In this episode, Zach and I discuss the importance of cushioning in running shoes and how it can improve your running and overall well-being. We talk about the benefits and drawbacks of different cushioning options, how to choose the right one for you, and how to make sure you re getting the most out of your running shoes. We also talk about how important it is to have good cushioning, and why it s not too late to get the best running shoes you can possibly get. If you re looking for a new pair of running shoes, you ll have to listen to this episode! This episode is brought to you by Nikes. Nikes is a leading brand in the running shoe industry and is one of the most comfortable running shoes on the market. They have some of the best designs out there, and they re a great fit for all types of runners. Nikes are a great choice for runners looking to improve their running, and also for those looking to get more out of their training and improve their overall health and performance. Thanks to Nikes for sponsoring this episode and for sponsoring the podcast! We really appreciate the support and look forward to seeing you in the next episode of the podcast. Stay tuned for more episodes coming soon! - Zach and Zach! Tweet us with any questions or comments! Timestamps: 0:00:00 - What's your favorite running shoe? - What shoes do you like to run in? 1:30: What kind of shoe do you wear? 2: Nikes? 3: What are you looking for? 4:30 - How much cushioning? 5: What is your favorite type of shoe you like? 6:10 - How do you're most comfortable? 7:00-10: what are you most comfortable in a race? 8:30-11: what do you need? 9:40 - What is a good shoe to run with? 10:00? 11:50 - Should you run in a shoe that s better than your heel? 12:10? 13:30? 14:40? 15: how much cushion? 16:15? 17:00 or 12: what s your favorite shoe should I wear a shoe I m looking forward to running in a marathon? 18:00 & 15:00 19:00 + 13:50?
00:00:50.000If you find yourself going into a specialty running shop...
00:00:53.000Ask them to try on a variety of different pairs, a variety of different models, and find the one that's most comfortable for you, and that's probably going to lower your risk to the lowest you can get from your footwear anyway.
00:01:06.000I think it's one of those things where it's kind of half true, half not, where you kind of have to look at what's the purpose of what you're doing.
00:01:15.000So the way I kind of describe it is if I'm trying to strengthen my lower legs, you know, I want that low cushion, that firm platform because that's going to really activate the muscles in the lower part of the leg.
00:01:25.000But if I'm dealing with some lower leg issues or a little sore, I did a workout and my calves are kind of sore or my ankles sore, then cushion can be great because it's going to relieve that kind of initial impact on the lower part of your legs.
00:01:37.000And the caveat though is those impact forces have to go somewhere.
00:01:40.000So they're kind of going to move further up the kinetic chain.
00:01:43.000So what I usually tell people, if you're dealing with lower leg pain or injury, then you might want to consider something a little more cushioned.
00:01:51.000And if you're dealing with something like in your knees or your hips, then getting rid of some of that cushion is going to just keep that kind of more precise foot plant and maybe alleviate some of those impact forces from ending up in those areas.
00:02:02.000But at the end of the day, the mechanics of it all are going to be the real driver.
00:02:06.000You want your foot to come underneath a bent knee.
00:02:08.000Because you're using your legs as kind of like a three-foot spring, essentially.
00:02:11.000So if you can get that foot plant under bent knee, it's going to absorb it in the way your body intends versus absorbing it in a way that could maybe send those impact forces into the wrong areas.
00:02:27.000And he said that five years ago he hired a coach, which is kind of crazy, like a 65-year-old dude hiring a coach but trimmed a bunch of time off of his marathon, I think more than five minutes off of his marathon.
00:02:39.000I think it was quite a bit more than five minutes.
00:02:42.000And he was running for a long time before that, but yet a coach sort of shortened his time in finishing a 26-mile race at 70 years old.
00:02:57.000The bent knee is really important because a lot of folks who don't pay attention to the history of footwear don't understand that this fat cushioned heel that everybody sort of thinks of when you think of a running shoe and when you watch a lot of people run that don't know any better,
00:03:13.000they run and they land on their heel, which is sort of something that was created, was it by Nike?
00:03:19.000Is that what it was that created that fat bottomed heel thing?
00:03:22.000Yeah, I think they were the first one to do the offset, where it was traditionally, I think it was like 12 millimeters where your heel would be that much higher than your forefoot.
00:03:30.000But I think even when we get into kind of like, say, heel striking versus forefoot or midfoot striking, heel striking is another thing where it's not inherently bad.
00:03:38.000It all comes down to what I was saying before, where if you can heel strike, but your foot is still underneath that bent knee, you're probably not going to do anything too detrimental.
00:04:07.000And just maybe some nuances with the way their body is kind of more or less designed.
00:04:12.000But I mean, there's heel striking folks that are not injury prone or have never gotten injuries or hardly ever get injuries.
00:04:19.000But usually, I think if you're doing that, that's probably because you're under that bent knee and you're not kind of having that point where your foot is out in front of your knee and then you kind of have that straight leg but at an angle where it's going to be, you know, not ideal for kind of absorbing those impacts.
00:04:34.000Yeah, that's the real bad one, right, is when people are...
00:04:43.000Yeah, I mean, I couldn't say for sure, but I think there's a lot of nuance and it ends up being kind of like an individual situation with a lot of these cases, so...
00:04:57.000There's probably people who can talk to mechanics better than me.
00:05:14.000Yeah, so it was, yeah, let me, I'll explain a little bit.
00:05:18.000So it was, the event itself was called Six Days in the Dome.
00:05:21.000And really what it was, was you could do anything from a 24-hour event to a 48-hour event to a six-day event and just see how far you could run within that time frame.
00:05:30.000Yeah, I know there's some crazy people out there.
00:05:33.000So just wait till David Goggins finds that event.
00:05:37.000But yeah, so I've been, it's interesting because there's not a lot of timed events that are necessarily structured for 100 mile or for like 12 hours.
00:05:47.000So a lot of times you find yourself jumping into some of these other events that are longer in duration and just kind of using them as a way to try to run a fast 100 miler or a fast 12 hour event.
00:05:56.000So the race director for that particular event had reached out to me because he's known me for a while and knew that I was targeting fast 100 mile times and just said, hey, I've got this cool event set up at the Olympic training facility in Milwaukee, Wisconsin at the Pettit Center.
00:06:10.000And I think it's going to be pretty conducive for fast times.
00:06:27.000And I went there targeting the 100-mile world record, which was 11 hours, 28 minutes, and 3 seconds prior to that.
00:06:34.000And ended up running 11 hours, 19 minutes, and 13 seconds for 100 miles.
00:06:38.000And then since we have like this 100 mile distance and also this 12 hour timed event kind of structure, you can find yourself if you're under 12 hours kind of double dipping and getting two events for the price of one, I guess you could say.
00:06:50.000So I kept running after I hit 100 miles and ended up going 104.88 miles total in the 12 hour time frame.
00:07:16.000Yeah, you know, it's funny, like, when you look at it, because I think sometimes people look at, like, 100 miles in 11 hours and 19 minutes, and there's not a lot of context in their mind, unless they're kind of familiar with ultramarathon running.
00:07:27.000But when you start to break it down into, like, the subcategories where it's like, well, that's like four...
00:07:33.000Like sub three hour marathons in a row or I can't remember how many or what the 5k time is.
00:07:52.000So, you know, this gets brought up quite a bit, I think, because, I mean, I eat a ton of animal products, for sure.
00:07:57.000But, you know, I wouldn't classify myself as a quote-unquote carnivore.
00:08:02.000Well, this is because the carnivore diet people want to claim you.
00:08:05.000And we discussed this kind of the last time you were here, where you take in a lot of glucose, and you ramp up your carbohydrates considerably before a race.
00:08:14.000But, like, what is a daily diet, let's say, in training, like you're preparing for something like this, what's a daily diet for you like?
00:08:23.000I think there is some nuance within that even because when you think of my lifestyle, the way I like describe it is if you took a calendar year and you grabbed a single day out of there and you grabbed a day where I was at like a peak training day versus a recovery day, those are like so drastically different in terms of my energy demands.
00:08:40.000So, like things tend to fluctuate quite a bit and change quite a bit and I think that's oftentimes what confuses people because they want to...
00:09:08.000But if you pick a day out where I'm doing like a big training day, doing like a 30-mile run or something like that, that's where I'm going to kind of bring back some of the carbohydrates to try to supplement that activity.
00:09:18.000And the best way to maybe describe it is, you know, there's like this kind of train low, race high, or this carb periodization concept that's getting more momentum behind it and more studies and science behind it too.
00:09:50.000One of the big things they're starting to recognize is that even with elite athletes, when you're periodizing your training like I do, your nutrition should be being periodized as well.
00:10:01.000The science is pretty clear that if you're doing a workout and you take in glucose or fructose, I think most science says a two-to-one ratio is ideal for maximizing the amount you can take in.
00:10:13.000And you're going to give yourself an advantage.
00:10:30.000Because what they found out is when they started doing a lot of the exercise science and nutrition was that the real limiter is your gut.
00:10:38.000So on paper- So absorption- Yeah, there's a finite amount you can absorb and you increase the amount you can absorb on average if you have that two to one ratio versus all of one or the other.
00:11:04.000I think like the way – like most like sports supplements and things like that are going to be designed to kind of meet those specific – because they're looking at the literature and they're seeing like, okay, this is how you optimize it.
00:11:15.000So like a Powerade or a Gatorade or something like that would be a two-to-one?
