September 2nd, 2010 Meet MCM Green Team Runner Christopher Stephens
Posted by
Bruce in
On October 31, 2010, I will run my eleventh marathon. Growing up, I was not athletic. Indeed, you could say I was whatever the opposite of a high school track star would be, and I used to think that running marathons was something that other people did, people with a little more get up and go.
My brother ran the New York City Marathon every year, but in 1998 he injured his foot. I figured that the family should at least be represented at the event, so I volunteered at the finish line. As I watched the runners come through, I thought “I could do this.” I joined the New York Road Runners Club, and the following November I finished my first marathon.
I ran the race again in 2000, and in 2006 I ran the Marine Corps Marathon instead, just to keep things fresh. I now alternate between the two events.
When I started to train for my first marathon, the NYRR had a great way of making the training seem doable. In addition to their regular race calendar, they scheduled a half marathon for the time in the summer when you should be able to run at least 13 miles. Later, they would have an 18-mile race, and finally a 20-mile training run. The increments between each race are not huge, but they build up to what is a big goal: running 26.2 miles.
People who want to be ‘greener’ can approach that goal the same way. Just as you would not decide one day to run a marathon and expect to be able to go the full distance the next weekend, you can’t decided to be green one morning and wake up the next day generating no pollution and eliminating your carbon footprint.
You start with simple steps. Maybe you replace an incandescent bulb with a compact florescent lamp (CFL) and use less electricity. Don’t even feel you have to change every light bulb in the house – just try one lamp and see how it feels. Once you get used to that, try switching out another, and so on, in the same way you might go for a four mile training run one week, and try running five the next.
You might even discover that some of the things you are doing are already green. With any luck, you will look at some of the suggestions I’ll make over the next few weeks and realize that you are already training “green”, a bit like Moliere’s Bourgeois Gentilhomme who was so excited when he learned that his entire life he had been speaking in something called “prose.”
Maybe you already carpool to races. Or skip the bottled water when there’s a water fountain nearby. Or carry your own reusable bottle. Being green doesn’t mean you have to completely transform your life any more than becoming a marathoner involves a complete change in your personality. But once you make those changes, you’ll be proud of what you have become.
After my first marathon, I realized that if I could run 26.2 miles, anyone could do it with enough training (those with bad backs and injured knees excepted, I suppose). And if I can make my training greener, so can you.
