Healthy Green Habits

Baltimore Sun @ baltimoresun.com

You're working out regularly. Taking in less fat and less sugar. Feeling good about yourself. But are you doing what you can to keep the planet healthy too? Here are seven ways to exercise in a greener fashion.

1. Donate your used fitness shoes. Try Soles4Souls (soles4souls.com), which made donations to victims of Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and the Asian tsunami in 2004. Nike also accepts shoes and recycles them into sports courts around the world.



2. When participating in a race, walk or other event, carry your own water or sports drink in a reusable plastic bottle (if you don't mind the extra weight).Not only will it save on paper cups, but you'll be certain you're drinking the same fluids you use during your training, says Bruce Rayner of Boston-based Athletes for a Fit Planet. Rayner's overall take on being a greener athlete: "We're all familiar with 'recycle,' but there's also 'reduce' and 'reuse.'"



3. Leave your car in the driveway and ride your bike to the gym (especially on weekends, when you have more time).If you have an old bike, keep it around to use for short neighborhood errands.



4. Carpool to races.



5. Wear eco-friendly training clothing.And if you belong to a group, encourage club officers to pick clothing made with recycled polyester instead of the regular virgin polyester.



6. Sign an "eco-pledge" created especially for athletes, at AFitPlanet.com/pledge."You can actually make a formal public commitment to being environmentally responsible," Rayner says. "It starts people thinking while wearing their environmental cap. I've had people come up to me and talk about how [the pledge] changed the way they've done things in their daily life."



7. Designate a cleanup day for your running, cycling, inline skating or fitness club, where you agree to pick up the garbage along your usual route.Runners and skaters could put a garbage pail in the seat of a baby jogger and push it along, so they don't miss their workout.

2009 Sourwood 5K launches new website

Event Mercenaries, Inc. in cooperation with the Cheshire Fitness Club, both of Black Mountain, NC, are pleased to announce the launch of a new Sourwood 5K and Cheshire Pump & Run website. Check out Sourwood5K.com for event details and registration information. The 5K run starts at 8:30am on Saturday August 8th. The "pump" portion of the Pump & Run starts at 6:45am. Both events are held at the Cheshire Fitness Club. Following the run head downtown for Black Mountain's famous Sourwood Festival 8th & 9th. See you there!

ChronoTrack Taps Athletes for a Fit Planet to Green the DTag

ChronoTrack Taps FitPlanet to “Green” the D-Tag

FitPlanet partners with ChronoTrack Systems to develop a recycling program to minimize the environmental impact of the innovative single-use timing system
Evansville, IN-based ChronoTrack Systems, maker of the popular D-Tag event timing system, is working with Athletes for a Fit Planet to develop a comprehensive strategy to reduce the environmental impact of the single-use D-Tag.
Working with ChronoTrack Systems, FitPlanet will introduce a program that encourages event organizers to collect used D-Tags post race and return the D-Tags to ChronoTrack for recycling and reuse.
“ChronoTrack Systems is committed to providing the highest quality timing system for timers, race directors and athletes,” said Dan Howell, President of ChronoTrack Systems. “We feel strongly that our commitment to quality includes minimizing the environmental impact of the D-Tag.”
The single-use D-Tag contains a UHF generation 2 radio-frequency identification (RFID) tag manufactured by Seattle-based Impinj, Inc. The RFID tag includes a silicon chip and aluminum antenna placed on a PET (polyethylene terephtalate) substrate. The RFID tag is encased in laminated paper to create the single-use D-Tag. The D-Tag is attached to the race bib, which is shipped to a race. At race registration, the athlete receives their bib, peels off the D-Tag, and attaches the D-Tag to their shoe.
The popularity of the D-Tag timing system has been increasing dramatically for a variety of reasons, including the time and resource savings it affords race directors. Earlier this month, ChronoTrack announced it had shipped 2 million D-Tags since introducing the technology in September 2008. That figure is expected to top 8 million in 2010 as more races adopt the single-use technology.
“Until now, the athlete has been responsible for the safe disposal of the D-Tag,” said Bruce Rayner, founder and chief green officer at Athletes for a Fit Planet. “While the electronic components in the single-use D-Tag are relatively environmentally benign, ChronoTrack recognizes that as the number of D-Tags in landfills rises into the tens of millions of units, the environmental impact also rises.”
“ChronoTrack is doing the right thing by addressing the waste issue head on with a formal take-back and recycling program.” said Rayner.
FitPlanet will work with ChronoTrack Systems to immediately implement a recycling program for events in 2009.