00:11:19.000Yeah, I'd have to look to see exactly if they have that, but my guess would be they would be if they're looking at the research and where that's kind of at.
00:11:27.000But yeah, so really the question that I think needs to be asked with a lot of this stuff is if I want to make a workout feel as easy as possible, if I can get in, say, 60 grams of carbohydrate per hour, it's probably going to do that.
00:11:42.000My perceived effort at that pace is probably going to feel easier.
00:11:47.000But then you have to ask the question, like, how often do you need it to feel that easy?
00:11:51.000So for me, the answer to that is like, well, if I'm doing something really strenuous or something that's in a little bit of a gray area where it's just fast enough to dip into the glycogen stores, but just slow enough that I can do it for quite a while, like maybe even a couple hours, then you're kind of in this area where that could be an advantage for you from a performance standpoint.
00:12:11.000But if I'm going out for an easy run of like 60 to 90 minutes and it's going to be like a 2 to 3 out of 10 perceived effort anyway, like there's no real need for me to be hitting glucose during that or, you know, sports drink during that to make that feel even easier yet because my goal isn't necessarily...
00:12:29.000To, you know, make an easy run feel even easier, I guess is the way to make it.
00:12:35.000Nothing, just a stroll, just a few dozen miles.
00:12:38.000Well, and I think that also brings up a really good point, too, where, like, a lot of this stuff, when we're looking at carbohydrate usage and performance, is we're looking at elite athletes.
00:12:46.000We're looking at folks that are training for, like, you know, the Olympics.
00:12:50.000You know, sometimes they're even Olympic medalists.
00:12:53.000And that's just not a very good comparison, I think, to the average person who's out there running.
00:12:58.000Because, you know, their purposes are different.
00:13:00.000You know, their objectives are different.
00:13:03.000Like, one is doing basically everything around a specific date and distance and trying to run as fast as they can on that date.
00:13:10.000And another person may be trying to run as fast as they can, but there's so many other factors in life, like their work, their relationships, their, you know, the level of training they're actually able to have with the time they have, and then also, like, You know, managing their own health and nutrition because like,
00:13:25.000you know, elite athletes don't have a very rosy picture in terms of long-term health either.
00:13:30.000So for someone who's like, you know, maybe 10, 20 pounds overweight and is trying to run to get into shape or trained to get into shape or something like that, they're probably thinking just as much about health as they are about performance.
00:13:41.000So for them to be, you know, shuttling in 60 grams of carbohydrate every hour during training and racing is probably not the direction that they'd want to go.
00:13:48.000Now when you get ready to do something like this 100 mile run, how many miles do you run on a typical day and do you ramp that up or do you just give yourself a base and know that you can push through?
00:14:04.000The way I kind of describe it is like I'm always focusing on specificity kind of being king.
00:14:09.000So depending on the race, distance, and the intensity is kind of how I'm going to structure my workouts.
00:14:14.000So the rule of thumb that I use is the closer I get to the workout, the more specific the workouts I do are going to be towards that race, distance, and intensity.
00:14:23.000Uh, so for me, what that oftentimes means, since I'm training for like a hundred mile distance races is early in a training block, I might be doing some like shorter interval work, like VO two max, like an example that would maybe be like a three minute, uh, kind of almost all out effort followed by like a three minute recovery jog.
00:14:38.000And then another three minute interval like that.
00:14:40.000Some of those real short interval sessions.
00:14:41.000And how many of those would you do in a row?
00:15:06.000It's really interesting because like, you know, I could go out on any one day and do like maybe 10 of those.
00:15:11.000But if I do that, and then it takes me like a week and a half to recover from that session, it's not nearly as probably effective as if I spread that out a little bit and said, did like five by three and then five by three.
00:15:45.000So he's got this sort of concept when it comes to weightlifting with kettlebells in particular called greasing the groove.
00:15:51.000Whereas instead of doing all these sets to failure, you would just do like half of what you're capable of and then do it again in a more frequent manner.
00:16:30.000Yeah, and I think endurance is a patient-person's game, so I think if you can build that volume in a micro-stressing or in a sustainable way, that's what's going to get you strong, and it's also going to make it less likely to get injured.
00:16:48.000If you got up to that insane pace that you did when you ran the 100 miles, if you took a week off or two weeks off, how much would you lose?
00:16:59.000Not much in that amount of time, especially at that intensity.
00:17:03.000So the thing is, the 648 mile pace, we need to be kind of relative about it.
00:17:08.000So for me, when I'm out training, when I'm fully recovered, that's a pretty reasonable pace from an intensity standpoint.
00:17:18.000So the interesting thing about ultramarathoning is race pace is sometimes faster than even some of your easiest runs in training.
00:17:25.000So your training is kind of all what we'd call like overspeed training.
00:17:29.000Whereas in most endurance events from like the 1500 up to like the marathon, the majority of your work is going to be sub race pace.
00:17:37.000And then you're going to have like, depending on the program, you know, maybe 20, 30% of that be like overspeed training.
00:17:44.000Well, just because the relative duration of the event is so long, like, you know, I can't run fast.
00:17:51.000If I run too fast, then it's just going to end badly for me.
00:17:54.000Right, but why is that with marathons?
00:17:55.000Oh, well, because it's similar to strength training, where, like, if the limiter is, like, the amount of, like, stress you put on your body.
00:18:03.000So if I was going to train to peak in, say, a marathon, my max potential pace for that wouldn't be sustainable to do every run.
00:18:12.000So I'd be running too hard, too fast, too often.
00:18:15.000And then we'd get into that kind of situation that we were talking about before where you're starting to macro stress versus micro stress.
00:18:21.000So if you run a marathon, what is your standard marathon pace?
00:18:25.000So I'm a little goofy where I competed in high school and college.
00:18:29.000And then I did some marathons, but not really in a structured manner.
00:18:33.000And then I got an ultra marathon running.
00:18:34.000So I haven't really done what I would consider a real legitimate marathon training program.
00:18:38.000So you're basically saying marathons are for pussies, right?
00:18:52.000It's just short enough where you have to be pushing like a fairly intense pace, but it's just long enough where if you make a mistake, you're going to pay for that for quite some time.
00:18:59.000So you're on such a razor's edge and you're also just one tiny mistake away from things going really badly.
00:19:05.000And what you're saying about mistake, you're talking about pacing, like if you go out too hard.
00:20:13.000So my question was, so if you're running, are you checking your watch if you're doing a marathon?
00:20:19.000You're making sure that you're not going crazy?
00:20:21.000Because is it otherwise you just have to kind of gauge it just based on the pack and based on how you feel?
00:20:27.000Yeah, and I think that's actually a good – especially when you get into ultramarathoning, I think the metric that people should dial in the most is their rate of perceived exertion because that's something that's not going to necessarily lie to you.
00:20:39.000Like if you base your thing – your stuff off heart rate exclusively or a pace exclusively, you can find yourself like justifying something that's not necessarily where you need to be.
00:20:47.000And if something like that malfunctions and that was your only compass, then you're in trouble.
00:20:51.000So when I'm doing my training and when I'm working with other folks, I like to use heart rate and I like to use pacing and stuff like that.
00:20:59.000But ultimately, I'm trying to get the person to really understand how hard is this effort and then across the board.
00:21:05.000Uh, from like very easy to very difficult.
00:21:07.000And then when it comes time to race, we can kind of dial in like, this is the intensity you're trying to look for so that they can kind of feel that out.
00:21:23.000Like most people are going to be using some sort of like, probably like zone system of training where there's like There's numbers that are associated with heart rate ranges or intensities, and there'll be descriptors.
00:21:33.000And, you know, there's some that are like 1 through 20. There's some that are kind of 1 through 5 and then 1 through 10. Isn't that so weird too, right?
00:22:04.000It can be tricky and it is very subjective, but I think it's one of those things where it falls into the same category that a lot of endurance events are where you just got to be patient and really work on kind of understanding that.
00:22:17.000Like you find out like, oh, I went and did this workout and I thought that was the right pace and intensity, but it turned out to be a little too fast.
00:22:46.000I did it a lot when I was in college and I did it a lot when I first started when I was really trying to kind of learn my body and kind of learn what things mean and how I respond to them.
00:22:55.000But now I've been kind of doing it long enough where I have enough of a...
00:22:59.000Like an understanding of kind of how, like when things go wrong, like why they did, or if something went really well, like why it did, that I don't feel like I need to take as detailed notes.
00:23:10.000But I think it's really valuable for someone who's, especially while they're trying to learn the rate of perceived exertion and kind of really dial those things in.
00:23:16.000It's probably worth their time to write that stuff down so that they can look back at it and they have that resource available to them as they're kind of reflecting on things.
00:23:25.000Now, say if you're getting ready to do something like this crazy 100-mile run, trying to break a world record, how much time are you giving yourself to really, truly prepare for that?
00:23:37.000Is it based on how you're at right now, like what your baseline is, like what kind of preparation you've done before you knew that this race was available to you?
00:23:46.000Yeah, no, and this is, we can kind of hop back to where we were talking about before, because when I was talking about the VO2 max workout stuff, that's kind of early in my training plan, because that intensity is very unspecific to a 100-mile pace.
00:23:58.000You know, those VO2 max workouts are much closer to something shorter, like a 5K. So what are you trying to do with those VO2 max workouts?
00:24:06.000You're just trying to elevate your base?
