GYM GIRLS LOCKER ROOM - Running Is For EVERYONE, How To Make It Part Of Your Routine & Training For A Marathon ft. Ben Parker

Episode Date: April 23, 2024

EP 08 - Does cardio kill gains? What are the main differences between men and women when it comes to running? Should you train during your menstraul cycle? Syd sits down with co-founder and head coach of Runna to chat all things running. WATCH the full episode on YouTube: https://youtu.be/RF2u8Jy_GTo Get a 2 week FREE trial of Runna using code GGLR: https://www.runna.com/join connect with Ben: https://www.instagram.com/benparkerfitness/ 💘 join the GGLR community: INSTA - https://www.instagram.com/gymgirlslockerroom/ FACEBOOK COMMUNITY PAGE - https://bit.ly/3TqhxDG TIKTOK - https://www.tiktok.com/@gymgirlslockerroom/ 📲 find Syd on socials: INSTA - https://www.instagram.com/sydgrows/ TIKTOK - https://www.tiktok.com/@sydgrows/ GYMSHARK - 10% off code: SYDNEY

Hello and welcome back to the Gym Girls Locker Room podcast hosted by me Sydney Cassidy. Today we have on Ben Parker, the co-founder of the fastest growing running app, Rana. He discussed his own journey, gave just the most amazing insight on how to improve your running. We spoke about accessibility, the differences between men and women and how that affects their running journey, the impact the menstrual cycle has on running and honestly everything in between. It was a really, really interesting listen for myself and I'm sure for you guys. I am really, really pleased to say that we have a code for you guys. If you listen to this and you love what runner is about and you want to

get into your running journey, you want to give it a a go you can get a two-week trial on runner using the code gglr that's gglr i hope you enjoyed the episode remember you can find us at gym girls locker room on all platforms and yeah let's get on with the episode yeah i feel like we could we could easily start there like you were down for the runner kind of collab with what's that sort of initiative they're doing yeah so um i guess kind of yeah for context runners this kind of online coaching service we help people all over the country all over the world um and um we've done most of our events and meetups all kind of centered in london but so got in kind of touch with the Manchester Young Professionals Group maybe like two years ago.

And I came up actually almost exactly a year ago, told the runner story. We must have been at about maybe 10,000 customers then, which was like a surreal. A year ago. Yeah, a year ago. And that was maybe only a year after launching the app. And anyway, now kind of things are 10 times bigger to me um runner still feels this like kind of like feels like this small little idea that my business partner and I had a few years ago and we've just been almost head down working really hard and before we know it like it seems to be this thing that like

is getting around and and excitingly helping a lot of people and I think that's the thing that means something to me and means something to him which is that it's an exciting thing that we're doing that actually just like helps people and makes amazing running coaching more accessible for everyone there's still a lot a lot more to do but no it's been a funny roller coaster the last few years yeah I wonder for people I mean I feel like you're massively downplaying it like you two are absolutely crushing it like even from my perspective as like a I'm in the fitness space but like I'm not a runner like to see how many people are using the app is like insane and um yeah just for anyone that didn't catch on for that I Ben kindly invited me to their event um yesterday and it was like there was literally

so many people there and so many it was like such a nice vibe and yeah it's just like so so cool to see I think it really has blown up and I wonder has it felt like it's sort of sunk in will it ever feel like that do you think like your success you've literally just had like the nomination for 30 under 30 it's kind of funny like for me like my kind of goal ever since leaving university was kind of get into fitness initially personal trainer qualified as a running coach ironman coach and gradually like spun more and more towards the running side of things and the thing that for me excites me was always running in the park with someone week in, week out and seeing them get fitter, get healthier, get happier. And then we went on to launch this business, which meant we could do that for many, many more people.

But it also then like very much changed my relationship with doing seeing that progress. I didn't get to meet our customers because they're all online. And as a result, it almost like changes that kind of like feedback loop. Then you don't quite realize like the business growing because they're like numbers on a chart on the, doing on the signups and all these different things. But you don't see the happy, smiley people kind of like, like you said, we kind of got nominated and won the kind of to join the list of the Forbes 30 under 30. Liz, my business partner and I, he's 29. So it's like the last time he can get it.

Just got in there. And you also, if you found a business as a pair have to win together um so very much was like our last chance to last chance to do it so that was like a very surreal moment but also at the same time it kind of means nothing and what I mean by that is that like the thing that like makes me excited and happy is doing hearing about one more person at an event who do event who maybe got purpose through a hard time in their life or I mean went on to achieve a challenge that they never thought they could do because we've been able to make what I used to charge over a thousand pounds a year for so much

cheaper so much easier to use so much more accessible and I think in a way maybe that's also why it's like starting to doing crop up in other circles and I think it's that like conventionally the people who ran marathons and got a coach would be that real like niche obsessed, real diehard fitness person, diehard running person. And as a result, they almost stay in their kind of niche. And that's because it's such an inaccessible way to go and train for a goal. And relatively, we've looked at that and thought, how can we make that experience that is great for that obsessed diehard runner who's going to spend a lot of money on their training and make it in so much more of an accessible way? And then what we found is that like over 95% of the people who train with us at Runner have never worked with a running coach before. And that's because it's one, cheaper.

