Josh Ried and I sit down and talk about the offseason and what you should expect from downtime.
During the episode, we talk about:
Josh Ried and I sit down and talk about the offseason and what you should expect from downtime.
During the episode, we talk about:
Hello, and welcome to the reinforced running podcast. My name is Richard Ryan. I am your host today. We have an HH MC or a podcasting partner named Josh Reed. And I sit down and we talk about relevant topics that will help your training. So today we talk about the off season because for a lot of us, that's where we are and what you should expect from downtime.
So during the episode, we talk about why not taking downtime might be the reason you are not hitting your goals. How long you should take downtime. And how do we start a plan for next season, some key metrics to track and to consider from your previous season and for every season moving forward and some qualitative questions to ask yourself to help and to help gauge your success from your previous season.
So as the off season gets moving, it is an opportunity to work on some of your weaknesses or to configure a new strategy for next season. And one thing that I know is that it's hard to figure out. What to do with that is going to help your OCR results, especially when it comes to strength training.
There are so many elements of the races that it can feel overwhelming to try to figure it all out yourself and put in all the work in the gym and still carve out time to get faster and to do the work that you know will really prove during the race that is obstacle course racing. And plus there's so much information out there that it is hard to tell who to trust.
So we saw this and we decided to create a coaching option specifically for strength training for the obstacle course race athletes. So these workouts are built to fit into your training schedule so that you can improve your strength and durability while you're getting faster for OCR. So you get the peace of mind.
Of knowing what work you're going to do and, and, and that it is going to pay off in the long run and that it's not going to waste your time. You're not gonna be spinning your wheels while you are at the gym and you'll have the exact prescription of workouts of what to do and how much do, and you'll have the guidance of a professional coach and a high level OCR athlete along the way, these workouts that are fun, they're engaging.
And it makes strength, training nonstop, which is. Always a plus it's only $19 a month and people are already putting in that work. So take a look at the link in the show notes to learn more. Shoot me a direct message at reinforced underscore running underscore rich, or shoot me an email@richatreinforcedburning.com.
Okay. Here is my guy, Josh Reed. Hey Jay GMC. And it's interesting for. The way I feel this year versus the way I felt after last year. Like last year, it was very much a like a, like, I just really tried to hang on to put the pieces together to finish out the season, like Tahoe, like West Virginia. I wasn't sure if I was gonna run and Tahoe, like, I wasn't that healthy.
And I just kind of. Was trying to get to the start line. And then I did like this ultra just almost for no reason, like, which is really kind of silly in hindsight, but it just like had, I just didn't feel satisfied with the way that is season was, was happening. So like I wanted to continue to push into something else.
Like that's okay. Like my mom's are now unhealthy now. So look, let's do this ultra to November and then, then I'll call it a season. And even after that, I was just looking back on my training log. And after that, That ultra, I still train for the following week, just cause like, I just didn't feel good about the way that the season had like wrapped up and like, it was all just disjointed.
It was super long and there was never any like really good, like peak fitness that I felt I had reached where in this year I felt satisfied. I felt really good about the way the planning line. I felt really good about my performance, especially in the running end of the. OCR stars like that six mile IPR to my four mile and my five mile and route to a six mile.
So like, and like those times that I had my former off I'm like pretty good. So I was really, really happy about that. That's probably the best running time that I've ever put together. Like for an event like ever, it's probably my most impressive PR if you could say that. So ending the season and then burly mountain, like, I was happy that I was able to show up and, and get like top five in that event, because I thought the toast of my workout was just so skewed towards the one movement that it like didn't show like my capability of being able to like bang at it in the gym.
So I'm glad that happened. And I actually did better in that workout than it did in the mile. So overall I felt good. So when I finished, I was like, cool. I don't feel like I have anything more to prove here. You know, I don't, I don't, I feel like this season was a success on the execution side of things.
And then on the side of the performance aspect, because I felt like I did everything I could and I pushed as hard as I can. So I could shut this thing down and feel like. I, I deserved it and that I feel happy with the way things ended, where there's been seasons in the past where I should have shut things down because I felt terrible.
And that I just felt like I just had to, because like there was going to be bigger races coming up soon. And so I just kind of forced myself, but this is the first time where I really was like, cool. I'm good. So. Like let's take a rest. Nice. So, so clearly, so this year you had, you had an awesome season. You had an awesome build up going into this, compared to the previous year where you didn't, right.
You weren't satisfied. So polar opposites, what did you do last year? Once you got into like the end of November, what was your decision there and how was that different from your decision this year? Going into the same time of year, it was very much based off of when I needed to prepare for the following year.
So. It was in the beginning of the COVID year, but we knew there was going to be a Jacksonville race. I think at that moment, at that point they had already, or there was. We kind of knew there was going to be the first us national series is going to be in February. So I was looking at the big picture of things.
It's like, okay, if I want to prepare for anything like this, or I was even looking at the stadium series and I wanted to make sure I was in good shape by April. And then I was going to do a race in may and then call that like my first half of the season. So just like looking at the way things lined up, I was like, okay, if this is the plan I want to execute next year, I like have to stop.
Now. It wasn't that like, I was. Feeling ready to, I just needed to actually stop, where this year is like the season actually went a little bit further into November, but it was like, once this is done, I'm going to give myself a mental break and I'm going to just pick up training as it would be normal and worry about when.
I'll be ready for later in the year and not be so hyper-focused on like these early events that, that happened in 2020, because 2021, we're not quite sure when things are going to roll around. And it also gave me the confidence that this is 2020 structure and training of the season. What went well? Right.
So like, okay, I just. Executed a really good like annual training plan. So I don't need to continue to kind of train, to prove to myself that I need that like, that the fitness aspect is going to work because I know it's going to work and I know it's going to, it will happen again. If I chill out now, it'll come back really, really quick.
And I've always kind of known that, but I never got to the point where I got to this year where it was. Like it showed up in the results. So, so you just said chill out, like why, why do you feel at this point right now? You should chill out at this point there, because there was so much buildup. I got to a point where I had built up my volume and intensity to its peak, and then I've brought it all the way down so that I was tapered and.
Generally rested. And will those, your OCR stars, essentially, it was like five weeks of tapering, right? There was no real training that was layered in throughout this. It was just kind of maintaining, maintaining. And so by the end of that, like five, five to six week period of time, like my training was almost non-existent.
Right. And that's how a general planning should planning should work. It should build up and then have a two or three or four week taper or two week taper and a week of recovery. So there ends up being like three or four weeks where you're not really deep into training because when you're deep in the training, you just want to keep going.
Like, you feel progress. You think, see things happening, numbers are changing and like your upward trajectory of how things are going. But like, after a long, I felt like a long taper and like a performance period. You're almost at scratch anyway. So there's no real rush to just start driving things back to where they were, because you're not close to where you were, so there's not this urgency.
So it really felt easy to be like, okay, well I'm not here right now. Anyway. So just now's the time to take some rest, to do some other things other than just like, get back to where I was. Cause there's no, because my fitness isn't where it was six weeks ago and there's no real event too. To rush back for, so at this, at this point in time, like that events has got done, you, you kind of want to chill out.
So is that more so to, is it just like a habitual thing you do? Like every year I'm going to take this much time to not run because it's, it's healthy. I recharge. Or are you feeling beat up after this? Do you feel like you really need to physically recover or is it more mental? yeah, this year, no, I'm not actually that beat up because they're.
Like the events were short and they were on road and, or the gym. So I don't have like, the events themselves weren't that brutal. So I'm not that beat up from the event and the training was down so low. So I feel like I could've gone back into training, but for me it was more mental. Like I was like four weeks of competition and just being really strict about everything.
