How do you northerners train in winter?

[SaMantis]

I just moved from Florida to the northeast, and while the summer up here wasn't bad for training, I'm worried about how crappy weather like today's rain (not to mention snow, later) will affect my training schedule.

When it's cold and rainy like this I just want to skip my evening KF class and go straight home.

How do you all stay in shape through winter?

[inic]

that reminds me, we should workout sometime.
oh but for your question, i love the winters here. running and boxing in the snow does a good workout for the legs, and the cold air really does a number on my lungs.

where do you do kf? do you know a boxing gym in boston? i live in chelsea right now, but it looks like i'll have to move dec 1. i'll probably be moving to alston or brighton, but i'm mad cause i have 3 gym bags in my back yard and i wont be able to use those once i move...

i left you a message a while ago, but you probably didnt see it.
I think we should workout together sometimes, i need the support and movivation. i really havent worked out since the summer and i feel like a fat slob now

[Qi dup]

Well, I don't really live in the north, but we still get a decent amount of snow up here at 10,000ft. This morning it was 8 degrees. Personaly I like to do a lot of hiking in the snow. We used to hike out Loveland pass, Vail pass, or Housier pass once a week. Usually spend a lot of the morning walking and shoveling. I can't see myself getting to into snowboarding this year however. I'm not even getting a pass. Doing forms in th snow was cool for a little while, until inches of snow turned into feet. That doesn't bother me to much considering I don't do forms anymore. My heavy bag hangs on my pourch which is still fun to swing at in the winter. It is hard to get motivation in the winter, but you get used to it. Did you ever see Rocky 4?

[SaMantis]

I go to the Wah Lum school in Chinatown, very nice club. But I got spoiled down in Orlando because the school there held classes twice a day and there was always tons of practice room, bags, etc. Plus the weather is usually nice, even on cold days.

Meeting for an outdoor workout or something like that would be cool, PM me and we can discuss details.

Qi dup, LOL on the Rocky 4 reference! I've got a tree limb down in the lot behind my apt., maybe I can pull that through the snow!

[WinterPalm]

The winter sucks for doing any outdoor forms or sparring but there is still a lot you can do inside. Take a cramped living room or bedroom and shadow spar. Think about tight quarter areas and figure out ways to use your kung fu in a cramped situtation.
You can always run outside. Do your forms chopped up inside or just work the basics. That's pretty much what I do. Work on stances. Tight quarter footwork. All the strikes and kicks. That should at least keep you building your foundation during the winter.

Of course you should still have classes to attend to that can keep you doing the things you miss out on at home.

[TjD]

yeah, we just train inside ;)

you dont need all that much room to practice wing chun, for one
and the weight room i go to is nice enough to be indoors as well. if i feel like running/swimming theres an indoor pool, and treadmills and stairclimbing.

i also love skiing in the winter and thats real good for your legs


aside from the skiing the main thing about training in the winter up north is the word "indoors"

[KC Elbows]

We workout outdoors all year round. Mind you, the new england(or even chi-town) winters are harsher, but it's cold enough as it is.

Working out when it's cold guarantees that you will not stop practicing.

[Stacey]

nothing hellps your sets like doing them on ice. Perfect stances are a must

[Qi dup]

Originally posted by SaMantis
I've got a tree limb down in the lot behind my apt., maybe I can pull that through the snow!

Yes, deffinatly. And be sure to eat quite a bit of lightning and crap a reasonable amount of thunder.

[SaMantis]

No problem -- there's a good Mexican restaurant at the end of the block, I'm sure I could produce a lot of thunder after dinner there! :D

Thanks for all the info, everyone.

Stances on ice ... hmm... do you think Shaolin's Wheel of Life tour would be even more exciting done on ice? :)

[ZIM]

no problems! Its a better training opportunity. Look at the outdoor challenges

Stances on ice. Bring whiskey to keep you warm and get drunken styles down. Practice throws onto snowbanks. Got to get arm moves good to work through heavy coats. Sensitivity gets better becuz U have to reach through the coats. Elbows get better becuz they haf to be stable against slippy ski coats. Kicks have to very stable. & U Got to get the qiqong right to keep you warm.

plus no one laffs @ your ninja outfit! LOL

There was sumbody awhil back who wrote about tibetan styles in the same way. like their crane style was wide open becuz of the coats? anybody know? or (similar) old tai chi was like that becuz of armor, so it's like this too? any thots?

