KoopCast
Coach Jason Koop covers training, nutrition and recent happenings in the ultramarathon world.
KoopCast
Excelling in Chamonix - Coach Roundtable | CTS Coaches Stephanie Howe & Ryne Anderson #231
Coaches Stephanie Howe, PhD and Ryne Anderson discuss what athletes should and should not be doing in the several days leading up to UTMB.
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Trail and ultra runners. What is going on? Welcome to another episode of the coop cast. As always, I am your humble host, coach jason coop, and this episode of the podcast is aimed at the thousands of runners that will be descending upon the Chamonix Valley over the next several days in order to participate in the UTMB races, but this podcast can also serve as a blueprint for any athlete that is going over to Europe, or any European athlete that is coming over to North America, or any athlete that is traveling an extensive amount to a race. We wanted to make sure that athletes have the right information at the tips of their fingers and in their earbuds, so I brought on to the podcast today two of our crack coaches and Stephanie Howe, who happens to live in the Chamonix Valley, as well as Ryan Anderson, who will be going over there with me with our contingent of coaches, to go out and help our athletes in the race. And throughout this podcast we go through several aspects of how we are advising our own athletes and how to manage the travel and the things logistically related to getting over there and having a good race how to manage jet lag, sleep, what to prioritize when you actually get on the ground and all of those aspects that I'm sure many of you are working through right now. This is a really magical week. I hope to see many of you listeners out there on the trails and in Chamonix itself. So, with that as a backdrop, I am getting right out of the way. Here's my conversation with CTS coaches Stephanie Howe and Ryan Anderson way. Here's my conversation with CTS coaches Stephanie Howe and Ryan Anderson all about how to manage the travel process as you get out to the Chamonix Valley. Okay, we'll start out with idiots running around the mountain. Thanks you guys for joining on the podcast.
Speaker 1:Today we're going to talk about all things training and preparation for Chamonix. I wanted to put preparation in there because the training is going to be baked. This is going to come out about 10 days before all of the UTMB races take place, which is precisely the amount of time that is left to, where you can't make a difference from a fitness standpoint. But you can sure screw it up. But before we get into all that, my point with this is to first and foremost kind of be a guide for mainly the North American athletes that are going over there. There are obviously going to be some European athletes, or people from the UK and maybe people from Asia and Oceania, are traveling over there and I think some of the things that we're going to discuss are going to cross over. But I wanted this to be a little bit of a guide for those people that are traveling over there and participating in the races. It's a once in a lifetime type of deal.
Speaker 1:It's hard to acquire the number of stones and get through the lottery process, and the purpose of this podcast is, to my earlier point, to make sure that people don't screw it up in the last 10 days. But since we're coaches, we're going to talk a little bit more or we're going to start out with just some of the training considerations going into it. So, for the people that are preparing to run UTMB 2025, people are starting to look at that right now. I've had a number of athlete inquiries come in the door recently that have referenced one of the races coming up in 2025 or 2026 as one of their goals. One of the races coming up in 2025 or 2026 is one of their goals. So if you are in that camp, listen to these training considerations as well.
Speaker 1:So we have two people on the podcast today Stephanie Howe and Ryan Anderson. I thought that they were excellent resources, not only having been over to the races for a few years now, but now actually Steph lives over in the Valley. So, steph, why don't we kick it off with you from a training perspective? You went through this move, where you lived in the Bay Area, you moved over to France, you know, kind of put down your roots there. I think there's probably nobody better equipped to talk about what some of just the day-to-day training considerations not only for training out there but also training for these particular races are particularly for people that are coming over there from North America.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the specificity of the trails over here is very different than what you can find in the US, and this is actually I was counting my seventh UTMB race at the finals, so I've done various distances, but I have been an American that's come over to race this race several times in the past. So I think what you have to consider is the difference in the trails between North America and Europe, and that comes down to generally the steepness. So you can live in a mountainous place I used to live in Bend, oregon, and there's plenty of vertical there but the trails are just a lot different, and so one thing that surprised me the first time I came over here was just how steep some of the trails were and how rocky some of them were. They're not super technical, the trails of UTMB but they are different, and so knowing that ahead of time, like looking at the course profile or maybe looking at the amount of elevation gain per mile, is something to be thinking about as you're planning your 2025.
Speaker 2:Like we said, this year is already, like you know, a little bit too late to do many training adjustments. But I was describing the trails to a friend and I was like they're just kind of relentless. There's no flow. You have to be able to run fast too, because there's big flat sections, but then there's like 40% grades that go on for like 45 minutes to an hour. So it's got a little bit of everything.
Speaker 1:I'm kind of reminded of one of the fundamental principles of training that everybody should have learned about when they first start training or first start coaching, and that's the principle of specificity and that matters a lot when athletes go out there. It's hard to do it unless you live in the area. You try to recreate everything. I always get this prototypical question of how do I train for the mountains when I live in the flats? Right, I'm training for Leadville, I'm training for UTMB and I live in Nebraska or Florida or whatever. And what they're speaking to is just that point is I don't have the specificity. That's what we would call it from a coaching perspective. But to your point, steph, the specificity of the trails out there are kind of incredibly unique and I was reminded of that because I had a few of my elite North American-based athletes kind of go out there recently and start to put together some training camps and the sentiment was all very similar and they were just tired.
