Training stress isn’t just about mileage, vert, or workouts — it’s about everything else competing for your energy, too.

In this episode of Trail Society, Corrine Malcolm and co-host Hillary Allen share both the science and their experiences with mental fatigue, allostatic load, and burnout. From road marathon training and international travel to work stress, technology overload, and emotional strain, they unpack why athletes often feel exhausted even when training volume drops.

Training stress doesn’t exist in isolation. If you’ve ever wondered why you feel flat during a taper, overwhelmed by metrics, or stuck in a cycle of doing “more,” this episode gives you permission to zoom out and reset.

This episode is brought to you by rabbit. If you're looking to treat yourself after the holidays or upgrade your winter running kit, head to www.runinrabbit.com and use code FEBTRAIL in February for 10% off.

Additional support provided by ProBio: Use code Trail20 for 20%-off orders (30%-off + free shipping w/ subscriptions) at probionutrition.com

Follow Us:

FeistyFest Info: https://www.wetravel.com/trips/feistyfest-feisty-media-1943243299#about-this-trip

Women's Mechanic Camp in Tucson: https://www.wetravel.com/trips/women-s-bike-mechanic-camp-tucson-az-feisty-media-24985624#about-this-trip

Courses and Coaching: https://feisty.learnworlds.com/

@feisty_media

@trail.society

Foreign.

Hey.

Hi.

Hello.

Welcome back to Trail Society, produced by our friends over at Feisty Media.

I'm your host, Corinne Malcolm, and today's episode is brought to you by our incredible apparel partner, Rabbit.

And I can't wait to sit down and chat with one of my favorite co hosts, Hilary Allen.

Hillary, welcome back to the pod.

How are you?

You just ran a road marathon.

Hey.

Yeah, I know.

I'm loving this new our new format for 20.

Super psyched with all the new partnerships and to keep growing the pod.

But yeah, I, I, I ran a road marathon.

Who am I?

I don't know.

I mean, I've been watching your workouts for weeks and weeks and weeks now.

So it seems like you were just like on a road kick and having a good time.

Yeah, you know, honestly, it was really cool.

I really enjoyed the process.

I, yeah, just like exploring kind of different avenues.

I had really needed to reset from like long and slow and, and I've never really been able to string together ever in my life, like this much speed and like actual like designated road marathon, like road training block.

So it was super fun.

Had like a really fun training group here in Boulder and like, literally just trying new things PR in after, you know, gosh, like 14 years of running, which is like super cool to see.

Um, and yeah, it was like really, really hard.

Um, I honestly, like, I ran two, well, 2:48, so not bad fast.

I know.

And I was, I know it wasn't perfect.

I know that you had some, some GI struggles, some like kind of off feeling middle miles.

But like, that's, that's not slow by any means.

Like you are cranking out some fast miles to make that happen.

Like, that's like I said, relative.

PR is the fastest I've ever run for that long.

So like, pretty cool.

And I was like, surprised how like, comfy it felt.

Um, for me it was interesting.

I felt like I had some like trail problems on the road.

Like I had like, I had a gel at mile five and then my stomach was like.

And I'm like, what is going on?

This is something that hasn't happened in training.

I think maybe the taper kind of like messed me up.

I like, didn't go to the bathroom the day before the race.

And so then the morning of I was able to, but like, maybe there's some like lingering digestive stuff.

So I basically had a side ache for 20 miles.

Um, and it was because I had to go to the bathroom.

Oh, that.

I didn't.

I like, I was like cramping cells, like, trying to, like, like, keep it together.

So I couldn't speed up, but I didn't want to slow down for fear of not being able to start again.

And I was like, hillary, you need to do your trail people proud and not walk in a road marathon.

So.

So I found a way to do it and I, like, you know, actually stayed pretty consistent.

That was my, like, if I had a really good race, I think I could have run like 45.

But I'm pretty pleased with it.

So.

Yeah.

Yeah, it seems like a great block.

And you're.

We're recording a little bit early.

This episode will come out in early February because you're traveling to the Southern hemisphere.

So what's going on?

Where are you headed to?

What race are you doing?

Where in the world is Hilly San Diego?

It is a common theme on the show, which is why we've made some changes, I feel like, to our general structure.

But it's good because I get to hang out with you, I get to hang out with Keely, and we get to do all the fun things we want to do.

So where are you going?

What's going on?

I can't exactly, like, literally just second everything you said.

This is perfect because it's like, yeah, like, ranging through different schedules, especially with, like, how busy each of us are individually.

Like, oh, my goodness.

But then to be able to keep moving the needle forward on all the science things and the interests that we have, it's like, it's awesome.

So I'm going back to Tarawera, but by way of Australia first.

I'm doing actually a bike race.

I'm doing the rattle grave gravel.

Um, so Amy Charity, she puts on steamboat gravel.

Um, she's a good friend of mine.

They.

I had was able to do her race in Finland two years ago, and then they also have one in Adelaide in Australia.

And because I didn't like, it's kind of close, I was invited there by them and because they're actually doing some cool things, like doing like, trying to build out, like a run day ahead of the ride.

So I'll be helping out with stuff like that and doing the bike race, and then I'll go over to terrawara for the 50k over there.

And like, last minute, I was only just.

I was planning to do those races and come home.

Um, but then we have Brooks Trail Team camp, the end of February in Hawaii, of all places.

Like, the first time we're doing, like, international.

I thought I was going to be able to come hang out with you in Seattle, Corinne.

But we're going to Hawaii, so if you want to, you know, like, come on over there, come meet us.

That's how I flew to New Zealand last year, is.

I had a layover in Hawaii.

So, honestly, you're.

It's on the right flight.

You're on the right flight path.

Like, that's pretty dope.

Exactly.

So if I'm on the right flight path, I might, like.

So I'm not going to come home.

So I'm basically just going to like, stop over in Hawaii for, like, a few days before team camp starts, and then.

Then I'll be home.

So it's like kind of like race, race adventure, team building, bonding, and then, sweet, I'll come home.

So.

Yeah.

And I'll see you in March.

It'll be great.

Exactly.

That's.

That's sick.

It's a lot.

But I'm.

Before we dive into, you know, a really cool conversation today about training stress, we've got to give a shout out to Rabbit again.

Super, super exciting.

I'm wondering, Hilly, what you're most excited about for this continuation of the partnership.

Oh, man.

So, honestly, like, one of my favorite things was just seeing, like, the gear out, like, the Trail Society gear out in the wild.

