics.com/30two. In the
actual interview with Mark, Imade a mistake and gave the
wrong link. The correct link ishealthinomics.com/32 and not
(01:02):
/30one.
Go there, leave a comment by05/31/2017 and I'll select one
random winner to receive a copyof each book. Before we get to
today's interview with MarkRemy, I wanted to see if
anyone's tried the popular couchto five k program and found it
too challenging. If so, I puttogether a free plan that
addresses the flaws I see in thecouch to five k. If you wanna
(01:24):
check out the plan, go tononetorun.com and then click on
the none to run plan button atthe top onto today's interview
with Mark Remy. Mark Remy is arunner and writer based in
Portland, Oregon.
He's been a columnist and awriter at Runner's World since
02/2007. Mark has been runningsince 1994 and has run 27
marathons including Boston Eighttimes. In 2015, Mark launched
(01:47):
Dumb Runner, which is a websitefor runners who enjoy laughter
and pie, His words. Most of theonline advice for beginner
runners makes running too hard,too complicated. Dumb runner,
well, dumbs everything downbecause Mark believes running
should be simple and so do I.
In this episode we talk abouthow running has impacted Mark's
life, the shower beer, give youa hint, you should try it,
(02:10):
stretching, was it only cool in1981? The only three things you
need to know to begin running,really, how to pick a training
plan, and much more. The shownotes for this episode will be
at Healthenomics.com/30two.There, you'll also be able to
download the transcript of thisepisode. Please enjoy my chat
with Mark Remy.
Mark Remy (02:30):
Welcome to the Healthenomics podcast.
Mark Kennedy (02:41):
Welcome to the Healthenomics Podcast. Mark,
happy to have you on the show.
Mark Remy (02:45):
Thanks. Thank you for inviting me.
Mark Kennedy (02:46):
Yeah, no worries. Excited to chat. I've been
following your sites online and,reading some of your articles in
Runner's World, for quite sometime now. Excited to, finally
chat and, I'm sure our listenersare excited as well to hear you
and hear about some of yourstories and some of your
(03:07):
information with regards torunning and helping beginner
runners which is what Iprimarily focus on helping out
beginner runners. Anyways, whydon't we start by can you tell
us a little bit about maybewhere you grew up and your
journey into running and thenwhat you're up to today with
regards to running and work etc.
Mark Remy (03:31):
Right. Taking those in order if I can. First of all,
someone questioned whether I'vegrown up at all but to the
extent that I have grown up ordid grow up, it happened in
South Central Ohio here in TheStates and lived in a pretty
small town, pretty rural andstarted out actually as a
(03:54):
cyclist, a road cyclist backthen in high school.
Mark Kennedy (03:57):
Did you
Mark Remy (03:57):
get into road I'm sorry?
Mark Kennedy (04:00):
How did you get into road cycling?
Mark Remy (04:03):
That's enough. So I'm afraid we're already going go on
a tangent. I'm terrible aboutgoing off on tangents. The short
version is that there was ahuge, huge two day, two hundred
mile bike ride that went kind ofby my hometown every Mother's
Day weekend. It's still goingon.
It's called the Tour of theSoyra River Valley.
Mark Kennedy (04:23):
Okay.
Mark Remy (04:23):
And I kind of caught into that and some friends and I
decided to, guess you would callit the equivalent of abandoning
when you're before I knew anybetter. So we kind of hopped on,
we didn't do the whole thing butwe hopped in with the writers
and did like half of one of thedays, you know, in our
department store junky bikes andit trashed us and everything
(04:45):
else but you know, we loved itand I certainly stuck with it
and that's kind of got mestarted with that. So I got
better bikes and got better andfaster and rode longer. So I did
that for a lot of yearsactually, dabbled in racing but
mostly century rides, hundredmile rides. And that kind of
laid the foundation I guesslooking back for my running
(05:06):
life.
And I kind of got into runninglater as kind of cross training
for cycling. So I kind ofstumbled into it I guess. You
know, for most folks it worksthe other way around. They start
out running and then, know, dueto injury or whatever, you know,
they wind up in their olderyears turning to cycling a bit
(05:26):
more, but I did it backwards.That's I do things I guess.
But yeah, it's been good. I'vealready forgotten, I've already
forgotten your other twoquestions. You had like at least
a three part question.
Mark Kennedy (05:38):
Yeah, know, I threw too much at you so
apologies but
Mark Remy (05:41):
No, no, no.
Mark Kennedy (05:42):
What did we talk about? We talked about where you
grew up, how you got in intorunning and what are you running
now? What's like or whatdistances did you start running?
Did you like you know one ofthose people who said I'm just
going to do a marathon or didyou start with five Ks? What's
your running journey been like?
Mark Remy (05:59):
Yeah. I was about to say I that dumb to jump right
into the marathon, but I
Mark Kennedy (06:04):
thought something happened. I
Mark Remy (06:06):
was fairly I was dumb enough even back then. All
kidding aside, for one thing,I've been biking fairly
seriously and pretty longdistances for, gosh, nine, ten
years, I guess, before I gotinto running. I had a pretty
good aerobic base, cardio base,and I was lean and healthy and I
(06:29):
was also 20 years old and thatgoes a long way. You're a lot
more resilient when you're thatyoung. So my first race My first
actual race might have been a 15miler if memory serves.
I remember it was a Valentine'sDay race. It was cold. I was
wearing tights. I remember doingfairly well and that looks
(06:51):
better than I expected and Ithought, well, there might be
something to this. So you know,that kind of was another rung on
the ladder.
So you know, it wasn't longafter that that I decided, you
know, a, I think I'm better, I'mbetter at running, you know,
naturally, just physically.Better at running than I am at
cycling and you know, and bythat time, like I said, I've
(07:14):
been biking pretty steadily,pretty seriously for about ten
years almost. So after a whileyou kind of get, even if you
still enjoy it, you kind of geta little burned out, know. So
the combination of those twothings just you know, gradually
turned me from cyclist whosometimes runs into a runner who
sometimes bikes and then youknow, just pretty much a runner
who keeps telling himself heshould get back on the bike more
(07:36):
but really doesn't. Although Iam more now but more for
transportation.