But I think that the other one is that like, it's so much easier to get started. So if you want to try out Runner, first of all, you hopefully see doing all these amazing people sharing their journey. And I think the opposite experience would have been doing wanting to train with me as a private coach previously. You'd have to find me on Instagram. You'd have to message me, have a phone call with me for half an hour. I mean, then I'd WhatsApp you your training. And that there's so many steps in the way that if you're like just on the fringe of feeling motivated to get fitter and train for a 5k that's so intimidating and then even if you can get over all those hurdles you then got to pay a fortune and i think that's the reason why it's kind of like

i guess being able to grow into like maybe other circles of people who wouldn't have previously um thought about getting a coach with reference to their running but at the same time I think the reason why running obviously is booming at the moment and has been such a popular sport for so long is that it's it is such an accessible sport you don't need much you need a pair of between old trainers and out the door off you go but at the same time conventionally so many people would have looked at running as this relatively the way that you got told is a way to be healthy lose weight get out the door run around your block for 20 minutes as hard as you can come back sweaty and that's a healthy life

and do that three times a week but actually hate running instead viewing it as i'm actually going to run really easily today and i'm going to make sure i'm running at a pace that i can chat to a friend or whatever it's going to be or enjoy it it doesn't hurt it doesn't feel as miserable and then actually some of the time going and doing some fun interesting sessions that you mean you might go do some intervals and being introduced to this new thing can make it so much more fun and you're breaking the rundown into these little chunks almost like sets in the gym and before you know it you're kind of doing 6k in a workout and you've had a great session um and at the same time then it all comes back to giving you those endorphins but you actually see you start to get

better whereas if all you do is run around the block for 20 minutes really hard, because someone said it's a good way to be healthy and lose weight, you don't really see progress, it's not the perfect optimal thing to do, and you don't really love it in the same way, for me, coming into like the fitness industry, so I came, I did a geography degree, had zero interest in it, and the day I graduated, I started qualifying as personal trainer and then kind of growing my expertise within the fitness industry. I was always very cynical, looking at all these different businesses in the industry. And there were like two particular examples of ones that I just felt like were so wrong. One of them was kind of like corporate gym chains. So like the big, not corporate,

sorry, commercial gym chains. So the big gym businesses um and i went and worked for one of them partly to gain some experience but also to work out what i didn't like about it you have to pay a joining fee like imagine like being that same person we kind of talked about that isn't isn't that motivated but really wants to get into their fitness and so they pull themselves up and doing go and find their doing their active wear and feel like they get all feel great and take themselves to the gym and it's like 100 pounds to start like that's crazy that that shouldn't be the case and they're doing the same example would be that then you've got to sign on for a 12-month contract and do you mean you you might just be getting started and the same experience in the same kind of commercial gym

chain i worked at was that if you wanted to do pt the minimum would be a six month contract. And if you wanted to go on holiday within that, you literally had to double up your sessions a week before because you couldn't just like miss a session. And that, again, it's just not accessible. So I always knew that I wanted to make sure that when it came to actually making something to help people, you kind of solve that hurdle. And then the other one was kind of the example of Weight Watchers. I mean, it's a huge, huge business. But what they don't do is they don't prioritize education. Instead, they slightly trick their customers by telling them about points. And rather than teaching them about calories and how to live a really healthy life and understand food, so you don't need Weight Watchers anymore. They trick you and relatively keep you from understanding everything.

And as a result you maybe achieve the weight you want think i can do this alone and because you haven't learned everything you almost then like probably put on some weight again and come back to weight watches and it makes some money as a business but it's not the like in my opinion the optimal way to go and help people um so for the same reason in mind like when we think about how we construct runner to be as a service it's like we want to teach you how to be a better runner how to be a happier runner so that you can go and run and do you mean enjoy that as a part of your life for the rest of your life everything you're saying like massively resonates and it's so funny like when i briefly like came up to see you at the event

yesterday i found it really interesting that you said and like for the record you you're standing on what 34 marathons is it currently something like that yeah not not all races so I've done the marathon distance 34 times but he's done a bloody lot and he's bloody good at it right and he like lives and breathes running and I just found it really interesting that you one of the first things you said to me was like oh yeah I don't look like a typical runner and I wonder like almost like do you think that that's something that like holds people back and like almost makes people feel I feel like with running am I right in thinking that there's this certain sort of image that people hold in their mind and if you don't fit into that maybe you don't look

like it or you know you're not used to doing that sort of thing you kind of feel like oh it's not like something that I can do and I think that's what is so lovely about what you guys are doing is that you're actually showing no it is for everyone and you offer plans from literally couch to 5k all the way up and everything in between I just wondered yeah like do you think that that's something that like, is like one of the main things, like barriers into like getting into running? Yeah, I think so often people will say,

I'm not a runner. Yeah. And we were speaking about Anna before we got started. Yeah. She had run a marathon and we were on a run together. She's like, I still don't feel like a runner. And like, that is an experience that people over and over and over again have. And will tell me like even in Instagram now like they'll send

me a message and be like you mean you're too big to be a running coach and it's like hilarious. What do they mean big? Well as in like I'm you know I've got bigger muscles than a conventional person who's running really fast times and even to speak for that in reality sometimes I'll get to start really in like the front pen of a of a marathon or a half marathon because of like the kind of the times that I've done um and I'll have people being like oh sorry mate you're you're in the wrong spot it's due back there like this is the doing the one the 115 half marathon pen and I'll be like oh okay uh that's all good I'm I'm I'm in the right spot. I'm right where I should be. And then like they will, Doreen, like try and like outpace me right at the start.

