The Nick Bare Podcast - 035: How To Build Endurance and Run Faster For Longer
Episode Date: October 16, 2023Every runner desires to run faster for longer. Especially those preparing for an upcoming race. In this episode, I'm sharing the five things that helped me shed 90 minutes off my marathon time and... how you can apply them to your endurance journey. Enjoy! Save 10% at BPN Supps: https://bit.ly/nickbare10audio Follow for more: IG: https://www.instagram.com/nickbarefitness/ YT: https://www.youtube.com/@nickbarefitness Topics: 00:00 Intro 1:20 5 tips to increase endurance 5:53 True meaning of “endurance” 8:54 Increase volume 16:56 Nutrition strategy 28:43 Implement speed work 35:47 Body composition 40:03 Endure the process 43:20 Final words
Transcript
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This goes back to that conversation I had with a gentleman in Leadville, Colorado in 2021,
when he said, the secret to all of this is endurance.
That man was wise.
That man was telling me, he was telling us to endure the process, endure the journey.
Now, he was talking specifically about the 100 miles that I was about to endure the next day.
But running in itself is a journey.
It's a process.
Getting better at anything in life is enduring the process.
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I appreciate you and let's dive into the show.
What is going on guys and welcome back
to another episode.
Today we are talking about
how to run faster for longer,
which is ultimately endurance.
Now, we just filmed and created a YouTube video that complements this podcast episode.
So we'll be talking about similar things in this episode that I discussed and brought up in the YouTube video.
But the reason I love the podcast platform is because it's longer format.
I can really dive into more and add some more context into the final.
tips that I've identified that I want to share with you that I've learned over these past
couple years that have allowed me and helped me run faster for longer. Now, if you don't know my
background, my first marathon was in 2018. This was the Austin Marathon. And I ran three hours,
57 minutes. And it was an absolute soup sandwich. It was a mess. It was uncomfortable.
I didn't know how to train.
I definitely didn't train properly.
Everything I knew about running came from my time in the military.
And it was just, it was very challenging, hard, difficult, uncomfortable as marathon should be,
but I didn't prepare for this race the way that I should have or know now.
In the following year, I decided to run the Austin Marathon again, and I did worse.
I ran four hours and 15 minutes.
And now, as many of you know, I'm in a marathon prep with a goal of sub two hours and 45 minutes.
My last marathon was in May of 2022.
That was Buffalo, New York.
And I ran 248.
So I've made a lot of progress in that time that I've been running.
I've learned a lot.
And I want to share, like I said, five things.
five tips that you can implement starting right now that are going to make a difference today,
but it's part of a process of getting better over a long period of time, enduring the process,
enduring the journey, which we will get to.
But we're going to talk about those things and kind of what I've learned up until this point.
Now the one thing I do want to discuss prior to jumping into these five things,
I get DMs, I see comments, I get questions all the time about these things that will
and can incrementally make you a better runner, but I don't believe are the foundational pieces.
I get questions like, what shorts should I be wearing?
What shoes should I be wearing?
What socks should I be wearing?
What watch do you use and should I buy?
It's all these small incremental things that are the icing on the cake
that will make an incremental difference, but it's not foundational.
Today what we're going to be talking about is the foundational.
And a lot of it might not be sexy.
It might not be super cool, but it works.
And the longer you practice it, the longer you endure it and implement these principles,
it's just compounding consistency.
It compounds and compounds and compounds.
Right now, I was just talking to my running coach,
Jeff Cunningham, this morning.
I said, Jeff, I'm in the best running shape of my life.
Like, this is the best I've ever felt.
I'm hitting all my workout splits.
I'm ahead of pace.
My easy runs feel easier than ever.
My heart rate's staying low.
My fueling and nutrition protocol and strategy is on point.
I said, well, what are you doing differently?
And I said, nothing, really.
And he said, this is the result of just compounding consistently, consistency,
showing up consistently good rather than occasionally great and just stacking bricks.
So if you take anything away from this episode, so you got to be patient.
And I have a story that paints that picture.
Now, in 2021, I ran the Leadville 100 Ultra Marathon.
Amazing experience.
