Your Questions Answered: Hills, Long Workouts, Heat Adaptations, and More!

Carrie Tollefson: Hey everybody, welcome to episode 25 of the RunDot podcast. Every 25 episodes, we dedicate an entire episode. to your questions. I have two RunDot coaches with us and we are gonna go one by one answering actual questions from actual listeners in the podcast. So, fresh off his own Boston finish, my gosh, I sound like I'm some big time announcer. We are joined by coach Brady Hoover. Brady has raced the Boston Marathon nine times now. and coached many athletes to their own BQs. Brady is an ACSM certified personal trainer and a 248 marathoner, wows up, who has been coaching runners and triathletes for many years. Also with us is coach Ben Somerville. Ben works with runners and triathletes through precision coaching based in the UK. He is a two time triathlon, a short course national champion and well on his way to his first one hour and 20 minute. half marathon. And I'm Keri Tullifson, Olympian, broadcaster, and your guide to the world of run dot. We treat the show like any good workout. We'll start with our warm-up questions, settle into our main set conversation, and then wind things down by having Coach Brady and Coach Ben answer an audience question on the cool-down. Actually, I think the audience question is for me this time, but we're gonna just get into all of it. So let's get after it! Hey guys, how'd you like that little intro?

Brady Hoover: Yeah, I mean you're on fire today like it is motivation Monday, and you've got it

Carrie Tollefson: It's like the WWE up in here. Okay, we have our warm up question. So we are going to ask, what is a hobby that you have outside of running? I mean, is there anything outside of running that we like to do? Brady, why don't you start?

Brady Hoover: Gosh, really anything. I like the outdoors, so anything outdoors. I guess I could say, though I haven't done it in a while, I do have a license to skydive. Yeah. A lot of people don't know that about me. And then because I like going fast, then I decided, well, I got to pick up this sport of running and just run fast instead. A little crazy.

Carrie Tollefson: No! Are you nuts? That is, I am not into heights. No, not so much. I don't know how you do that.

Brady Hoover: Well, picture this, there's nothing to scale against. There's no cliffs. You're just up there. So it feels like you're stepping into space. You don't get the ground rush because the plane is moving at about 90 to 100 miles an hour. So it's like picture going down the highway and sticking your head out the window and then just jumping out, but being like in space, right? Even at 5,000 feet where you pull your chute, it still looks the same as when you jumped out.

Carrie Tollefson: No, no, mm-mm. Okay, I'm gonna just be mesmerized by you that you do that, but Ben does not look like he's into that as well. So Ben, what's your hobby?

Ben Sommerville: Freddie, I am in awe of you for saying that and for living that truth. I just can't vibe with that at all. I like to stay on the ground. I like to move as fast as I can on the ground within sort of safety reasons, of course. This is my favorite question. And some people know this about me, some people don't. I'm an avid lifelong comic book reader and comic book collector. I have been since I was in my early teens. It's something that\... I love to do just for that sense of escape and just for like that time away from sport. Like I was going to make a joke, can triathlon be my hobby away from running? But actually in reality, try and if I'm not doing sport, I want to get away from sport. And the best way to do that is to sit down with a few good comic books and just to explore a whole new world. Literally I will read anything and everything and just absolutely love it. It costs me a fortune. I've got more comic books than I have normal books. It's a storage problem in my house. But other than that, Perfect.

Carrie Tollefson: I love that. I mean I would have to say my hobby is dancing like and I'm not saying I'm really good at it but I love to go out and go dancing and it I had a dance party last year for women that was from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. so we were in bed by 10 that's what we were calling it and it was awesome we had like 250 women there and we just danced in the early evening and we got home and we were like ready to do our long run on a Saturday morning and so I think that's That's my hobby. So we have very different hobbies, but that's good. you know, we have lots in common with our endurance craze that we have in our lives, but let's get into the main set. This is really fun because we have a lot of different people that have written in and asked different questions and if you aren't getting on this podcast with your question we'll get you on another one. But the first one, Ellie wrote in and she asked, If you have a long run and don't have enough time to complete that run in one session, is there any benefit or harm in doing it in two sessions in one day? Could this also help an athlete who is easily injured build up volume more safely? This is a good question and a loaded one. So who wants it?

Brady Hoover: I'll take it. And Ben can chime in because I'll probably miss something. Yeah, great question. First of all, for the long run, how long are talking? Are we talking returning for a marathon, a half marathon? But really, it depends. If it was my athlete, I would first, when this issue came up, is there another day during the week we can squeeze it in? Sometimes there is, and then we can move things around and shuffle it around so they can get that long run done. You if there isn't an opportunity for that, it's probably, it sounds like it's a one-off. It's not like every, every weekend long run. there is like when you're training for a half marathon, a marathon, or really any race, there is a benefit to going long and getting that time on legs, running through fatigue. There's some adaptations, some muscular skeletal system, things that are happening in the body. I'm getting that long run in. but seeing that she wants to break it up into two sessions on the same day, I would say, okay, you got a two hour run, you do an hour in morning, hour in the evening, great. You know, that's better than not getting it all at once. Could it also help athletes who coming back from injury build volume more safely? There is a mechanism of some rest there. I wouldn't advise it. I'd work with a coach. don't know the extent of the injury. So it's hard to advise, you know, just out of the blue on that. But potentially, yes. I've had some athletes that have been injured or returned to running, and we kind of shuffle things around to get a lot of volume in, but get the ample recovery period in there within the given week and go with a more frequency approach.

Carrie Tollefson: Ben, do you have any follow up there?

Ben Sommerville: I hear everything Brady's saying and it's everything that I've ever been taught, I've ever been coached, I've ever then passed on to anybody that I've coached or just spoken to. I've dabbled with the whole, increase the frequency by sort of separating longer runs into lots of small chunks. All it does, kind of, it chunk, it truncates your day more than realistically a lot of people like. Like it, cause you're just moving constantly from one thing to the next. You're going from one little run to then a couple of hours of normal life stuff, and then another couple, another little run, I'd rather just go get the run done maximum sort of effective dose. So the most high quality workout you can do in the shortest amount of time once done, and you can move on with the rest of your day, whether you've done it at the beginning, middle, or the end of the day, it's just that one just sort of detour, so to speak. But, you know, I don't want to be that person to say, don't run multiple times a day. If you do want to chunk things down because you know, you've got to Some people just don't have an hour in the morning. They may only have half an hour, then they get another half an hour later on. So it's definitely an evolving process. It's an individual decision. everything Brady said there to listen to the coach first, that is what I would recommend. I much prefer to do my run in one go. Done. And I can move on.

