The Fuss About Cotton and the Monument 10k

NOTE: I wrote this about a week ago, but since life has been rather hectic with work, my birthday, and vacation planning it wasn't a priority to finish the post.

Lets Talk About Cotton

Since my Ate Joy decided to show me what she calls "link love" (ie - the practice of linking to one's blog) last week, there was quite a bit of fuss about me wearing cotton sweat pants during my runs.  Actually most of the fuss was from Ate Joy.

I justify my running in my sweat pants for several reasons:

1. Running gear is expensive! I just started my running a couple months ago and didn't want to waste my money on something I wasn't sure I was going to commit to 100%.  And if that isn't enough, think of the economy people!
2. They're comfortable.  I love being comfortable.  Some of my best work gets done when I'm wearing sweats or a hoodie.  This is especially key, when I'm starting something new and uncomfortable to me (ie - running long distances).
3. Its been cold the past couple of months.  This point relates to my first one.  Its been cold, so I've pretty much compensated by throwing every piece of clothing I had on.
4. I'm old school.  I love physical play in basketball, strong defenses in football, Galaga, Transformers, the Original Trilogy of Star Wars, the click noise old keyboards make, etc.  Forget all this new school updated stuff!  I mean its not like running was invented with the tech/dryfit clothing lines.  People still ran in cotton 20+ years ago.  Heck, the first Marathon was before 1 century AD, you think people were worried about running in cotton back then?!

This is what I ran in a couple weeks ago:

Now some of you new-age running extremists (this is mostly directed at my Ate Joy as she is the only one that reads this blog) might cringe at the sight of this, but it fits my basic criteria: cheap, readily available, and warm.

Now, I ran 5+ miles with this on.  You know what my pace was?  8:45 mins/mile.  This may not seem fast to some people, but I've only been doing this for a couple of months.  So I think a time like that is awesome.  I'm awesome!  I'm not doing this to look cool or run extremely fast.  I'm doing this to finish something I said I was going to do.  Will I wear this kind of thing on race day?  Heck no!  Time matters on those days.

Monument 10k

This past weekend I ran the Monument 10k.  It was my first race.  Well first race as a distance runner, I used to run sprints in high school.

My wife, the Doctor Lady, and my cousin David (AKA JoyCuz-D) were in attendance.

I wasn't nervous at all.  This is probably because I just thought of the event as a benchmark of my progress towards completing the Richmond Marathon with my cousin, Ate Joy in the family challenge.

What made it especially relaxed were the numerous costumes at the event.  I saw ninja turtles, a swimmer (in just a speedo), and best of all Indiana Jones (scroll down to see the pic from the link)!

The run itself wasn't too bad.  I was in the wrong coral for the time I wanted, but I think it helped my confidence more than anything.  For the first part of the run I was well below my usual pace but this was recommended by my training group as they noted that zigging in and out of people tends to waste a lot of energy.  I just took my time and waited for the gaps to open.

Towards the end of the run (about the last half mile) I decided to kick it in a higher gear and finish strong like I've been practicing.  This is the part when my mind was tested the most.  It was especially disheartening when a kid who had to have been 10 years old kicked it into an even higher gear and made me look like I was standing still.  I like to justify this with the thought that he started in a much earlier coral, but I have no proof for this.

What was my time for the race, you may ask?  I ran a 52:58 or what is equivalent to around a 8:31.3 pace.  That's about 15 seconds faster than my usual pace per mile, and I was stuck in the wrong coral!

So in my strong opinion people should train in whatever clothing they want.  I mean its running.  Its supposed to be as low maintenance a sport as they get!  For those fashion police out there, I challenge you to run in cotton for a couple of weeks.  You'd be surprised how much a little change of clothing can help improve your time.

As a bonus for actually reading this blog.  Here's my morning race day dance, courtesy of the Doctor Lady.