One of the greatest experiences in my entire life.
And the day before the race happened or kicked off, we were scouting the course and we were
looking at different checkpoints and just doing a recon of elevation and what I was
about to experience the following day.
when we came across his older gentleman
who I believe was working at the park
and it's funny because we actually recorded
this interaction
and he saw us walking around
with our cameras and just scouting the location
with all of our maps out
and he goes
what are you guys doing here? Is one of you racing tomorrow?
And I said yeah I'm running
and we just started talking a little bit
some small talk
and he left us with some final work
He said, you know what the secret is to tomorrow
and the secret to the people who cross the finish line
after embarking on this massive,
big journey of 100 miles
in the Rocky Mountains of Leadville, Colorado?
He said it's his thing called endurance.
And we all chuckled, we all laughed
because we're like, yeah, we understand,
like this is an endurance event, this is an endurance race.
It's a 100-mile trek at high altitude.
covering trails.
And as I've thought about it
over time since then,
I realized what he was telling us
was more applicable
to a lot more things than just a race.
It wasn't just about
finishing the Leadville 100
Ultramarathon.
Endurance is applicable
to all parts of life.
your professional career,
building a family, having kids,
marriage, being in a relationship,
building a business.
Endurance is patience.
It's consistency.
It's the work over a long period of time.
It's wisdom.
I put together this quote after analyzing all of that.
And I said that,
Endurance is an outcome forged by those who are wise enough to endure the process.
Endurance is an outcome forged by those who are wise enough to endure the process.
There is wisdom and endurance.
There is patience, like I said, you have to be consistent and committed to the journey to the process to see a massive result and outcome.
And if you apply these things we're about to talk about,
you will experience endurance,
specifically around running.
So the first tip I got, the first thing for you guys,
it's to increase volume,
being weekly mileage or time on feet.
Now, as you start running,
a good rule of thumb is that you don't want to increase
your running mileage or time more than 10,
10% from week to week.
There's a few reasons for this.
One, it helps to mitigate risk of injury.
There's a lot of running injuries that happen.
I've experienced a lot of them.
I have some wear and tear right now that I'm dealing with.
But one of the ways you get injuries, you experience injuries, is from overuse.
And this is increasing volume too much.
I'll tell you right now the reason that I'm,
I don't want to say injured,
but I have some knee issues right now.
I have some calf issues, some tendon issue.
It's an overuse injury from a 100 mile race that I did six weeks ago.
I mean, talk about increasing mileage way more than 10% in a given time,
and I'm feeling the effects of that right now.
So the reason I say don't increase weekly running mileage more than 10% week to week,
really is to mitigate risk of injury,
but two, to allow your body to adapt
to the stimulus that you are providing it,
being volume.
We want progressive overload.
And the way that you progressively overload the body,
the muscular system, the central nervous system is slow,
but it's progressive, it's intentional, it's strategic.
Like, if you have a strong strategic,
marathon build or a running program, you will see in that program or that build that your weekly
mileage increases slowly throughout the build before you taper because it's intentional.
There's a purpose for it.
But if you do that too quickly, well, that's when you can get injured or you won't be able to
recover fast enough or properly.
So that's my first tip.
Don't increase weekly running mileage more than 10% weak to work.
week. Now another reason I'm saying you need to increase volume being mileage or time on feet
is because for a lot of runners as you progress and you start running more and you start selecting
some races you might want to do or maybe you don't want to do races and you just want to run longer
distances. You know, we're talking about how to run faster for longer. Well, one of the ways we do
that is by building the stamina, one through our V-O-2 Macs,
and our aerobic capacity,
but also lower body strength,
muscular.
For a lot of runners, myself included,
if I'm going out on a lactate threshold
or a tempo workout or even say a race,
it's not really that my breathing is holding me back.
Yes, my heart rate will elevate
and it will significantly shoot up on different efforts
or different splits and segments of a race or a run.
Yes, that does have.
happen. But ultimately why end up slowing down or stopping is because of muscular fatigue in my
legs. So by increasing volume over time, progressive overload, getting more miles in, more time
on feet, your legs, your muscles will adapt to that amount of volume. It will make you a stronger
runner. So that's another reason to increase volume to be able to run faster for longer. And the last
I'm going to talk about in regards to volume is applying the 80-20 principle.