And then like, Doreen, I look forward to seeing them at the finish line and just like giving them a nod. As you should. Kind of like, what time do you call this, mate? You're meant to be in the 115 pen. And at the same time, it's probably also then what leads back to kind of like the accessibility side of running or runner particularly which is that like they maybe relate to that they might be a stronger runner and think oh actually I can run a marathon or I can go and train doing with this service because it's not just like conventional looking people at the front of marathons and I think at the same time anyone

who can put their shoes on and go for a jog for one minute they're a runner they're literally running and the things that we're working on now behind the scenes to make runners smarter will help someone right at the start of their running journey and the person who's doing their 10th marathon. And that's the same when it comes to adapting around the menstrual cycle, adapting around your sleep. All of these things that we're thinking about behind the scenes to make runners smarter will help everyone and I think that's the kind of the beauty of it and we all have the same challenges we're all not motivated all the time we all have to get up early and want to turn the alarm off and we all want to cut our run short

and we all get out of breath and it's all doing doing different challenges but the same challenges and I think that's the thing is that we're all in the same boat really like no matter how strong you get and how great you get at your squats your deadlifts it's never any easier and I think that's the thing is that we're all in the same boat, really. Like no matter how strong you get and how great you get at your squats, your deadlifts, it's never any easier. And I think that's the thing that often like puts people off starting is they're like, oh, I can't do it. I'll never be as good as them. But it's like the only thing they do differently is they just keep doing it. And relatively with anything we're doing, whether it's recording a podcast, the more you you do it probably the better you get at it and with that in mind like the key is just like finding the energy or finding the the thing to get you started and it always comes back to then how can we make it easier to get started and I think there are so many obstacles in people's fitness journey because it's this scary

intimidating thing you see beautiful people on the internet, you see doing these expensive barriers to entry of hurdles of money or location or whatever, intimidation. And so with as many of these, we want to try and really strip them back so that people can get started. And between time and time again, someone who does their 5K, does their first 5K. And I think it's the case that we are evolved

as a species to be able to run. Like our ancestors would have run ultra marathons regularly through the desert without Nike, without Adidas fancy shoes, because it's the way that we've evolved to be. We've got Achilles tendons, we stand up, we've got these lungs, we're not covered in hair so we can keep running and not getting too hot. We have evolved phenomenally to run a long way. But the thing we haven't done is almost trained our bodies to do that if we sit down at a desk all day for for 10 years straight and then try and run a marathon something's going to break and we're going to get hurt and that's where you just need that extra support to guide you to to get to the start um of of that goal and just building up gradually yeah i know i think i think like you know even just hearing what you're

saying it's like no wonder you guys are doing so well because you're really allowing people like regular people the your customers to feel seen and like like heard you know what you touched on a second ago about like oh it's very easy to see you know these influencers or people online that you know that's their sole focus but like the reality is for most people is that they actually have a job and they have a family and they have like housework and they have like responsibilities and it's like you guys are offering something that will select like sort of slot around that I'm really interested I heard you say I've like picked up on you saying like you're developing working around like menstrual cycles and stuff like that like obviously you've been doing coaching for like years now what are the main sort of differences between men and women when it comes to running

our goal is to build to the experience that a western world well-funded olympic athlete would get of having a data scientist having a nutritionist having a running coach a strength coach a psychologist all of these different things all in one place, again, at this super accessible, affordable package. And with that in mind, like we need to be doing better, we need to be supporting women with the different needs that they have, supporting men, doing supporting the differences between age, between doing different heights, different weights, doing different historical injuries, all of these different things. And at the same time, people coming in with busy lives and we want to make it so easy that they don't have to think about all of these complicated things, what stage of my menstrual cycle I'm at, how well slept I was

last night, and then actually what run do I go on to do? So with that in mind, we're at this really great position in time where people are so comfortable tracking their life during you're wearing your woot band now so you know how well you slept last night um in the same way doing it's such a doing common way now for doing women to track their during stages of the menstrual cycle through the flow app and different services like that so it's our goal to integrate with all these different services one of the next phases is to adapt around your sleep um and additionally to adapt around the menstrual cycle which is the kind of the biggest kind of observation or significant difference kind of male to female whereby women's performance within a month will change and during there'll be periods of time where they're better suited to their kind of speed and strength work and periods when they're maybe better at their

kind of endurance and they're also periods when they're more likely to get injured um and so with that in mind like we should be making sure that like we're syncing up these different weeks in line with doing the body's natural cycles but at the same time like you said people have their real lives going on they might have their marathon that unfortunately aligns in the middle of doing a period and so you can't do it perfectly so it's a really complicated thing for us to be working on and there's's, as you can probably tell, there's a huge opportunity of all these different things that we can work on. Yeah, amazing. So obviously, there's a lot of people doing marathons, half marathons, doing races this year, I feel like it's really like picked up momentum. I definitely know from our community, like a lot of the girls are doing it it and we've seen some of them doing it already which is like insane um as a man who's very very experienced what would some of

your top tips be for just like really making sure you've done all your training what are those like extra little pieces like nutrition wise in that like build up to running the race that you would sort of suggest yeah so maybe in like the the week of the marathon let's say so you've kind of done your training you're kind of feeling like you're going in the direction ready to do it um you kind of want to think ahead to all of the logistics and this is not just for a marathon but any race like you want to make sure that you've thought about what you're going to wear um because the last thing you want to do is buy a really cool beautiful new outfit and realize it actually just chafes in really uncomfortable places and then you feel miserable the whole way through the run um or another one would be um doing you doing here online here on

podcasts whatever it's going to be that you should be taking energy gels you go and buy some energy gels a week before a race and actually realize it upsets your tummy and comes out one of two ends and that's not what you want in the middle of a in the middle of a race either so relatively ideally we're trying out a lot of these things over the course of training working out what works well for us and practicing all these things so in the kind of race week we don't really want to try anything new I would always suggest in that kind of like maybe second to last or the last run you're almost putting on your race kit putting on your exciting shoes you're excited to wear for the race and making sure everything feels right and feels great and then you also want to think about