And that's another thing like. For me when I need to, to really hunker down and focus on performance, the training will always be there. And the way that I can lead myself into a performance block, like, that's fine, like actually doing the workouts. There's no problem, but like, The lifestyle things behind it, or what's exhausting to me where it's like making sure I'm getting as much sleep as possible, making sure that my diet is on point in terms of food quality, making sure that like I'm not having any type of like drinks or out extracurricular activity, that's gonna like really.
Not serve my performance. So like, that's the part that's really hard for me. And like coming into the holidays was great because it's like, okay, cool. Now I can just like, finish, have a couple of cocktails and not have to freak and worry about it or feel guilty about it. You know? So to me it's like a mental reprieve in terms of like the lifestyle.
And like, I've been thinking about that a lot too. He's like w like periodize our programming so much, right? Like this phase is for base building. This phase is for pre-competition. This is your taper. Like. I kind of need the period. I's my lifestyle to make it sustainable. Right? Like just how, like you can't sustain like a 12 week pre-competition phase.
You might be able to be like a really hard training block. Isn't super sustainable without rest. I feel that way about my lifestyle and I feel like. There's a lot of guilt behind the way people's lifestyles or like if their sleep gets out of whack or their stress gets too high, like you need a break from that.
I need a break from that. So that's kind of how I'm thinking about it also is like periodizing. My brain work. So it makes a lot of makes a lot of sense. Yeah. Then you're like, you have to decompress, you have to decompress. And like, it's, like I said, physically, I keep it going. I'm sure. But, and I I've had this need in the past to just feel like I need to keep training.
Cause like what else would I do? But there's just this. This thing that can happen, that you could just kind of continuously run in this cycle where you still think you need to, you're not there yet. You're not quite good yet, but like, you might not be good because you've never stopped training. So it's like which part of it.
And it's easier to keep to me, it's easier to keep training and just keep chasing it, or if you're just like chilled out and backed off and then allowed yourself time to recharge mentally and physically like. You might see much bigger and better results, but it's like this moment of trust. And you also had a season, your season ended a little bit ago.
Right. And you were very much into like some longer distance ones. So we were kind of on the opposite ends of what we were preparing for at the end of the year. So what was your process like when it came to just like. Chilling out where you, where you planning on that. I know you're hurt. I know you hurt your hand and you hurt your hands.
I'm glad it's feeling better. Like was that was at a dead stop for you or did it get to a point where you were like, I'm exhausted. I need a break or how was that on your end? No, I actually, so. Coming up to like that final event of doing the Prezi traverse. I knew that like the last event that I had really planned, like Lucy plan was that long abandoned Catskills that I was planning on doing, in like early October.
But after. After the, I think I did the Prezi traverse on the 29th of September. So it was already like pretty close to that time of year where I was going to take time off. And I had a really good day and I, I hurt my hand on my pinkie. Actually, my pinky still kinda messed up, but, Hey, it is what it is.
Oh. And. You got to push through, you got to push him in. Yeah, so like between that, I was pretty stoked on it. Like my, my foot was a little, a little beat up as well. And where in the, the, like the Iraq's on super Rocky terrain, like they're called Iraq's, but they're, they're really like mud shoes, you know, from VJ.
Muds. Yeah, they're not, they don't do they not play minimalist, but like, but they're super agile. I mean, I love them. They're great performers and they treat my feet better. Like for whatever reason, they don't blister my toes, like the extremes do. So I wore, I wore those and like I was hammering Hills, so I was a little beat up from the rocket pack, but all in all I got done with that thought, like I'm super stoked with that.
I had a great performance. Like I feel really good, but at the same time, I'm super duper satisfied. Super satisfied. I don't feel the need either. None else approved this year. I'm going to stop while I'm at a really good spot and not like stop, like let all my fitness fall away. Like I, my goals were done.
It's time to kind of sit back decompress from the training scene. Think about what I want to do next year. Plan out my, my own training and, And then yeah, hop back into it with a little bit more excitement. Not only because I had taken an entire week off, I literally didn't do anything for a week. It was the longest week ever.
Nice, hilarious. but then I got back into it and I was doing some slightly different movements that I've been doing throughout the year. So there was excited to do something new. So the, was it a blend of. Satisfaction and excitement to start something new. And how did that, how did that relate to the end of 2019?
If you can recall, what was your, like how my season ended, like shit the year before it was harder. What was your season like the season before? I coming out of. Come out of 2019, I, I took a little bit, a little more like time off. I can't really even remember what was going on. I remember I I'd have to like look at my journal, but I got kind of distracted by some things I wasn't really disciplined with my training at that point.
also had some other things going on, like trying to start like start my own business and work jobs and, you know, holidays and stuff going on. So I took a little extra time off, but by the time, the last week of December came around, I started. I I hopped back into it. I knew I needed to spend more time climbing.
I knew I needed to spend more time in the mountains. So even though I took some time off. I, I got pretty excited about getting back into the mountains. Like whatever happened, just like the fire hit me. And I was like, you know what, 2020, it's going to be a fucking awesome season. And we're working really hard to make it happen.
And even though there was no like real Spartan races for me, it had up been an awesome season. Totally. I, I feel like I, this is the best season I've ever had. I like zero, but yeah, I know like, and I don't want to speak for you, but I think that you and I both were at like that. The highest fitness levels that we've ever been in.
In our endurance athletic career. and that's just called us the PR podcast because PR and everything this year cash crushed trust PR 2020. And so, yeah, so we definitely felt the same in terms of like the satisfaction of things. And so there is like this part of how much. Time to take them. Right? You say you took a week of doing nothing.
I've taken this week. I'm not doing nothing, but I'm very less structured. I'm not really running a run like once or twice only like 20 or 30 minutes of running at one shot. And I'm just kind of going down to the gym. I just start my watch and then I just do stuff for an hour and it's. Not that intense.
Like, it's really not that structured. It's like sort of fun. It's not that fun. I'm just kind of like doing stuff. It's not that fun, but like sometimes mobility, sometimes I'm just doing stuff and when an hour hits, I'm like, cool. just for both ends. So I don't keep going. And just so that I am moving more, not, I'm not just like sit in the house all day.
So there is this, there is kind of a balance of when to start up. Again, and, and what, and how long you should take of like complete downtime or moving into your off season for me, like just the idea of a quote unquote downtime. I'm not sure if that's actually what it's called. I just call it that, is that it?
But have you been, have you heard it been called downtime downtime off season? Yeah. Yeah. Whatever that is, whatever we're using it. So. I've always thought of downtime was like two weeks of like one week of like off in the second week of like really the light and the third week, then you can kind of start to get back into some structure instead of like you took one week and then started to kind of put some structure back on it.
Oh yeah. I went right into super, super structured. Yeah. Put out a like six weeks of really no running, just, just focusing on building up leg strength and doing some more variety, kind of putting my joints through some slightly new ranges of motion. What's that look like? Yeah. All right. Well, rather than running, I went back into this muscular endurance workout.
That I'm a really huge fan of, it's just a strength endurance. So just like lots of blocks. Step ups, lunges, squat jumps. It's straight out of the uphill athletes are good workout. I felt results from it. You feel, you get to build. Like strength and like endurance, but in a fashion that's not running. so there's less impact.
And it's just a little bit, you put your joints through a little bit greater range during that particular workout. So something like that, I'm doing lots of a lateral movement, lateral balance, lateral hops, single leg, both legs, ice skaters, different jumps, 90 degree jumps 180 degree jobs. So just like lots of spinning, twisting side to side jumping and, And building up like strength again, but really focusing on more like maximal strength and trying to avoid pulling on any more muscle.
Cause like I'm already, I already feel beefy, but my sets are good enough. I don't need them to be any bigger. That's and this is an interesting time to do something like that. And it's an appropriate time. Cause like, I feel like a lot of times it's, it's, it's really hard to add in things like that.