00:24:35.000Basically, what you do is you give yourself kind of a bigger range of what your potential is going to be when you start focusing more in on, like, the aerobic side of things that we're going to see, like, as I would move further down in the training plan.
00:24:48.000So once I kind of do that section of training, to answer your question though, like ideally I'll have maybe about, since I'm coming into most programs, not completely out of shape, like four months is kind of the sweet spot for me.
00:25:01.000If I was coming like off the couch, so to speak, six months would be a little more appropriate.
00:25:22.000So what I think, I don't know, it's hard to know for sure, but what was, the way it was described to me when I was going in and getting that stuff checked out was what likely happened was I had such a history in kind of flat running that I was actually preparing for a race that had a lot more climbing and descending, so I started changing my training to more climbing and descending.
00:25:38.000And when I did that, like, uh, One thing that sometimes happens when you're running a lot of flat, hard surfaces is your ankles and your hips can get pretty tight from that real kind of uniform mechanic that you're doing.
00:25:51.000So my range of motion was semi-limited.
00:25:54.000So when I was doing some of that hard downhill and uphill running, I just probably wasn't very efficient with my form.
00:26:00.000And it ended up, kind of what we were talking about before, those impact forces ended up in the wrong spot.
00:26:04.000And then the stress fracture occurred.
00:26:19.000The really goofy thing about it, too, was when I first had the pain surface for that, it was kind of in the lower back glute area is where it surfaced.
00:26:33.000I went in to the doctor and they were like, okay, let's try some active release therapy and let's see if we can get this thing to loosen up.
00:26:39.000And we just were working on it and it would clear up where I wouldn't notice it if I was walking around.
00:26:44.000But then anytime I'd go for a run or try to go for a run, I'd get that sharp pain right away.
00:26:49.000And so after about, I think it was maybe four weeks or so, we had been doing a ton of active release, a ton of mobility work.
00:27:44.000But he said maybe the mobility and the strength work I was doing while I had that to try to rehab kind of strengthen the areas around it enough that when I just was running flat, really slow, really easy, that protected that area enough where I didn't feel the pain anymore.
00:27:58.000So after that, I think I took another like two weeks off completely just to make sure before I started building back up and then I started kind of building back up again.
00:28:05.000Do you ever run on one of those Air Runner things?
00:28:08.000You know, those self-propelling treadmills?
00:28:10.000I've been on one once before, but not in any significant way, but they look pretty sweet.
00:30:01.000And I think it's pretty cool because with the weighted stuff, you run the risk of potentially hurting something by adding that additional weight.
00:30:07.000They were doing these ruck challenges.
00:30:11.000I think it was trained to hunt or one of these competitions.
00:30:17.000They were making people wear heavy packs.
00:30:20.000It might not have been trained to hunt.
00:30:23.000Anyway, they would make you wear a 100-pound pack.
00:30:26.000And so the idea was they were doing these races with 100-pound packs on, which you can imagine is a fucking recipe for orthopedic surgeon visits.
00:30:36.000And so these people were getting kind of jacked up, and I believe they stopped doing that.
00:30:44.000But there's a few of those similar kind of competitions where they force you to do a bunch of physical activities and then bring your heart rate down and execute shots on targets and then run to the next station and do a bunch of physical activities.
00:30:56.000And they were doing that with heavy, heavy weights on.
00:31:02.000I think that would be maybe good for if you're going to do like a mountaineering experience and you're going to have to carry a bunch of little stuff like you're doing with hunting.
00:31:09.000But even then, you really should just ruck.
00:31:13.000There's a company called Outdoorsman's that makes a really good one.
00:31:17.000It's called an Atlas Pack and it's essentially a pack frame, but the back of it is a universal post like what you would use for weights, you know, like a weightlifting post.
00:31:27.000For, you know, Olympic weights, you know, so those big round steel plates slide right onto it so you can get a 45 pound plate on it and then clamp it down.
00:31:37.000And so it's like really secure on you as opposed to like, sometimes if you put too much weight in a pack, like maybe it'll sit all at the bottom.
00:31:44.000It's This is like, boom, right in the center of your back, and you cramp it down, and then you're really carrying all that weight on your hips, a little bit on your shoulders, and it's all really centered well.
00:31:55.000That's a good one for really training, but you don't fucking run with it.
00:32:03.000Yeah, hard enough just to walk with it.
00:32:05.000Does it say what the extra percentage it is?
00:32:07.000I couldn't find an official testing of whatever, but one person that did a big deep dive into it said its main thing was to fix his gait or it will improve running gait.
00:32:18.000That 30% is a number that they read as a sales point.
00:32:36.000Do you do any training on machines or is all your training essentially done on the road?
00:32:41.000The running is all pretty much done on the road and the trails.
00:32:44.000I'll do some mobility work and some strength work in the gym, and that's where I'll kind of go inside, I guess, for it.
00:32:51.000But yeah, I've used treadmills and stuff in the past, and I do use them from time to time, but usually if I have the option to go outside, I'll do that.
00:33:00.000I mean, I live in Phoenix, so it's sunny most days.
00:33:04.000Cold day is 70. I'm there this weekend, actually.
00:33:23.000In July when I used to do Tempe Improv and it was like fucking 120. Uh-huh.
00:33:27.000Well, and that's the funny thing, too, because when I was training for that 100-mile, 12-hour world record, it was through the summer because the race was in August.
00:33:34.000So my peak training was like 110 degrees some days.
00:33:37.000And the funny thing, too, is the Pettit Center, where I did the race, it was actually built for speed skating and some hockey rinks.
00:33:54.000So it's really funny when you see that.
00:33:57.000And I think I'm no expert at it by any means, but I think there's some pretty cool studies and stuff of the effects that happen when you are training in some of those extreme heats, like what happens.
00:34:08.000The way it was described to me is it kind of simulates training at altitude to a degree.
00:34:20.000Someone was explaining the whole deal to me.
00:34:22.000This is not something that I read, but essentially what they're doing is they're trying to find out whether or not hot yoga, these 90-minute hot yoga sessions, replicate some of the known benefits of sauna.
00:35:06.000So I try to remember that when it's the summer in Phoenix so I don't get too miserable.
00:35:12.000Yeah, you've got to be doing yourself good.
00:35:14.000Kronk Gym, which is one of the most famous boxing gyms in history.
00:35:18.000Emanuel Stewart, who was just a wizard of boxing, and he trained Tommy Hearns.
00:35:24.000Some of the all-time greats of that era, he would crank the temperature, and this is in Detroit, they would crank the temperature up really hot.
00:35:32.000So you'd go into that gym and it would be that way, for that specific reason, because he believed that it increased endurance.
00:35:40.000Yeah, it's interesting stuff, but I'll still take January and February.
00:36:00.000And I try to get out relatively early so that it's not like 110 from start to finish.
00:36:05.000So like if I get out say at like 6 or 7 in the morning, you know, it might be in the 80s, high 80s and be working its way up so that like I'm...
00:36:37.000So hydrating is interesting because, you know, I grew up in the Midwest, so I was very familiar with running in hot, humid stuff in the summer.
00:36:45.000And, you know, the dry desert heat, though, it seems like you get thirsty a lot quicker and a lot more frequently.
00:36:51.000So, you know, one of the things I learned the first summer I was in Phoenix was knowing where the water fountains are and kind of planning your routes around that.
00:36:59.000Do you drink out of public water fountains?
00:37:03.000I haven't gotten anything too miserable yet.
00:37:05.000In fact, I did a race earlier this year.
00:37:08.000I think it was in early June called the San Diego 100. And it's got this spot in the middle of the course where the aid stations are a little further apart.
00:37:17.000There's like a nine mile stretch and a seven mile stretch.
00:37:19.000And I kind of mistimed how much water I did, so I filled up my water in a stream, and it was probably not an ideal spot.
00:37:27.000But I rolled the dice, and I didn't get anything bad.
00:37:30.000My thought during the race was, this is the mindset in the middle of one of these things, is like, well, if something really bad happens, it'll happen after the race.
00:37:36.000Definitely would, but it's really bad.
00:37:48.000Yeah, I mean, in a race, I wouldn't want to.
00:37:51.000And what really helped for me was the situation is since the race was on an indoor track, 442 and some odd meters, I was doing a lot of my big long runs on a 400-meter track.
00:38:06.000So when I did that, I would just bring out a cooler and I'd have ice and water in there.
00:38:11.000Just have it sit there waiting for you.
00:38:18.000Historically, I've done a lot more flat, runnable stuff, but now that I'm out in Phoenix, I like to try to split the year into two halves and do some trail stuff in half the year and some flatter road or track or runnable stuff in the second half of the year.
00:38:30.000Do you bring water when you run trails?
00:38:32.000Do you bring a backpack or something like that?
00:38:47.000They are, and you can pack a lot of water.
00:38:50.000Usually, unless I'm going to be away from a potential stop long enough, usually what I'll do is I'll use the pack, but I'll have smaller little...
00:39:14.000Yeah, when I run with my dog in the summer, when it gets really hot, I bring a Hydro Flask in a backpack in one of those collapsible dog bowls, because, you know, I don't want him drinking out of puddles and shit.
00:39:26.000But just having that extra couple pounds on your back, it makes a difference.
00:39:33.000Yeah, and that's part of the reason why I try to go as minimal as I can with water if I can get away with it.
00:39:41.000Obviously, if I go out and do a big loop where there's no potential stops, I'm going to have to carry it all from the beginning.