[Ford Prefect]

Hey SaMantis,

I'm in Boston too. Basically you just have to toughen up your spoiled warm climate body. ;) Just train outside to help you body acclimate. Don't overdue it at first or you may develop cold-weather induced asthma. Holding stances is a good way to warm your whole body up in the cold. After that, keep your body heat up by staying active.

[Ford Prefect]

Anybody done any mountain biking on snow covered trails? I think I might give it a whirl this winter.

[guohuen]

Yeah it's crazy. Just stay off the environmentally sensitive trails.

[Mr. Bao]

I am a native New Yorker. I train indoor. F**k the out door winter training. This isn't a Rocky movie or Best of the Best movie. I don't want to die from the cold or worst get sick. Maybe I am a punk compare with some nutts out there. More power to them. I guess fighters who came from warm climates aren't as bad asses as those from the cold mountain. lol.

My advice be smart and train indoor and stay warm. I workout inside my gym and inside my kwoon. I hate the cold and I think running outside is good if you have the proper gear. Good luck with the training.

Bao

[SaMantis]

F**k the out door winter training.

I like that idea. :D

[Fu-Pow]

I live in Seattle so I feel you pain. We have wonderful summers and I take every opportunity to train outside. But in the winter it just sucks and I always end up gaining weight.

But staying in shape in the winter is just this simple: join a gym. Make sure it's relatively inexpensive and doesn't have big join up fees. Find one that has an aerobics studio that isn't used very often and make sure you can use it to practice kung fu. This is the only way to get a consistent work out during the winter. I've tried running and training outside in the winter but ultimately the weather will screw up your routine plus I always seem to get a cold.

I go to the gym almost everyday on my lunch hour. I alternate between running and lifting weights every other day. This is in addition to my kung fu training (3x a week) and Taiji (1 x a week.) I expect to be in awesome shape when summer roles around.

[Starbuck]

I'm in North Carolina now, but grew up and lived in the north until 3-4 years ago. I'm surprised nobody has mentioned the #1 winter exercise: shoveling snow! If you have a weak back, you won't come next spring. Just be sure to stop and take a breather every few minutes. Every year, at least one guy drops dead from a heart attack while shoveling snow. Granted, he's usually over 50 and it's the only exercise he gets all year, but you can't be too careful. Although if you don't have a driveway you won't get the full benefit from this chore.

Light outdoor sparring is also a hoot in winter. Open hand strikes become stinging b1tchslaps that'll make your eyes water. Also, as previously mentioned, the slippery surface forces you to develop a good stable root and footwork.

[Ford Prefect]

Haha! Starbuck is correct on both counts! Shoveling kicks my ass.

[SaMantis]

Hmm ... my landlord put a snow shovel by the front door. I have a feeling he's going to ask us to do some shoveling this winter! (We do some of the maintenance in return for a good-sized break on rent.)

OK, so any tips on shoveling? That shovel doesn't look like your standard dig-a-hole-in-the-yard model.

I also found out this week -- working out in the cold stings your lungs like crazy but I could have worked out for hours without sweating, if I had the time. Winter may not be too bad. :)

[inic]

told ya cold air kills your lungs! (in a good way though)

[KC Elbows]

Okay, some of you might disagree with me, but here's my take on it. This comes from camping/training with minimal gear through an arctic blast(though in the MO area, but still nasty), and general outdoor practice:

-Cold air is NOT good to get deep in the lungs, so do not get huffing and puffing too much unless you're young and crazy. This WILL raise your likelihood way up of getting sick.

-Push ups or anything else like that need to be done indoors.

-Stretching should be done indoors, and will go much quicker that way.

-Sparring in the cold is higher risk than elsewhere for obvious reasons(you will be tighter, no matter what, because that is what cold does).

-Start with many layers, and remove as need be.

-Anything that requires extended duration of more than your shoes touching the ground is risking losing a lot of body heat, which increases your risk of getting sick.

-I've yet to experience a temperature at which I could not do chi kung comfortably. However, the more wind, the more skin I need to cover.

-Sitting on concrete is trouble. Don't do it.

-Dress for the season, and workout slower. Most body heat is lost through the head, so wear a hat.

I HAVE to be at class throughout winter, as I'm a senior student. We train outside, so this is what I do to keep well.