When you're training at a high volume where you're like looking to perform really well really soon, like adding a no Sibbet things. Where it would be just muscular endurance, some, some joint strength. It's hard to find a place for that when it's like, all right, well, I need to do speed work here. I need a long run here.
Like when does this all work? And I think that that can happen to programs a lot where it's like, Oh, I just learned about this thing. Let me put it in four weeks before this next event. And then it throws the. It throws your total work rate. Like it gives a jump in that, and then it makes things a little bit less predictable.
So now is a really good time to do those types of workouts or things that you feel like you might have been missing in your regular training. And then you can just see. How that makes you feel, and then you can see if you want to keep that or change that. So, yeah, man, I mean, when you're doing, like, if you're doing eight to 10 hours of gym work, it's like, yo not a lot of people are going to have time to do that and run a mile, you know?
So, so you gotta make decisions. If you have your, if you're. Sport involves mostly running. You gotta spend most your time running. So, yeah. And that was a nice opportunity to kind of like I'm letting my running legs kind of chill a little bit, still holding on some legs, strength or building leg strength even and holding onto some Durance.
but yeah, focusing on like doing more. Being more generally prepared, like working on my general athleticism and then I'll, I'll work more into the specificity as we get closer into, late winter, early spring, depending on how things are looking. Got it. And it's nice. Cause like you start, like, I don't think I would have, I'm not going to have a phase quite like that where it's without running at all.
I'll probably, I'm going to get back into running and in two weeks, like I said, and just try to have a little bit structured there and start to build out. like my full running plan, but with this time it's going to be about fitting in strength work that is going to be kind of similar to what I was doing through OCR stars, where I'm going to be doing a little bit more conditioning with my strength, work, something that's a little bit more, you know, Metcon oriented.
But with, with like, Metcons that aren't meant to just beat you into the dirt, but trying to try and get my versatility and training through those type of workouts. As I start to work into the next season. So that's really where I'm going to kind of try to add things in that I didn't have necessarily during my big training throughout the year.
And I'm going to probably try to keep that in for the, for as long as I can, as long as I feel like, yeah, it is going to serve me well, because that's one thing that can happen, right? You can kind of get really stuck on doing some routine across. It's a great example of this. And then it gets to the point where it's like, is this helping your goals or hurting your goal?
And like, you kind of have to have a, a moment where you really. Have to have a honest conversation with yourself, like, is this helping, you know, or do I just like it, but it's like a big time of year for that kind of stuff, man. Thinking about like, is this good? Is this getting me towards my goals? Whether it's because like you're messing up your sleep or you're messing up like how you're eating or I should say messing up.
Like, you're just not as aligned as you could be. Or it's like, it's cold outside. You don't want to go out there or whatever. It's like, yo, it's a, it's a hard, it's a hard time and a lot of different ways. And, Kind of putting in a little bit of extra work might be necessary, right? It's it's your it's off season for also, like I said, your brain periodization off season for that too, but you can bring it back.
You don't have to backslide for good. You does not have to be like that always. So, so my understanding is like you and I, we had a good season. We took, just a little, little time to step back, you know, for short amount of time. And if we're going to go back into training, starting out with some. Not running focused work.
We're doing some slightly alternative work. That's a little, it's not super duper specific for Oscoe horse racing, but it's good. Kind of like general conditioning. Is that what I'm understanding of on your end too? No, it looks like on my end for sure. But with, running's going to come back pretty quick.
Okay. Okay. It's always going to be my bread and butter. That makes sense, man. Makes sense. Feel good about it? I feel. I like to do it. I don't think that I would mentally feel that well going, going away from it for too long. And I don't think, I believe you. I see you look in your face and I believe you, that that 28 minute, six miles is going to run itself next year.
It's exactly. Yeah. I gotta get this thing. So it's like, so. you know, it's, it's like who should, who should follow in similar steps to what we're doing? What, what individuals should do that? What individuals should maybe not even take one of these quote unquote off seasons or step back, you know, what's appropriate for, for these different people.
Yeah. So it really is going to be gold dependent and. I think the most common advice that kind of gets dulled down about like kind of bringing, coming back in out of off season training is to just go into like a base phase. And I feel like that that's just good general advice, but if you're like a base phase is going to look different for every single person.
Like if they're, if you are an ultra runner, Who is going to be doing, you know, say like yourself, world's toughest or going after, the 24 hour Spartan, but you're not comfortable with how your leg turnover is, or you just feel like if you could get a little bit faster, Like then you might be a little bit more confident.
Like now it's not a bad time even to do some speed work in like your quote unquote base phase, but on the opposite end, if you feel like you're like turnover, is there like someone like myself where it's like faster turnover is something that helps me get really sharp and really good for racist, specific instances.
Like. I'll probably just start doing miles and little, little, little pieces of, of speed work, like fartlek workouts, or just like minute pickups here and there. Maybe those Hill sprints type of thing, just to keep the speed present, but not to have it be like the main focus of the training. Cause it's just hard to like recover from at that point.
So like, It's lame to say, but it really just does depend and it's all going be different. Right? That's always the answer. It's always, it depends. And actually, before precedes, even deciding who is going to do what, not only does it matter, like what their season look like, what the year, you know what the whole year looked like leading up to this point.
But these, everyone listening has to kind of think about what they want to do next year. Like, what is, what is the goal for me? It's it's right now it's looking like WTF. Full year away. It's literally like 350 days away. So, so that's a far away goal, but it's one else's goal is like, they want to do something in January or they know what they want to do in August.
It's like, that's something that they should kind of think about because if they don't have any particular goal, that kind of, that, that changes things. So that's perfect. So like, what was that process like for you? How did you decide? I mean, I know Rosa has, has some, like a spot in your heart and you're like, That race is my shit.
I need that orange jacket, bro. I need that jacket. You look good in orange, orange hat on now. So it's a very bright orange, orange jacket will go real well with like the whole thing. That you have in terms of like your look. So I think that that's a great reason, but like, w like when you look at the scope of a year, how, like, what is your process like for that?
Like, how do you determine the goals that you want to go after? what am I good at now? What am I shitty at now? How long does it take to how much time do I have? How long does it take to build a fitness or skill in a certain region? Does, do I have the time to do that? If not, should have, how much time should I invest in this particular thing before I'm like moving more towards the next thing.
So in other words, it's like, okay, this events pretty far away, I could be. Faster, but speed isn't really necessary for this particular event. However, it would be good for just ultimately my economy and my, my turnover and for other events that are gonna lead up to that, that I might care about. So I'll work on speed, but ultimately it's just going to be time on feet.
So I was like, okay, I need to build my mileage with my mileage. The mileage is really high. I'll probably, increase my durability by continuing to do strange stuff. Maybe throw a, throw a vest on for my hikes. Things like that, but even, even more than the nuts and bolts of like how you're going to get to that goal.
How did you even determine that goal aside from the orange jacket? Like what was it that you were like? My goal race is in November. How did you decide that specific race? well, it's only one that's like on the table right now. I saw like Atkins posted about it. And then, you know, like Kilian wants to go to a Trevor psychos, wants to go to it.
Javier Escobar. There's that, there's a bunch of people that want to go there who have already done a hundred plus miles. It's going to be good competition there. I'm going to feel super driven to go against these people and try and stand on the podium, with them. So when you kind of look at it, is it that.
You want to see how you stack up against the best of the best and like wherever that would be like, that's where you want to go, or was it more about the events or was it about unfinished business? It's like if all of them, dude, it's such a fun event. I had such a good time. There. I, the distance calls to me, I've never run a hundred miles before.
so between it being fun between it being a distance that I want to achieve the competition. Yeah. You all those. So it was like a no brainer for you. For sure. And what would you have done if they put it on the same day as Spartan? No competition, man. I'm going to world's toughest. Do the obstacle are just more fun, man.
