Shownotes
Summary
In this episode of the Athletes Compass podcast, Paul Warloski interviews Bartolomew Buczek, an Ironman athlete from Poland who has overcome tremendous odds. Despite having no athletic background and facing a serious health scare with a pituitary tumor, Bart transformed his life through dedication and training. He recently completed the challenging Lanzarote Ironman in just over 10 hours, finishing seventh in his age group. Bart shares his journey from an unhealthy lifestyle to becoming a top Ironman athlete, emphasizing the importance of consistency, smart training, and perseverance.
Key Takeaways
- Bart Buczek had no athletic background and was overweight before discovering endurance sports.
- A pituitary tumor diagnosis motivated Bart to change his lifestyle and take up triathlon.
- Bart's first Ironman experience was in Barcelona, finishing in an impressive 9 hours and 7 minutes.
- He emphasizes the importance of consistency and smart training over high volume.
- Bart's notable achievements include breaking the 9-hour mark and competing in the tough Lanzarote Ironman.
- He advises against common beginner mistakes such as treating every training session as a competition.
- Bart finds balance by integrating his training with his professional and personal life.
Transcripts
Hello and welcome to the Athletes Compass podcast where we navigate training, fitness and health for everyday athletes. Today is special. We get to interview Bartolomew Buczek from Poland for our everyday athlete segment of the show. Bart recently finished the notoriously challenging Lanzarote Ironman course in just over 10 hours, a remarkable time that landed him seventh in his age group. So today,
Bart, can you tell us about your athletic background and what initially got you into endurance sports?
Bart Buczek (:Sure. So hi, I'm Bart. And basically,
Well, I don't have any kind of athletic background.
especially at university, after high school, I just simply was sitting and partying probably. So not much sport at all.
got what you called, I think it's Pituitary tumor.
Paul Warloski (:Pituitary.
Paul Laursen (:I don't.
Bart Buczek (:Yeah, it's like brain tumor, basically. So I had that one and when you're signing the papers that you can lose your vision or whatever, I started thinking that I probably should do something with my self if I get through
Marjaana Rakai (:Yes.
Paul Laursen (:wow.
Bart Buczek (:was like 12 years ago.
was pretty overweight because back then I was like 104 kilos, which is like 230 pounds.
back then and basically
surgery went
already bought my first bike at auction and I couldn't train for a month because of the surgery I had to lay down probably and rest for a month but I was just watching the bike and I was waiting to start training or start whatever.
And about the triathlon, it's like I always knew how to swim pretty
And my friend from
me if I want to do a marathon with him.
I was like, yeah, let's do that. Yeah. So basically after we finished marathon, he was like, you know how to swim. Yeah. And I lost. Yeah. And you have a bike. And I was like, yeah, I have. So maybe you should try triathlon. Yeah. That's how it started basically.
Marjaana Rakai (:You
Paul Laursen (:That is amazing. Honestly, like think about your transition, right Bart, from being on death's
said you were overweight, is that right?
Bart Buczek (:Yeah, yeah, it was like 25 kilos almost overweight.
Paul Laursen (:Yeah, and maybe like if I can just keep asking on
any idea that you could be an athlete? I mean,
time in Lanzarote was one of the most difficult Ironmans on the entire Ironman circuit. I know that because my athlete Andy Buescher, that was his final race before he...
before I retired and that's like, that is just an incredibly hard race. And what was your overall place placing in that one, Bart?
Bart Buczek (:don't really remember
Paul Laursen (:Your top looked like you were top 50 though, right?
Bart Buczek (:Yeah, that's definitely like maybe 40 something like that, I guess
Paul Laursen (:Yeah, I mean, to come to like, it's just a remarkable performance that you did. Like you would have, reflecting back, you would have no idea that that was possible probably in you. Is that right?
Marjaana Rakai (:Wow.
Bart Buczek (:No, no, no, no, no. The initial goal was basically not even like lose the weight. I just wanted to bike faster and run faster. And like I started obviously losing weight, et cetera. And then it comes like, I just enjoyed it. Yeah.