Carrie Tollefson: Yeah, I agree. And I also think like I think what Brady said where if you do split it up coming back from an injury, like there might be some inflammation that happens after an activity where if you're coming back from injury, we might not want to stress it again quickly, you know, eight hours later or whatever the time limit is or the time amount is between. So make sure you think about that and actually talk to your coach or whoever's helping you with an injury. But also I think that we have to realize that there's a reason for a long run. So I wouldn't get used to doing this. I think this is just like a one-off type thing. You know, the reason why there's a long run is for us to be able to be on our feet and to be able to handle that long sustained effort. So yeah, but I agree with everything you guys said. Sometimes life just gets busy. But I think if it is just setting the alarm clock a little bit earlier to get out the door and slug through those first early early miles, that's probably better than splitting it up if you have the opportunity to do that. Okay, next question. George asks, if you have a race course with of hills and don't live in a hilly area, what's the best way to prepare? Ben, we're going with you.

Ben Sommerville: Yes, this is an amazing question and ironically something that I had to deal with for three years whilst away at university because where I was, it was very flat. So there was no hills. You had to run for miles to get hills. You had to cycle for miles to get hills. for any of you who are in a flat-ish or flat actually area, the easiest way is to hit the treadmill because you can artificially create the gradient you need to prepare for your upcoming run event. It's not an exact science, but what I've always gone by is roughly a 1 % gradient on a treadmill kind of matches the experience of running flat outdoors. So if you're looking to kind of replicate a moderately hilly course on a treadmill, you're probably looking at anywhere between 5 and 8 % of a gradient on a treadmill to kind of get those hill repeats. And that's probably where you're going to focus the majority of your time. Now, there's going be a lot of people screaming at me going, Coach Ben, I hate indoors. I hate the treadmill, even if it is useful. And I totally get it. I've been there. I've had my demon hours in the middle of a hot sweaty gym staring at a wall on a treadmill. It's not fun. It's not for everybody. And so it's not something I've had experience doing, but if you want to head outdoors, think stadium stairs, parking garage ramps, bridge approach roads, things like that. They're probably the most practical substitutes you'll find in a non hilly area, like in a flat area. And they're probably also really great ways to practice going downhill as well, because if you're doing a hilly race, you're not just going to be going uphill the whole time. You're probably going to have to come down at some point as well. And that's another skill. I don't want to spend too much time talking about downhill as much as uphill, but something that I've learned from watching the Paris 2024 Olympic Games Marathon was the best runners in that race were all running like scarecrows down the hill because they let their arms and their upper body detach from their legs because what people don't realize. is their arms are as much involved in your pace as your legs are. If your arms can't keep up because your legs are going crazy down the hill, you just got to let them go. Just let them go. Let them hang like a scarecrow. And then you can just lean into it, let the legs get carried away. And it's rather than leaning back and sort of trying to physically control your speed, which is actually a lot really damaging on your muscles and your joints by holding yourself back, leaning back on a downhill. So treadmill steps. Anywhere you can find, but definitely the treadmill and don't run every run to try and be hills. Certainly not until your race preparation phase in that kind of 12 to 16 weeks before your big a race. And then just one dedicated high quality hill session a week. In my opinion, we'll do just fine to give you the adaptations you need without over training and shorter, the better. I'd rather you go and do some shorter slightly. sort of higher gradient efforts at maybe a slightly faster pace than just kind of finding a moderate grade and just kind of slogging it out for an hour. Quality over quantity here, let's not waste any time. Let's not overstress the system and let's kind of develop those energy systems, our muscular endurance in really smart ways. But all hands to you, I would never do a hilly race because I hate hills.

Carrie Tollefson: Mm-hmm. You just avoid them. I have heard of different ways. I have heard of different ways like the great Dick Beardsley. I don't know if you know him, Ben, but he was, you know, had the duel in the sun in Boston with Alberto Salazar back in the day. He's from Minnesota, very good friend of mine. And he used to pound his quads because he lived in a very flat farm country area of Minnesota. And he would pound his quads a thousand times each after long runs to get ready for the Boston Marathon course. That is crazy. And it's different, but it was back in the day. and he was getting creative with his training. We also know some other runners put bricks underneath their treadmills to learn how to run down like severe downhills for the Boston Marathon. Also, I've heard of athletes that have put weighted vest on. This is all you have to have a coach, I believe, to be able to do this stuff, but it's just kind of different ideas. A weighted vest like halfway through their long run, if it's flat and also using the bike after long runs to load the quads. just maybe if it's it's even more not only physically but like mentally be able to handle coming back from real quad fatigue. So I don't know there's all kinds of ways. Brady do you have any other ways that you've heard of people kind of mimicking hills when they're not in a hill area?

Brady Hoover: Yeah, I have an athlete that lives down in Tampa, which is a really flat area. You have to go for miles to find some hills. So she was training for MDS 120 down in Peru. And we had her running up the parking garage in the early morning, like 5, 5.30 AM. And there's no cars. And it was four stories. So just doing the up ramp, if she got up a little bit later, she would do stairs and kind of walk it with some weight, you know, with like a 10 pound bag. She also.

Carrie Tollefson: Mm-hmm. Yep. No. Just a straight up stair workout or did she run before or did she run after? Like some people bike before run after.

