Dirt Nap Diaries

Episode 47: Your body knows: The physiology behind why your numbers lie

• Brittany Olson • Episode 47

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Your watch doesn't know you. It doesn't know you had a rough night of sleep, that you're in your luteal phase, that you've been stressed all week, or that you're climbing in 90-degree heat. It just spits out a number. And yet somehow, that number has the power to make or break a run.

In this episode, I'm going deeper on one of my favorite coaching topics: why your body doesn't know your pace, but it absolutely knows your effort. We've talked about RPE before, but this time I'm getting under the hood on the actual physiology, what's happening in your body when conditions stack up and your pace drops, and why that's not a bad run. That's just your body doing its job.

  • What heat, humidity, sleep, stress, terrain, altitude, hormones, and fueling actually do to your pace (and why none of it means you're falling apart)
  • Why chasing pace in your training blocks is quietly undermining your fitness
  • How VO2 max, lactate threshold, and endurance blocks each connect back to effort-based training
  • What to do with all of this information when you're standing at the trailhead about to lace up

Effort is the stimulus. Pace is the result. You control one of those. Let's talk about which one.

Links & Resources for This Episode

SPEAKER_00

Hey y'all, welcome back to Dirt Nap Diaries. I'm your host, Brittany Olsen, trailrunner, women's trailrunning coach, hypewoman, and professional overpacker of the mid-run snacks. This show is for the everyday trailrunner, the ones training on real life legs and real life time. You've got work, relationships, laundry, pets, a group text that never shuts up, and maybe a big goal sitting quietly in the back of your head that you're not totally sure you're allowed to want. You're not out here chasing podium spots, you're chasing finish lines, sunrises, and maybe a little sanity. This podcast is about trail running, but it's also about navigating life. The hard seasons, the joyful ones, and the ones where everything feels like too much. So let's get into it. Alright. No huge personal life updates. Kind of like the last couple weeks. Uh running's getting better and better and stronger. I saw uh Megan Slavin last week, my PT, uh, just to check out a few little niggles that were happening um and things are starting to feel better. Got a a new workout to do. So uh working through that, nothing like I said, nothing's injured. It's just more when you do something super hard. Sometimes things take a while to recover, and sometimes it uncovers uh just some weaknesses that probably needed to be worked on before. But uh now I know a couple more. So um outside of that, just getting ready to leave for France in less than two weeks, which is crazy. Um, I don't think I'm ready. I mean I'm ready to go on vacation. I'm just like, I have not traveled um overseas, guys, so this is all new, new for me. So outside of that, just uh heads down working, coaching, running, um, and enjoying everything well as I can. So, all right. So, today we are going to talk about um your body um and how it doesn't really know your pace. Um, it can feel your effort. Um, and we're also gonna talk about like why, you know, some numbers really, especially those numbers on our watch, um, should be ignored um or not taken seriously. I know a lot of us get excited when Garmin says productive or um, you know, whenever we get upset because we feel like we're we're running hard, but our pace is less than we thought. So um it's it's we're gonna talk about that a little bit. Um I've done a couple episodes on uh running by effort, rate of perceived exertion, so I'll link those in the show notes. But um that's what we're gonna talk about today. So you've heard me say this before though, like trust your effort, not your pace. Um, because that is how we train. There is varying terrain. Um, there is uphills and downhills, there are different temperatures, there are different hormone cycles. There are so many things that impact you that you can do an effort of say even easy, say like a four on the effort scale, and your pace can look different from day to day, month to month, season to season, but your body knows that effort, it doesn't know that pace. Um, but I still get questions about this. I can st as people still struggle to hit the effort they need to hit or get that pace out of their mind. So now I want to get more into like the why, you know, why. So, like what is actually happening in your body when those conditions stack up and your watch makes you feel like you're falling apart, or your watch makes you feel like you're a superhero too, right? Because we can have both. Um, so that is what this episode is. It's more, it's diving a little bit deeper. It's getting that under-the-hood version. I don't know why I use that analogy because I don't know anything about cars, but I do know things about this. So, but it is, it's it's just diving deeper into that. So this is just gonna be a quick little so the quick foundation here, because I've already done an episode on it, but effort is the stimulus that you put into it. So that is what you control. You control your effort. Pace is the result, and you're like, I can control my pace, I can just run harder. That's not the point of training. Most runs should be easy with some