Speaker 1:It was just hard to speak to your point about the trails being relentless.
Speaker 1:You go out on a four or six hour run and it's a bigger toll, it's a bigger ask than a four or six hour run in most of the areas of North America and taking some of that into consideration, I think, is a big kind of a big part of it, so much so that a lot of people will notice that their stat sheets kind of get knocked down a little bit.
Speaker 1:So this is of particular importance for the athletes out there that train by miles. We don't do that. We try to train athletes by time or we try to define volume predominantly by time. But for the athletes that that that prototypically define their volume by miles per week or kilometers per week, most of them, when they go out there, out to this area, will immediately notice that their stat sheet gets knocked down and they're more tired. And that holds Stephanie's saying yes, because you're like, yeah, that happens to be still, and I've lived over here for a long time. That whole cycle of getting your stat sheet knocked down when you're actually looking at it in training peaks or in Strava or however you're capturing your, however you're capturing your training data, is actually something to be mindful of because it can get a little bit depressing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely. I mean, even living here, sometimes I still have to be reminded of that because you know a two hour run, I cover half the distance now and that's just the nature of the terrain. So I think particularly important going into a big race to keep that in mind, not to knock your confidence right to be like, wow, why am I suddenly running so slow? It's just slower over here and you're not going to move as fast, you're not going to go as far, and that's something. If you know that going in, I think it can help take the edge off. So you don't like knock your self-confidence totally before you go into the race or overdo it, which is something we have typically seen. Somebody is like I'm gonna do a 10 mile run and they go for a 10 mile run and it takes three hours and then they're fried. That's like we also see that direction too, of like overdoing it because of using what they're used to with distance.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I always have to. I always have to adjust athletes functional threshold pace when they go over there, just to make sense out of everything, and some of it is more than others depending upon where they're coming from. But even if they're coming from I'm going to use a really prototypical place that a lot of athletes are familiar with Even if they're coming from somewhere like Boulder or Flagstaff, I'm still adjusting their functional threshold pace north of 10%, depending upon the athlete and exactly where they're coming from. And that's not a trivial amount. That means you're running around doing 10 minute miles, you know one day, and then you go over there and you're running 11 or 12 minute miles, right, somewhere kind of somewhere in that neighborhood, and that is. That's a material amount to kind of take into to, to take in consideration.
Speaker 1:Now, I'm not suggesting that every athlete make that adjustment, but certainly depending upon where you're coming from, even if you're coming from a more, even if you're coming from a mountainous area and you mean Colorado Springs here I have all the vertical in the world I would still do that for myself If I went over there and I spent a significant amount of training.
Speaker 1:I would adjust everything, or at least adjust my mileage expectations and or my pace expectations by maybe 20%, probably 50, probably probably closer to 15%.
Speaker 1:So, athletes, keep that in mind when you go over there and even if you do a recon, like a quick little, like if you've never been there before, you do a quick little recon of the trails or whatever you go and you map it out on gaia or whatever it is, make sure that the time is going to be reasonable and in line with what you want to do from a training perspective. Because we've all seen this where athletes want to go out there, they want to to recon part of the course and that recon ends up being a four or five-hour run when all they wanted it to be was a couple hours. Ryan had an athlete who he went over and continued ahead, who did something similar to that, not to the exact same tone, but we'll turn it over to you. Ryan, do you want to add anything to what Steph and I were talking about in terms of just the general training considerations for athletes that are going over there?
Speaker 3:Yeah. So on that note of athlete gets over there early and their stats change quite a bit. Here's some real numbers. So this athlete, before they went to Chamonix to get in some training time on the course, they still live in a very steep mountainous area. Two weeks before they go 79 miles, 14k, 94 miles, 16k. They get over to Chamonix 56 miles, 10k of MERT and then a 70 mile week at 20k. That was a lot of numbers. So basically, putting actual data to that of their climbing went up by 50 percent and their mileage went down by 20 to 30 percent. So it's way easier said than done.
Speaker 3:But don't get attached to your numbers. And on that confidence piece you will find athletes who have been out there for many weeks in Chamonix over a month, and they have been getting time on the course with all that steep terrain and that climbing. And you may see their numbers on Strava and like, oh my gosh, I'm not doing enough. Turn off your Strava, delete it off your phone, because if you look at that your confidence is only going to tank and like I have to do more. That's getting close to the race. How can I fit in more? So and this confidence comparison piece applies to any race. Avoid, avoid the trap of comparison as you get closer, because we always want to compare to people that are doing more than us. Right, we don't want to consider how their life is way different than us being able to get out there much sooner, being a full-time professional athlete or whatever it is. So avoid the comparison trap so it does not knock your confidence the fresh.
