Shenzhen Ping Pong: the way things should be

I was back in Shenzhen for a few days a year after my first visit to garner more knowledge, record more video (using my new Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS3) and grunt my way through a bit more training. Once in a while, like a moment of clarity that follows after a storm blows through before the everyday haze we have become inured to is restored, something comes through like a breath of fresh air to remind us of the ways things should be.

(Link to video in a separate page here.)

On the last day, while practising a few tables away, I recorded just 45 seconds of video of professional coach Lu Yan (陆炎) looping to a customer at the Shenzhen Century South China Table Tennis Club (深圳市世纪南华乒乓球俱乐部), a place that I've posted quite a bit about. It's only 45 seconds, but it should be obvious Lu Yan has great technique. As someone correctly told me, one can easily fall in love with the sheer perfection of his swing.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if we could all learn to hit like that?

Tucson Marathon 2009

Good morning yesterday

you wake up and time has slipped away

and suddenly it's hard to find

the memories you left behind

(song by Nichols and Lane, sung by Joanna Wong - thanks Elaine!)

Luckily we have blogs these days. At least some ground truth for epic experiences like my struggle to come to terms with marathoning.

The good? A spectacular sunrise (captured on my iPhone) 4500 ft (1400m) up at the start in Oracle. What an awesome start and a dream course. Eliminating the Biosphere deviation (2008) meant uninterrupted panoramic vistas of the Santa Catalina mountains coming down Oracle Rd after mile 10.

(This course is nearly as good as when I ran it first in 2006 when there was the luxury of finishing at the Hilton El Conquistador.)

Also good. I bought a new pair of shoes after briefly trying them at the marathon expo on Friday. Newtons. They're quite different from ordinary running shoes. (And priced quite differently too.)

Decided against conventional wisdom to chance them on Sunday for the event. The soles of my feet haven't had the chance to get used to them but they're a dream shoe if you have decent running mechanics.

The final good thing was that I finished. Just under the psychologically important 4 hour mark. You can all stop reading here.

What follows below is a core dump for when this event becomes part of the "misty yesteryears" (song reference).

Time

3:57 bracket. This was my slowest Tucson marathon out of the three I've done.

(In fact, I had a minor heart attack when I looked at my iPod and it said 4:15... turns out I'd left it running after crossing the finish line. Have always been looking to improving not sliding backwards. That would have been a major bummer. Glue factory thoughts. I've never done a marathon over the 3:59 mark, and I really don't want to start now.)

A tale of two Tucson marathons

(2008) Last year, I had nearly enough endurance but I noticed didn't have speed. Although I was unhappy that I faded late in the marathon, still I managed to post an almost respectable 3:41 time. (See report here.)

(2009) This year, I had no opportunity to do long runs. Instead, I hoped 30 min sessions with speedwork on a treadmill would address my lack of speed last year, boost my aerobic capacity and substitute for endurance. Outdoors, I ran 10Ks once a week to save time. The result? I ran with good form for about 18 miles and then suddenly crashed to a limp and robotic shuffle as my leg muscles locked up on me. Last 7 miles was excruciatingly long and pathetic. 3:57.

A Stupid Exercise

Afterwards, I realized this was a stupid exercise. I was also 3 kg overweight (good food in Doha). There is nothing heroic about completing a marathon when one's muscles have quit. It's extremely dispiriting to have to walk unnaturally mile after mile. And the damage to the undertrained and overworked muscles is counterproductive to recovery and fitness anyway.There is no point in entering.

Completing it in just under 4 hours: there is simply no value to this experiment. I've done the "just under 4" before. What possibly more could I learn? I really wish I hadn't run it this year.

Lessons for the Future

Memo to self: I believe there are two necessary and sufficient components to a successful marathon. One is sheer aerobic capacity from speedwork. The second is muscle endurance from long runs. Having just one out of two will only get you so far. But not having the 2nd will result in a total collapse like this time.

Speedwork can compensate for lack of endurance to some degree. In fact, I believe simple speedwork can substitute for half-marathon fitness. But there is something special about the marathon distance: 42.125 km or 26.2 miles of pounding overwhelms ordinary, everyday fitness. It imposes an endurance demand on the human physiological system that requires specific training.

Another way to look at it is total workload. A marathon is about 3000 kcal for someone of my weight. A 10K is about 800 kcal's worth. There is no way you're gonna scale up from 800 to 3000 kcal on race day.

Memo to self: Put another way, if you haven't put in the miles, don't bother to show up. Seriously.If you're gonna show up, respect the distance.

With that in mind, let's roll on and look forward to a decent showing in the Tokyo Marathon (2010)...

[Update: A week later, my left calf muscle is still hurting and my right knee (outside) twinges now and then. Simple overuse injuries. Definitely overdid it.]

No ping pong in Doha?

I've been here a month in Doha working at CMU Qatar.

Like many unfamiliar cities with a large expat population, once you learn a few things and get to know Doha a little better, it's possible to find decent food and just about anything... except ping pong perhaps.

I've tried emailing the Qatar Table Tennis Association. I've put out feelers on the Table Tennis group on qatarliving.com. Never got a reply. There is an ITTF event in Doha every year. The Qatar Open attracts the best players in the world. Sport shops sells cheap paddles. Players? I haven't found any.

As a last resort, I went to the Table Tennis social hour scheduled for Monday nights at the Recreation Center in Education City. Predictably, the room was completely empty. Nobody showed up. They have truly excellent lighting and three tables. I'm sad.

So what did I do? No robot. And I only had two balls. I stared into the mirror and practiced my serve for an hour... Why did I make this blog entry? Well, a search engine will pick this up if someone is looking for table tennis in Doha. The Activity Room upstairs at the Recreation Center, Education City. Now you know.