workouts mixed in, right? So effort is a stimulus and pace is the result. You control one of those, like I just said, you do not control the other. You control your effort, and then your effort will dictate what your pace is. Um, if you want the full mindset, like go to episode 31. Again, I will link it in the show notes, but you're gonna get more around this and the mindset around it too. Uh, but today we're gonna go deeper on that body side of it. So a lot of my episodes do tend to go around that mental side because I think it's super, super important to get your brain to go because your body's not gonna go where your brain doesn't go. Um, but today is definitely gonna go. We're gonna get more into that physicality of this. And y'all, I still have a little bit of a cough, which is crazy. I think it's been like close to a month. Um, so anyway, I keep pausing here to cough. Uh so anyway, um, so what's your body like actually managing on any given run? Um, your body is constantly trying to regulate, right? Our organs are doing stuff in there, and for the the longer we go, the hotter it is, all of that, like the body is like regulating even harder. So it's temperature, it's oxygen delivery, it's fuel, it's muscle fatigue, it's stress hormones, it's sleep, it's all the things at once. So pace is the byproduct of how well our body is managing all of that in that moment, in that run, right? So they the your body is is regulating each and every moment of your runs. Um, and pace is just that byproduct. Like I mentioned earlier, it's the result. So when conditions do change though, the management load goes up. Your pace can drop, and what you need to know is that's not failure, that is physiology. So that's what we're gonna jump into again. Like it is, like it can get in our head, but maybe if you know the physiology around it, it can help that that meant that the mental things that are going on in your head, maybe even the emotions that you feel um whenever you feel like your pace drops, um, and it shouldn't be. So we're gonna do these one by one. This is really the meat of the episode. Um, this actually may be a little bit shorter episode, not because I don't like talking about it, um, but because it's it's very foundational, I think, and I don't have to go deep, deep, deep into like this. Like I've mentioned this before. I'm not getting all science sciencey with you. Like, I am going to put this in as plain terms as possible so everybody understands. Like, if you want more science behind it, definitely like feel free to reach out. But this is me talking to you in a way um that you will understand it. So, we're gonna start with heat and humidity. All right. We got a lot of heat here, especially in the Phoenix area. Um, and we get a little bit of humidity from time to time. But there are other places, um, especially, we'll think about like Alabama, Virginia, have a couple athletes in those states. That's why I mentioned it, where humidity is ridiculously high. Um, and it can, and it's for a long period of time, months upon months upon months. Um, but what happens with this is your body diverts blood to the skin to cool you down. So whenever this happens, like your body, you're so your blood is not going as much to your legs, it is going to help you cool down. So that means less oxygen delivery to your muscles. So when I say muscles, yes, it's to everything. It's to your arms that are holding up that pack if you're if you're wearing a pack. Um, it's the core, it's it's the legs, all the legs, right? And we know we need legs to be able to run. Um, but because of this, of because of the heat and humidity, like we are will have that same effort, but a slower pace. Um, like I said, where it's hot and humid, um, so if it's hot, you're gonna feel it. Even if it's humid and it's not super hot, you're gonna feel it. And then when you put both of them together, even more so. Because your body needs to divert blood to the skin to cool you down. So that's physiology. You cannot control that. Yes, you can use ice bandanas, you can throw water on you, but every second of every run, you are not able to do that. That is just not a thing. So your body is still going to try to cool you down. That's part of that regulation. And you cannot control that outside of like trying to cool off as much as possible when you can at eight stations or at your car during a training run, whatever that is. Sleep. Oof, yeah. I don't like to mention cortisol that much either because it's such a buzzword right now, and people are trying to get you to buy their supplements and buy their plan because I like to talk about cortisol and belly fat. That's not what I'm talking about here when it comes to sleep, but I am going to mention cortisol. Um, so even one bad night of sleep can elevate your cortisol level, and that tanks recovery and it also impairs your ability to clear lactate. So when I say that, so for clearing lactate, there are runs that we do, tempo runs to help with the efficiency of that. But if you are unable to efficiently clear lactate due to lack of sleep, due to those elevated cortisol levels, that means your legs are gonna feel heavier. You are gonna feel sore quicker. Um, so even when you're out there, it could be a one-hour long run for you, and that could be, you know, your normal weekday run, you weren't gonna feel that that fatigue, that cortisol is going to impact how your legs feel when you