The One About Ultra Running: My Favorite TEDxSacramento Talk

One of the first live TEDxSacramento events I attended was the main event at the Crocker Art Museum a couple years ago. I found Lisa Donchak’s talk about ultra running to be motivating. For people who don’t know what ultra running is, it’s a person crazy enough to run 100 miles in a timed race. For fun. The time limit to complete the race is usually 24 hours.

In her talk, Donchak goes into great detail about all the decisions that led up to her picking the race she would attempt to complete to how she decided to finish her first 100-mile, ultra run.

The first time I heard the term “ultra running” was while working in Hawaii and a local news article mentioned the H.U.R.T. (Hawaii Ultra Running Team).  The fact that there was 100 miles of trails on Oahu fascinated me. Up until 2012, I didn’t think I could run anything longer than three miles at a time, myself, until Thanksgiving when I finished the 10k at Run to Feed the Hungry in just under 1:16.

Fun run Tuesdays at Fleet Feet Sacramento and day hikes with some pretty cool people I know, one of whom recently returned from attempting to climb Mt. Everest have kept me motivated.

For a while Donchak’s day job was at Google where she implemented her ideas about individual decision making within groups of individuals. Lisa’s thoughts about reaching mile 75 kept going through my mind: the dark, the blisters, the small circle of light surrounding her progress as she moved forward. All part of the decision process to consider if she would continue.

“The last mile was the hardest,” Donchak says, but for me, in the recent 10k race, the last 1.2 miles was the hardest.

In the end though, it’s about perseverance. Decide to keep pushing until the goal is reached, completed, finished. It will be worth the journey.

Olympic Gold Medalist Billy Mills, 50 Years After

This year marks the 50 year anniversary of when Billy Mills stunned the world. He overcame a contentious field of top distance contenders to win the 10,000m race at the 1964 Olympics in Tokyo. This win squarely secured his place in history as the only American to ever win the Olympics at that length and the second Native American to ever win a Gold Medal.

A few years ago, students in the Native Voices program of the Center for Multicultural Cooperation had the opportunity to interview Billy and learn about the difficulties he faced and overcame to win.

This week the 2014 Outdoor Championships for USA Track and Field will be occurring over a four day competition on the California State University, Sacramento campus. As part of the activities surrounding the event, participants can run the Billy Mills 10k. My most recent 5k time is equal to Billy's 1964 10k time, but you'll know where to find me come Thursday at 7:00 p.m. anyway, reaching for the next goal.

Eat Well

Food rules I'm making an concerted effort to enforce for myself:

1. It's a balance. Eat a little less than you think you need.
2. Before eating, drink water, about half an hour before eating, actually. And anywhere from 64 to 128 ounces a day.
3. Consider cooking more from scratch. You can control which ingredients are going in and you learn how to balance the flavors better.
4. Exercise 3 - 5 times a week for about an hour each time.