00:39:46.000But if it's a spot where I know I can get to water every five, six, seven miles, then usually I'll pack a little lighter and not be carrying as much at any one given time.
00:39:58.000Yeah, I mean, I think one of the hardest things to really get right in Phoenix was just, like, kind of learning kind of how much you need to be hydrating, like, between sessions.
00:40:08.000Because what I usually found out is I could go out and kind of neglect hydration for any one given, like, run or workout.
00:40:13.000But if I did that, then the next one I'd probably pay for it.
00:40:16.000So, for me, the big motivation to make sure I'm on top of hydration during any given run is because I know, like, if I don't, then the next one is going to potentially be miserable.
00:40:27.000That's a weird feeling trying to do anything when you're dehydrated.
00:40:31.000It's like you have a bad battery or something.
00:40:33.000It's like everything's like, oh, come on!
00:40:36.000It's amazing how just normal everyday life, like you could feel like a little run down and you barely notice it.
00:40:45.000But once you start physically exerting, once you start training, once you start doing something hard, that's when you become, like, really in tune with how you're screwing your body up.
00:41:42.000And I'll do a lot more of that especially in the heat too just in general is like having electrolyte supplementation and things like that.
00:41:49.000What do you use for your electrolyte supplementation?
00:41:51.000I use a product called Hydro-X mostly.
00:41:54.000It's like a powder that you can kind of mix in with your water by a company named X Endurance.
00:41:59.000They make these little tubes now too where like, so if I'm running and I have like one bottle with some in it already, I can have these little tubes that if I refill and want to put more and I can just kind of take them out, pop it off and pour that in.
00:42:14.000A lot of other people will use, you can make like little caps that you just like swallow with your water and it's got like the formulation of the different electrolytes in there kind of dialed in and I think that's a little more hit or miss as to where people feel you need that.
00:42:32.000Some people tell you you don't really need electrolytes at all.
00:42:34.000You just need to salt your foods and things like that, all the way to you should be taking X number of these every hour.
00:42:39.000There's got to be science behind it, right?
00:42:41.000I mean, are you getting blood tests and finding out what your levels are pre- and post-workouts or anything along those lines?
00:42:47.000Yeah, I haven't done any post-workout tests.
00:42:50.000I was part of the FASTER study, which was a study that looked at high-carb and High-fat athletes, and I think they were looking at some of that stuff, too.
00:43:00.000And, like, any time I've ever had a blood test done, though, by, like, my electrolytes, like my sodium-potassium levels have always been in range, so I haven't really tried to...
00:43:08.000It's one of those things then where it's like, I'm probably not going to try to fix something that's not broken.
00:43:12.000Right, and you're pretty diligent about your supplementation and things all those things.
00:43:15.000Yeah, and I mean, I definitely am not afraid to salt my food.
00:43:18.000You know, most of my food is conducive to putting salt on, so, you know, I'm probably getting quite a bit of that stuff just in my day-to-day nutrition, too.
00:43:25.000Do you have a specific salt that you like?
00:46:02.000Like, these motherfuckers are stealing our shine.
00:46:04.000When a sea spreading over the region dried up, it was covered by geological shifts leading massive deposits of salt scattered throughout the hills.
00:46:14.000Odd name aside, Himalayan salt has a lot going for it.
00:46:17.000It's tasty, it's pink, and some even claim it has healing properties.
00:46:21.000Well, those fucking healing properties, assholes.
00:46:23.000Those are the people that like crystals.
00:49:11.000You know, I think like the low and slow is the way to go for a lot of that stuff.
00:49:16.000And when I do a, when I roast a, I'll get like a roast and I'll put it in a slow cooker and ultimately some of the fat will separate and kind of form on the top and always take that off and use it, cook eggs and stuff later.
00:49:30.000Well, a lot of people have their own idea about what to do and what not to do, but I learned this from a guy named Chad Ward, whose label on Instagram is Whiskey Bent Barbecue.
00:50:33.000But the sous vide method is fantastic too because say if you have a steak and you want that steak to be 135 degrees, you basically put the setting at 135 degrees and you can put it in there for four hours.
00:50:47.000So when you get it, it's just all the tendons and ligaments and all that stuff is just broken down.
00:50:53.000All the fascia is broken down and it's just so tender.
00:50:56.000But it feels weird because you're boiling it in a fucking plastic bag.
00:52:59.000Well, I feel like if you don't cook in it every day, like when the director of The Cove was in here, I always fucking have a hard time saying his last...
00:54:59.000The amount of damage that's been done over a hundred years, it's very similar to the amount of damage that was done sort of at the end of the 18th century, the beginning of the 19th century in the United States, where market hunters had basically wiped out almost every animal,
00:55:20.000Do you know when they were shooting the buffalo, they were basically shooting them for their hides and their tongues, and they would leave the carcasses to rot?
00:55:37.000But we basically almost wiped out every animal on this entire continent until they stepped in and decided to start regulating, hunting, and stopping it, and then sort of made concerted efforts to reintroduce animals.
00:55:51.000And still, most of them are not at their historic range.
00:56:04.000I mean, there's basically a healthy supply of bison, but not the ocean.
00:56:08.000The thing is like the same thing that we did, not we, you and I weren't alive, but that human beings did in North America, they're doing right now, the world is doing to the ocean.
00:56:19.000And there's no real concerted effort to reintroduce these animals or fish.
00:56:44.000We have the land world and the land monsters go into the water world with these floating little fucking killing machines and suck all the living forces and living beings out of the water world and then serve it up on rice.
00:57:49.000I've only done, over the last few years, I did the Snowden interview, which I did remotely, and I did one with Dr. Anthony West, who's an Egyptologist, who did it with him.
00:58:35.000Yeah, but it's been a cool experience just from a learning standpoint.
00:58:38.000I mean, I don't think we really have a specific direction.
00:58:41.000I mean, Sean's kind of the guy that everyone looks to from the carnivore thing, so I think sometimes we get identified as carnivore, but we...
00:58:51.000Definitely go down a bunch of different rabbit holes.
00:58:53.000We've had some of the protein researchers come on and talk about some of that stuff, like Professor Stu Phillips, Professor Don Lehman, Professor Jose Antonio.
00:59:07.000Yeah, they're doing like the protein research.
00:59:09.000They're kind of the guys who are doing some of the more recent research and looking at like, well, what are our protein needs across like a variety of ages as well as when you introduce athletics and then like what is the quality versus – or I guess maybe the best way to look at it is like the bioavailability of different protein sources and things like that.
00:59:28.000It seems like something that we'd have figured out already, but there's, I guess, some nuance with that even.
00:59:34.000And now they're saying that there's probably reason to believe that our recommendations should be higher than what they have been historically, especially for athletes and elderly folks.
00:59:52.000And I think they maybe are learning more, too, about just kind of what role protein plays in bone health, too, as opposed to just because people think of protein as just this building block for muscle.
01:00:01.000But there's a lot that goes into it with bone health as well.
01:00:05.000So those guys were really interesting to hear about.
01:00:09.000And, you know, we've done a lot of stuff with ranchers and some of the, like, The Savory Salatin folks come on the show and talk about kind of that practice versus kind of your standard agricultural production methods and things like that.
01:00:25.000So we've had Alan Savory, Joel Salatin, Will Harris from White Oak Pastures on, Bobby Gill, he's part of the Savory Institute.
01:00:32.000Come on and just kind of share with us like kind of where that stuff is at because I think there's a lot of guesswork and unanswerable questions at this point with some of that stuff because we're projecting like Way down the road with some of this stuff.
01:01:06.000Regenerative type practices into one bucket or one category when in reality there's a lot of different variants within them.
01:01:13.000So someone can say like, oh, regenerative agriculture is going to save the planet and then someone will go dig up a bunch of studies that show like, well, no, it actually doesn't do anything.
01:01:20.000Yeah, I'm confusing that because Chris Kresser is all in on this regenerative agricultural thing.
01:01:25.000But is there real evidence that you can have a zero carbon gain?
01:01:38.000The idea is that if you use regenerative agriculture, meaning that animals graze, you're not talking monocrop environments, that these cows graze on open fields of grass, and then they shit all over the place, and then that shit becomes manure,
01:01:54.000and that this actually helps the plant life grow, and all this stuff sort of...
01:02:28.000And then look to the other side and see where the counters are to that and just kind of go back and forth until you hit a dead end.
01:02:33.000And then, you know, if you hit a dead end, like that's where you're at for now until something else gets introduced.
01:02:37.000And where I got to now is, I think it was maybe Will Harris told us this, that when you're looking for these studies on kind of what practice is going to be good in terms of like soil regeneration, you have to look up adaptive multi-paddock grazing.
01:02:55.000Because if you look up like holistic or regenerative agriculture, you're just going to get a whole mess of like different ranges or different types of it.
01:03:02.000And, you know, some are effective, some aren't.
01:03:03.000So it's really hard to kind of piece out, you know, who's got the accurate stuff and not.
01:03:08.000And I mean, I think ultimately some of this stuff is we just don't know yet.
01:03:12.000What was the one that's most, what did you just say?
01:03:17.000It just means like you're instead of kind of you're you're it's a rotational grazing from what I understand, but you're kind of moving the the herd along to these different products and then they're like, you know, they're doing their thing in a what would you consider like a natural way like it would have been before we came in and shot all the buffalo and all that stuff.
01:03:55.000So you would need massive amounts of land and massive amounts of areas for them to graze?