Teachers, staff get in shape boot camp-style

Asheville Citizen-Times

SWANNANOA — Pushing a truck up a hill and flipping over tires helped Buffy Kirkman shed 15 pounds and two sizes in the months leading up to her June nuptials, forcing the kindergarten teacher to have her wedding dress altered twice in three months.

“Even in the final wedding pictures, my dress was as tight as it could go and it could have even gone down a little more,” Kirkman said. “It was really nice to look at the pictures and not see a double chin or any pudginess.”

The 26-year-old newlywed is one of more than a dozen teachers and staff at Asheville Christian Academy who started working out after school this spring with the school's strength coach Carlos Perez.

The group spent two days a week getting whipped into shape by Perez, whose boot camp-style workouts included drills that split participants into competing teams to see who was fastest at flipping over tractor tires or pushing a jeep up a hill while Perez stepped on the brake.

Perez continues to train the group two mornings a week this summer, with a goal of having them run in the Sourwood 5K race in Black Mountain on Aug. 8, and plans to revive the after school workouts when school starts up again.

“It's always different; it's never boring. You never know what to expect,” said Angela Rhew, a receptionist at the school's office. “Granted it's hard and it's work and you are sore and exhausted afterwards, but also it's a good feeling.”

"Superfit Camp"

Rhew was the first to approach Perez with the idea of starting an exercise class for faculty, similar to the program that he used to get the school's athletes in shape.

Perez agreed and came up with the regimen, which he has dubbed “superfit camp,” and includes the innovative workouts along with a personalized nutrition program.

“A lot of people think you have to spend hours in the gym, but this is about getting outside that normal gym mentality,” he said. “People are working and sweating but it's fun.”

Liz Johnson, a substitute teacher and wife of the school's athletic director, said she enjoys the relays and the group aspect of the workouts, and likes that she could be lifting weights one day and running across the parking lot the next.

But Johnson said the workouts, which have enabled her to do “boy” pushups for the first time in her life, are not all fun and games. She said it is the hardest thing she has ever done in her life.

“Carlos pushes us beyond what we think we can do,” Johnson said. “It is the first time I have really experienced that.”

Johnson said she also likes Perez's approach to nutrition, which doesn't focus on what a person isn't eating but rather about putting good food into one's body.

“Our bodies are a gift from God and we want to take the best care of them that we can,” she said.

Group benefits
Participants said that while the group aspect of the program may not be for everyone, the accountability and camaraderie of the superfit camp has helped them to achieve their goals, whether it be losing 15 pounds or just getting healthier.

The teachers and staff made sure their colleagues were attending the after school workouts, doing their exercise homework and eating right, while also cheering them on as they crossed the finish line during relay races.

“It is something that I have never done to that extreme on my own,” said Kirkman, who joined the group to get in shape for her wedding. “It is such a motivating factor – seeing the other ladies of all different ages, weights and sizes. It makes you keep going.”

Perez charges the faculty a minimal fee to participate in the camp, and said he did it more to help the teachers, who serve as role models for the students. He said the superfit program allows the teachers to not only work on their bodies, but their minds, and that he would like to expand the program to other schools.

“I just love the work ethic the teachers put into it,” Perez said. “They are people that actually want to work out and have that drive to succeed. As a trainer that's where I get the satisfaction.”

Rhew said that the group workouts have helped to bring the faculty at the school closer together and to relate to the students, who see their teachers running through the parking lot or doing squats in the gym.

“In helping the teacher's mind and body and spirit and feeling better, in essence we are helping the kids as well,” Rhew said. “It does trickle down – how you feel about yourself and your attitude about everything. It benefits more than just the teacher.”

For more information on Perez's superfit camp, e-mail him at superfitwithcarlos@gmail.com or call 279-1269.