I had a hilly goat run retreat last year, and one of my favorite moments was, like, Rabbit was able to give, like, a crew neck, the.

The crewneck sweatshirt to everyone in the team who came out.

And it was a moment in the kitchen where everyone is wearing the sweatshirt.

And, like, to the back of it, you could just see the Trail society like, like, logo and, like, the flowers.

And I'm just like, oh, my gosh, this is amazing.

So I'm really excited to continue the partnership to, like, and then have some.

We've got some really cool just apparel, I think, coming out, and it's like, it's so cool to see it at races and just like, to have that.

I don't know, it's just like the.

The badge of honor of, like, science, women's sports.

Like, yeah.

So one of the many things.

But yeah.

Yeah.

Well, they'll have a spring drop with us this year, and it's huge.

Like, it's going to be really, really cool.

We saw the mockups in Oct. October, and they're beautiful, so keep your eyes peeled for that.

But they've also launched a clubhouse for this year, where basically they're going to be popping up at specific races where they take over, like a local hotel and it becomes kind of their site of operation.

I think they've tagged UTMB Chicago and New York City.

So two road marathons and then a big trail weekend.

They're going to, you know, gather runners there, do shakeouts, activations that are like the hub for the weekend.

So they're super excited about that.

We're excited to see them out there in the wild, literally.

They've got a lot of pretty purples on the website right now.

And you know me, I'm a sucker for a good purple.

And you can use for the whole month of February.

We've got a new code for you, and it's Feb F E B Trail.

Feb Trail for the month of February.

Get 10% off your order over@runin rabbit.com.

okay, we're moving along.

We're doing it.

We're clicking.

Click things away.

I'm snapping here in studio, obviously.

Again, this is coming out in February.

You are taken off to the other, to the Southern hemisphere.

Kind of right after this episode comes out will be the double header of Tarot Air, where you'll be running the 50k golden ticket.

There in the 100k, we've got Black Canyon 100k going on.

It'll be really cool to actually recap those races on the back of things.

We're excited to see Molly Seidel debut in the 100k at Black Canyon.

Des Linden announced today when we're recording that she's running the 50K at Black Canyon.

And they're, they're both women that we hope to have on the podcast this spring.

Des, I think, is running Marathon de Saab as well with Magda this spring.

So that'll be really cool.

So we're, we're excited about all that stuff, but this is also prime prep season for athletes.

And so we're, we're redesigning our calendars.

We're thinking about what we want to do.

We're, I don't know, we're analyzing how we want to set up our year.

We're thinking we got metrics, we got stuff going on.

And so we want to talk about stress today and, like, all the varieties and shapes that it comes in.

And so I'm just wondering to get things kicked off.

Like, why is this topic that we chose for today important to you, specifically Hilly?

Well, in addition to all the travel and stuff, I'm going to be doing week one in Australia, I'm starting school again.

So a lot of things.

So, I mean, when.

When I was read.

So basically why this is important to me because, you know, as a coach and as an athlete, I feel the stress of just being a human, you know, day in and day out.

And, like, what I think at first when I got into the sport, you know, I was just like, social media was just starting to happen.

Like, there was.

There was a little bit.

Not as much comparison is happening now, but it feels like, you know, we're in the thick of the information age and there's so much stuff coming at us all of the time.

I feel like it's really hard to.

To feel rested, to feel like refreshed, rejuvenated.

Life just seems to be coming at me so fast.

And, yeah, it just become, like, ebbs and flows of, like, this feeling of burnout.

And I'm unsure sometimes of where it's coming from.

And so I kind of go down these rabbit holes and I was doing more.

So this semester, during a lot of the research papers I was reading, I was kind of going down these rabbit holes of, like, what actually contributes to athlete burnout?

What is, like, how can we quantify, you know, why do we need mental performance coaches?

Like, why am I studying this in the first place?

And it's because there's such a thing as mental fatigue versus physical fatigue.

And I think as athletes, like, I've focused so much personally on, like, the physical training, but if we forget all this other stuff that actually contributes to stress, we're kind of missing a big part of the picture.

And I think that's where athletes can kind of, like, who have at least come to me of, like, through burnout and, like, you know, lacking this motivation or becoming injured when there's really not anything, like, physically wrong, but they're just, like, burnt out and tapped out.

And so really, it's just because I want to understand the complexities of what it means to be an athlete and a human being.

And yeah, thinking about it more from just, like, the physical part, a more kind of composite view of, like, stress and fatigue and what that looks like.

Yeah, I love it.

I think one of the things I loved the most, and it'll probably become like, the title of this podcast, which is cool and nerdy, is that when you pulled the topic for us, you Described it as, quote, training stress does not exist in isolation.

And that's so like hitting the nail on the head.

So I'm wondering, what does that mean exactly?

Like, what do you mean by that?

Yeah, so again, I think as athletes, we think that we're like, you know, we exist in this bubble.

Like when we're thinking about training, we think about our.

Like when we're preparing for a race, we focus specifically on the training itself, which is like the running, the vert, like pick whatever metric, but it's usually has to do with physical exertion.

And we think that like trading stress especially.

I mean, if you open up, I use training peaks.

If we open that up, we see like training stress score.

We're seeing how fatigued we are.

We're seeing what our form is, right, where basically all of those metrics are gathered in actual activity itself.

But we all know this, that we're humans first.

We, we're not just robots.

We're not just, we can't.

We literally don't exist in isolation.

Nothing is that.

We are the composite of all of these things bombarding us all of the time.

So, I mean, it'd be great if it maybe, you know, it could, it could work that way.

Maybe some people can just like focus on training, then they just like go and like lay horizontally on the floor and close the rise and like, you know, zone out all day.

But I don't think that that's actually, you know, realistic in any scenario, even if you're, you know, professional, you know, cyclist on the pro tour.

Um, so yeah, that's kind of what got me thinking.

I go into these little, these little, like, I don't know, just these rabbit holes where I'm just like thinking about a topic.

I like to write about it just to kind of get a grip for where my questions are.

And then I kind of go to the research and see if I can answer the question.

And that was the main thing.

Um, like we don't exist in isolation.

So therefore training stress.

And we can't as coaches or athletes think of it that way.

It's like why you feel so crappy during a taper when you're like, I'm not training as much, shouldn't I feel better?

And you're like, no, hun, you're still stressed as shit.

Like you still got a lot going on.