Like you go through more water, you wear a wetsuit. It's just, it's, it's a different style, you know, it's just messier. And that's an appropriate answer sometimes when talking about goals, right. It's always like, Oh, I wanna get on the podium. I want to get this time or whatever, but like having fun and enjoying the race is, is something you should consider, right.
Or like, Oh my friends go out there and I know it's going to be a good time. And that's where I'm going to see, like, even around the event, like that's appropriate, that's an appropriate way to set a goal, you know? Also it's like probably the only place I can come close to beating Marco day. Yeah. So work, you better be going, he better be out there, Mark.
yeah. I wonder if he will go. Cause that'd be good. That'd be good. Yeah. I hope it's like stacked so stacked. I want it. Yeah. I want it. I want to actually be nervous. I haven't been really nervous for a race in awhile, so you had to get out and to get after it that way. So, so your, so right from the start of things, you already know you have a full year to prepare for this.
So it makes it easier to kind of like S like work backwards then, and that gives you the time. So you, you stopped in September. Yeah. Yeah. The week off was the first week of October, we have to do it. Right. So that gives you, that gives you that leeway. It's like, okay. My race is not even for over a year. I, I can have this.
This luxury of taking six weeks of doing things like spending time on my bikes, spending time in the gym, because I know that I might not really need to get after specific things for several months. So I was going to look like for you then when you start to look at world's toughest is late November, right?
Mid November. What, what months are going to be the most critical part for you in terms of training, leading into that race? Well, it's going to be, I'm going to do it a lot of building this winter, for sure. I'm going to kind of do like a, like a, to build, not really that I'm going to peak necessarily in the middle of the summer, but I plan to do a lot of building up and seeing how durable I can make myself or over these winter months to take advantage of the snowy mountains.
Cause it's like, it's low impact at the same time. It's like tougher to move around. as cold, it's just, it's, it's fitting, it seems to fitting. And also like I'm not there, but I'll take it. I'll take advantage of that. And then, and then again, coming around, like, August and September, and probably ha like halfway through October, it'll be pretty high mileage.
It'll be pretty high mileage. Yeah. That's cool. Specific, right? Like when talking about our event, that's going to be 24 hours when your goal is a hundred miles, like. It's not going to be a 16 week build, like your build starts today. It's a good, no time to waste. It's a year away. There's no time to waste 50 week build.
And it just has to be appropriate in terms of how you structure things out. Just how you're saying, like breaking it into two pieces. But knowing like August, September, October, those might need to be those blocks of where I would mentally. Periodize my train and be like, this is where I need to be in crunch time.
We're right now it might be like, okay, I'm going to go out. Still try to just get in, but just get these miles in. But you're still working. But like, you know, when crunch time is because, you know, when your race is, and you've already had that time to like, look at the grand scope of the entire season and know exactly where it's time to like hit it hard.
Right. So, so, so thus, yeah, it's been easy to kind of determine where I'm going to go right now. Exactly. So I'm kind of afforded, I'm kind of a fortunate one in that regard. I have like a specific event. If I didn't have that event, I would just know, okay, I need to work running economy and I need to keep getting better at like climbing up Hills, but I wouldn't really have a date that I'm like, I need to get a good bite by this time or be at a certain point by this time.
So, so I guess then we'll listen. It's like, you know, put a goal out there in one way or another. Put something on the calendar, I think is what I kind of recommend to anyone. And that's where we're kind of at the opposite ends. It's like, I'm just finished this event. And now I'm leading into the season where there are not necessarily any races that I know that I'm going to do.
Like if sporting worlds is in Abu Dhabi, I'm probably not going to go. if. It's if you nor AMS at Tahoe. And I haven't really been doing the national series that much, I don't know if that's going to serve me. Well, if they've like high rocks has been, is going well. If DECA fits actually happen in these indoor events, who knows, like, who knows what those inhabits our stadium's going to happen because like sports.
Like the people who, the teams that actually own those stadiums and play in those stadiums, their schedules are all over the place. Right? Like they don't even know when they play, they're going to get canceled, moved around like, Oh, you know how Spartans could possibly secure a date for that? Like, they'll be like, dude, get out of here.
So for me, I'm kind of on the opposite end. I'm like, I'm not quite sure what it's going to look like for the next year, but I know where. That I'm going to want to work in that, you know, 30 minutes to like our 30 minute timeframe, you know, with the caveat that if I start to work into a beast, I know that I need to have my volume at a certain level to pivot into something like a Tahoe or something like that.
So what I went ahead and did, I went back and looked at my previous season and just, and there's, there are definitely good. Metrics to look at through something like training peaks or through Strava, right. You can kind of get a snapshot of what's going on, but to like really know, you kind of have to go through it.
So I went back and actually went through like each week of training, starting at the beginning of my season. Last year. I only did half the season cause it was taking a long time, but, So I went through it and I looked at a couple of different metrics. I looked at what my starting baseline test was, and then like my ending baseline tests and how many miles per week, how many hours per week out of running, how many hours a week outside of running.
And I also tracked my body composition, my weight. I had that all, all saved, which was great. And then just kind of like looked at it in the snapshot of things and saw it after about 16 weeks of. Like four week mezzo cycles. I was able to really kind of get into peak shape. Like I saw at the beginning of the season, I was at 1605 for a 5k.
And then by the end of those 16 weeks, I was at 1,505. So I know that I can take it from, from over the course of those weeks. And I saw the exact mileage that I was running and all the other stuff that I was doing. And it can kind of give me an idea of like, okay, if I have an event where I want to get peak shape for like, I need 16 weeks.
So I'm a little bit more fortunate than you are, because like, I can be a little bit quicker that way. Whereas like, if you plan for world's toughest, Mudder, it gets canceled. Like, I mean, at least you have big volume and if you're planning to do world's toughest, Mudder, Like doing big volume. You'll probably like it, like, you'll probably be better suited for other events that we'll do anyway, but like taking a real look at the season that you've previously had and everything that happened to.
So I was even able to see like, Oh, this is the time that I went to Mexico for a wedding. And this is a time where I like. Went on vacation so I could see how my training became inconsistent. But for the most part, like if I do all of these things in this exact order, like I'll be able to have this type of result, which is helpful when trying to pick something, what you don't quite know what you're doing.
And then it's just a better about. Getting that volume to a place where you feel comfortable doing and just kind of keeping doses of speed and not necessarily like cranking at any type of hard progression, right jump. So, so someone like, so somebody listening and getting that bit of information, if they go back and look through their, their data, maybe they'll see something similar just for ease.
They say, Oh, it looks like it takes me about 16 weeks as well. So. In the meanwhile, without having an event on the calendar, knowing that, okay, you need about 16 weeks. I mean, in the, in the meanwhile or you just want to kind of work on, on everything, are you, like you were going to be running, but you're also working on like your general fitness.
So would you say that everyone out there should just kind of be like, just having their toes kind of like. In everything kind of staying engaged with all the different facets. So not so they're not too focused on any specific thing cause it's not necessary right now. I think there's two ways to go about that.
I think that's really valuable to do that. It's a little bit less stressful. Like if you're going to have more of a let's call it undulated progression where it's like. A different workout every Tuesday, a different workout every Friday. It's like maybe a tougher run here, maybe a fartlek workout here, maybe some fast pickups here, maybe do some bucket carries or whatever.
Just like keep your general fitness around. I think it's a good approach for obstacle course racing in general. And just so that you're. But having the progression and having there be consistency with like the total amount of hours, I think would probably be your best bet. And just knowing that the total volume is there, and not going insane with, with intensity.
