Sprints for Fitness, Fat-Loss, and Emergencies

At this point, it's old news: Sprints are good for you. As Men's Health sums up,  sprints are better than jogging for weight loss, heart health, and maintaining muscle.

From a practical standpoint, I would add that sprints are a more vital life skill then jogging. Think about  it... How many situations can you imagine finding yourself in that would require you to run at a moderate pace for three or more miles? Probably not many. How many situations can you imagine having to run at a high speed for a short  time? If you see a child about to walk in front of a car, my  guess is you'll sprint, not jog, into action. You may sprint to catch the bus. When possible, one of the best options for avoiding violence is to run away as fast as possible.

So sprinting is a good thing. What spring routine is best? Do a bit of research, and you'll get all sorts of answers. The Polinquin Group has a good rundown of a few options on their website.

One thing that many sprint routines inadequately address is rest periods. Sprinting is tremendously taxing. You need to have recovery time built into your workout. For shorter sprints lasting just 10 or 15 seconds, a good ratio of work to recovery is 1:3. If you sprinted for 15 seconds, you would rest for 45 seconds. And by rest I mean rest. Do nothing more difficult then walk around. No jogging, no  push-ups. Rest! If you are really going all out during the sprints, you won't be able to do much more.

Roz Chast (!?!?) on Self-Defense

Roz Chast is one of my favorite cartoonists. Her work is often featured in The New Yorker, which is where I found the cartoon below.

Though I doubt this was her intention, Chast actually did a good job summing up one of the key components of practical self-defense: avoidance.

For example, consider "Can sense trouble from ten miles away." I sort of read this as a simplification of the principles behind Gavin de Becker's excellent book The Gift of Fear. If you can sense trouble (and you can, if you trust your instincts) avoid it!

How about being an "Expert at making self invisible"? Despite our exhibitionistic society, being noticed is not always a good thing. I had a good friend who was a life-of-the-party/class-clown kind of guy. Unfortunatley, he couldn't really turn it off, and more than once he encountered critics who were willing to express their disaproval of his antics with their fists.

Finally, "Master of deflection." For some types of violence, especially the 'Monkey Dance,' there is a verbal interview phase; e.g. "What you looking at?" This is the time for deflection or talking your way out of the situation, instead of playing the game by responding with something stupid ("What am I looking at? Your ugly face!")

In his book Meditations on Violence, Rory Miller writes

It is better to avoid than to run; better to run than to de-escalate; better to de-escalate than to fight; better to fight than to die.  

I think Roz Chast's cartoon illustrates some of those principles nicely.