Speaker 1:I'm always reminded of the freshness, the freshness and fatigue curve that's automatically generated in strava and training peaks has an equivalent of that, or I guess they have kind of the original version of that in their CTL and their ATL. There's no way that those equations can account for the surface of the train unless you're manually adjusting the threshold values, which is the kind of the relative calibration point, and that's really hard to do, even for us. We do it for a living and a lot of athletes they get it kind of engrossed to your point, ryan, in the stats. They'll look over at that and immediately, because of the math that you just went through lower mileage, more vertical, slower miles their, their fitness will take a little bit of a hit and they'll be like wait a minute, it's just, you know, I feel fit, I'm the fittest I've ever been. Why is my fitness line going down? Nothing's happening from a physiological perspective. It's just math that you're slowing down and and that curve is just a reflection of that, of the, of that very simple math. So, needless to say, I think the thing, the summary of it, is if you're going over there and you're doing your last few runs and or you're thinking about doing this 2025 or 2026 and you go and you spend an appreciable amount of training over there or you're trying to get ready for it. Start to psychologize what the difference in terrain is actually going to mean to you. Don't let it get you down. Everybody has to deal with it. We just ended a really long stint of the North American men not being able to win that race, and a big part of that is this terrain transition. It's not the only part, obviously, but a big part of that is the train transition that we just don't have but that we just don't have available here. So that's, I think that's really emblematic of what everybody experiences.
Speaker 1:Okay, so let's move to here and now. By the time this comes out, race will be 10 days away. There's going to be a lot of people participating in it about 10,000 total between all the races there. All of a similar setup for athletes that are traveling there. They're traveling there the week of 10 days before, 14 days before.
Speaker 1:Most people will fly into Geneva. Some people will fly into Milan. There'll be some other smaller airports, but Geneva airport tends to be the hub and for the North American athletes, they're going through a pretty significant time zone shift between as they fly over the Atlantic ocean, and they're giving themselves just barely enough time to get over that time zone shift. But some of the races start in the evening, so it presents this kind of weird like conundrum of how do I actually start to, how do I actually start to plan for this? So let's kind of bring it from a very practical standpoint. We all have athletes that are coming from North America and other parts of the world over there in terms of travel. Brian, we're going to kick it over you first again what are you advising your athletes on? What to do and also what to avoid, as they're traveling over there?
Speaker 3:So first, your point of the untraditional start time CCC, 9 am, utmb, 6 pm. Don't overcomplicate it and try to get this perfect shift to that time. You never did that for your training. You went to work, you worked your third shift, shift, whatever and you made training work. You've got less than a week to get over there and get adjusted. Don't over complicate it and like, oh, if it's a 6 pm start, maybe I could time it to where I sleep from 9 am to 4 pm, and just oh, don't over complicate it.
Speaker 3:And the time shifter app is a great app that can help you slowly adjust and potentially have a smooth transition. You put your flights into the app and it tells you how to target the time of day in which you're exposed to light or not exposed to light. And your caffeine timing and it's straightforward, it's on your phone, it gives you some good guidance. Caffeine timing and it's straightforward, it's on your phone, it gives you some good guidance. The CDC also has a very helpful section on their website on jet lag that simplifies the information. That's another good resource. And again, remember, it's not going to be perfect, so just take a deep breath and relax when you're planning your traveling over there. It's not going to be perfect. Much like a C-level athlete going to altitude You're not going to get the timing right and peak and fill your most best. Do the best you can, use good information to do the best you can and be okay with that, and it's not going to be perfect.
Speaker 1:Shout out to the Time Shifter app. I've pretty much I think I've had all my athletes use it this year. I actually have some athletes that are coming over for Leadville, which is two days from when we're recording this from Europe, and I had them do the same thing. You hit the nail on the head, ryan. It's not perfect, but it can soften the blow. You guys have been there with me in the CTS coach chalet. Usually the third day I sleep for like 12 hours because I do a pretty shitty job of managing my time zone shift, but, needless to say, I have no affiliation with that. I've just found it pretty useful.
Speaker 1:It's not perfect. The recommendations are sometimes slightly impractical because they don't know your lifestyle or anything like that. But be an adult, you know, be intelligent, follow the the guidance, follow the advice as much as you can and, like I said, I think the big thing is it can can kind of soften the blow there. So if I'm gonna throw it over to you because you're living there right now but you still have north american athletes like coming over there and they're going to probably visit you in the you know, days before the race and they're on one time zone and you're on the other one. What are you telling your athletes to do in route as they're getting into the valley?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I have two things to add. The first is, remember you're coming over here to do a race and so sleep is important. So you want to adjust to the time zone if you can, but not at the expense of missing sleep. So if you're coming over and just have a few days, I would say like, yeah, land, and like take a nap, whereas if you're here like, let's say, 10 days before, I would say try maybe that first day to stay up a little bit later, get a little more used to the time zone, and then you know you can kind of adjust along the way. But if you're coming over kind of last minute, like let sleep be the number one priority, because it doesn't matter if you're adjusted to the time zone, if you haven't slept at all in 48 hours, that's not a good place to be going into a long race.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's the first thing. That's a good point, because TDS, utmb and CCC for it. Well, utmb and TDS for the back of the half finishers or is over a day in terms of how long it's taking them to do the race, and CCC can be upwards of a day plus 24 hours, plus in terms of how long some of the back of the packers are out there. So sleep deprivation actually becomes a really important component of things.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah for sure. The other piece is a lot of people take melatonin, and that can be useful, but make sure you try it before you use it before a race. Saying this because I've done this the wrong way, because some people are more sensitive than others and so if you take a melatonin you might wake up and be super groggy. I don't know what the half-life is on it, but you don't want that going into a race at all, so sometimes it might mean a half a dose. Some people feel better without it, but you don't want that going into a race at all, so sometimes it might mean a half a dose. Some people feel better without it. But if you are going to use it as part of the way that you get yourself on this time zone, make sure to try it ahead of time to make sure that your body responds to it in an appropriate way.