are out there. That is something you're like, well, I can control my sleep. Sometimes we just have bad nights of sleep. Sometimes we wake up and toss and turn. Sometimes we can control it. We went to bed too late because we were watching a movie or hanging out with friends or whatever. But sometimes we just don't get enough sleep. So just know that say you have a a sleep, like a sleepless night or not a great one, and you still decide to do your run that day. Um, I have skipped a couple runs here and there whenever I was so tired because of that, by the way. So no judgment on that. But just know that your ability to clear lactate is gonna change, which's gonna cause that heaviness and that soreness to happen earlier. Also, like when I talk about tanking recovery, um, that is also like a super, super like important thing. And one night of sleep doesn't help your recovery, like like bad sleep, but if you can consistently have bad sleep day over day over day, it's definitely something to really look into because again, elevates cortisol, tanks recovery, and then impairs your ability to clear lactate. All of that happen. Um, and we all know um how important recovery is, even when we don't want to take those rest days or take those easy days and we want to run harder. So that's we've talked heat and humidity, we've talked sleep. Let's talk a little bit about stress. Um, that is an emotional and mental load. It really is, but it's also a physiological load. And I think sometimes people forget that until they're in it. Like when you're like, oh my gosh, I just I just have had a rough day at work, or like I've had a rough couple days at work, or like, man, I've been arguing with my partner too much, I'm just feeling all these things. And a lot of times we don't really realize we're like, man, I just need to go for a run. Like, I just need to run this out, and then you're out there and you're just like, well, I feel like a piece of shit because like everything feels heavy, everything feels harder, nothing feels good, or the run feels good in the beginning and then all of a sudden it feels worse, or it feels like shit in the beginning, then it starts feeling better because yay, running. Um, but it does have an impact on your physiological um load. So again, this is where cortisol comes in. Like it is there, whether it came from a hard conversation or hard workout, your body doesn't distinguish this. So, what does that mean? It means you can have a spike in cortisol, which causes that that um you to feel that uh that mental load and that emotional load as a physiological load. I said load way too many times. I need to come up with a different word. Um, but it doesn't matter, like it it's not like, oh my gosh, like I just had a hard conversation at work or I lost my job, which is even worse, um, or a hard workout. It literally is what it is. So it does cause your body to feel heavier again. Like it does can cause you to feel bloated, it can cause all of these issues with your run, which again will slow down your pace at these same effort levels. What do people do whenever they have those slower pace at those effort levels? They try to push that pace up so they push their effort level up, and then they're outside of their prescribed uh effort level they're supposed to be running in, and then that can really mess up the the workout. Um, whether it's an easy workout or a hard workout, there's a reason those workouts are prescribed, guys. There's they work in a certain way for you. Um, but then when that happens, you start pushing, um, you could start like you could start feeling a little bit of like injury, um, you could start feeling a little bit of burnout. You can also uh feel you can also get slower over time. So if you do this once, like, and like you didn't sleep much and you're stressed, if you do this once and you push a little bit harder than you should to get to that pace, it's not going to kill you. I know I shouldn't be saying this, but like when you consistently do this, this is when there becomes more and more issues. So keep your effort where it needs to be, no matter what the pace. Alright, so heat, humidity, sleep, stress. Now we're gonna get to terrain and elevation. Um, so think about this how uphills demand more of your cardio, right? Like when you are going up a hill at the same effort as you are downhill, you are breathing harder. So downhill, you know, your your quads are feeling it, your hips are feeling it, you know, there's an impact to your needs because and your knees because of that. Like that is a thing that happens, but when you're going uphill, you are definitely breathing harder, faster, and you're gonna be slower uphill, and that's okay. That's pretty normal. Some people are a little bit slower downhill if it's super, super technical, and I totally get that. But typically going uphill, you were you have the same effort as you would downhill, you're definitely like getting that cardio workout and you're going slower. Also, when it comes to technical terrain, too, on top of that, whether uphill or downhill, it demands more of that neuromuscular uh effort. So as you are focused, this is why I found trail running so much more interesting than roadrunning, by the way. It's like there's so much more to focus on and get your brain in tune with. And if you do not focus on things, that's when you trip and fall. Um, or not even trip, you just Superman. Um, but