Mango madness!

Dianne and I are now the proud owners of a Mango velomobile. Specifically, Mango #106. That's right, the 106th Mango ever made by Go-Mango in collaboration with Velomobiel.nl in the Netherlands. The purchase was arranged through Canada's only velomobile dealer, Ray Mickevicius of Bluevelo.

For those who missed my recent velomobile ramblings, this machine is essentially a human-powered car. Or, put another way, it's a very, very expensive tricycle.

I'll be driving the Mango to and from work every day, winter included.

I took it to work on Friday and the ride was superb. It was an odd feeling to be kicking back in a car-like vehicle – with a horn, headlights and turn signals – while at the same time getting exercise and not polluting. My commute in the Mango actually made me look around and wonder, honestly, why there weren't hundreds of thousands of these things driving around town.

From the reactions on the street, you'd think I was driving some kind of spacecraft from the future. I heard a lot of: "What IS that?!" or "That is SICK!" And since my legs and the pedals were hidden under the fairing, there were a lot of questions about how the velo is propelled: "What powers that thing?," one driver asked me. "Quads, hamstrings, some calves," I said.

More photos and video clips will follow. The picture above was me taking an elated Lauryn out for a spin. She is the world's youngest velomobile enthusiast.

The joggling training is winding down now; two weeks to go. Tomorrow I have a 13-mile joggle planned, with 10 miles at marathon pace. That should give me a good indication of my fitness heading into the big race.

Joggling for dummies

This post is for all the millions of you out there who want to learn how to joggle but don't know where to start. Here are some tips:

1. I'm going to assume that you already know how to run ... or jog.
2. Now get yourself some nice juggling beanbags. I use Sportballs, Perry uses Gballz and Zach I think uses Higgins Brothers.
3. Learn how to juggling the three-ball cascade. Click HERE for a great tutorial.
4. It's time to put the two components together. This sport is not like the triathlon, where to get to do your sports separately; the joggler needs to seamlessly mesh together the sports of running and juggling.
5. Find a nice clear path outside. Start out by juggling your cascade, then walk forward for a while to get the feel of forward motion while you juggle. Concentrate on keeping the juggling pattern nice and even, as it you were standing still.
6. OK, you're ready to joggle. Start up your cascade, then break into a slow jog. Each time you toss a ball with your left hand, match it to the right-leg stride, and vice-versa.
7. When you run, the right arm will automatically swing forward as you stride with your left leg. You need to match your joggling tosses with this natural arm swing.
8. The height of your tosses is determined by the speed of your running. The faster you run, the lower the toss. This is because as you run faster, your arms pump at a faster rate.
9. Take care not to toss the balls too far forward. I made this mistake when I was first learning how to joggle. If your biceps start to burn after a short joggle, you're probably tossing too far forward. The beanbags should only be about half a foot in front of your nose.
10. When you're juggling while standing still, your elbows are stable at your sides, but for joggling your elbows swing forward and back with the running motion. To accommodate this arm swing and increase running efficiency, you need to carry the ball back with you on the backswing, then release it as your arm shovels forward. Toss each beanbag just before your opposite foot strikes the ground.
11. Try to avoid any excessive trunk sway and maintain normal running form. When I watched Zach pull ahead of me in the Boston Marathon last year, I could barely tell he was joggling. If it weren't for the telltale yellow beanbags popping up over his shoulders, I could swear he was a regular runner.
12. When you're joggling, you should focus on the road or path ahead of you, not the beanbags. As long as you have them in your line of sight, you'll know where to catch them, but your eyes should focus on where you're going. Otherwise you'll run into a pole or a ditch or other runners or a water buffalo (depending on where you're joggling).
13. That's it. Congratulations, you're a joggler.
    

How much does juggling slow you down?

Adeel asked a good question relating to my 10K forgot-my-balls mishap: Exactly how much does juggling slow me down?

This is easy to calculate. Below is a comparative chart of my running and joggling PB times and the percentage differential:

400m: 53 secs. vs. 59 secs. (89%)
Mile: 4:22 vs. 4:49 (90%)
5K: 15:05 vs. 17:50 (84%)
10K: 31:59 vs. 36:27 (87%)
30K: 1:43 vs. 1:55 (89%)
Marathon: 2:30 vs. 2:53 (87%)

Joggling pioneers like Bill Giduz say joggling should cost you only about 10% of your time. Mine are a bit higher, but that is likely due to the fact that most of my running PBs were set about five years ago when I was a) younger, b) fitter, c) 8 lbs. lighter, d) less overworked, e) less sleep-deprived.