kind of like the logistics because the last thing you want to do is wake up on the marathon morning crack of dawn because you've got to travel to the start and actually then get stressed about all those tubes cancelled or whatever so you want to map out all the logistics map out what you're wearing map out what you're bringing um so that relatively on the the morning of all you've got to do is wake up get to the start and you're going to be nervous you're going to be excited so doing what you can just to calm things down a little bit um and then particularly with a marathon but it's the same with a half marathon and and it kind of for any race we're we're doing we should be looking to reduce kind of our intensity so we're feeling really really fresh uh for that race and it can be a really daunting thing imagine training

for 16 weeks and then two weeks before the race you're starting to do less and less it almost feels counterintuitive it feels like you're going to get less fit. And this is what we call like the taper period. But yeah, reducing our mileage a little bit, reducing our intensity so our body can feel really fresh, really great. And then you want to do a few kind of like little workouts that are keeping you sharp, keeping you fast, but without fatiguing your body too much that you're on the start line raring to go. And at the same time, because you might do a little bit less running mileage and it'll be the same if you're training for a gym competition you should be doing reducing the intensity a little bit so you're feeling feeling fresh feeling great and with that in mind you're gonna have a bit more time to prioritize your

sleep prioritize to making better meals cooking better or whatever it's going to be prioritizing doing more mobility so don't necessarily for those who are running a little bit less as we come into that that race experience or working towards your goal feel like you just need to swan around and sit on the sofa way more because you've got more time in your hands you can still use it productively so you don't feel like you're going going backwards but at the same time you're not going backwards we need to need to rest and that's such a key key thing to do to do right and it can also lead us to then feeling like we're on the start line of whatever we've trained for so long for and you feel phenomenal like you're full of adrenaline

you're well rested where you've done a lot of your training runs with fatigue in the body so you almost go out really fast and that can then lead to you going a bit too hard at the start and things coming coming apart in the second half so relatively having a good plan of what you want to do for your race and really sticking to that and only in the kind of second half or in the last third, letting yourself start speeding up and speeding up. And if you can get to that place, that's really the sign of having a great training behind you. And then also really like knowing what to do on the race and really sticking to a sticking to a strong plan. But I think the other bit to think about is also after the race, particularly with a marathon, which is a huge toll on anyone's body. I mean, I did a marathon in Paris last weekend. And then this week, I'm intentionally

being really cautious not to overdo it. The week after your marathon or the two weeks after your marathon, I would suggest is like kind of the two weeks where you're most likely to get injured. You've just got to put your body through hell. You've jumped up and down, traveled forward for 40,000 jumps essentially to go and run a marathon. And that's really intense on your knees, on your hips, on your ankles, and on all those muscles that are absorbing that impact. And as a result, I would basically say to anyone

who's just done a marathon, probably don't run for five, six, seven days. And what I always used to say to my private clients, when I had my 40 clients before runner, would be I'd almost ban them from running. So if they do the marathon on Sunday, I'd say you're not allowed to run until the next weekend. And some of them be like, oh, but I just want to. And they feel fresh come the Thursday. And it's like, no, don't run. And part of that is also the psychological side of things, which is it's so great if you can get to the marathon and love running. And some people are going to find it's a real big chore getting out building the routine and pushing themselves out the door and they get

to this big goal um and then relatively by saying no you can't can't go to run for a few days it makes you really want to go back on another one and that's the that's the best thing and the thing that i can be happiest about is that if someone can enjoy their training journey to get to this big goal and then be dying to go out on another run and then you wait you go for it maybe the park run that follows the marathon six days later at that point your body's going to be ready for it and again hopefully if you're well rested be controlled don't go and race your park run as hard as you can because you're full of all the adrenaline having done this amazing marathon and feeling unstoppable recognizing your body's still not fully recovered that's the most likely chance you're going to get injured, so really keep the intensity low for kind of two weeks or so,

and then gradually return to that same normal level of training, and relatively it then comes back to thinking about your year or your races that you're signing up for, really making sure that we don't get carried away and book too many things back to back, because the last thing we want to do is overdo it, get injured, and then miss out on this thing that we've really enjoyed doing having as a doing a crutch in our physical but our our mental health and our routine as well so yeah there's a lot of a lot of little things to think about but yeah I think that would be some real advice hopefully in the run up to a marathon or a race and then also immediately afterwards as well um how have you navigated like running injuries and has that been something have you been super cautious and you have managed to like

avoid them or so i've personally been on a um an interesting journey whereby probably from during 21 when i left uni through to 24 i'm a PT having opportunity to even have a nap in the afternoon because no one wants to have a PT session in the afternoon eat well and really prioritize my training and that's then shifted to now running a pretty intense startup for the last three or four years whereby relatively I resonate with a lot more of the problems and the challenges that most of our customers have which is a stressful life, an office job where you're sitting down all the time. And as a result, I've had more and more injuries relatively since Runners started. And it's been really frustrating because that's my performance.