Yeah. So I basically I went, ifmemory serves, I think I went
for that 15 mile race. My nextrace you know, per se actually
might have been the marathon.But that's only because there
weren't a whole lot of races, atleast that I knew about in South
(08:00):
Central Ohio back then. So infairness, I do recall actually
training for the marathon.
Maybe not very smart or veryintelligently but I certainly
did put the miles in and so Idid my first marathon at age 25
and did reasonably well I guessand just kept going from there.
Mark Kennedy (08:18):
So how many I know you've done a lot of marathons.
How many marathons total haveyou run?
Mark Remy (08:23):
I ran marathon number twenty seven two days ago at
Boston.
Mark Kennedy (08:28):
Oh, you ran Boston? Congratulations.
Mark Remy (08:30):
Yeah, did. Thanks.
Mark Kennedy (08:31):
How did go?
Mark Remy (08:32):
It good. I never intended to do Boston twenty
seventeen. To be honest, I neverreally planned. I no plans on
really doing a marathon againever for the indefinite future,
not that I was totally againstthe idea but I just had no
plans. And then you know monthsago, a fellow Canadian,
(08:55):
Sullivan, a Facebook friend ofmine, just shot me an email and
said, hey, would you beinterested in possibly guiding
me at Boston?
Tim is blind, you know, he'svisually impaired Okay. And
legally blind. So I I said,yeah, because how can you say no
(09:16):
to an offer like that? So Iwound up guiding him. That was
my first time guiding a blindrunner And it went okay.
There were no major calamities.We we were lucky enough to have
another more experienced guidewith us. So there were two two
of us guiding and Tim kind ofrunning in between us and we
(09:40):
actually hooked up with a thirdguide whose whose runner had
unfortunately had to drop outduring the race. So by the time
we finished the race, were youknow, three guides for one
runner.
Mark Kennedy (09:51):
So lots of support for him. It was a warm day. Was
it a bit too warm for themarathon?
Mark Remy (09:57):
Yes. It's the short answer.
Mark Kennedy (10:01):
Yeah.
Mark Remy (10:01):
So yeah, there was a lot of yeah, it was rough. Let
me put it this way, I don'tthink I spoke with anybody after
I haven't spoke with anybodysince the race who had told me
like, Yeah, had an awesome race.I had a really good time at PR.
I felt great. You know, everyoneI've talked to including ones
(10:21):
who are really in shape andreally ready for it.
Just you know, it was a slog foreverybody I guess.
Mark Kennedy (10:28):
Yeah. Do you know Mario Frioli at all?
Mark Remy (10:32):
Yeah, sure.
Mark Kennedy (10:33):
Yeah. He was a guest on my podcast a few weeks
back and yeah, just sort offollowed his updates on his race
and he said it was his worstmarathon time ever.
Mark Remy (10:46):
Yeah, but we still went like a 2.3 or 2.4 or
something ridiculous or so. It'slike, yeah.
Mark Kennedy (10:51):
Oh yeah. I had no sympathy but I think he ran a
2.45 or 2.47 or something.
Mark Remy (10:58):
I think I think I think it's around there, you're
right. Yeah. But I mean, I, youknow, I I joke. I mean, it's all
relative and, you know, a badrace for one runner is it it
would be a, you know, afantastic race for another and
it's just it all depends on onwhere you are and what your
goals are. But yeah, everybodywas adjusting their expectations
down on Monday, I think.
Mark Kennedy (11:18):
Yeah, for sure. Through all those numerous
races, you've done marathons andother races, any favorites that
stand out for some reason oranother?
Mark Remy (11:27):
Well, you know, a related question that I get
sometimes, what's your favoritemarathon? And you know, it
sounds like a kind of a glibanswer or maybe even a cop out
but I always, you know, I alwayssay Boston automatically just
because it, you know, it'sBoston. You know, there's really
Mark Kennedy (11:45):
Yeah.
Mark Remy (11:45):
You know, I've kind of run out of ways to describe
it without sounding completelytrite but it's a pretty special
race, know, it's the BostonMarathon and it's just, you
know, I struggle for words todescribe those emotions when you
make that final left turn onBoylston. You know, I mean it's
emotional every step of the way,don't get me wrong, know,
(12:05):
there's, you know, through allthe towns and the crowds are
great and Wellesley's great andthe fire station in the Newton
Hills, it's just, you know, it'sjust, it's crazy, you know, like
the same literature sometimes,like the marathon itself is like
a character in the story, youknow?
Mark Kennedy (12:23):
Absolutely.
Mark Remy (12:23):
It's really something else. And you know, as far as
like my best or my mostmemorable race ever, this might
sound like a bit of an easyanswer too, but you know,
Monday's race was prettyamazing, you know, just because
it was my first time ever, notonly my first time ever guiding
a blind runner, it was the firsttime that I've ever really run
(12:46):
for anybody else but myself,period. Yeah. You know? You
know, I've been at this, youknow, twenty some years now and
it encouraged me like, wow, I'venever, you know, I was I was
never one to to go the charityrunning route.
Yeah, I have great respect andadmiration for those guys but I
just never went down that pathmyself Yep. For a reason and I
(13:08):
never really ran even like insomeone's memory or anything as
simple as that. You know, when Iwas running and really racing,
it was just pure competition andwanting to see how well I could
run and you know, how PRs Icould set, all that kind of
inward focused stuff. So runningwith this outward focus was, it
(13:32):
was brand new to me and it waspretty incredible, you know, I
gotta say. And you know, mybuddy Tim who I was guiding was
having a bit of a rough day, notjust because of the heat but he
had an injury flare up fairlyearly into the race.
And for a while there I thoughtit was kind of touch and go,
like I was wondering to my,know, strictly to myself of
(13:54):
course, like I'm not sure ifwe're gonna finish today, you
know. Yeah. But I tried to stayas positive as I could and Tim
was just a champion. He's asuper positive guy and he, you
know, we took plenty of walkbreaks and got lots of fluids
and just got it done, know. Wefinished and he ran all the way
down Boylston, so
Mark Kennedy (14:15):
That's awesome.
