Born to Run???

"The Tarahumara have a saying: “Children run before they can walk.” Watch any four-year-old — they do everything at full speed, and it’s all about fun."
- from an interview with Christopher McDougall, author of Born to Run (courtesy of Amazon.com)

I attended Back to School night last night, and came away with a brain chock-full of knowledge. If my children learn even one half of what was explained, outlined, and scheduled last night I will be duly impressed and possibly overwhelmed. The comment that won my highest praise and lasting gratitude, however, related to recess. As background information you should know that my children only get two recess breaks per day and both are quite short. They even lost five minutes of recess from last year; to what purpose those minutes were snatched away I do not know. To add insult to injury, a school policy regarding late or missing homework places the offender at their desk or "on the wall" during recess, resulting in the loss of precious time when they could be burning off energy and frustration.

My son's second grade teacher explained that she had a new policy regarding late work; if a first-time offender, the individual retains their recess and has to take a warning note home to the parents. The note and the missing homework need to be returned promptly, or recess may yet be lost on a succeeding day. However, she understands that more time spent burning excess energy equates to more time sitting still and focusing in the classroom. Such good sense and excellent judgment can be difficult to find in any institution, and I am thrilled to hear that recess is a priority for someone (besides my son) at the elementary school.

My internal review of recess time sparked a connection to Christopher McDougall's excellent book, Born to Run. In the book, McDougall presents research and argues for the hypothesis that humans evolved to run. Our weird two-legged gait, forward-leaning spine, and odd hip joints all serve a purpose: to hunt in packs and to escape predators. As he says in the Amazon interview, "According to a new body of research, it’s because humans are the greatest distance runners on earth. We may not be fast, but we’re born with such remarkable natural endurance that humans are fully capable of outrunning horses, cheetahs and antelopes. That’s because we once hunted in packs and on foot; all of us, men and women alike, young and old together."

Last autumn I read his book and got so fired up to run that I upped my mileage and started trying to run barefoot, an option which McDougall and Harvard University espouse (http://www.barefootrunning.fas.harvard.edu). Unfortunately, I got ahead of myself and hurt my foot trying to do too much too soon. (The foot problem was followed by a serious IT Band issue, and resulting physical therapy.) I am still not positive that I, personally, was born to run, but I know that my sons and daughter and their friends can hunt and chase with the best. It seems cruel to move from hours of exercise each summer day to a scant forty minutes of daily recreation during the school year; one of my biggest hats as a mom is the "coach" hat where I make sure to get them all outside and running around. After all, if I can't hunt or run from predators, I had better make sure that someone in my family can!