Like, turns out we just use training as like the scapegoat for why we feel so tired and bad all the time.

And it turns out there are so many reasons as to why we feel so awful.

Right.

And we've talked about this a lot too, Corinne, because I think it's like, obviously changed a lot or the duration of our career.

Right.

And even just definitely post Covid.

And now how.

How we can get so much work done virtually, and we can literally, like, our work is on our phone or our computer, and we can literally be working all of the time.

And.

And that's a different kind of training stress.

Training stress coming from work.

Right.

Or just these just, like, being able to be on all of the time.

And that's draining.

And so obviously, we're both scientists, and I like to look to research.

How can you quantify this?

Like, what does that.

What.

We've said this on the podcast before.

Like, stress is stress.

And whether that's emotional stress, physical stress, like, from a.

From a relationship, like, did you just get in a fight with someone?

Like, oh, my gosh.

Like, I've had that, you know, effect a workout or the quality of how I'm feeling my sleep.

I mean, we just had the holidays and, you know, does your family stress you out?

Maybe, like, training didn't go as well, or you felt like you needed it even more.

But all of these things, like, we cannot.

We don't just exist in this simple world where we can just, you know, it's like, turn it on and off.

You know, it's not.

It's not like a typical.

It's.

Yeah, being an athlete is not even a pro athlete, but even a recreation athlete.

It's not like a typical 9 to 5.

I can't clock in and clock out.

It's just your.

It's the human condition.

Yeah.

I joke with Steven all the time that, like, our dog hates that I'm, like, looking at my little square or looking at my big square, and sometimes I'm looking at my little square and my big square at the same time.

And I'm honestly just feeling, like, so incredibly burnt out on technology in general right now.

Like, I want to brick my phone and become a Luddite.

I want to, like, go just, like, wander into the woods and be a little training monk or a little he.

Like, just, like, don't want to talk to anyone, answer any emails.

Like, just go be one with, I don't know, like a tree or something.

But it's also, like, we rely on tech to tell us how we feel.

Right.

Right now, too.

And.

And sometimes that data is very public.

Sometimes that data is very private.

Right?

Training Peaks is private.

Our.

Or the Oura Ring app is Private, et cetera and so on.

Like, a lot of that is.

It's private data that we only see, or maybe us and our coach sees.

But then there's all this public data too, and with Strava and social media and sponsorship obligations.

And so I feel like we're pulled so intensely to be so tech aligned and to have this need of technology in our life all the time, and that's really hard.

And I'm wondering how you grapple with that or how you see that show up with your athletes right now.

Right.

And this is something so, I mean, to go, even to go personally, this is kind of the, like the track I was on, like two.

Two years ago, I remember I just like hit this critical mass of, of just feeling so burnt out and pulled in so many other directions that I felt like my running was being consumed by all of these other pieces and there was nothing left for me.

And I realized this is kind of, again, it stuck me on another journey through this mental performance, you know, coaching, working with my psychologist.

But it's like, why are we really doing these things?

Are we.

Are we doing it for other people?

And then for me, at least I thought I wasn't, but there was a line where I realized that all of this external validation was guiding me of where I, Where I wanted to.

Where I wanted to pursue running or how I thought about myself and, like, confidence.

And then that kind of leaked into, you know, poor performances and then over training and overcompensating.

So that's kind of what led me on, like, to basically realize that, okay, actually this is a really big thing.

And I was relying on, you know, like my aura ring to tell me how I felt.

And I was relying on my training stress score to tell me how fit I was or even my coach to, like, interpret my.

My numbers instead of literally going for a run and figuring out how I felt, did I enjoy it?

And so I see this a lot of times in, in my athletes where it can almost become crippling.

Like, where they wake up and they see a Garmin score of like, oh, I'm under recovered.

And then they're like, oh, I shouldn't do my workout today because my Garmin is saying this.

And I was like, well, why don't you give it a try?

Like, you can just go out there and see how it feels.

And then if you, like, knock off the rust and then, you know, after the first interval, then like, let's go for it.

But, you know, but then if you truly feel like crap, then you know, we can move it to another day, but like that, that can be really hard and actually, and like really seeing this actually increasing that just reliance on and like having a power meter or like us that the stride thing that you can attach to your, to your shoe in addition to a running watch, in addition to a whoop, in addition to an aura, in addition to all of these other things.

And then we're forgetting like when I'm asking them, okay, how do we feel?

I train a lot with rate of perceived exertion especially this is important for trails and they couldn't tell me.

And so yeah, honestly I just think that.

I don't know.

I see that as a problem because then really a lot about running, especially in trails and ultra running, it's about self regulation and being able to be at least tuned into to like the, in like the inputs that your body's telling you.

Because at the end of the day, I mean like my, my old coach, your old coach as well, Adam St. Pierre, he studied a lot about like hydration and I mean you study this a lot too.

And like in heat and all these other things.

But basically our body can actually like our cues to thirst are actually quite accurate.

And it's like when we start to listen to nutrition companies telling us that this is the recipe of the amount of liters that we're supposed to drink with this amount of salt content.

And we listen to that instead of our body, like, are we actually really thirsty?

And if we're drinking past the cues to thirst, we can actually get into a pretty dangerous state like hyponatremia or something like this.

Where is the line?

Like we're going to this point where we're no longer listening to our internal cues or what our body is like very good at telling us, but instead we're just looking to these outward metrics which actually aren't.

Can't tell the whole story anyways.

Yeah, it's this interesting juxtaposition of sometimes I need the data because it's like the workout felt hard.

Yes.

And then I can go look and be like, well, you ran hard and sometimes.

But the issue is when you go to comparison, you say, well, I, I've run these faster, I've done these things faster, I've run, I've been fitter or whatever.

And it's like having to remind myself and having to remind athletes.

Well, it's like, yeah, the numbers can say, okay, we like we, we did we got to the, the heart rate or we got to the pace that we needed to get to if it felt.

Felt hard or it's also reminding, remembering, like you are where you are right now and your body doesn't.

Can't tell the difference between a 6:15 mile and a 6:45 mile.

It's like it.

But it can tell that, yeah, you're at like an RPE8 or whatever.

And it's like it doesn't matter the pace as much as it matters, like, going and doing the effort.

And so I do think it's like, important to like, remind athletes of that.

And sometimes, not always, we can use the data to do that, but you can't necessarily start with the data and then it's like, I like to use it second.

I like the data as secondary input versus primary input, I guess, is how I think about it.