Brady Hoover: Well, yeah, straight up there. Every other week we would have her because we knew she was going to be walking too because it was in the dunes. So she wasn't going to be able to roam or she would if she was to run up or walk up, she'd have the same essentially the same pace. And we said, well, conserve your energy and walk. There was also a bridge three miles from her house. So she would just run up and over. It had a pedestrian. So if you're in that hilly area and you have some bridges and they have a pedestrian walkway, you could use that. And then in the garage, GPS doesn't work too well, but if you have a Stride power meter, you know, okay, I'm gonna be running zone three, uphill, downhill. You can use that power meter, right? I know that if I'm running a seven minute mile, let's say, my power reflection is about 265, so running up, if I was in a garage in a flat area, I could mimic that up and down there. On the outside, I would have her do some zone four, efforts. So zone four effort, so we've used great adjusted pace there. And then I like to throw an eccentric loading as well, which prepares quads for downhills. Because when you're running downhill, you're essentially in hip extension the whole time. So doing things like split squats and going down like five to eight seconds, lightweight, really contract those muscles, like squeeze them as much as you can on the way down and then pop back up. And do about eight to 10 reps that you may not even make it to eight, right? If your tempo's very slow, you may burn out at five. Really kind of prepares the quads what I'll have my Boston runners do to prepare for those downhills is that eccentric loading. Same with like a squat pattern or a single leg deadlift or if balance is a little wonky, a regular traditional deadlift with lighter weight there will be some good things to come in and mimic that.

Carrie Tollefson: That's cool. I mean just all the fun ways you can you can do it. I mean there's there's lots of ways. So George get after it and let us know if you need any help with some ideas. OK so Larissa she says hey y'all. Hi Larissa looking to see how I ensure run.ads Hill training to my race plan or is there a way is there or if there is a way to do so. Excuse me. It has done it in the past but I think it was based on if the race was in the system or not. So she wants to know what the app does with Hill Training.

Brady Hoover: yes, so you'll see you'll see hill repeats in there more in the development phase when we're training for speed of power. You will see them. Gosh, but I have a better idea. It's maybe every six to eight weeks when you're, you know, developing speed and power not in that specific race preparation window. And then as, as I like kind of alluded to, if you live in a hilly area, use your great adjusted pace. I loved, I love doing uphill intervals now. It's like something that I'm toying with now is doing like, I am, you know, if I'm supposed to run for an hour and 30 minutes in, I'm supposed to do some zone four efforts. trying to get some hill work in there and then use my stride power meter or grade-adjusted pace so I can get that threshold effort up the hill, a little bit, you know, extend my stride going uphill. Playing around with a lot of that I'll let you know in the fall how that works out for me.

Carrie Tollefson: Yeah, what are you getting ready for in the fall?

Brady Hoover: Bay State Marathon. Get that BQ so I can get back an 11th time because I'm already headed back next year.

Carrie Tollefson: okay. And Ben. An 11th, did we say it wrong in the intro?

Brady Hoover: You know, I've run it nine times. I'm qualified for next year with a fast enough. Well, should be a fast enough. I think it's a fast enough. Well under. Yeah, it's well under. It's almost 10 minutes under. Should get me in for next year. So the fall would be because it's after Boston registration would be for the 2028. Keep that streak going.

Carrie Tollefson: Okay. Okay. my gosh, I would say so. Then when is your half marathon?

Ben Sommerville: Not until next year now, unfortunately. Yes, so I'm doing a double whammy in the space of six weeks next week where I'm going back again to make my 120 or sub 120 half marathon attempt and then not six weeks later I'll be running my first ever marathon.

Carrie Tollefson: okay. I didn't know this. Where's the marathon?

Ben Sommerville: It is hot off the press. only entered it a few weeks ago. I'm entering the man. I've already entered. It's the Manchester Marathon here in the UK. So in the northwest of England is where I'm from. I grew up in the Manchester area. So all my extended family, I don't get to see very often will have the opportunity to come and support me doing a marathon for the very first time. I'm terrified.

Carrie Tollefson: Very cool.

Brady Hoover: I take it that race is fun. You did mention miles and miles.

Carrie Tollefson: Did\... Do you go to the Manchester 10K that is, you know, just now in the springtime?

Ben Sommerville: I have never done it before, but I literally saw all the highlights and the clips from it because I think it was yesterday. I think it's this year's edition has just happened. So yeah, I'm very familiar with the course, grew up near Manchester. So the Manchester Marathon course is if you can't get into London, it's the next best here in the UK. So Manchester Marathon it is.

Carrie Tollefson: Yeah, it was yesterday, yeah. Okay? Well, if you're gonna listen to the See Tally Run podcast on Thursday, then you're gonna hear from the winner of the Women's Manchester 10K. Clara Lukin, I think is how you say her name. She's Slovenian. She's the fastest 10K road racer in European history. She just set the European record and then she won your 10K this weekend, So that's pretty cool. But good luck to you. my gosh, we're gonna get you back on then. In what did you say, six weeks?

Ben Sommerville: and tuning in. It will be next year, so I'll be doing the half marathon in March and then about six weeks later I'll be doing the marathon in April.

Carrie Tollefson: okay, okay. I had to have you explain that again. All right, we gotta go back to the questions, but I'm super pumped for you both. So this one is from Jennifer, and Ben, I think you're gonna take it, but she says, I just completed an assessment, and because of the heat, my pace was way slower than usual. Now my dot score is in building when I used to be an intermediate. How can this be reversed or updated since my new paces are way too slow?

Ben Sommerville: This is a great question. And the short and most likely very unpopular answer to this is to just to try your assessment again and perhaps do it on a colder day to eliminate heat as your limiting factor. It's not popular. It's not glamorous. It's not pretty, but it's personally what I would do rather than trying to kind of get in the weeds and start messing with technical details and things. Just give it another shot. Now, if you did it as a 5k or a 10k the first time and you're

Carrie Tollefson: I was wondering if you were going to say that.

Ben Sommerville: maybe not wanting to do the same effort again, perhaps downgrade yourself for doing the 12 minute test. It's still a valid assessment result. And it's also just less intent, well, it's not less intensity, it's more intensity for just a much shorter amount of time. So it may be more accessible for you to do it again. Just as a refresher though, just to kind of, for those people who are trying to understand why would you be graded down by doing an assessment. So your run.score is calculated using the temperature, humidity, and elevation from the run that you've just done. So in this case, the run that's then led to paces that are perceived to be too slow. EnviroNorm normalizes for the conditions, but in this scenario, they've said that the heat has caused them to significantly underperform relative to what they perceive to be their current fitness, which is fine. So the raw output, your pace may have dragged that calculated threshold down more than EnviroNorm could compensate for. Perhaps you were just over fatigued, not quite as fresh as you were hoping for, or your pacing strategy completely broke down at kilometer three. Very, very normal for that to happen. You went off full gas for the first 3K, know, 10, 15 minutes worth of effort for a reasonably good standard runner, and you've gone kind of a little bit too far, and it was again hot. So you can edit and replace these assessment results in your threshold history from Rundle itself. Word of caution, if you artificially then change your threshold paces in your zones, to something then well beyond your capabilities. Perhaps you don't reset it back to where you were. You push it a little bit further forward again. You're going to have the exact same pace breakdown issue just on every single run. So you're going to feel even worse about yourself. You'll very likely end up overtraining. You'll impact your recovery. And you could increase your risk of injury and or illness, which none of those that we want. So I would recommend giving it another go. On a cooler day, perhaps downgrading to that 12 minute test. Or just find a day where you're the freshest, you're the most motivated, and you really stick to that pacing strategy from minute one, rather than waiting to kilometer three to completely blow up. It's not a pretty or glamorous answer, but it's what I get my athletes to do if we have a bad run. We go and do it again when we're ready.

