Hollywood Circuits

Today was, uh, interesting. Gilbert was a little late arriving, due, in part, to a person following him around today with a video camera. He's being filmed for a bio feature on an unnamed national cable network, and we became a part of the story. Now, we knew about this ahead of time, and most of us were there in Gazelles shirts for the occasion. Once G got there, he sent us off for the regular (shorter) warmup run over to Austin High for circuit training. I suspect he changed the workout to circuits because he gets to be more "hands on" with us on that one. Plus, there's all the fun stuff after the circuits to film.

I ran over at a comfortable pace with Alex and some other folks, and per instruction, we started right into the circuits once we arrived. No drills today. We did 800m runs between circuits, and I ran each successive 800 faster than the one before, always a good thing. (3:55, 3:48, 3:36). Gilbert had originally told us to do two circuits, but called an audible when he saw we were moving through it fairly quickly, and most of us had to do the third circuit. I didn't mind. You certainly get winded and tired doing circuits, and it's hot and sweaty work, but compared to almost every other workout, this one is usually fun.

The camera was everywhere, and I noticed that several Gazelles had been singled out for face time and short interviews while we were working. At first, it was a little disconcerting to have her on the track, filming us as we ran towards her, but you soon got accustomed to her presence. Once we had knocked out three circuits, it was time for extra fun. We did the hopping, bounding, and form drills, followed by a lot of ab work, planks, and finally 2 x 1:00 of "fast feet." There was a lot of laughter during that stuff, always a good sign. At the end of the second plank repetition, I was called over for a quick interview on camera. I always think I'm ready for such things, but I fear that I looked and sounded like a doofus on film. I was totally hot and dirty by then, though I guess I smiled a lot when the questions were about Gilbert and the Gazelles in general. Who knows if any of this stuff will be used in the final product?

Once we were done, I scored a couple of cups of water, and then I had to get back to RunTex a little quicker so that Gilbert could sign some of his books for me. So, I didn't get to do the long cooldown. It was a quick little recovery run, though, with Amy and, geez, I forget who the guy was. Was it Richard? Sorry about that. We moved along smartly on the cooldown, but it felt just fine.

Gilbert knocked out the book signing duties, and then he was off with some of his fast guys for more filming back at Austin High. I hung out for a while talking with folks, as is my habit, including John, who is relatively new to the herd. He's running San Francisco this weekend, since he's on the Marathon A Month club for a while.

That's about it. A short 4.7 miles for the day, but some quality work nonetheless. I'm sure I'll feel it tomorrow on the recovery run. :-)