this is where like you really do, you get that neuromuscular like feel. You you are focusing on these things. Um, so it demands more effort there, which means you are also not going to be running particular as fast. Yes, like going downhill on technical terrain is still gonna be faster than going uphill typically on tact uh technical terrain due to that cardio the cardio um bump that you get from going uphill, but like it really does demand more of that neuromuscular effort, which does will say take away from the effort you're already running at. So again, causing some slower paces than normal. Um, so although if you're an amazing downhill runner, let me know. Uh, because I do like to hear how y'all are doing. Uh that is one thing I'm still working on. So we've got the uphill demands for your cardio system, the technical drain demands for your neuromuscular uh system and effort there. And then altitude also means um, as you guys, as a lot of you guys have felt, once you get up to a certain amount of altitude, you are definitely your body reacts to that, and you can be going the same effort again and be slower. So here's the deal. I am gonna tell you this, and I feel like I've mentioned this before, and some people don't believe me. Most people start feeling altitude to 8 to 9,000 feet physically. Mentally, we could be at 4,000 feet and we're typically at like a thousand feet, and I'm just using Phoenix for an example. I don't even know our exact thing. And you could go somewhere and be like, oh, like I feel this. And it's not that you don't really feel it, it's not that you're a crazy kook, that's not what I'm calling you, but like most people don't um have any like actual physiological impact until they're between eight and nine thousand feet. The other part is that mental piece. How do I know that? Well, it's science. Um, but I talk to athletes, to friends who have ran at four to five thousand feet, and within like if they go a couple of days early and they do some walks and some jogs, they're normally okay, like I feel like I'm ready for this race at this. When altitude or elevation is actually like an issue, um, or not, I want to say an issue, but it takes longer to adapt to. Um, it takes you either get to a race the night before when it's at altitude, so your body hasn't had time to adjust to any of it, or you get there at least two weeks early, because your body needs that long to have the physiological adaptation for that altitude. So, what that tells me is if in two days you're feeling good at where you're at, there's not a physiological adaptation there. That's a mental adaptation, which is fantastic that you have that, by the way. But this is where people do get in their heads with that. They're like, oh my gosh, like when I'm at elevation, like, holy cow, I'm it's harder to breathe. I'm hungrier, my body's working harder. And it is, it's working harder at the same effort, and you do have to prep for that. So, but that doesn't mean push outside your effort level that you're supposed to be at. That just means you have to prep for it. That also means eating. We're getting more tips here than I had planned. I don't even have this in in a in a bullet point here. But you're gonna have to eat more, you're gonna have to drink more, all of those things. Your body does very similar things at altitude that it does at heat, very hot temperatures. Um, but like you're gonna your body's gonna be working harder at the same effort, which means more food, more hydration. Um, and again, probably a slower pace, and that's okay. There is nothing wrong with that at all. All right. What's next? Hormones and your cycle. Ah, there are all kinds of things with that, but just so you know, um, progesterone raises your core temperature and your perceived effort. So whether it's in your luteal phase, which is right before um you start your period the 10 days before, whether it's while you're menstruating, um, any of that, like your core temp is going to raise, which also raise that perceived effort. So again, you could be running at an effort level of four, and three weeks before you're feeling great, and you were just running along and you're right, you're what you felt was your normal pace for that effort, and then all of a sudden, right before uh you menstruate, which is that last couple days of that luteal phase, which is normally the hardest on women, not always we are unique, but it normally is the hardest. You just feel like shit. Everything is heavy. Your heart rate runs higher too in the luteal phase. All of these things affect those that pace, right? So remember though, all you do is focus on effort because when you focus on effort, the pace is just the result. And if you're hitting the effort levels you're supposed to, you are going to be ready for the race or ready for whatever you're training for, or be hitting those goals of getting faster and stronger. Um, so your easy effort on say day 20 of your cycle is going to feel harder than day seven. That's real and it is documented. Like this is actual research. Again, I'm trying not to get too sciencey because first of all, I don't want to lose you. Um, secondly, I don't even know how to pronounce some of those words when I read and read them, so I'd have to practice this podcast a bit more. But just keep it in mind and don't put yourself in a box of the 28-day cycle. It's normally 28 to 35 days, but everybody can be different and