My exercise is the thing that everything in my life is kind of wide and centered around. And that's what makes me really happy um and so as a result like i've um yeah battled a few injuries mainly from initially kind of sitting down a lot more and being on my feet a lot less so i get a little bit weaker and then when i don't have time in between work i'm going out to smash a run um and maybe not warming up properly or whatever it is so um relatively i'm having to stick to a lot more of the advice that we go and tell everyone else and be a lot smarter with it. However, at the end of last year, kind of in October time, we had a really busy spell of work where we were raising some investment. Working through that investment process is a very intense time period. At the same time, my kind of main goal of last year was to do an Ironman, which annoyingly lined up in the middle of that or right at the end of that spell I then started to get this really like weird pain in my my right

hamstring um which relatively got worse through October November um and basically I had what's called like a bulging disc so one of the kind of pads in between my vertebrae spilled into the spinal cord and so even though I had this problem on my back I was having this horrible pain in my right leg and it's essentially the electric impulses were traveling up my back were getting tricked and telling me that my hamstring was in pain but actually it was just the spinal cord um and so for the whole of December I couldn't couldn't move I couldn't run I couldn't even swim because like pushing off the back wall in the pool and changing direction hurt um so that was a really like hard time and particularly a hard like a hard month where i

literally couldn't do anything because like i'm the face of this this running out we're helping all these people and like i can't even sit at a chair i had to stand up or lie on my belly and work on my laptop i had a um what's called an epidural so a kind of an injection in my spinal cord at the end of um end of december and that kind of allowed me to then start moving again and relatively doing the marathon in paris on the weekend just being so kind of three or four months later um was a huge um kind of reflection point that actually i built back up to being able to do a marathon again and to be healthy um i still have some sensation in this hamstring from the nerve pain still but it's so much better. And at the same time,

it's now making me so happy and grateful to be able to move and to be able to exercise again. But at the same time, I'm a long way behind where I was three or four years ago before starting the business. But to some extent, it probably makes me a much better coach because I can resonate with all of the normal challenges of getting up early, having to a commute having to sit down at a desk all day having some real stresses rather than just being a happy PT guy he doesn't have to do do too much worry with that in mind I've been very intentional to really build up carefully this year really listen to my body something that I've done for a while is I go and see the physio every week so I've done that for a long time. And obviously it doesn't stop you getting injured,

but it does reduce the likelihood of it. And for someone like myself, when obviously it's my work, but at the same time, it's the thing that makes me happy. Like exercising, endorphins, progress, are just the things that excite me. So if there's anything that I can do to reduce the likelihood of these things happening, then I will.

And so if people are listening and they're like, oh, you know, I'm running and I've got this little niggle and it's just not going away what would you sort of advise someone who was feeling that like do you do you avoid anything or do you are there actions you can take there's lots that we can do and there's probably doing it's not going to be rocket science I'm not going to say some like magical solution that like it's like oh my god I'm never getting injured again it's doing sleep sleep regularly eight hours a day and try and have regular like go to bed times wake up times and that's just going to be so good for all areas of your life you want to make sure you're doing some mobility so we don't just want to run we don't just want to do our strength training all the time we want to make

sure that we're actually like lengthening our muscles as well and creating good range of motion with everything that we're doing um relatively doing strength training is going to be so good because it's going to make us stronger to be able to absorb the impact of running but at the same time a lot of strength movements will be a really good way to stretch while strengthening so doing full range of motion things like a straight leg deadlift or between a bulgarian split squat and stretching out your hip flexors at the bottom of the lunge some of these movements can be a great way to strengthen the body while also mobilizing the body at the same time. So thinking about your sleeping, thinking about your strength, your

mobility, and then the final one would be your nutrition. Drinking plenty of water and also making sure we're getting plenty of protein, fueling before and after our runs. There are things that people have heard a thousand times before um going and getting a massage can be helpful but again it's like an extra thing that comes after those four staples and then kind of massage guns and all the compression stuff that you can get there all these extra layers the extra one percent that you can do but like the nutrition the strength the sleeping um they are not one percent they're like doing 25 percent and it's only doing nail those things and then don't spend your money on these expensive extra little bits until you've

got those things right the other one is to really make sure you're building up gradually not um doing not being like right new year new me january the first i'm going to run 5k every day for a month like for almost anyone that will just guarantee you get injured especially if you've not been running that often beforehand and so during whether it's doing following a plan with runner working with a coach or between learning and building up your own plan making sure that you build up things gradually don't go from zero to 100 and also make sure that you have a down week every few weeks or what we call a deload week to make things easier let your body adapt all that hard training kind of check in with your body see how you're feeling and then continuing to build up from there. So hopefully all those things will reduce the

likelihood of getting injured in the first place. Then should you start to get an injury, and a niggle is kind of a funny word for like a small injury, but yeah, relatively, if you start to feel an unusual pain that doesn't just feel like tired muscles, and it feels like something sharper or something unstable, at that point we really should like initially like really ease back because the thing that we want to try and do is address it really early before it becomes this longer term bigger problem that becomes harder to solve so you mean you start to get a little bit of pain whether it's in your shoulder press or your squats whether it's with your running reduce your intensity and reduce the volume that you're doing as well. So that's kind of like the speed work, which is going to be the intervals or tempo

workouts that you do, which are the relatively the most intense workouts that are going to put the biggest stress on your body. So really kind of reduce those, but then also think about reducing the total mileage that we're doing, and that will reduce the pressure on our body. And hopefully a few weeks of that should mean that a smaller injury or a little ache or a pain might start to improve and then gradually build back up again it might be the case that what you were doing before was too much for you and so maybe don't just jump back to what you were doing before and gradually ease things back up I would say if you've had an injury for doing more than two weeks and it's not getting better just by kind of easing off a little bit that's the point at which I'd always recommend to kind of go and see a physio and it's not getting better just by kind of easing off a little bit that's

the point at which i'd always recommend to kind of go and see a physio um and it's a it is an expensive service um but at the same time for someone who really gets a lot of happiness and health out of it it is really worth investing earlier rather than being like for six months i'm going to leave my sore foot alone and then actually realizing right now you've really got like, first of all, you've missed out on six months of enjoying these things. And then you might spend a lot longer working through a few months with a physio, which is going to cost a lot more money. And you might need to go and buy these new shoes and these fancy insoles or whatever it's going to be to overcome this thing that's become a bigger injury. So I would really encourage people to like hit these things