Speaker 1:I'll add one thing to the don't focus on perfection side of it as well. That we know from the research is in. We have really great research on sleep deprivation and sleep restriction Thanks to the, thanks to our almighty military. They tend to be the pioneers in this because they want soldiers up at all day and night doing soldier types of things. But you can synopsize from an endurance perspective. One of the things that we do know about sleep restriction is typically one night of sleep restriction. So you screw up your sleep one night, you know. You go to bed at 2am, you wake up at 6am, something like that right, where you take your prototypical eight hour sleep cycle and you condense it to just a few hours. Performance isn't affected after that one night, usually after two and three nights, if that's when you start to see some sort of performance deterioration. So to your point of both of you guys have kind of mentioned this point either with the night starts or just trying to figure out how to get sleep in the first place. Realize that it doesn't have to be perfect. Even if you came over to UTMB and you had crappy sleep for a few nights, if you get back on track, that's probably not going to affect your performance. And it's probably going to affect your performance more if you're up worrying about it and you start to take copious amounts of sleep aids like melatonin and things like that. So realize that you don't have to get it perfect. You can go through a certain amount of sleep, a small amount of sleep restriction, and not have it affect performance too much, but you certainly don't want it to compound.
Speaker 1:We're going to talk about some COVID precautions in a little bit because we'd be remiss to skip over that since there seems to be another wave breaking out in Europe right now. But I'm going to go into a couple of other travel things that I wrote notes down on. First thing is every year we tend to have this year we're going to have a north of 40 athletes over at UTMB. I guarantee you at least three of them and probably five. We can take a $2 bet on this rhyme. When we get over there, probably five and I hate to say this but I'm just trying to keep it real We'll have their luggage lost. This happens every year will have their luggage lost. This happens every year.
Speaker 1:The Geneva airport, for whatever reason, it's like on and off shit show. I remember one year when I was leaving the Geneva airport not to make everybody paranoid about this, but their luggage handlers had gone on strike and all of the luggage that they basically couldn't process it. So you could check it in but it would never make it to your plane because they had nobody to like take it from where. You checked it in and loaded up on the plane and they just stacked it up in these big like shipping containers that were on the airport property just dozens of them. And so, anyway, people would check it in and their luggage would never make it on the plane. Hopefully that doesn't happen to anybody, but it will happen to some people.
Speaker 1:So there's two things about this. First thing is, if there's anything absolutely mission critical your favorite type of loop, your favorite socks, whatever it is that is impossible to recreate carry it on with you. Also, realize that Chamonix is, at this time, probably the best resourced trail running place in the entire planet. For that week you have every single brand, every single nutrition product, every single shoe company, every single sock company, every single company that makes a pack poles you name it. So when your luggage gets lost and I'm sorry for the small percentage of people whose luggage will be lost. You know what you should think about it as a good opportunity to go and buy more gear and inevitably because of all of our athletes out there, to my earlier point of we're going to have a north of 40 there. I will probably be that resource.
Speaker 1:People will call me in a panic. I've done this several times and driven out to places in the middle of the night to find gear and find nutrition stuff like that. It's usually pretty easy because everything is so resourced. You have 10,000 runners and 80 or a hundred thousand trail running fans and things like that all in the same area. You have all the brands in the same area. You're going to be able to find your stuff. I guess is my point. So don't panic.
Speaker 1:If you do end up losing your luggage, say yippee. Whip out your credit card, buy a bunch of stuff that's overpriced in the Chamonix Valley, you'll get over it. But carry the stuff that is absolutely mission critical to you. Maybe your shoes, maybe something that just fits in your pack in a certain way that you've never been able to find before, your lucky necklace or whatever it is. Carry it on with you. Everything else that may get lost in a certain percentage of you, this will happen. You can recreate in the Chamonix Valley, so, don't worry, is the big thing For the RCTS athletes that are going out there that are listening to this.
Speaker 1:You guys all have my number. You can call me and we'll fix it. We fixed it every single year. I can't tell you how many iterations of this. It's been batting a thousand percent. We've always been able to get nutrition. We've always been able to get gear you kind of name it at the last minute. It is never. I was going to say rarely, but I can't think of one time where we've missed the ball on this. It is. It has never been a big deal. We've always been able to replace stuff. Either of you had anything to add to that.