also depends on if you're on birth control and all of these things. But just know that luteal face, especially the two days before you menstruate, typically the hardest on your body. A lot of times, once we start menstruating, we actually are start running um that same effort at a better pace than what we were just the day or two before. Sometimes it takes a couple days of menstruation to get there. But that's one thing. Like, I just want to hit home because it does have an impact. And then talk, and then we're not even gonna get into this yet because I want to do a whole episode and I actually want to talk to uh one of the experts on this, but with paramenopause and menopause and all of that, once cycles start really going crazy. I mean, some of us have it before that anyway, with the crazy cycles, but that's also going to have an impact on your effort levels, on the core temp that you have, on your heart rate, all of it. Um, so keep it in mind there are some times where we at those times we are eating a little bit different than what we normally would because it's just what our bodies are craving too, and that has an impact. I'm not saying eat something different, like sometimes you just eat what you're craving because you need that for you. So, all right. That's hormones in your cycle, and then also we got to think about fueling and hydration. Uh, so like if you think about when you went into a run, if you're underfueled, fueled or underhydrate, hydrated, your body is managing a deficit on top of everything else I've already talked about. So some of these things are all these things could stack. You could have heat and humidity, you could have had a bad night of sleep, you could have some stress, you have different terrain and elevation, which is pretty typical for um trail running, um, your hormones in your cycle, and then all of a sudden you're going in underfueled, underhydrated, so you have a you have that deficit. So pace suffers, but your efforts should stay the same. And that's, I mean, I don't say that's it, but going into the underfueled, under hydrated, and then if you aren't fueling enough intra-run and hydrating enough intra-run, it just makes it harder and harder. So your heart rate starts to go up faster, um, your aerobic system is working harder, your legs are gonna feel fatigued earlier. All of these things are variables that do have an impact on your pace. Your effort should remain the same. If you were running at a four effort for your easy run, your pace may vary. I have said that many times. I'm saying this so you get it. The whole your body does not know pace, your body knows effort, and effort is how we make sure you hit your goals, you finish that race, um, you get faster. Whatever it is that you're working towards, um, and whether you're working with a coach or not, by the way, effort is so important. This is one of the things I talk about the most is running in that effort, why it's important. Um, already did an effort, and today it's more digging into like what our body does and why it does that. So there are like there can be other factors too, but these are the main ones that I talk the most about, you hear the most about. Um, I mean, other things that can hurt you, it can help can like hold you back a little bit. You had a trail fall, you know, um your body is everything's fine, like you can run, you're not super injured, but that can impact you both uh mentally, emotionally, and physically too, right? Because you're a little sore. Your hands like I don't want to fall again. That's another variable out there. Um, so just keep in mind, all of these things are are variables that I gave you that you can't necessarily always control. Yes, you can be like, let's focus on what we control so we don't get stressed. I focus on what I control as much as I can, and I still get stressed sometimes, okay? So these are things that just happen. Um, and you have to be able to be okay with this is what my body does sometimes. Um, and yes, we can do the best for our bodies as possible. We can try to get enough sleep at night, we can try to fuel as we need to fuel for ourselves, we can try to not stress out about things we we can't control, we can um try to take uh birth control. To work on our hormones and your cycle and that we can choose to run on different tyrant uh terrain. We can make sure again, like we're fueling, we're not just fueling with the food we we need that helps us the most, but also fueling with the amount of food, the quantity, and not just the quality. But we want both. Um, but that doesn't mean any one of these variables will not impact your pace based on your effort. So make sure you're not pushing too hard, y'all. But so what does this have to do with your training blocks? What the heck? Um, and I have broken apart the training blocks a little bit. I really want to dive into each one of them eventually. But you know what? There is a lot of podcasts I have to talk about, and we're in episode 47, y'all. We're almost uh to a year. Wow, that's exciting. Um, but that said, um, we're gonna connect back to the why of our structure training, like how we're how our training works, how block periodation works. Um, and say we're just going in, I don't want to say we're just going to race, but we're going into a race. Um, so we start in that VO2 max block, which raises your ceiling. Um, I've I've used analogy before, but like the the the engine, you