Paul Laursen (:But this is my point is that everyone, like, you know, like we walk around, we're in this group, right, in Athletica users where we typically are, you know, we look at least the part of being pretty healthy looking, you know, and we might look at others and think that they don't necessarily have the capacity, but they do. Everyone has this, everyone's an athlete. Everyone has this capability, but,
So many of us are stuck in this situation where we're constantly metabolically unhealthy. And yeah, it's just, my hat's off to you, Bart. And I just, I love your story. I had no idea that your transition was from a brain tumor being metabolically unhealthy on death's doorstep to what you achieved. I'm just, it's just remarkable.
Marjaana Rakai (:such an amazing story. Thank you for sharing
after the surgery that you thought Iron Man was possible? Because Iron Man is so far from getting healthy to actually doing it.
Bart Buczek (:I was really focused, like I want to do an Ironman eventually. And I wanted to do it after maybe two or three years. But then I got into a triathlon club. And basically, I started training with them. And there was more of the 70 .3s, et cetera. So I've done the first Ironman, I think, six years ago. I think it was six years ago in Barcelona.
And basically, I remember that I was like, it was like, you know, the first Ironman is really hard. Like it's, it is hard. Yeah. Especially on the run and the last 10 kilometers, I was like thinking, my God, I will never do that again. Yeah. And, and like right after I finished that and I basically to, for the record on the, my first Ironman, I had like nine hours and seven minutes. So I never imagined that I will break even 10 hours and I didn't did
Paul Warloski (:you
Bart Buczek (:9 .07 I was like I really like well It got to my head like after like an hour or two after the competition after I finished But my friend came in and I was like, yeah, we should do another next year Yeah, it was like a really switch of you know of thinking like during the competitions like my god never again Yeah, or maybe I was like thinking maybe my bike chain will break and I don't have to finish or something like that
Paul Warloski (:Wow.
Bart Buczek (:But this was hilarious. Two hours later, I was like, yeah, I'm signing for the next one. And I actually signed out the next day. I signed for Ironman in Italy for the next year or so. But that's kind of like, what was it, I would say.
Marjaana Rakai (:with
So just to be clear, your first Ironman that you did, you finished in nine hours.
Bart Buczek (:Yeah, nine, nine seven
years ago, I have a goal to break nine hours and I broke nine hours. So my personal best is like eight 58 right now.
Paul Warloski (:you
Marjaana Rakai (:must have some great genetics behind you.
Paul Warloski (:Yeah.
Bart Buczek (:I honestly don't think so because no, because I have few friends who basically can like, you know, stood up from the couch and they are running much faster than I. And in four weeks they can achieve like really good goals. They have probably a really good VO2 max, et cetera. For me, it was always like consistency and consequence. So basically if I'll do like 90 % of the plan,
Marjaana Rakai (:No.
Bart Buczek (:which either a coach or whoever subscribed to me, I think that's the key. You have to hit at least 90 % of the goal and obviously not bury yourself. If you feel not right, then you should probably slow down. If you feel good, then you can go above a little bit. I'm 12 years into this sport, so I learned... Probably I lost seven first years.
first seven years I probably lost because I was just stupid and I'm really glad that I didn't injure myself because I was doing stupid things back then. But after those seven years I think I achieved a kind of consistency, consequence and I know what to do not to injure and bully myself with the training.
Paul Laursen (:Bart, can I just clarify, you know, what would you classify as stupid things? What are some beginner mistakes that you wouldn't want others to maybe make? And, you know, how could others maybe fast track their own performance so that they don't make stupid mistakes that you may have made?
Paul Warloski (:Hmm.
Bart Buczek (:Sure. So I remember when Sebastian Kinley said to Lionel Sanders that not every training is a competition. And that's true. So at the beginning, I was like thinking like that. If I was like running in a group, I wanted to be the fastest. And that was kind of stupid because the slow run should be the slow run. Yeah. You should like, probably you should rest for the intervals and for the hard work, not like do that on the slow runs. And I was like,
Paul Warloski (:the
and
Bart Buczek (:I was doing this a lot, like two hard sessions, I would say. And then for example, I was like scheduled for like Saturday and Sunday for four hours of bike ride or two hours of run. And I just couldn't because I was already exhausted. Yeah. So that was probably the first thing I would say. Yeah, most likely. And I was completely thinking too much because I remember that once I had a year that for 12 weeks,
I was in the competition every weekend,
every weekend. So including like three 70 .3s and like, I don't know, eight or nine 51 .50 or kind of similar distances.
