I originally planned to post a video I had found on a quick and easy pre-run active stretching routine, but the site I was pulling the video from was having technical difficulties. I'll try again tomorrow.
So instead, I'm posting this video about 13 year old Mackenzie Riford who recently finished a 50mile ultra marathon. I had some strong reactions to this video, but I'm interested to know what you think.
Little Makenzie is so cute and seems like she has such a bright spirit, but how will this strain effect her body at such a young age? I have strong feelings about young kids not running marathons until a certain age, so this story of a 13 year old completing an ultramarathon really struck a cord? I'm not surprised at all that she could finish it, but what does allowing her to do this at such a young age really doing for her psyche and physical development? Everyone seems so excited in this video, but isn't the major role of being a parent to keep your child from harmful situations. It is a major accomplishment but I do believe there is something to be said for building yourself up to a certain level and taking your time. She has her entire life ahead of her and plenty of time to do marathons and ultras. That's just my 2cents. What's yours?
Saturday, February 2, 2008
Thoughts?
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10 comments:
i'm with you 100 percent. no reason for anyone her age to be putting that type of mileage into their legs. i can't quote any specific studies, but i have heard it can be harmful.
I wish I knew more about kids and running. I'm not an expert but I would guess everybody has a body type that is different for another. In Kenya there are probably young kids who run 10 to 12 miles a day.
That's a great point. I guess I just feel like she has so much time to get up to the level. Why rush? Who knows maybe we'll see little Mackenzie out there winning the NYC Marathon in 5-10 years?
Thanks for your comments!
Maybe this girl just wants to spend time with her mom!? Would be interesting the know the WHOLE story of it - I'm sure there's more...
Yeah, that's true too. I just found the whole thing very interesting. I'd love to know more or at least see a follow up on her in a few years.
I think that's *way* too young to be doing marathons and ultra races. I think that you can injure yourself running those kinds of distances.
As far as spending more time with her mom, yeah that's true. But I would think that mom could take time off from her ultra training schedule to spend time with her daughter so her kid doesn't feel like she needs to run 50 miles to spend time with her.
I don't know, I thought it was kind of strange. Maybe the daughter could run the last 10 mile with her or something.....just my opinion though.
Yeah, to be honest, I kind of thought it sounded selfish when her mom mentioned that running an ultra marathon gave her time with her daughter.
Seriously, little Mackenzie is so cute, but I just think that as a parent, her mom could have excercised her right to say "no" and could have used this as a lesson to teach her daughter that there are proper steps to take in order to achieve certain goals.
There's a reason why people build up mileage and train for things, it's to prevent themselves from injury/harm.
It's definitely an interesting story.
Thanks for your thoughts, Leahc!
Sure, she has plenty of time to do ultra's, but she said in the video that she wanted to do it now and maybe in five years she won't want to.
There is no for sure fact that it will do anything to her, so stop worrying about other people and get up a do an ultra yourself.
She said she was not doing any training so what do you mean putting in too many miles? Did you seriously watch it before writing those things?
One last point, what if she was reading what you wrote? She probably does since she is an accomplished runner. I bet you never thought about that!
Oh, I forgot. She is not little! She is fourteen and in highschool!
Well Mackenzie, everyone is entitled to their opinion. Thanks for sharing. And I as for me, I'll be staying away from ultras for the time being, but I do give a lot of credit to those who are brave enough to run them.
And you're right, 14 is really a ripe, mature, old age.
Thanks!
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