Mark Remy (14:15):
So, you know, we got it done, yeah. So that was that
was pretty that was prettymemorable, you know. Probably
number two would have been alsoat Boston, but you know, my
first Boston because you youonly get one first time and that
was a pretty special day.
Mark Kennedy (14:29):
Yeah, well that's great. Thanks for sharing that.
And then today, so you're awriter, is that what you do for
a living primarily?
Mark Remy (14:38):
I ask myself the same thing quite often. My wife asked
me, you're just for a living?
Mark Kennedy (14:44):
Wait, wait, who are you? What do
Mark Remy (14:45):
you do? Yeah. Who are I anewis really, know? Not to
get all existential. Yeah, yeah,I'm a writer.
So my background is strictly inpublishing. I started out, you
know, at first in newspapers,believe it or not, if you
remember what those are. And Idid that for a while and still
(15:09):
have deep affection and love fornewspapers, like the actual
print physical, you know, smudgykind.
Mark Kennedy (15:17):
As do I.
Mark Remy (15:18):
Yeah. It's good stuff. So I I started with that,
and then from there, got got myfoot in the door at Rodale. Back
then, it called Rodale Press,which is based in Eastern
Pennsylvania. And of course,Rodale Rodell Inc, as it's
called today, is the parentcompany of not just Runner's
World, but bicycling and men'shealth and prevention and all
(15:40):
these other healthy crunchy kindof titles.
So working there was literally adream come true for me. I
dreamed about working at Rodalesince high school really. I used
to read Backpacker Magazine,which back then was a write up
title. So I kind of againstumbled into a job at Rodale
(16:01):
and was fortunate to do that.That, man, you know, more than
any other single thing in myprofessional life, I think that
was probably the single biggestevent that kind of shape the
rest of my adult professionallife was getting that first job
at Rodale.
So it wasn't in Runner's World,but it was in the company. I was
(16:24):
close enough and eventually Idid make my way to Runner's
World and worked at Men's Healthfor a while, that kind of thing.
Then bounced around a bit in NewYork City and then came back to
Rodale and back to Runner'sWorld actually. Edited their
website for a few years, becamean editor at large and just kind
of a general utility player typewriter slash editor there. Then
(16:49):
three years ago, my wife and Idecided to pull up stakes and
move.
So we got to Portland and havebeen here ever since.
Mark Kennedy (16:56):
That's great. And so you're still working with
Runner's World today?
Mark Remy (16:59):
I am, yeah. I was fortunate enough to be able to
bring most of my job at the timewith me, minus the benefits and
so on because there were variouslegal and tax reasons for that,
but I essentially became acontractor. And since then, my
work with Runner's World hasbeen kind of narrowed down and
(17:22):
focused. I took the initiativeto do that, so I was doing, I'm
doing a little bit less forRunner's World now and that
freed up time for me to launchmy own website, which is
dumbrunner.com, and that wasback in the fall of twenty
fifteen, So ever since then,I've been, you know, continuing
(17:45):
my work for Runner's World,which includes McCollum and Matt
in the print magazine four timesa year, a feature article here
and there, and various otherduties along with other, you
know, whatever other freelanceeditorial work I can scrounge
up. And also a lot of time, I'mfunneling into Dumbrunner, know,
(18:06):
trying to cultivate that andbuild a readership and have some
fun with that.
So yeah, I kinda got a lot oflot of things going at once
here, it's fun.
Mark Kennedy (18:16):
Well, I wanna come back to Dumb Runner for sure
because Yeah. I I love yourwriting there. Thanks. With
regards to Runner's World, itseems like it comes up every
podcast I'm with, but AlexHutchison who writes Runner's
World actually lives in myneighborhood, seen with the
butcher periodically. I've yetto have him on the podcast but
I've been for beers with him butyeah, he actually grew up in
(18:38):
this neighborhood randomly.
Anyways, love his writing aswell.
Mark Remy (18:42):
Oh, Alex is a great guy. Yeah. I've only met him in
person a few times but we'vewe've corresponded quite a bit
via email and Facebook and stuffand I have tremendous respect
and admiration for Alex, know,because not like is he like a
bonafide, like you know, reallysuper fast runner, but he so
knows his stuff. And he, know,Alex has this super rare talent
(19:06):
for taking what is, you know,let's face it, a pretty dry
topic which is exercisephysiology and exercise science
and all this in the research andthat kind of stuff and kind of
translating it for a massaudience in a really smart
readable way, you know, withoutwithout dumbing it down. And
(19:28):
that's that's a really fine lineto to to walk and he does it in
a way that I never could becauseit's just not my thing.
He's smart guy, smart funny guy.
Mark Kennedy (19:39):
Yes, smart guy and often times, I studied
kinesiology in university andstuff so I get the science
aspect but often this questioncomes up and more often than
not, I'm like, I know Alex haswritten about this somewhere, I
just search for his answer andsend it to people because I
Mark Remy (19:55):
know it's
Mark Kennedy (19:55):
simple, easy to read, easy to digest and it's
not too science y.
Mark Remy (20:00):
No, I do that myself. It's very personable writing.
Know, his voice comes throughand that's rare too for a writer
who primarily focuses onresearch and health and fitness
and stuff like that. Yeah, it'sgood stuff.
Mark Kennedy (20:18):
Yeah, exactly.
Mark Remy (20:18):
And you know, he's also, by the way, another thing,
I was trying to put this intowords and I couldn't until now,
but I think another thing Ireally like about Alex is that
he is, at least in my opinion,he's a skeptic. But he's a
healthy skeptic. He's skepticalwithout being cynical about it.
Yes. He's not afraid to pushback and ask tough questions and
(20:43):
to be honest, to call BS whenthere's BS to be called out, but
never in a mean or snarky wayand I admire that as well.
Mark Kennedy (20:53):
Yeah, exactly. Well, I got to get him on the
podcast one of these days.Again, before I get to Dumb
Runner, I want to talk a littlebit, how has running impacted
your life or made you a betterperson?