Paul Laursen (:Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Guilty with all those same mistakes as well too. I actually used to race to actually get fit in my early, early days. I would almost race every weekend when I was kind of starting out. And that worked to a certain level. And then, yeah, and then everything also was a competition in my own training back way back when. And yeah, you break down though, don't you?
Bart Buczek (:And to be honest, even right now when I'm running, I'm just trying to do that sometimes as you prescribe with the heart rate, but sometimes on the field because I think I achieved kind of like the level that even if I'm running in zone two, it can be tough sometimes. I feel it's tough. I see that my heart rate is really low.
but my tempo is like too fast and I know that it will break my legs. Yeah. Like the day after or something like that. Yeah.
Marjaana Rakai (:So you kind of develop that feel and not just blindly go by the metrics, sounds like.
Bart Buczek (:Well, I still like, you know, the more magic you have, the better, but still it's like, I think zone two shouldn't be like RP, I don't know, six or seven. Yeah. It should be probably more like four, three, something like that, I guess. So I'm trying to dial down that.
Paul Warloski (:Thank you.
Paul Laursen (:did you first come across Athletica? How did you find us?
Bart Buczek (:gonna sound harsh on my previous coaches, but basically, most of the time,
there was
two packs for a training. Like, they just like in the training peaks, they are just like moving the trainings into your schedule and that's it. Yeah.
I don't want that anymore. Yeah. I just want to, to probably be able to a little bit dial my trainings and to, I was looking for something that was able, if I was performing like today, really good or today really bad to be able to like, you know, calculate this overnight or during the week and like adjust rather than prescribing me every time the same 10 minutes. Yeah. I would like to have like sometimes eight minutes, sometimes 12 minutes, sometimes, you know,
So that's how I initially, and professionally, I'm a programmer. So I was actually, the AI is like a boom for the past two, three years. So I was basically wanted to try and I remember writing to you like a year ago when I started. And basically I was switching from the monthly subscription to the one year subscription and I was like, yeah, let's give it a go. And I started like, actually like,
I think it was like a year from now I started training with Atlantica.
Paul Laursen (:have you found
Bart Buczek (:going to be honest, I tried a few others as well, but, and despite like the others sometimes have like a, you know, better mobile app or better view, et cetera. I, I really found this one like not really bloated with like a lot of things going on in other apps. And, and I read your book.
Paul Warloski (:Hmm.
Bart Buczek (:So basically I know that some of the probably trainings, yeah, yeah, some of them are, there's like, you know, I have few coaches who really like this book as well and who are like prescribing the trainings from this book to their like, you know, to the athletes. But basically I found it like, this is something I want to try and this is something that probably will suit me in some way.
Paul Warloski (:Bye.
Bart Buczek (:So that's basically why did I choose Atlantica.
Paul Warloski (:Bart, what are some of the endurance accomplishments you are most proud of? You've done a lot in these 12 years.
Bart Buczek (:So I'm most proud of probably the Breaking 9, which was like two years ago for me. It wasn't easy. And I like to be honest, by the last 20, sorry, 200 meters, I didn't know if I will be able to do that. And especially like after a bike, I finished the bike and it was like, I looked at my watch and I was like, I have a three hours and 10 minutes and I never broke 315 in Marathonia. So I was like...
I give it a go, but I don't know how it will work. Yeah. And then the run course was like awful. It was like six loops, some cobblestones, some grass, et cetera. But I was like prepared and only after like five laps, I started to like feel it really. I started feeling like, like I'm not, I don't know if I'm going to finish that one. Yeah. Because I was so tired already, but you know, I was really driven by that. I want to break this nine hours.
So that was the one really goal that I wanted to achieve. And honestly, the Ironman Lanzarote was also a really good achievement because I was always struggling in heat. And in Lanzarote, maybe it's not that hot, and you don't feel that because of the wind, but it's still really hot. And especially, there is a place you are running around the airport when there is no aid station because probably they...
cannot do that for like three or four hours, sorry, three or four kilometers. And I was like, and I was feeling strong. I was feeling strong on the run, which I was like impressed because the bike is like, you know, in the Lanzarote is like the toughest course probably, maybe Nis is probably similar, I guess. But the Lanzarote because of the winds, et cetera, could be like, you know, heartbreaking, I would say. So I was really glad that for the first time in the heat, I didn't break.