So I would kind of keep the intensity on the lower end of those workouts. I'd probably stick with things. Threshold and slower. So I really wouldn't get any like mile pace. this is for me personally right now, cause everybody like caveat. That all depends for me personally. I wouldn't go anything faster than that, just because that to me would be more race specific and I need to have space for that for those 16 weeks kind of build into where I really want to be.
Gotcha. Interesting. I'm doing some, a little different where I'm like, I'm not doing a lot of intensity, but when I am doing it, it's like, it's really short. It's really short and sharp. It's like, yeah. It's like the reverse periodization thing where it's like, I'm moving, I'm doing short, sharp stuff off the get just to like, I will feel that like that limb speed, get the heart rate up really quick and they bring it back up, but nothing super sustained.
So overall the amount of stress I'm taking on is fair. It's like, it's really, it's moderated. It's easy to, and, and that's kinda why, why I said that staying away from it. 5k 10 K mile pace. Cause that will beat you up. And if you're, and you can handle a good amount of it, and that's why it's so effective to get you an awesome running shape is because it's like, you can, it's the maximum dose of hard work that you can do before your body shuts you down, doing super fast stuff.
You can only do a little bit of it to like really get that the effort that you want, right? Like a hundred percent effort. You can only do that for 10 seconds right before you can really go, go too crazy, wherever you're doing. Like. thousands at 5k pace. That's like three minutes of three minutes, something of work that you can do, like six times, like it's a lot and it can really tear you down.
and like what I'm saying, you could also do it. Like they approach it being kind of generalized. And that is a really good, good approach. Yeah. If you like variety, if you like to have fun, if you'd like to have add different splashes in and you might not want anything super structured or you could kind of do the thing, like we talked about working on your weaknesses, like you had mentioned earlier, it's like, what w what do I need to work on?
Or that ultra runner who might not have the, they won't have the luxury to do four hundreds in August or September. Like, you're not going to be on the track in August, September doing four hundreds. I don't think. Me. Yeah. Probably not, probably not, but if that's something that area you want to go, if you're like, Hey, I want to see what my leg speeds like or on the opposite end for someone who's more in that stadium realm or a sprints realm.
Like working on that longer sustained, endurance. Like if you did OCR stars in your mile was much better than your six mile to, okay. You need to work on some of that longer duration, some of those endurance pieces. So doing like longer tempo runs or like changing the pace of your tempo runs doing like a mile at like marathon pace at a mile at.
A little bit fashioned, easy pace, just kind of moving things around would be another way to kind of go about that. So working on your weaknesses, I think is an appropriate time before those 16 week training block for you to really kind of hone things in to then sharpen up to that actual race specific stuff.
But, so I don't necessarily approach it as in terms of like working on my. Weaknesses. Do you do that much or do you, are you like, I need to do this stuff because I'm not good at it. Or how does that work for you? To, to a degree. for example, with a flat running, I'll end up doing more of that and spending more time on my running economy, but it's it, even though I know I'm not very, very good at that compared to some of my other skills.
it's, it's not super high in importance. Like I'm not, I'm not really great at it, but it's also not super high and important, so I'll spend some time on it, but not a crap load. I'm going to work on the other things that I know are going to be. Ultimately more beneficial for the sport, which is just keeping my whole body communicating well with like compound movements, being able to move my body through space and, and making sure like my hips, my laser just durable to handle the abuse of the courses of the quick of the quick movements as sharp turns, drops and jumps.
So I'm not bad at that stuff. but we can always get better at that. Yeah. And that's the. Thing with obstacle course racing for sure is like terrain based work. And that's one thing I didn't mention for my, but that would be part of like the 16 weeks. Like if I know that, like my goal race is going to be maybe one of the us national series races, wherever they end up being or say it's just like Palmerton, whatever.
like I know that my work that I would need to do in that 16 weeks would need to be. On terrain specific stuff to really kind of make sure that it gets sharp. but for me, cause that's a weakness of mine. I'll definitely spend time on the trails in this kind of base building phase, kind of like this generalized phase.
And if I'm doing tempo runs or fartlek runs, I'll probably do it on trails. Just to kind of like do a little bit of both. W I'm all about that, man. Like talking to me, I'm like, yo, you're going to get stronger. And how ultimately like. Healthier joints as like star record, better reaction time and all of that.
You have better engagement running on trails. I know. I got, I got, I got a pair of VJ's. I got them coming in the mail. I don't think I told you I got the maxes. Oh, shit, son. I'm excited. They do that does have a rock plate, right? I believe it is. I believe you don't have a pair of Max's. I have the extremes in the Iraq's I'll probably get some acts as though everybody listening.
Definitely has a pair. Every older has a probably I need to get on board. VJ just owns us. They got us. So yeah, I got, I got to find out. I got to see what's up. I don't need to, and they're they're lower drop. I think the max is, are six. Yeah. Yeah. That's and I'm fine with that. so did you do much in terms of like reflecting, are you a reflective person when it comes to your training?
Like, will you stop and be like, Hmm, what did I learn from the previous year? Like what, what did I learn from the races that I've done? What did I learn from the training? Like what did I add? What did I take out? Or like, actually, let me just ask you. What did you learn this past year from yourself in terms of like racing and competition?
What did I learn from this past year or racing in competition? Yeah. About yourself. one I love MKTs because I'm alone. I'm in my own head. There's no one else to look at. And I just always assume that there are ghosts around me that are faster than me. And I'm like, no, fuck you. I don't know. It's easier to compare myself to myself cause there's nobody around.
So, so I realized mentally speaking, I'm pretty strong there. I feel like, but more, more physically. in terms of like physicality, like, all right. I downhill still solid, just like, just send it to them and it just going to go pretty well. but something that I realized that I dropped out in the past that I needed to bring back in was more of the heavy lifting.
I realized like, okay, we're strong. I don't need to, I don't need to do that anymore. but at the same time, it just, it just did something, did something for me. Like, even though like the strength was there. Let's use like deadlift, for example, I, at one point I was so competent, it felt so natural lift a weight in that manner.
And even though he likes to have the strength going back to it, it's kind of like felt awkward. And I just, looking at my time from like, say one ultra marathon to the same ultra a couple of years later. And it's like, my time was better, but I felt like it should have been better, better. and so what that told me, I was like, okay, what are they doing then?
That was really good. It's like, okay. My hips, like I was really durable, but I didn't have as much volume. And then this past year going into it, Or two years ago going into it, it's like, okay. I was faster. I was doing more mileage, but the left less lifting. So I felt like I had better cardio, but I was like slightly less durable.
So that made me, I was like, okay, I need to, I need to bring more heavy lifting back into me, back up heavy lifting back into me, back into my training because that had served me well, so heavy lifting in combination with higher volume, like, okay, that seems to be the moneymaker for me. So you learned this year that, you know, the competition doesn't necessarily have to be.
Present with you that like you're able to, to push with MKTs, you know, chasing the ghost of the F Katie or whatever that, that is, that is satisfying too. And also that like heavy lifting is something that you didn't have that you wish you would have had and you feel like you would have better performance on that end.
Yeah. Yeah. The takeaways for the year were definitely like perky, heavy lifting in keep, keep volume up, but like easy volume. Cause like my buh-bye doesn't like Rhodes, so some of the stuff is just resounding for previous years it was like, okay, check. Still don't like rows. And then the other thing was like, Oh, just bring lifting back in.
And then other things like, yep. Let's keep doing, keep doing that and stuff. So, but yeah, there's definitely, there's definitely check-ins there's never looking at notes like, Oh, this felt good and felt bad. need to do more of this. And like that. So that's, so that's a little bit of the training aspect of what you will learn this year is that you think that.