01:04:00.000I think, yeah, I mean, I think you would need, I think the more the better is probably the way to look at it, but hopefully the soil biologists aren't critical.
01:04:13.000But the interesting thing, though, is like, I mean, I think there's a lot of work to be done in looking into this and finding out the best way to maybe utilize it.
01:04:20.000But the thought, the part that I thought was really interesting is with the Will Harris white oak pastures thing, they just, I think this study is maybe overutilized by like the pro-regenerative or multipathetic group to a degree because it's like it's what they have.
01:04:45.000And the thing that's compelling about that study to me is the way it kind of happened was essentially what happened was Will Harris and White O'Patchers, they were raising animals for Epic Bar.
01:05:00.000Epic Bar got acquired by General Mills.
01:05:06.000General Mills looked at what Epic Bar was claiming when they were independent and they were saying, our stuff is regenerative.
01:05:14.000You buy our product and you're giving back versus taking, kind of a mindset.
01:05:19.000And I think General Mills was skeptical about that.
01:05:21.000So they spent, I think it was like $80,000 to go in and have a study done on Will Harris' White Oaks pasture to really see if they could back that claim up.
01:05:31.000And they went in and they did the study and it actually showed like a net...
01:05:35.000Carbon sequestration versus, like, they weren't even neutral.
01:05:38.000They actually pulled in more than they put out.
01:05:40.000So this is from Epic's particular type of farming that they use?
01:06:02.000And it really is important to look at that honestly.
01:06:06.000Because even though you do have this one area, is that because of the environment where this farm is taking place?
01:06:12.000Is it because of the particular soil quality?
01:06:15.000What are the factors that allow them to have...
01:06:18.000So it actually takes carbon out of the atmosphere, like a certain percentage.
01:06:25.000So instead of adding carbon, it actually removes some.
01:06:29.000Yeah, because I guess the way it was described to me is that the inputs of that type of system are so low that, like, you're not – because if you look at just a normal, like, agricultural setup, you know, you have all these inputs of, like, manure and all these other things that are going to add to that,
01:07:06.000But, you know, I think we probably have a lot to learn and stuff with that stuff too.
01:07:10.000But it's one of those things when I think about it, it's like, hopefully we're spending a lot of time looking at that stuff because if they're right about the number of harvests we have left, I think, what are the estimates?
01:09:07.000Yeah, so it seems like we'd have a long ways to go.
01:09:10.000But I mean, I guess the counter to that would also be we're essentially going back to what we would have been doing historically.
01:09:16.000And so it's not necessarily like reinventing the wheel as much as it is just saying, okay, what we did here obviously is not sustainable or potentially not sustainable.
01:09:26.000So let's look at, well, what did we do to get back to where we were before?
01:09:30.000I guess maybe is the way to look at that.
01:10:40.000We're kind of two ends of the spectrum from an athletic standpoint.
01:10:45.000So I was just interested in kind of what he was doing and what he was up to.
01:10:49.000And that's kind of why we started the podcast together.
01:10:52.000But yeah, I mean, one of the things that Sean always says on the podcast, I think, is kind of a better reflection.
01:10:58.000I mean, he'll say, the only thing I know for certain is that I'm wrong about something.
01:11:04.000So it's like, you know, it gets, I think it gets tough for someone like him who gets identified as the, like the face of the carnivore movement.
01:11:14.000Because then like you get all the positive and the negative coming your way too.
01:11:57.000You know, I've got a theory with social media and that stuff in general is that for a lot of the people who are most active on it, they either take it 100% serious or it's kind of a joke or a game.
01:12:10.000And then when those two polar ends meet, that's where you get the big blow-up interactions.
01:12:17.000And then it becomes kind of a game of, well, the vegan told me that I should die or something like that.
01:12:23.000So then I'm going to go tell that vegan that this or that.
01:12:25.000And it goes back and forth, back and forth, back and forth.
01:12:29.000The one I always get a kick out of, though, along those lines is someone will come up with a picture of, like, here's the human's jaw system.
01:12:39.000And this clearly means we're frugivores.
01:12:42.000And then someone will say, well, look at the digestive tract of a human being.
01:12:46.000It is clearly designed more to be eating meat or animal products than And, you know, they go back and forth with different, like, parts of the human anatomy to try to, like, prove that we're vegetarian or vegan, fruitarian.
01:13:00.000And then I'm thinking the whole time, I'm like, so what we have here is people who can have specific traits that are good for eating fruits and vegetables and some specific traits that are good for eating animal products.
01:13:51.000He said something that was really resonated with me where he said, you know, humans, we're unique in that we've over time developed ways to use tools and things like that to liberate nutrients.
01:14:05.000So to look at anything in its raw state is kind of missed the point of why humans are the way they are.
01:14:13.000I've seen this argument that human beings aren't supposed to eat meat because if we were, we'd be able to just rip it apart and eat it with our own teeth and go eat a squirrel with your face.
01:14:28.000You can't eat a lot of beans without cooking them.
01:14:30.000Like, we've figured things out, folks.
01:14:33.000I mean, cassava, in the jungle, they figured out that you have to cook this stuff and strain it, and it's a primary staple of the diets of many people that live in the jungle.
01:14:42.000And it's fucking toxic as shit if you don't do that.
01:14:45.000I mean, it literally produces cyanide.
01:14:48.000Cyanide is produced by cassava, which is like one of their primary foods.
01:15:10.000And this idea that you're supposed to be, we're clearly an herbivore because of the fact that we're not supposed to be killing animals with our teeth.
01:15:20.000Like, we kill animals with tools, and we've done it for so long that our bodies have adapted.
01:15:26.000We've adapted to the fact that we have clothes.
01:15:28.000That's why we're not covered in hair, you fucking idiots.
01:15:31.000Like, this is like real, clear, obvious stuff.
01:15:34.000People who live in the coldest climates of the world aren't covered in hair, you know?
01:15:40.000Yeah, you know, and it was interesting because like what you're saying too, when we had Bill on the show, he's got this unique experience where he's actually gone in and visited these indigenous tribes that have been relatively untouched by modern society to basically with the one question of like, well,
01:15:56.000So he's been, he's seen like a variety of different stuff.
01:15:58.000I think he even had a show on National Geographic for a while that looked into some of this, but he, like just to show you the polarization of what humans can kind of do, he went and he visited the Samburo, which is a branch of the Maasai over in Africa.
01:16:12.000You know, they're basically drinking blood and milk for a huge portion of their nutrition.
01:16:19.000So you have this tribe that's basically on a primarily animal-based nutrition plan, and they're super healthy.
01:16:26.000He said that they were maybe one of the most healthy groups of people he's seen from just like a physical stature, like tooth health and that sort of thing.
01:16:32.000But then he also went down to, I think it was in South America, I can't remember the name of the tribe, but they found a way to basically liberate nutrients from a poisonous potato.
01:16:58.000And what he said was this tribe that ate basically mostly potatoes, what they would do is they'd literally dig a pit and put thousands of pounds of these potatoes in there and let them sit there and ferment, I guess, for up to six months.
01:17:12.000And then they would actually make this clay that they would use because there was still a toxin or something in there that they needed to kind of prevent from interacting with them.
01:17:22.000Yeah, so there's this clay and there's this potato and when they dip the potato in this clay, it binds to that toxin so it doesn't become an issue when you eat it.
01:17:31.000So by itself, that potato could potentially kill you, I guess, but with the clay, it doesn't.
01:17:37.000How the fuck did they figure that out?
01:17:54.000I guess when your only goal when you wake up in the morning is to find your next meal and kind of build enough around so that you can kind of survive.
01:18:03.000You put a lot of time and energy into it.
01:18:05.000But yeah, it is interesting to think how they all got passed along from generation to generation and how it got fine-tuned to where it is today.
01:18:12.000But I think it's cool to look at that stuff when it just comes to your own nutrition too and kind of when you understand it's less about this food Is net bad for me or this, this food is this particular food item is bad for me across the board.
01:18:27.000And this one is great for me across the board more so about, well, this is what this food does.
01:18:33.000Like you mentioned mix and match to where you get, get the profile that you're looking for.
01:18:37.000Yeah, I think the problem is what we were saying before, is that people are entering into these conversations with this goal that they want to achieve, this goal being plants are bad for you, or meat is bad for you, or we're supposed to be only eating meat, or we're supposed to be only eating plants,
01:19:41.000This is a whole history on potatoes and how it changed the world and, like...
01:19:44.000Wild potatoes are laced with solanine and tomatine, toxic compounds believed to defend plants against attacks from dangerous organisms like fungi, bacteria, and human beings.
01:20:20.000The toxins stick more technically absorb to the fine clay particles in the animal's stomachs passing through the digestive system without affecting it.
01:20:29.000Mimicking this process, mountain peoples apparently learned to dunk wild potatoes in a gravy made of clay and water.
01:20:36.000Eventually, they bred less toxic potatoes, though some of the old poisonous varieties remain favored for their resistance to frost.
01:20:47.000Clay dust is still sold in Peruvian and Bolivian markets to accompany them.
01:21:14.000Yeah, well, people are worried about the environment.
01:21:18.000They're worried about the health consequences of certain diets and the environmental consequences of certain diets.
01:21:27.000This is what I've really gotten into after Chris Kresser was on the podcast recently debunking the Game Changers when he was talking about the positive net benefits of regenerative farming.
01:21:38.000I don't think that's clearly been established worldwide or in large scale.