Carrie Tollefson: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that is tough when you have a hot day and you just kinda wanna get it over with. Sometimes it's better to just suck it up and wait for a cooler day and do it again or even don't do it on that hot day. Just wait for the cooler day.

Brady Hoover: or what?

Ben Sommerville: Yeah, for sure.

Carrie Tollefson: Okay, so this one is from Lisa and this is I think a lot of people's issue. Brady. He wants to chime in. Sorry, Brady.

Brady Hoover: I got a little something too. So the other thing, when you go into your threshold history, make sure your toggle was toggled to outdoor and not indoor. Because if it was toggled to indoor, it's going to pull up 70 degrees, or I don't know what that is in Celsius. Or it just didn't capture the weather because your watch didn't get good information there. So just make sure when you go to edit your threshold, check to make sure that temperature is correct. I've seen it 60 degrees when it was actually 80 degrees. And when I edited that, it changed it over. Now assuming. environment was, you know, maybe that was the stressor. I know the first hot run I have it's like I'm boiling from the inside out and I don't perform as well as I do later in the summer. But a little hack I'll do when it comes to like my 5k test is I'll actually go into the what-if in the E-norm. And I'll look at my, say my threshold pace is a six minute mile when it's, you know, 55 degrees. Um, in my zone five target, which would be where I was going to run the five cat on a perfect day on a cooler day is going to be a five 30. Let's just say I'll put in the what if like it's going to be 85 degrees and I'll see how it changes my pace. Okay. Now it's slowed me down 30, almost 30 seconds. Like it's like 28 seconds. So now my target, rather than my first mile on the track, what I'm testing is going out at 530, I'm going out at a 558 because I know that's the environmental condition for that same effort and I'll start there and kind of accelerate from there. Sometimes the heat gets to me and I'm like, yep, I'm just going to come back at a cooler day or I'm going to get up at some ungodawful time in the morning and try it on a cooler day. Enorm, environment, environment relation. it's right within the, yeah, right within the app. there's a little toggle for it when you get into your settings and you, there's a nice little what if, like if I'm going to go to Denver, Colorado, well, what pace it, well, when I get there, I can look at my phone, but if I'm like curious, in Denver, I got to slow down eight seconds per mile. Just to get off the plane because there's less oxygen. I'm going to Breckenridge. I'm curious. That's at, you know, 9,000 feet. What's that do? I just slid it in 30 seconds there. Okay, cool.

Carrie Tollefson: So you definitely have to know how to do all that within the app.

Brady Hoover: Yeah, we have some great tutorial videos like earlier on in the run. So go back. There's a whole tutorial walkthrough. It was like, I don't know the exact episode. was early on, like one through five. It was one of those.

Carrie Tollefson: Yep, okay. Great. Okay, Lisa says that she travels two to three days a week for work. So 5.30 a.m. start of the workday and usually goes until 4 p.m. It's getting really difficult to stay consistent with her training. She says she's dead tired at the end of the day, which makes total sense and that she usually can squeeze a short run in, but she also is in Arizona. So a lot of 100 plus degree days. So what are your thoughts on how to keep fit while traveling a lot? and also I think even just like living in kind of areas that are hard to get runs in even in the evenings. Who wants this one, Brady?

Brady Hoover: me, I think I'll start with it. Yeah. So the day started 5 30. Cause that's usually my like thing is I run at 5 30 before my day begins. Cause then I got kids and everything else and it's not going to happen later, but she's got the opposite effect. And yeah, you're tired at the end of the day. say on travel weeks, like trying to kind of plan ahead and moving things around so that you can free up those days. I like to, when I travel, I just went to Ibiza or how do I say it better? Ibiza. I just came back from.

Carrie Tollefson: Mm-hmm. have never heard it that way.

Brady Hoover: And I did all my quality sessions prior to leaving. So I kind of like\... Yeah, I went against the grain a little bit, but I knew that out there it's just really, it's really hilly. It's like I ran eight miles and got 1500 feet of elevation. just where we were, it was crazy. So I just said, I'm just going to do my easy days and zone two, right? So I was walking some of those hills, taking in the view. This way don't have to stress about missing a quality session. or if it's hot in the end of the day, like it is where Lisa is, then I have to worry about zone two. So I can go super, super, super slow in those hot temperatures. and make sure I get my quality work done before I travel, after I travel, to not give up those.

Carrie Tollefson: Ben, you have any suggestions?

Ben Sommerville: think when you're traveling a lot, and this is going to be a really weird analogy, but it's only from lived experience. My fiance is a nurse in the NHS, in intensive care. So she works long days and nights, weekends, unsocialized. So she's a shift worker. For people who travel a lot, treat yourself like you are a shift worker. And exactly as Brady said, when you have got opportunities to do the hard work, get it done, even if you do have to sort of stack them up a little bit. And then when you\... then working or traveling or coming back from traveling and you're really tired. If you've done the quality work, all that can therefore remain is the easy stuff. Now, I'm not going to be that coach that says if it's easy, it's pointless. But if you've already done the high quality work and you've got through your travel and now you're absolutely exhausted and you've still got an hour and a half's worth of long easy run to do, perhaps across two or three runs, I wouldn't necessarily try and force myself through to do those. If actually she's going to make me worse off. So treat yourself like a shift worker and stack that stack that quality and then let everything else just become that kind of optional bonus extra. I have the same approach with any athlete, even if they're not a shift worker, let's get the high quality done at a time of the week where you're going to be the freshest, i.e. the beginning of the week. And then the remainder can be that optional extra stuff. If you've got the time, the energy and the motivation to do it yet, go out and do that hour and a half. You know, easy across those next couple of days. So I can totally empathize. Well, I can sympathize with the situation. I'm very lucky I don't do shifts. I thought if I did a night shift, it would probably completely kill me. But just treat yourself like a shift worker and just find those opportunities and just make the most of them and perhaps set that slightly earlier alarm on your days off than you really want to just to get that quality done. And then you're signed off for rest of the week. You've got the adaptation. You can go away and work and not have to worry about it when you get back.