And I was like, and I was, I was feeling strong. I finished, I finished in 10 .06 because I was like aiming a little bit for 10, yeah, obviously. But after like 32 kilometers, I knew that it's like, it's not gonna happen. Not this day, yeah. I'm not going to like run another 10 kilometers in like 42 minutes. Yeah. So I just like probably the last 10 kilometers I a little bit enjoyed.
So I started walking at the station because for that 30 kilometers, I didn't walk at all. So basically that's probably two of my achievements I'm really proud of, I would say.
Paul Laursen (:Yeah, very, very cool Bart. I'm just reflecting on, Athletica ambassador, Andy Boucher, his, his performance, his last performance prior to retirement in Lanzarote was 832. And, he was two minutes, I believe off the course record, but just to put it into perspective, just what, what an incredible performance you gave, you know, a 10 0, 10 0 6 or 10 0 8. Can't remember what you said is, you know, it's.
It's remarkable and whatnot. You compare that relative to the pros and the course record.
Bart Buczek (:It was funny because for the first time I could write to my friends that I joined your club. I'm a slow Ironman right now because I didn't break 10 hours for the first time. Yeah, because the previous life I've done, I always broke 10 hours. So, so that's that's
Marjaana Rakai (:does your typical week of training and work look like?
Bart Buczek (:typically it's like two trainings a day. So usually one in the morning and I'm swimming like at 6 a with the master squad, which is kind of fine. But if it's not like a swim day, then probably I will run at the lunchtime or maybe in the morning. And then usually the second training is after work. So like at 6.
5 PM depending on how fast I can finish my work. And I was a little bit struggling when I was preparing for the Lanzarote because I chose the high volume plan. And sometimes there were days when there are three trainings, which is not as easy because you have to do like morning, lunch and evening. Yeah, because I didn't want to stack the trainings. I wanted to at least have like
two, three hours between them. But to be honest, I handled that pretty well. There were only like two, maybe three weeks, which had like all the days was like three trainings, I think a day. But you know, I knew what I signed for. I wanted high volume plan, then that's it. And to be honest with the high volume plan, I think there are very hours for like...
for like 12 weeks or 15 weeks before the Lanzarote was like 15 hours, like average. So it's not like really high volume. Yeah. I don't think I ever got me like to 20 hours. Maybe when I was like walking in the mountains, I had like 22, 23, but like real training, it was like always between like 14, 13 to 18 hours, I would say.
Paul Laursen (:Yeah, that's, and that's pretty cool. And, like there's purpose to that too, right? like we're, Bart, we're, you know, we, there's a lot of plans out there. I'm sure, you know, like you've, you know, you've, we're mentioning the, you know, all the plans you've had on training peaks before, right? And it's not hard to put it, push a plan to push it out to 30, 35 hours, right? We can, we can all prescribe that huge amount of training, but what we try to do with Athletica.
in terms of the volume is we believe that by incorporating specific sessions, strength endurance sessions, high intensity interval training sessions, purposeful, you can get more bang for buck out of your hours. And yeah, you don't necessarily need these humongous volumes that we do see in others. It's individual, but this is generally our philosophy that we see give.
gives better effects, a more holistic effect, and a healthier body, ultimately, to be able to recover better from these and build a more robust engine for events like you're doing.
Bart Buczek (:I would probably say that probably most of us are not pros, are like amateurs. We have work, we have another life, et cetera. It's just a hobby, let's say. And as you said, I don't know. I could probably try to go to 20 hours or something. But then I would probably be constantly tired, I would say, like constantly, which I...
which I don't like that feeling that every, when you go like on every session, you feel tired. It's not always that it's like, you know, you feel tired, tired, but it's fine. Yeah. Like you can still like hit the, I don't know, power numbers or tempo sessions, et cetera. But the constant feeling of tiredness is like, it's not great for the amateurs, I would say.
Paul Laursen (:Yeah, yeah. Marjaana I'm sure you'd agree.
Marjaana Rakai (:Yeah. totally. It's just my latest run. I woke up super tired after late nights this weekend with baseball, my kids' baseball. And I just had to get going and then you feel better and actually feel really good after. Just to give context to listeners, what else do you do in your daily life? Do you have family? You work obviously. Do you have kids?
