The Art of Manliness - #504： How an Olympic Marathoner Trains, Eats, Recovers, and Stays Mentally Strong

00:00:00.000 Brett McKay here, and welcome to another edition of the Art of Manliness podcast.

00:00:11.140 The marathon race is one of sport's most physically demanding events.

00:00:14.360 To not just complete a marathon, but to compete in the race at its highest levels

00:00:17.480 takes an incredible amount of dedication to training, recovery, diet, and mindset.

00:00:21.640 My guest today gives us a firsthand look at what that kind of dedication and strategy look like.

00:00:25.340 His name is Jared Ward, and he placed sixth in the marathon at the 2016 Rio Olympics

00:00:29.800 and eighth in this year's Boston Marathon.

00:00:31.980 But Jared is more than just a runner.

00:00:33.420 He's also a coach, a statistics professor at BYU, a husband, and a father of four.

00:00:37.600 Today I talk to Jared about how he balances all those aspects of his life,

00:00:40.580 even as he trains for the 2020 Olympics,

00:00:42.660 and about exactly how he eats, recovers, and programs his workouts.

00:00:46.040 We also discuss how he deals with nerves before a big race

00:00:48.600 and stays in a positive mindset while he runs them.

00:00:50.960 And we end our conversation with Jared's advice for amateur runners.

00:00:53.500 After the show's over, check out our show notes at aom.is slash olympicmarathon.

00:00:57.740 Jared joins me now via clearcast.io.

00:01:10.520 All right, Jared Ward, welcome to the show.

00:01:12.960 Hey, Brett. Thanks for having me on.

00:01:14.840 So you're an Olympic marathon runner.

00:01:16.560 What was your path like getting there?

00:01:18.480 Was running something you became interested in at an early age?

00:01:20.940 Oh, man. I think every runner has a story of how they got to where they got.

00:01:26.220 I mean, I guess everyone in life has a story, and mine's a long one.

00:01:30.220 And so we'll try to give the boyfriend version instead of the girlfriend version of the story.

00:01:35.360 But I liked it in elementary school.

00:01:37.340 I liked the days when we'd run the mile in PE,

00:01:40.500 and it transitioned to me eventually being linked up with the high school coach

00:01:45.060 when I was still in junior high and beginning running with the high school team as a freshman

00:01:50.280 before I was actually in the high school.

00:01:52.480 And I really just liked it because I could race myself and I could get faster every week.

00:01:57.160 I mean, at this point, I wasn't cracking onto the varsity squad.

00:02:00.380 In fact, I think out of four freshmen on the team,

00:02:02.600 I was probably number three on the descending order list.

00:02:05.440 And so I really just loved it for this, you know, the idea that I could go out

00:02:10.800 and I could beat myself week in, week out,

00:02:13.340 and I could try to run a faster time than I ran the week before.

00:02:16.060 And then things started clicking in high school.

00:02:18.620 And, you know, grateful for a patient coach that kind of bore with me through my early JV days

00:02:25.140 and then set up some opportunities in college.

00:02:27.680 And then my college coach kind of saw me as a marathoner

00:02:30.400 even when I was running five and 10Ks in college.

00:02:32.440 And so after that was over, I continued being coached by Coach Eyestone at BYU

00:02:38.180 and started doing some marathons.

00:02:40.440 And they just kind of clicked for me.

00:02:41.940 I loved the training.

00:02:42.980 I loved the long distances.

00:02:45.680 I think that I'm kind of just built for it.

00:02:48.280 Yeah, so that's interesting.

00:02:48.940 You didn't start marathoning until after college.

00:02:51.160 Is that how most people go?

00:02:52.140 Like, do they start marathoning young?

00:02:53.560 Or is it something you typically pick up later on in your running career?

00:02:57.480 No, I'd say it's typically, at least at the kind of the high-end level,

00:03:01.860 there's often some track racing beforehand.

00:03:04.780 And I think one of the reasons for that is just that as you work that speed system

00:03:09.100 and that VO2 max type training, you sort of raise your ceiling for your potential as a marathoner.

00:03:16.160 And then you see runners kind of transition to the longer, more aerobic marathon running later in life

00:03:24.140 after they've already trained that VO2 system really well.

00:03:27.700 And I think because runners run late into life,

00:03:33.940 and we probably don't even peak aerobically into our 30s or 40s,

00:03:38.580 and I think there's even some academic cases for the opinion that we never really peak aerobically.

00:03:44.780 All that happens is our body can't keep up structurally.

00:03:48.400 Our bones and ligaments and muscles start breaking down.

00:03:51.800 And so I think it takes a long time to develop the systems to becoming a marathoner,

00:03:56.780 and there's some other things you can work on early.

00:03:58.720 And so, no, I don't think that my approach was necessarily uncommon,

00:04:03.320 but I certainly was happy at how I responded to the marathon

00:04:06.200 and really fell in love with it so early.

00:04:09.340 So right now, you're training for the 2020 Olympics, but here's the thing.

00:04:13.860 You're also a coach yourself.

00:04:15.720 You're also a statistics professor, and you're a husband and a father.

00:04:21.300 That's a lot on your plate.

00:04:22.740 I mean, what made you decide against just being a pro runner?

00:04:26.400 I think there's just too many good things in life to just enjoy doing one of them.

00:04:31.880 I don't know.

00:04:32.380 And I think I certainly cut back on distractions as we approach an Olympic cycle,

00:04:37.580 and there are phases where I focus on one aspect of life maybe a little bit more than another.

00:04:42.560 But I think that balance is a key in general to longevity.

00:04:48.200 And I found that I'm not going to run all day long.

00:04:52.780 And so I have a few choices with what I can do in those hours in between running.

00:04:57.360 And I can watch Netflix, or I can play with my kids, or I can teach a statistics class,

00:05:03.120 or coach a few other athletes.

00:05:05.160 And so I've just filled my day with things that I love.

00:05:09.160 And it's some of these other things that really fit around running nice, I think.

00:05:16.500 But I don't know.

00:05:17.160 I just think I'm a happier person when I'm doing all the stuff that I like

00:05:20.000 instead of just sitting and waiting for the next run to come around.

