Just bought latest runners world

After reading the aformentioned article by John Bingham along with the comments on this thread, I fired off a letter to RW back in May. Well, I just received a package from them with a T-shirt and the latest issue (August?). It seems that they printed my letter and you get a free shirt for that. Actually, they printed about half of the letter and rearranged a few things in the part that they did print, but the idea remained. Maybe I should've just received half a shirt. ;-) I wonder if I'll be getting hate mail now?

Having read a past piece, I forget where, on John Bingham I believe he started out a music teacher somewhere. He was a trombone player, which you don't find many educators that played trombone. (Mostly all flutists, saxophonists, pianists or trumpet players teach in middle/high school settings). It was interesting to find that out, but it didn't really influence my belief in running to improve does require doing hard work. I think Runner's World has turned running into the same situation we see everyday: laziness is great, do the same with your running then find something more important to do with your time.

this bugs the hell out of me. almost all the runners world pretty covergirls/coverboys are overstriding. glaringly overstriding. Check out some of the covers at the grocery line....you'd think they'd at least tell them not to overstride for the cover shot. maybe soledad would have gone under 60:00 for her 10K (to be honest I don't remember that cover maybe she doesn't overstride).

yeah, I know. Write a letter.

How can anyone take over an hour to run a 10K?

I thought that Penguin article was bad, the current month's is worse! He actually brags about eating pizza and mcdonalds food during the marathon he finished in 8 and a half hours...how on earth can a grown man w/o physical handicaps take THAT LONG to finish a marathon? Folks, that's almost 19 and a half minutes a mile. And this guy writes for "the world's leading running magazine"? That is truly sad.

I agree with everything that is said about RW being a fluff piece of shit, but the cover thing is really nothing new. Do any of the old-timers on here remember back in about 1980, when they put Susan Anton on the cover to promote the movie "Golden Girl"? They've ALWAYS gone for the lowest common denominator when it comes to whats on the front of the magazine....just seems a lot worse now because what's between the covers is just as bad.

Carl Hiassen wrote:

If the Penguin were really an "accomplished" musician, wouldn't someone have at least mentioned what instrument he plays? Most people, if pressed, can tell you that Tiger Woods is a great golfer, not just a great athlete, and that John Holmes was not merely a notable film actor, but a notable porn-film actor. In that vein, I'll be the only instrument the Penguin is proficient with is the skinflute.

Pay attention dip-weed, John may NOT be what you want in a running columnist but he is most certainly an accomplished, classically trained musician. Before you start spouting off insulting nonsence have some sence to know what you're talking about. Since you're already proven yourself to be a bonehead that's incapable of even the most basic research, here's some help:

JimFiore wrote:Here's who's been on the cover for the last year (in reverse order):

June Soledad O'Brien of Today Show

May RW subsriber gal

April RW subscriber gal

March Will Ferrell of SNL

February RW subscriber gal

January Carrie Tollefson

December Dan Browne

November Lisa Guerrero of Fox Sports

October G W Bush

September RW subscriber guy

August Sarah Schwald

July Khalid Khannouchi...

You need to keep better records, here they are back to 92:

I agree.

All of you guys have just made me feel so bad. I work very hard on making a great running magazine for adults and high school runners alike. I really wish that you guys liked our magaizine. We sponsor a lot of races as well, which I think you are forgetting. Well, forget all of you stupid college runners. Forget you guys! Why try, why bother? I come home every night extremely late just because I try to write a good article for you all. Quit bashing our magazine you all.

"It also talks about how he doesn't have a life and has to resort to 5-6 hour of training sometimes during one day"

Sounds like a better life than spending 50 hours a week in an office. He makes more money and "works" less hours than most people. Sounds like he has plenty of time for a life.

"Finish Line," the essay on RW's back page, has to be both the most predictable and the most nauseatingly mawkish regular guest column published in any major magazine in the world, and is now worse than either the Penguin's column (which even reads "fatly") or Galloway's oh-f***-he's-off-the-Haldol-again training advice. Read something relevant and dignified like Newsweek's "My Turn" and you'll never again be able to muddle through another "Finish Line" without seriously questioning whether the submission was invented as a joke by a bong-addled Ambrose Burfoot, a la National Lampoon's "Letters from the Editors."

On the occasions I find myself reading this shit, which is every month, I have made a game of desperately wishing for the worst possible ending for the narrator and all those involved in the "drama." If someone's running in remembrance of her dead father, I root for her to be hit by a truck driven by the drunkeb administrator of a major charitable organization. If someone aims to run a marathon to raise money for Type 9 juvenile-onset hemophilia in dromedary camels, I squeeze my eyes shut, clench my fists, grit my teeth, and convince myself the tale will end with a DNF or the unexpected death of someone innocent, yet central to the story. But it never does.

This sounds harsh, to be sure, but if the editors believe more people feel as I do, perhaps thy'll begin accepting submissions from actual runners rather than publishing material that throws even the shitty, slow runners like me into a state of misanthropy and soullessness. Then again, I doubt it - I'm complaining, but I still read the magazine.

Funniest post ever.

.

serioulsy, who created RW and what must that guy/gal be thinking now? if dead, are they rolling in their grave?

Bought the March '05 edition nice piece on Radcliffe.

Portland Runner wrote:

The problem is that most of the bad coaches out there look to RW and RWOL for workout schedules. God forbid they should hit the local Barnes and Noble, buy a Martin/Coe or Pfitzinger/Douglas book and attempt to learn something.

They see, "Run Your Best 5K: The Perfect 15 Mile a Week Plan" and figure since it's in RW it must be legit. Then they think, "Hmmm...if 15 miles per week is good for 5K, I'll cut the workouts in half and that should work for my milers."

Runners World has very little influence on coaches. I've coached HS for over 25 years and have never once heard anyone say that they found a training program out of Runner's World.

Most HS coaches are thinking "what do I have to do to run fast in the next meet" rather than "what does this runner need to do to develop in the long term". But that's because we have a system that has the kids running meets 2 weeks after their first practice, as often than not runs 2 meets in a week, and places more of a premium on how many points that runner can get in a meet rather than how fast they can go for the mile or 5K.

You're all right about RW. A long time ago it was a good magazine, but, there is something wrong in this country all of a sudden with actually trying hard at something. God forbid you fail to achieve as well as someone else. So if you're not world class you have to have every excuse to be slow. You wouldn't want the average person to suffer to keep running for 26 miles, so take walking breaks.

There used to be pride in putting up a good fight to the finish, now, Plodders World tells us all about other slow unders achievers.

It sucks that in a sport as noble as running there are people telling us how easy it is to run a "race" from 5K to teh Marathon. Whatever happened to running your hardest and feeling like crap at the end of a run.

RW is good for the beginning runner. So it only gives them a brief look at Webb or other elites, maybe that wets the appitite and someone decides to pick up a T&F News for more info.

There's a place for RW, just not for anyone that has been running for over a couple of years.

Think like this: RW can have the "Playboy effect." Start with it before you move on to the real hardcore stuff.