Carrie Tollefson: Yeah, a couple of things I think of when I was reading that question is the first time I trained in Arizona as a pro, I was there and that's where I learned how to wear my headlamp because it does get super dark. But in the summertime, I mean the I was there in the winter because we needed warm weather from Minnesota. So we went there in the winter, but all of them are wearing headlamps and they said they use it mostly in the summertime because they're up so early because of the heat. So I do like just want to remind her that maybe there's some groups that are in Arizona that are going really early if she doesn't like to go alone or you know she needs some other motivation. Also a lot of people get gym memberships in Arizona in the summertime so they can use the treadmill and you know obviously that's tough. Just like I'm sure just physically she's exhausted so who wants to run at 5 p.m. but that is an option where you will still have people there maybe a little bit of a group to get motivated to get there. But also for me I travel a lot and sometimes it's easier for me to get a longer run in when I'm traveling because I don't have three kids to make breakfast lunch and dinner for I don't have eight loads of laundry I don't have a dog to walk like all of those things so sometimes I plan that in when I am doing strict training right now I'm just living life and doing whatever but just remember that sometimes a trap like a work trip You only have to focus on your work. So sometimes adding in a little bit of a training block if it's like, you know, the second day you're there or the third day you can add in a little bit more mileage like that might be your trick. You know, you could be tired and putting in long days, but you also get good night's rest because you're dealing with other things. So I don't know just an idea that maybe she hasn't thought of so fun fun stuff there and good luck Lisa.

Ben Sommerville: I think, Carrie, you've got the best one there. That's the best idea, which I was never going to come up with because I don't have kids or a family. So I'm just living in complete, non-dependent bliss. It's great. So I think that's a great idea.

Carrie Tollefson: Yeah. Well, you still have your stressors, but I think sometimes we forget how physically demanding it is to get everyone else going every single day. When you go on work trips, sometimes I feel bad for my husband. He doesn't travel much for work. And I'm like, I just slept from 10 till 6 a.m. without any interruptions. Like, it's awesome. So, yes.

Brady Hoover: You go to bed when you want, you wake up when you want.

Carrie Tollefson: Yes, you can eat your Chipotle in your PJs in bed. I do it all the time. My mom and dad are like, aren't you going to the theater and doing all this? I'm in New York a lot. I'm like, heck no, I am eating dinner in bed and not doing anything. So you get some good runs in. did best way to sight see.

Brady Hoover: Yeah, I love exploring on the internet. yeah. Oh, and it reminds me, there was a podcast earlier, it was episode 17 I have here in my notes with Elizabeth James and Stephen Horan about training and traveling. So that's, if you want to dive really deep, highly recommend giving that a listen. There's just a few episodes to go.

Carrie Tollefson: Mmm. Yeah, mean, know, grass is always greener, right? We always think that we have it made and we know how to do it. But lots of support for you and I know that life is tough to get that training in around work. Okay, Nuno is asking or she says she or he, they, I don't know, but Nuno, do you know what? He, you know Nuno? Okay. Hi Nuno. I don't know you. Nice to meet you. So anyway, Nuno wrote in, I've been running through the raindrops of this winter cold front, but this past weekend my body said it was enough running and I should spend the weekend in bed drinking tea and eating chicken soup. I've been there. I normally run even when I'm ill. As a general rule, I think that as long as my legs are fine, I can breathe. Right? I can still go out for a run. What about you guys? Do you go out for a run when sick? Who wants this one first, Ben?

Ben Sommerville: I'll go for this because this is a man after my own heart talking about cold rainy winter runs. I live in the United Kingdom. I live in the southwest of England. Our winters are gray, wet, dark and just downright awful. And I haven't said this yet. I can't believe I haven't said this yet. I say this on every podcast and I always laugh, but it depends. This is the first time I'm going to say it today and it's the only time I'm saying it. It depends. I'm not your coach. I'm not a doctor. I'm not a registered clinician in the medical sense. But first of all, if you can't breathe to anybody, please don't go out and run. That counts when it's really hot, really cold, or because you're ill or becoming ill. Please just don't run if you can't breathe. Please get yourself sorted. But this is a really great question. And if there's any triathletes listening or even runners who kind of keep an eye on the triathlete world, there's a lot of chatter in our endurance world about how much or how little to compromise your training. during so-called sickness weeks. And for those listening, I'm putting in inverted commas, sickness weeks. Again, the triathletes amongst us will know exactly what I mean. And it's quite a controversial topic. And it's one that I find personally frustrating, genuinely unendingly frustrating. Because for me, I will always prioritize my general health and my athletes' general health before any possibility of a fitness gain from doing more training or continuing to train when ill or when becoming ill. Any amount of physical exercise that's beyond moderate, i.e. beyond going for a walk, can slow down your body's recovery. So you're just chancing, you're risking the possibility of becoming more ill or becoming more seriously ill than you currently are because you're not listening to your body's signals. You're not giving yourself the time and the space and the actual energy just to recover fully and then come back stronger. So I would always take a couple of days off to recover completely, then try and power through. risking needing to take maybe a week off later because my body just goes into complete shutdown. It's very cautious. It makes me sound like a little bit of a sort of a wuss. But you know, let's be real, most of us aren't professional athletes. We're not chasing a living from our running and our running results, running races, PBs, PRs, whatever you want to call them. So it's just not really worth the risk. If you're becoming ill, you're already ill, just listen to your body honestly. and transparently and just give yourself the time off that you need. It's not weakness, it's not giving up, it's not a lack of discipline or a lack of potential or a lack of ability. It's the kind of self-awareness and maturity that makes the greatest athletes the greatest. So just listen to your body and do the right thing and don't be dictated by what other people are doing. Again, these so-called sickness weeks, I've had enough of them. Like if you need to take time off because you're ill, just take it off. Don't be a hero in the bluntest, most English way possible. Don't be a hero.

