I just finished listening to an interview with climber, Alex Honold with REI's Wild Ideas Worth Living. He gave the best run your first ultramarathon pep talk, but it was disguised as his own mental process through the solo climb of El Capitan in Yosemite.

"I didn't want to make it bigger than it needed to be, because I knew that it was already predominantly a mental challenge. And so by putting it on a pedestal, making it feel like this is the biggest thing of your life, this is the craziest climb we ever do, this means so much that almost makes it too big and more of a mental challenge. And so I felt like for me, part of the process was to actually make it more part of my normal year."

Your race is just part of your normal running year. Just do what you have been doing, maybe for just a little longer than you are used to. Left, Right. Snacks. Pep talk over. 

GREAT JUMP!
I was on a mountain bike ride with a friend using a Garmin Edge bike computer. We were practicing jumps, which sounds gnarly, but think mini little mounds that get a person off the air enough to jump items including a credit card, pita bread or one unfolded sock. As we were jumping her bike computer was beeping like crazy. When we finished with an amount of relief unwarranted by those mini jumps, she noticed the computer was saying "Great Jump!" With an exclamation point and everything. Now any of you who have been around me long enough have heard me rant on how nasty Garmin can be to runners and how absolutely easy it would be to have it give affirmations instead of notices like, "unproductive training", "72-hour recovery time" or my least favorite, "Move" after you just ran for the better part of all day. Now that I know it says nice things to mountain bikers I am really annoyed. C'mon Garmin, just tell runners we are pretty, that our hill running is way better than those people we passed hiking and we rock for getting after it. I am not even asking for an exclamation point! 

HOT TUB VS SAUNA
"A new University of Oregon study shows hot tubs raise core body temperature more than saunas, delivering greater cardiovascular and immune benefits." For those of you hoping on the heat training train, maybe that less than sexy bathtub is looking better and better! The study "found that soaking in hot water outperforms both traditional dry saunas and far-infrared saunas in raising core body temperature and triggering positive physiological effects." Read more here. 

LISTEN UP
Stories to inspire your PT session and run warm ups. 

• 80-Year-Old Bob Becker’s Badwater 135 Race Report. ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY-FIVE MILES! In the heat. On the road. At 80! 
• The podcast, Your Diet Sucks has an episode, Why is Everyone Obsessed with Protein?  "How diet culture, aging fear-mongering, and gendered marketing shape the protein conversation. And why more isn’t always better—and why fiber and carbs matter too"
• Super short Instagram post about the camera runners. These guys are running so fast. Time to think about who is making the content for these fastest runners. 
• Want to know more about women's cycling? The Queen Stage podcast breaks down women's cycling and good timing since the Tour de France Femmes started on July 26 and goes through August 3. 

RUN UNDERGROUND 
How about a marathon over 3,000 feet underground? Sounds dark. One of Europe's deepest mines in Sweden is hosting the race in an attempt to say something about the future of mining and endurance and I don't think I understand the connection. 

STRENGTH 
See you on Wednesday nights for Strength Training for Runners, live to your screen. Free always. 

​YOUR WATCH IS A MEAN GIRL
You may have heard me in person or on social media ranting about how Garmin watches, which I use to track every workout I do, can be downright mean. The watches flash messages of frustration ("non-productive training", but I was just outside running and I feel GREAT, you ridiculous piece of tech) and hand out suspect advice ("72 hours recovery time" for a moderate run, really?). It is a missed opportunity for what I call affirmation mode where after a workout your watch flashes, "you look gorgeous" or "way to get out for a workout today!" Science writer Alex Hutchinson wrote a piece titled, Your Watch Doesn't Know How Much Recovery You Need" and goes in depth into some of the why and alternatives to tracking training load. He doesn't advocate for affirmation mode, but I will keep doing that one! 

Hi all,

This is the time of year when athletes with the best laid plans in March start getting infected with self-doubt in August. Just a gentle reminder to NOT GET STUCK! Can't decide on a training plan for your fall event? Then you doubt yourself and don't go all in giving yourself a poor training block. Can't decide on the next race? Then you have weeks stuck deliberating rather than making progress on the path towards your goal. 

"Make a decision. If that decision doesn't work out, make another decision."   ECFit newsletter on one of the best pieces of life advice. 