01:21:45.000Like in terms of, and maybe it can be.
01:21:52.000Yeah, you know, I think that's, I mean, that's the million dollar question right now too, right?
01:21:55.000Like, well, how are we going to feed however many they're predicting?
01:21:59.000Like how are we going to feed the 10 billion people we're going to see in X number of years?
01:22:02.000And I think it's interesting and it's certainly worth thinking about, but like, it's also like, well, how far do we keep kicking that ball down the road before we find ourselves in a situation where like, you know, then what's the next question?
01:22:14.00015 billion, 20 billion and so on and so forth.
01:22:17.000And eventually like, you know, we just overpopulate the world and it ends really badly for us.
01:22:22.000Well, diseases usually follow overpopulation.
01:22:26.000I think the real key for us, I think, is going to be, and I think this is within our lifetime, is going to be lab-created meat.
01:22:36.000And I think they're really close to doing that.
01:22:38.000And I think if you have some sort of ethical...
01:22:42.000Lab-created, nutritious meat where you don't have to worry about suffering or death.
01:22:46.000If this has been established, then we open up a whole new avenue of exploration because now you can say, okay, all these people that are vegan for this moral and ethical...
01:22:59.000That sort of dilemma that they have with animal agriculture, killing animals, suffering.
01:24:28.000Can they figure out some sort of a way to have some sort of net positive effect where that waste is utilized in some sort of a form where it actually can contribute to the natural processes of soil regeneration and manure and composting and things along those lines?
01:24:46.000Yeah, no, I think it's interesting and we're in an interesting time for sure.
01:24:51.000It'll be interesting to see where they get with that and everything else with that.
01:24:55.000And, you know, you brought up an interesting point too, not to keep going down the rabbit hole, but the other thing that I thought really interesting was when you look at waste components.
01:25:05.000I feel like we're not maybe looking at that as much as we should be when we're talking about trying to feed a bunch of people.
01:25:10.000It's like, well, maybe we should start with what we're throwing away that we wouldn't have to.
01:25:24.000And I actually had asked Dr. Schindler about that, and he actually did a study with some of his grad students where they looked at, I think they took 30 whitetail deer, and they processed it down to, like, the very last potential calorie to find out how much is wasted,
01:25:40.000even in, like, you know, a A deer that say you go and you shoot a deer and then you take it to the process and get it all done.
01:25:46.000He said it was between, I think it was between like 13 to 30 days worth of human nutrition that gets wasted in a single whitetail deer.
01:25:55.000Well, here's the problem with that idea.
01:25:59.000Waste is only if you do something with it.
01:26:02.000If you leave it in the field, there's no waste.
01:26:28.000If our objective is to feed as many people as possible and we're maximizing the amount of nutrients we can acquire from a specific thing, like...
01:26:35.000We're leaving a lot on the table or we're giving a lot to different areas, like different animals and things that would be- Well, we're doing it wrong.
01:26:41.000We're putting our waste in bags and we're throwing it into the landfills.
01:26:46.000Have you seen they did this aerial study of Los Angeles?
01:26:50.000They're trying to find out where most of the methane comes from.
01:26:57.000And this is not how it's supposed to be.
01:27:00.000It's supposed to be animals are supposed to have access to what's left over.
01:27:05.000I mean, this is what would happen if a bear killed a moose.
01:27:08.000If a bear killed a moose, it's going to consume a big portion of the body, and then it's going to leave whatever's left, and then rodents and vultures and then eventually insects and bacteria are going to break it down.
01:27:20.000And this is a natural cycle of life for animals.
01:27:43.000We understand the whole process of these things breaking down in the wild and what happens to them.
01:27:50.000We understand that there's animals that their entire diet consists of eating animals that other animals have killed and they leave some of it behind.
01:29:39.000Then you learn it, and then it doesn't get forgotten when you're an adult as easily.
01:29:42.000Wow, we're so enamored with this idea of working.
01:29:46.000We're so enamored with this idea of getting a job.
01:29:48.000We're so enamored with this idea of the structure of civilization as it stands in 2019 is the way to go.
01:29:54.000So we're teaching kids how to complete this life that they're born into, the way it's established for their parents, the way it's established for their neighborhood.
01:30:03.000Get in your car, drive to work, work all day, come home, eat what you can, throw the rest of the garbage, go back to work in the morning.
01:30:38.000Like, oh my god, you know, Zach found a job that he really loves and he got really good at it.
01:30:42.000And now he actually has joy in what he does.
01:30:45.000But there's a lot of different places in this country alone where you can live and you can do things in a non-traditional manner and you can get by.
01:30:56.000And you'll probably be healthier and happier than someone that gets stuck in the same goddamn civilization cycle, this industrialized cycle that we're all in.
01:32:20.000But for a lot of people, they just live these lives of frustration.
01:32:24.000You know, and they never do find, and they're not taught to find a thing.
01:32:29.000And there's also, I think, there's great satisfaction to working on something that you enjoy, whether it's working with your hands or working on something that's creative.
01:33:27.000If you could figure out a way to run an organic garden and you do compost, you don't use pesticides, you do everything organic and everything is regenerative and you actually can feed people, my God, how good would you feel?
01:33:48.000You have to be one of those outside-the-box thinkers because school's essentially set up for scale, right?
01:33:54.000It's set up for, you got 500 kids, you got to turn them into not losers.
01:33:57.000How do I get 500 kids to not be a loser?
01:34:00.000Well, just standard path, you know, like standard American diets, like standard American education, these like standard paths that will work for X amount of people.
01:34:10.000You get 10 people, 7 of them won't be losers if you just shove them into this machine and pump them out in this fucking form.
01:35:59.000And it's also, I don't desire to do that.
01:36:02.000Conversely, if you had to become a stand-up comedian, you'd probably be like, well, fuck this.
01:36:06.000I don't want to be thinking about things that's funny.
01:36:09.000And the first time you bomb, you'd be like, what am I doing with my life?
01:36:12.000Everybody has a different personality and these different personalities and these different interests and desires, they take different paths.
01:36:19.000And I think we need to open that up to people more and just sort of in some way encourage people to seek more, to genuinely try to find the things that interest you.
01:36:31.000Maybe you should be a fly fishing guide.
01:36:34.000Maybe you should be a guy who makes homemade mugs out of wood.
01:37:02.000And I think that's so hard for people.
01:37:04.000And that's why people, when they find someone like yourself that's doing this unusual, unorthodox thing and you're extremely successful at it, it becomes so attractive to people to hear your story.
01:37:14.000Yeah, and I think I would have never guessed I'd be doing what I'm doing now 10 years ago.
01:37:20.000So it's equally surprising to me, I think, sometimes.
01:37:23.000But, you know, it is interesting when you think about just...
01:37:30.000Where you thought you would maybe be and then where you end up and all that stuff in between.
01:37:35.000Ultimately, I think you want to be smart about stuff.
01:37:38.000I didn't necessarily just quit my job and say I'm going to be an ultramarathon runner.
01:37:42.000You kind of have a few different options available or you just keep options open to...
01:37:47.000For me personally, I like to coach too.
01:37:49.000So I'm going to do some of that and that helps supplement things.
01:37:52.000And then, you know, podcasting has always been a fun thing to do.
01:37:55.000So historically, I'd always go on podcasts.
01:37:57.000And then a couple of years ago, it was like, well, if it's this much fun to go on them, it must be fun to do them too.
01:38:03.000So, you know, starting these other, I think when people start kind of really exploring where their curiosities are, you find these different avenues too.
01:38:10.000And it just kind of snowballs a little bit as opposed to being, you know, maybe you start out making the dream catcher and then you become something else or Right, right.
01:38:47.000I mean, it sounds fucking corny and self-indulgent.
01:38:50.000But realistically, I think there are some lessons that I learn off of really hard workouts.
01:38:56.000You know, where it's like at the end of it, you know, when it's all done, first of all, there's always this feeling like eight out of ten times I don't want to work out.
01:40:04.000I want to call people and tell them I care about them.
01:40:07.000There's moments post-workout in particular where you just feel really good.
01:40:13.000And I think life is sometimes about...
01:40:16.000Getting over those periods of feeling kind of shitty or low energy or lethargic or unrested or what the fuck it is and just pushing through that because you know the territory.
01:40:28.000You've been there before and then developing a habit of being able to do that and being able to know and have faith in the process and understand that this, yeah, yeah, yeah, I know you don't want to do it.
01:40:46.000And I think in my own training, I get that from a lot of different workouts.
01:40:51.000But the one that I really love is when I get closer to a race, and like I was saying before, you start dialing things in to be more specific to the activity you're trying to prepare for.
01:41:00.000I'll do a phase of training where I'm running kind of in an area of about 150 to 155 beats per minute.
01:41:08.000It's just fast enough where I feel like I'm really kind of working, but it's also slow enough where I can go for quite a while so I can log a really big run.
01:41:17.000When I was training for this last race at the Pettit Center, I had a training cycle where I hit a four-week block where...
01:41:27.000I had one deload a week, which is basically a reduction of volume and intensity, and three build-ups.
01:41:32.000Because I'm reducing volume and intensity.
01:41:34.000And the other three, though, were build-up ones.
01:41:36.000So I had a 130-mile week, right around 130, and then 250-mile weeks.
01:41:40.000And they were just basically loaded with...
01:41:44.000Just faster than or right about kind of 100 mile intensity.
01:41:47.000So, you know, I would do and you can maybe pull it up.