Mark Remy (21:07):
Geez, that's a big question. Where should I start?
I mean, like with a lot ofthings, think running throughout
my life So first of all, I've tosay that like I said earlier,
(21:27):
I've been running more or lesstwenty years, a little more than
twenty years now. I paid my lifeas a runner to my first
marathon, which was 1995, whichis close enough. So I've been
doing this quite a while andover that period of time, and I
(21:48):
don't think I'm unusual in thisregard, I think I'm fairly
typical, the rest of my life hasjust been a roller coaster,
know?
I know just geographically andpersonally and emotionally and
professionally and romanticallyand everything else, it's just
like everyone else, life justkind of comes at you and you
(22:12):
know, it's just this craziness.And the one kind of through
line, through all that stuff hasbeen running, know, it's been
this constant. So in that sensealone, it's helped me just
because it's, gosh, you know,it's like a, it's kind of like a
(22:35):
rope, a rope leading you throughthese tricky mountain passes and
there's this rope that you cangrab on and it's right there and
no matter what else ishappening, you still have
running. As long as you'rehealthy, God willing you are,
more often than not, you can,you know, just put your shoes on
(22:58):
and go out the door and just go.And virtually every time you do
it, you come back at leastfeeling like a slightly better
person.
You know, a little more clearheaded, little more energetic, a
little more, I don't know, youhave more perspective. It's just
this weirdly wonderful thing,know? It's almost magical. And
(23:25):
it never diminishes, you know?No matter how much you do it or
how long you do it.
Like you know, I could go outfor a run today and come back
and it would have the sameeffect, you know? And that's a
pretty remarkable thing. I can'tthink of a lot of things in life
that are like that.
Mark Kennedy (23:38):
Yeah. I like your analogy with the rope. I never
really thought of it that waybut that really resonates with
me. Just like it's always thereand you know, life throws twists
and turns at you all the time,but there's always this rope and
it's this constant that you canhold onto. Yeah, it just kind of
(23:59):
keeps you moving in the rightdirection.
Mark Remy (24:02):
Yeah, yeah. So then, apart from that, there are the I
think running, for me anyway,works on at least two levels, a
micro level and a macro leveland the macro level stuff
includes that stuff I justdescribed, you know, running is
a constant, it's always there,it's always available and just
(24:22):
knowing it's there isreassuring, you know. Yeah, it's
kind of built in stability evenwhen everything else is just
going to pieces, know, there'salways running. That's like the
macro level and on the microlevel, just day to day it helps
your mood, know, it keeps youfit and healthy. Gosh, you know,
(24:43):
it strengthens your heart andyour lungs and your soul and all
this other corny stuff and it'sjust great, know, what can I
say?
So to look at it another way,you could ask, you know, where
would I be today? In every senseof word, where would I be? You
(25:05):
know, to write off that samelist, you know, geographically
and professionally andpsychologically and emotionally
and all those other things.Where would I be today if I
didn't have running that wholetime? You know, if there's some
parallel universe out there thathas, you know, one of me in it
but without running, you know, Ithink I'd be in a significantly
(25:29):
worse place, you know?
Mark Kennedy (25:30):
Yep.
Mark Remy (25:32):
So, you know, I try to I don't dwell on those kind
of thoughts but I do think aboutit fairly often only because
important, you know, not to takethings for granted and I try not
to take things for granted.Yeah. But, yeah.
Mark Kennedy (25:46):
Well, that's great. Thanks for sharing that.
Now, your site Dumbrunner and,before I let you tell us a
little bit about it, I justwanna read a couple little,
either their titles of articlesor a couple little, segments
within, articles or posts thatjust jumped out of me today when
I was just looking through. Onewas just a question and I think
(26:08):
this is a serious question,someone went in, you can correct
me if I'm wrong. Dear dumbrunner, is it possible to freeze
my twig and berries whilerunning in shorts during the
winter months in Colorado?
Did someone write that in?
Mark Remy (26:22):
Yes. Yeah. So that is from a section of the site
called Ask Dumb Runner.
Mark Kennedy (26:29):
Yep.
Mark Remy (26:31):
Actually in the top navigation of the website, it's
called Reader Q and A, which Ithink is more clear than Ask
Dumb Runner. Yep. And that's theone section of the site that's
pretty much always serious or orabout as serious as my site
gets.
Mark Kennedy (26:46):
Okay.
Mark Remy (26:47):
Not not to get ahead of ourselves, but most of the
site is at least intended to behumorous and satirical and
little tongue in cheek. The askdumb runner part is where I take
reader questions and answerthem. And I do try to answer
everyone who writes me even ifit doesn't wind up published on
website. So everyone who writesme hopefully gets at least a
(27:10):
brief personal response. And myphilosophy with Ask Dumb Runner
is that, well first of all, Iincluded that in the site in the
first place because I didn'twant the whole thing just to be
a gag.
Mark Kennedy (27:23):
Yes.
Mark Remy (27:23):
You know, because laughter is good and necessary
and fun and all that stuff, butyou know, I just felt like the
site needed something that wasreal, I guess, and useful.
Mark Kennedy (27:37):
Yeah.
Mark Remy (27:38):
A little more substantial, I guess you could
say. Plus, I just like the ideaof helping people out, which,
know, making them laugh ishelping them too I guess, but
you know, have been doing thislong enough and have been, you
know, read enough and writtenenough and worked closely enough
(27:59):
enough really smart other peoplethat I feel like I have some
wisdom at this point to offerand I try to offer it. So long
story short, yeah, AskDumbrunner is, they're all real
questions from real readers. Youcan remain anonymous if you want
to but I'll publish the questionif I think it's publishing
worthy
Mark Kennedy (28:17):
Yeah.
Mark Remy (28:18):
And an actual response, know. And the response
might be a little fun as wellbut there's an actual answer in
there someplace. We said I tryto put one in there.
Mark Kennedy (28:26):
Well that's great and I I I like to cite the
methodology to how you set it upwith, know, the humor side, the
serious side because I mean,Runner's World already exists so
there's no point, you know, sortof rehashing another site that's
just, you know, like how to dothis, how to do this, what to do
with this. So I found it reallyrefreshing and a couple
Mark Remy (28:46):
of Oh gosh. Yeah. Sorry,
Mark Kennedy (28:49):
go ahead.