I've talked about this extensively.
But the 80-20 principle says and states that 80% of your runs should be done at a low-intensity
aerobic condition being below your max aerobic heart rate, and then 20% of your running
should be focused on speed work, lactate threshold, critical velocity, spending time on
the track or on a road at faster paces.
But 80%, majority of your running should be done.
Most of this volume, like as we're increasing volume, most of that volume is going to be
in a bucket of that 80% low and slow because we want to build this aerobic base.
We want to build your aerobic capacity.
So here's how we do this, the Mathetone equation.
So it's 180 minus your age.
180 minus your age, that number that you get, that is your max aerobic heart rate.
What does that mean for you?
It means that your heart rate should not go above that number when you're trying to run an aerobic zone.
Now, when I applied this method and this philosophy, philosophy, it game changed my
running. You would think, hold on, you're telling me to run slower than I have been running and
I'm going to get faster? Yes, it makes the biggest difference. When I started actually running slower
on my quote-unquote easy runs and logged more aerobic miles, I got faster. My aerobic base became so
strong. So here's how you implement this. You take 180 minus your age, that number is your
max aerobic heart rate. That number is very important because when you go out on these easy
runs, you don't want your heart rate to go above that. You want to keep it maybe 10 beats per
minute below that. And the best way to measure it is through a chest strap heart rate
monitor. You can use your watch. Most watches have a built-in heart rate monitor, which is not
extremely accurate. I will monitor it, but I take it with a grain of salt. If you want to be
accurate, we're a chest strap heart rate monitor. And as you're running, just look at your watch
every so often because your watch will sink to your chest strap. And just make sure that your heart
rate is below your max aerobic heart rate, that number you got through the equation. And stay in that
zone on these easy runs.
Now, when I do my tempo workouts or my track workouts at faster paces, higher intensities,
I don't really monitor heart rate.
I don't really care about heart rate.
I'm focused more on effort.
But for these easy runs, log them low and slow.
Now, me personally, I wore a heart rate monitor for maybe two years off and on.
I don't wear it anymore just because I, I, I,
now know what below my max aerobic heart rate feels like.
I know what aerobic feels like just because I've been doing it for so long.
So it's rare now that I wear a chest strap heart rate monitor because I'm so just conscious
of what that feels like, that effort feels like.
So I don't necessarily do that anymore.
But if you're brand new to running and you want to make sure you're staying in that zone,
that's what you should do.
So the goal is with that first tip, we want to.
increase mileage.
Do it slow over a long period of time,
but you will see a great return
as you log more base building aerobic miles
and your legs get stronger
by being able to handle the stimulus of more volume.
Tip number two is fuel and nutrition.
Now, in a lot of my content recently,
as many of you probably know,
I have been hammering in proper fueling strategies and nutrition.
Because I'm such a believer in it.
It's one thing that I used to fail at horribly in terms of endurance training and conditioning.
And it's one thing that you can implement right away where you're going to see a return.
Now when it comes to running, when it comes to endurance training,
and again, we're talking about how to run faster for longer.
What ends up happening with a lot of people is that they don't fuel properly.
And we don't fuel properly, you end up bonking.
You can't make it through training sessions.
Because thinking about it in terms of a vehicle,
we want to fuel a vehicle to get from point A to point B.
If we don't put fuel in that vehicle, it's going to break down along the way.
It's going to be running on fumes.
The engine will blow up or break down.
We can't get there.
The only way you can get from point A to point B is by putting fuel in your vehicle to cover the distance.
Our bodies are the same way.
And proper nutrition and fueling strategies, that is one thing.
you can do right now that you're going to see an immediate result.
And it is a controllable that we can control.
There are a lot of things in life,
but a lot of things in terms of endurance training and conditioning
that we can't control.
We can't control the weather.
We can't always control when we run or where we run.
If you're traveling for work,
if you had a massive life transition recently,
new job, new hours,
had a kid, got married.