00:05:23.300 Right.

00:05:23.520 And I imagine that helps your running too as well.

00:05:25.620 I 100% I think so.

00:05:28.180 I think when you get too hyper-focused on one thing,

00:05:32.300 you subject yourself to being burnt out from that one thing really quickly,

00:05:35.820 or in the case of running, overtraining and finding yourself injured.

00:05:39.440 And so yeah, Brad, I mean, I think it's blessed me in a lot of ways.

00:05:43.820 I mean, are there any habits or routines that you've developed to help you find that balance?

00:05:47.980 Do you have certain times of the day where you run,

00:05:50.220 and then certain times of the day, it's like family time?

00:05:52.420 What does that look like?

00:05:53.260 Sure.

00:05:54.020 I'm trying to get up and get out the door to a morning training session as early as I can.

00:05:59.140 And on the days when I can get out the door before my kids are awake,

00:06:02.160 it normally is a little bit more smooth for me.

00:06:05.620 And then it's kind of the idea of how do I manage things when I get back.

00:06:10.240 So as soon as I walk into the door, I have four kids.

00:06:12.900 The oldest is seven, and the youngest is three months.

00:06:16.280 And so when I walk in the door, those kids are ready for dad to be home.

00:06:19.800 And so it's become a game of how can I sit in my Norma Tech boots and read a book to the kids?

00:06:25.900 Or how can I get them playing around with my vibrating meteor rollout ball and give one to them and one to me?

00:06:35.160 And we do some recovery together and get the kids stretching with me and things like that.

00:06:39.400 So yeah, I have some tricks for engaging the kids, and then they help me make breakfast and things like that.

00:06:45.560 And I have a lot of fun that way.

00:06:47.480 And then my kids are young enough that at least half of them are still napping.

00:06:51.580 And so a lot of times when it gets to 11, 12 o'clock, it's time for a kid to take a nap.

00:06:57.200 And sometimes I can peel off with that kid and put a kid to sleep and then get my rest too.

00:07:03.040 So yeah, there's tricks.

00:07:05.660 And I think it's important to dedicate time to my kids too.

00:07:08.860 And so some days, certainly it means that my kids and my wife take the front seat, and I feel running in in the cracks.

00:07:17.840 So my wife delivered our fourth baby three months ago while I was in the middle of training for Boston.

00:07:22.520 And so I bought a treadmill and put it downstairs, and I bought my kids some gymnastics equipment and put that downstairs.

00:07:27.740 And so I could take the three older kids and say, all right, we're going to go downstairs and play for an hour.

00:07:33.100 Dad's got to run, but I want to see what you guys can do on the gymnastics equipment.

00:07:36.900 And so I watch them, and they play while mom rests with the baby.

00:07:40.400 And so it takes a little bit of planning and some creativity and some willingness to shuffle things around.

00:07:46.840 But it brings me a lot of happiness to have kids and to see them grow and to be involved in some of the other stuff that I do.

00:07:52.640 So I consider it all worth it.

00:07:54.400 That's great.

00:07:54.820 I like that.

00:07:55.420 If you wanted to make it happen, you'll make it happen.

00:07:57.740 That's right.

00:07:58.760 Yeah.

00:07:59.240 So let's talk about running and sort of training your philosophy towards training and recovery and all that stuff.

00:08:04.220 Because I know there's a lot of people who listen to the podcast who are runners or who want to get into running.

00:08:09.040 I'm sure you'd have some great insights.

00:08:10.480 But let's just look at your training schedule right now.

00:08:13.520 Like how many days, miles are you running a week right now?

00:08:17.840 So I just ran the Boston Marathon 10 days ago.

00:08:22.520 And so I'm just getting back into it right now.

00:08:25.080 I ran six or seven miles yesterday and I did a little kind of a speed play 10-mile run today where I went a couple minutes faster and then slowed down for a couple minutes and kind of testing things out and making sure that everything's feeling good.

00:08:39.780 And I like to be pretty cautious coming off of marathons to make sure that I'm recovered before I really put the throttle back down again.

00:08:46.820 But in general, I train six days a week.

00:08:50.080 I take Sundays off and that's a day for family and a day for church.

00:08:55.080 And so I don't train Sundays.

00:08:58.020 Occasionally, I'll race on a Sunday, but I prefer not to.

00:09:01.520 And then the other six days, I'll have harder workouts on Tuesday, Thursday and a long run on Saturday and fill it in with mileage totaling somewhere between 100 and 120 miles a week, depending on where we're at in the training and intensity and things like that.

00:09:17.820 And then throw in a couple of lifts and probably two or three hours of cross training on the exercise bike, normally downstairs with my kids watching Coco or Moana or whatever they're into.

00:09:32.340 Well, let's talk.

00:09:32.960 We talk about strength, right?

00:09:34.620 I want to talk about that.

00:09:35.520 But let's talk about how do you program yourself or maybe other folks as well.

00:09:40.440 Like, you know, I do barbell training and so I'm typically looking at like three months of like training where your first couple weeks you're doing volume and then you increase the intensity a bit and then eventually you peak.

00:09:53.880 Is there something similar that goes on with your training, like where you sort of break things into cycles?

00:09:58.460 Yes, absolutely.

00:09:59.800 And, you know, I consider a training cycle around the same as conventional for lifting.

00:10:05.940 And my lifting cycle kind of mirrors in terms of what we're doing in the running stuff.

00:10:12.420 And so, yeah, it's a 12 to 16 week cycle, maybe as long as 20 weeks if I'm starting really from ground zero or when I'm coaching athletes that are really starting from ground zero.

00:10:24.360 And then we build into it.

00:10:27.020 And so, you know, it's a volume phase at the beginning where for running and for lifting, we're building up volume and resiliency to training.

00:10:34.720 And then we go into kind of more of a strength phase where we're doing tempo runs and marathon pace stuff.

00:10:41.820 And we're gradually increasing volume as our body adjusts to that.

00:10:47.260 And then towards the end, there's a little bit more of a speed segment where you cut down on volume and intensity gets a little bit higher.

