Barry Goldmeier: The amazing 5-ball joggler

Barry Goldmeier, seen in the above YouTube clip, has always made me feel like a bit of a fraud when I talk to people about my joggling. For years now, he has quietly been joggling in road races with five balls.

Wardian smashes stroller-pushing marathon record

They did it!

Michael Wardian of Arlington, Virginia pushed his son Pierce in a stroller for the entire Frederick Marathon in Virginia in 2 hours 42 minutes and 21 seconds, breaking my 2004 record by seven minutes.

"It was bonkers," the prolific marathoner said after the race. "It was one of the hardest races I've ever done."

Wardian said there was a strong wind that the stroller caught like a parachute. I remember the same thing when I pushed Annika at the Toronto Waterfront Marathon in 2004.

Congratulations to Michael and Pierce.

Will I defend the record? My two girls are too big now, so unless I get a loaner, the answer is no. Does anyone have a baby they want to get into the Guinness Book?

Wardian, Pierce go for stroller-pushing record

Michal and Annika celebrate their Guinness World Record at the Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Marathon in 2004. This photo, taken by race staff, was printed on page 220 of the 2007 Guinness Book of World Records.

As reported in yesterday's post, my Guinness World Record for the "fastest time to run a marathon while pushing a pram" (I actually consider this record more Annika's than mine) will likely be broken tomorrow.

U.S. marathoner Michael Wardian, who has a marathon personal-best of 2:21, will be pushing his nine-month-old son Pierce in tomorrow's Frederick Marathon in Virginia.

Wardian's marathon PB is nine minutes faster than mine, plus I don't think that 2:21 reflects his full potential, based on the fact that he tends to run several marathons back to back, rather than the usual two or three per year favoured by most elites. I predict he stroll past the line in the 2:33-2:35 range. I think I was in about 2:32 shape when I ran my record of 2:49, and I also ran an extra 800m or so because of a course turnaround mix-up (the guy at the turnaround point was apparently off taking a leak when Annika and I got there). Annika was 20 months old when I pushed her, so he'll also have a weight advantage that might save a few minutes.

But the record is certainly not a given because so much rides on the kid staying put in that seat for two or three hours. If little Pierce decides to throw a hairy fit at 15 miles, or has some serious diaper issues, Wardian could lose a big chunk of time, or be forced to pull out altogether. I'm assuming he has done several long runs with his son and is confident in his ability to stay put. Nothing is guaranteed, though, when it comes to babies temperaments.

I wish Mike and Pierce all the best. Go for it guys!

Joggling with five

Owen Morse joggling with 5

How hard would it be to joggle a marathon with five beanbags? I put this question recently to American joggling legend Barry Goldmeier, who joggled his way through "most" of a marathon several years ago with five beanbags. His finishing time was about six hours.

Barry emailed me a couple of days ago to let me know that my stroller-pushing marathon record is soon being challenged by U.S. marathoner Michael Wardian. I already knew this, but was excited to hear from Barry, one of my joggling idols. I'm hoping to get some pointers from him on five-ball joggling (no balls jokes please) because the few times I've tried it, I found it very difficult to sync up the tosses with the running.

Joggling with clubs

I've been spending more time lately working on my clubs juggling. Dianne bought me a set of five Renegade clubs for Christmas, but I haven't had much time to use them because of the risk of dropping them on my kids' heads.


Zach told me he joggled with clubs when he appeared on ESPN last year because they wanted something more flashy than beanbags. Now that my clubs juggling is coming along, maybe it's time to give clubs joggling a whirl?

The guy you see juggling the clubs in the above photo is Anthony Gatto, and I just read that he is performing in the upcoming Cirque du Soleil show, Kooza. It's coming to Toronto in August and Gatto alone will be worth the admission. I'm going to book tickets.

For those of you not familiar with Gatto, watch this:

Saunders just misses 5K joggling record

Canadian joggler Travis Saunders
(Photo: Stephen Petrick, KingstonThisWeek.com)

I ran home from work yesterday without joggling. I had my beanbags in my knapsack, and was tempted to bring them out, but I resisted and ran the entire route as a normal runner. To make up for the lack of juggling, I did some gut-wrenching short intervals.

I'm honoured to have been chosen as the Runner of the Week on the site, Faithful Soles. Check it out here.

In other joggling news, I'd like to congratulate fellow Canadian joggler, Travis Saunders, on an excellent 5K race this past weekend. Travis was trying to break the 5K joggling world record at the Limestone 5K in Kingston, Ontario. He ran a superb 17:05, missing the 21-year-old record by just 10 seconds. Travis told me he did drop once and that probably made the difference. I'd love to organize a 5000m showdown against him on the track. Could this be the start of a new friendly joggling rivalry?

Can I run like a normal person?

Now that the joggling duel is done, I'm going to take a break from joggling and see if I remember how to run like normal human being. I hope I don't still run with palms facing up, because that would look stupid.

Thanks to my mom for pointing out that I'm listed in Upcoming Stories on the CBC News: Sunday site as the Marathon Joggler. I'm waiting for confirmation on the date this will go to air, but here's the link. I watched the show last Sunday and Evan Solomon did a fantastic interview with David Foster. No doubt hundreds of thousands of viewers will be anxious to see what kinds of insights Evan was able to pry out of The Joggler.