And that's.

That's a really good point too.

Like a really good, good example.

I mean, so it's like basically what, what we're both saying, but what.

What you're saying in particularly is.

Okay, so if we're, if we have like, if we're running a 6:45 pace today, and that feels almost as hard, like maybe our heart rate, like that secondary point of data is basically as high as maybe two weeks ago when you're running to 6:15.

Well, what's the story now?

Like, what's going on in your life now that's actually contributing to that extra stress?

Right.

I mean, my life is not the same as it was, you know, three years ago.

Like, I have a lot more, you know, things on the burner happening simultaneously that are contributing to overall stress.

So it's like I have to train a little bit differently than I did, you know, three years ago.

And it's kind of the same thing.

It's like this.

The how you feel or RPE can be a very valuable input because it tells more of a full story of maybe where your recovery is, like where your mental load actually is, like coming into a workout.

What, you know, your sleep was right.

That necessarily, like, you know, a Garmin can't tell you when you wake up first thing in the morning.

So you're right.

It's like having a push and pull, but it's again, like telling that full story.

And we can't just look at only training in isolation.

We have to look at other things.

Yeah, like, context is key, is what I like to say.

Like, like the context of the inter.

Like, of the context of like, how you feel and your experience of the workout and the context of the data and the Data in, within that space is really important.

And I'm wondering, like we're both coaches, obviously it's kind of our primary job.

Running is kind of our secondary job that we tack onto it.

They're mostly symbiotic, I would say, but it's important to make sure that our athletes have a healthy balance in that.

And I'm wondering, you know, when it comes to measuring load, and obviously load comes in different forms.

So like maybe specifically that's training load here.

Like, what is our best means of helping an athlete quantify it without becoming, you know, entrapped by the, the numbers of significance there, right?

Like, I need to train this many hours, I need to train this many miles.

Like, how do we break away from that but still have a measure of quantifying load?

So it's kind of this concept of talking about, and there's some, some, some papers that, you know, we can, we can link, but this concept of out like allostatic load, and it's basically an all encompassing load.

It's basically talking about trading stress, like training load, but also the cumulative psychological burden that's placed on the body through repeated stress, which is effectively everything that we've been talking about.

School meetings, relationships, just being on all the time.

Like Corinne, you're like, I don't know how you do it.

Like, like, like, can you.

Okay, so like when you were, you were doing, you know, western states live commentary, like that's a stress.

Like you're doing.

Like, I know how, I mean, I don't know, but like I can imagine just by like, you know, I do a podcast for an hour and if I'm really like, you know, having a really good conversation, I feel tired.

Right.

And so something like that, like, how do you actually quantify that?

You feel it in your body.

Right?

But how does, how does that actually feel?

Right?

So kind of asking athletes or prompting them to rely on cues that aren't necessarily quantified in metrics or numbers.

And so as a coach, something that I love in training peaks is like looking or you know, whatever platform you're using, but prompting them to write something down, right?

Like their homework for a long run if they're working on fueling.

Okay, well I want you to write down exactly what you fueled with and I want, then want you to write down when you had like highs and lows and like, so this is like associated with bonking, like figuring that out.

Like, okay, maybe you had a low here.

You didn't actually, you were on top of your fueling so it's like putting it in front of the of like pen to paper or you know, typing.

Another thing is when we're talking about, you know, from week to week, what are some other things that are adding to your stress.

Like I work with a lot of athletes who maybe they're sharing kids one week versus the next and during their on week with their kids, they cannot handle as much of a training load.

And so we write that in the schedule.

Like this week I'm actually dealing with a very high stress work week or a very high stress, like family week.

My time and stress and like overall energy is going to be consumed by these other things that are going to then detract from my training load.

So like again, so then it's like, okay, well then we understand if we don't want to get injured or burnt out or just feel tired, well then we need to compensate a little bit.

It needs to be like kind of like a teeter totter, like a little recipe.

It's a bucket, right?

It's the bucket and you all stress, stress.

Everything is stress.

It all goes in the same bucket.

And if life stress is high, training stress has to come down and that's that like allostatic, total like side of things where it's like it all has to fit in this bucket.

But I also love what you said about like making a comment and using that as a way, as a means of quantifying stuff.

And it's, I do this in two ways.

I do it where it's like, yeah, the most important metric for me is you putting in a post workout comment.

And the second most important thing is oftentimes because it's so easy in the day to day to get like, so like miss the forest for the trees.

Like you're just in it, you're in it, you're in it, you're in it.

And then so I say, okay, how about so athletes that I can sense this is like building in them where they're like, I'm not.

What's like, am I getting better?

Like, I don't know what's happening.

I'm like, okay, every Sunday or Monday I want you to sit down and reflect on the previous week, the whole week and say, what did I do well, what like what was, what was a miss?

What can I do better?

And like have that reflection moment that allows them to say, okay, like this actually went really well.

This well, like this, like I failed here.

And I really want to make that correction for this week.

But it gives them this like better perspective on like maybe where that stress is lying.

And it allows them to start asking those questions of like, why do I feel this way?

And having an answer because they're actually doing that reflection.

I love that.

And something also true when, when someone is like, like just really, really stressed and like not understanding this, like writing it down, like, oh, okay, what actually did you have going on this week outside of training?

And then when people write it down and then I'm like, okay, well this makes sense.

This makes sense that maybe you didn't PR your workout this week or like this makes sense that maybe this track, this, this speed workout didn't go as well as last week because when comparing it, you didn't have as much.

And like you said, it's a big bucket.

Like when we're talking about allostatic load it, we're talking about the whole picture.

And you know, we know as humans we're not just physical beings, we're not just athletes.

We have, we have these big brains for a reason and we use them for, with a lot of different, with a lot of different things and it turns out to like have energy to show up outside of just physically training your body.

It actually takes a lot of energy.

I mean ask Keely on your next episode that you record with her how tired she feels because she's studying all the time.

I feel the same way too.

When I'm like in finals week and trying to write these big papers, I feel so drained of energies because my brain is using all of this, these calories.

Like I have to like fuel like I'm in an ultra when I'm studying.

Corinne, you know this too?

Oh yeah, the like she posted this like funny Instagram story after she took step, like a practice step exam the other day.

And it was like she was like goofy.

It was like she had just run a 50 mile.

It was pretty, pretty wild.

But.

And periods of that are okay.

