Cold....

One of the challenges about training for the Boston Marathon is that you have to train through the winter. And in Boston, that means snow, ice, slush, wind and coldness. Now my mother likes to tell me that since I was born in northern Maine, I should love the cold. However, in reality, I'm not a huge fan. Today I woke up with the thought that I would try and get in 5-6 miles. And then I looked at the weather....11 with a wind chill of -9. Hmmm....well that changes things. I thought about not running but then decided to give it a try. So I bundled up as much as I could and headed out. When I first got outside I thought "this isn't so bad"...and then the wind hit.....and my dream of 5 miles quickly evaporated. I got through about 3 miles and then called it a day. This is all a very long winded way of saying that in Boston at least, training in the winter means you have to be flexible with training plans.

In childhood obesity-related news, the Surgeon General just released a report about obesity which has a number of statistics about childhood obesity as well as some general recommendations about how to address this problem. I haven't had a chance to read the entire report yet, but look forward to doing so and will share my thoughts here soon.

At the same time as this report, I was very excited to see that the First Lady is beginning a national campaign to address the problem of childhood obesity. I was happy that this issue was mentioned in the State of the Union the other night and am excited to see how the campaign unfolds. Whatever your political leanings, I think we can all agree that it is a good thing that our national leaders are talking about and addressing this important issue.