Like, things are all over the place.
We can't always set the conditions to have the best day for training.
But if there's one controllable that we can control, especially on race day, it is our fuel.
There's so many people that have a bad race and they want to blame that race on the course
or the weather or the way that it was managed.
and the event was hosted.
Well, those are things that are out of our control.
So it's not even useful talking about it.
But what's something that is in our control?
The amount of sleep we got the night before,
a big run or a workout or race,
the food that we put in our body,
the days leading up to that morning of during the race itself,
how we hydrated,
the amount of water we consumed,
staying off our feet and conserving energy.
So control the controllables, set the conditions for your chances of success to increase, even if it's just a run the next morning.
Fuel and nutrition is one of those.
That's why I hammer it in so much.
It's because it's something that you can manipulate and control to increase your chances of success towards your goal.
Now, in terms of fuel and nutrition,
we can break this down into two different things.
One, general nutrition throughout the day, every day,
especially in a build or a prep,
and then nutrition specifically around training workouts or races.
Now, we're going to talk about a few things.
I could go in so many different directions
in terms of talking about nutrition.
but we're going to focus on carbohydrates, water, and electrolytes.
Now, me personally, my protein is always consistent.
I'm always hitting between 225 and 250 grams of protein a day.
Every day, I have a plan to hit that protein intake.
Dietary fat right now, I've actually decreased the amount of dietary fat that I'm consuming
because I'm trying to change my body composition,
which we will talk about here in a little bit,
to show up on race day lighter and leaner.
So I've decreased dietary fat
because dietary fat is more chlorically dense
than carbohydrates or protein.
There's nine calories in a gram of fat,
there's four calories in a gram of protein or carbs.
And fun fact, there's seven calories in a gram.
than a gram of alcohol, if you didn't know that.
So my diet right now is consistent protein,
a little bit lower fat.
It's probably around 85, 90 grams of fat a day.
Average, when we go on to dinner,
I know that I'm going to be getting more dietary fat in my diet,
but my carbs right now are very high, for me at least.
I'm usually someone, if I'm not in a big endurance training block,
I'll keep carbs moderate,
maybe 300 grams a day,
250, 300 grams a day.
I just personally prefer
lots of protein,
veggies, fruit,
higher fat,
fattier meats, steaks,
ground beef,
egg yolks, avocado,
nut butters,
butter,
the good stuff,
you know,
all the good stuff.
But now,
based off my goal,
my carbs are higher.
My carbs are 500 to 600 grams
of carbs a day
because my running volume is higher.
Right now I'm running about 75 miles a week.
And I'm tapping into a lot of my fuel sources.
And one of the ways that we provide our body a fuel source is through glycogen.
Now, glycogen is the way that your body stores carbohydrates.
And we store carbohydrates in the form of glycogen in the liver,
maybe about 100 grams in the liver
and then a couple hundred grams in the muscles
and your body is first going to use the glucose
that's circulating around your body
as a quick source of energy
but when that's not available anymore
it's going to break down glycogen
from the liver and the muscles and use that as energy
so I want to ensure
because I'm doing some big workouts right now
like Wednesday for example
this past week I had a 14 and a half mile
a lactate threshold workout.
Tomorrow, as I'm recording this podcast,
I have a 20-mile workout
with a bunch of miles at marathon pace.
So I have some higher intensity
and longer duration workouts right now.
So I want to ensure that my body is topped off
on its fuel sources.
My glycogen's topped off
so that when my body needs to reach for fuel
during one of these training sessions or workouts,
it can do that and it's available.
So that's why I'm throughout the day consuming a lot of carbohydrates
because I want to top off my muscle and liver glycogen
for a fuel reserve.
So that's kind of the way that I'm approaching everyday nutrition right now.
And most of my foods are coming from these whole natural food sources.
But sometimes, you know, when carbs are higher,
I will pull from some processed foods to get more carbs in,
like a granola, which isn't highly processed,
but it's somewhat processed.
A lot of, like, my carbs right now are coming from,
like in the morning I have honey, oats, fruit,
lunch is rice,
my third meal of the day, I'll have like rice cakes,
I'll have an Ezekiel English muffin, some dried mango.