So I think the 10% figure is about right, and it may be even lower, based on yesterday's 35-minute non-juggling 10K. My running speed is slowing down over the years, but my joggling technique has improved greatly, as have my props; the lightweight Sportballs have made a huge difference for the long-distance events.

Note to self: bring beanbags nex time

If you're trying to set a world record for joggling, don't forget your balls.

I discovered this the hard way on the ferry ride on the way to the Longboat Toronto Island Race. Dianne and I had successfully packed up the whole family for the day out, including raincoats, sweaters, snacks and drinks. But I forgot three important items: my Sport Juggling Co. Sportball beanbags.

"D'oh!" I said.

"Maybe you could use apples," Dianne suggested.

Sadly, the apples weren't going to cut it for a new 10K joggling world record, so I ended up running it as a normal runner. It was a tough adjustment and I ended up finishing fourth in 35:00, three minutes slower than my PB, but a good effort.

Ed Whitlock was there, but didn't race because of a knee problem. In fact, he's not running the Toronto Waterfront Marathon either. Ed did tell me that his knee issue comes and goes and he is back running again, just not ready to race. I'm sure he'll be back soon enough to set some more 75+ age-group records. I needed a gimmick to set world records, Ed is just pure guts, speed and endurance.

Up next for me: On Tuesday morning, I'll be joggling my final super-mega long run before the marathon.

Join the f–ing circus? I wish!

As I was joggling home from work today, a guy yelled out the window of his car at me: "You should join the f–ing circus!" The tone was one of distain, but his words were funny to me on several levels.

First of all, I had just seen Cirque du Soleil the previous weekend and still had images of this dazzling circus fresh in my mind. Secondly, it was a complete flop as an insult – I'd jump at the chance to join the f–ing circus! And lastly, joggling acts as a litmus test to get a glimpse of the personalities of complete strangers. This guy thinks he's putting me down, when in fact he's just demonstrating to me that he's a total numbnut.

Cirque du Soleil's Kooza: a short review

Kooza was a magical mix of everything that can be good about a circus.

The clowns were actually funny, the live music was right on cue and filled the tent good vibes, the costumes were over the top but not freakish, the acrobats performed impossible stunts and the juggler was ... Anthony Gatto!

My kids were enthralled. Both girls sat through the entire two-hour-long performance with boogled eyes. The show was a seamless mix of stunts, artistic beauty, magic, laughs, lights and sounds. The closest thing to a dull moment was the magic act by the Pickpocket, who's routine seemed to plod compared to the zing of the other performers.

The highlight of my night was of course seeing my juggling idol perform live. Anthony was dressed in a suit of tiny mirrors and looked like a disco ball. His routine went straight into five balls with another ball bouncing on his head, progressed into clubs and culminated in a good run of nine rings and then seven rings put around the neck while he bounced a ball on his head. He dropped one thing: a beach ball that he was tossing on top of a metal post he had balanced on his chin.

These tricks might be easy for Anthony, but the audience was obviously flabbergasted to see someone juggle seven clubs, and frankly so was I; it was the first time I've seen someone do this in person. I liked how compact his act was – he jumped straight from one thing to the next and moved around the stage with ease while doing tricks. You could tell he was a joggler.

The only disappointment was not seeing the act that got rave reviews: the guy who stacks chairs on top of each other and then climbs to the top and does gymnastics.

But I was blown away by the "Wheel of Death," a giant metal contraption that consists of two human-sized hamster wheels that rotate is a big circle around a centre point by the momentum of the guys inside, or sometimes outside, the wheels. These guys had no safety nets and performed truly death-defying leaps, bounds and somersaults as the wheels spun around at a ridiculous pace.

If you're considering going to see Kooza, I have one word for you: go.

Kooza craziness

A full review will follow shortly, but for now let me just say that the Kooza Cirque du Soleil show did not disappoint. And neither did Anthony Gatto.