Mark Remy (28:49):
No, no, no. Was just gonna Sorry to interrupt. I was
just gonna say that, you know,yeah, you're right, of course.
And first of all, you know, therunner's world is, you know, the
800 pound gorilla, you know,let's face it. And and they're
that for a reason, you know,they're they're completely
dominant and they they do acertain thing and they do it
super well.
And, you know, yeah, tryingtrying to establish a new kind
(29:12):
of Runner's World like websitewould be not only redundant but
kind of stupid on my part. Thatthat'd beyond dumb. That'd be
stupid.
Mark Kennedy (29:25):
Yeah. Couple of other ones I like too. There's
an article called Let Us NowPraise the Shower Beer, which
really made me laugh because Ihave been guilty in the past of
bringing a beer into the showerand I don't know if it was the
morning. I hope it was in themorning, that'd be brutal. I
think it was an afternoon run,cracked a beer and then we had
(29:46):
to get somewhere and I was like,Well, you know, it's a warm I'm
not going to waste this beer soit's coming to the shower with
me.
Mark Remy (29:52):
Yeah, of course.
Mark Kennedy (29:54):
Another one too I just saw in one of your articles
for it might have been targetedto beginners but it said, When
should I stretch? And then yourfirst line was, I recommend
stretching in 1981, which isfunny but also true. Mean that's
sort of what the research saysand yeah, I tell my listeners
(30:15):
all the time, by all means ifyou want to stretch because it
makes you feel good, go for itbut you don't need to.
Mark Remy (30:21):
Yeah, that's the thing. Yeah, and you know, I
wrote a more recent bit onstretching when, I don't if you
remember this, but a while backsome research came out about
flossing, flossing your teeth,you know? They essentially
concluded that there's no Theydidn't say it was useless, but
the conclusion, if I recall, wasthat there's really no evidence
(30:42):
anywhere to suggest thatflossing is really that
beneficial as far as oral healthis concerned, despite what every
dentist out there will tell you,including my own. So that
finding was a littlecontroversial and some people
pushed back, dentists for one.But I loved reading it because
it validated something I felt inmy gut my whole life, which is
(31:05):
that I don't know how familyfriendly or I'm feeling that
your show is, but I'll try to bePG here, is flossing is BS.
I made the analogy betweenflossing and stretching.
Mark Kennedy (31:18):
Yeah.
Mark Remy (31:18):
And I think they're really similar. If you want to
do it, if it makes you feelbetter or healthier, you know,
God bless knock yourself out.But you know, don't feel that
you have to. You know, andcertainly don't admonish other
people who choose not to do it,know? Yeah.
And most important, and this isa big thing for me, most
important, don't feel bad if youdon't want to do it, you know?
(31:42):
Yeah. It's, yeah, getting backto the stretching thing,
stretching is really emblematicof this I think. You know,
running has kind of become, Iguess like a lot of things in
life, just super needlesslycomplicated, you know? You know,
(32:02):
we've been kind of trained andgroomed to overthink it and
know, agonize and analyze everylittle thing and every little
bit of research that comes alongand this and that.
If that's your thing, if thatmotivates you, worrying about
(32:23):
what you should eat at whatpoint during the run and timing
your protein intake just right.And like, there are, you know,
there are a thousand littlethings like that that just blown
up. I mean, if that's, if youlike getting into that and you
really enjoy it and you reallythink it makes your life and
your running better and happierand everything else, then again,
(32:45):
go for it. But one of mymissions in life, as I get
older, is to just pound thishome just to tell people if you
don't want to live like that,you don't have to. You know,
there's this, that's kind ofbecome like the default for a
lot of people like, you know,gosh, what running shoes should
(33:05):
I wear and you know, what sortof wearable technology and you
know, how should I fuel?
You know, the word fuel, usedlike that, is one my pet peeves.
I never refer to fuel. To meit's food. It's food and drink,
know?
Mark Kennedy (33:19):
Yeah, eating and drinking, Yeah,
Mark Remy (33:21):
you know, and you know, it goes on and on and on
and on and you just barrage, itjust beats you up after a while.
And you know, what kills me isthat people who are looking to
get into running, I'm afraidwill be so overwhelmed, so
daunted by this tsunami ofinformation and tips and advice
(33:45):
and warnings and, you know, areyou stretching wrong? Are you
stretching wrong, are you eatingwrong, you know, here are five
ways, you're sabotaging, you'retraining all that stuff.
Mark Kennedy (33:54):
Yeah.
Mark Remy (33:54):
I think they're so like daunted by just seeing all
that stuff that they might bediscouraged from even running at
all, you know, which kills me.I'm like, oh, it doesn't have to
you can safely ignore virtuallyall that stuff. Just got there
and run, know. There are a fewguiding principles.
Mark Kennedy (34:11):
Yeah, well this is a perfect actually segue right
now because this is an article Iread on your website and after
reading this because I focus onhelping beginner runners, I read
this article you wrote and saidimmediately after I read it, I
think I put a comment on yourblog and I think I emailed you a
week later and said I need thisguy on my podcast because he
(34:33):
thinks the same way I do withregards to beginners. Article
was sorry, the only three thingsyou need to know to begin
running. And you talk aboutthree different things. One,
just go. Two, be patient.
And three, pay attention. Canyou talk a little bit about each
one of those three and how howit relates to a beginner runner?
Mark Remy (34:56):
Yeah. That was a nice segue, wasn't it? Nice. That's
just my head was going to beforeyou brought it up. I'm like,
actually wrote something aboutthis.
Mark Kennedy (35:03):
Yes.
Mark Remy (35:03):
Yeah. And I thought, know, so I wrote this post and I
thought it was so important thatI included a link in the, again,
in the top navigation of thewebsite, this cruise called
Running 101. And if you clickthat, it doesn't take you to
like a section about how tostart running with tips on
nutrition and gear and da da daand all this stuff. It just
(35:24):
takes you to this one article,which as you said is called The
Only Three Things You Need toKnow to Begin Running, Really.
