Eat As Though You Were A Poor Person

Coach Joe Vigil is one of the most successful cross country coaches in American history.  He taught and coached at Adams State College for nearly 30 years.

One of Vigil's most famous athletes was Olympic medalist Deena Kastor. He was credited for coaching her to dominate in the marathon after winning the bronze medal in Athens.

In Christopher McDougall's bestseller "Born to Run," the author describes how Coach Vigil's coaching of Kastor included some unorthodox methods. In addition to putting her through the typical drills of intervals, hill work, and track sessions, Vigil introduced many non-physical, esoteric elements to her training--elements that seemed to have nothing to do with training.

Mc Dougall describes how the walls in Vigil's office were posted with mantras like "practice abundance by giving back," and "show integrity to your value system."  And my favorite:  "eat as though you were a poor person."

In other words,  keep it simple.  

As my running improves, I find coach Vigil's advice to ring true.  I find I need LESS, not MORE. 

No more PowerBars, PowerGels, PowerShakes or PowerVitamins.

This became abundantly clear during the Leadville Marathon last summer.  Unlike the typical city race aid stations equipped with colorful gu's, gels, bars and funky colored "recovery drinks," the various aid stations at the Leadville race (all over 10,000 ft elevation) were equipped with flat Coca-Cola, watermelon and my personal favorite:  PBJ sandwiches--on white bread.

The best food I ever had on a race.

And the most effective.

I think the Coach Vigil's metaphor of "eating as though you were a poor person," applies off the track.

We don't need as much as we THINK we need to accomplish what we want to accomplish.

I just read how many of the titans of tech in Silicon Valley send their kids to schools WITHOUT COMPUTERS.  That's right--WITHOUT computers.  As they see that test results for digital classroom students are BELOW their classmates in the non-digital, pen and pencil schools.

My family and I are going to take the kids out to a fancy Thai restaurant this weekend.  One of those places where the plate presentation is a mini-work of art. To be sure,  I will enjoy watching the kids experience a cuisine that broadens their palettes beyond mac n cheese and hot dogs.  But I have to admit, while I consider panang curry or chicken pad thai, I will be thinking...

I wonder how the PBJ is...

AMJ