Joggling: Poetry in Motion

Glad to see Reuters include this piece on joggling in their lifestyles section. Here's the opener:

The long-distance joggler understands better than most that the race is not always to the swiftest.

Joggling, juggling while jogging, requires a hand as sure as a foot is fleet. But for some well-coordinated multitaskers, there's nothing quite like it.

"Once I get in a good joggling groove with a nice, relaxed stride and a perfectly timed cascade juggling pattern, it's pure poetry in motion," competitive joggler Michal Kapral said in an interview.

Bolt breaks 200-metre record

Usain Bolt runs 19.19 for 200. Crazy.

Montreal Half-Marathon

Thanks to Jamie Lynch for this photo at the end of the Montreal Half-Marathon. I'm still getting the paperwork together to submit the record to Guinness World Records. Jamie, incidentally, is married to Cindy of Running Skirts fame.

This Sunday, I'm going to race the 5K, without joggling, at the Bread and Honey Road Race in Streetsville, Ontario.

Half-Marathon Joggling Record Established in Montreal

Success! I set a new half-marathon Guinness World Record yesterday, joggling the beautiful Banque Scotia 21k de Montreal course in 1:23:49.

I dropped a beanbag right at the start line and probably lost about a minute after kicking the ball off the side under the barricade. I had to ask one of the spectators to hand it back to me and by the time I jumped back into the race, I was behind a huge mass of slower runners. In the end, it probably helped me, since the slow start allowed me to finish strong. I dropped once just past the 10K mark and that was it. Much of the route is ont the Gilles Villeneuve F1 circuit, which makes you feel like a race car as you cut the tangents over the red-and-white stripes.

Congratulations to Tara Quinn-Smith for setting a new Canadian half-marathon record of 1:12 and change, and to Matt Loiselle for winning the men's half-marathon championships it 1:04.

SPIKESmag.com Interview

Here's an interview I did with SPIKESmag.com - a U.K.-based athletics magazine -- as a lead-in to the Montreal half-marathon record attempt this Sunday.

Salomon Giant's Rib Raid

I had the honour of joining brothers Mike and Wil Smith on a three-man team at the Salomon Giant's Rib Raid 25K orienteering race in Milton, Ont. Mike and Wil have each won several national and North American orienteering championships. Racing with them was a bit like playing a round of golf with a couple of PGA pros. It gave me the chance to witness up close some spectatcular navigating through scenic, rugged terrain on the Niagara Escarpment. These guys can absolutely fly over loose rocks, slippery boulders, treaturous roots and loose branches, all the while plotting precise routes to lead us to checkpoints hidden in the woods (or in one case, inside a cave!). I had always assumed that orienteers spent a fair amount of time standing in one place poring over their maps. Wow, was I ever wrong. The pace of our four-hour-long race was merciless, with only a handful of brief pauses. Our team, Canadian Running Magazine, placed second, six minutes behind The Foreigners, led by Nick Duca.

Here I am climbing out of the cave checkpoint.

Galavanting in Puerto Rico

This marks the first time I've appeared in a travel show. Check out Kim and Maren's Galavanting Guide to Puerto Rico. And hey, my name is even in the credits. It was fun to watch this and re-live all the fun times Dianne and I had in PR.