Most of the times I see people get sick or get sick myself, they either underdress for the cold, or get huffing and puffing too much cold air.

[Ford Prefect]

Huffing and puffing cold air will by no means get you sick. You may get cold-air induced athsma, but you will not get ill.

[KC Elbows]

Semantics. Asthma, sick, what's the difference, functionally? Pushes the envelope for a cough too. Granted, it won't spontaneously 'create' a virus or anything, but it will make you less able, and is effectively the same as being sick.

"Most of the times I see people get sick or get sick myself, they either underdress for the cold, or get huffing and puffing too much cold air."

'Too much'

"-Cold air is NOT good to get deep in the lungs, so do not get huffing and puffing too much unless you're young and crazy. This WILL raise your likelihood way up of getting sick."

Again, 'too much'.

I'm not saying there should be an absolute ban on aerobic activity in the cold, but there's a point that's too much.

[SaMantis]

So ... going for a little jog in the cold (like 1 mile or so) would be OK, but running until you're ready to fall out would be detrimental -- you get weak, your immune system weakens, and it opens the door to viruses. Something like that?

[Qi dup]

Originally posted by SaMantis

OK, so any tips on shoveling?



Usually, I start with a medium/tall stance and step into your shoveling swip, keeping your rear leg mostly straight. You will then be in something a lot like a bow stance. keep your back straight and use your front leg to help lift the weight on the shovel, slidding your rear leg in as you lift. Wah-la, shoveling and stance training. with this method you will be very unlikely to fall down while you are shoveling. This is the way I shoveled all last winter and it worked well for me. Being a snow plow driver shoveling is a good portion of my job.

This may be the completely wrong way of lifting snow but it worked for me.

btw, we had 10 inches of new snow this morning!

[KC Elbows]

SaMantis: Well, perhaps my response to Ford was too involved. I have a deficiency in my briefness gland which prevents me from saying something like "Who wants asthma symptoms, either?"

Yeah, I have nothing against jogging in the cold, or sprinting, I just keep wary of that point of exhaustion that opens me up to sickness.

Ford, sorry if I came on a little strong with the semantics bit.:)

[SaMantis]

That's cool, KC Elbows,

Qi dup, LOL on stance training! I'll keep the info in mind this winter.

[SaMantis]

OK, I've been able to workout indoors most of the time, plus I do stairs at work. Yesterday I tried a workout in the snow for the first time.

Big difference! Basics were extremely tough, forms were nearly impossible. Couldn't do anything at full-speed. My feet were either sliding around or getting jammed in packed snow. By the end of the hour I was just putting together line drills and working on balance.

Worst thing was that the leaves are off the trees, so all my neighbors could see me flailing around in the backyard. :D Oh well.

Anyone else working out in this weather?

[Ford Prefect]

**** that snow was heavy. I had enough of a workout shovelling out.

[IronFist]

I train indoors :)

IronFist

[rubthebuddha]

sweeeet. inic's on the mend. :)

[Laughing Cow]

Weekdays:
Indoors work on stances, silk reeling, single movements and similar.

Weekends:
Hit the running track in the Park (7 min. on Bicycle) at 06:00am and also do forms and other training in the center of the track. Normally do 1 1/2 ~ 2 hours.

Example:
Different leg kicks step combos for about 150 meters turn do a different kick step combo, etc.

This kicks also work wonders for your flexibility and I don't need additional stretching.

Luckily we hardly ever get snow and temps don't drop much below -2 C at night.
;) ;)

[harry_the_monk]

It has snowed in Central London for the first time in about 10 years, so I got a chance to snow practice yesterday with some friends. It also ended up being a much more balance type workout, but was good. It made us practise our horse stances downwards rather than with outward pressure so we couldn't fall. ( which is if I understand correctly the right way to do them.)

It was cold to begin with but after qigong practise for an hour we were quite warm and training in just our t-shirts. Falling on the floor was also more on the agenda, so we got a chance to develop some breakfalls and strengthen the body(once the snow had been compacted to ice it was reasonably hard to land on.)

We are also looking forward to warm summer weather.

[SaMantis]

LOL IronFist, indoors is the place to be I guess. :) I usually hit the stationary bike for a couple minutes a day, do bits of a tai chi form and 13 postures.

