308. Sub-2 Hour Marathon Fueling, The High Carb Plus Bicarb Era, Strides v. Plyometrics Study, Supershoe Evolution, and Iron Theories!

Summary

Some Work, All Play – Episode 308 Summary

Sub-2 Hour Marathon Fueling, The High Carb Plus Bicarb Era, Strides v. Plyometrics Study, Supershoe Evolution, and Iron Theories!

Hosts: David Roche and Megan Roche, M.D. Date: April 28, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this lively, science-packed episode, David and Megan Roche explore the new frontier of performance: fueling, shoes, and innovative training approaches and supplements. With their characteristic enthusiasm and banter, they dive into remote healing gadgets, skepticism versus hope in elite sport, the latest studies on carb and bicarb fueling for marathons, the next generation of supershoes, strides vs. plyometrics, and iron supplementation experiments. The episode is full of relatable discussions about balancing athletic pursuits with family and work, and closes with listener affirmations and gear chat.

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Key Topics and Discussion Points

1. Home Shockwave Therapy, Personal Lubricants & DIY Dilemmas

[00:06–05:34]

• David's impulse Amazon purchase of a (sketchy) home shockwave therapy wand to self-treat a lingering heel injury, admitting to a 4:45 AM decision to avoid Megan's veto.
• Creative problem-solving: substituting store-brand KY personal lubricant for ultrasound gel, provoking an awkward encounter with their favorite grocery clerk.
  • Memorable moment: “You should’ve walked into the store and bought, like, some Fritos, some personal lubricant, and a banana. That would be perfect.” – David [04:18]
• Concludes: Don’t try this at home; there’s a 5% chance at-home weird experiments become gospel, but mostly, they just become podcast stories.
• Discussion of cycling-induced saddle sores and chafing, and the not-actually-“personal lubrication machine.”

2. World Records at the London Marathon: Sub-2 Hour Breakthrough

[05:45–16:41]

• Recap of Sebastian Sawe’s historic 1:59:30 marathon (4:33 per mile), discussing the physiological and technological optimization at play.
• Referencing Alan Joyner’s 1991 "ultimate limit" prediction of 1:57:30, set before modern shoe tech.
  • “You are seeing the optimization of human physiology pushed almost to the very limit.” – David [11:28]
• Discussion on the legitimacy and transparency of doping controls:
  • Adidas paid for extra AIU testing, making breakthrough more credible, but full transparency (public release of test results) could backfire due to internet negativity.
  • “If there’s anybody you’re going to trust, it has to be this guy.” – David [13:06]
  • “Testing isn’t always just the pure answer.” – Megan [13:22]

3. Game Theory & Human Nature in Elite Sport (and Zwift Cheating)

[14:47–19:39]

• Introduces a viral hypothetical: If survival depends on a private vote (red button: self-survival, blue: >50% for group survival), which do you choose? Both choose red, citing lack of trust in collective coordination.
• “What are athletes actually doing in the, quote, unquote, private vote? ... That’s why we always try to be no secrets…” – David [16:41]
• Parallels to subtle, accepted cheating in Zwift, and distinction between public and private ethical choices.

4. Sub-2 Fueling Case Studies: The High-Carb and Bicarb Era

[19:39–27:48]

• Deep dive on elite fuel strategies:
  • Sebastian Sawe took 115 g/hr carbs during race, plus ~12g pre-start; real total ~127g/hr. Similarly high numbers for second and third place, regardless of brand.
  • All used sodium bicarbonate (“bicarb”), with Sawe taking a lower dose than bodyweight would predict.
  • “So, obviously, in the marathon it works ... but it also helps in ultras. I promise... it is such a performance benefit.” – David [21:13]
• Women’s-only record and drafting discussion: drafting at marathon pace offers a huge performance benefit (up to 3–4%, more than some shoes).

5. Supershoe Evolution: Weight, Materials, and Margins

[22:37–27:48]

• New Adidas Adizero Pro Evo 3 is only 97g (3.9oz), about a third the weight of classic racing flats.
  • “When actual performance is on the line, weight is being optimized.” – David [24:33]
• Shoes designed for single-use at the highest level; debate about whether advancements are peaking or ongoing.
• Industry race to define "luxury brand" status for astronomical pricing.