Speaker 2:No, I think if you don't want to buy it, you can borrow it, because there's 10,000 athletes here, and everyone who lives here. Even if they're not racing, they have gear because that's why they live here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we figure it out. That's a good point. Stuff, I'm all about buying new gear, though I like buying stuff. Okay, let's talk about COVID precautions. There's another round going on there. I've had athletes that have been, that have gotten COVID since. They've been there over the last six weeks or so just training.
Speaker 1:The Olympics just happened. It affected the US men's track and field team, kind of sports up and down the board, and that's a big deal, right, you go from a potential gold medal to no medal. You go from, in a UTMB case, potentially finishing to not finishing because you get sick. People spend hundreds of hours training and can sometimes, very unfortunately and very tragically, kind of get knocked out by an illness. So I want to kind of hear from you guys what you're telling your athletes to do when they get here there.
Speaker 1:I have heard from the UTMB folks, just to kind of put this in perspective, that close to a hundred thousand people come down to the Chamonix Valley for this race, which is kind of incredible. Right, there's 10,000 people in all the races it's somewhere around that number. So that means 10 times the number of participants are coming in just to watch, cruise, spectate, observe on and on, and whether or not that's a marketing number that's slightly inflated, or a real number. We'll leave that speculation to other people, but it's a lot of people in a small area, I guess, is what I'm coming at. We'd be naive to think that there aren't some illnesses that are going to go around, whether it's COVID or, you know your run of the mill, flu and cold types of stuff. So, steph, what are you telling your athletes to do as they're, as they're traveling, kind of like being cognizant of this and also, as you as a resident, seeing all of the people come in and observing what is actually going on with the congestion of humans that are congregating in the valley?
Speaker 2:Yeah, as a resident, it's overwhelming Because, yeah, just like you said, I would believe that number 100,000 people descend upon the valley. So I think, in terms of precaution, you just use common sense. I mean, there's we can't prevent all human interaction. Stay out of big crowds and I realize that sounds contradictory because there's so many people coming but you can stay outside, right. You don't have to go inside to places I personally am not going.
Speaker 2:I'm gonna try my best to stay out of, like any type of indoor place. I mean, you have to go to the grocery store. You can wear a mask. That is a thing. It can be protective. It's not going to protect against everything, but if you have to go somewhere and you're going to be around, a ton of people who just came from who knows where, you know that's something that you might want to weigh that risk and choose to wear a mask, for those types of activities are outdoors.
Speaker 2:So just spend your time. You know, spend your time outside and you are here to race again, not to socialize or to, like you know, go to all the different events. So just, you don't have to isolate yourself, but you know, try to keep yourself on the good side of safe, like not doing all the activities, because that the number of exposures just increases your number, the number of the risk, I guess, of contracting something. So that's what I'm telling my athletes and that's what I'm doing myself, and you know, it's kind of a roll of the dice. Sometimes you can do your best to prepare and take precaution, but you can't prevent everything. But you can surely reduce the chances that you're going to interact with multiple people.
Speaker 1:I think you touched on the point of consternation that a lot of people have is they want to go out and socialize and experience things and at the same time they're going there to race and those two things in turn. Those two things can come into a con and come into conflict in a number of different ways, and one of them is just the social interaction that we're. You know that we're kind of discussing, and so finding your own fine line or finding your own balance point between those two things, I think is a lot of people are going to make that personal decision, but think through the what if? That's why I always encourage people to do we can't mandate people wear masks in the airport and at the grocery store and things like that. Everybody can choose what they want to do. But think about the what if. Think about, hey, listen, what if this happens, and can I feel good about the decisions that I made that potentially led to that consequence or outcome?
Speaker 1:Also, if you're in a group setting or a team setting this is the number of my elite athletes are you got to think about people that are not you? There are other people in this equation that you're interacting with. Perhaps there are other athletes in the races, perhaps their teammates of yours, perhaps their colleagues, perhaps they're participating as well. You know, your actions can also affect them, and I think that's also a kind of a point of consideration. So so for our, for our part, ryan, how many coaches do we have? We have one coach that's not coming at the last minute, but I forget what the total head count is. I think it's 10?.
Speaker 3:It's eight or nine, eight or nine.
Speaker 1:Okay, eight or nine coaches, like I said, north of 40 athletes that we've got there. For the coaches that are staying in our two chalets, I've told them to all take rapid tests kind of throughout the week, and the reason is because we're meeting with a number of athletes and we've got to go there, they've got to come to our place and we can't not. We have to have that, that, that small amount of social interaction. And the bigger point with that is is also want the athletes to feel confident that we are taking precautions so there's nothing kind of noodling in the back of their head saying ah well, you know, I got to meet with Steph or I've got to meet with Coop, and they've also met with 10 other people right this week, and they're also sharing a chalet with nine other people that are coming from all areas of North America. I want them to have an enhanced level of confidence that we're taking the kind of the correct precautions here as well. So anyway, brian, I'll open it up to you Once again.
