Run to Win

Looking back at this week last year is a bit late this weekend, due completely to the fact that I have a really bad infection in my right index finger and up until today it was too painful to bother typing anything. I’ve managed to drain a lot of the crud out, though, so I can use the finger a little now; at least enough to catch up on my work. This week last year was concerned mostly with The New Rules of Lifting and my email exchanges with one of the authors, but there was a bit of news, workout tips, and making fun of Olympic Athletes thrown in as well.

• I demonstrated how to do pullups in the continuation of my animated series. I also explained how to do a negative pullups when you are overloading your muscles or are not strong enough to do a full set of pullups yet.
• I learned a new reason to keep myself well hydrated, since thirsty people feel more pain. I also included a recipe for cooking shark steaks after they went on sale in my local fish market.
• I wrote a review on The New Rules of Lifting, which has proven to be one of my more popular reviews. I exchanged a few emails with Alwyn Cosgrove after he responded to my review of his book. I also asked him about how well the workouts would translate across gender lines, since the book seemed to ignore women.
• In lawsuit news, Nike sued Adidas because they thought that Adidas was ripping off the design of their Nike Shox shoes.
• In Olympics news, Lindsey Jacobellis made a fool of herself in the snowboard cross finals when she decided to showboat a jump and fell off of the course. This is just further proof that you should never showboat in the Olympics or in a race with $5000 on the line no matter how much you think you have the bonus money in hand.

Adidas, National Geographic, GAP Adventures, and Kenya Airways are sponsoring a contest to fly a lucky winner to Kenya for the Safaricom Marathon. It is a simple sweepstakes where you give them contact info and they let you know if you have won. You can enter the contest or find the official sweepstakes rules at the National Geographic website.

(Source: Complete Running)

The NFL has a deal with Nike, Reebok, and Under Armour that allows NFL players to wear clothing with visible logos only if it belongs to one of those three companies. Reggie Bush has a huge contract with Adidas now, and was fined in the preseason for wearing their cleats. Sunday rolled around, and there he was with his bright gold shoes. Was he going to keep paying fines? Or did somebody notice that Reebok was owned by Adidas now?

No, apparently the NFL has struck a deal with Adidas that allows their brand to be shown. They ponied up some money, in other words.
(Click here to continue reading…)

This week last year dealt mostly about steroids and baseball’s poster child, Barry Bonds.

• Rafael Palmeiro tested positive last year, proving Jose Conseco right. The Italian police busted up a steroid ring that was supplying steroids to US soldiers in Iraq.
• Barry Bonds had some fun with the media. First, he said that he was out for the year, and then his doctor said Bond’s injuries were minor.
• An attempt was made at the stair climbing world record.
• Adidas bought Reebok.
• At the Beach to Beacon, Gilbert Okari won for the 3^rd time in a row and I ran a repeat of the previous year with a time that was within ¹/₁₀^th of a second from my previous year’s time.

There was also some minor football news last year, and in the article about my Beach to Beacon 10k repeat I described the heat stroke suffered from one of my teammates. Coincidentally, the same woman that will be officiating at my wedding in a week. This year’s Beach to Beacon will begin at eight o’clock this morning.

Nike is sueing Adidas over the Nike Shox shoe patent, which Nike believes was stolen to be used in many of Adidas training shoes.
(Click here to continue reading…)

Adidas has struck an agreement to purchase Reebok.

Adidas boss Herbert Hainer said that the deal “represents a major strategic milestone for our group”. “This is a once in a lifetime opportunity to combine two of the most respected and well-known companies in the worldwide sporting goods industry”, said Mr Hainer.

Nike is now going to have a serious rival. Because of the global nature of the business, and the fact that even combined they are still smaller than Nike is, there should not be much of an anti-trust issue.

I do not have a problem with Adidas buying Reebok (except that I don’t own any shares, of course…), and see nothing wrong with giving Nike a challenge. Normally, I like seeing the little guy prosper, and none of them are little guys. I don’t use any of their shoe products from any of the companies, but I hope that it results in cheaper products being available all around. Shoes cost too much money.