6. Carb Revolution for All: Inclusion, Gender Gaps, and Real-World Impact

[27:48–44:15]

• Surging sub-3 performances at major marathons attributed to more widespread high-carb adoption.
• Recap of a new case study of elite female athlete fueling: 120 g/hr carb increased carb oxidation and lowered RPE vs. 60 g/hr.
• Sex gap in fueling, slower adoption for women on the roads/high-level; discussion of physiologic pitfalls in ultra distance—ultras still lag on full high-carb adoption.
  • “If someone comes along that is similarly talented and uses carbs, they’ll have the advantage.” – David [42:23]
• Listener anecdotes: massive PRs and improved performance after adopting high-carb and bicarb regimens.
• Notable moment: “If you’re out there—carbs are for everybody. You don’t need to be pushing 1:20, but it’s just driving physiology forward in crazy ways.” – David [29:33]

7. Strides Versus Plyometrics: Study Says... Strides Rule

[48:39–56:16]

• Pre-print study compares ground reaction force and mechanical outputs of sprints/strides (90% max) versus classic plyometric routines.
  • No significant difference between max and submax sprints.
  • Strides (submax sprints) yield as much or more mechanical stimulus than plyometrics, with less injury risk.
  • “That is a strong sentence... Submax and maximal sprinting, when programmed and performed correctly, can also be considered as a very high quality, fast plyometric stimuli.” – Megan [55:07]
  • “If you want to optimize, skip the plyometrics—do your strides.” – David [56:16]
  • Hill strides suggested for long-term adaptation, bone density.

8. Iron Dosing, Supplements, and David’s Experimentation Corner

[86:05–91:26]

• Observations from athletes with chronically low hemoglobin:
  • Creatine as an adjunct for increased hemoglobin in certain populations (though Megan remains skeptical).
  • Aswagandha (Pure Sport KSM-66) and multi-micronutrient approaches (Vit A, copper, boron) as possible but unproven hemoglobin boosters.
  • Emphasis on evidence and caution: “Don’t cosign; desperation situations only.”
• Debate over daily versus every-other-day iron dosing: Megan prefers daily in practice, noting the danger of Hepcidin-driven confusion.

9. Gear, Economics, and Running’s Luxury Brand Boom

[62:44–70:23]

• Shoutout: Women’s Gear Index for authentic women’s gear reviews, highlighting gender disparity in gear testing and studies (“it is a critical gap”).
• Debate about Satisfy Running’s eye-watering $320 tie-dye t-shirts, the bandwagon of running “luxury” goods, and the reality of margins versus value for consumers.
  • “Aura requires labor. It’s a thousand percent true.” – David [66:09]
  • “We’re not luxury brand people.” – Megan [66:31]
• Transparency about their own coaching pricing philosophy, and the broader impact of brands and sponsorships on consumer choices—even for “industry insiders.”

10. Family Balance, Identity, and the Laugh Index

[71:08–76:46]

• Listener writes about balancing athletic ambition with family, work, and personal identity.
• David and Megan honestly discuss the ongoing negotiation of showing up for family vs. athletic pursuits after kids.
  • “How can I show up as the thing I want to be with the time I have, rather than lamenting the time you don’t?” – David [73:33]
• Megan recommends reframing life’s achievement narratives and shifting toward appreciating family moments.
• Ultimately: focus on maximizing laughter as a metric of success amid daily chaos.

11. Listener Corner: Affirmation Tuesdays

[93:23–94:57]

• A listener shares that their weekly “Happy Tuesday” podcast greeting inspired them and their partner to start Affirmation Tuesdays: writing each other weekly notes of affirmation.
  • “Maybe the best test of all is just the laugh test. How much you laugh in each day.” – David [76:46]
• David and Megan challenge each other (and listeners) to add this tradition at home.