Local business owners form Ironman support group to fight growing negative sentiment

LakePlacidNews.com

LAKE PLACID — Thirteen people from the business community gathered last week to form an Ironman support group and brainstorm ways to counteract anti-Ironman sentiment they say has been growing in recent years. “I was really surprised how much anit-Ironman sentiment is out there,” said Julie Voss, owner of Placid Planet Bicycles. “It was shocking to me.” Voss and others say that negative comments about the Ironman triathlon, held every summer in Lake Placid since 1998, have been surfacing on the Internet and in local media forums, like newspaper letters to the editor and radio station WNBZ’s Talk of the Town. Lake Placid/Essex County Visitors Bureau President James McKenna said that his office also receives many comments and complaints regarding Ironman. “There’s a rising tide we see starting to happen,” he said. Last year, Ironman North America was sold to World Triathlon Corporation. 2009 is the last year the race is under contract to be in Lake Placid. McKenna said he and other local officials are working on what he hopes will be a three-year contract with the new company that would guarantee the race stays here through 2012, but nothing has been finalized yet. McKenna said many people don’t like the inconvenience of road closures and crowds on race day. And even though there is an economic trickle-down effect, McKenna said people fail to see how Ironman impacts them personally. According to a 2005 SUNY Plattsburgh Technical Assistance Center study, the total economic impact of Ironman on the area is about $6 million. That number does not include indirect “ripple effects” generated by the event. There are also 55,000 overnight visitor stays, including pre-race visits, that are directly connected to the race. “We really need this business,” said Mirror Lake Inn owner Lisa Weibrecht. “We need people to go out and be great ambassadors.” Since most of the group agreed that much of the negative sentiment is directed at cyclists who ride in narrow, curvy, shoulder-less sections of road in the Wilmington Notch and state Route 73, some suggested a campaign to educate both cyclists and drivers. A recent letter to the editor in the Adirondack Daily Enterprise, which detailed an argument between a cyclist and a driver in the Wilmington Notch, generated nearly 75 Web comments — a testament to the controversial nature of the topic. Some attendees suggested working with the state Department of Transportation to get permanent signs along the bike route, encouraging both drivers and cyclists to be safe and share the road. That, however, could take months and this year’s event is just one month away. In an attempt to immediately address the issue, Placid Planet has put up a sign in its store asking bikers to be considerate of drivers and Voss said she is mentioning the issue to people who are here training for the event. Tim Chien, a cyclist and massage therapist from Balanced Bodywork, suggested naming this Ironman support group, creating a Facebook page and using other social networking tools to help attract members. Searching out and responding to anti-Ironman sentiment in blogs is also one of the group’s goals. “Clearly, the vast majority of businesses favor the event,” Voss wrote in an e-mail. “I think most residents do too; we just need to overcome the loud ones who don’t.”

Donated shoes can make a dramatic difference

LJWorld.com

Amick repeats at Firecracker 5K

Asheville Citizen-Times

WEAVERVILLE — It is a good thing Daniel Amick decided to run in the 16th annual Kiwanis Firecracker 5K in Weaverville — but maybe not for the other runners.

Amick, who thought the race was canceled, had planned to run in a 5K in Knoxville this weekend. When he found out that the race was still on, the Weaverville resident kept his commitment in Tennessee, but made it home in time to take first place in his hometown event.
Amick said he thought he would be too tired to run in Saturday's 5K, but he managed to get out of bed and cross the finish line in 15 minutes, 2 seconds.
“I can't explain it,” he said.
Amick finished this year's race nearly one minute faster than his first-place finish last year, but this year's course wound through the countryside, starting and ending at North Buncombe High, rather than following Weaver Boulevard through Weaverville as it had in past years.
Organizers had to change the route after the town canceled its July 4 celebration, and street closures would not be in effect.
“We had to figure it all out again,” said Mary Lynn Manns, race coordinator with the North Buncombe Kiwanis Club. “Everything changed this year. We were here at 6 a.m. scrambling.”
Despite the changes, and the initial confusion that the race was canceled, nearly 300 runners came out for the race, the largest fundraiser of the year for the Kiwanis Club's college scholarship program for North Buncombe High students.
“We didn't want this thing to die,” Manns said. “Even if we're down (in number of runners), we're happy.”
Wake Forest University junior and cross-country runner Marley Burns was the first female to cross the finish line in 19 minutes, 49 seconds. It was the first time in four years that the Weaverville native had been in Western North Carolina for the race.
“I haven't done the race in such a long time, I thought it would be fun,” she said. “I like when we went through downtown (on the old race course), with people cheering on Main Street, but I'm glad that they still had it.”
It was Nadine Gnall's first time running in the Firecracker 5K. The Weaverville resident is training to run in the Citizen-Times Half Marathon in September as part of Sole Mates, a program that raises money for Girls on the Run, the program for young girls that encourages healthy living and a positive self-image through running.
Gnall plans to coach the program at Weaverville Elementary this fall, where her daughter attends fourth grade.
“I figured (the race) was close to home, and it was a good run and it was a good way to start off the day,” she said.