Want a sounding board to make a decision, get in touch! 

ODE TO THE 48 MINUTE MILE
"One mile. Forty-eight minutes and sixteen seconds. A personal worst, possibly. A dark PR. I swore, partly because that is an extremely slow mile, and partly because it meant I was definitely not getting to the trailhead in time to grab a sandwich from my favorite deli before it closed. In those 48 minutes, I could’ve run five miles around town. I could’ve baked a loaf of banana bread. Finished a full wash-and-dry cycle. Called my mom. What the hell was I doing with my life?"  Full article HERE and please note, the article includes the phrase "non-consensual cold-plunge" and I will be using that in every winter puddle I run through from here on out. 

LOOSE CHANGE
Need a short watch while you are doing PT or mobility this week?

• A Regular Person's Guide to Surviving an Ultramarathon video here. Advice includes, "loose change adds up" and "if you feel bad, eat something."
• If you are finding nutrition and hydration hard to nail down on training runs or races, DO NOT beat yourself up. Keep iterating. Keep trying. This video of David Roche, coach, sponsored athlete and racer with a full crew of doctors and physiologists dropping from Western States is a reminder that even the best with all the best resources don't always get it right. 

STRENGTH 
See you on Wednesday nights for Strength Training for Runners, live to your screen. Free always. 

“They're telling you to blend in,
like you've never seen how a blender works,
like they think you've never seen the mess from the blade.”
― Andrea Gibson

Hi all,

I have been including talk of sand in my coaching pep talks lately. Specifically, about holding handfuls of sand as a metaphor for holding onto goals. It may be a beautiful Zen idea and it is probably also on a 'hang in there kitty' type of poster/mug/inspirational merchandise. The idea is to hold onto goals like they are sand. Hold too loosely and they slip right through your fingers. Hold too tight and whoosh, out the bottom of your fist. It feels profound. Then I heard of a sad death in the world. 

Colorado Poet Laureate, Andrea Gibson had been fighting a public battle with cancer that ended yesterday. Their writing is heartbreaking and uplifting and magic and is full of power and if you aren't familiar, you can start with this post on five counterintuitive self care tips. They would have something profound to say about holding sand for sure but more important, they have something to say about being a good person. And being a good person is more important than being a good runner and also key to it. If you get sucked down the rabbit hole of their voice and truth, apologies and mostly, you are welcome. 

I know most people try hard
to do good and find out too late
they should have tried softer.
– Andrea Gibson, You Better Be Lightning

THIS DIDN"T NEED TO HAPPEN

• Sad news from the Grand Canyon. The North Rim of the Grand Canyon is currently experiencing a major fire which has destroyed the Grand Canyon lodge and has closed many of the trails in the canyon. If you have a Rim to Rim to Rim planned for this fall, keep up on the news. For updates on the fire and fires closer to home you can use the Watch Duty site or app. 
• World's oldest runner, Fauja Singh, made his debut at the marathon at age 89 and has been running and setting records ever since. He died at 114 years old after being hit by a car while on a run. No words. Run carefully out there. 

CHECK YOUR HAND
Can finger length predict running ability? Apparently, I can hold my hand in a way that predicts I am about to be the first 50-year-old to win an Olympic marathon OR in a way that says, sit your butt on the couch. I guess finger length shows extra testosterone exposure in the womb which is then predictive of success in endurance. If you love running a long, long way, I think you should skip checking your digits and just use that hand for high fives on the trail.  

STRENGTH 
See you on Wednesday nights for Strength Training for Runners, live to your screen. Free always. 

Hi all,

I just Googled, what is heat's effect on the murder rate. I know, what is my problem? I was pretty warm in my house being too stubborn to put on the air conditioning, writing athlete plans like this scene in GI Jane and I remembered a thread from a podcast, or was it the radio? My memory checked out. This study states that "every 5 °C increase in daily mean temperature was associated with a 9.5% increase in intentional homicide in Chicago and New York." 

This effect has one explanation where discomfort and frustration leads to increasing aggression. 

Meanwhile the bulk of running races are held in the heat of the summer. Many of you are training right now and can't always get in your run before the heat sets in. So let me say this, if you are not loving running in the heat or find heat demotivating for running after work and are feeling guilty about getting in less exercise, go easy on yourself. Heat drives people to do some really bad things, it's cool to just binge some ice cream. 

