A Lesson

Since moving to Kigali, I've been trying to be as patient as possible in slowly building my aerobic base. I recognize that I have taken off enough time that I have probably lost a lot of conditioning in general. Add to that the high altitude and the new challenge of running hills, I suddenly feel really really slow.

My solution to this has been to go slowly and take much more frequent walk breaks. Back at sea level in New Orleans, I have been accustomed to taking one-minute walk breaks regularly, usually after 9-14 minutes of running. Runners will recognize this as the Galloway Method, long touted by marathon guru Jeff Galloway, and I've used it for years. Since coming here, I started taking my one-minute breaks every 5 minutes or a little more (to even out over a 55-minute run). I look at my heart-rate monitor, a Polar RS200, occasionally during the runs as a guide to keeping it cool. But for me, it has recently been just as helpful to look at the ExerciseLog feature after the run. This not only gives the max HR and the average HR, but the calories burned, and time within each of the 5 customized heart rate zones generally recognized by most endurance coaches.

I am no expert, but I think I can summarize the approach to heart-rate zones. They are all based on either an age-estimated or a determined maximum. Zone 1 is 50-60% of your max HR, and usually compared to a brisk walk. Zone 2 is 60-70% of max, and is described as a slow jog, commonly called the "fat-burning zone." Zone 3 is 70-80% of max, and is called the "anaerobic zone" because this is the zone in which cardiovascular health is most improved, and calories are burned most effeciently. Zone 4 is called the anaerobic threshold and is when you use your anaerobic system for energy. This is not sustainable for long periods, and is usually when people really feel the burn and cannot speak typically because they are too busy huffing and puffing. The final zone is "the redline," in which you are really giving it your all.

Back to me. Since arriving here, I have started paying attention to how much time (proportionally) I have spent in each of the 5 zones at the conclusion of the workout. It has been very instructive. I realized that 5 1/2 minutes of running per minute of walking was not nearly enough rest. So I tuned down to 5 minutes. Then to 4 1/2. Then to 4. All this while, I'm trying to go slower. Slower on the walk breaks. Slower up hills. Slower on the flats. Slower, and more deliberate. I find that a way to remind myself to keep it cool is that I should be able to greet everyone I come across. I try to keep it easy enough running that I can smile a little and say either "Good Morning," "Bon Jour," or both to nearly everyone I meet.

I run through neighborhoods with large private homes, with small shanty villes, with business, with government offices, and with industrial businesses. As I run, I come across professionals, tradesmen, men and women looking for work, people sleeping in the shade, peddlers selling various things (including a guy who tried to sell me some shorts that couldn't possibly have fit me), and many, many children.

Kids here don't start public school until age 7. Some can't afford to go. And -like New Orleans- the poor parts of town are very much integrated with the tony parts. And so I have become the interesting muzungu to a lot of (usually dirty) beautiful, enthusiastic young children at different parts of my run.

This morning's run was an hour and with more flats than normal. But I still did my Big Nasty Hill. I'll have to come up with a more poetic name than that, but I'll say that it's not incredibly long, but I don't think anyone would call it an easy or short hill. It's all dirt and very uneven, with many ruts and rocks, and a few switchbacks. There is one segment that is a path used by the local poor to get to a municipal water faucet. I go down this hill on my way out of the run, and turn around and go back up it on the way back.

Well, on a quarter-mile segment going up to the beginning of the hill, I somehow picked up a little boy in old dirty flip-flops. He looked to be about 6 years old or so, and carried a water bottle, though he never drank from it. He was smiling enthusiastically and talking to me for most of the time in Kinyarwanda, though occasionally in French a little. He stayed with me on the uphill approach, then on the first two-thirds of the downhill. He stopped at the last switchback until I came back up again, about 3-5 minutes later. Then I called to him, "Allez, garcon!" (Let's go, boy!), and he took off by my side. I was huffing and puffing, trying to keep the smile on my face and failing. I was just looking at one foot in front of the other, and this guy was smiling, and trying to talk me up. I kept thinking I would lose him, but he kept coming.

When we got back to where I had found him, he kept with me for another quarter-mile up the next hill before growing bored. I really hope he becomes my regular training partner, because he is awesome. Here I am, trying to just not be quite so pathetically slow, and this little kid in flip-flops totally schools me. I guess that's a good sign that I'm slowing it down. And the real lesson, of course, is to not become competitive and say to myself, "am I going to let this little kid beat me?" A lesson in humility. A lesson in patience. A lesson in strategy. And a nice kid, to boot. I hope to get a photo of him when our smaller camera arrives.