00:10:52.940 I think in the marathon, that training is a little bit more subtle than if it was, you know, a 5K or a 10K where you'd really jump into the speed.

00:11:02.760 The reality is in a marathon, you're never going to be hitting oxygen debt.

00:11:06.440 And so it becomes very important to train the aerobic system and then to be well rested and tapered up before the race.

00:11:13.460 And so I think in marathon training, we see, you know, this building phase and then our strength phase slowly transitions to a little bit of a speed phase.

00:11:23.120 But on paper, you might look at it and say, no, that's still very much strength.

00:11:26.340 But there is a little bit of that.

00:11:28.420 And then certainly in the lifting, you know, I'm doing sets of, you know, sets of 8 to 10 really early in this segment.

00:11:35.140 And then I'm doing sets of 7 and sets of 5 and then sets of 3 towards the end.

00:11:39.380 And so very much follows kind of the conventional periodization of training.

00:11:44.380 And what does your strength training look like?

00:11:45.940 So you talk about the set, you're doing volume and then increasing intensity while dropping off volume.

00:11:50.020 What kind of lifts are you doing?

00:11:52.160 So power lifts, you know, Olympic lifts like cleans and snatches, squats and lunges and step ups, a little bit of time on my hamstrings, RDLs.

00:12:02.880 Or, you know, I love Russian leans or Nordic curls, those kind of exercises.

00:12:09.120 And then I leave about 6 minutes at the end of my workout for a push and a pull on my arms.

00:12:14.140 And that's about all I do up top.

00:12:16.780 But my lifting isn't, you know, this massive, long workout.

00:12:20.260 You know, it probably takes me on average 40 or 50 minutes to do where I'm doing some sort of Olympic lift.

00:12:27.240 I'm doing some sort of, you know, something like squats or lunges.

00:12:31.520 And maybe I'm supersetting that with some sort of plyometric.

00:12:34.720 And then I'm doing some hamstring work and I'm pushing a pull on my arms.

00:12:37.380 So, you know, it's very much ancillary to what I'm doing as a marathon runner.

00:12:42.900 But I think it makes a difference.

00:12:44.520 And there's a lot of research out there, the compelling research that says that, you know, when you lift and when you lift heavy, it makes you a more efficient endurance athlete.

00:12:53.580 And so when it comes to running, you know, you force, you know, we do the same running motion day after day.

00:13:00.540 Your muscles are going to slowly lose the volume of firing capacity in them because you don't need to fire every muscle fiber to push yourself for the next step on a 10-mile run.

00:13:11.440 But you get under a heavy bar and you're squatting and you get down there in the bottom of a squat.

00:13:16.700 You demand a lot more of your body.

00:13:18.560 And so the theory behind that of why we see runners more efficient is that it just, you know, it makes a difference in terms of the volume of fibers you have activating for you.

00:13:29.220 And I just feel better when I'm lifting.

00:13:31.000 I feel better when I'm strong.

00:13:32.180 I feel like I recover a little bit faster.

00:13:33.980 I'm a little more resilient to injury.

00:13:35.360 And so it's an important part of my training cycle, but it's not a very, you know, in terms of the percentage of time I spend lifting, it's a very small part of my training.

00:13:45.980 And where do you fit in your strength training?

00:13:48.560 So you're running in the morning?

00:13:50.140 Are you lifting in the afternoon?

00:13:51.440 Is that what it looks like?

00:13:52.960 Yeah.

00:13:53.460 So, you know, on most days I run twice a day.

00:13:56.960 And so on my hard days, you know, I'll lift after hard workouts.

00:14:00.900 So typically coach has things set up for my more interval-like training or tempo runs on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

00:14:09.300 And so, you know, I'll run that in the morning and then I'll come back in the afternoon and do a shorter run before a lift to kind of warm up.

00:14:16.680 And then I'll do my lift on those hard days.

00:14:18.680 I like my easy days as really recovery days.

00:14:21.440 And so I want the days in between my hard workouts to be rest.

00:14:25.680 And so I kind of try to pack it all into one day and then allow myself some recovery time.

00:14:31.120 We'll talk about recovery here in a bit.

00:14:32.600 What's your approach when you're training, when you have a day?

00:14:35.700 Like, so like, you know, when you plan a program cycle, you are trying to pre-plan the stress that you put into your body so you can recover and adapt.

00:14:44.600 But then there's other stuff that comes into life, like, you know, the kids up until three o'clock in the morning throwing up.

00:14:50.500 You have a bad night of sleep, which adds more stress to the body.

00:14:53.860 How do you manage that?

00:14:57.040 Like, are there days where you have to back off a bit and then ramp up again?

00:15:01.060 Absolutely.

00:15:01.860 And I think that is key to long-term sustainable improvement.

00:15:07.240 If you just put your head down and push through, you're liable to get injured.

00:15:10.180 And I think, you know, when I was in college and even just out of college, you know, three and four and five years ago as an early marathoner, I think I kind of did that.

00:15:20.380 I just put my head down and said, okay, I'm in the training cycle, so no matter what happens, I'm hitting this workout.

00:15:24.740 And these are the paces I hit this workout in last time, so I got to hit the same paces this time.

00:15:29.160 And to a certain extent, it worked.

00:15:30.820 You know, my body was young enough to recover and handle that mentality.

00:15:37.280 And as I've gotten a little bit older, and I just turned 30, and so I'm not super old, but I feel older, and I don't recover as fast.

00:15:46.620 And what I've had to learn is that I really do need to take those kind of things into consideration.

00:15:51.720 And sometimes I wake up and say, you know what, today's not the day.

00:15:54.620 So it's either going to be the same workout, but at 70% or 80%, or it's going to be, we're just going to take another easy day-to-day, and we'll talk with coach, and we'll replan this workout when I'm ready for it.

00:16:05.140 And I think this mentality that really has developed for me over this last year has been to just let the fitness come.

00:16:14.700 And so instead of trying to force some sort of result or force the weight or the times in training, I just say, you know what, it's an effort-based thing.

00:16:26.020 I've run long enough that I know what things should feel like when I'm healthy, and I know what pushing too hard is.

00:16:31.020 And so I just let the fitness come and try to be a little bit more patient, and I've had a lot of success with that.