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Memorable Quotes & Moments

“If there’s anybody you’re going to trust, it has to be this guy. Because last year Adidas ponied up $50,000 to have the AIU test him more often than everybody else.”
— David [13:06]

“This actually gave me hope. 1:59:30 off of fueling and bicarb...and really fast shoes.”
— Megan [19:39]

“Bicarb is something that you’re seeing at the top end of almost all these marathons now. Studies find sodium bicarbonate helps on events one hour and below so far. ... But oh my god, it works.”
— David [21:13]

"A single submaximal sprint session...is therefore equivalent in the number of lower limb impacts to a session with 10 sets of 4 to 5 drop jumps."
— [55:45] (Study paraphrase)

"We’re not luxury brand people."
— Megan [66:31]

"How can I show up as the thing I want to be with the time I have, rather than lamenting the time you don’t?"
— David [73:33]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:06 – 05:34: Shockwave machine & DIY injury humor
• 05:45 – 16:41: London Marathon records, doping discussion, game theory tangent
• 19:39 – 27:48: Sub-2 fueling, bicarb case studies, shoe evolution
• 27:48 – 44:15: Carb revolution, sex & gender disparities, listener fueling stories
• 48:39 – 56:16: Strides vs. Plyometrics study, application to real-world training
• 62:44 – 70:23: Women’s Gear Index, Satisfy Running, luxury brand economics
• 71:08 – 76:46: Listener Q&A—athletic drive vs. family balance
• 93:23 – 94:57: Affirmation Tuesday & partner traditions

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Tone, Style, and Takeaways

• Style: Breezy, candid, playful—scientific rigor mixed with vulnerable storytelling
• David’s and Megan’s dynamic includes playful ribbing (“Blue in the streets, red in the sheets!” [35:59]) and frequent food, parenting, and pop culture asides (Creed lyrics, ChatGPT therapy, etc).
• Main Takeaway: Elite performance is advancing through the interplay of training, fueling, tech, and psychology—with many lessons and accessible strategies for every runner. Yet, the pursuit of excellence has to be balanced with the realities of life and family, and levity (and affirmation) are essential for the long run.

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Further Listening/Reading

• For the research-minded: Check out the referenced Science and Sport carb studies, and search for more on sodium bicarbonate and endurance performance.
• For practical training: Dig into the strides vs. plyometrics debate—4–6 strides, 1–3x/week, can be a "power stimulus" on par with plyometrics.
• For inspiration: Consider starting your own family or partner affirmation ritual—maybe on Tuesday!

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Final Encouragement

“Laugh more. Love more. Carbs and bicarb for all. And don’t try Shockwave therapy at home (unless you need a podcast opener story).”

Transcript

[A]

Welcome to the Some Work All Play podcast. We are so happy with you today.

[B]

Happy Tuesday.

[A]

It's Tuesday, and we're bringing out the

[B]

magic wand on this Tuesday.

[A]

The magic wand.

[B]

That's quite a way to start a podcast.

[A]

Whoa, Megan.

[B]

In many ways. Okay, do you know what I'm talking about?

[A]

I think I do. Which is the home shockwave machine that I bought.

[B]

Yeah. So about a week ago, I came downstairs, and this was early morning. It was 5am Probably 5am and you're like, megan, I have something to tell you. And I'm just like, oh, no. You're like, I bought a home shockwave machine on Amazon. And I was like, bro, what are you doing?

[A]

That's kind of how, you know, you hit a low point. So they aren't that expensive on Amazon. The question is, do they work? Because at this price, it would be like buying a car for 50 bucks.

[B]

I mean, legitimately, it's like 80 times cheaper than what they use in the.

[A]

This is because I can't make the time to get these appointments. So I just haven't been doing shockwave. And I need to do it for my heel, which regressed a couple of weeks ago, just randomly, when I. It was 100%. So, Megan, I got desperate at 4:45am and I was like, okay, I'm gonna wait till Megan comes down. This is a big purchase. We always talk about big purchases. So I need your advice on this. And then it just sat there in one of my tabs, haunting me just like Edward Edgar Allen Poe, like a heartbeat. And I'm like, I gotta go for it before she wakes up, because she's gonna talk me out of this, isn't she?

[B]

I gotta click that button. I would have talked you out of it.

[A]

Yeah, you would've.

[B]

And we wouldn't have had this story on the podcast.

[A]

It's true. It's true. I'm just paying $1,200 for content.

[B]

You're doing it for the content? Yeah.