01:41:50.000I think I have a picture on my Instagram page of the I did these key workouts where I'd go to a track and I would just do loops around the track.
01:41:56.000And it'd be like anywhere between 27 to like 32 miles at that kind of intensity.
01:42:02.000And you just get into a flow and a rhythm, and once you get moving, it feels great.
01:42:07.000And afterwards, yeah, you feel great the whole rest of the day, and you just want to go out and do it again.
01:42:11.000You almost have to be careful not to do too much at a certain point.
01:42:18.000To kind of go back to what we were talking about in the beginning, like when I structure a plan, ideally I start out, I start out with a good base, a good aerobic base, which I typically kind of retain almost year round.
01:42:28.000I'll take like off season, but I like to follow a principle where I'll let myself kind of lose some of that peak fitness just so it's sustainable because staying at your peak fitness level is not sustainable.
01:42:38.000So I let myself get like just out of shape enough so that I'm not always at that level.
01:42:43.000Uh, and then, uh, I, I start kind of building in the, the structure towards the race itself, which starts with those shorter, faster intervals since they're further away.
01:42:51.000And then I get closer and closer to the race where I'm doing things that are more specific.
01:42:57.000So like the next step would be, I'd be doing some longer intervals or kind of like what you consider like an anaerobic threshold type workout, which generally speaking is about like your max intensity.
01:43:06.000If you did like a 60 minute all out time trial.
01:43:09.000And then, you know, that's still not specific to 100 miles because I'm out there for 11 hours, so I'm kind of still moving closer to that slower race pace.
01:43:18.000Yeah, and it just follows the principle of, you know, hitting all the systems of training like you would in any other periodized endurance plan, but always keeping that compass of the stuff you do or the intensity of the race itself is the type of work you should be doing closest to it.
01:43:34.000So you're really just optimizing when you're closer to the race itself.
01:43:38.000How do you know what your peak fitness is?
01:43:41.000Like when you say that you want to, you can't really maintain the peak fitness, you want to back off a little bit so that you can just keep your training running.
01:43:49.000How do you know where that is and how do you know that you cannot expand that and then...
01:43:57.000I mean, you can analyze things if you want to go into like heart rate variability type things, but that's a little bit more on the micro level.
01:44:04.000For me personally, like usually I'll get to a point where like I'll do a race and you can just kind of tell like I'm exhausted from that.
01:44:12.000And I like to think of it kind of two-folded.
01:44:14.000We're like physical recovery and mental recovery.
01:44:17.000So if I do a big race and afterwards, like I can't even like bring myself to think of another big training block, I know I need to like let myself kind of get a little bit out of that fitness state, that peak fitness state and just kind of reset or hit the reset button.
01:44:33.000So this is just from years and years of training?
01:44:47.000Like, say if you're getting prepared for this 100-mile race and you know you're going to have to run for 11-plus hours, what's a long day for you?
01:44:54.000Yeah, so the longest run I did for this particular one was three and a half hours.
01:44:58.000It was, I think, 32 miles or somewhere in that neighborhood.
01:45:04.000I usually don't push up much past five hours in my own training, but If I'm going to do much more than that, I'll just jump in a race.
01:45:11.000The nice thing about Phoenix is there's a race company called Aravipa, and they put on like 30-some ultra events every year.
01:45:22.000So the guy who race directed at Jamil, he'll let me jump in events when I want to.
01:45:28.000So sometimes if I'm going to do something, like say I'm preparing for 100 mile and I want to get a really long day, like a 7-8 hour session in, I'll just pick a 100k type event or a 50 miler type event and just do that.
01:45:42.000I like to say, those are training tools, so I don't want to necessarily race it all out.
01:45:48.000But if you can keep yourself at maybe 80% of what you're capable of, you can get that good long stimulus, but not necessarily beat yourself up so much that it takes away from the race you're preparing for.
01:45:56.000And so 50 miles would take you, or how long would that take you?
01:46:02.000Like I just did a 50 miler actually about a week and a half ago called the JFK 50 mile and that took me five hours and 42 minutes.
01:46:09.000And that course is kind of, it's got, you go over the Appalachian mountains for about 60 miles and you get on a really flat towpath for about a marathon.
01:46:40.000It's really interesting too because like some of the – I live just about two hours south of Flagstaff and there's a group of ultramarathon guys who train up there and they – I got a lot of inspiration from two of them specifically for this last race, the race I did at the Pettit Center.
01:46:56.000One guy's name is Jim Walmsley, and he's, for my money, probably the best ultramarathoner we have, certainly in North America, if not the world.
01:47:06.000I mean, he's got the course record at the Western States 100, which is the most tested 100-miler in North America.
01:47:13.000He's got the course record at the Lake Sonoma 50-mile by a pretty big margin.
01:47:18.000He's actually got the two fastest times, but the next closest person to him is like...
01:47:22.00018 minutes behind or something like that.
01:47:24.000And then he's also got the course record at the JFK 50 mile, the one I just was mentioning before.
01:47:28.000And these three events are three of the most tested courses that we've had.
01:47:33.000And he's got the course records at all of them, and he can probably go faster on all three.
01:48:39.000This next year, he broke his course record with the 1409. Jared came in second in, I think it was 1423 or 26, just behind Jim, basically pushing him all day.
01:48:50.000So any other time Jared would have won that race, except for that year, and it would have been a huge story for him.
01:48:59.000And, you know, it just, I mean, it was an amazing performance from those two guys, and just watching kind of their training, and then their performances, because I was out there crewing and pacing my wife, was, like, a huge motivator for me when I kind of got into the training buildup for that race at the Pennant Center,
01:51:09.000And they had actually proposed last year, I think they just were maybe spitballing a little bit, but they were like, hey, would you be ever interested in doing that?
01:51:15.000Like, go running, you know, doing that cross-country route.
01:51:18.000And I was like, yeah, I've been actually wanting to do that at some point.
01:51:21.000I just haven't gotten around to actually planning it out.
01:51:46.000You'd be a lot of learning on the fly.
01:51:48.000I think really the big key thing there is you're managing a lot of stuff with that.
01:51:52.000Like you want to make sure you're sleeping well throughout that because obviously if you're not sleeping well, it could end badly for you pretty soon.
01:51:58.000So then I think you just end up trying to do as much specific things as you can to prepare without going overboard.
01:52:06.000I mean, you can imagine the pace is going to be incredibly slow.
01:52:09.000There's probably going to be like walking breaks.
01:52:10.000I'm not going to be like, you know, certainly not going to be running 648 per mile pace.
01:52:14.000But my first thought is like, I'll probably target like a 12 to 14 hour range per day.
01:52:20.000And whatever I get out of that 12 to 14 hours is what I get.
01:52:24.000And then that gives me kind of the flexibility to have at least 10 hours of buffer to kind of prep and sleep and get ready for the next day.
01:53:16.000I mean, just to do one marathon when you're not in shape...
01:53:20.000I just can't imagine the just a fucking sheer amount of just will just pure will that it takes to do something like that and to just keep pushing left right left right left right left right even though everything your head your brain your feet everything stop stop stop fuck you left right left right left right i mean he ran how many thousand miles was it The entire length of
01:55:28.000But yeah, I mean, I think for this particular run, I probably would have kept punting it down the road had I not talked to Justin Wren, to be honest with you.
01:55:40.000When you do something like that, part of the reason I think you do that is, for me anyway, is when I see...
01:55:47.000Endurance, ultra-endurance sport too, it can be a very selfish sport because you're putting in tons of training.
01:55:53.000Race day is like an all-day effort with tons of people helping you out.
01:55:56.000They're taking time out of their schedule, their day, to come out there, crew, pace, essentially be your...
01:56:02.000Your support system while you're out there trying to do all these things.
01:56:07.000Part of it is I want to try to give back in a way as well, as opposed to just always going out and racing for my own sake.
01:56:42.000And I think it was on here that I heard his podcast for the first time.
01:56:45.000I know I heard him tell I guess what you would call his origin story here and I think I heard it again on like the Mind Pump Media Guys podcast and it's, when I describe just listening to Justin Wren's podcast or his interviews to people, I try to say like well it kind of comes in these stages where he tells his background story of like his experience with bullying and And at first,
01:57:08.000You're thinking like, well, how could anyone have to go through that?
01:57:11.000I would never want anyone to go through that.
01:57:13.000And you kind of transition into this phase of like, you kind of get nervous and anxious because you're thinking like, well, who did I say something mean to when I was younger?
01:57:20.000Or who did I potentially affect in a negative way?
01:57:24.000And then it's like, then you just want to try to do something to support.
01:57:27.000And You know, it's really, when you look at someone like Justin Wren, it's mind-boggling to me that this guy isn't like an internationally known hero or leader, yet anyway.
01:58:30.000Especially in the current climate, our leaders today tend to be people like celebrities, athletes, and then politicians and things like that.
01:58:40.000You look around and it can be very underwhelming about just how badly are people actually trying to help people and how many of these politicians actually care about poor people.
01:58:55.000How many of them actually care about someone who's disenfranchised?
01:59:19.000Yeah, so I think when I look at, I think people want to help, and I think people want to do things that are good for humanity, but oftentimes they don't necessarily have that example to lead the way.
01:59:33.000And they look into a void in some cases.
01:59:35.000And I think Justin is the type of person who, you know, if the more people we can get to know about him, his story, and what he's trying to do on the wells and the farms with the pygmy, as well as his new branch on anti-bullying, the better.