head on. And it can be a really hard thing to to do which is in you're in the middle of this marathon that you've signed up for and you're raising loads of money for charity and you've told all your friends and you've told your Strava followers and your Instagram followers that you're you're running a marathon and then to have to be like I've got this slightly uneasy feeling in the side of my knee and try to be like right I'm going to ease off for a few weeks but like that's key to prevent it being like you smash through this sore knee and then there's not sore knee becomes a really sore knee and then you've got to pull out all together or um you get through the marathon you don't see anyone about it you just soldier on because you're strong-willed and you can suck up the pain and then actually you've got to spend three months off running working with a

expensive physio for for a long time to get back up and running um so it's one of these things like hit it head on um and relatively um will really help you to enjoy running that much more longer term as well um i've got some quick fire questions but before i do that i would love to know what's um one of your happiest like running memories be it from a race or just something that really is prominent in your mind maybe like the proudest or the the one of the best feelings I've had in like kind of running running journeys as well would probably be finishing my first marathon um and at the time I was 22 I'd kind of just graduated uni newly started as working as a PT and um even doing some kind of like running specific coaching as well and I think at the time my best half marathon was like 122 and I kind of thought I could go and run my first marathon and I was ambitiously aiming for a three-hour marathon which is a really like

huge milestone to do as your first marathon and everyone's first marathon is always just that little bit harder than they think it's going to be and I was a little bit naive and I hadn't I didn't know everything that I know now so I had never ran more than a half marathon on the start line of the marathon I thought I'll run the half marathon at 1 1 30 and then I'll run the second half marathon at 1 30 and I'll be fine and whatever um and I told my little sister who was there cheering me on that I was going to run exactly three hours um and I think she knows that I'm strong-willed hard as nails and if i said that's what i'm going to do that's what i was going to do um and they her and my dad were cheering me on

around the course at different points and did the first half i think in like 128 and a half minutes so relatively on track and sticking to the plan um and i think i didn't see her after maybe 25k where she gave me a lucas aid on the course or whatever um i um she's then on the finish line kind of expecting me to finish at 2 59 and i'm not there um and i'm slowing down a little bit in the second half and i ended up coming in in like three hours and 12 minutes so still really great time for my first marathon um and anyway she's there kind of on the finish line being oh my god ben's like ben must have died like what the hell's happened to him i haven't seen him and like he's really slowing down um and like ben would never not turn up um and um at the same time there's always like ambulances going off and people panicking and so i think like there must

have been an ambulance that like siren right past the finish line at during the three hour point oh my god ben's died um and anyway i like come to the finish line and i'm like have loads of my uni friends cheering me on I'm so happy that I finished this first marathon it was hard and I thought it was going to be absolutely delighted and I see my sister like right by the finish line cheering me on but like crying um across the line and literally like reach over the barrier and give her a hug and I'm like why are you crying just I thought you died and I was just like I'm like I'm so sorry for being late so sorry for like making you worry and I was just like I'm like I'm so sorry for being late so sorry

for like making you worry and I'm like so delighted and so happy that then we both just had this like big tearful cry and we like hugged over the um hugged over the kind of like finish line barriers um anyway then she went on to um she's kind of six years younger than me but she went on to do her first marathon um 18 months ago now when she was kind of 21 uh on her on her 21st birthday so that was amazing to get to see her um finish the marathon in Valencia on her 21st birthday oh I love that that's so cool it's so funny as well how like our first you know for people that are nervous getting into like sport or fitness or whatever it's so funny that like even when you're like super experienced often those first memories are like your fondest you know and it just I always say to people enjoy

the journey because you've got such a wonderful journey ahead of you you know being a beginner is the most exciting time you've got so much ahead of you and you can also improve so much faster at the start like yeah do you mean like begin again imagine well exactly but like you get to your first 5k like you're going to be able to double how far you run and go on to run a 10k whereas like i'm probably not going to double how far i run ever as in like i've my longest runs like 127k like i don't think i'm going to run a 250 kilometer run that would be a bit impractical if i'm lucky i'll get to shave a few minutes off my marathon time in the rest of my life um that i'm doing I'm not going to be able to take 40 minutes off a marathon time um or whatever which is something that people can do when they're slightly

earlier on in their running journey um but at the same time nothing changes like it's amazing to push yourself to doing a little bit better and to go on to see what you can you can achieve and um obviously the better you get the harder you've got to work to get an improvement but at the same time that makes that improvement feel all the more satisfying so it's it's almost like we're all at completely different stages of our own different journeys but it's all the same i love that okay right Some quick fire questions. Running alone or running with someone? I would go to say running with someone. Although I do love putting my favorite playlist.

Main character moment. Yeah, I do love listening to my same playlist that I know 101 times and going out and smashing that in the sunshine with some sunglasses. What do you like to listen to when you're running? I do like a lot of cheese music. I did say at the event last night

um that yeah i will i'll listen to listen to abba listen to the greatest showman listen to listen to share um um i i finished my marathon pb with my it was in the lockdown so i was running a virtual marathon uh with my best friend driving his mini next to me music on full volume listening to share believe uh so anyway that's uh that's some good vibes love it love it probably shouldn't tell that to the world so this might have been might have been a mistake we'll have to take this down no the girls will be so impressed they'll love it um mountain run or beach run oh i think i'm a i'm a heavier guy like we said so i like keeping it flat um so i definitely say a beach run and then you can jump in the sea afterwards yeah but like running on sand is that hard it's very good for you um well so if you were to run like almost like you know like

when the waves come up and make the sand a bit wet so it's like hard but soft running along that barefoot can be such a good way to make your feet strong strengthen your calves um and it can also just feel so lovely oh wow so no like you probably look absolutely crazy if you went and did a run in your bikini up along the beach. You probably look like you're looking for attention or something. But no, it can be a really clever way to do some really good training.