Update: Something to think about...

My game declines when I'm not playing. The longer I'm without practice, the rustier I get. But to my surprise what I'd call the strongest parts of my game are not necessarily the parts that are best preserved or decline the least.

For example, most people who know me would say my forehand loop is the strongest part of my game. But after nearly two months without playing, I realize my forehand loop is off. Surprisingly, my reverse penhold backhand (a relatively new stroke for me) is still there.

I think there are two possible explanations:

• My forehand loop is much stronger than my reverse penhold backhand. So there is less to deteriorate to begin with with the backhand stroke.
• My forehand loop was developed through sheer practice and not from strong fundamentals. It relies on excellent timing. Without constant practice, it simply doesn't work. That is, the percentage landed is low.
  On the other hand, my reverse penhold backhand has been coached professionally from the beginning. So although it hasn't had the time to become as well-developed as the forehand, the fundamentals are better and don't require as much calibration.

Food for thought...

Doha: England - Brazil

Whew, it has been quite a first weekend in Doha.

Yesterday was the century ride (blog entry).

Tonight, I attended the sold-out England - Brazil soccer match in the 50,000 seat Khalifa International Stadium, ticketing courtesy of my friend Majd Sakr.

It's a gorgeous looking stadium:

Here is the view from the 500 Rials ($140) seats we got:

Yup, a little too far away to see the faces of the players despite my recent iLasik surgery.

For the second half, we ended up in some minor-VIP seating area. Free juice and a big difference in terms of viewing:

The game? It was 1-0 to Brazil and we unluckily missed the only goal just after half-time due to going for free juice. It was a friendly and both teams had already qualified for the World Cup in South Africa, so neither team had very much at stake. Still, it was fairly obvious Brazil was the better team. They scored a goal, hit the post and missed a penalty. England barely had a look in at goal.

The stadium is part of the Doha Sports City Complex built for the 2006 Asian Games.

Next to the stadium is the 300m tall Aspire Tower shown here. (About the same height as the Tour Eiffel in Paris.)

Also, next to it is a large shopping mall (Villagio) - not shown here.

A century in Doha

A century in Doha.. no, I've actually only been here about 5 days...

Unlikely though it may seem, there is a bike club here called Qatar Chain Reaction. Today, November 13th, was their 2009 Century Ride. That's 100 miles (160 km). Hell of a way to see the country, see route below:

I haven't actually biked much since 2007, the year I began this blog.

(That year I did the Pactour Elite Transcontinental (blog entry) and a 600k in Southern AZ (blog entry).)

My annual mileage has dropped off a cliff since then, partially due to not having goals in cycling anymore. Also, having spent Fall in Tokyo, I was worried about (lack of) acclimatization to the Persian Gulf area. It might not be wise to put my body through 100 miles as the first meaningful sporting activity since getting here 5 days ago. (The desert should always command one's respect.)

On the other hand, there is s the romantic idea of a century ride. From time-to-time, I still smile wistfully about halcyon days of back-to-back, stunning beautiful Fall centuries in NJ, PA and NY, when I used to live in the Princeton NJ area.

Fast forward to nearly 2010, and I'm "signed up" to ride a century along the Persian Gulf with my new-for-2009 travel bike, a Bike Friday (see entry). How exotic is that?

How does that Supertramp song go?

It was an early morning yesterday, I was up before the dawn...

Well, I got up at 4am. Arrived at the parking lot at 5:30am. Fortunately, it's November and the temperatures won't be greater than 30C in the shade. (But, of course in the desert, there is no shade)...

(The sun peeks out above the horizon. It's around 6am.)

I have my friend Majd Sakr to thank for suggesting the ride and lending me the helmet.

Seems like there were about 50 riders of all nationalities (due to the multicultural expat society that is Qatar). Also there were Qatar national team junior members. It was surprisingly well organized. There is nothing out there. Volunteers handed out bottles of water at 3 locations along the route.

Ride report?

Well, I started off staying with the lead pack. There was a lead vehicle and a police escort. They were _moving_, so at mile 20 I knew my time was limited, so I put my head up front, took my token pull and then dropped off.

After being shelled, I got picked up by a 2nd group and rode on and off until mile 85, at which point it was hot enough that I felt cooked Tandoori style. One motivating factor to stay with someone was that I was unfamiliar with the area and didn't see signs.

On the final 15 miles into Doha, there was excellent signage to the finish, so I proceeded to ride in alone.

Stats? Total time, about 4:55, a bit under 5 hours. Ride time about 4:50. The leaders must have finished around the 4-4:15 hour mark.

(I used a Camelbak Racebak undershirt for the first time. It has a 70oz bladder. I put 50oz of frozen Sustained Energy for cooling and drinking. You can see the blue drink hose.)

A great experience. Makes doing centuries fun again. Have I re-kindled my love for the bike?

Sunset: Liberal Arts and Sciences Building, Education City, Doha

The Liberal Arts and Sciences Building (LAS) in Education City, Doha as seen from the Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) Qatar building. Sunset beginning around 4:30pm: A closer view of the LAS. Photograph taken on my walk back from the Recreation Center pool at 6pm:

More to come...

Sunset

Sunset over Houston on my way to Doha

A beautiful moment on a grand scale rendered in 2D as the plane slowly sweeps around, a rush for a handy pocket camera, just a peek through my porthole ...

[How can we capture the feeling of 3D space? Some photographs are almost three dimensional in nature. Is it a property of focal length (telephoto => compression vs. wide angle => exaggerated perspective)?

taken from seat 1E on CO 509 to IAH. Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ5. Unretouched colors.