Bart Buczek (:Yeah, I have a work as I said, I'm a code -developer and I have a fiance and I have a dog. We don't have kids yet. So that's why I enjoy high volume plan right now.
Paul Warloski (:Hahaha!
Marjaana Rakai (:Yeah
Paul Laursen (:I'm going to go to bed.
Bart Buczek (:That's probably the key. But I always responded pretty good for the low volume, high intensity, I would say. I always responded to that good. And I think that's a key for amateurs. If you don't have time, probably don't do any kind of stupid hours here, like stupid sessions, just for the sake of volume. It's not worth it, I would say.
Marjaana Rakai (:Yeah.
Yeah, totally. So what else do you like, do you, obviously you do your training, you walk your dog, you go hike in the beautiful mountains in, in South Poland. do you record everything and how do you like, you said you mentioned you, swim with the swim squad. So you, do you use the Athletica swim sessions and just pull them on those squad swimming days or how do you like organize the weekly sessions that you do with the group?
Bart Buczek (:So basically I'm trying to swim the amount of hours and probably the volume as Atletica prescribes, but I swimming with them. So I don't follow here in the plan. And I think with the swimming is like, I don't know, I mean like for the past 10 years, I'm swimming the same.
Marjaana Rakai (:Mm -hmm.
Bart Buczek (:I mean, like I did not like started swimming faster one year or the other. It's like always, it's constantly the same. And I'm, I'm pretty satisfied with like breaking one hour of swim in the Ironman. I'm fine with that. I probably don't want to like swim 25 Ks a week to achieve 58 minutes or 56. I don't think it's worth it.
And I enjoy basically swimming with the club because it's 6 a So if you can say enjoying, I'm probably half sleeping then. But it's like, it's flies. Yeah, it flies really fast, I would say at 6 a
Paul Warloski (:Mm -hmm.
Paul Laursen (:Yeah, I just, for sure. And I was just, I just concur with your philosophy there too, Bart. Just two key points that you made. A lot of people do that where they've got their swim squad and they just, you know, they, they know when the squid swim squad is happening, they drag an equivalent athletic accession to that placeholder and they record their swim in their swim squad. And yeah, like Paul mentioned, you know, you get the social aspect.
Marjaana Rakai (:Yeah, it -
Paul Warloski (:That's good social time, too.
Paul Laursen (:I'm going to go to bed.
you get the aspect where you're, you know, you're chasing feet or, you know, there might be someone that's slightly faster or whatnot in a lane, lane beside you or a lane, you know, or just in front of you. And, and then, yeah, also, you know, in terms of swimming more hours in the pool, just to get two minutes, that's not where you want to be putting your, if you're an Ironman or a half Ironman athlete, that's probably not where you want to be putting your effort. You, when you just, when you look at how much
of the races is bike and run relative to that swim. You can get a lot more bang for buck of your time if you're putting it into either your bike or your run. And yeah, so you're doing things right in my opinion.
Bart Buczek (:So before an Ironman, it was usually 12 kilometers of swimming a week on average. I once hit 18, but I was like, I don't want to do that ever again. And right now, since I only have 70 .3 in my sight, I'm doing about 10 kilometers a week, which is fine. Because just recently,
Paul Laursen (:Nice.
Marjaana Rakai (:That's the season.
Bart Buczek (:A week ago, I finished Challenged Task, which is like 70 .3, and actually I swam like 29 .30, so it wasn't so bad.
Marjaana Rakai (:Nice. Talking about going forward and what do you have in the race calendar?
Paul Laursen (:Very good.
Bart Buczek (:in the race calendar, in the three weeks, I have another 70 .3 on flat, on really flat surface. And then in September, I have a 70 .3, but it's in the mountains, totally. Running and everything is, well, swimming is in the lake, but running, I probably will have to put with the backpack, et cetera, because it's going to take three hours. And the bike is four times to the top.
and down. So in September. And then I have like plans for the next year. So probably the next year, the main goal would be 70 .3 Mallorca, which I want to do. And in next year, I probably will focus more on 70 .3 because we have a wedding. So probably I don't want to spend on Ironman.
Marjaana Rakai (:I'm Fred.
Paul Warloski (:Yay!