And you're right, yeah, thefirst one, and this is not
something that I just wrote offthe top of my head, by the way.
Want to stress that. Is, a lotof stuff I write is just stuff
that kind of tickles me and it'sspur of the moment and I dash it
off and publish it and walkaway, but the information in
(35:46):
this article, I think, had beenkind of, gosh, have been kind of
fermenting in my head for yearsand years and years, you know?
And I finally just sat down andtried my best to distill all
these thoughts into one article,and then I distilled the article
(36:07):
into those three points as youmentioned. And the more I
thought about it, I thought, Ithink this is actually useful,
good advice for anybody. And bythe way, not just for beginners,
I think this applies, you know,even for veteran runners.
So basically, yeah, the firstpart, just go, gets back to what
I was saying a minute ago aboutnot, you know, shaking off that
(36:29):
paralysis that you might feelwhen you're thinking about
starting to run. You know, maybeyou watched a marathon or
something and you spectated, yougot inspired, boy, should run. I
got to do a five ks orsomething, but you know, I
haven't run since high schooland I got a few extra pounds and
this and that, and what shoes doI run? You know, like my wife
(36:50):
for example was talking tosomeone a while back and told me
that her friend wanted to knowwhat kind of running shoes to
get. She wanted to start runningand I basically told her like,
just go to a good running storeand chat with them a little bit
and just buy the shoes that feelcomfortable.
And that's it. You know, it'sreally that simple and there's
(37:12):
been a whole industry that'ssprung up around questions like
that that are working hard toconvince people just the
opposite. Like no, you need agait analysis, you have to over
point it or under it, should dothe wet test, you should do
minimal, maximal cushioning, dada da. Just try some shoes on if
(37:32):
they're comfortable, then justgo with them, know, don't beat
yourself up. And kind ofunderlying what I said before,
that the really sad part aboutthis anecdote is that as far as
I know, unless something haschanged, this same woman still
hasn't run a single step becauseshe doesn't know what shoes she
should get.
Mark Kennedy (37:50):
Yeah.
Mark Remy (37:50):
So she's been like kicking that can down the road,
you know, she has these shoesfor CrossFit or something. She's
like, Can I wear the shoes I usefor CrossFit? I'm like, This is
ridiculous, man. Know, you couldEspecially when you consider
when you're first starting, youshouldn't be running far enough
for even horrible shoes, youknow, to really mess things up.
(38:12):
You know, you could run aroundthe block in penny loafers if
you had to or whatever the shoesyou're wearing, And that's the
thing, if you're just starting,you should be running around the
block.
Know, run around the block andcall it a success and build from
there. Worry about fine tuningyour footwear later, but yeah,
(38:33):
just go. The second point isjust kind of ties in with that,
is be patient. Too many peoplejump into running and I don't
know if this is getting I getthe sense it's getting worse
over the past five, ten, fifteenyears or so as technology has
gone into hyper speed and we'reall accustomed to getting
(38:58):
instantaneous results andimmediate gratification that the
whole idea of deciding to becomea runner one day, know, running
for three or four or five or sixmonths even, just very, very
short distances very slowly, andthen maybe signing up for a five
ks, you know, and after a fewmonths of that, maybe a 10 ks,
and then eventually after ayear, year and a half, how about
(39:20):
a half marathon, and then a yearafter that maybe you'll try a
marathon. Like that would drivemost people today crazy, which
is too bad.
Know, so many people want gofrom zero to marathon in a few
In fact, I got another Ask aWetter question about that some
time ago from someone asking,you know, my son is fairly fit,
he's young, he's in themilitary, he wants to do a
(39:41):
marathon this fall. And this waslike in the summer, so he had
like three months Maybe four,was four, three or four months.
Can you recommend a trainingplan? And my response was like,
Honestly, my advice is find atraining plan for a half
marathon and do that. I don'tunderstand the urgency.
(40:04):
Why does he need to do amarathon this fall? Just be
patient, be patient.
Mark Kennedy (40:08):
Yeah, there's couch to five ks and then that
sounds like now, I mean, there'sgoing be couch to marathon.
Mark Remy (40:13):
Couch to ultra, I guess. Couch to ultra, there you
And move on to the next thing,right? It's just a shame, which
especially when you consider,and this is so paradoxical,
because one of the mostbeautiful things that distance
running can teach you if you letit is the value of patience. And
the fact that, being patient,developing that discipline to
(40:38):
delay gratification can pay offin the long run, no pun
intended, can pay off in a bigway and that's a valuable life
lesson as well. But you're nevergoing to get there if you don't
have enough patience to beginwith to stick with it and just
take one step at a time, youknow.
Again, guess I tell people itdepends on your goals. If your
(41:00):
goal is just to finish amarathon and then cross it off
your list and move on to bungeejumping or something or
skydiving, then okay, train forone in four months and risk
getting hurt and probably hateit.
Mark Kennedy (41:12):
Yeah, you won't enjoy it.
Mark Remy (41:14):
You won't enjoy it. Let's face it, even if you're
well trained and experienced,not enjoy it, you probably won't
enjoy it. That's another story,but you know, at least you won't
wreck yourself en route andyeah, it depends on your goals.
I always ask people, Why do youwant to run a marathon? Fairly
(41:34):
often, they don't have a reallyvery good answer to that, you
know?
I don't think they've everstopped to think about it. I
don't know, why don't they?Exactly. I think it's about 26.2
miles or you know.
Mark Kennedy (41:46):
And then the last one, pay attention.
Mark Remy (41:48):
Right, right, right, pay attention. So this gets a
little Well actually this worksagain on a couple levels. As I
say in the article I think, justin the here and now, you need to
pay attention to your body. Toomany people I think push
themselves too hard, too fast,too long, too soon, and you
(42:10):
know, break something or getfrustrated because they aren't
getting the results they want,and I guess that's more about
being patient. The point is, ifyou don't pay attention to your
body and adapt, then that canlead to pretty bad things.