00:16:36.660 I ran my best marathon time in Boston just a week and a half ago.

00:16:41.480 And if you looked at my training, there weren't really any fireworks workouts.

00:16:45.780 There weren't anything where if you compared them with other training cycles that you'd say, oh, man, he's running faster than he's ever run before.

00:16:53.020 That just wasn't the case.

00:16:53.940 But in general, the big picture was much better.

00:16:56.940 There were less peaks, but there were less valleys.

00:17:00.760 And I feel like I learned something about staying consistent and being patient.

00:17:04.880 And so, yeah, you got to.

00:17:06.600 And especially as you get older, you got to listen to your body.

00:17:09.520 You got to respect your body, and you got to take care of it.

00:17:13.180 Well, let's talk about recovery.

00:17:14.940 What's your approach to recovery?

00:17:16.240 So you mentioned some things you're doing.

00:17:17.440 You're doing the Norma Tech.

00:17:18.620 You're doing the vibrating massage ball.

00:17:21.540 Tell us more about that.

00:17:23.040 So I married my high school sweetheart from high school, actually.

00:17:25.700 We met on the track team.

00:17:27.220 But when we got married, she had been considering massage therapy school, of which I was 100% supportive.

00:17:34.120 And so she ended up going to massage therapy school and is a licensed massage therapist.

00:17:38.700 And that's been a big blessing.

00:17:40.640 And so if I come home and something has flared up, she has me on the couch within minutes of walking in.

00:17:47.620 And she's working on it.

00:17:49.180 And I think that quick attention to injury has been beneficial over the last many, many years of our marriage and of me competing.

00:17:58.600 I also have another massage therapist that I see sometimes when things are just too crazy at home with the kids.

00:18:03.720 And I try to make it a point in training to get to him once every week or every other week.

00:18:09.560 And then I'm still close at BYU, training with my same coach and, in fact, running with the guys on the team occasionally.

00:18:16.880 And the trainers and physical therapists at BYU have been so nice to continue to spend some time with me when I have something flare up or when I need some attention there.

00:18:25.760 And chiropractors.

00:18:27.320 And so I do try to make sure I'm staying on top of these things.

00:18:32.280 And when something flares up, you want to get some attention to it really quickly.

00:18:36.200 And so the Norma take and the vibrating meteor ball and some of those kind of self-massaging stuff I'm definitely using at home.

00:18:45.560 But I'm taking advantage of a lot of things.

00:18:48.280 And I do, I think it's made a difference when you're trying to perform as high as your potential is.

00:18:56.580 You're putting your body under a lot of stress.

00:18:59.360 And I think it comes back to respecting your body and respecting recovery as much as you respect putting your head down and training hard.

00:19:08.320 Well, you mentioned you take Sunday off once a week.

00:19:11.520 Are there periods in your training or during the year where you might take a week or two off?

00:19:15.880 Or are you always running and you just might taper off and just do a slow jog on those days where you just need to – or those weeks where you need some time off?

00:19:24.900 Really, unless in the sake of injury and that I really just need to take a minute and reset and get things healthy again, the only time that I take off besides Sundays are right after a marathon.

00:19:37.060 And I'll give myself, gosh, a solid week of at least little, you know, if you're going to call it training, it's 20-minute runs at much slower than I typically run.

00:19:49.400 And it's more just jogs to try to get my legs feeling better and get a little blood flow in there.

00:19:53.400 It's hopping on a spin bike and spinning for a few minutes.

00:19:56.260 And sometimes those weeks after marathons are just totally off.

00:19:59.200 I don't do anything.

00:20:00.340 And so I would say I give myself really two weeks of pretty solid recovery after a marathon.

00:20:07.240 So, you know, the second week it's kind of phasing back in and making sure that I'm healthy and things like that.

00:20:13.040 And then it's just kind of listening to things and, you know, listening to my body.

00:20:16.620 And if we get to the end of a season that doesn't end with a marathon, sometimes there still is, you know, a week or two that I just need to take off and reset.

00:20:25.800 And I think the reset is as much mental as it is physical.

00:20:28.720 So for some people, they can wake up the day after a marathon and they can go out for a run and they can continue running every day.

00:20:35.400 And it's still a good reset time because they've let go of things mentally and it just works for them.

00:20:39.260 And for me, the diet aspect and the training aspect and the focus aspect has just been so much that I'm ready to just say, you know what, I don't want to think about that for a few days.

00:20:52.700 And that ends up being a really, I don't know, relaxing and I think a very positive mental thing for me.

00:20:59.320 Okay, we're going to take a quick break for your word from our sponsors.

00:21:03.100 And now back to the show.

00:21:04.840 What does it feel like?

00:21:05.800 How do you feel after you finish a marathon?

00:21:07.920 And like, are you like fine, like immediately, immediately afterwards?

00:21:10.680 And then like the next day, you just feel like someone's beating you with a hammer.

00:21:14.880 Is that what it's like?

00:21:15.760 It's like when I do like when I do powerlifting meets, like I feel fine as soon as I'm done with it.

00:21:19.640 But like the next day when I wake up, I feel terrible.

00:21:22.060 Yeah, and that's so when someone who's never run a marathon asked me how it feels after a marathon, that's normally what I say is I say, you know that day, you know, you've taken off the off season, you go back into the gym and you squat really heavy.

00:21:35.520 And then two days later, you're trying to walk downstairs.

00:21:38.120 That's kind of how it feels.

00:21:39.360 And I think in the marathon, you do feel, I mean, I was feeling pretty, you walk slow.

00:21:45.340 As soon as you hit the finish line and your body's done, things start shutting down.

00:21:48.820 You know, you've been pushing your body for longer than it's said you could.

00:21:52.960 And so there, you know, I'm walking slow that day, you know, even just like walking, you know, up the steps into the hotel, I'm holding on to the rail and kind of helping myself up.

00:22:03.380 But then that seems like nothing compared to how it feels when you wake up the next day and roll out of bed or when you wake up two days later and roll out of bed.

00:22:11.880 So, yeah, you definitely get some of that delayed onset soreness that two days after the marathon is certainly onset.