Dinner will either have rice or potatoes and some sourdough.
And at night before going to bed, I've been crushing purely Elizabeth granola.
Oh my gosh, like the white chocolate chip and the pumpkin-flavored ones.
I eat that at night with some raw, unpasteurized milk we get at the farmer's market.
Talk about a treat.
Talk about a delight.
those carbs so good.
That granola is so good.
But my carbs are high
to make sure I'm topping off
that muscle glycogen
throughout the day.
And then talking about
nutrition specifically around
workouts, I will not
do any workout fasted right now.
So every morning
before my run,
I have at least
two scoops of G1M sport.
So two scoops of G1M sport
gives me 40,
grams of carbs and then 700 milligrams of sodium and based off of what run i'm doing that day i'll either add
some sourdough with some jam and honey along with that i'll have some of the bpn go gels each go gel
has 24 grams of carbs 110 milligrams of sodium throughout the workout or throughout the run
for these easy aerobic runs most of my fuel is done that morning before i get started
for my lactate threshold, critical velocity, big workouts throughout the week,
that's what I'm also adding in fueling throughout the workout itself with gels or electrolytes.
But I'm making sure that carbs are always present.
I'm a carb lover.
I believe in carbs, especially around training, not just to enhance performance, but also to
facilitate proper recovery.
I'm staying on top of my hydration all day, every day with water consumption and electrolytes.
As we talked about in a previous podcast, that was really all about fueling for endurance.
One of the issues a lot of people make is they consume a lot of water, but they don't prioritize
electrolytes.
What ends up happening is they dilute their electrolyte concentration, and then they become actually
dehydrated because it's too much water, not a lot of,
enough electrolytes.
So I'm consuming electrolytes around training and throughout the day to maintain proper
hydration levels.
So with all that to say, we need to look at fuel and nutrition from a few different
perspectives.
One, it is essential.
It is essential and critical for endurance training if you want to maximize your performance.
Two, it is a controllable that we can control.
It's a variable that we are in control of.
So we should leverage and control it.
And then three, we need to think about nutrition and fueling in terms of day to day, all day, every day, and how that helps us reach our goals.
But then even on top of that, how we use nutrition and proper fueling around runs and workouts and training itself to maximize the performance of that.
training session and to facilitate proper recovery.
So that's tip number two.
Focus on fuel and nutrition.
Tip number three is to implement speed work.
Now speedwork can mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people.
And this is one topic that I've seen people argue about more than many others when it comes
to running online.
So the way I like to think about speed work, it's anything.
faster than your aerobic base building low and slow miles.
I like to think of it in terms of lactate threshold, which we will talk about, critical velocity,
which I always directly correlate to being on the track, and then tempo workouts.
But tempo workouts, I kind of look at tempo workouts and lactate threshold as the same thing.
Now, talking about lactate threshold, what is it?
If you understand and implement lactate threshold training,
it can unlock your running success
and help you break through performance plateaus.
It is so powerful.
This is where you build a lot of confidence
in your ability to run faster paces,
faster splits, faster miles.
This is where you get really confident
and comfortable at your ideal race pace.
And it helps you just with leg turn.
over. You know, when I'm always just running a lot of low and slow easy miles, because if I'm not in
a marathon build or prepping for some sort of endurance race, I don't typically do a lot of speedwork.
So when I jump back into a build, that lack of speedwork actually, there's a period of time
where you have to adjust because my legs aren't used to turning over that quickly.
So that's one of the reasons that speedwork is important
because it helps just keep your legs used to moving faster
and turning over more efficiently.
Lactate threshold is the point at which lactate is produced
and accumulates in the blood at a faster rate than it can be removed.
So as we're training and we're doing these bigger efforts
so you're running at a faster pace than what is easy or comfortable,
lactate starts to be produced and it accumulates in the blood.
And it accumulates at a rate faster than we can clear it.
And this is why you start feeling fatigued in the muscles.
This is why your legs start to feel heavy and tired and slow
and you can't hold a certain pace.