know like your car engine, do you have to make it bigger to make it like go go for longer, for faster, all that stuff, run efficiently. You have to have that. So more oxygen efficiency means the management load from heat terrain, elevation hits a system with more capacity. So if you don't raise your VO2 max, that is your ceiling for management load from the heat terrain, elevation, all the things. That is it. That is where you're at. You cannot go any higher than that. So a lot of people are like, well, I don't run like I don't sprint during an ultra or I don't sprint during trail running. Like, that's not my thing. That's okay because yes, these are sprint intervals that you do. These are the hardest you will run, the most intense runs you will have, and it is pushing your ceiling up, and it is the foundation. So when we get to the next block, you can have improvements, and then when we get to the endurance block, you can have even more improvements, and that means you can run harder, longer, and stronger. Um, did I say longer? I did say longer. So that's where we start as that VO2 max. So this helps you manage that load. Um, so those variables that I just mentioned, like that heat, I'm not saying you're gonna love the heat. I'm not saying you're gonna be fast as what you are whenever it's winter and it's beautiful here in Phoenix, or it's fall and it's beautiful like wherever you live. Um, but what I am saying is that you are gonna have, you're gonna be able to manage those things better by raising that VO2 max. Okay, so that's VO2 max, that is block one, typically about three weeks, sometimes four. It just depends on what the heck's going on with it, your experience, your background, your goals, what race you're going to, all the things. The next one is your lactate threshold block. This is actually, I'm not in that block right now, but I'm doing some tempo runs, and that's when we do those. Um, but I guess I'm kind of in that block. I'm in a weird space now after doing Coca-Dona. So um, but the uh lactate threshold does it improves clearance. What do I mean by that? So it's that lactate clearance. Um, that means you're gonna be better at recycling that lactate, um, which means the leg stays light, stay lighter longer even when conditions are working against you. So lactate uh forms in your muscles, and as that, if you are not clearing that out, it that is what causes that soreness and that heaviness and all of that, even when you're in the middle of a run, this can happen. Um, so yeah, sometimes when you're done running, you know, you've probably heard of um of like DOMS and different things. There are different things, by the way, with that too. But if you do not clear out that lactate as you are out there, you are going to have that muscle soreness. You are not gonna be able to run for as long. You are going to uh feel um all of those conditions, all of those variables I talked about much sooner. So, what happens though is when we so we've already raised that VO2 max, right? We just talked about that. The big goal of that is getting that lactate threshold, it can go up to the VO2 max. And we want to be able to clear that lactate. Like that is a huge thing. So if we don't raise the VO2 max ceiling and you do the right effort and don't pay attention to the pace, pay attention to the pace, don't pay attention. Sorry, I said that backwards. If you are doing the VO2 max and you're not paying attention to effort, but you're worried about pace, your body is not getting the work that it needs to get. It needs to focus on the effort. You do not want to burn yourself out. You also do not want to run too slow. This also means, and I did an episode of this, don't focus on your fucking heart rate. Let me say that again. Don't focus on your fucking heart rate. The only way you should do that, and yes, I have an athlete who has her things all measured out and knows her zones, so I'm fine with that. Um, but to get your zones, you have to do certain things to know that. You have to wear a heart strap or a heart rate strap, whether um they have them for your chest now, they have them for your arm. But the data for the heart rate do not pay attention to. So pay attention to your effort because when you pay attention to your effort and you're running those VO2 maxes at a nine, you are hitting the effort level and raising your ceiling as needed, and you're not at risk for overtraining. Then you go into that lactate threshold, which I just explained, is clearing that lactate so you can run for longer. Um, you don't feel that soreness um so quickly. This this really, really helps, especially as these distances get longer and longer. Um, but again, like you have to be in the right effort level for that to be able to raise that lactate threshold up to that VO2 max. And focusing on effort is what gets you there. Focusing on pace is not what gets you there. Um, and then that last block is the endurance block. I call it the most boring block, not because it's boring. I love the endurance block. That's where you get steady state runs, and that's where you get um endurance runs. So these are lower intensity than all the others, um, but longer intervals. Um, so these help, but these keep helping you. Like you've already worked on that VO2 max sealing, you've worked on the clearing that lactate, and now what you're doing, you're doing work to get the leg tone turnover, and you're doing the