00:22:20.960 And then a couple of days later, you start to feel normal again.

00:22:24.220 And the first few jogs feel a little weird.

00:22:27.600 Like sometimes it just feels like your muscles aren't quite firing right.

00:22:31.240 And there's, I don't know if there's any other way to explain it.

00:22:33.560 You're kind of back in terms of the soreness is gone, but it just feels funny.

00:22:37.600 And then normally after, you know, a week or two, it's kind of back to normal.

00:22:43.440 Well, you mentioned diet.

00:22:44.540 What's your diet like?

00:22:45.700 And does it change depending on where you're at in your training cycle?

00:22:49.200 Absolutely.

00:22:49.980 I think, you know, certainly a part of being a marathoner is trying to keep a lean and light frame.

00:22:56.200 But I think the bigger part of it is fueling with things that are going to recover you and give you the energy to keep training.

00:23:04.500 And so, you know, I kind of, I picture my snapshot of my diet would be, I start the day thinking, okay, I need probably 1500 calories just to live.

00:23:16.360 And then for about every mile that I'm running, I need another hundred calories.

00:23:20.760 And then if I have a lift, I need a little bit extra there.

00:23:23.440 And if I have some cross training, I need a little bit extra there.

00:23:26.400 And so I very much start the day looking at what my training is going to be and how much that means I need to replenish in my body through the process.

00:23:33.900 And then I break up the day in terms of saying, okay, I need a snack before I run, normally high carb.

00:23:39.540 I need to get something in right after I run because that's going to help with recovery.

00:23:43.440 And so that needs to have a little bit of protein in it, but be mostly carbohydrates.

00:23:47.380 And then, you know, in my meals, I'm saying, okay, I need to get a good chunk of protein in here and I need to get, you know, eat for volume.

00:23:55.280 You know, I tend to be just so hungry that I'm pushing the vegetables and things like that just for some volume.

00:24:01.160 And then healthy fats, like I think that I, well, I've had some genetic testing done and it seems that my body metabolizes fat really well, which would indicate that I'd be able to respond to a marathon well.

00:24:16.480 And frankly, that's what I crave.

00:24:18.060 I crave the savory kind of fatty stuff.

00:24:20.760 You know, I'm eating nuts or nut butters.

00:24:22.660 I'm putting avocado on salads or sandwiches and things like that, trying to get, you know, healthy dosage of fats integrated into my diet as well.

00:24:31.300 So, and that's kind of the snapshot, if you will.

00:24:35.740 I've, you know, I've found that eating right after exercising is critical if I'm hoping to exercise later that day.

00:24:42.100 Just jumpstarts recovery, glycogen stores are most receptive to being replenished in the 30 minutes following exercise.

00:24:49.160 And I feel that.

00:24:51.220 And then also getting a little protein in right before I go to bed seems to help me not wake up starving in the middle of the night and just helps me feel a little bit better in the mornings.

00:24:59.280 Are you tracking macros or are you just sort of like, well, I need a little bit of protein, a little bit of fat?

00:25:03.360 No, absolutely tracking macros.

00:25:05.460 And I counted calories very meticulously for a time in my life.

00:25:10.400 And I feel like that exercise, you know, sometimes we get discouraged about embarking on new things, especially as it relates to diet.

00:25:18.520 You know, it feels so, so lifelong and limiting and we are imagining all the desserts that we're going to go without or whatever.

00:25:25.520 But I felt like just the experience of tracking my macronutrients for an extended period of time, and maybe you only need a couple weeks of that, but I did it for a couple months.

00:25:35.540 I feel like that exercise gave me a really good handle of just looking at food and knowing roughly what I'm getting from that.

00:25:43.280 And so, you know, I don't have a notepad or an app on my phone in my back pocket that I'm entering in stuff as soon as I eat it, but I have a macro count going on in my head every day, going through the day, making sure that I'm keeping myself fueled and that I'm getting my, you know, what's about 150 grams of protein in at least every day and making sure that I'm getting enough in that I can continue to train the next day.

00:26:11.800 And what's your take about like low carb eating or intermittent fasting?

00:26:17.020 Because I've, in the past few years, I've seen a lot of long distance runners like swear by it.

00:26:22.060 Like this is the thing that's a game changer for them, but other ones who say, well, no, it's like the high carb actually is what we need.

00:26:27.760 So what's your approach to that?

00:26:29.500 So I think there's certainly merit to it.

00:26:31.760 And there's, I mean, maybe the merit in itself is just that you and I and many others have heard stories of people going on these low carb diets and then running really well.

00:26:41.800 I think as it relates to really high level metabolism, I mean, when I'm running a marathon, you know, my heart rate is probably in the 160s, maybe as high as 170 and I'm, you know, I'm cranking through fuel.

00:26:58.460 And so when I've talked with nutritionists, you know, some of the research that has applied in general and has indicated that these kind of keto like diets could be beneficial for endurance athletes, their opinion is that in my case, I still need a very high carb diet just because of the rate at which I'm burning fuel.

00:27:18.040 And I, you know, and I think that, you know, I'm, I'm blessed to have a metabolism that metabolizes fat at a pretty good rate already, which, which seems to be one of the reasons to kind of cycle is to, to train your body to metabolize that fat.

00:27:30.900 And so in my case, um, I'm still relatively high carb, you know, probably 50 to 60% of my caloric intake is carbs, but, but relative to the guys that I'm racing against, that's, that's fairly low.

00:27:44.080 You know, I'd say you look at like the, the East African diet, they're, they're probably eating more like 70 to 80% carbs.

00:27:50.400 And so, I don't know, I'm, I'm an advocate of a balanced diet.

00:27:54.820 I'm an advocate of just these whole foods and eating what your mom would put on your plate.

00:27:59.680 And, uh, and that kind of a mentality as it comes to fueling.

00:28:03.840 So you mentioned earlier about running is often like there's a psychological aspect of it.

00:28:08.100 There's a, it's a mental game.

00:28:09.260 Um, how do you keep yourself from being bored or getting burnt out from your workouts where it's just, man, you're pounding pavement day in and day out year after year?