So we need to train our body to adapt to feel this.
and understand it and get better with that stimulus
so that we can run faster for longer.
Now there's a lot of different tests that you can do
to find where your lactate threshold pace is
and I've done some of these and they're very insightful
but I'm also a person when it comes to running.
I look at data.
I look at my heart rate.
I look at my paces.
But I'm a big fan of just going based off of,
effort. Now, my coach, Jeff Cunningham, he will give me paces to hit for certain workouts
now that we're in this build, but I still like to run based off of feel. So if I can give you
one piece of advice on what lactate threshold training or workouts or paces should feel like
it's controlled discomfort. If you have a scale of 10, one being easy peasy,
10 being you're about to have blood shoot down your eyes because it's so hard.
Controlled discomfort or lactate threshold should be between a 7 and an 8.
And when we're talking lactate threshold or critical velocity, critical velocities where
I'm typically doing my track workouts, it's faster paces and shorter distances than lactate
threshold.
But I will tell you, I think lactate threshold training in workouts make the biggest difference
and getting faster and being able to hold that faster pace for longer.
But it's like, it's the icing on the cake.
It's the 20%.
80% of your running should still be this low and slow aerobic base building running,
but that 20% that refinement, that does make a big difference.
It's a speed work.
And lactate threshold is one of those things.
So the way that I incorporate this into my training program right now,
as I've talked about
Jeff Cunningham
has been my running coach
for the last couple years
he helped me achieve
the sub three hour marathon
he helped me run
248 in Buffalo
and he's now helping me
run a sub 245
at CIM
that I'm going to run
on December 3rd
my speed work every week
is done on a Wednesday
so Wednesdays are reserved
for
we rotate between
tempo or lactate threshold
and critical of
velocity. So one week I'm on the road doing longer distances, faster paces that are controlled
discomfort. And then the next week I'm on the track, shorter distances, even faster paces with
small amount of rest periods in between. Think of 800 meter repeats, 1,000 meter repeats,
2,000 meter repeats.
My lactate threshold work might be
2 miles, 3 miles,
4 mile segments.
And then Saturdays or Sundays right now
are reserved for long runs
or marathon-paced workouts.
But that's icy on the cake.
Like you don't, when you first start running,
if you want to
run faster for longer,
you don't first start doing speed work.
You first start accumulating more mileage.
and an aerobic zone.
And then as you progress,
maybe we start adding on some speed work,
some lactate threshold,
some critical velocity.
But it's like making a cake.
We've got to add that big layer
at the bottom first,
and that big layer at the bottom
is the aerobic work.
It's 80%.
And then we can build on top of that.
But if you put the small piece,
like the top of the cake down first,
that being the speed work,
lactate threshold,
track workouts,
and then you try to workouts.
And then you try to work on,
try to build upon that and at the top is this big base piece, well, it's going to fall over,
right?
It's just going to tip.
So we need to flip over that cake, put the base aerobic building piece down first and then stack
those smaller layers on top and it'll make incremental progress over time.
Speedwork is your friend, but I wouldn't say it's the most important piece necessarily.
Tip number four is all about body composition.
Now there is an ideal run or race or weight for everyone.
I would be ignorant and naive to say that at 220 pounds,
I can run just as fast as I can at 180 pounds.
It's a 40 pound difference.
That 40 pound difference, whether it's fat or muscle,
is going to slow you down.
Weight will slow you down.
Now me, I'm a bigger, bulkier runner.
Like, lean and light for me is 190, 195 pounds.
And I'm sitting around 195 pounds right now.
But it would be very, like I said, ignorant and naive of me
not to talk about this.
Because if your goal is to run faster for longer,
being very honest with yourself,
you have an ideal race weight or body composition.
When I'm leaner, when I'm lighter, my body moves differently.
My body moves faster.
I feel like I'm just like floating.
Right now I feel like that.
Like I said, I'm sitting around 195 pounds, which for me is lighter than I normally sit.
But I can feel that during my running.
My arms just move better.
My body moves better.
I feel light on my feet.
Running is more fun.
It's more enjoyable.
Now, I talk about and promote the hybrid athlete lifestyle all the time.