Carrie Tollefson: Yep. Brady.

Brady Hoover: yeah, it depends. if it's, if it's in the head, if it's a cold sinus infection, something like that. I'll usually train through an illness, but I'm very cautious and I know my body and I know when it's going to make me, sometimes it makes me feel better after I exercise, but I go really easy and I stick to that zone two target heart rate, which for me is like one, you know, the top end of my threshold is like 150, the sweet spot's 138. So I stick to 138 and below. And oftentimes my pace is, it could be a minute slower per mile. And I don't mind, right? And I feel better afterwards. I'll usually go shorter if I have to go for an hour. I'll go for 30 or 40 minutes. I'll give myself permission to turn around and come back. I'll advise my athletes the same way. I definitely don't do any intervals until the pace, until the heart rate and the pace align once again. so over a couple of days of illness, maybe I'm a minute slower per mile and then two, three days later, I'm now 30 seconds slower per mile. and eventually it gets back to normal. And when it does, that's when I kind of ease back into it. I won't always necessarily do what's prescribed. I'll do that first interval. Maybe I have four and I'll see how do I feel? Did that feel a little bit harder than it otherwise would? It did. Yeah, I'm gonna pull back and stay zone too. So I'm very give-and-take when it comes to illness and I tell my athletes the same thing and then I remind them and myself that consistency over time is going to yield the best results. So sometimes pushing too hard when you're sick is going to require more days off because you're just kind of zapping your immune system. I'm watching HRV, I'm watching all these metrics and I'm also seeing how does my body feel. And then if all else fails and I'm like, yeah, I know I can't run, it's just too much. Maybe I can get on my bike trainer and put no resistance on and just spin, right? And then just keep my heart rate in zone one, get a light sweat going. And usually that makes me feel better. But then I know those days that if I do any sort of movement like that, it's a bad idea. So you know, take that with a grain of salt.

Carrie Tollefson: Yeah, it's tough. I used to use the old school way. I kind of still do. I'm kind of old school all together. But like if it's above the shoulders and there's no fever, I would still train. Obviously, cautiously. If it's below the shoulders, so like if it's in your chest, if you're vomiting, if you have severe aches and pains, you cannot stay awake. Like if you come back from a jog and you're totally wiped, I usually then would take a day or two. But definitely no fever. I do not think people should run with fevers. I think that's a big sign for us to that we're fighting something where our body's trying to clear it and you know just just go home and take a nap like nobody gets out of shape in two or three days people and you only get back faster if you take the break so take the break okay so

Brady Hoover: I mentioned that, said it like above the head. I said it like in the head, right? I didn't. Did I say that? Okay.

Carrie Tollefson: Yeah, you did. Or if you're a little congested, get it. Sometimes when I go out and I do a bunch of snot rockets, I feel so much better. You know if it's just a little cold that you're getting through, but if it's something I think with a fever, elevated heart rate, any of that, throw up, all that stuff, you guys know, that's too much. It's just not smart. It's just us being a little crazy, right? We don't need to be crazy when we're training. It leads to injury, leads to fatigue, all of the things. So take it from me. if I could just break it down that way. Don't be crazy. Okay, Amber asks, I don't have a coach anymore. Is it possible to switch to development to work on speed on your own?

Brady Hoover: Yeah, I'll take this one. Yeah, yeah. So development mode is our development phase is based on your how many races you're doing in a calendar year. So look at so every time you add a race within if you go to the calendar feature, you can see your training phases. You can see development phase, it's got a purple bar. And then you've got race preparation phase, it's got a pink bar. If you hover over that pink bar, it's going to tell you for me for a marathon, it's 12 weeks is race preparation phase. If I have no other races, everything that comes before that is development phase. Oftentimes when athletes, I do a lot of the athlete coach connect and oftentimes I'm not getting any faster. I've been training for years, I'm not getting any faster and then I look and they've been on run dot for a while and I look at the history, they're a April or April marathon, they're doing a half marathon in the middle of summer and a fall marathon. And I look and I'm like, from January 1st to the first week of January, all the way until the end of October, they're in a race preparation. So they're building stamina. They're not building speed because they're getting ready for the next event and the next event and the next event. So I go, that's your missing link right there. So this could be what is going on. There could be just a lot of priority races. So think of those shorter races. If it's a 5K, a 10K, entering those in is a C race. Even a half marathon. Bye. And I'll say a half marathon lightly because if you're in a development phase and half marathons a sea race, your longest run is going to be 70, 75 minutes, which is might be enough for some people to just finish that half, but not race at their potential. For others, they might be lacking, you know, a few, they might need to go to an hour 45. So it really comes down to priorities and looking at that race calendar and making sure there's not too many A races and being selective about those priorities. I ran as, as we talked about an earlier episode, because of this I'm doing a 70.3 I also do triathlons and then the fall marathon I put Boston is in the C race because I didn't want to miss that development time I knew I was running Boston next year in 2027 so I said I'm gonna run just enough miles to run Boston at a training pace at my low zone to pace and just finish because I didn't want to give up that development time and I'll do this a lot with my athletes as well

Carrie Tollefson: Mm-hmm. Okay, interesting. Ben, do you wanna double up on that?

Ben Sommerville: There is nothing there there is nothing more to say there realistically, I think there's usually just a mismatch of expectations People just don't understand that you can't do two things at once your body can't develop its stamina And it's strength and speed and its power at the same time. You've got to isolate those so if you you know Cut if you need to cut down those races or reprioritize those races or better yet work with the coach that can help you make those best decisions. So you can still have a really vibrant and active and fulfilling race calendar by your own standards, wherever that is. Some people that's 10 races a year, some people that's three, and you can still find those ideal opportunities within even just a race preparation phase or to give you at least one solid development phase where you can create that strength, speed and that power that you need to see those improvements, see those gains that people are always chasing. They want to get that sensation that they're going faster. you know, time after time after time, you year on year, but also those expectations that sometimes those improvements are just going to be very, very small. The most consistent athletes, the most high performing athletes, they're not looking for overnight big, massive 10, 20 % jumps in performance. They're seeing one to two, maybe single digit improvements over a period of the season. And that's normal. That's what they chase. That's what they accept. And so have that conversation with a coach again or with a trusted friend, trusted mentor, sort of an experienced runner that you know, and just find a way to get that development phase while still being able to race in the way that you want to. I love racing. I perform better from racing. So I'm not going to be the person to say, stop racing. And then you get a development phase because that's the easier way to do it. But it's also not the most fun. know, it's like saying you need to build a whole winter's worth of durability by just going out and running really, really long and really, really slow. A, that's boring. B, in the winter's cold. You're not building the right level of durability there because the chances are you're just going to sack off that running after six weeks because you're bored, cold, and just meh and uninterested in running. You've got to find various different ways, that variety and that interest to find those progressions from different things. So Brady actually met on the head as per usual. He's an expert.