work that is going to continue to help you run longer, stronger, and with less soreness early in the race, right? I'm not saying you're not going to feel any soreness, especially as distances get longer and longer, and depending on your background experience, yada yada yada. I've talked about this before. But you do need to know that you still need to stay in the effort levels for those. This is where I see people um really push above that effort level, especially when they get to endurance runs, because like, oh, I'm so used to like pushing a little bit harder. But that's not the point of the endurance block. We are building endurance again. So we want to be able to run longer and feel better for longer. So when you understand like what these blocks are building, you understand why chasing pace instead of effort during these blocks undermines the whole thing. Um, if you were chasing pace and heart rate, I should have added heart rate earlier, but it just kind of hit me. Um, it is gonna undermine that training. You are not doing the training that is needed for you to hit your goals, for you not to get burnt out, for you not to get injured. So this is important. Like that's why I keep repeating effort, not pace, and not heart rate. It is effort. So I know my one athlete who does um her heart rate, um, again, she has adjusted it for what her her her different zones are, but she doesn't look at heart rate while she's even running. She does an after-workout analysis on that just to see what the heck things are looking at. So she still focuses on her effort when she's running. She is not worried about pace during during at all. Maybe she does afterwards when she's she's analyzing this. Hi, Renee. Um, but she is looking at the data after the fact. That's also another reason why I'm like, hey, that's cool. Because if you are focusing on that all during the run, you're not doing you're not focused on effort like you should be. Look at it after the run if you really want to. But just remember you're training the system, and the system is what protects you when conditions get hard, or helps you as conditions get hard. So, what do you actually do with this, all this information that I just gave you? This amazing information. Know your variables when going into a run. Um, so you know, it's like it's gonna be hot, right? Like, and you can say hot day. A lot of us already know it's gonna be a hot season, we're in it. So, no. Check the temperature if you need to. Um right now we're still about 80 to 85 in the mornings, I think, maybe 88, but like it's still still warmer than what it was in the winter. So just prep for that. Um, I don't know if but you can prep because you know the hotness is coming. Bad sleep. It depends how bad of sleep. If you slept an hour or two and it's a hot day, um, I would probably skip the whole run. That is not good for your body. Um, but if you just had like a bad night of sleep, you kind of toss and turn a little bit, and you still like do want to go for that run, just be okay with the effort level you're doing is probably gonna be a little bit slower than what you normally um would run. So, no too, like if you've had a whole stressful week, um, that has an impact. So knowing all these things, and it's just not that, right? We've talked about hormones, we've talked about training elevation, we've talked about feeling. So all these variables we've already talked about, and knowing what they all are, adjust your expectations before you even lace up those shoes. Not mid-run when you're already spiraling. I'm not saying you're not gonna have some thoughts or doubts or anything going through your head, um, but if you've already adjusted expectations, already allowed yourself or gave yourself permission to be fluid, to figure these things out as you go, um, you're not gonna start spiraling in the middle of that run, hopefully. Sometimes it just happens because it happens. But it's being able to think about those variables before actually starting that run. Dude, same goes for life, just so you know. Um, you know stuff's coming up. You might have a heavy meeting day, um, you might be traveling with a toddler for the first time. Um, you might be taking a couple weeks off work to take a much-needed vacation, there's just some stress going in. Like, there can be all these things in life that will change how your normal day-to-day goes, right? Maybe it's an emergency room visit, whatever it is. But when you look at this, like you can look at the variables and then you can adjust your expectations. I get sometimes things come up where we don't have the time to like sit and think, and then a little bit later you're like, fuck, that could have been real bad, but it ended up okay. But like in life, it's the same thing. It's okay to adjust those expectations. It's okay to be fluid. Give yourself permission to know that you can't control everything and focus on those controllables. Okay. Number two for this, what to actually do with it, use it as data and not a verdict. A slow pace and tough conditions tells you that your body is working, and that's the point. Um, when things are tough and you are pushing um harder and harder and harder, and you're not listening to your body, that's why injury occurs. That's why burnout occurs. That's why you're not gonna get faster. Um, that's why you're not gonna get stronger. That may be why you DNF a race. So use what happens there as