HOW TO PACE A MARATHON
Here is a great summary of a new study looking at ten years of data from over 146,000 runners in the Valencia Marathon. This is real data from real runners as opposed to a short-term study of people in a lab. Some findings include:

• "Slower runners were more likely to pace poorly and hit the wall. Sub-3:00 men and sub-3:15 women showed the most even pacing and least fatigue collapse.
• Even-paced runners ran 27–34 minutes faster than those who used positive or negative pacing; that’s an enormous margin for such a simple strategy.
• Pacing variability was strongly correlated with marathon time, and runners who hit the wall at 18 miles lost an average of 36 minutes compared to those who didn’t."

From a coaching perspective, this means ensuring nutrition strategies are dialed in to avoid bonking and finding a realistic goal marathon pace in training and using that as the target across the race. For racers this means nailing nutrition in training and racing as well as not going out too fast even if it feels good. 

WESTERN STATES HOT TAKES

• Precision Fuel and Hydration puts out case studies of their athletes from Western States. They total grams of carbs (70g to 126g per hour) and how much fluid and sodium. 
• W​omen's winner, Abby Hall describes her win. "I believe the compilation of my own experiences and heartbreaks from past races and my injury became a secret weapon. we talk about the pain cave, but this work almost became work in my “heart cave”, if you will." 

SLEEP
I liked this Fresh Air podcast on sleep. It covers using melatonin, night owls, the stigma on sleep aids and how much sleep we really need. 

STRENGTH 
See you on Wednesday nights for Strength Training for Runners, live to your screen. Free always. Join me.

"Abundance is not something we acquire. It is something we tune into."- author Wayne Dyer
​
TRAILCON AND WESTERN STATES WRAPPED
Last week I attended Trail Con and the Western States 100-mile endurance run. My key takeaway from both is ABUNDANCE. From Trail Con I saw an abundance of caution away from real talk of pushing the sport towards more sustainability, diversity and inclusivity. I saw an abundance of marketing and brand activations and the commerce of trail running. I saw a lot of hat giveaways and less thought to getting more people into the hats. But there is the other side.

At Western States, I saw abundance as well, but mostly in the in the best way. This is a race with more spectators in the stands for the final hour of finishers than for the first-place finishers and people were OUT to cheer on perfect strangers finishing up what for most is an impossible task of 100 miles through the mountains and heat. I also saw numerous past Western States champions out on the course as pacers and volunteers. Seven-time champion Scott Jurek volunteers through the night at mile 90. Not many marathon champions out there handing cups to the back of the pack runners in Boston.  

I met people who drove from Oregon on a family vacation just to spectate the race, no connections to any runner in particular, just fans of the sport. And I saw so much giving of time, heart and spirit from one runner to another. There is just so much joy, hard work and can-do attitude it is hard to come home and not feel the abundance in my own sport bubble. If you want to experience the magic of a trail race and are not ready to sign up, you can volunteer, just ask me how! You won't be sorry. 

MULLET PROTOCOL
During a panel discussion at Trail Con, a race director in gravel racing said that as a race organization, they utilize the "mullet protocol" which got me listening. She described it as a way to celebrate the front and the back of the pack with intention. They include a mullet podium for those nominated by fellow riders for exemplifying the spirit of the sport. LOVE! If you are looking for local race directors who share this same spirit, check out this post from Go Beyond Racing and the organization they started Trail Mix Fund. 

BREAKING 4
Last week Nike held a moonshot when they went all in on Faith Kipyegon in an attempt for a woman to break the 4-minute mile barrier. Her PR was 4:07 which meant taking off almost 2 seconds per lap. You can watch it here, worth five minutes to see sports going all in and investing in a woman.  Then, you can get critical and read an interesting analysis of the attempt. 

READING ROUNDUP

• Why fasting doesn't work for active women. By Stacy Sims. 
• Langkawi International Ultra Run won outright by Wong Mei-yan. 
• Turn off the Excuse Machine. "Those excuses come out sounding quite a lot like complaints."

STRENGTH NEEDS
This fake thing cracked me up. "No pain, no popcorn." Or, another idea for motivating your strength training, JOIN ME! See you on Wednesday nights for Strength Training for Runners, live to your screen. Free always.