On another level, you need payattention to your surroundings
(42:32):
and that means not just trafficand other kind of threats, but
just nature or yoursurroundings, you know,
whatever. This gets a littlehippy dippy, but I'm a big
believer in it. One of the otherbeautiful things about running
is that if you let it, and thisis something you can cultivate,
(42:54):
know, if you let it, it canreally open your eyes to so much
Beauty seems like such aninadequate word, but it can open
your eyes to so much beauty outthere. And not just like the,
you know, trees and waterfallsand baby deer, that kind of
beauty, but just beauty inplaces you wouldn't expect it
(43:15):
otherwise. Because too often wewalk around, you know, staring
at our phones or in our cars onthe way to an appointment or
rushing here, rushing there, andknow, one of the most appealing
things for me about running isthat it's the time to kind of
get away from all that and justtake a breath and look around a
little bit, know?
(43:36):
So pay attention. Pay attentioninwardly too to your thoughts,
you know? Running is a wonderfulopportunity to do that as well,
and we have fewer and feweropportunities like that to
really pay attention to what'sgoing on between our ears. And
again, on a macro level, payattention and recognize how far
(43:58):
you've come. If you've beenrunning for even just a few
weeks maybe, certainly a fewmonths, you're going to see some
difference.
It can be so incremental thatyou risk not noticing it if you
don't pay attention. But ifyou're feeling frustrated that
you're not making enoughprogress fast enough, then maybe
(44:22):
try to pay a little closerattention, you know, go back in
time and remember like, wait aminute, actually I'm going
around the block, not once now,but half a dozen times, I'm not
completely winded and feel likeI'm dying. So you pay attention
and you recognize that, and thatcan be motivating as well. So
yeah, just go, be patient andpay attention. One, two, three.
(44:45):
Once you got that nailed down,if you want to make things more
complicated, you certainly can.It's easy to do, trust me. But
you don't have especially whenyou're first starting.
Mark Kennedy (44:56):
Out there today, the internet, there's so many
training plans available forrunners, especially beginners.
What's your advice on picking atraining plan?
Mark Remy (45:07):
Oh gosh, you know, I not to keep plugging Ask Runner,
but that's another question Igot for Ask Runner as well,
separate from the previousmarathon training plan question.
My answer amounted to basicallyand this might make some
seasoned actual coaches outthere cringe, but I stand by it.
(45:29):
Again, especially for beginnersor for folks who, I to say just
want to finish, but you know,quote unquote just want to
finish, which I think isperfectly fine goal by the way.
Especially for folks like that,who aren't necessarily going for
a PR or trying to run a blazingtime or something. If your goal
(45:50):
is just to get fit withouthurting yourself and just get
prepared for the distance, Ithink that within reason, with a
few obvious caveats, withinreason it doesn't really matter
what plane you pick.
And that might sound ridiculous,but I truly believe it. Of
(46:11):
course the caveats are there,the caveats being, and I would
hope this goes without saying,just use your head, you know? If
looking, if you know that you'reprobably, let's say you're
running a half marathon, you'retraining for your first half
marathon, for example. You'vebeen running five Ks for a
couple of years, you you runpretty routinely, you're fit and
(46:34):
healthy and all good stuff, youthink you're ready for a half
marathon, and you think that,let's say a two hour and fifteen
minute half marathon sounds likea reasonable goal to you, then,
you know, choose a training planthat just looks like it's about
right for a two fifteenmarathoner type runner. Mhmm.
(46:55):
You know? I mean, if it's ifit's called the, you know, the
the break one thirty halfmarathon training plan, that's
not for you. That's not going tosay it's obvious. Because
obviously, just if you look atit and think like, Woah, that's
way too much mileage and theseworkouts are too intense, then
keep looking. But don't agonize,just like with shoes, don't
(47:18):
agonize over which trainingphilosophy or approach you need,
which method, you know, how muchcross training should there be,
you know, is it a seven daycycle or a ten day cycle, is it
you know, it's just, you know,as long as you, if you look at
it and think like this looksmanageable, I could do this and
(47:41):
if I do what it says more orless, you know, can always fudge
a little bit or if you miss aday or two, it's not life or
death.
If I do what this training plantells me to do more or less
between now and race day, yeah,I will probably be okay and I'll
be healthy and happy along theway, then choose that training
(48:02):
plan.
Mark Kennedy (48:03):
Yeah, it's kind of
Mark Remy (48:04):
And I tell people too not to overthink it because
choosing a training plan isn'tlike signing a mortgage or
something. It's not like you'relocked, it's not getting
married. No, you can just, ifit's not working out after a
couple weeks, if you realizelike, wow, this is way too hard
for me or wow, is way too easyfor me or it's just too much
mileage, you can either makesome tweaks to the plan itself
(48:27):
or toss the plan and go find anew one. All these things are
allowed, so don't sweat it toomuch.
Mark Kennedy (48:35):
Yeah, read an article about diets and if
you're looking to lose weight,there's hundreds of diets that
will work for you. It's just amatter of sometimes just picking
one and having the awareness anda lot of these things will get
you to the same place. It's justa matter of just going like your
first point in that article wetalked about. You just got to
(48:56):
start.
Mark Remy (48:57):
Yeah, by the way, are you you're familiar with a
writer named Michael Pollan, thefood writer?
Mark Kennedy (49:02):
Yes, the Eat Mostly Plants. Exactly.
Mark Remy (49:09):
Yeah, yeah. So it's actually love to bring I think I
bring Bob actually anotherarticle I did for Dumbrunner.
But yeah, I love his approach,is he distills all of his kind
of advice on eating andnutrition and diet and all that
stuff into just a handful ofwords, which is eat food, not
(49:31):
too much, mostly plants.
Mark Kennedy (49:34):
Yeah, simple and so amazing.
Mark Remy (49:37):
Yeah, yeah, and to be honest, I was kind of thinking
of him in that phrase when Iwrote that three things you need
to know article. I wanted to getsomething similarly concise and
pithy and memorable thatdistilled everything you really
need to know into these threeguiding principles that you
could remember. Mean dietnutrition alone is just, poof,
(50:01):
it's just crazy. It's gotten sonuts.