Speaker 3:You're going over there with us you'll be there and you've also have athletes going over there. What have you been telling them, and I guess maybe also what are you going to do personally to set yourself up in the best way possible In terms of avoiding the crowds? Go to the grocery store in the morning when you get over there. There's not much going on in the mornings. If you wake up early, nearly all of those restaurants in the square there have outdoor seating. Pick one of those. Eliminate the chance to go inside and just do the things you're told to do when the flu's going around when you're in elementary school Wash your hands, drink water, have your hand sanitizer, do all the little things.
Speaker 1:I think that sums it up pretty good. Okay, so now let's talk about what to do when people actually get there. So we get there. They've protected themselves. They're either taking a bus up to Chamonix or they've rented a car. Their family, they're hitching a ride from somebody. How should athletes think about the order of priority in which they get things accomplished? Because normally they're there for five to seven days five, seven, eight, nine days, somewhere around there, a handful of days and they've got to do a number of things, including go and train on the course. So I want to kind of hear from you guys Ryan, I'm going to throw it right back to you I want to hear it kind of from you guys, as how are you having your athletes internally prioritize? Hey, make sure you get these done first, get these done. Second, get these done. Third, what's your advice to, what's your advice to athletes in terms of that rank order of priority?
Speaker 3:lengthy process just to get to Chamonix. You fly into Geneva, you run a car, you take a bus, whatever it is. Then you got to haul your luggage to wherever your lodging is. Get to your lodging first. Drop off your heavy luggage, go to the grocery store and stock up on what you need.
Speaker 3:A big component with all this traveling is anxiety. Your gut can get off. You're eating all these different foods at different times of the day. Make your grocery list on the plane, give yourself something to do and then go get what you know works well for your stomach. Do that. Then get back, settle, build your nest and just rest and relax.
Speaker 3:I would say on that first day you get there, you're going to be walking around quite a bit and getting in a lot of movement. You're going to be walking around quite a bit and getting in a lot of movement. If you feel the need for another shakeout, run, go for it. But don't I'd say don't plan on. Oh, I gotta get there and I gotta go get on the trails immediately, because I'm excited and it's three days to my race, so I gotta get on the trails now. Just, it was a big day. You probably didn't sleep that well on the plane, get your groceries, go chill out, make a little agenda for the next couple of days of when you want to eat, what parts of the course you want to go see, and take care of all that.
Speaker 1:Steph, what do you have to add to that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's pretty good. I mean, I'm on board with that. Get in, get your food, get settled. I would say, instead of a shakeout run, a better option might be to go for a hike. It's good practice hiking here anyways, that can be a little bit easier, lower barrier of entry. But yeah, just prioritizing, like feeling saddled. And then do look at a course map Another good thing to do, maybe on the plane and try to identify where you do want to run, because there are some logistical considerations to be aware of Like you can't just drive, you know like, wherever you want.
Speaker 2:It's like going around a mountain or through a tunnel and you know, going to three different countries. That does create some difficulties and there's good public transport, but it doesn't go everywhere. So be aware of like what your limitations are and start planning out little parts of the course. And if I only had a few days, my order of like what's important would be to see the finish, so you can take a train up the valley to Valercine or to Argentier to do the last part of the course. And if you're cutting even closer, you can just go up to Fleijer. You can even take a lift up to Fleijer and run down. I think that's an important part to see. Other than that, I mean you're going to have there's a lot of the course that isn't going to be accessible. So prioritize the parts that you can get to and then, just you know, focus on good rest.
Speaker 1:Yeah, your note on the public transportation and just getting around peace is well taken, because it's not easy when that many people come down. So sometimes the trains get overwhelmed, Sometimes the buses get overwhelmed. The Mont Blanc tunnel is notoriously a shit show from time to time where they'll close it or it's a three hour wait. There's a good app that I'll link in to the show notes of where you can kind of check the wait times. If you need to go through the Mont Blanc tunnel, either for your CCC start or you want to go over to Cormier, that's where you're staying for CCC. But don't think of it as like unlimited, unfettered access to all these places. It's just a little. It's just hard to. It's just hard to get around and the counsel that I give athletes is to pick the path of least resistance. And the counsel that I give athletes is to pick the path of least resistance. If something has two or three steps, try to do something else that has one. In terms of where I'm going, where I'm going to start from, Do I need to take a train to a bus and hitch a ride and I'm going to hike uphill and then you know take, take. You know take the gondola. If you've lived, if you've lived in the Valley and you know how to work this system or you've been there for a few years, great, Go and go at it. But if this is your first time, your second time, like, just be smart with that and just realize that even the locals there to to Steph's point, complain and bitch and moan about the transportation come race week because it does get so overwhelmed. So if you think you're going to be able to navigate it as a kind of as an outsider or as a first timer, I would say, think again and pick simple things. Ryan, I had the same kind of rank order of priority as you did, but I simplified it to sleep first, get food second and then train third. Like, if you just want to internalize it there, make sure you're on top of your sleep, go and get groceries before you train and then, if you do end up doing a little bit of training, you can absolutely, to Steph's point, prioritize hiking, Like you're going to hike a lot of all of these, a lot of all these races.