But it seems like if we have chronic, if we're chronically like this, it's probably why I've had shingles multiple times as like an otherwise healthy 35 year old because I get dysregulated.

What, like what happens from a chronic standpoint for athletes that their stress bucket be overflowing too regularly.

Well, do you remember?

I remember it's maybe not as much anymore.

Maybe we're a little bit better with fueling.

But um, but this whole thing about like over training syndrome, Remember this?

Yeah.

And then they're like, maybe it's just under fueling syndrome.

I Mean pretty much.

I, I, the, the, really the, the biggest thing that we've noticed with this is like one of the biggest things to, to fix over training is to eat more, eat more carbs, but then also maybe to like take a few rest days.

But basically it leads to just dysregulation of hormones.

The biggest being cortisol, which affects then your sleep and it affects just other, other hormone signaling in your body.

Especially for women.

Cortisol can affect estrogen depositing calcium into your bones.

So effectively leaking calcium.

So if this is prolonged, like think of it as a leaky pipe, like leaky cortisol.

It's just like that long drip, like slow drip, but a puddle forms and that can actually lead to decreases in bone health through like estrogen dysregulation.

So there's a huge cascade effects like in hormones.

I mean you're in, your body is like, is not just one closed system.

Like all the different, you know, an endocrinology, they're all communicating to one another.

But cortisol is that really kind of that high stress hormone that if it's, if there's too much of it for too long, it affects a lot of different things and hormones like estrogen and like that being one of them also into your adrenal gland, pituitary, like all of the stuff that regulates like hypothalamus, your sleep, rest and rest and digest the really important stuff that actually is going to make your adaptations happen and become a stronger and better athlete.

So that's a no, no, we don't, we don't want to do that.

And so if you're over training, over physically exerting yourself and burning the candle at both ends with like a high level job and you know, family stress and all of these other things, there needs to be a little bit of like okay, it's okay to have that high level of training and stress allostatic load for maybe a couple weeks, but then we need to have a recovery, we can come back down.

So we talk a lot about how it's really actually almost impossible to over train to like physically do too many hours.

But it's really easy to be under recovered.

And part of that I think is actually like directly like the allostatic load.

I feel like there aren't very many, most professional athletes that are quote overtrained are probably just red ass patients.

And then the general public, though the general public might be fueling issues, but I think that they are more likely to quote unquote, fall into that over training bucket where maybe they're dietarily actually, like, net neutral.

Right?

Like, they're doing fine, but they, Their.

Their stress balance, their bucket, their cup be runneth over too many times.

And I think that that is, like, I am.

It's more likely for me to see, like, a busy mom who's working and has two kids and is trying to train for 100 mile.

Like, she is more likely, or he is more likely to end up in a quote, like, perpetual chronic stress state than, you know, Courtney dewalter, who gets to, you know, eat Kodiak cakes and run every day.

Like, that is.

That is an easier, quote, unquote, easier alestatic load to balance.

Like, when I dealt with, like, like what we believe was over training syndrome, it was like I'd gone through a breakup.

I had, like, moved to a place where I didn't have as much community and family.

I had no family.

And, like, you know, was put under a microscope and was training a lot and, like, was probably dietarily mostly okay, but there were probably a few things that were a little bit out of whack.

And it's like, yeah, no, my body could not adapt to it.

It was too much all the time.

And you can only take that for so long.

I love that you bring up kind of like those multifactorial elements to it.

And then I, like, legit got so excited reading your outline because I.

Maybe it's just me, but I'm like a.

A huge, like super, super, huge Samuel Marcoris.

Oh, my gosh.

Like, our, like, just.

I was going to say RIP he's like, very much alive at all.

I'm pretty sure RIP Samuel Marcora.

Fake news here, ChatGPT, is going to freaking rip that.

And there's going to be like, some sort of posthumous post about Markora.

He's alive, but I've been obsessed with his research for a very, very long time.

The labs that he's worked in, his own lab, he's worked specifically in, like, the mental fatigue space and how that shows up physically and, like, kind of the dynamic of, like, is there's like, central governor theory.

He's definitely touched on that.

Like, he's.

He's been in it.

Yeah.

For forever.

That's one of my favorite papers.

But then he's also very relevant still.

And so I'm wondering what you've specifically pulled from his research that you think is relevant to this conversation about cognitive load, mental fatigue, et cetera.

Right.

So, I mean, you mentioned this central governor theory.

So this is something that I went and like a deep dive actually wrote like a really cool research like basically a literature review and pulled a lot of Marcora's research because he was pivotal in like basically figuring out that there, there's more things to that contribute to fatigue than just your body.

And just like the physical physiological things like when your muscles run out of glycogen or you know the, the, the metabolites that you're using to actually or like energy to propel yourself forward.

It's more VO2 max story or oxygen being delivered to your muscles there.

Athletes quit for.

Why, why do they quit?

And this kind of, it was right off of Tim Noakes work of like the central gu Governor's theory which basically was like oh, the brain is there as a protective like to basically tell you like oh, when you're tired it's going to basically shut things down just so like it's a protective mechanism so you don't like die.

Right.

Or I mean something whatever.

Yeah.

So you don't harm yourself, your body.

The idea being like your body's job is to keep you alive.

And that is very true.

Like there are things we know with like red s for example.

It's like well your body's job is to keep you alive.

It's going to shut down the non functional or like non less important things like fertility for example.

But in this regard it was like oh, there's other stuff going on beyond this like mental on off switch.

Right.

And so this is what Markora was talking about.

And it's actually really, it's, it's, it's kind of difficult to, to think about it from a, from like physio physiological research and you know basically they have all.

I mean how do you quantify mental fatigue especially from person to person.

And this is what's really interesting because he started the conversation of like okay, well these athletes, they're not actually in a dangerous position.

Right.

We're basically testing them on a, on a, you know, on a treadmill or on an FTP test on a bicycle.

But basically their motivation to do something like because they weren't interested or because they, they, they weren't motivated or like they didn't see a point in finishing this task, then it would lead to this feeling of an increased rate of perceived exertion and then they would basically stop sooner.

And so he, he started to pioneer this, this research and some of the other papers that I've, that I kind of was like pulling this part of this conversation of going down this rabbit hole.

It's, it's inspired a lot of other scientists to look at how mental fatigue and mental load pre activity can contribute to poor performance.

And there's been studies that have shown, you know, basically penalty kicks in soccer, if you give someone a mentally fatiguing task right before they go out and have this high pressure environment, it actually affects like fine motor control, it affects their precision, their ability to, you know, like free throws in basketball.