Mark Kennedy (50:03):
Yeah, absolutely. And that's that's a topic for
another probably two podcastepisodes.
Mark Remy (50:09):
Oh, gosh.
Mark Kennedy (50:10):
One, one question I want to ask you and this is
something I want to address onmy site or blog at some point
and I I I sent a survey to allthe people who sign up to my
email list and I've got about700 or so people who responded
and one of the, biggeststruggles people come back with
and I I've never reallyaddressed it, I've never seen
anyone write an article about itis a lot of people struggle,
(50:33):
especially beginners, withgetting started running because
they're shift workers. Theyeither work night shifts, or
their shifts are all over theplace, could be day, could be
night. Sometimes they work longshifts like twelve, fourteen
hours and they may work fourteendays in a row with shifts like
that and have seven days off.I'm just wondering if anyone's
(50:55):
ever asked you that type ofquestion or any tips that you
might be able to provide forpeople who work shift hours.
Mark Remy (51:02):
Oh gosh, I don't think anyone's submitted that
question to me recently, butit's certainly a question I've
seen pop up here and again overthe years in Runner's World and
so on. You know, I really, I'mafraid I don't have much really
useful advice, sad to say,except, you know, I guess my
(51:27):
advice would be, you know, beyoung and single. Because when I
was actually, because I did incollege, summers in college, I
did shift work and it wasbrutal. We did, it was this
television tube glass factory,right? And it ran twenty four
hours a day.
So we would do seven days in arow from 8AM to 4PM, have a day
(51:48):
off and then seven days in arow, four to midnight, have two
days off and then seven days ina row midnight to 8AM.
Mark Kennedy (51:54):
Yeah.
Mark Remy (51:55):
Four days off. So it was brutal. But when I was
working there, was biking a lotand that was actually the period
of my life when I won. I think Iwon like two bike races my
entire life and while I wasdoing that swing shift work was
when I won one of them, youknow? So I was obviously
(52:15):
training but my secret was being20 years old and living at home
with my parents.
Mark Kennedy (52:21):
Yeah, exactly.
Mark Remy (52:22):
So that's my advice, be young and have no
responsibilities except trainingand working. But beyond that,
gosh, that's a tough one. It'stough. I don't know.
Mark Kennedy (52:33):
I think a lot of it too, maybe go back to your
three points again. You bepatient and you really got to
pay attention because if yoursleeping patterns are messed up,
you might be more apt to getinjured and sick and you got to
be really patient because maybesome weeks perhaps you can maybe
run only once or twice and thenother weeks you can run five,
(52:55):
six times so that patient reallykicks in there too.
Mark Remy (52:58):
Yeah, yeah. I mean some questions are just really
tough questions and I'm justcurious if there's any way to
see what kind of answers youcome up with. But yeah, I I
would add at the last minutehere, don't be afraid to, and
this applies to a number ofscenarios I guess, don't be
afraid to kind of play aroundand experiment. Try different
(53:19):
approaches, know. Try trainingbefore work, try after work, try
this and that, eat this time orthat time.
Again, you be patient, if youjust go and be patient and
you're patient enough and openminded enough, I'm sure sooner
or later you're going to land ona combination of, on a balance
(53:46):
that works for you and yoursleep cycles and your own body
and your own needs.
Mark Kennedy (53:51):
Yeah, that's a good point. Yeah. So I also,
before we, I know we're movingalong in time here, before we
sign off, I want to mentionyou've also got five books or
four books?
Mark Remy (54:04):
Depends on how you define books. I'm not trying to
be coy, but really, so, my mostYeah, so I've written what you
would call, I guess, four actualbooks.
Mark Kennedy (54:14):
Okay.
Mark Remy (54:15):
And one, training journal.
Mark Kennedy (54:17):
Gotcha.
Mark Remy (54:17):
Which is book like, but not a book book, if you know
what I
Mark Kennedy (54:20):
mean. Okay.
Mark Remy (54:22):
Yeah, if anybody's curious there, you can see them
all on dumbrunner.com/store. Youcan order personalized signed
copies there as well as theirlinks to buy them on Amazon and
so on. My personal site ismarkrami.com. It has similar
information about all my books.
Mark Kennedy (54:43):
Okay, well I'll be sure to put the links to your
sites that you mentioned therein the show notes but I also
want to give away asappreciation, or token
appreciation to you and, to helpa lucky listener. I want to give
away a copy of each of, your 5or $4 plus your training
journal. So all five of them toone lucky listener and I thought
(55:05):
to enter just leave a comment onthe show notes page which will
be at healthenomics.com/31 andit may take a week or so for me
to get this post or episode up.But, leave your comment by
05/31/2017 and I'll pick, alucky winner on 06/01/2017 and,
(55:29):
I'll contact you and then I'llget in touch perhaps with you,
Mark, and maybe we can arrangeto get those signed as well and
I'll send you the money andsomeone will be a happy winner.
Mark Remy (55:39):
Oh, that's brilliant. Thanks.
Mark Kennedy (55:40):
Yeah, no worries.
Mark Remy (55:41):
Yeah, first prize is one copy of each of my books and
second prize is two copies ofeach of my books.
Mark Kennedy (55:46):
What's that? No. Oh, two copies, yeah. Yeah, that
would be good. So anyways,again, so Healthenomics.com/31
and Mark, anyways, thanks verymuch for your time and
expertise.
Anywhere else people can connectwith you online besides
dumbrunner.com andmarkrennie.com?
Mark Remy (56:10):
Oh gosh, those are the two biggies. You you can
find my columns in Runner'sWorld magazine, of course.
Eventually, they're archived onrunnersworld.com. You can also
find my older Raney's Worldonline columns, which is like
seven and a half years worth ofonline content for Runner's
World are still there someplaceif you search for them. But
(56:30):
yeah, dartrunner.com, markramiCom and you can find links on
both the sites to my socialmedia feeds as well.
Mark Kennedy (56:36):
Awesome. Well thanks again, Mark.
Mark Remy (56:38):
Thank you very much. I appreciate it. Thanks for
listening to the HealthinomicsPodcast at
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