[A]

Is. What if the settings are different? Right. Because thankfully, I do have an MD PhD, though you're not trained in this particular field, but I trust you to administer it. But what if the settings are wrong and I just need surgery? And I think that would be the funniest way to end this story is if I just went for it with the home shockwave. And as a result, you know, my career's over. Which, honestly, I would deserve.

[B]

You. You. So you asked me to do the shockwave. So I was down there on the floor just, like, rolling that Wand around your foot. And you were giving me so many affirmations.

[A]

Oh, my God, you crushed it so hard. You were amazing. I was just incredibly impressed. I've gotten a lot of Shockwave in my life recently, and I just like, damn, my girl's made for this. You're the number one pick in the Shockwave NFL draft.

[B]

You're like, you're using your degrees. I'm like, all I'm doing is doing little circles over here with this wand.

[A]

So the big conclusion is don't do this at home. I was telling Megan, maybe we shouldn't even talk about this. We'll report back. If it does work, that would be pretty transformative. You might need an MD PhD to apply it, but I might also need surgery. So please, please don't do this. And this is once again kind of going down the rabbit hole of David doing dumb shit. But maybe it's a good thing, right? So on one side, like the dumb shit, like 95% of it doesn't work and hopefully doesn't lead to surgery or negative outcomes. But I. It peters away. But the 5% that does becomes like dogma and gospel in the running community. You know, like the high carb bicarb. The stuff we're going to talk about in the future. The stuff I go over the top with. And then things like the heat suit or maybe the home shockwave. Perhaps not.

[B]

David's just lying on the floor of the bedroom using Shockwave personal lubricants.

[A]

Yeah, exactly. So we got this machine and it comes in and I'm like, desperate to use it, right? Because my foot needs it. I need something in my life. And I still can't get into PT with our time demands. And so I'm like, oh, shit. To do this, you need, like, ultrasound fluid. And I don't know where we would

[B]

get that ultrasound goop.

[A]

Actually.

[B]

Maybe we should have gone to our cabinet and been like, we're going to put some molten on this.

[A]

Oh, yeah, yeah. Some hydrogel.

[B]

Some hydrogel would be perfect.

[A]

Perfect. My heel needs some sugar. Um, and so just a dilemma. And then I looked it up online and you can use personal lubricant for these purposes. So we went and got some store brand KY lubricant. And it worked like a charm.

[B]

It was fantastic for 4.99. And we did this in the mountain grocery store where we know Carlos. He's the guy that does checkout. And we just like every weekend we go and have conversations with Carlos. He's our man, man.

[A]

We hit it off every single week. He's like, my best friend, truly with young kids.

[B]

Yeah. But now he thinks you're buying $4.99 personal lubricant for our use. He's going to be so disappointed.

[A]

He's like, how was your week? I was like, good. We went on a date trip. Here's my personal lubricant, and I'm buying the cheapest type possible. It's like, my girl deserves the worst.

[B]

It was the only thing you bought, too. You should have walked into the store and bought, like, some Fritos, some personal

[A]

lubricant chips, personal lubricant, and a banana. That would be perfect. Yeah.

[B]

I feel like it's like when you go in and buy pregnancy tests, and you're like, I need to buy some cereal. I need to buy some other things. You really should have mixed it up.

[A]

So, yeah, this is where my life is right now. And at the same time, to just, like, really drill, drill home with how negative things are going for me. One, I bought a personal lubrication machine.

[B]

Number two, a personal lubrication machine.

[A]

That's basically what it is. You just apply lubricant in a very inefficient way on your body.

[B]

I mean, it is a wand.

[A]

It is a wand.

[B]

I feel like I would have been a lot happier with. If you spent the. Like, spent the money on a Hitachi magic wand of this size. That would have been great.

[A]

That might have been a good idea.

[B]

A different kind of wand.

[A]

But I also got my first Savile sore from the week of biking.

[B]

Oh, yeah.

[A]

And so I had to use that lubricant in other places, too. So, man, things are going to be looking up in the future. Right now, not so much.

[B]

Did you put that lubricant down there, or you should have done desitin?