Heavy lifting would, would be appropriate. And the racing part is that you just, you don't necessarily need to have a race. Yeah. Also I turns out I just really like running, like I do, of course racing. Cause I wanted to, I was like, Oh, I'm strong. I'm going to crush people on these monkey bars and sandbag carries, but ended up being mostly running.
And that started Raymore. I'm like, wow. I just really like running, running. That's the thing, man. Running tricks. People, people like think that they go to sign up for a half marathon with their friend and they used to, they learn like. Oh, this is actually, I actually don't hate this. Or like, you know, I used to play a ball sport.
Like I hate running whatever. That's my, that was my sports punishment. And again, they're like, ah, it's actually, it doesn't suck. This is actually is actually pretty sweet. I like that. It's like, should I do a marathon? Should I get a pair of short shorts? Yes, you should get short shorts. You shouldn't wear tights.
Over or under your short shorts, just rock your short shorts. Brian. I had to do the test. I got to do a test and I got too much chafing, but anyway, so enough about me. what's what do you have like over the past year? Cause I'd have to ask you the same thing as like, you must've been reflective. That's gonna, that's gonna influence how you go into the next year, what you do right now.
It's nice. I always liked like the year end of the list, they get the Spotify list. Got King gaze on yours, Jack. I try my buddy's always trying to give me the check. I have this song called superbug and it was very fitting for this year. Oh yeah. I'll check on it's song. I always tell my buddy I'm like, Oh, and I put the, I put the albums on.
They just came out with a new one. I'd put it on. And I just like couldn't. Well, they put on a new album, like every eight weeks they crutch stuff, man. But I love those lists. My list was, was pretty basic this year. I was, I was kind of bummed about how basic it was. I'll tell you about it later. It's but I liked these reviews, right?
And like, like this, I like that this part of the year there is this like reflective nature, like. Ultimately when the calendar changes from 20, 20, 20, 21 or 2019 2020, it doesn't mean anything like in these months that like, there's nothing that has to do with any of our mental state that changes. It's just, the sun comes up, the sun goes down, like, there's nothing that matters, but like it's a good time to sit and reflect on like what, what has passed.
And if we didn't have this type of structured time and, and, you know, monthly schedule, we may never necessarily do that. I'm sure they didn't do that when it was just like, I'm just trying to hunt and eat food and, and move on. They probably don't do too much reflection. So I do like the reflective period that this has, and this is another good time to do it.
Sit down and just like, think about it for a little bit. So in terms of like bracing, I mean, I raised really well. I mean, they're all virtual races obviously, and only race I didn't raise. Well, that was the one that wasn't virtual, which was at Jacksonville, but I really have worked hard on shifting the focus.
And this was, this year really helped that to not have the goals be. Like not having the goals hinged on the perf the outcomes, right? Like how well my place was or how well, my time kind of came around that. I learned that being able to kind of push myself for the sake of pushing myself is like enough.
And it's something I feel like I've been sort of striving for for a long time. And it's something that I really was kind of forced to execute on this year. Is that like, if you push yourself and you're satisfied with your effort, then like you will accomplish your goal one way or the other. And if like your fitness follows your aspirations, like you're asking to your aspiration, they'll fit your aspirational fitness.
We'll follow. If you push yourself as much as you can on race day. And if like you can be satisfied with that, you meant to that, man, I feel like we've said this before. It was like, you might finish a race and like you're the place. Wasn't what you wanted it to be. But like, based on how you feel, you're like, no, I, I, for sure it gave it everything.
Like I couldn't ask for more and I'm happy because of that. And sometimes like I would finish a race and be like, I F I gave it everything I had. I finished like six and I'm still pissed because it was like this, this. Reality that set in on me. It's like, okay, is my best not good enough. Like, and I just didn't like that feeling.
And it's just like, you know, almost like your mortality, right? Like it's reality. That's like in front of your face and it's like uncomfortable. And now, like, I. Feel like that I've spent so much time alone and competing alone that like I would be okay with. I am okay with that, those type of finishes. And if I finished sixth or eighth at a race, and I know everything I did is what I could have done.
I feel like I've made that step. And it's hard to say because there are no physical races, but, I felt really satisfied with the efforts that I was able to put forward in terms of like the racing itself. and. Training, I I've learned to just, you know, volume, I just reaffirmed like volume matters and, and having structure and having a plotted out and having very specific aspects of what you're training for will pay off.
And just, I think I learned more that, like how little of dope, how little dosage you would need to get results. Like it doesn't need to be. 12 weeks of one thing to get a big result. It doesn't like you could just, you. Can adapt pretty quick, to get race specific. Anyway, you just have to be consistent.
You just gotta to be consistent and we've seen reflection, man. That's yeah, definitely. What I've seen with myself. It's like, if I take a week off or I'm down for a couple of weeks, like, Oh, well I didn't really jump up in fitness that much over these couple of months. I thought I would've well, look back.
See, and that's also alarming too. If you look back and like, Oh my God, I thought these all these weeks went well. And you saw that. Oh, there's several like unplanned days of rest or some travel. Didn't go the way that you thought it would or, or whatever. Like there might be things in there that you didn't necessarily think were in there.
Cause when you're in the moment of the workout, you're like, Oh, I'm crushing. But like you forget about like how inconsistent you may have been. So that's another reason why to like, looking back is important. Okay. So another thing Josh wanted to ask you, what is something that you added into your routine that you saw big results this year?
You already know son kettlebells kettlebells. Kettlebells all the time they have been. They've been awesome. As far as, like I say, with the deadlift, how, like some of these lists make me just feel like my whole body's kind of working better together. like more effortlessly, nothing has done that.
Like kettlebells. I mean like the fluidity that you. That you end up just like having to have with swinging a kettlebell. just the way the whole kinetic chain works together. The, the power that I feel like you're my hip extension, the, competence that I feel in my grip and how I noticed like, Oh, I can get all these back muscles to do work and not my arms.
And I'm not trying to like muscle things around. So it was, it's been a really awesome learning tool and strength building tool. That's right. Like it's super convenient to work around. I'm using it for mobility. It's just like, yo kettlebells are the shit. And, she'll have one, just get one. They are available on rogue again.
Cause I went cause our gym shut down here and I jumped on the rogue real quick. I was like, let me see if I can grab one, but I think I'm going to be okay. Cool. Good one. So on my end, I did a lot more of that like joint mobility. Like I learned a lot from, to the cruise and crucially training and the way that I was able to be to train pain-free has been.
Pretty astonishing. that's really been the limiting factor in that first 16 week block of the season. Last year, by the end, I was just so run down. Like my feet hurt real bad. I just wanted it to be over. And I took some time and learned about like the drum ability pieces and really put that into my practice.
Almost every day, six days a week of doing some sort of joint mobility where, you know, it's very hip, knee, ankle, wrist, shoulder focus like in your neck. And it doesn't feel like it's doing anything, but then after, and it's like really kind of gentle and you just kind of move around and just have to be focused on how you're moving.
But dude, it just helps so much. It just like allowed me to train and not hurt because that was always the thing. Like, in my case, like it was like pain ended up being kind of a limiting factor for me. And not necessarily like fatigue or anything. Like if I didn't race while it's usually I'm like something hurt.
And that was a point I wanted to see if I could fix, and I don't necessarily know if I fixed it, but I definitely helped alleviate that the joint mobility piece. That, that was awesome. That's an important one. That's pretty sweet. Yeah. And so that's another thing, the problem, this reflection periods, like, did you add something that served you that wasn't good.
And another piece, Josh, what was something that you removed from your routine that you saw big results from? But honestly, man, I. Can't really say that I, that I did. Yeah. I can't really say that I really removed anything. I guess something that I made an adjustment doing was like, I did cut back on the volume of my calisthenics and changed up the style.
