A week ago, I lost my Uncle. He was an amazing person, who taught me many things over the years. He taught me value of a good joke and the subtleties of humor. He taught me tons of amazing history: Most of which was true. Most importantly, he showed me what true strength is.

For the majority of my adult life he was fighting cancer (20 some years). True strength doesn’t come from training or practice. It is your Will to keep going, no matters the odds, no matter how tired you are, no matter the pain, no matter the obstacles. He fought through too many obstacles to count. Persevered through pain, procedure, and set backs again and again. He simply kept going.

That is the last and most important lesson I take from my dear Uncle Bobby. Be Relentless!

I will.

“Stepping outside the comfort zone is the price I pay to find out how good I can be. If I planned on backing off every time running got difficult I would hang up my shoes and take up knitting.” – Desiree Davila 

This quote sums up what I’ve discovered in myself through running. I started with small goals ”put one foot in front of the other and get over this hill”, “keep it up to the next cross street”, or “keep it up to the top of hill”. Almost every time I kept going after that impromptu goal. Now I think “I hope I can make it through this intersection without stopping”.

Every time I think well that’s not possible: I’ve adjusted my goals and beat it. I’ve placed 2nd in my Age Group in two 5k races! I’ve run 2 half marathons: 1) 1:39:30 (avg. 7:30/mi) 2) 1:34:18 (avg. 7:11/mi). Not every run is a winner, but the majority I enjoy myself.

What I love about running can be summed up simply ”Running forces me to find my inner strength, and launches me beyond the things I said weren’t possible.“

I hope this helps you tap into your inner strength. It’s there: you just have to find what gets you in touch with it. It might not be running. But I promise that the longer you dig deep and “push” yourself in anything, the better you’ll feel at the end. That little victory is yours. It lasts for several hours after said workout. It doesn’t matter whether you tell anyone or not: That’s up to you. Stop reading this and go challenge yourself.

photo by marshall oram

I found this recipe on allrecipes.com I think. I’ve tweaked and perfected it over the last 6-8 months. Now it’s ready to share.

Gluten Free Pizza Recipe Card 
[PDF 4x6 card formatted]

Prep Time: 10mins | Total Time: 40 mins

Ingredients:

• 1 Tbs Dry Yeast
• 2/3 cup Brown Rice Flour
• 1/2 cup Tapioca Flour
• 2 Tbs Powdered Milk
• 2 tsp Xanthan Gum
• 1/2 tsp Seasalt
• 1 tsp Unflavored Gelatin (~1/2 Knox Gelatine Packet)
• Italian Seasoning (I use 1/2 tsp Oregano, 1/2 tsp Garlic Powder, 1/4 tsp Onion Powder, 1/2 tsp Rosemary: Adjust for your taste) 
• 1/2 tsp Sugar (or 1/2 tsp honey or 1/2 tsp agave nectar)
• 1 tsp Olive Oil
• 1 tsp Cider Vinegar
• 2/3 cup Water (110º F, aka warm from the tap)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 425º F

In medium bowl using regular beaters (not dough hooks), blend all ingredients on low speed. Once combined, increase speed slightly and beat for 2-3 minutes. (If mixer bounces around bowl, dough is too stiff. Add water if necessary, one Tbs at a time, until dough does not resist beaters.) Dough will resemble soft bread dough.

Prep pizza stone or 12-inch pizza pan with a dusting of brown rice flour.

Coat hands in olive oil to remove dough from mixing bowl.

Liberally sprinkle rice flour on dough, then press dough into stone/pan, continuing to sprinkle with flour to prevent sticking to hands. Make edges slightly thicker to hold toppings. (on a pizza stone, make sure to separate the pressed dough from the stone with spatula, this will save you a big headache later.)

Brush pressed crust with olive oil.

Bake pizza crust for: 11 mins (pizza stone) or 13 mins (pan).

Remove from oven.

Spread pizza crust with 1 cup of pizza sauce, 1 cup mozzerella, and season with: oregano, rosemary, garlic salt, & black pepper to taste. Return to oven.

Bake another 14 mins (pizza stone) or 15 mins (pizza pan) or until top is nicely browned.

Remove, slice into 8 and enjoy!

They make me a more efficient runner. Proven by nike+.

When early December hit, I needed a new pair of shoes. My Asics Nimbus 13′s were starting to feel real flat after 600 miles. Reading and hype led me to want to try a pair of Brooks Pure Project shoes, but they weren’t available from my regular running store. Brooks decided to offer their shoes only to big box and stores that would carry the whole line from the beginning. While this creates hype and  anticipation from restricted supply, it shuns the stores that foster the sport. So taking a chance I ordered them straight from Brooksrunning.com. Note to Brooks: I will not buy running shoes from ANY big box store: I don’t trust them and they don’t offer realistic return policies for runners. The best I’ll do is try them on there, order them else where.

Review:

Running in Asics for the last 3 years and never liking a single Brooks shoe, I absolutely love this shoe!! The improvements to my gate/stride were immediately noticeable after my first run, where my avg. pace/mile dropped by 30 s.!

After 100 miles:

My pace is steadily 7:30/mi , even when I go out with the intent of a slow recovery run and don’t look at my watch for the whole 5 miles, I’m still 15 s/mi faster than my November runs. I am starting to feel some arch pain after my runs behind the ball of my left foot. A month before I bought the shoes I decided to try to crank 180 miles before the end of the year to hit 1,000 miles. Given the increase in my mileage since I bought the shoes, the transition to minimal running footware, and the amount of treadmill running i’m doing now this is not surprising in the least. I plan to push through and see how it goes.

Lessons learned:

Landing more forefoot feels exhilerating, much faster and lighter on your feet. Each stride, push off I can feel my foot and toes separate and launch. 

At this point I don’t think I’d go back to anything else, I’m totally hooked! Every stride feels right, every push off feels powerful. This is what running is supposed to feel like. It’s natural and I dig it!

“At first I was running just to lose weight, and then after about six months when I was increasing the distance of my long runs, I was intrigued and fascinated how the human body can go from barely able to run a mile to being able to run eight miles. It was the day before this eight-mile run that I had this weird feeling—I could not wait to get up in the morning to do that eight-mile run.”

- Jeff Mastro, runner and restaurant owner