Marjaana Rakai (:That's smart. Yeah, that's smart. So, congrats. That's amazing. How can we help? What questions do you have for us?
Paul Laursen (:Congratulations.
Bart Buczek (:Thank you.
Paul Warloski (:Congrats, that's awesome.
Bart Buczek (:So the first question probably, do you plan to have the mobile app or redesign a little bit? I know, I'm reading the forum, so probably this is the most common question to redesign or have a mobile app or update it a little bit. So that's probably what gets me into. Because nowadays I'm still poking around into the training peaks. And I honestly would like to like...
Paul Warloski (:I'm sorry.
Paul Laursen (:Yeah.
Bart Buczek (:resign from them to just like, you know, to have everything in La Tudica. But just the mobile apps keeps me, keeps me, you know, having them as well. So.
Paul Laursen (:Absolutely. It's a great question. And yeah, it's a very common comment. And some good news to announce, Bart. We'll say it right here. We have started the process of building a mobile app with some partners in Vietnam. And yeah, just prior to this call, I was going through some wireframes of the mobile app. So this is going to be in a...
Now, just to be clear, if you're a user in Athletica, you can already use the web browser. So there is always that option. It is designed to be web browser compatible. But nevertheless, we still recognize the importance of an exclusive mobile app. And we'll get benefits as well from the marketing standpoint, being on the App Store.
Bart Buczek (:Check. Yeah.
Paul Laursen (:and the like. But that process is, that building process has already commenced. So yeah, it's hopefully a first version within three or four months will be released. So yeah, that's first question tick on its way Bart.
Bart Buczek (:Cool.
As to the other questions, I think like I was writing with you, Paul, during like last year a few times. You pointed me always to forums. So I always like write a topic in a forum. And I think I have like almost everything from the app. Like I can set like how many hours a day I want to train. What did I want to train? There is an option to do that.
Let's say I want like 25 % of swimming, like 35 % of running. So that's also like covered. Maybe, maybe just some kind of like more variety in trainings because like there is like a few sessions that drives me nuts already, which is like strength, strength on the bike, which is like four times 10 or three times 10 in like low cadence.
Paul Warloski (:you
Bart Buczek (:I know that this is like key session. I know that, but it's like when you are doing like 50 time, 50 time in a row, like, like, you know, it's, it can be tiring and also running hills that are like two sessions that I really like driving me sometimes nuts, but I'm, I'm doing it and I'm enjoying them from time to
I don't know, it's about like difference. I think I don't like the low cadence work or something. I don't know, honestly.
Paul Warloski (:Thank you.
Paul Laursen (:Yeah, on the low cadence stuff, we actually, on the sister podcast of this one, the training science podcast, we've had a few, I think it was Dayo Saunders actually, who's one of the top Tour de France team coach slash sports scientists. There's a real purpose to those low cadence sessions. And it's really, it's actually not proven because we can't do muscle biopsies, but in general with that high torque,
high force, low cadence effort. You think of yourself, you're grinding up these hills. There's a larger recruitment of the fast twitch muscle fibers in these. And what you wanna do is you wanna convert those powerful, larger, fast twitch muscle fibers over to being more fatigue resistant. And that's what we anecdotally say. I can't say that there hasn't been a direct.
study where someone's actually looked at a fiber type conversion or anything like that. But that's anecdotally what Tour de France coaches and other sports scientists I think that's kind of going on because there's a real feel that you get a benefit from those sorts of efforts.
Bart Buczek (:Yeah, before I asked the question, I knew already that there is no escape from the low cadence.
Paul Laursen (:know, in terms of the variety comment, are you, do you ever leverage the workout wizard?
Bart Buczek (:No, no, sorry. I just, I, yeah, I know, I know. Obviously I clicked from time to time, but it's just like, I honestly don't know why I do not use it. I'm just like, if I have a prescribed training and I can see it, I'm just like, yeah, let's go with it. It's fine. So like usually, yeah.
Paul Laursen (:Do you know about it?
Yeah. Well, I would just recommend to your point, there's almost infinite variety within that workout wizard there. And it kind of answers your criticism. And if you just click on that workout wizard, you will have loads of like variety, changes in duration, changes in fatigue. There's even an injury context. And, but you're going to get a similar, for most of those, you get a similar stress.
Marjaana Rakai (:Yeah.