[A]

Uh, I mixed it up. I did both layers, so the lubricant was really good for the training. We'll see, though. Uh, I never knew what a saddle sore was. I always assumed it was something that was, like, a little bit grosser, but really, it's just kind of chafing in a bad spot.

[B]

It's very similar to diaper rash.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I feel like, as a parent, it's like, okay, put hydrocortisone cream on that, then put a layer of desitin, and you're good.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

You wouldn't let me treat it. You're like, megan, this is. This is not for your eyes.

[A]

You want to use the wand down there.

[B]

Maybe it would work.

[A]

You can bring Carlos in to bring it full circle. Okay. We have the best episode for you. We're going to start by talking about new world records at the London Marathon and what it means for the future and present. This was absolutely game changing in every way. Can't wait to talk about it.

[B]

And kind of a breakthrough moment in running, too. My mom was sending me text updates about the London Marathon. I'm like, thanks, Mom. This is great.

[A]

Yeah. I wonder where she was getting those.

[B]

I think she was getting updates like. Like push notifications from cnn.

[A]

Whoa.

[B]

About the London Marathon. So this hit big.

[A]

It's a lot better than some of the other push notifications from cnn.

[B]

Oh, yeah. You're like, world's ending right now.

[A]

You gotta get your mom off those. Um, I actually think she was talking about the business side of the shoes, which we'll talk about then. Bicarb and carbs in marathon performance. A couple case studies there. Uh, then a study on strides versus plyometrics. I think this is kind of a breakthrough study.

[B]

You sent me this study on Sunday, and you're like, look at this study in all caps. And it confirms our biases. Oh, yes.

[A]

It's very interesting as it relates to doing then ketones and racing. Plus a Q and A on luxury gear. That one's spicy. I don't know how spicy we'll get. We'll probably delete our answer, I assume.

[B]

Oh, we'll probably get spicy. That's more than an hour in, so stay tuned for the spice.

[A]

Okay. Then a treadmill study, Hypothetical barefoot shoes, iron dosing. I have a lot of thoughts on iron now. So if you're concerned about your iron levels or you just want to optimize your hemoglobin levels, stay tuned for David's iron corner.

[B]

David's iron corner. Great.

[A]

These aren't experiments on myself. These are experiments that I've been piloting with some athletes who have had chronically low hemoglobin levels and have seen some very interesting results. So I'm just saying.

[B]

Okay, this scares me.

[A]

I'm just saying it might involve copper.

[B]

Okay, this sounds like the YouTube video of a strength routine that you want to launch. I'm like, david, you're not a strength coach. And you're like, I don't care.

[A]

I'm not a nutrition coach, and I talk about nutrition all the time.

[B]

That's different.

[A]

Megan, come on.

[B]

We have to say, iron is different, strength is different.

[A]

No secrets means no secrets, which means strength video on YouTube and then lots more. So before we get to The London Marathon. Quick promo for the feed, go to thefeed.com swap S O A P. Your first order there is 40% off and then every $100 spent subsequently you get 10% off. So best deal on the market.

[B]

Okay. We sold out enervit gels, didn't we? Maybe not us.

[A]

I don't know if it was us.

[B]

But we've been talking about the mango so much, including lots of choice words and they're gone.

[A]

It might be Tade Picacha who won Liege best on Liege, and we saw slurping some enervit during that race. But enervet gels are amazing. Thankfully, I'm kind of back on the science and sport beta fuel train. Yes, they raised their prices and I was very, very sad about that. I was like, you know what? I'm not going to promote science and sport beta fuel gels anymore. And then I just keep coming back because they're the best in really long hard events. And I'm like, you know what? Science and sport knows their value and I would never get on a human for knowing their values. So maybe I should uplift this corporation.

[B]

Same, actually. I took an electrolyte gel this weekend, which sometimes is like an acquired taste. The taste gets me at first and then I kind of like get over that hump and I'm like, I'm good. But for whatever reason, maybe it's the electrolytes or just the way it hit, but like five minutes later I'm like, damn, I felt good.

[A]

Yeah, it's so true. So science and sport beta fuel gels. A big recommendation and then a recommendation for creatine. Just going there. The feed lab makes a very inexpensive creatine option. The best on the market that you can just search. But if you put creatine to the search bar, you can get a bunch of different options. So this is a place I've been evolving. This kind of gets to my iron dosing and hemoglobin recommendations. I don't necessarily think everyone should take it for sure. I don't take it personally.