00:28:20.540 Well, you just have to bite off what you can chew right now and try to not look so far in the future that you can't fathom it.

00:28:27.220 I mean, as it relates to the marathon, I, I mean, I think, you know, we, we talk about hitting the wall in the marathon, right.

00:28:34.320 And around miles 16 or 18 or wherever it is, runners experience this effect where all of a sudden it feels like you're, you're pushing into a wall.

00:28:44.440 And I don't think that it's so much one step where burning glycogen.

00:28:49.320 And then the next step we're out of glycogen and we're burning fat or, or some, you know, crazy thing like that.

00:28:55.140 As so much as it is, you look up and you see mile 16.

00:28:58.580 And for the first time in the race, you say, oh no, there's 10 miles left.

00:29:02.600 And I don't know if I can make it.

00:29:04.600 And that, oh no moment can be so debilitating.

00:29:08.780 Um, I remember running, you know, I was competing in, um, in Rio in the Olympics in 2016.

00:29:15.740 The, the lead pack made a, made a move to separate.

00:29:19.980 Um, there were probably 50 of us running together.

00:29:21.940 And then the guy who ended up winning the race, um, took off and there were a few guys that went with him.

00:29:27.880 And I was kind of in that middle ground of not really going with him, but not really running with the other guys.

00:29:33.240 And there were a couple of us in the middle ground, but I, I started thinking, oh no, I actually don't feel that good.

00:29:37.780 And I'm, you know, 10, 11 miles from the finish line.

00:29:41.100 And I don't know what's going to happen.

00:29:42.260 And, you know, and then I start thinking all these what ifs, well, I'm, I'm running with team USA on my chest.

00:29:48.260 What if I can't do this?

00:29:49.420 What if I'm not tough enough for it?

00:29:50.840 What, you know, what's all of these people, what's coach going to think?

00:29:54.080 And what's my wife going to think? 1.00

00:29:55.360 And, um, and, you know, I think when you, when you take yourself out of the present, one step in front of the other and take yourself into this world of the future, you open yourself up to anxiety.

00:30:08.960 And that's what I was feeling.

00:30:10.340 My, and my sports psychologist in college would always say, fear and anxiety live in the future, regret and remorse live in the past.

00:30:17.180 None of those emotions exist in the present.

00:30:18.800 And so he conditioned me to, when I start feeling anxious, um, or regret or anything like emotions, like those to think, Jared, you're not living in the present.

00:30:28.700 You've got to figure out how to get yourself back to the present.

00:30:30.680 And so in this middle of this Olympic race, I started thinking, okay, what can I do?

00:30:35.540 And my next water bottle was in two miles.

00:30:39.120 And I thought, you know what?

00:30:40.360 I don't know if I can make it to the finish line, but I know I can make it two more miles to my next water bottle.

00:30:44.740 So that's all I focused on.

00:30:46.020 I focused on keeping form and rhythm and getting in my next water bottle.

00:30:49.660 And I got there and I drank it and thought, I don't know if I can make it eight more miles, but I know I can make it two more miles to my next water bottle.

00:30:56.220 And that became the theme for the rest of that run was getting water bottle to water bottle and then looking up and seeing the guy in front of me and saying, you know what?

00:31:04.220 I don't know if I can get to the finish line, but I know I can catch that guy and, um, working my way up.

00:31:09.580 And, you know, and I ended up surprising myself at the finish line, having worked all the way up to sixth place, which is, which is higher than I thought that, that I could have finished.

00:31:20.800 And I think what got me there, um, was the reality of just running the mile that I was in and, uh, and trying to live in the present.

00:31:29.440 And when I thought back to, Hey, you know, 10, 11 miles ago, I was thinking, I don't even know if I can make it to the finish line.

00:31:34.780 And then I made it to the finish line in sixth.

00:31:36.520 And so I think it can be a pretty powerful exercise to find something that motivates you and something that you can say to yourself or something you can do that gets your mind back to right now and just bites off the chunk that you can manage.

00:31:50.180 And so, I mean, cause you're just thinking about the, the now, like, but like, do you, what do you do to manage the nerves?

00:31:55.100 Like before the race starts before you've actually, the, you know, the starting gun went, goes off.

00:31:59.780 Like, do you get nerves before the race or do they, is that not an issue for you?

00:32:04.680 Sure, sure.

00:32:05.180 I think, you know, almost everyone feels nerves and the more times I race and the more times other people race, they, I think we, we become a little bit more accustomed to it.

00:32:14.120 But, but the reality is that before the race starts, the race hasn't started yet.

00:32:19.420 And so it doesn't, I don't know how much good it does to worry about what might or might not happen, you know, a mile into the race, you know, with the exception of, you know, we got to have a race plan and things like that.

00:32:31.860 But an hour before the race, you're nervous.

00:32:34.380 What I think about is, okay, I just need to make sure my shoes are tied tight.

00:32:37.600 I need to get one more sweep of water.

00:32:39.180 I need to make sure I'm warmed up properly.

00:32:40.740 Like, focus on the things that matter and are relevant to what you're doing right now, as opposed to just stressing about what might happen in the future.

00:32:50.680 I think, I think we can always, almost always, we can use the argument, well, I'm not there yet, so what can I do right now that's going to help me when I get there?

00:33:02.020 And I, and I think that type of a mentality, um, can maybe help eliminate some of that anxiety.

00:33:08.560 Well, let's shift gears to sort of beginner runners.

00:33:11.980 You, I mean, you coach people from all walks of life.

00:33:14.220 You have your own coach.

00:33:15.760 I'm sure some of the people that you, that you coach are just getting started.

00:33:19.560 When you start coaching people who like, they want to start, they want to run a marathon.

00:33:24.000 Maybe they've never run a marathon before.

00:33:25.900 Um, what are the most common mistakes you see them fall into when they're first getting started?

00:33:30.640 Uh, honestly, I think it's getting just so excited about what we're doing that we don't exercise any restraint.

00:33:37.200 You know, when you're looking at like, you know, I'm going to use a comparison of Michael Phelps swimming.

00:33:42.840 And, you know, when he's getting into, you know, we're coming up on an Olympics, we're hearing stories of how much he eats and how many hours he's spending in the pool and things like that.