But within that, the hybrid athlete lifestyle obviously blends strength, size, muscle, endurance.
But with that, there's also chapters and seasons where I like to prioritize different goals.
Right now I'm in a chapter and a season where I'm trying to.
prioritizing running and I'm not lifting as much as I normally would be or would prefer,
but it's because there's a goal in front of me and that goal says sub 245 marathon.
And I know in order to get there, I need to log more miles, I need to get faster.
I need to be able to run faster for longer.
And part of getting there is changing and manipulating my body composition to be efficient
and effective.
So I'm trying to lose some size right now.
And you might see it.
You might see that I look thinner,
especially my face.
My face changes so fast.
Thinner, lighter.
Like I said, I'm not lifting as much as I normally would be
because the goal, the priority, is running fast
and running faster for longer.
So you can manipulate body composition a few different ways.
One, your training.
My training is naturally changed.
changing my body composition.
Like I said, I'm running more.
I'm lifting less.
My mileage is higher.
All of that training is making me a little smaller,
leaner, more efficient.
My biomechanics while running are smoother.
So the training itself will facilitate an outcome,
but also diet will as well.
That's why you see me, like I talked about earlier,
decreasing dietary fat,
increasing carbohydrates.
I'm still fueling my body for these workouts,
but I'm not overfueling
because I want to get leaner.
I want to get lighter.
That is the goal.
Run fast.
Run faster for longer.
Through diet and training,
you can manipulate and change your body composition
for the outcome
and the result that you desire.
It would be very ignorant and naive
of me to say that you can run
just as fast being 40 pounds, 50 pounds, 60 pounds, heavier.
That's just not the case.
Lighter equals faster.
But there's also a point of diminishing return when you get too light, you get unhealthy,
you're not fueled, your nutrition isn't strong.
When you're weak and not strong anymore,
there's a point of diminishing return.
You won't be faster.
You won't be able to run faster for longer.
You become weaker.
And the last piece that I want to talk about, which might be the most important piece of all, is enduring the process.
This goes back to that conversation I had with a gentleman in Leadville, Colorado in 2021.
When he said, the secret to all of this is endurance.
That man was wise.
That man was telling me, he was telling us to endure the process, endure the journey.
Now, he was talking specifically about the 100 miles that I was about to endure the next day.
But running in itself is a journey.
It's a process.
Getting better at anything in life is enduring the process.
What I'm learning and what I've learned throughout my lifetime is building a strong business.
That's a process.
Building a great team.
That is a process.
Learning how to be a good husband and father.
That is a process.
Building your body and your health and your wellness and your fitness.
That is a process, a process to endure.
That's not going to change or happen overnight,
but you forge it over time with consistency,
with patience, by setting the conditions.
The only way to be faster for longer
is by enduring the process.
I ran my first marathon, 2018, around four hours,
five, six years later, shaving off what will be 90 minutes off of my marathon time is significant.
But there was no secret sauce to it.
There was no overnight change.
I learned a lot of things along the way.
I learned how to fuel properly.
I learned how to eat the right way for the training that I was doing.
I learned all about lactate threshold training, critical velocity.
and I realized that my body composition had to change based off of the goals that I set.
I learned all these things along the way.
If there's one thing that I've done well in my life and my career
is that I've been able and willing to endure a process.
And you might not see the result today, tomorrow, next week, next month,
but give it time.
Give a time and you will get so much better.
This is applicable to so many things, but especially running.
Running will teach you so many things about your mind, your body, your life, your work.
And set the conditions.
While enduring the process, you got to set the conditions.
Set the conditions with the food you're consuming.
Set the conditions with the sleep and the rest that you're implementing,
managing stress and communication of your goals to friends and family
and backwards plan accordingly so that conditions are set
so you can show up for those runs,
for those workouts, for that training and those races
in the best mental state, emotional state, and physical state
so you can perform with excellence.
I'll leave you with a quote that I started with.
Endurance is an outcome forged by those who are wise enough to endure the process.
Implement these five tips that I shared with you guys today.
And you will run faster for longer.
You will build endurance.
So thanks for tuning in and we'll see you in the next episode.