Paul Laursen (:but done a different way and flips it around a little.
Bart Buczek (:Okay.
That's what I wanted to ask, if I choose the other one, if it's going to impact overall fitness, et cetera, at the end.
Paul Laursen (:Yeah, so that was the whole purpose. And it's probably not clear to you, and it's really good that we're having this conversation because the purpose of the workout wizard is to provide a similar stimulus, hitting that same physiological target, but done a little bit of a different way in accordance with your context. So they're all individualized to your own workout reserve, to your own physiology.
but they're done like a little bit different to give you that variety. So, and I don't believe there's, I know there's no other platform that can do that, those types of calculations. So it's kind of novel, kind of cool.
Bart Buczek (:I think you nailed that, that you probably should promote that a little bit more because I was under the impression that the default session is like the best, to be honest.
Paul Laursen (:No, the default session is the benchmark. It's the benchmark that we anchor, but everything else is very, very similar. I know Marjaana uses it a fair bit. She's addicted to 40 20s, which I don't necessarily agree with. I'm a 30 30 proponent, but she flips things around all the time.
Paul Warloski (:you
Marjaana Rakai (:You
That's just my personality. So a little bit of context, like I've been using Athletica almost three years. So the same workouts are getting a little bit boring to me sometimes. And I'm kind of like you Bart, like I want to see that I've done the plan. What is given to me, I want to follow it. But...
Paul Warloski (:Hahaha
Bart Buczek (:Yeah.
Marjaana Rakai (:Recently, I realized that there are better workouts that fit me better. Like for example, instead of doing five times one K runs towards threshold, I think better to do the longer, like three times two K runs. So I'm, I'm changing now I'm going to workout wizard and I'm changing the, the one K, intervals to two K because that I think that works.
better for me as my goal is to increase my speed on the marathon at the end of Ironman. So, but yeah, 40 20s all the way. I love
Paul Warloski (:So Paul, what are, what are three things you heard that will help Bart improve his health and performance?
Paul Laursen (:just continuing along the same pathway, the same consistency. I think the only potential work on for you Bart is to get in and leverage that workout wizard so that you are...
You know, you are getting a little bit of variety. The sessions are a little bit more interesting to you. You know, especially as you become a little bit more of a seasoned and experienced athlete, you do need that mental shift to, yeah, to, you know, and it's this facilitates the kind of the creative element in the, you know, the craft that is your sport. But I'll just kind of revert back, Paul, if I may, just in terms of the key things that I
heard in this podcast that were remarkable. The very first one is your transition, Bart, from a really, I guess, an unhealthy human. And there's just this transformation that you had when you had that abrupt brain tumor and this awakening. I mean, you never would have thought that you could be a sub -nine -hour Iron Man.
and a top 50 Lanzarote finisher at that point. And that, you know, maybe it's not that remarkable, but of a performance, but you know, who knows, if you're a listener, who knows what is possible, anything really is possible. That potential or some form of it sits within all of us. The other thing that you discovered along your journey was the importance of training consistency that comes out all the time.
Bart Buczek (:No.
Paul Laursen (:And in order to get that training consistency, the last one is really the key mistake that we all make as everyday athletes when we start in is training too hard. And you don't need to be at the front of the group. So get control of your ego and you don't always have to race every weekend, even though it is kind of so exciting. So yeah, training easy, training consistently is really the road.
that you have followed Bart and hopefully you'll continue to follow as you move forward with your next goals. And yeah, wishing you all the best with that.
Bart Buczek (:Thank you. Just one thing I can add is that I never, I never was thinking like about the Ironman and triathlon, like something that I want just to do and to get over it. I always like was thinking like, I want to do it probably by to the end of my life. So I, I really enjoy training. I really enjoy. So I probably it's not something that
Even if I would, I don't know, like do 8 .30 or whatever, I would not stop, yeah. It's just like, I love it. That's it.
Paul Warloski (:Well, that is all for this week. Thank you for listening and join us next week for the Athletes Compass podcast. You can help us by asking your training questions in the comments and in the forum, liking and sharing the podcast, giving us five star reviews and engaging with us on our social media. For Bart Buczek, for Marjaana Rakai and Dr. Paul Laursen I am Paul Warloski and this has been the Athletes Compass podcast. Thanks for listening.