The snow workout is still pretty cool -- I'm lucky because the landlord takes care of shoveling it away from the steps. And the ice underneath will make you practice breakfalls, whether you like it or not. Maybe if I hit the ground enough times I'll become a master of Iron Butt.

I noticed the same thing about horse stance -- the ice won't let you push outward, but you've still gotta get low or you're gonna slide.

inic, you're not going running this weekend are you? The temperature is supposed to be like ... 9.

[Suntzu]

Worst thing was that the leaves are off the trees, so all my neighbors could see me flailing around in the backyard. atleast u have trees… my backyard is a open book… and the sun just beems dwon on me with disrespect… I KNOW my neighbors think I'm crazy… wait until I get my big azz tire… then things will get interesting…

[ricksitterly]

I am usually residing either in Albany or Poughkeepsie , upstate New York (but not THAT upstate). There always seems to be plenty of snow. I favor going deep into the woods, at least 5 miles or so, dragging with me a 45 pound weight plate by a rope. Depending on how you drag it, you are working different muscle groups. The deep snow helps to build leg power. In addition, I will strap weights to my ankles and sometimes wear a backback with additional weight. I climb the trees, and jump down into the snow to practice falling/ landing. I do kicking line drills in the snow and I practice my punches and hand techniques on the trees, which conditions my hands and knuckles. This is how the old masters trained thousands of years ago. One time, while training in the woods, I was attacked by a wolf and I killed it with my knife. You never know what will happen in the woods, when you return your whole body is sore. It is among my favorite training methods. When I get tired of dragging the weight, I then start picking it up and throwing it forward in my path.

[inic]

sorry but i feel like i'm reading a fiction story when reading your post. theres no way you can do all that alone, you NEED another person with you. and being attacked by a wolf?? first of all, wolves dont attack alone, always in groups. if a wolf is alone, no way is it attacking a human. and you'll need more than a knife to stop it, if it does attack. wow, and i though I exaggerated!

[SaMantis]

Ok wait a minute. Wasn't that whole training scene done in Rocky IV?

[ricksitterly]

i often take a training partner with me into the woods. it comes in handy in case of emergency to have someone with you. but "going out there alone" is not as harsh as you make it sound. These arent the adirondacks, they're about 150 acres of woods bordering my neighborhood. Rocky did drag logs through the snow in part 4, but surely the movie producers weren't the first people to think of that. I dont claim to have invented any of these training methods, i've picked them up along the way. as a kid (and even now), whenever i heard or saw something about training, i would be the first to go out and try it. "dont try this at home kids". i grew up practically in the middle of nowhere, so was always out camping/hunting/hiking/ whatever. wolves often do hunt in packs, however there simply arent that many of them around here, and most of them are starving, which is probably why the one attacked me. people usually believe the story more when they see the scars on my leg and arm to go along with it. if the training concepts sound too harsh i'm sorry, you should try them some time though.

[No_Know]

How long is the rope?

[GeneChing]

Could Exercising In Frigid Temperatures Make Us Healthier? (https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2019/01/01/681259440/could-exercising-in-frigid-temperatures-make-us-healthier)
January 1, 20195:00 AM ET
PAUL CHISHOLM

https://media.npr.org/assets/img/2018/12/31/gettyimages-924156940-40662251d158d9e6b4f7e50178bab5a969914ce8-s700-c85.jpg
Winter swimmers enjoyed an icy dip in Poland's Garczyn lake last February. Recorded air temperature was around 14 degrees Farenheit, and a large ice hole had to be cut to allow the lake bathing.
NurPhoto/Getty Images

When Scott Carney first saw the photo of a nearly naked man sitting comfortably on a glacier in the frigid cold, he was skeptical.

The man — Wim Hof — is a Dutch athlete who claims to control his body temperature in extreme cold through sheer force of will. Exercising in the cold, Hof argues, makes people healthier.

"I actually flew out there with the intention of debunking him as a fraud," says Carney, a Colorado-based journalist, author and senior fellow at Brandeis University's Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism.

But after learning Hof's methodology — a combination of meditation, breathing exercises and immersion in icy cold water — Carney became a believer.

"In a matter of a few days, I was meditating on the bank of a snowy river in Poland in ridiculous, freezing winter, and melting the snow around me with my body temperature," Carney says.

Carney details that experience in his book, What Doesn't Kill Us, which was released in 2017 and recently came out in paperback.