So, there were periods of times where I would do I'd wake up and I'd do a hundred pull-ups 200 push-ups 300 squats. And I was doing that every day. it was just kinda, it became kind of an unnecessary and I switched it to, or more power. Power movements. So I would end up doing like 25 pull-ups, 50, 50 pushups, a hundred squats.
I would just do them all at a much higher velocity. So that's an alteration that I've made signed that I had been doing for a very long time volume. That, that makes sense. That's a lot of volume. You do a hundred pushups a day. Well, there's a lot of like, yo, if I joined the seals or something, like I gotta be ready, gotta be ready.
Yeah, one one-arm pull-ups do 100, 100 pull-ups a day. Holy shit. Y'all I D I'm like, shit. I got three, four, two, three, bro. How long until the new year, was it three weeks? Three weeks. Okay. I got three weeks before I was one of my goals this year. I got to do two consecutive one-arm pull-ups and like, you know, the training's intense right now for the pull-ups.
Is this as a centric coming down has to be really hard. Huh? And then pull it into the pool again at the, at the bottom. So, okay. That makes sense for me. I, I mean this, like the thing I've spoken about a bunch, like the lifestyle, like sustained pieces of not like drinking is just like fantastic. Obviously it just makes me feel so much better in every aspect and just like recover better, sleep better.
That's just. Kind of a no-brainer, but like being able to put it in place. And I was like, you can have like a week leading into a race, like, Oh, I'm going to have a drink, like, you know, two or three weeks out. Like I think sustain big, long pieces to really see how you're feeling, you know, cutting that out can make a huge, huge, made a huge difference in my performance, for sure.
When it, when it came time to, hell yeah. Side note, did you notice the change of body composition a little bit? I mean, I D I actually, I didn't focus on it too much as it turned into straight up competition phase, just because I didn't want that to be a focus in anything. It's like, okay, here I am. Like, this is what I got.
Like, I need to fuel this. And just whatever, like nothing, it doesn't matter how I look or what the scale says. I need to. Just make sure I'm doing whatever I can in terms of like the performing it's like, am I shredded? Cause they stopped alcohol or am I shredded because I'm running a hundred miles a week who cares?
I'm just ready threaded. But that happened that I did the same type of no drinking block in February and I lost a bunch of weight and I got real ripped, super ripped. So I wasn't as ripped as then. But but yeah, I mean, you will see it, like if you, if you're, if you want to lose weight and you're not, and you're drinking, like stop.
Stop the dry. It just don't do that anymore. so that was a good one on my end. And I, I, I forget I had another one, but I forget now. But I forget, I'm like searching for it in your eyes now, now that you can see it. But if you, if this was like in 4k would be able to get it. Yeah. So there was a couple more examples of, you know, when people have these big buildups and kind of both how we did and that we were satisfied with how they ended, but like, you know, some of the athletes that we're coaching are in some interesting.
spots as well. And again, it always depends on where you're at, who you are and, and what this is going to look like moving forward. So tell us a little bit about some of the situations that you've been kind of, handling on your end with the athletes you're coaching. Oh, well, like one individual that, I just actually just started working with after getting his history.
He just kind of floated through the summer, not doing a whole crap load of work. so he never really felt beat down. He could sick, constantly felt healthy. And even though he was like, he was consistent throughout the summer. but again, just wasn't, didn't do anything in intense. and he has a goal.
He has a goal to do, in a local, actually a really cool local ultra marathon called magnitudes revenge. It's this beast, it's 54 miles and 16,000 feet of vert. and that ends up being in June. So it's like, all right, you're healthy now, that's your goal. And we have, we have a, this amount of time to get there.
Perfect. So he's getting busy, he's excited. He's like, you know, COVID has been, been going on. He hasn't really had the guidance. Like I said, he's just kind of been floating along. Now he has structure, he's ready to rock and he's going to continue to push, it's active season for him. He's, he's working hard and he's going to continue to work out to that, that goal.
Whereas also they have had a, again, how to con continuously like decent year, Was, it was more structured than this other individual that I just spoke of. however, they are also still feeling very good, feeling, enthusiastic, excited. We have a goal on the table and that's all the way coming around next year as well.
We have a full year to work towards this, but since they're in such good health feeling driven, I see no reason for them to pull, pull back for any reason. So pushing on. Totally. And it, again, it just does depend if you don't like that big build and your training and then a big event is a reason to back off to so you can mentally refresh or if it's a huge event.
That you're physically going to need to back off for like, like a world's toughest or even like something like a Tahoe or, you know, like a seasoning beast where the effort you're going to put forward is going to take a lot out of you. But like, if you're feeling good and you haven't had this big crazy build and you're ready to start something like, yeah, just keep rolling.
You don't have to take two weeks off in November. You know, just, just like the most logical point. So if you're ready to train, keep doing it, but you gotta ask yourself, like we said before, like, are you training? Because you're. It's appropriate to train or are you training? Cause like you're chasing something because you're dissatisfied, right.
Because those are different. So like if it's that, if you're dissatisfied, you might need to kind of take a step back just to kind of take that mental break. But yeah. It, depending on your circumstance, I definitely kind of keep things rolling forward. Yeah, it's exciting too. Cause I mean, it might seem, uncommon, like for most folks who are going after like spring, summer events, they're probably just doing like easy stuff right now.
I feel like that's a pretty, a pretty common thing, but like I got these guys doing like speed work and strength because based on schedule, I put together, I'm like, yo, this is where it fits. It's what's a good time to do it. And so they're getting after it, in the cold, they're running are lifting heavy, the sweet time of year for them.
Totally. It's awesome. Yeah. Like they, and like, and that's where. People can get worried about what other people are doing. It's like, Oh, well, this person is doing speed work right now. I saw on their Strava, like, should I do speed work? It's like, well, you don't know what they're training for. You know what their goals are.
You don't know where they've come out of. So yeah, if you have that goal on it and it's appropriate to keep training, freaking keep. Yeah. Otherwise just do Stu stuff. That's good for you if you're not sure what to do, just do good. Just do good stuff. Totally. So you're going to add in some strength training this year.
Yeah. Yeah. I don't have a barbell, but I got a body locally. So I ended up going and hopping over on that barbell. But other than that, I'm, I'm still gonna focus on kettlebells, heavy ass kettlebell swings, keep doing like the Turkish. Get-ups all that stuff feels phenomenal. My shoulders are loving it. my body just feels like it.
It knows how to. Operate better. So yeah, lots of kettlebells continuing to do this kind of general preparedness, non-specific work and all end up picking up running. I already ran, like 20 miles this past week. So I had to pick it up in the running, but I'll, I'll be spending a shitload of time in the mountains come while like January, February, March.
Nice man. Yeah, I'm probably going to be doing something similar. Just getting out, some miles in the next two weeks, trying to spend some more time on the trails with my new VJ's. I have a car now, so I can drive to trails, make it easier. Got a car man. So it might not have to spend all the time on road, even though it did kind of pay off by the end of year, this year with two road races to finish out.
My competition is pretty nice. Your training was nicely specific. How bout that? Yeah, take that. yeah. Cool. Well, if you wanna talk about, do, did it, did, did it do, Oh, what you're going to tell me about something before. Diane. Tell me about for what you talked about. OCR stars. That shit was cool. Oh, Spartan, Spartan games.
Let's talk about Spartan games. What do you think? I thought Ted, I thought it was a cool and funny at the same time. I was like, yo. All right. It's a cool, it's a cool concept, but, It looks like things are a little chaotic, not only with like how they were getting run at some things were kind of hard to understand.
Cause like the camera action was also chaotic. They didn't like spend time on the real event. It was just like, click here, click there, look at this, check that out. They didn't really spend time to let you see how the things were structured other than like the rock. Over the wall event because it took 20 seconds.