Like, if you mentally fatigue someone with like a, like a task on a computer or you know, a written exam, a mathematical test, that it actually decreases their performance performance in the game.

And so then I was reading this research and I'm just like, oh my gosh, like we're living in this digital world where people are scrolling on social media all of the time and then they feel like, you know, completely drained.

And so then having that conversation with, you know, my athletes or just even other people or even like reflecting on my own, it's like, okay, if I'm actually, am I really recovering in this moment, is it better for me to like read a book or like, you know, go have dinner face to face with the friend, you know, and instead of just like doom scrolling like what is actually contributing to mental fatigue?

And it can look different in other, in it from, from person to person, but it is quite convincing.

And Markura was, his group, was the person, was the group that pioneered this type of basically looking at the idea of mental load and what that can look like and how it can dictate overall performance.

Yeah, they, they basically were like, we can do this in a way where we are gonna like be a detractor to your performance without changing physiology.

So there were all these studies with like maximal repetitive contractions, like bicep contractions or quad contraption contractions.

There was ones where they would lie to them and they'd have them do like a wingate, like a power test where you do like the maximum output for 30 seconds and it's maximal.

You're done.

You're not supposed to be able to do another one.

And then they'd lie to them and then they'd actually like have them do another one.

Yeah, and they had just quote unquote done a maximal effort like, they shouldn't be able to do it and then they'd be able to repeat it.

And it's like the psychology versus the physiology is super, super interesting.

And then, oh, my goodness, what is his name?

Finn just had him on single track like a month ago.

And it was.

He's a, he's a sports psych who I think no longer works in academia and now is working, like in the private coaching business.

I want to say his name is Steve.

It's a very like, guy name.

Dr. Steve something.

Yeah, yeah, his name is Mark or Dan or Steve.

But they were talking about mental fatigue and how that's a limiter for performance.

And they were specifically talking about like, we do physical tapers before races, but are we doing a psychological taper?

So we do have athletes that are like getting off social media or limiting their access to, to certain things during race week.

But what about the people that have jobs?

Right?

And I've seen this with athletes, right, where it's like, well, when is, when is your last day of work during race?

I have updated training peaks the night before the morning of a race so many times, right.

It's like I'm doing that to myself because I could have done it ahead of time and I didn't.

But I have done it into the wee hours of the night before a race because I'm a psychopath.

Not great for my mental fatigue, I am sure.

And so he was talking about the importance of protecting that time for optimal performance, performance around a race.

So, like, I know it sucks to take PTO starting on Monday, maybe, but maybe you need to take PTO if this is your a race and you really want to perform and you can't like having mentally exhausting tasks all the way up until your race on Friday might not be ideal.

So trying to figure out that balance.

And that's very easy for me for pros to.

Easier for pros to do or the limitless PTOs to do.

It's a little bit harder if you are like getting by.

Right.

Um, but I like that I, I think that that is such an applicable way to take that research and say, well, what are you doing during race week?

And are you actually, you're not training as much, but are you scrolling more, are you consuming more, are you working more because you're running less?

Like, what does that actually, right, look like there are people who can't avoid it, like Lauren Purette's, like, done like gynecological surgeries, flown to javelina, raised javelina, gotten a golden Ticket and then been back in the OR on Monday.

Like she's is a psychopath and a very talented one.

That is not for everyone obviously, but I thought it was interesting.

And so when you set this up in our outline, you referred to it as am I like am I tired or am I just under recovered mentally?

Yeah.

And that drives the point home so well.

So I'm wondering like, as your gears are turning about that, like how do you think about that as an athlete?

How do you apply that into practice with, with, with the athletes that you work with?

Right.

And so like you mentioned, I mean for pros or people that you know can have limitless PTO that could be more realistic to build to have like really just a period where they're kind of detoxing and really, really making sure that they're guarding up that psych mentally.

But something that I've tried to work on with my athletes where that's not so, so realistic is to really have a good reset and recovery routine where you really feel refreshed.

For me, a lot of times this happens.

It's a routine pre bed and in the morning that I can kind of take with me all the time.

So for me it's like I start my day and I end my day with no screens.

I have a cutoff time of okay, this is when I'm done with work and I'm putting it away and then it's like things go on, do not disturb and I'm not going to do this.

And I read a physical book and I write in my journal and this is how I end my day and this is, and then how I start my day.

Um, and so really being protective of that time and protective of these routines.

And so I encourage athletes to kind of figure out what that looks like for them.

Sometimes it could look like meditation, like in the morning.

10 minutes, right.

It can be five to 10 minutes.

Really, it doesn't actually have to take that long.

But having those non negotiables that can actually like create a reset.

And this can happen in periods of high stress, even just during the training block, but in particular during these moments where you feel like you need to be a little bit more centered and grounded, you know, pre race or pre big effort.

Right.

And this is something that we try to practice in a training block so that it's not so foreign, but it's something we over utilize in, in, in taper time.

And also like, you know, things that like sauna, something like that could, it could be a really good like Reset.

But really for me, at least with the research that I've read that it really involves limiting, limiting screen time and really kind of diving into senses that, that seem to kind of create a good reset.

But that's something that, that I try to do with, with the majority of my athletes were taking that like extra PTO or extra.

Having that kind of break might not be as, as doable or realistic, but.

Yeah.

And honestly, it's like I always like to think about it.

I'm like an experimenter of one and I always try these things like when I'm reading research or kind of trying out new meditation routines or different little recovery routines, I like to try them on and then kind of get a feel for them and then can recommend them to people.

And I guess maybe because this is topical, it's a little bit of a tangent.

And then we're gonna kind of round things out with like, what is burnout?

And how does that even work?

Yeah.

And maybe it's when your cup overfloweth too much too often in a negative way.

But this idea of like you're about to fly to Australia.

I am a, I am a lover of not tapering in Europe and just like showing up and racing, which is apparently a horrible idea.

Cuz apparently travel days are not restful and are not rest days.

But I'm wondering in that sense, like, how do you.

And I've also had a number of athletes.

Like half the stuff that we do is like the races start at like midnight.

So like, why would I adjust to a new time zone?

But travel is travel.

It's really hard.

It's really disruptive.

Like, what do you do with athletes?

What are you doing when you go to these races?

Many hours different from where we're sitting right now in Seattle and Boulder.

Like, how does that work from a stress perspective?

Because like, external workload isn't changing really.