Carney points out that humans dealt with cold temperatures for much of their evolutionary history. Introducing a bit of chill into our daily life now, he says, stimulates muscles and tissue in a good way.

"Our bodies need to be in constant variation," Carney says. "That's what keeps us healthy and fit."

But how does that translate to the way most of us exercise?

Is jogging in the cold this winter any better than hitting a treadmill in a warm gym? How about jumping into a frigid ocean for a swim?

Article continues after this message from our sponsor

We asked some leading physiologists to weigh in.

Burning extra calories

Many of the purported benefits of cold hinge on brown fat, sometimes referred to as "good" fat. Long known to exist in human infants, brown fat burns calories and generates heat.

Dr. C. Ronald Kahn, a researcher at the Joslin Diabetes Center at Harvard Medical School, was among the first scientists to document the existence of brown fat in very small amounts in adults in the mid-2000s.

People can increase their levels of brown fat by being in mildly cold environments, Kahn says, though the effect on the number of calories they burn will be relatively small.

"The average person will burn an extra 100 to 200 calories a day when brown fat is activated," Kahn says. "But if you go eat half a muffin, forget it."

And that "100 to 200 calories" figure is for someone who's chilly all day long, he says. Most people experience cold for only short periods of time.

"When you activate brown fat, it may stay active for a few hours," Kahn says. "Not permanently."

Kahn also warns that Hof's call for exposure to the extreme cold could be overkill.

"What it takes to activate brown fat is very mild degrees of cold," Kahn says. "If I put you in a room at 60 or 62 degrees Fahrenheit and you're dressed in very light clothing, that's enough to do it."

A second way that people can burn extra calories when they're cold is through shivering. But Kahn doesn't suggest that strategy, either, because shivering makes most of us miserable.

"It's a way to burn extra energy," Kahn says. "But I don't think there's any data to say that this is a good way to lose weight ... because it's not comfortable."

Furthermore, people often warm up when they exercise, notes John Castellani, a research physiologist with the U.S. Army Research Institute of Environmental Medicine. Since you have to feel cold to burn those extra calories, Castellani says, people who exercise outside might not actually be burning any more calories than those who are in a warm room.

Exercising the blood vessels

A side effect of exposure to the extreme cold that Hof calls for is vasoconstriction. When you're subjected to extreme cold, the muscles surrounding many of your blood vessels cause them to contract — sending more blood to your core, where it can stay warm.

Carney says that because modern humans live in temperature-controlled environments, "all of that musculature is weak." Exercising those muscles through cold exposure, he claims, has "a huge impact on circulation and arterial health."

Castellani says the theory is interesting but still untested.

"In terms of using [cold] as a way of ... 'training the blood vessels?' To my knowledge there's no data to support that claim," says Castellani.

Additionally, Dr. Aaron Cypess, a researcher at the National Institutes of Health worries that cold-induced vasoconstriction could have negative consequences for some people, including spikes in blood pressure.

"We were looking at someone in one of our mild cold studies, and his blood pressure went really high," Cypess says. "That's not a good thing."

Training the immune system

One of Wim Hof's more startling claims — that he could consciously control his immune system — drew the attention of Matthijs Kox, a researcher at Radboud University Medical Center in the Netherlands.

"At first we were a little bit reluctant, but then we started to look up all the remarkable feats he had pulled off," explains Kox. "So we decided to give him a chance to prove his claim."

To put Hof to the test, Kox and his team injected Hof with a solution containing pieces of E. coli bacteria. Since the injection didn't contain live bacteria, it couldn't actually make Hof sick. But in most people, these bacterial compounds would fool the body into believing it is being attacked, triggering a temporary immune response that includes fever and inflammation. If Hof could indeed suppress his immune system, then the injection would have no such effect.

Sure enough, Hof's body showed little reaction to the injection.

"He had virtually no symptoms — which was remarkable," Kox says.

Kox followed up, repeating the test on a group of individuals whom Hof had trained. Just as with Hof, people in the study who had received the training showed little reaction to the injection. But untrained control subjects experienced fevers, headaches and chills. Kox and his research team published their results in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, in 2014.

Suppressing your own immune system may be possible, those results suggest — but for many of us, this may seem counterproductive. Why would we risk getting sick?

Carney thinks that sort of suppression might benefit patients who are suffering from autoimmune disorders — such as forms of arthritis that are linked to the body's immune system essentially attacking itself. If people could suppress their immune system as Hof does, Carney contends, some could potentially cure themselves of those diseases.