Oh, amazing. But no, and then there's nothing better than when you're all hot and sweaty afterwards going and jumping in the sea. What's your favourite distance? Oh, that's really mean. I would say that my favourite event and the thing that means the most to me

is an Ironman, which I also hate in the way that like is savage it's frightening is so hard but that's what makes it feel so amazing at the end of it um but i would say my favorite running event to do would be a half marathon because it's like the sweet spot between it's a great achievement you feel like you've really worked really hard but you also don't get broken or relatively by being a more experienced runner doing a half marathon for me now doesn't break me in the same way I'll be running two or three days later um I mean I get the amazing atmosphere I get to enjoy the endorphins I get to really push myself get a medal um but also it's like something that I can you know I could do five or six half marathons a year and it's not probably gonna break me or push myself as much whereas I

could never do more than two Ironmans in a year and I probably shouldn't do more than two or three marathons um so I think like my favorite running distance half marathon but my favorite event as a whole would be my kind of like one Ironman that I'll kind of look to do a year nice yeah I have heard that about the sweet spot I've heard people say Sid do the half marathon you'll love it like it's a nice distance to do yeah I think like the full marathon is this thing that relatively gets so like so much kind of like attention because it is the distance but it is so hard it is relatively a high injury risk it is I mean you really need to commit high injury risk. It is, I mean, you really need to commit a lot of your life towards it. And running doesn't need to be like that. Like running

can be this one stream of a fit, healthy, happy life. You could do your spinning classes. You can do your two or three days in the gym and push yourself to get a bit fitter in the summer, run a little bit more and push yourself for a 10K and a half marathon. And like, I would say only if you do that and you realize that I love it, I can go further i want to push myself more go and do the marathon don't do the marathon because you need to tick a box and everyone you need to prove to your friends that that's what you can do like do what makes you happy and i think like a half marathon or it's such a nice um happy distance that it also will relatively won't take over your life in the same way and hopefully much less likelihood to to get injured but at the end of the day running is a

high injury risk sport you're jumping up and down essentially for a really long way and that's stressful on the body and it's very rare that even Olympians will get injured every few years no matter how good their training is and so it's maybe one of the things that makes us grateful not to be injured the rest of the time. But it's one of those journeys we have to go on. Yeah. What's your go-to running snack? My go-to running snack. So mid-run, I'm pretty good at smashing a gel

and I always quite like enjoy the taste of them. So I'll go for my SIS gels. And the tropical one genuinely just tastes like Haribo so I I know a lot of people don't like having gels I don't don't struggle at all but um I think also having like just doing a big big cyclist like my cycling and I'm very used to having my snacks and eating eating on the bike um that I'm doing I don't struggle having snacks on the go love it um and then this is the final one. Miles or kilometers? I'm in kilometers.

I don't know. You get to do a lot more. So you can be in a marathon, you could do 42 or you could do 26. And I want 42 pats on the back than 26 pats on the back. This is the final part. We asked our community if they had any questions that they wanted to ask you. So one of the questions, this is runner app run an app specific is from sarvo i think will there be a triathlon plan that includes swimming and cycling sessions added to runner yeah absolutely

so i'm a ironman coach and passionate ironman as i've said um so absolutely in the long term um but at the same time there is a lot that we want to bring to runner so with that in mind like there's a few things that we want to do to elevate the running journey um like we talked about adapting around your sleep your stress your menstrual cycle all of these other things and they are really complicated um so with that in mind that's what's coming first um so then the triathlon side of things will probably come doing that in the kind of months or years. But at the same time, very much coming. We kind of like relatively in three to five years, we want to have this amazing service that whatever you're training for, running, triathlon,

cross training, whatever it's going to be, you can come on. We give you the perfect training. It's going to adapt around all your real life circumstances and take you that way. We do already have our kind of running for triathlon training so if you're training for a sprint distance triathlon or an olympic triathlon half ironman ironman we'll set you the running training to do around your cycling and swimming but we won't set the cycling and swimming just yet but longer term but not not not not a few months but maybe okay amazing um this is from. Beginner and heels how to tackle that best way to not feel like I can't breathe? Yeah so heels are a tricky one a lot of training and

also primarily the way that we'll think about setting workouts within the runner app will be about pace so telling you to do you mean think about doing your tempo workouts and running at this pace or thinking about a particular pace for your easy run but ultimately as soon as you start going up a hill pace is going to be kind of thrown out the window you're going to go much much slower up the hill and then much faster down the hill so relatively thinking about training in rpe um which i guess you'll know from the gym so thinking about your kind of relative effort so maybe on an easy run we're thinking about running at a four or five intensity out of ten and ultimately when you're going up the hill go much much slower and as a result the kind of

things to think about would be your technique, really trying to stand up nice and tall, driving your hips forwards and taking lots of steps. If you go and take huge, big, long, leapy, boundy steps, you're going to absolutely cook your muscles. So instead, really think about your form, standing up tall, keep breathing, slow it down, and then almost kind of just try and try and push through if you're wanting to go and push yourself for some intervals or your tempo workouts it may well be and something that I'll always try and do if I'm going on holiday or if I'm staying somewhere new for a while I'll try and find a nice good flat area that I can go and do and whether it's even laps of the same area or out and backs it can be really productive to find a stretch near you that you can use for some of those other sessions as well. Amazing. This is from G. DeGrun.