But you've got this big shake up of things.

Yeah.

So I mean, first and foremost, like circadian rhythm.

Right.

I think the, the biggest thing is like trying to kind of get on that time of like winding yourself down when it's dark and then like trying to stay up when it's light so you can kind of get on the schedule.

But it is a huge load.

I mean, you're like, you.

I feel it when I, when I travel.

I had definitely have an increased perceived exertion.

And I think that's like also like acutely, maybe a little bit dehydrated, but just like stiff from like, you know, being in A small tube in the sky for so long.

But I think with.

With that traveling well, again, this is not always realistic, but for me, I like to travel like well in advance, so I can kind of like work out the kinks, but also just understanding that training might need to take a little bit of a.

Like I need to temper down the volume a little bit when I travel.

Like, for instance, I'm going to Australia.

Not only it, you know, in the future, like 14 hours ahead, I'm.

It's also going to be very hot.

It's going to be full on summer there.

And I don't know if you heard about like the hole in the ozone layer.

It's right there where I'm going to be going.

So it's going to be really hot.

And so I'm basically.

There's going to be multiple stressors that I'm going to be dealing with.

And so I probably will need to not only temper down the amount of training that I'm doing when I first get there, but also the effort.

But what about even like the pre.

Right.

You know, you're about to walk into this extreme thing.

Like, I've got athletes all the time that are like, can I do a long run today before I get on the plane or before I travel tomorrow?

Or should I do a. I really want to do this workout before life gets crazy next week and I'm traveling.

It seems like you probably shouldn't do it like a threshold workout or like a long tempo or a long run and then like get on that night flight to Europe.

Like that might be a bad idea.

Yeah.

You know, Corinne, that sounds pretty reasonable, but it's something.

Something that I might do.

So I need a coach to tell me to not do it.

And yeah, honestly, like, so literally with my coach, like, if I'm having a travel day, we know that I'm not doing a long run.

Like right the day of.

I'm shifting that to earlier in the week to get that done before.

And if my schedule doesn't allow, okay, well then I'm just skipping it for that week.

And then also maybe like in particular for Australia.

So if I'm going to run 90 minutes today.

Well, actually maybe I'm going to run an hour and then do 30 minutes in the sauna.

Like that seems maybe appropriate.

So just, just try like again, it's.

But it's that whole view, like we said, allostatic load.

Like the whole picture of what.

Where stress comes from.

And it comes from more things than just the training itself.

Yeah.

Oh, so smart.

Because the bucket you got, you can only fit so much in there.

Okay.

I swear there's no hole in it.

It's not going to drain for you.

Like, you gotta, you gotta really like put this together.

And so that leads me to this idea.

We talked about overtraining syndrome or being over trained a little bit.

But there's also like, like, and I think that's a delineator.

Like what is burnt out?

Like what versus or a little bit fried?

Maybe versus and maybe it's like over training where it's like, it's a spectrum and overtraining is a final destination.

Is being burnt out a final destination?

Is it on this, like train track to doom?

Like, what does that mean?

Maybe.

How do we think about it versus, like, is there like the literature around burnout and what does that mean practically for athletes?

Right.

So I think the wording of it can be a little bit different.

I do think the burnout can be equivalent to over training.

Right.

It's kind of on this continuum and there can reach a point, it's just kind of like if you take things a little bit too far that you might just never want to return.

But so there's different, there's different, I think levels of burnout and they're all related to basically of kind of just doing too many things all at once.

But as listening to those cues when you start to feel stressed and your motivation is lacking, really taking a look at where your energy is going and where you might need to temper things back a little bit, so it feels a little bit more doable.

But burnout, when we think about it, when a lot of the literature that I've looked at that it's basically associated with athletes basically doing sport for a reason, outside of an internal motivator.

So they're very, they're very fixated on external motivators.

Whether that's like external validation from a coach or, you know, accolades from winning a race.

Like, they're looking for those external validations to basically like, like to basically qualify their, their running and to make to or, you know, any sport, but just to qualify that, okay, I'm, I'm good at this, so I'm going to keep doing it for them.

And instead of actually looking inward to say, actually I really like doing this, I'm going to continue down this pathway because I actually enjoy, you know, getting faster, trying to be a master of sport.

So that's one aspect of burnout.

We've talked about this with like a coaching environment, right?

Like, like, if it's like, not a good team or community environment that could actually contribute to burnout, because it's just like sports, not fun.

Like, at the end of the day, the reason why we do these things in these races, it's really fun.

And the more I'm thinking, the more I'm looking at, like, burnout and even what we're talking about with training load and training stress, we do these workouts.

We do these things because overall we enjoy the process.

Right.

At least we enjoy the race or some part of it.

Like, we're not just.

We better.

We better enjoy something of it.

Right?

Right.

And it's hard races.

If we're not, then what.

What really is the point?

And I think that leads.

That leads to burnout when it becomes something that we're so obsessed with because we're just so attached to the numbers and these external things that we lose touch with our internal drivers, like what our body cues are telling us, and therefore we lose some sort of enjoyment that can lead down this pathway of, you know, that sometimes can lead people away from a sport for a really long time.

I mean, we've heard these.

We interviewed Lauren Fleshman on this, on this.

On this podcast a really long time ago.

But, like, you know, she talks about this in her.

In her book about, you know, like, good for a girl, of the pressures on these junior athletes and how that can impact their longevity in sport.

That's.

That's a pathway that we don't want to get down.

But it's like, if we had these conversations earlier, hopefully prevent this.

It totally.

And that's in stark contrast with a conversation I just had with Olivia Amber, which is like the.

It's the epicenter before this.

And.

And she's talking about her college experience.

And she went to Colby College because the coach there, Tracy, was amazing.

And it wasn't this pressure cooker environment.

It was like the variety of athletes they had on that team were, you know, NCAA All Americans and also just like, not recreationalists, but people that really spanned that spectrum.

And so that their.

Their environment, their team environment was really pleasant to be in because it was kind of like, we will support you and support your goals, whatever those goals might be.

And it was like they wanted to make the carnival team.

They wanted to get to go to a collegiate carnival and compete as a Division 1 NCAA skier, or they wanted to win NCAAs.

Like, they had athletes at various levels.

And it was like, you know, you come out of that not, you know, not cooked because you've actually had a very supportive experience versus the throw a dozen eggs against the wall and hope something sticks.

Right.

But that doesn't work historically.

Exactly.