00:33:52.540 And, and for runners, we need to train this aerobic system, but we need our, our legs not to break.

00:33:58.200 Uh, running is an impact sport.

00:34:00.120 And so it's, it's not like you can jump in the pool and just, you know, hammer yourself day after day and kind of wait for your body to catch up.

00:34:09.180 We've got to be careful not to get broken.

00:34:10.980 And so I think what I, what I advise my, my new athletes and new athletes in terms of new to the sport of running is just to be, be careful about how you're increasing intensity and volume and do it gradually.

00:34:25.760 And I think if you can get onto some program that's sustainable, it's going to do you so much more good in the long run than if you just get hyper excited about this new fad that you're into and you train hard for two months.

00:34:37.680 And then you get shin splints and you have to take two weeks off and then you're frustrated at having to take two weeks off.

00:34:44.540 And so you get back into it and you're ready to train again and you hammer it again for two months and then guess what you're injured again.

00:34:50.260 And, um, and so I think to me, the best approach is to try to be patient and sustainable.

00:34:55.980 And it doesn't mean we don't push cause we still push.

00:34:59.080 You still have hard days, but it means after a hard day, you wake up the next day and say, you know what?

00:35:03.940 I need to exercise some restraint and take it a little bit easy today.

00:35:06.760 Cause we pushed hard yesterday and you know, I increased volume last week.

00:35:10.920 And so this week I need to just keep the volume the same, even though I feel good.

00:35:14.340 And so, uh, you know, I think it becomes the coach's job to exercise a little bit of big picture restraint and it becomes the athlete's job to pay attention to how you feel day to day.

00:35:24.200 And when you're tired, listening to that, and when you feel good, taking advantage of feeling good subject to the restraint that your coach or your supervisor has given you in terms of your weekly volume and your intensity and workouts.

00:35:37.500 When a person who's, you know, transitioning from say doing a, like the weekend 5k to like their first marathon, what is it?

00:35:44.400 I mean, it's going to be different for every, for every athlete, but like sort of broadly speaking, what does that look like?

00:35:49.440 How long does it take for someone who's never run a marathon before to work up to that point where they can do a marathon?

00:35:57.320 Well, you know, if you're already running a 5k, then, then you're, you're a lot further along than someone who's not running at all.

00:36:04.320 So, so those, those are different approaches.

00:36:07.020 So someone who's not running at all, we're going to start with some, some walking and some walking slash jogging.

00:36:12.840 And, and it's probably going to take someone coming off their couch, at least in, in how I like to train a 5k for a 5k.

00:36:21.440 It's going to probably take someone coming off their couch to me two or three months before I say, okay, let's put you in a 5k. 0.85

00:36:28.020 And then, but, but I think once you're running three miles, I don't know that it's that crazy to think about building up to a marathon.

00:36:35.920 Now it seems crazy on paper, but when I was in college training for 5ks and 10ks, and then transitioned to running the marathon, I think you'd be surprised at similarities in my training.

00:36:47.620 You know, in college, you know, I probably went to running 20 or 30% more volume per week.

00:36:52.920 And maybe not even quite that much.

00:36:54.860 Maybe it was more like 15 to 25% more volume.

00:36:58.800 And my long runs got a little longer and my intervals got a little bit longer and a little bit shorter.

00:37:04.680 So, you know, instead of running mile repeats on the track, I was running two, two mile repeats on the road.

00:37:09.680 And so instead of doing four or five by mile, I was doing three by two mile.

00:37:14.160 And so it wasn't maybe as drastic of a change as you might think.

00:37:18.900 And so for someone who's transitioning from, hey, I ran a 5k and I just want to run a marathon.

00:37:23.740 We start with saying, okay, let's leave your training the same, except for your weekend long run.

00:37:29.560 And let's start gradually building volume to a weekly long run.

00:37:33.220 And then as we start adjusting to that volume, we might make a couple of changes to their midweek workouts or their weekly mileage in general with the in excess to the additional mileage they're going to get from a longer weekend long run.

00:37:47.160 But I think that's the big picture is just getting that volume up on that one day a week.

00:37:51.760 And if we can build to, you know, 15, 16, 17 miles on a long run, then when I taper you off and you're well rested, I think you're ready to run a marathon.

00:38:01.300 Okay. So it's not that, not rocket science.

00:38:04.940 No, no, it's not. And I think it's, it's more doable than you might think.

00:38:08.640 Yeah. Oh yeah. I mean, to me, like you say, I've done, I can do a 5k, probably not great, but knowing that I could do a 5k that I could work up to a marathon.

00:38:16.540 That's, that's, that gives me hope.

00:38:18.820 Yeah. Give me 16 weeks with you, man. We'll get, okay.

00:38:21.480 All right. We'll, we'll see. I might take you up on that.

00:38:24.740 Maybe we'll do it, do it. Take me up on it. We might have to cut back on your lifting a little bit, but.

00:38:29.180 Oh no, that's my gains.

00:38:31.300 My precious gains. Well, so you mentioned, uh, injuries. Um, that's shin splints is a common one.

00:38:36.580 Like, yeah. Runners often, I mean, some of these guys, they're just injuring themselves left and right.

00:38:41.920 What's the common cause of all these injuries is just pushing yourself too hard. Uh, is that what it is?

00:38:47.000 Well, I think so. You know, if we, you know, if you, if you, uh, were to say, you know, for the, the average middle age runner that hasn't really done anything super active since high school or, or maybe college, you know, you take 10 years and you do a lot of sitting and a lot of walking.

00:39:04.600 And then you go to running, you're, you're, you're using a lot of muscles very differently than you've used them for the last decade.

00:39:10.260 Right. And so while the ambition might be there and while you still might have that same high school athlete mind, you've got to be a little bit patient with, um, with where your body's at.

00:39:19.580 And there are things we can do to help. Right. I mean, I think if you're, if you're into the wrong pair of shoes, a pair of shoes, that's not, not agreeing with the way that your foot's shaped or the way that you make contact with the ground or things like that, then that's certainly going to lead to a higher likelihood of getting injured.