I don't even know how to say that. How to manage strength training and running in the week. I feel like this is something that I definitely hear mutterings of about like the fact that the two can't coexist. Is that something? Yeah, so there's kind of like there's two things there's one which i always love to talk about which is um cardio kills gains uh which is nonsense i guess and the other one would be kind of like how to balance the training of the two so we'll come on to that one i always thought of it or knew it was a thing when i was doing in my gym era and i was from

16 to 21 i didn't really do much running and instead it was just be big and strong look a certain way get huge muscles gets always said like don't really do much running. And instead it was just be big and strong, look a certain way, get huge muscles. It was always said like, don't do too much cardio, your muscles will fall off. And it is completely nonsense. We will grow our muscles by progressive overload and by having plenty of protein, sleep, rest, and all those other things. What can happen is if we do loads more running,

we then stop doing as much strength training. We maybe don't consume as much protein. We don't give that same progressive overload. And as a result, we don't progress in the gym as fast. But so it's not that the running has stolen our muscles away. It's that we've actually just done less strength training because we're now doing, imagine you start doing four runs a week

and you've gone down from six gym sessions a week to two, your muscles are going to progress a little less speedily. Or you might even see your muscles get a little smaller. Additionally, if you're exercising more and burning more calories, you're going to progress a little less speedily or you might even see your muscles get a little smaller. Additionally if you're exercising more and burning more calories you're going to potentially if you don't change what you're eating you're going to lose some body fat and that again can make our bodies change as a result but yeah it's not that doing cardio means your muscles disappear but doing less strength training not consuming our protein and not really kind of smashing that progressive overload and all of that hypertrophy will mean that we're not progressing in the gym in the same way. And as a result, if your goal is to get big and to be really big and strong

and you're running, you just got to really keep up the volume in the gym and make sure you're eating plenty. Then the other side to it was how to actually balance the two. And I think, and relatively, I'm sure the way that you'll think about it and the way I always thought about it in the gym was we're lifting till failure a lot of the time. You're cooking your muscles. They're going to be absolutely fried. So then have to go and do a run the next morning. Like, how are you doing that when you've got these jelly legs that can hardly walk up and down stairs?

And doing those two at the same time and having to really push yourself when you're running, that's impossible. And so relatively, it's a case that like, we relatively should make sure that we're doing our lifting with slightly less intensity. So I would always say to kind of like look to lift to about 80% of failure, because that way you're going to get a lot of the training benefit, but not as much of the fatigue and as much of the DOMS. Obviously, depending on the amount we're training, if we are are imagine you're doing three gym sessions and two or three runs a week looking to kind of not do those sessions on the same days and if we're doing enough sessions that we're now starting to have to double up gym and run on the

same day try and keep your easier runs on the days of those gym sessions or even keep those maybe upper body sessions the ones right before your longer run or your really hard intense interval sessions to try and balance that intensity over the week. Yeah. Looking to kind of like almost think about keeping your fatigue as flat as possible throughout the week. So not doing all your gym at the start of the week and all you're running at the other end or definitely don't go and smash your squats on the same day. You've got your long run because something is not going to go as well. So just kind of looking to balance it. But the key is kind of like looking to do those strength sessions, particularly those lower body strength sessions that are going to use such similar muscles to 80% rather than to that 100%

failure, because then you're going to have these super, super sore DOMS to follow. And the only other flip side is that with running, it is not only is it jumping around for doing 10 minutes for half an hour for 10 kilometers, whatever it's going to be, but it's also always on one leg. You're jumping on your left leg, then you're jumping on your right leg. And you're also looking for power. Whenever you run, you lift your left knee up with your right arm. So you're looking for this diagonal power.

And so as a result, we want to make sure we do a little bit more core strength to connect the power, to be able to stabilize our body so we're not rocking side to side as we're running. But also we want to do lots of single leg work so that we're strong enough to do these pushes off one leg at a time so with reference to thinking about how you build up your gym routines thinking about doing a bit more single leg work your lunges your single leg deadlifts your kind of your split squats that types of thing single leg calf loading and all of that will really help to become a stronger stronger body to become a stronger uh stronger body to become a stronger runner as well amazing oh that was actually i didn't even know any of that that's

so interesting um where what do you have like going on where can people find you yeah so um you can um you can find runner by searching are you-a in the app store uh or google it whatever you fancy um i'm the head coach at runner so i'm i'm ben parker fitness um and if you want to have a two-week free uh trial to try out runner um what code have we aligned on gglr gglr um so just whack that in when you download the app and you'll get two weeks to try runner for free you can set up the strength you can set up the running um and again you can also chat to us at any point inside the app and you'll get two weeks to try runner for free you can set up the strength you can set up the running and again you can also chat to us at any point inside the app and we're there as a team to help you amazing thank you so so much it's been so helpful and i know loads of girls will like massively appreciate you coming on so yeah thank you thank you for having me and hopefully

we can uh we can get you running at some point as well absolutely hopefully thank you so much for watching i hope you enjoyed that episode as much as we did. If you want to find us, you can find us at Dreamgirls Locker Room on all platforms. What else did I want to say? Oh, I wanted to say, do us a favour. If you enjoyed the episode, give us a five-star review on whatever platform

you're listening or watching on and be sure to subscribe or follow. This really helps in pushing us out to new audiences and means that we can help you get even bigger and better guests apart from that i think that's everything and i will see you in the next episode bye