Speaker 1:Even the leaders hike a lot, Like don't you know? You don't have to run around the track and chimney, it's beautiful, it's a nice track. It's a pristine area and you'll see a lot of. You'll see a lot of athletes doing their shakeout run there and doing strides out on the track and things like that. Just go for a short hike. It's more specific, it's easier, it's it's the scenery is better out on the trails. But anyway, I guess my point with that is is sleep first, get food, second, if you can sleep, and then and then think about training at third ryan. Do you have any other things to add in terms of training and scouting out on the course? You know you've had a number of athletes that are out there and and they're all kind of doing different races. Are you directing them to any one particular part of the course or another and how are you managing that?
Speaker 3:for most north american runners. They are not used to a thousand people at the start line and having to run at your threshold on the pavement with all those people. So I like to advise my athletes to go run the start, because you run you kind of run around town you still onto the trail and then you start to climb. That's like a four or five mile run. If that is a great way to just preview that section and get a feel for, oh, the road is this wide so we're really going to be jumbled together and then it splits out, you hit the trail, et cetera, I say go run that, beginning to where that first climb starts, just to get a feel for it's kind of a net downhill, it's going to be pretty fast, and then also realize that it stays relatively wide to track going up.
Speaker 3:This is talking about the UTMB start. You're not going to have this pinch point bottleneck of just single track and three miles or whatever bottleneck of just single track and three miles or whatever. So I say go see the start so you can be comfortable with that very fast start and mass of people. Because the biggest race in North America at least the United States, Western States 369 runners, you go two and a half X. That it can be overwhelming for a lot of North American runners.
Speaker 1:A lot of people are surprised at how long that first section is of just flat running right, cause we just spent this whole time talking about oh my gosh, it's steep and you're going to hike a lot and blah, blah, blah, blah. That's what everybody you know, that's what they've heard, that's what everybody says. But then they get out there and it's like a lot of just it's over an hour of just running on flats just to get to the first climb.
Speaker 3:Yeah, five miles. Looking at here. Yeah, five miles until you hit that pitch.
Speaker 2:It's like a run that I do. I live at the base of the first climb, so I will run from my house to Chamonix and back and that's like an hour run. So it's not insignificant and it is fast. And to Ryan's point, the first climb is very wide, like you've got room does turn to single track when you start to go downhill, which can be kind of a bottleneck, but you do have time to sort it out and to like end your groove and breathe and think because it is a very fast start.
Speaker 1:Okay, I think we've got a pretty good toolkit going around. I'm going to open it up to any other. Like unique or special things or things that kind of didn't fit into our outline that you're advising your athletes to do or even not to do as they are about to travel over here or as they are kind of in route. I can imagine people like sitting on a plane like oh shit, I should have done this or should have done that, while they're actually listening to this. We'll see if that turns up or not. But, steph, we'll kind of start from you. Is there anything else that doesn't fit in this outline that you want people to be aware of as they're traveling into the valley?
Speaker 2:One thing when you're out in the course that I think is a benefit is there's a lot of options to refill your water and to get food. So that's something we're not used to from living in North America of like having to filter water, like go to a store. There's a lot of spigots. It's kind of nice to know where they are, like, if you can be aware as you're running, if you know where they are in the race, that's kind of like a nice benefit too. So that's definitely a perk.
Speaker 2:Everybody who is french says hello on the trail and it's rude not to, and like they do call out the americans. So everyone says bonjour when you pass them on the trail, like it doesn't matter if they're friendly or not. They might not actually be friendly, but they always say hello. Just say bonjour back rather than like ignore them or say hello Like you're in France. Give it a little bit of effort. That goes a long way, I think, for people and locals have a little bit of a love-hate relationship with the race Mostly hate, I would say, of a love hate relationship with the race, mostly hate, I would say. So anything that we can do to make it like a positive interaction with the runner here I think is a good thing to do.
Speaker 1:I love that social component of it stuff. Now that you've lived there, you've kind of see, feel the feel, feel the vibe. All right, ryan, we can turn it over to you anything else that didn't fit on the outline well, I'd say control what you can control.
Speaker 3:Pack your snacks and then be prepared for that long flight. Airplane food's not that great and I said it earlier. You're traveling, your meal routine gets out of whack. Lessen the stress as much as you can by controlling as much as you can. We can't control everything, but you can pack your favorite snacks and be prepared when you get off the plane in Geneva or wherever you still got a ways to go to get to Chamonix. Stop in the airport. You can get you a snack or already be prepared. Consider cutting out alcohol. Like we all know, it impacts our sleep. We've been bemoaning the fact of the time zone shift getting settled. Cutting that out for a few days isn't gonna hurt you.
Speaker 1:Giving somebody a little bit of a challenge there, ryan. Okay, so I have one here that we didn't talk about, but it kind of I think it's an umbrella over everything. So there's a lot of stuff to do and people to see. There's all of the media events. You want to go and see the elite athletes? You want to get your selfie taken with Jim Walmsley?
Speaker 1:There's any number of different talks that all the brands put on that they bring their athletes, uh, that they're athletes too. There's usually a couple of movies or films, uh, that are shown. There's a huge expo what do they actually call it? There's something that they call it like that, the salon. There we go Thank you, steph when every brand that you can think of and that you've never heard of is there, and I guess what I'm saying is there's a lot of cool stuff to do. There's also a lot of really great restaurants and pastry shops and things like that.