Yeah. That was the only one that they did really show it's like this person got this core score. This person got this score. The rest was just like a highlight reel. which I, I was deaf. I was definitely disappointed with the way, like in, right from the jump. I was like when they started showing the.
Highlights of the, the, the, the Spartan cross or whatever they're calling it. They, they, they immediately just started showing highlights. I was like, Oh, they're not going to show this race. Like, I'm on it. I'm not going to know what happened during this race at all. Yeah. I prefer, I prefer like some of the more raw footage of like watching a national series race on YouTube that lasts two hours.
Yeah, absolutely. And like, it's just like, I've been critical of the sparring games, like right from the jump. Like I have, I think that it's absurd that they had this promise of giving it, giving the OCR, OCR athletes, something to, to earn money with. And then I didn't invite very many of them and just like the events, they don't seem to make a ton of it didn't make a ton of sense to me.
And I was just soured on the idea, right. From the jump. And then, then when they showed us. This is a TV show. They made a TV show. It's not an event. Like if you watch the Spartan, like the CrossFit games, which the Spartan games, it seems like it'd be kind of comparable. I mean, I don't know where they got the name Spartan games from, but you think it was, it was derivative from CrossFit games.
And he was crossing games. They show the freaking events and they have people commentating who are knowledgeable about the event and can actually talk about what's going on. It's so exciting in CrossFit. And I get stoked watching those games. I watched the CrossFit games and then I watched like the buttery boys behind the scenes on it.
And like, I'll watch all of it and just cause it's. These are awesome athletes and it's crazy to watch them do these awesome feats of like CrossFit strength and endurance. And that was what we had the opportunity. We could see Rhinebeck. It's like how we can move in and out of things and how a Hunter does has his strategy and how Aaron kind of attacks.
The obstacles and how it was, would be a struggle for the football player or for the ultra runner. They didn't show any of it, but yeah, like I'll, I'll watch the rest. I'll watch the, the, you know, the episodes and see how they play out. But as of right now, it looks like a show that's really good for, for people that have never done the sport before.
But like, it's not a show, but no, it is a show. It's just a show. It's not a competition show at all. Like they're just kind of creating a narrative and even like the way that they were just like, Showing certain clips of people giving Kurt encouragement and not Hunter encouragements. Like, Oh man, everyone seems against Hunter.
And I'm like, yeah, it's just like, they're just making a freaking TV show. Like this is a real sport. I thought, I thought they knew that like, what the heck? So I've definitely been, I've been critical and I was definitely disappointed in, in that it was entertaining. I'll watch. I'll definitely watch the rest.
But probably only to, to hate on it and shit on it. Another thing just hate watch it. Another thing that is like that I didn't even think of in terms of consuming the Spartan games. It's like, you already know who's going to win every event. Like the distance runners are going to win the distance running events.
The strong guys are going to win the strength events. Why are we, why are you showing us at all? Like, what you should have had was all athletes who are similar and then give them a bunch of different things. Like it's like if you had a basketball player, play a baseball player and had them play one-on-one basketball.
And are like, we'll show this on TV. It's like, well, the basket player is gonna win. Obviously they're gonna win. And that's like, what? This is. It's like, okay, cool. The OCR guys, when the OCR event and the football player one, the rock toss event, like no shit. But, yeah, I hear that. I guess, what, what does make it interesting at least is like the, they, they smash a bunch of these events together, so it was like, someone was good at this event, but now they're fatigued from this other event they weren't good at.
So how does, how does that kind of change things up? I bet the people with better endurance, like the distance runners will do better. I don't even know what all of the events were, but I feel, I feel like it'd be like out of Hunter or Atkins. Yeah. I think it's like there's a six hour run come and there's like a six hour bike ride.
And there's like the wrestling. I was actually really impressed Hunter beat that dude and tug of war. Yeah. Yeah. Me too. Well, I mean, I have Ryan even said to him, he's like, yo Curt, like he has more endurance than you. You got to get done quick or you're not going to get it. Yeah. How impressive is that football player guy?
Like. Is he impressive? I ain't judging man. Yo, he's a, he's a deep sea diver. Now he's like a shot. I don't know. He's a fucking diver now drop. He dropped out of the swim, swim under water. I'm just like muscle is not poignant. We're too buoyant. The w the wet, I know muscle is it's hard to swim with that much muscle.
And it has a lot of muscles. I know that swim is not going to be easy for them, but like, Which was the Trek, which was dragging him through the mud on when they first announced them. He's like he has like two career tackles or something like that. And the NFL it's, but Hey, he got, he got a chance to earn all that money that, you know, Spartan graciously put out there for the athletes who didn't have a chance to repeat this year.
So Hey. Do for them and good for them, but for them, yeah. I wonder if I'd even do it. If they, if they asked me to do them, like, would I even want to do it now? I mean, it seemed really cool from the start, but I saw the episodes. I'm like, nah, it's just like good. I think that the episodes just made it. It seemed really cool when they were, when it was actually happening, you would have done so well.
You've been great. I would have loved to see you out there. Oh yeah. I would, I would have won. You definitely would have won. And Mark, Mark to Mark got out. We've done a really freaking well at that event. But yeah, I wish they just invited Oh, Sierra athletes to this OCR events, but Hey, and they're not even showing any doubt.
No, one's getting like featured, they're talking to like Island Ninja and the football player. They have a bigger following on social media. They haven't even like mentioned Nicole, like, you know, the world champion of the Spartan race, but I'll keep watching.
Yeah, sure will. All right. Well that's that's good. Cool, bro. I got to go. I'm going to go do a Oh, running workout. Go run, go run. Short, short and quick, short, quick Teddy Roosevelt, Roosevelt Roosevelt. It was about my dad. our dude, where can we find you? J underscore S H U N underscore R I E D is my Insta Grammy.
Yeah. Perfect. Perfect. Perfect. All right, bro. And I'm at reinforced underscore running underscore rich, always reach out, hit us up with questions. If you liked this episode and you like all the other episodes, hook us up with a five star review, say something nice. It would mean a lot. We would appreciate that very much.
That would be so nice. Nice. Nice. All right. I'll do pieces, right? That was great. I hope you are feeling good and confident about what to do with your off season. And that you should have a plan, take some time to reflect as Josh and I both have in our own with this and that we encourage all of our athletes to do as well.
So again, if part of your reflection process is thinking that, you know, strength training might be an area where you can improve, or if you wanted to take on some more strength oriented events, like a high rocks or a deck of fit, or just strength is something you just don't really know what to do with. I implore you to take a look at the link in the show notes, to look at our coaching program for the obstacle course, race athlete.
It is just hard to know what to do and who to trust, and you just don't wanna waste your time. And I know that feeling and it's really hard when it comes to OCR, because there's so much in the sport that we just. You could do it. You could do everything. You could do all the things everyday, all day, every day.
So we made it really simple for you. We gave you workouts to do there two to three times a week with mobility workouts built in there as well. You'll have the exact prescription of work of what to do. And these are workouts, not CrossFit workouts. They're not just regular bodybuilding type workouts and not the standard strength workouts that you're going to.
Get when looking at runner's world, what will we'll do for strength? These are for obstacle course, race athletes, and this sport doesn't really have very much of a paved way of how to improve your strength training in the gym that is widely available. So that's why we made this. We wanted to make it easy for you guys to know what to do, how to do it.
And it's cheap. It's $20 a month and there's no contracts. You can take it. You can learn from the gym. You learn what to do at the gym, get an idea of what the cadence feels like and how it all will play out. And really it's going to make you a better athlete. I promise, so take a look at the link in the show notes and let me know what questions you have.
And again, thanks for listening to, we appreciate you guys and we'll talk to you.