data. And like I just mentioned, look at that data after the fact. Um, I encourage people to start removing stuff off their off their watch face more and more and more. Um, I think like not having I think I actually have pace on my watch right now. Um I don't think I mean to. I think my watch reset and like it reset all my faces. But um, I like to have total time. Um, and I even have distance on mine, and I don't know why I have distance because normally I run I do run by time unless it's a a specific training run or I'm on course. Um, but like there's really no reason to have anything else on your watch. Your watch still captures that data, by the way. So so even if it's not on your watch face, your watch is capturing the data if you want to look at it after the fact, certain things you want to see. Um, but like my main phase is like total time out there, and then I also have a countdown for like how long my runs are supposed to be or how long my like if I have intervals. Then I have another screen that just shows um how much I've climbed and descended um in the run, and I just like it because it's fun to see sometimes. Um but again, like that's on a non-primary watch face, so I'd actually have to scroll to see it. Um so, but that's what you can do, right? Think about hey, it's okay to use the data. Don't look at it while you're out there running. Like, just fucking enjoy it. Be in the effort level you're supposed to be in, and just move. Be in the moment. Um, because that's really is the point of being out there. And also remember this is something I say, their effort is still not your effort. So, what do I mean by this? You can both be at an easy effort. The exact same thing. I keep using the number four, I don't know why, but four on the effort scale. And somebody could just be faster than you, and it might just be on that day. It could be in general, they could be faster than you. Like that's that's life. There are people who are faster and slower. That's just what it is. Um, but their effort is still not your effort. So if you are trying to keep up with somebody and you're pushing your effort level, don't do that. If you are slowing down for somebody and you are supposed to be doing a work at a certain um effort level, don't slow down for them. Their effort is not your effort. Also, and today's effort is not last Tuesday's effort either, right? So, when you think about that effort, it can change for all the variables already mentioned heat, humidity, sleep, stress, hormones, fueling, all the things. So today's effort is not last Tuesday's. It's not yesterday's effort. It isn't. Everything changes because of how our body physiologically reacts, as we had talked about um in the beginning, too. And then you've got the mental and emotional things going on on top of that. We are human. Sometimes I forget I am human because I think I can just push through, but I will say my runs suffer, especially when my brain starts to um to just go and go and go, and I'm like, I need to do this, and I need to do this, and I need to do this on my run, and I need to do when you start doing that, it does have an impact. So, focus on you, focus on being in the right effort level, fuck pace, fuck heart race, focus on effort. Got it? Those are the F words right there. Um, so oh man, I coughed in the mic without having it in pause. Sorry guys. Um, but remember this. Your watch just shows you a number or numbers, right? That's we know this. We can get whatever numbers we want out there. It can even show us how much we sleep, and it's really not accurate, just so you know. But your body is running an entire operating system. It is everything. Your body is doing so much, it is doing so much regulation, not just while we're running, even like it's constant throughout your day. And think about when you're putting more effort and exertion on it. So your body is running an entire operating system. Think about it that way. When conditions stack up and the pace starts to drop, that's not a bad run. That's your body doing exactly what it's supposed to do. Remember, regulation. Do not forget that. So trust the system, train the system, and focus on effort. Alright, y'all. Thanks so much for being here and spending time with me and hearing all about effort and focusing on that because that is a big thing. I think I hope you can hear how passionate I am about that because it is one of the hardest things um I think runners uh runners can figure out. Um, I think it's one of the hardest things to coach to, not because there's not charts showing effort, but because it is in a lot of athletes' minds that I need to run harder to get faster. There are sometimes you need to run harder to get faster, but you're not always running harder. And then people get in their heads a lot about their effort level and um and and their pace dropping or their pace going up even. So, um, but appreciate you guys listening because this is like my third or fourth episode on effort. But if you love this episode, make sure you download it, follow the show, leave a rating or review, share it with a friend. It really does help this uh podcast and this message reach more people just like you. I don't know how it works, but it's in a logarithm thing, I'm pretty sure. Now, go move your body, drink some water, stretch your calves, and if you're listening while running, loosen your shoulders. You're welcome. Good effort, positive attitude.