GOOD LUCK SHAN! Dam I wish I had a turkey trot to go too... I feel like I ran a marathon today. I cleaned my house, including windows, made a snowman, did laundry, bought groceries, wrapped presents, painted my bathroom, got my son ice skates so he can twirl tomorrow, and ran an hour. Gotta go bake now.

Brian, That kind of "work" works too.

Good morning all! Got in a quick 6 this morning wth a running friend that I haven't been able to run with in a while. So much to be thankful for. Here's just a few big ones Faith Family Health Country You guys running the vast abundance I am blessed with on a daily basis to the point it is difficult not to take for granted. Have a great thanksgiving everyone.

Did you say 28:18? As in 9:08 pace? That is awesome, Shan!! This is turning into a strange Thanksgiving day for us. Got up, the house was cold. Furnace is out. I'm pretty handy so I did some troubleshooting and think I've identified the problem but there is no way to get a part today. Space heaters and baking until tomorrow when we can get someone out here. I made some raisin bread in the breakmaker with our 3 year old. Only problem was that I put the raisins in too late (distracted with the heater) and they all ended up on the outside. It looks sort of like a raisin porcupine. Turkey had been in the refrigerator all week, pulled it out and its frozen solid. Excellent. Doing the rapid thaw thing in the sink. We'll see if that works. Even with all this, I can only say how truly thankful and blessed that our family has been over the last year. Grateful for our good friends (of which I count all of you), great kids, happy marriage, growing faith, and good health. Have a very Happy Thanksgiving everyone

Shan's turning into quite the running fool! Good job, girl! That's quite the improvement in your times. Dave, sorry to hear you're having furnace problems on Thanksgiving. Things like that always seem to happen on holidays or the middle of the night. We ran out of dog food this morning. Stoopid kids are supposed to tell me when it's getting low, and this morning there was about a half cup left. Poor dog. Guess she'll eat biscuits till tomorrow. I was thinking of trying an outdoor run today, but that was when the forecast was for a high of 10. Now it's a balmy -16F out there, and not looking like it'll get to the high of zero. Looks like it might be a treadmill run after all. Phooey. Happy Thanksgiving, guys! We're going to my parents' for dinner with my siblings and all the kids. It'll be a zoo, I'm sure.

Hey all! Happy thanksgiving! Great race times... So I ran this morning a 4 miler. Time 31:16. I thought it Would be faster. I have some excuses.... Want to hear them?  17 hours in the car makes my legs stiff. It was 68 and sunny... Hot... 25 last weekend Locals wore tights . No joke . Oh well. Still a fun day. I'm thankful for you guys too.

Great improvment Shan! Gonna have to start calling you Speedy Shan now. Today was watching football with my best friend and then out to a pub for a late lunch. Counts as cross training in my book. You don't expect to manly men to cook a turkey do you? For my fren Erika: Andrew Getzin, MD Member AMSSM It is accepted lore by most athletes and coaches that stretching before vigorous activity is essential. This idea has been promoted for years by sports medicine and exercise specialists who believed that if an athlete did not stretch properly he would have an increased risk for injury. According to Shehab et al. 1, 95% of Michigan high school coaches advised their athletes to stretch and felt that stretching decreased injury risk. Wikipedia defines stretching as the deliberate act of lengthening muscles to increase muscle flexibility and/or joint range of motion. There is strong evidence in the medical literature that stretching does increase muscle length when done consistently. Increased muscle length can translate into improved joint function. As people age there is a physiologic decrease in flexibility and joint range of motion. Many older people can improve their functioning and quality of life by stretching. In addition, I am reminded every time I watch my daughter’s gymnastics team practice that there are some sports one cannot do if one doesn’t have sufficient flexibility. However, in my sports medicine practice, I increasingly see many patients who are too flexible and their joints have become unstable. When the joint becomes unstable (as we often see in swimmer’s shoulder) there is an increased risk of overuse injury or dislocation because joint motion is excessively increased. Studies looking at stretching have had mixed results. It is a difficult intervention to examine because stretching is ingrained in the psyche of so many athletes that they are unwilling to act as a control group. Most studies that have been done have been compromised by both the control and stretching groups doing warm-ups. Thacker et al. 2, in a 2004 review on stretching from the CDC, found only six studies that met their inclusion criteria. The pooled data from these studies showed that the group that stretched is not injured less frequently. Herbet et al. 3, in another meta-analysis, found that stretching does not decrease post-exercise soreness. And Craib et al. 4 showed in a group of sub-elite distance runners that a lack of flexibility correlates with an increase in running efficiency. Some people love to stretch because it makes them feel good. I am not trying to discourage people from doing things they enjoy. I tell the extremely flexible triathletes whom I see in my practice that they would benefit more from time spent weight training (especially if they are 40 years or older, when muscle mass loss tends to increase) and I discourage flexibility work. It is better to spend their limited time doing things that have been shown to improve performance (such as plyometrics or working on swim form) and to decrease injury (such as weight training).