Speaker 1:So my advice to athletes is to give yourself a budget and schedule it out in terms of what activities you actually want to do, because when you get there, there are more things to do than you have time for, and I have been there every single year. I've been there and this is probably I'm probably going on my like ninth or 10th year right now. I have been there as a tourist. I've never done the race. I've always been in a coaching capacity and in a business capacity and a work capacity. I can go do all this stuff and I try to and I fail at getting all of it done. So what I use that as an example just to say that there's there, there's more things out there to actually do that are actually really cool than you can usually practically, practically get to. So look at it all of, look at all of it in advance. Make yourself a budget and then, when you get there and you want to go to athlete, talk X instead of the training talk that I'm going to do or whatever, substitute one for the other and don't add because that's the mistake people make is that their eyes get start to get bigger than their stomach in terms of all the things that, uh, that they can do.
Speaker 1:And it is cool. I got a lot. It is really cool. I've been there, I've seen it all. I do think that it's that that a lot of it is really neat. But give yourself a budget and a schedule, stick to it and try not to get too overwhelmed with everybody else, and if you absolutely have to go and see something, go send a surrogate and just ask them how it was. 80% of it is kind of the same stuff and then 20% of it is kind of the same stuff and then 20 of it is kind of novel and unique. So that that's my advice to people is to set a schedule, set a budget in terms of the activities that you actually want to do and then stick to it as much as you can and I'll add to that going into chamonix is overwhelming because of all the people and events going on.
Speaker 2:So when you're thinking about that budget, maybe don't plan something every single day. I start with, like when is packet pickup? Okay, packet pickups then is there a shakeout run before then like cluster your things. So it's not like every day you're going into chamonix twice, especially if you're staying a little bit outside, if you have to take public transport in hopefully that's the option or if you have to drive in, that can be really painful to find a place to park, and so I would just like limit the number of times you're having to go back in. So find things that you can like stack together, and that's a good strategy, I think, to keep yourself from overdoing it.
Speaker 1:We didn't even talk about packet pickup. That's a whole nother deal in and of itself. It's a lot of waiting, so be prepared for that.
Speaker 2:Take some deep breaths.
Speaker 1:Yeah, steph, to the overscheduling part of it. You can tell me to delete this if it's throwing you under the bus a little bit. But I remember one year we worked together as coaches and athlete for a long time. This is one of the years that we were working together. You got scheduled for, I think, nine different things UTMB week, from all of your various sponsors and kind of other obligations that you had. I remember you telling me that and I'm like that's too much. So just think, if one person is getting that much stuff scheduled, multiply that by all of the other things that are going on. That gives you a great sense of what, like all the things that you can do that you're probably are not going to get to.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's not restful when you're on your feet walking around interacting with people all day long. So pick what's important and say no to everything else.
Speaker 1:Ryan, what are we going to pick? We're going to be coaches and tourists there, so what are you going to do?
Speaker 3:I'm going to get a lot of pastries in the morning.
Speaker 2:I will say I'm going to give a shout out here for the best race of the best race of the week is the kids race, I'm not kidding you, and that's on, I think, wednesday or Thursday. There's every different age. You can start from three years old up to, I think, seven years old before they do the YCC and they send them off in waves and it's like the most magical thing. So if I were to add that to both of your lists, that would be like one of the top ones.
Speaker 1:I'll go check it this year. Can I watch Julian race?
Speaker 2:Yeah, he is going to be racing this year. He's already stoked. Nice, awesome.
Speaker 1:All right, you two. Well, the next time I see you guys, we will be all in France.
Speaker 1:Besides our Zoom, yeah bonjour, besides our Zoom Bonjour, yeah, bonjour. Besides our Zoom calls and things like that. The next time I see both of you guys in person, we'll be all there. So I'm going to take all the advice that you guys gave me I won't get sick. I'm going to abstain from alcohol, I'm going to log into my time shifter app and start shifting my time so that I'm like rip-roaring and ready to go Coach people not necessarily train or run or race, but go coach people out there, appreciate you guys' time and expertise on this and I'm looking forward to connecting with you guys once we all get over there Likewise.
Speaker 1:All right, folks, there you have it, there you go. Much thanks to Ryan and Steph for coming on the podcast today and enlightening us with some of the things that they are advising their athletes on as they travel out to the UTMB races. I cannot wait to get out there. This is one of my favorite times of the entire year. I hope to see a lot of you listeners out there. If you happen to see me strolling around the streets of Chamonix, probably with some gelato, say hi, take a selfie.
Speaker 1:I love meeting y'all out in the field. Tell me what you want to see coming up on the podcast. A lot of these things that we mentioned on the podcast are things that I am going to do and things that I actually have my athletes do. So take note, please feel free to use them, regardless of if you are going to one of the utmb races or you happen to go to another race that crosses a lot of time zones. Much of this content will be evergreen across everything. That is it for today, folks, and, as always, we will see you out on the trails.