[B]

Actually, you know that you're a little bit desperate in the injury recovery because this morning at 5:30 in the morning, you're like, megan, should I take creatine?

[A]

Which brings me to the story, which is I was talking to ChatGPT about

[B]

creatine and the shockwave machine. You're like, what setting should I put it on?

[A]

It's true. But basically I just wanted them to confirm what I was seeing on other sources. And as I was looking at creatine. At the very end of the creatine discussion. You know how it gives you the follow up at the end, I put this in the outline. It says, I can tell you how someone like David Roach might actually think about it in practice. It's a fun one. Where's that coming from? Is it doing that because it knows I'm David Roach or is it just doing that?

[B]

Oh, it probably knows. I'm confident. Actually, at the end of this podcast episode, we should go to ChatGPT. You can do it and ask.

[A]

No, the same question you asked. The same question I asked it on your link.

[B]

Perfect.

[A]

And then see if it says the difference.

[B]

It's definitely not, but I don't think

[A]

that's also how Jack GPT works. It's different feedback for every. Like, it goes down different neural pathways.

[B]

But you've definitely. It definitely knows your David Roach. I promise you. And it's like, we want to make him feel good. Okay. There is actually something like, you know, I talk to ChatGPT sometimes about, like, random things.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Sometimes it really does make me feel good.

[A]

It does. It gases you up big time.

[B]

It does gas you up big time. It's like, you know, like some kind of therapist that just like gases you up instead of asking the important questions.

[A]

Well, it can be very negative, but it's. It's better than Google searching. Gotta be honest.

[B]

Oh, it's way better than Google searching.

[A]

Wouldn't it be so funny though, if it does that to everybody? If it's like, hey, Barack, I'll tell you what Barack Obama would think about creatine.

[B]

Barack Obama probably loves creatine.

[A]

Okay. And then final recommendation.

[B]

Oh, what? What did it think?

[A]

What did it think?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Oh, no, no, I was. I was looking at it for complex things related to iron absorption. Given some of the things I've seen. We'll talk about that later because it's a slightly bigger science.

[B]

Did it think you should take creatine?

[A]

Um, it did not think I should personally agree.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And. But, you know, I think that especially aging athletes, especially aging female athletes probably should be considering this. Or any athlete with chronically low hemoglobin.

[B]

Or vegetarian vegan athletes.

[A]

Yes. Which is probably related. Right. Like, so I think that it is a slight hemoglobin boost that could be one of the reasons endurance athletes are actually taking it rather than the strength boost. Um, and then final recommendation here. Amax drink gels. I took one this weekend. They go down so easy when you're kind of hot. So if you're in a hot place, a max drink gels rock.

[B]

Yeah, they're a little acidic for me.

[A]

Yeah, you can't shit on something during an ad.

[B]

Sorry, I do that all the time. Don't.

[A]

I do.

[B]

These are authentic ads.

[A]

This is true. So go to the feed.com store.

[B]

It's very liquidy and go down easy. So there's my sandwich feedback.

[A]

That's what she said.

[B]

I started the sandwich with the turkey meat first.

[A]

Okay, let's get to the London Marathon. We're going to start with the big story here, which is the first legit sub two hour marathon Sebastian saw ran 1 hour 59 minutes 30 seconds. That's 4 minutes 33 seconds per mile. I do not know what that is in metric, unfortunately.

[B]

That is so fucking fast.

[A]

Yeah, it is unreal. Um, it's interesting because this is an optimization of human physiology that goes almost to the very limit. So there was a paper written in 1991 by, I believe, Alan Joyner. But Joyner, who estimated that the ultimate limit for humans might be 15730 credit, he did that before shoe tech. So you're really pushing. Maybe if you optimize everything, you're getting these results. Thus it's very interesting to look at what is everything that's being done? What does it mean for the future of the sport? Are there lessons everybody else can take?

[B]

Also it was fun because I felt like it was a trip down our bias lane.

[A]

Oh yeah.