Second attempt at Smokies End-to-End run brings renewed sense of purpose

Asheville Citizen-Times

XTERRA Tahoe City: Damian Gonzalez, Emma Garrard take overall wins

SierraSun.com

TAHOE CITY — Damian Gonzalez dashed across the Commons Beach finish line with a look of pain and achievement. The 32-year-old Stockton athlete had met his goal, winning the third annual XTERRA Tahoe City triathlon Saturday morning with a time of 2 hours, 42 minutes, 42 seconds — 9 seconds in front of second place. As the pain faded from Gonzalez's expression, he sought out the man he could not shake from his heels.“What's your name?” he asked the runner-up, 20-year-old Julian Langer, whom he then congratulated on a first-name basis for chasing him to the finish.After paying respect to his game opponent, Gonzalez turned to face the media.“I feel a little worked,” he said between laboring breaths, going on to explain how he passed Langer on the run after the two battled neck-and-neck during the bike leg.“Julian was in sight the whole time, so he's probably regretting letting me go. But he pushed hard the whole way. I wouldn't be feeling this worked if it wasn't for him.”As short-course participants trickled in, John Donovan of San Mateo crossed the finish in third place overall (2:45:36), while Eric Ronning of Incline Village finished fourth with a time of 2:50:35.“I'm exhausted,” Ronning said after pacing the finish area to catch his breath, having just completed the 1,200-meter swim, 22-mile bike and 6-mile run that encompass the full-course triathlon. “I worked really hard, especially on the run.”Richard Blanco of Redwood City, Ronning's “nemesis” in his 40-45 age group, finished fifth in 2:50:44, and defending champ Ross McMahan of Incline Village placed sixth posting a time of 2:53:37.On the women's side, XTERRA pro Emma Garrard of Truckee won her third straight XTERRA Tahoe City and took 10th place overall with a time of 2:58:25. Garrard, 28, was followed by Julie Young of Auburn (3:12:44) and Lisa Heisinger of Mill Valley (3:20:12), while Sarah McMahan of Incline Village came in fifth with a time of 3:26:20.

XTERRA Tahoe City Results — Top 5 (full-course)
Men:

1. Damian Gonzalez, 2:42:42

2. Julian Langer, 2:42:51

3. John Donovan, 2:45:36

4. Eric Ronning, 2:50:35

5. Richard Blanco, 2:50:44

Women:

1. Emma Garrard, 2:58:25

2. Julie Young, 3:12:44

3. Lisa Heisinger, 3:20:12

4. Paris Edwards, 3:22:36

5. Sarah McMahan 3:26:20

— Complete results will be posted online at www.bigblueadventure.com.

XTERRA Tahoe City short-course

Dustin Sweet took the win in the short-course triathlon — a 600-meter swim, 13-mile bike and 3-mile run — with a time of 1:53:07, and was followed by Steve Pearl (1:53:17) and Kevin Joell (2:03:46).“I feel good,” said Pearl after the race, “but I don't want to do it again, that's for sure.”Incline Village triathlete Dorea Shoemaker was the first woman to finish the short-course triathlon, posting a time of 2:12:22 after signing up just two days prior to the race, she said. “It was great. I just did it at my own pace,” said Shoemaker, a first-time participant in the XTERRA Tahoe City. “I loved it.”Sabine Dukes (2:16) was the second short-course woman and Destiny Ortiz (2:17:32) third. Ortiz, who traveled from Salt Lake City to compete, told dramatic tales of foundering in the cold water during the opening swim leg. She said she was rescued “like four times” from the water, despite her top-three finish.“I almost died,” said Ortiz, 35. “I think I got motion sickness, because I felt really dizzy. And (the water) was really cold. I wasn't prepared for that.”Ortiz was one of 47 athletes to finish the short-course race, while 142 athletes finished the full-course, according to the results. It was the best participation in the three-year history of the event, said Race Director Todd Jackson.To view a photo gallery from the event, go to www.sierrasun.com/photos.

XTERRA Paris Mtn. Trails 7k coming to Greenville SC

Gather Logic