Carrie Tollefson: Yeah. I know, right? think that that is hard though. It's a hard thing to decide what is an A race, a B race, a C race. Like how do you, you know, build your plan on your own? But I do like how both of you said, talk to somebody about it, get a coach, have a trusted friend, like kind of look through your plan with you or your goals. Okay, so Susanna is asking, she said, I'm listening to my music via my watch. So what's going on there Ben? Can you help her?

Ben Sommerville: right. Just because I'm young doesn't mean I'm a technical expert. So I'll give it my best shot, I'm not, I'm not promising anything. First of all, Suzanne, it's great that you are back running. Woohoo. Do let us know what you're training for. We'd love to hear it. Perhaps we can get that in a feature of the next podcast. The good news for you is that aside from your specific technical setup, the new Run.App is designed to have its own in-app workout recording feature, which does support audio alerts for your intervals.

Carrie Tollefson: I know, I'm like, I have no clue.

Ben Sommerville: So you get countdowns and you can set how many seconds they count down and when you're doing them. And you can also get quite extensive audio coaching and feedback, which you can then probably hear through your AirPods whilst you're running. So the experience you remember is still available. It's definitely not gone away. We may just need to play around with your setup between your watch, your phone, your AirPods, things like that. When we do get all set up, those cues will just layer on top of your music. So provided you've got your volume levels correctly, you'll be able to hear them. You'll still be able to listen to your tunes so you can be in the zone without any kind of mismatch of volume and things like that. But I'm not an Apple watch expert, nor am I a technical expert. So I am going to pass you over to our athlete success team, support team for that specific technical help, because they have helped countless people exactly like you to get set up in the best possible way for you. Easiest way to do that. is through the questions tab in the app. So the little bottom right hand corner, the little three lines, the hamburger menu. I don't know why, apparently it's a hamburger. Click that and click questions. Or anytime you can just email support at run.com. We will let them know to keep an eye out for your email and to keep an eye out for your ticket. I hope this helps because we want to hear that you're getting on with your running and that you're getting the audio coaching and the interval sort of cues that you need in your ears so you can stay and do the right training right.

Carrie Tollefson: And then always remember to just power your phone on and off and see if it works that way. I'm just kidding. I feel like lately everyone is asking me how to work their garment and it will be like working on it, working on it and then we're powering on and off and then just randomly you turn it back on and it works. I'm so sick of that.

Brady Hoover: Thank you.

Ben Sommerville: Why didn't I think of that? I should have just led with that. Just turn it off and on again and then we don't need to speak for any longer. I will shut up.

Carrie Tollefson: I mean, yeah. Suzanne, I'm just kidding. I am kidding, but it's true. Anytime you call the technical support, they're like, have you turned it off? Actually, Andrew, you know Andrew, he'll say, Carrie, we need to just turn it off and turn it back on. Okay, last question before we get to the cool down. Arturo asks, how does Race X estimate projections? Sorry. Estimate projections. So how does race estimate? my gosh, I can't say that word today. Estimate projections. What factors come into consideration and how much how much do each of those factors affect the projected race time? So Brady, did you understand that? Do I need to read it all over again? Okay, Arturo. I totally jacked up your question.

Brady Hoover: I that question. I understand that question. I know what they're asking. Yeah, I understand what they're asking. So I got the Bay State Marathon in the fall, right? And I've also got Maine's. But say I delete Maine, right? And I add my biggest, I always add my most important race of the year first. And I do this with my athletes. We're planning for the year. What's that one big, you know, they got a couple big races, but what's that one big race you want to really go big on? And we'll put that in first. It could be 10 months out. So then their prediction, maybe it's It's a 345 marathon, right? But they're at the fitness level to run a 405 if they were to run today, assuming they had done the work. And they see that 345, whoa, how am I going to run that pace? Well, fitness comes up together, right? We have tons and tons of athlete data, age, of athletes just like you. And we know that given in the 10-month period, maybe your race preparation phase is 16 weeks for that marathon. In the time before that, so what's that give us if it's 10 months out? That's about four months. So that gives us, why can't I do today. I'm still tired. Yeah, another 16 weeks, essentially, of speed and development work. So we expect, or Rundown expects you to gain that much fitness between now and then. That's assuming that you do all, assuming it's like a perfect world, you're doing all the workouts, like you don't get sick, you don't take time off, right? And it's gonna change as you get closer to that race day. But when you put it in today, 10 months out, it's saying, okay, if this athlete does all of the workouts that are prescribed and they score at least, there's a training execution score of at least a 76 or better, we expect them to be here. In your settings, you can lower that bar. You can lower it to say 65%, right? And that's gonna maybe that all of a sudden alters the time to 350, right? So that's what's being calculated is the fitness we expect you to gain on race day. And it's also looking at the 10 year average history. So it's looking at the weather 10 months out. Oh, it's a cooler day. We expect it ideal conditions. Or if it's the middle of the summer, I thought I was gonna run like a 345. I put this in at the middle of the summer and now I'm running a 415. Well, the average temperature is 80 degrees. So those things are coming into it. Now when you're 10 days out from the race, it's starting to pull in that real data. So all of a sudden, day by day, your pace or your predicted time can change. can speed up, it can slow down depending on the temperature of that day.

Carrie Tollefson: That is so interesting that it can calculate all that.