00:39:38.180 But I, but I do think you're right, Brett, in general, it's just that we're not, we're just not being quite patient enough as we build up and, and it's a hard balance.

00:39:46.780 And I get it, you know, when, when we decide we want to do something, we want that thing done yesterday. And so, and that's, that's part of the, you know, that's the beauty of, of, and the curse of, of high achieving minds is that when, when you set yourself out to something, you want it done right now.

00:40:04.780 And, um, and I think we just have to be a little bit patient with the process and, and hopefully still have some of those days where we can say, Hey, you know what, let's, uh, let's turn it loose. Let's run. Let's see what happens.

00:40:15.020 But, um, but then on the flip side of that coin, coming back and saying, okay, now let's look at what we were doing three months ago.

00:40:22.360 And we're doing quite a bit more now than we were doing three months ago. So maybe it's time to exercise some restraint.

00:40:27.520 So let's, uh, geek out with some statistics here. You did your thesis for your master's, uh, on, in statistics on analyzing runners split times in the St. George marathon.

00:40:37.760 Uh, what were your key takeaways about ideal pacing from analyzing?

00:40:42.940 Um, man, I had so much fun with that project and I, and I realized, um, I realized that, uh, that I'm labeling myself as a nerd right here and I'm okay with that.

00:40:53.100 Um, that, that was a fun way for me to, to cross the paths, I guess, or the, the interests of running and of, uh, and of the research and the analytics that I do statistics.

00:41:05.260 And so, um, we had some cool takeaways. I, you know, I was working with this data before I had run my first marathon.

00:41:11.160 So I was acutely interested in what the data said and, uh, and what we could learn from, from, uh, people competing in the St. George marathon.

00:41:18.900 And we really, we, we used Boston qualifiers, uh, or runners that hit a Boston qualifying mark as our indicator of, um, faster runners in this data set.

00:41:30.440 And so, so you could argue that, uh, it may or may not apply directly to, to kind of Olympic level athletes.

00:41:37.600 But, um, but what we learned was that the people who qualified for Boston were being a lot more patient in their pace.

00:41:44.380 So relative to their average pace, they were starting more conservative.

00:41:47.960 They did a better job at taking advantage of downhills.

00:41:50.540 And I think some of that related to the more average runners, just, um, you know, coming out of the gates so hard at the beginning that by the time they got to, to incredible downhill portions later in the race that they otherwise could have taken advantage of their, their legs were hammered.

00:42:04.920 And so we, we just saw a lot of, you know, it seemed like over and over we were seeing patience is better.

00:42:11.520 Patience is better.

00:42:12.760 Um, you know, exercise some restraint, save it for the downhill sections later to take advantage and bank up some time later.

00:42:19.040 We also saw that ladies do a better job at, uh, exercising this pacing restraint than men do. 1.00

00:42:25.100 It might not come as a surprise, um, to us, but, uh, uh, uh, and then, you know, that as runners age, they got a little bit better at pacing.

00:42:33.720 And so, um, I think it was also encouraging to think that even after a runner has maybe passed their physical prime, they might still be able to expect to see lifetime best performances because they're getting a little bit smarter as they learn how to pace and, uh, and train just a little bit better.

00:42:52.460 So, so kind of some cool stuff, but, uh, and you could argue that it wasn't earth shattering, but it, but it validated a few thoughts like start patient before my first marathon.

00:43:03.020 And, and, and some things like that, that I think, um, contributed at least in some small ways, uh, before I really had any marathon experience under my belt.

00:43:11.580 Are you still like looking at data and using your statistics chops to shape your own training or how you approach races?

00:43:18.920 Sure.

00:43:19.500 You know, we are working on a project still, um, analyzing kind of how stride length and stride rate changes across the course of a marathon and how that maybe relates to fatigue and some other things like that.

00:43:31.200 And so, um, so yes, I'm, I'm always interested in new research.

00:43:34.760 I'm interested in what the research says for getting ready for a hot marathon.

00:43:37.760 And I'm interested in what the research says as it relates to lifting and interested in what research says as it relates to oxygen uptake requirements and different types of running shoes.

00:43:47.380 And can we come up with optimal running shoes for running the marathon and, and design those and things like that.

00:43:52.880 And so, so yeah, I think I'm, I'm certainly excited about that kind of stuff, but you know, ultimately the, the gold standard is experience.

00:44:01.100 And in every marathon that I run, I learn something else about myself and something else about the marathon.

00:44:06.560 And I think while the data and the analytics provide some good counsel in general, everybody's so different that the gold standard for you and anybody else should be your own personal experience.

00:44:18.600 And, and so the data can help when you're in an early marathoner, but as you, you know, as you become more experienced, I would, I would more heavily weight your experience to data in general.

00:44:30.120 Well, Jared, this has been a great conversation.

00:44:31.640 Is there someplace people can go to learn more about your work and what you do?

00:44:34.220 Sure. So I'm, I try to be active on my social media.

00:44:37.860 So Jay Wardy 21 on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, and try to keep you updated on, on all the upcoming fun.

00:44:47.080 Well, Jared Ward, thanks for your time. It's been a pleasure.

00:44:49.440 Hey, thanks a million, Brett.

00:44:50.740 My guest there is Jared Ward. He's an Olympic marathon runner.

00:44:53.360 You can follow what he's doing at his Twitter account at at Jay Wardy 21, or check out his website, coachjaredward.com, where you find information about his coaching services.

00:45:02.420 If that's something you're interested in.

00:45:03.600 Also check out our show notes at aom.is slash Olympic marathon, where you can find links to resources, where you can delve deeper into this topic.

00:45:10.220 Well, that wraps up another edition of the AOM podcast. Check out our website, artofmanlios.com, where you can find all of our podcast archives. There's over 500 there.

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00:45:49.680 As always, thank you for the continued support.

00:45:51.760 Until next time, this is Brett McKay reminding you not only to listen to the AOM podcast, but put what you've heard into action.

00:45:56.660 We'll see you next time.

The Art of Manliness - May 01, 2019

#504： How an Olympic Marathoner Trains, Eats, Recovers, and Stays Mentally Strong

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