Kox is cautiously optimistic that this could, indeed, someday be a treatment strategy.

"We still have to test it, but it might be beneficial in conditions associated with an overactive immune response," Kox says. "But we need more work — more proof — to see whether this is really beneficial."

But which component of Hof's training contributed to the outcome? Was it the cold exposure, or the breathing exercises and meditation?

Kox says he can't tell from his findings, but he is currently supervising an experiment to find out. He expects those results to be published within the next couple of years. Until then, the value of cold exposure as a treatment for autoimmune disease remains largely unproven, if promising.

The case for cold?

The bottom line is, there is little evidence so far to suggest that training in cold weather makes you healthier, or that you can burn significantly more calories. The physiologists Shots talked to all agreed on one thing: There simply hasn't been enough research to say one way or another.

Cypess says he isn't ready to dismiss the potential benefits. But until he sees more compelling data, he's not likely to suggest it as a therapy. He has a bigger priority.

"The most important thing is to get the person to exercise," Cypess says. "There is no obvious added benefit to exercising in the cold."

Paul Chisholm is a freelance science writer in Rapid City, S.D. You can reach him on Twitter: @PaulJChisholm.

Well, that's reassuring. I hate training in the cold.

[GeneChing]

I knew there'd be some news on this somewhere about now, thus my post above. I just felt it. :D


Martial artists ring in 2019 with icy plunge (https://tdn.com/news/local/martial-artists-ring-in-with-icy-plunge/article_a18840a5-a632-5fff-89d3-bcf8283d58b6.html)
Rose Lundy rose.lundy@tdn.com Jan 2, 2019

https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/tdn.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/4/39/439aeaab-747a-5974-a5b8-2e288a6a225b/5c2bf52eb1a56.image.jpg?resize=1200%2C949

For the past three decades, Steve Larson has welcomed each new year by wading into icy waters with fellow martial artists. Tuesday marked the last time Larson will do the polar plunge as an owner of Longview’s Academy of Kung Fu.

Larson, 65, has sold the school to 21-year-old former student and current head instructor Eric Beattie.

But Larson says retirement won’t keep him from dipping in Lake Merwin near Ariel with other kung fu enthusiasts on Jan. 1 each year.

“I’ll do the plunge even if I have to have a walker,” he said with a laugh.

The plunge started in 1971 on the Kalama River as a way for martial arts students to challenge themselves and get out of their comfort zones, Larson said. After growing in popularity, the plunge eventually moved to Lake Merwin to have more room.

At noon on the sunny, but brisk, first day of 2019, about 80 people from seven martial arts schools across the region gathered to briefly join hands before marching into the still lake.

At 35 degrees, Tuesday’s plunge was milder than previous years, Larson said. One year, the sleet blew sideways at the swimmers and the windchill was below 0 degrees.

“We do tough things sometimes … and when we do difficult things together, it strengthens a bond,” he said.

Jason Ramsey, 31, drove up from Vancouver for his tenth polar plunge at Lake Merwin. He studies at Moy Martial Arts and Tai Chi Academy in Vancouver.

“They say you should let the cold drive your New Year’s resolution into you and let the cold water wash the old year off of you,” Ramsey said before the plunge. “And it’s fun to get with friends and do the same incredibly stupid thing.”

16-year-old Mikaela Jones, who also trains in Vancouver, said coming out of the cold water feels like an accomplishment each time.

“It starts the year off with the mindset that if you do a hard thing and come back, it shows you where you can go if you push yourself,” Jones said.

Those characteristics — confidence, self-discipline and respect — are important values that the Longview Academy of Kung Fu teaches students ranging from age 4 to 40, Eric Beattie said.

“(This event) is important because it shows our spirit: No one wants to do this, (but) the black belt is a long journey and there are things you don’t want to do but you have to,” he said.

Larson told the gather swimmers that the plunge “anchors” his life. He added afterwards that it is important to carry on traditions. He took over from former Castle Rock Police Chief Bob Heuer in the 1990s. And now Beattie will run the school.

“At a certain point, the mentor has to step back and let the new generation take over. And he’s doing an incredible job,” he said.

“Symbolic rebirth,” a nearby student suggested. Larson paused to consider the phrase.

“ ‘Symbolic rebirth’ — I like that.”