SOME HINTS ON GENERAL ATHLETICS, INCLUDING WALKING, RUNNING AND
JUMPING
I do not think the advice I have given, as to the games appropriate
for each season would be at all complete, if I did not give some
advice that will be useful for all seasons and every day in the year.
To the boy the enjoyment of the sport is the first thing to be
considered, but it is not the only thing. Our lives are often affected
for good or ill by very little things. Injuries have been received by
boys in sport that marred all their after lives.
It is natural for the young to delight in exercise. It is by taking it
that they develop, but the development, to be of value, must be along
sensible lines.
Every healthy boy wants to be an athlete; wants to excel in some line,
and as this ambition is reasonable, it should not be discouraged. The
youth eager to win in his sports is not apt to be found lagging when
he takes up the more serious business of life.
Competition is said to be the life of trade, and it certainly adds
greatly to our interest in sports, but the boy who starts in to learn
by trying to compete is doomed to failure. There would be more success
in the end if we learned to go slower and so became more thorough in
the beginning.
There are certain exercises that every athlete must take to have a
good physique, and the very first, and by far the most useful of
these, is walking.
WALKING
Can you walk? I hear you laughing at the question; but let me change
it slightly and ask, "Can you walk properly?"
"Of course I can," you reply. "I walk just like other folks who are
not lame."
Now very few people walk properly, and no two people, unless it be
soldiers or others who have been drilled to the exercise, walk alike.
Just watch and see for yourself.
The good walker is always the graceful, easy walker. He stands erect,
but not stiffly. His shoulders are well thrown back. He keeps his
mouth closed, except when talking, and he breathes and exhales through
his nostrils as the wise God meant him to do. His clothes fit him
loosely and comfortably. He steps naturally, and without a trying
stride, or a short step mincing gait, as if he wore hobbles. He walks
by lifting his feet and not by raising his shoulders. And he wears
shoes or other foot gear that do not breed corns or bunions.
Unless in a great hurry the walk, even the brisk walk, should never
exceed three miles an hour; good heel and toe walkers have made forty
miles without fatigue in ten hours, but this power comes only after
long practice.
Walking is the very best, as it is the very cheapest, form of
exercise, and it is best enjoyed on a country road with a cheerful
companion.
Remember in all your exercising that good health is the one great
object. Suppress all ambition to be merely strong. Many brutes are
stronger than many of the strongest men, and many strong men have gone
to pieces where lighter but more enduring men have come through the
ordeal fresh and unharmed. This I have often noted in war times, when
soldiers were called on to make a forced march over trying roads and
in a downpour of rain.
Endurance is the great thing to strive for. The man who lasts is the
man who wins. Therefore, in your walks, particularly when you are
learning to walk well, like an Indian or a soldier, never try to do
more than can be done without making too great a demand on your bodily
strength.
RUNNING
Running is a fine exercise, provided always that it be done in season
and in reason. To do it in reason you must start in by acquiring the
skill to run and the endurance to keep it up.
There is one organ which if it stopped for a minute, the owner would
be dead; that is the heart. Yet many young athletes act as if they
were not aware that they had hearts.
No exercise that requires sudden violent effort, like fast rowing, or
a hundred-yard dash in running, can be undertaken without serious
effect to the heart. The Andean Indians will run, lightly and easily,
at the rate of ten miles an hour, and keep it up for ten hours without
rest, but you cannot induce them to make a short dash at high speed;
they do not want to feel the warning thump of the heart.
In learning to run, breathe as in walking, keeping the body slightly
bent forward, and the elbows gripped close to the sides. Under no
circumstances start out by competing with any one, or by trying to run
against time. Such a course will result in final failure, and may
bring on a serious injury.
The jog trot is the thing to start in with. Try it for a week or two,
and you will be surprised at the ease with which you can do it. At
first a mile is long enough for a run. After a month you can do two
miles without as much fatigue. Finally, if the gait be not too fast,
you can keep it up for hours.
After you have mastered the jog, it will be time enough to quicken the
pace into a run, not your swiftest run, mark you, but a run that you
can keep up for a mile, with as little exhaustion as you did your
first mile trot.
It is only by this slow, pleasant training, that you can ever learn to
walk and run well, but when you have learned you will be paid for the
effort, and then if the time comes to test your speed you will be
ready to respond.
Jumping is closely related to running. It is an exercise in which boys
delight, but which they seldom practice so as to achieve any skill.
We divide this exercise into standing and running jumps, and each of
these can be subdivided into high and broad jumps.
In running contests, hurdles or other obstructions are placed in the
path of the runner. These hurdles vary in height, but if you want to
learn, start in with one or two about as high as your knee. Of course,
you could take them standing, and it is not a bad exercise, but learn
to take them at a moderate run. When you can do this with ease,
increase the number or the closeness of the hurdles and add to the
length of the run.
After a time you can take more and higher hurdles and lengthen the
run, but never do either if you find your heart beating, or that the
effort brings fatigue.
I do not think the running high jump pays for the effort. It is
spectacular, that is all; not so the running broad jump. This may be
of use. It is safe and sane, and with practice it is surprising the
distance that can be covered.
After violent exercise of any kind, be sure to take a bath and a brisk
rub down. If this cannot be had, a towel well soaked in cold water
will make a good substitute, if you dry down with another towel.
If your clothes are wet and you are exercising, they may be allowed to
dry on you with safety, but if you cannot do this, get dry clothes if
possible. I have known sturdy boys to contract rheumatism from wet
clothes; and they never got over it.
In conclusion, let me advise common sense. Think before you act, even
when you are out for sport.