But it seems like the latter is, seems to be far more common than the former, which is unfortunate.

Yeah, it's quote unquote, probably easier to get champions out of that.

And that's unfortunate because you got to break a lot of people to get a few champions, which we don't want.

We don't support that individually with our athletes.

We don't support that collegiately with the places that you or your children or your friends may be going to college.

Because we want you to be lifelong athletes.

And I think that's the biggest, the biggest thing.

But we're always learning, we're always learning these lessons the hard way.

Oftentimes we're here to tell you that hopefully you learn from our lessons so you don't have to learn them the hard way.

And your bucket is like just perfect and like nothing is going wrong with it whatsoever.

So I guess in summary, Hillary, can you read your summary statement?

Yeah.

So I put this.

So again, maybe this is just like, again, it's like an internal dialogue or like journal for, for myself.

But more isn't always so training load.

It equals physical plus cognitive and emotional and environmental.

We had taken me a long time to get there and Corinne, you have been with me like for a long time.

Oh yeah.

To realize that more isn't always better.

And this, this is really important.

So it's like practicing what I'm preaching.

I've learned this from first hand experience and really trying to have this like, you know, basically encourage this in the athletes by coach.

So it's not about tolerating more stress.

It's about knowing when the system needs less and how can we be more aware of this as athletes and coaches.

And I think the biggest thing is like, I tell this to athletes that I'm working with.

I tell this to the coaches that I've had.

It's like, I don't need you to motivate me to do more.

I actually need you to tell me when to do less.

Yep.

I need you to tell me when to take a rest day.

I need you to tell me that I'm doing enough because I think many of us are inclined that more is more, more is better.

And it's, it turns out it's like not infinitely, just like up above up.

It's like we have to scale back and we have to be honest about what's going on so that we can appropriately scale back.

And maybe that's what we need athletes to know is that your coach can only help you if they know what's going on.

Yes.

And the best coaching you're going to get from a coach is when they actually know what's going on in your life.

And people are like, I don't want to do tmi.

And I'm like, it's not tmi.

I need to know.

I need to be able to.

I want, I don't want you to be disappointed in your training because I'm prescribing something that doesn't fit your life, doesn't fit your stress, doesn't fit what you've got going on.

I have an athlete who's a new dad and he texted me, being like, can't get stuff in, a little bit busy.

And I'm like, yeah, no worries.

Like, you're, you're, like, you have a job.

Like, you, like, you have a job that isn't great for, like, parental leave.

And you are a new dad.

Like, you've got a baby and an amazing wife who needs your support.

Like, exercises for your own, like, mental clarity and sanity right now and doesn't need to be performance based because it's like, like you've got, you've got very important stressors in your life right now and that bucket needs to just be perfect.

Oh, yeah.

And I mean, I, and I love that that's.

This is literally why I have a coach.

Just, just to remind me of that.

And I think again, if we can be encouraging of this and honestly, if.

Do some research on your own, right?

And like, look at, look at the data and really kind of, you know, challenge, challenge yourself to kind of think outside the box of like, what this idea of total.

Are we enc.

Encouraging people to do their own research?

Is that really our.

Is that our stance?

Is that our stance?

Yeah, maybe.

I don't know.

That seems, that seems a little, A little.

Maybe counter to the culture that we generally identify with.

Oh, how about this?

Ask us questions and then we will provide that for you.

Yeah, we will provide some resources in our show Notes.

That is a good place to start.

And read it.

I'm encouraging you to read it so you can see what we see.

Read the research and therefore have more questions and we will help answer them.

That was amazing.

I really, really, really, really enjoyed Tie Things in a Bow with a Little Society Slam, which we will be doing on the episodes where I have Hillary with me or I have Keely with Me.

So please slide into our DMs.

We will be answering those on.

On Instagram, but also on the podcast as well.

And if there's some really excellent or fun questions, maybe I'll pull them into the interview.

Interview questions and.

And add them to those shows as well.

But we have to give a shout out again to our amazing apparel partner for this year.

That is the fine folks over at runnandrabit.com check them out.

Amazing stuff.

I've been running.

I think I told you last time.

I've been running the easy joggers, like to and from the gym and then lounging in them all day.

They are excellent.

This morning I ran in the mock neck, like kind of pullover long sleeve and it's got thumb holes and it's a wool blend and it's excellent.

So.

RunAndRabbit.com Feb Trail Winter is still here.

You're gonna need some warm stuff.

Stuff.

Get 10 off for the month.

I'm bringing the sun shirt to Australia for sure.

Yeah.

I have an athlete who just like, picked up like an ice bandana because they're running Black Canyon.

So some of you have winter, some of you have summer.

It is okay.

And then also huge shout out to the amazing women behind the scenes at Feisty Media.

Go check out the website Feisty Co or follow them on Instagram at Feisty Underscore Media.

They are putting together some of the best women's sports news out there.

So we've been saving their stuff on Instagram for a freaking like two years now.

And now we are part of their family, so it's very exciting.

Okay, let's slam.

Hillary, what do you got for me?

Oh, man.

Okay, so just a short and sweet one, but I mean, hopefully we.

Sick.

Love it.

And then I have a couple of stories from the road marathon.

It actually, like, took me by surprise.

I was like, running, you know, trying not to poop my pants.

And this guy runs by me.

He's like, are you Hillary Allen?

I'm like, yeah.

He's like, oh, my gosh, what are you doing on our road?

And talking about.

He's like, I love the.

The.

The trail study podcast.

And then he passed me, but then I cut up to him, so that was good.

And then in the finishing shoot, I had literally two separate people being like, oh, hill.

Like, like, are you Hillary?

I read your book.

And then the other one is like, my girlfriend got you to me to listen to your guys's podcast.

I love it.

Like, keep up the good work.

So.

And then they we'd like the guy's like, oh, I haven't checked that out yet.

So got some new listeners.

It was.

It was super cool.

Like, took me by surprise at a road marathon.

I thought it'd be, like, incognito, but nope, nope.

I got a photo from Courtney Olsen and Devin Devon Yenko, too.

So you could not fly under the radar.

I got.

I got a finish line photo from the ladies, so that was very cool.

That was so cool to see them there.

I love it.

I love it, I love it, I love it.

Wow.

We did it.

59 minutes on the dot.

Whoa.

You're an hour into your run right now.

Hopefully our weekly episodes are helping keep you more entertained on more long runs.

And until next time, we'll catch you out on the trails.