Brady Hoover: you Yeah, I'll use it for Amanda who was on the podcast earlier on, of the moms. And she's like, Brady, should I run the Ventura Marathon in February or should I run in April? Um, and I said, well, let's run a simulation. Let's use race X. And we were, yeah, about 10 months out from February. Um, so we put it in there and it had her, I think at a three, three 22, um, or three 21. And then we looked at, okay, in April, now what's she going to run? Oh, at three 19. Well. Anyone would say, oh, I'm going to go run in April. But I said, Amanda, keep in mind, you're in Southern California. In April, temperature, right? It's saying average temperature is 70 degrees. I don't like that, because it could be warm, right? Whereas in late February, it was saying average temperature of 50 degrees. I said, that is a lot more stable. You could lose three minutes and more if you get a hot day.

Carrie Tollefson: Yeah. Could be, yeah, could go up a little bit or whatever. Yeah. What did it end up being there? In April.

Brady Hoover: she was like 320. I didn't I don't know I didn't check the weather this past April but I should go look I'm curious.

Carrie Tollefson: Yeah, I wonder if it was hot, because you know, we did have some hot weather around the country in April, so hmm. That's cool. I like that it does that. I think that's neat. Obviously, you know, anything can happen as you're saying. Like, we could have an off day, but I like that it has the projections like that. Ben, did you want to follow up on that at all?

Brady Hoover: Yeah, right around there.

Ben Sommerville: No, think Brady absolutely hit the nail on the head there from a technical standpoint. I think there's nothing else I could possibly say. I've seen it in action for myself. I know it works. I don't usually look at my predictions until those kind of like final two weeks, 10 days before my races. I'm very much say just kind of set it and forget it, focus on the process of the training. But I've seen my predictions become more more accurate within that final 10 days to the point where over 70.3, I've been able to then. Effectively based on the conditions that I'm expecting get it's predicting me 20 minutes faster than it was showing me before and then I went that exact time on the day so That's for a 70.3 triathlon. I don't have much experience for running events I will do soon because I'm doing more running than I am triathlon So I will have even more ammunition in the bank to kind of prove that this does work in everyday circumstances So just rewind listen to Brady's bit on repeat five times and then you'll you'll be sorted

Carrie Tollefson: Cool. Love it. well hey That was awesome. The main set was really cool. We have a fun question for the cool down. It is, guess, directed to me, but I want to hear from you guys too. So Morgan asks and she says on Carrie's podcast, See Tally Ron, I've heard her interview several big time trail runners like the fairly recent episodes Courtney DeWalter, Randy Zuckerberg and Ashley Paulson. Is Carrie thinking about trying the trails? Will we possibly see her try a trail event sometime? Well, first of all, Morgan, thanks for listening to See Tally Ron. It's quite different. in the Run Dot podcast so if you guys ever need something else to put in your ears head on over to see Tali run. I don't know if I'm gonna do trails my best friend and the longtime training partner Katie McGregor she's a nine-time US champion she's made multiple US or world teams for the US she just ran her first 25k on the trails and she said it was the hardest thing she's ever done she did it superior hiker hiking trail and she was like what was really hard for her was mentally she could not Like just get into the zone of just like zoning out actually, know, like she was so Into making sure she wasn't gonna twist her ankle and getting up and down over the rocks and doing all that that she said she actually It was hard for her mentally It just took forever because she was so in tune mentally and not letting her mind just wander like she can during a marathon Maybe or a longer race. So I think the cross-country gal in me would love it I don't want to get injured, so that's the one kind of like thing that scares me about it. I don't want to roll. I was a basketball player. I've had plenty of sprained ankles and things like that. But I think you'll see me at a trail event eventually. I need some time to be able to get to the trails. I don't live super close to technical trails. So once these little guys, I have a 10 year old and a 13 year old that are getting there where I can just leave for a few hours on a Saturday or Sunday, I think then you'll see me maybe enter something. Definitely one day. I don't know when though. So thanks for listening Morgan and thanks for the question. Do you guys do any trail racing?

Brady Hoover: I just did the wildflower 20k, which is 20k, because I was out there for, we were out there for that event. Tried our other platform. We sponsored that event and, you know, they said, if you want to free your ascent tree, said, yeah, I'll just, I'll do the, I'm trained up. I'll do the 20k. my gosh. It humbled me. Yeah. The, the inclines are steeper, right? It's.

Ben Sommerville: No.

Carrie Tollefson: Yeah. Yes! Totally different ball game.

Brady Hoover: decline, the descents are steeper, you know, it's just more things happening. I'm lucky enough to have a Stryd power meter, so I just kind of kept it, you know, my pace was, you know, it reminds me of Lauren. She lives here and she did Boston announcing with you for the 5k Lauren McGreen. She just did one and I said the same thing. I went through and my lap goes and I'm like, there's no way, no, I was faster than that split. You know, so that's the way I look at Yeah.

Carrie Tollefson: You have to throw the time out the door. I'm sorry. I mean, obviously I think people race for time, but you can't really it's not like you can take mile splits out there. It's different.

Brady Hoover: It's you can trails. No, it's totally different animal. Yeah. Run power is the way to go out in the trails and okay. I knew they keep it at, you know, a percentage of threshold and just, just camp there and just let the splits go and be like, I can't believe I just did a 12 minute mile.

Carrie Tollefson: Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And I think also like calming yourself down. I've heard so many track and road racers that have gone to the trail like learning how to get out in those races and get out in front of people. Like it's hard to pass people. And obviously there's some sort of, you know, like courtesy that people will allow you to go around and things like that. But if you get behind a big group, then you're passing through and it's you get stuck. It's a whole different thing. It really is. But it kind of intrigues me. And I also love the community. think people seem, I mean the running community is like home for me, but it just seems like a different, a different community where they're just so interested in helping you achieve your goals in any which way possible.

Brady Hoover: I like those fire access roads that are in the woods that sometimes be around lakes. Do you have those out there? Those are hard to walk on. Yeah. Cruising.

Carrie Tollefson: Yeah, yeah we do and they're not quite as group like gnarly right? They're a little bit I guess some might be like up north they can be if it's more like ATV type roads where you don't have any vehicles on it except an ATV but is that what you call them? ATV? Yeah when I when that came out I was like is that so right? But yeah no Ben have you done a trail race?

Brady Hoover: Yeah, ATVs, yeah, four-wheelers. Awesome.

Ben Sommerville: No, I'm gonna stick to the tarmac if that's alright with you guys.