[B]

It was like, oh, we do all these things. This is great. I mean, we obviously don't run that fast, but like, we apply some of this theory to ultras and it's kind of cool to see it being used. Like you assume with all the data they have, they are doing everything within their power. And it was kind of cool to see, like, what did that wind up becoming?

[A]

Absolutely. Especially because, you know, the reason we have our biases is related to the real world of what we see. And then we try to bring it to the podcast and then we get shouted down by people who aren't actually seeing it behind the scenes or experiencing it within themselves or their athletes. So seeing this, seeing some of the transparency is really cool. But before we get to all the details, we should probably address the elephant in the room, correct?

[B]

Oh, yeah. At first, as soon as I heard that, I was like, skeptical.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But you know what, then I dove into the details and I was like, I'm slightly less skeptical.

[A]

Okay. So the concern would be doping. Right. Like every historic, historical breakthrough almost has had some Swirling of like, drug conversations around it. So it's important to address, thankfully. I mean, if there's anybody you're going to trust, it has to be this guy. Because last year, Adidas ponied up $50,000 to have the AIU, the Athletics Integrity Union, test him more often than everybody else.

[B]

And they were doing rigorous testing. They're using mass spec, they're sometimes testing twice in a day. That would make microdosing very challenging. But at the same time, too, you think about like Ruth Chepnage was tested like 14 times in 2024.

[A]

Two oven marathon for women that was. I think it actually might still be standing, but no one recognizes it because she tested positive.

[B]

I think it still is standing, but, you know, she's now serving a doping conviction. And so it's like testing isn't always just the pure answer. But I love, I think this is awesome, though. And I think it's actually kind of changed the conversation surrounding the result, which is really cool. But I love how Adidas is invested in it and I feel like that changes the conversation for me in the future of like, you know, in order to make this kind of like a cool, standout record, a company like this needs to make sure it's clean like Adidas. Like, you know, it'd be a big shame if Adidas sponsored a doping based world record. And the fact that they're ponying up this money makes me happy.

[A]

What else could you do? Is my big question. I guess what you could do is release the data of every test, too. Like your blood levels on every single test. That being said, you do that and you're going to be opening it up to the Internet. And the Internet is horrible. Right? Like, you're going to get so much negativity out of that. So that's cool. I mean, granted, the testing that he paid for was last year before the Berlin Marathon, where he ran 202 on a hot day. And it wasn't this year, though. He still got tested a million times and probably more than almost anybody else. It's just so tough to know. And, I mean, I want to be, like, hopeful, but, you know, human nature is human nature. Which brings me to a hypothetical that took over the social media world this past weekend. It's all based on game theory. But I wanted to bring this to the podcast because I thought that the answers I was seeing on social media were extremely counterintuitive to how I would think about this problem and probably addresses the doping conversation a little bit too.

[B]

Okay. And you have to Phrase this slowly, because people might be listening. On 1.5 or 2 speed less. Your souls. And I just give them. Give everyone a second to process this and think about your answer.

[A]

Okay, here's the tweet heard around the world on, you know, the godforsaken hellhole of Twitter. Everyone in the world has to take a private vote by pressing a red or blue button. So, red button or blue button? If more than 50% of people press the blue button, everyone lives. So if more than 50% press it, everyone lives. If less than 50% of people press the blue button, only people who press the red button survived. Which button would you press?

[B]

Okay, give me.

[A]

So the way to frame this, though, is the red button means you survive no matter what. Everyone who touches it survives the blue button. You only survive if more than 50% touch it. And if more than 50% touch it, you're saving everybody on the planet. And I thought this seems like an obvious answer.

[B]

What was your. I mean.

[A]

Yeah. What's your answer?

[B]

My answer's red.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And. Same. Same. Right. And I thought it was just kind of obvious because, like, if it's the survive button, you press the survive button because if, you know, human nature, if it's a private vote, you cannot count on more than 50% of the people, you know, organizing for this future. And that level of trust in a system, in a society, I do not think is grounded in reality that you see in the real world. And I understand now much more where the counter argument would be, which is you're essentially saying that people that don't understand this question or people that are trying to be good, if it's under 50%, which I think it almost certainly would be, would, you know, it would be a bad outcome for them. It would be like mass killing. So it's obviously a very tough problem, but I think it's relevant for the doping conversation because behind the scenes, like, you know, what are athletes actually doing in the, quote, unquote, private vote? It's so different than what you hear publicly, most likely. And that's why we always try to be no secrets, because our theory is, well, if everybody feels comfortable to have no secrets and it's fully transparent, it'd be great. Similarly, if this wasn't a private vote, if this was a public vote.