01:59:49.000So when I reached out to him, I was actually kind of surprised.
01:59:54.000I shot him a note on, I think, Instagram and Twitter.
01:59:57.000And I thought, he's probably not even going to see it because he's not following me.
02:00:03.000He followed me, responded back, and he's just like, this is so awesome.
02:00:06.000I feel super honored that you'd want to help out in some way.
02:00:09.000He's just always looking for opportunities to help promote this great cause.
02:00:12.000So then when I got that response from him, it was like clarification of what I think some I already knew about the guy just from listening to him on your show and others.
02:00:45.000Because I worry about the guy because he's so selfless.
02:00:48.000When he's talking about blacking out and all this after training, they gotta get him in the shower because he's shivering and he's pale white.
02:00:56.000I'm like, bro, what is going on with you?
02:01:09.000He's the most selfless person I've ever talked to.
02:01:11.000He's talking about fighting again, right?
02:01:12.000He's getting over these incredible bouts of...
02:01:18.000Antibiotics that you know weaken your ligaments, right?
02:01:21.000Like when you take Cipro or any of these like super intense antibiotics, one of the side effects is a lot of times people get injured, like your ligaments get injured, because apparently there's a weakening effect, which is really kind of...
02:01:37.000It's really fascinating when you think about the human body as an overall organism and that it's really an ecosystem and that when you flood antibiotics into that ecosystem to try to prevent disease from destroying it, you also have these unintended side effects and one of them is weakened ligaments.
02:01:56.000There's a lot of correlation between people getting staph infection and then blowing out knees, ACLs, you know, tendons and things along those lines afterwards.
02:02:42.000He's such a rare, totally selfless person, and he's such a powerful force for good for the people that live in the Congo.
02:02:51.000And what he's done for them I mean, I don't know how many wells they've built so far, but they've made an alliance with the Cash App, which is one of my sponsors.
02:03:00.000So every time someone downloads the Cash App, when they use the code JoeRogan, whether it's for Google, for Android, or for an iPhone, for Apple, you get $10 goes to this cause.
02:03:12.000So they've raised hundreds of thousands of dollars, and they're building wells right now.
02:03:16.000It's just this amazing thing that he's done.
02:03:45.000He's one of the best heavyweights in the world.
02:03:47.000And how much better would he be if he was selfish and spent all of his time training and not getting malaria three times, not having this unknown parasite that they think might be in his fucking brain?
02:04:49.000Each kite is going to generate X amount of dollars.
02:04:52.000Just need to bottle up Justin Wren and feed it to everyone, I guess.
02:04:55.000Well, you know, it's an interesting—not just an interesting—it's a beautiful sort of expression of what can happen to a person when they experience deep pain and sadness, and then they find a way out, and then they find a way to help other people.
02:06:18.000Well, so if I go and try to get close to or right around the record for that, it's about a 40-day-ish timeframe, give or take.
02:06:30.000So you're really, I think the biggest hurdle or planning thing is to find the timeline where you're going to run into the least amount of weather issues.
02:06:38.000Because you're going across the country, so you're going over the Sierras and you're going through the...
02:06:42.000You know, the middle of the country and then all that stuff.
02:06:44.000So obviously you don't want to be going over mountain passes in the middle of winter, but you probably don't also want to be going through the Midwest in the middle of the summer.
02:06:53.000So some of it's going to be kind of planning around that.
02:06:55.000There's probably some good opportunities in the spring and the fall that kind of catch that window of moderate temps versus extremes.
02:07:01.000What's the gentleman that did it before?
02:07:21.000A year ago or two years ago, he went up in Alaska and went from Alaska down to the southern tip of Florida all by himself with just one of those push strollers.
02:07:30.000And he averaged, I think it was like 50 miles a day or something like that.
02:07:59.000These weeks after weeks where it's like 50 mile day, 50 mile day, like, you know, like 350, 400 mile weeks and stuff like that.
02:08:06.000And then if you like zoomed in on his routes, you could see like he'd be on this route and all of a sudden you see him deviate a little bit and you'd zoom in and be like, oh, there's a grocery store there.
02:10:19.000My thought is it's probably got to either be about a 10-month start point or 18. So I could either do it now, or I guess it'd be a little less than 18, but by finishing.
02:10:31.000So I would either maybe try to do it this fall, or if I don't have enough in place by then, target kind of the end of winter for 2021. And what would change?
02:10:41.000What would make you decide to do it 2021 versus 2020?
02:10:45.000Just, I mean, I'm trying to respect how much, like, planning it's going to take, and I haven't really started that yet, so I don't want to, like, necessarily get, find out, like, okay, let's say I just put a date on the calendar right away, and then find out, oh, I need to,
02:11:01.000There's a lot more resources I have to try to acquire to make this happen.
02:11:18.000Um, obviously this will probably, this will take the place of an entire, the way I look at, uh, like seasons of racing is just kind of two key ones.
02:11:27.000You have like your spring, early summer, and your kind of late summer, fall slash winter season.
02:11:33.000Uh, so I'll basically just sacrifice one of those seasons for this.
02:11:37.000And I probably won't, I mean, I don't really know what to expect cause I've never done anything quite like this before, but I'm planning on dedicating one of those seasons towards that exclusively.
02:12:04.000People followed it like it was the World Series?
02:12:06.000So it continued on until the Great Depression and World War II, probably because people didn't have enough time to waste their time doing this.
02:12:12.000And then it picked back up in the late 20th century, and that's when you had to prove what you were doing.
02:12:18.000The first known transcontinental journey took place in 1896 by a mother-daughter duo who, needing to raise money to save their farm in Spokane County, Washington, responded to a $10,000 public wager that no one could make it by foot across the country.
02:12:35.000Helga and Clara Espy left home with $10 between them, as well as a compass, a knife, a curling iron, and a Smith& Wesson revolver.
02:13:04.000Yeah, so it started again, picked that back up again in like the 60s, and in 1980, somebody that was doing it had his team scramble to get witness signatures the whole way across so he could prove that he did it when he did it and the amount of time that he did it.
02:13:17.000I mean, people cheat on marathons, right?
02:13:20.000They jump in cars on marathons and make it on the train.
02:13:23.000There was a guy, I think, before Pete broke the record that I think got caught cheating trying to do it.
02:13:28.000Because, I mean, you've got to document stuff pretty detailed.
02:14:32.000Kind of to maybe go full circle with what we started before where we kind of talk about kind of what I periodize with carbohydrates and stuff like that where I think there is a point where the distance is long enough where like a strict ketogenic diet is maybe more applicable.
02:14:50.000If you follow a strict ketogenic diet or a zero-carb diet and try to perform in some of these typical endurance events, it's going to come at a performance cost unless you have some weird outlying type situation.
02:15:02.000Trent Stellingworth looked at, he's a guy up in Canada who works with a lot of the sports performance stuff, and He did some studies that actually looks at if you go super strict keto or zero carb, you get really fat-adapted.
02:15:17.000But it comes at a cost of your ability to burn exogenous glucose.
02:15:22.000So if I went zero carb for a year and then I tried to take in my fueling strategy that I do now, my body would probably reject it or at least I would have to be really, really conservative with how much I used.
02:15:35.000Have you talked to Dom D'Agostino about this stuff?
02:15:39.000Yeah, I know, I know, I follow him and stuff.
02:15:41.000I'm actually going to be presenting at his Metabolic Health Summit in, I believe it's in end of January, early February.
02:15:47.000He's a very, very interesting guy because he's a super legit fact-based scientist who's also a power athlete, you know, and ketogenic, like for a long, long time now.
02:15:57.000Try to get him on board for this attempt.
02:15:59.000But like what I'm trying to say with that is like- He'd probably help you.
02:16:03.000I mean, he'd be a great resource for sure.
02:16:06.000But like for something like this, like my intensity is going to be so low that like I don't technically need to be taking in exogenous glucose for something like that.
02:16:15.000So it might actually behoove me to be as fat adapted as I can get versus what I'm normally doing is I'm trying to get as fat adapted as I need to be, but not necessarily so far that it comes at the compromise of being able to do my in-race nutrition fueling plan.
02:16:27.000I was always under the impression that your body always knows what to do with glucose, but that it has to be fat adapted.
02:16:34.000I think you probably can to a degree, but what happens is you downregulate...
02:16:40.000I can't speak to the science perfectly, but Trent Stallingworth did a bunch of research where basically it downregulates the mechanism that allows you to take in glucose and utilize it in a meaningful way.
02:16:52.000So most people can tolerate probably somewhere between maybe...
02:16:57.00060 to 90 grams of glucose per hour during some of these events.
02:17:03.000Whereas if you went on a strict zero carb diet and tried to do 60 to 90 grams of sports drink or fuel or something like that, I don't think your body could clear it because it would have down-regulated your body's capability to do that.
02:17:16.000So, I mean, folks who are interested should look at Trent Stallingworth's work.
02:17:20.000He would be able to describe it in much better detail than I can.
02:17:24.000So you would just go on a real super heavy fat diet?
02:17:56.000I'd have to look back and see what he was doing.
02:17:58.000I don't know if it was consistently the same every day, so maybe that's where my plan would deviate, and I probably am going to learn along the way and maybe change things, but I do kind of like, at least on paper, that idea of targeting a 12 to 14 hour window so that I have at least 10 hours to kind of refuel and sleep We're good to go.