Pacing Ourselves

I've been sticking to the training schedule for 6 weeks now, and it's going pretty well. Today I decided to inflict it I mean share it with my husband! We rode the subway over to Tokyo Station, which is really amazing in itself. It's huge and completely overwhelming when you're inside trying to find a train, but on the outside there is one exit with a facade that dates back to 1914. Here it is, currently under renovation:



For a much prettier picture, click here.

From the train station, we walked over to the Imperial Palace, which is a really popular place for both strolling and jogging. The palace grounds are surrounded by a moat where ducks, koi, and even giant swans like to float around. On the outside of the moat is a wide sidewalk that goes in an uninterrupted loop for about 5K. I ran two laps and tacked on a little extra to make it 6.4 miles, total.

It was a perfect day for running and there were lots of people out there enjoying it with us: girls, guys, and couples all working out in various layers of highly technical running gear. And for me it was a nice change since I don't often see other runners on my routes. Tourists? Check. Car enthusiasts? Check. And old Japanese guys dressed as 50's gang members while throwing a makeshift dance party? Check! But runners? Not so much.

Afterwards we stopped at Dean & Deluca in Marunouchi for a delicious grilled chicken sandwich to go. Yum!

It's gotta be the shoes

Over my last 15 or so years of running, I've done most of it in Asics shoes. The 2130 shown above will probably be my next pair. I used to buy the 1100 series (1110, 1120). I tried the 2110s two years ago because I couldn't even find a pair of 1120s at that time in Pittsburgh. The selection over there is surprisingly sparse, even at running stores, where they fill up the shelves by displaying the same 3 shoes over and over again.

Eventually I just gave up and bought a pair of whatever they were pushing at the time - in this case some nondistinguished style of Nike Shox (maybe Saikano?). But it's time to replace them again, and that means shopping for sportswear in Tokyo.

To put this experience in perspective, keep in mind that in Tokyo we're crazy about hobbies and everything related to hobbies. Most of the time, participating in a sport is more than just training, teamwork, effort, or achievement - it's an opportunity to buy "gear". I've seen it on the ski/snowboard hills, where everybody out there is dressed like they've got an endorsement of some kind. But watch out, only a few have actually skied before. As a result of this mentality, there are plenty of specialty stores packed with flashy stuff for you to use - or just show off with - while you train.

One problem for me is finding out where these stores are, exactly. We started with this list from the Namban Rango running club. But because it was compiled in 2002, the "list" is really more of a cryptic, historical clue. We followed the directions to ART Sports Okachimachi, only to find that they now sell only camping equipment. Fortunately, in addition to being cleverly hidden, Tokyo shops are also clustered according to purpose. So by traversing from the camp store to a nearby climbing store, and eventually to an all-things-outdoor store, we eventually got directions to the displaced running store.


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Down an alley and around a corner, behind the JR Okachimachi train station, we found a tiny doorway leading to 4 floors' worth of every kind of running device, tool, supply, accessory, or clothing you could want. That is, assuming that you don't want shoes bigger than women's 7.5, which I'm told they don't carry in Japan. So at the end of this marathon of shopping, I will probably run the actual marathon in shoes that come from roadrunnersports.com.

Boston's all right

We went to Boston a couple of weeks ago, on our way back to Pittsburgh for some status meetings with my thesis committee. In Boston I got a chance to meet up with my little sister - yay! We took a walk around so she could show me some cool sites like these:

The bar where she drinks after work (dangerous places- it was in just such an establishment that we both decided to get tattoos, back in 2001):



The "Old North Church" of Paul Revere's Ride:



And a nice Boston-y mix of old and new buildings at dusk:


She also took me to the incredible flour bakery where we tried one of every kind of cookie. It was amazing!

I really liked Boston, even in the cold rain. So I was happy to be flipping through the channels back in Tokyo and see the final game of the
World Series being shown live! I guess I shouldn't have been surprised, given the absolutely crazy amount of media coverage they had here about Daisuke Matsuzaka joining the Boston Red Sox.

What did surprise me was the coverage strategy adopted by the Tokyo broadcasters. The game looked like a blowout until the eighth inning, when Colorado scored two runs and came within one of tying the game. At this point Boston replaced Japanese pitcher Hideki Okajima with an American guy. I'm no baseball fan, but I was into it enough to wonder whether Colorado would actually build some momentum and tie or even win a game. It was just at this moment when the station decided to stop broadcasting the World Series and return to the usual daytime soaps instead.

I'm not kidding! They broadcast eight innings - and baseball games only go to nine - but apparently once Okajima was taken out the whole thing became unwatchable to Tokyo audiences. Fortunately I already use www.sportsline.com for live scoreboards in all kinds of sports. So I got to kind-of watch the end of the game and send my sister an excited go-Boston! email afterwards.

And that's how I learned an interesting lesson about baseball:

It's not whether you win or lose, it's how you play the Japanese pitchers.