[B]

Oh, it would be so different.

[A]

I think it would be totally different.

[B]

I press blue.

[A]

Yeah, exactly.

[B]

And I press blue because of the sake of, like, other people would press blue, understanding the outcomes, and other people

[A]

would press blue because they. It's public. And so that becomes an issue. And it also brings up. I've been doing a lot of riding on Zwift, and we've been having a

[B]

lot of Zwift discussions. We were driving up the canyon this weekend and I was like, david, let me tell you about Zwift.

[A]

Oh, we.

[B]

I. It was like your love language. Oh, it was the best, actually. I was really. So you went into my Zwift. This was like almost like going into my phone. I gave you my. My phone, though, and my Zwift. And you realized I was riding some, like, shitty ass bike on Zwift. And I was like, oh, my gosh, David's gonna be so disappointed in me.

[A]

I was really sad. But you know what? I got to be a knight in shining armor.

[B]

Upgraded it.

[A]

Like those that really aggressively hold the elevator door for everyone to say, oh, my God, put their arm out like that. Whenever I see them, I'm like, okay, chill.

[B]

You're like, I got you. I come by trails.

[A]

No, Victor. Maybe I'm showing I'm a bad person from all these answers.

[B]

No, that's actually, you know, everyone was

[A]

called that did Red was called a bad person on the Internet.

[B]

I actually just think this is you on Shockwave with personal lubricants. This is the David I love.

[A]

But on Zwift, there's these group rides and there's clearly some form of cheating going on where people are trying to upgrade their fake bikes.

[B]

On Zwift, you can accumulate points the more miles that you ride by teleporting

[A]

in and out of rides. I'm sure it's like a Claude code program or something. And it's quite annoying when you're riding there because they come, they appear, they might make you drop a drafting wheel, things like that.

[B]

Okay, you were telling me this, and I was just like, david, it's okay. Let people do what they're going to do. And then I had a two hour date ride with Jeannie. You're taking your shirt off as I say this. I'm like, you're like, swift is turning me on. It's hot new. I had a two hour date ride with Jeannie the robot, just him. And I like rolling at higher power. And the problem with that is if you lose a wheel, like, there's not a large enough group to be able to get back on. And these people would teleport in and grab the wheel and then teleport out, and I'd be one wheel off. That's a problem.

[A]

It's such a problem.

[B]

And I was getting so pissed. And I was like, david, I understand.

[A]

And so I don't know that this is to upgrade bikes, but I assume that's why it's happening. It doesn't make any sense from a training perspective. They're not on the bike when this is happening.

[B]

Happening. Okay. But it's kind of cool from a coding perspective that we can do this.

[A]

I mean, I had.

[B]

I was in a larger group ride this morning and I was like, there was a bunch of people coming in for their coffee breaks. And I was like, you know, well,

[A]

maybe if you ask ChatGPT, you'll say this is a great and ethical thing to do.

[B]

David Roach would do the same thing.

[A]

You dare say that? Yeah, if I did the same thing, I would talk about it openly. But what that points out is this is just upgrade bikes. Often these are people that are on racing teams, on Zwift. So clearly this level of quote unquote cheating, because it is like cheating, even if it's within the code base of the game, is accepted in that world when no one, when everyone thinks no one's watching. And so you have to be careful because when no one's watching, everything is different than when it's public. And so we try to bring those conversations to the open and bring it back to London. I think that this is as reliable as you can get. And maybe there's hope. Maybe there's hope.

[B]

This actually gave me hope. 159.30 off of fueling and bicarbon. All the case study stuff that we're going to get to in a second and really fast shoes or what is everyone else doing? And hopefully they're clean too.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So it actually, like I started skeptical and then kind of landed in a place of hope.

[A]

Yeah, same, same. And I'm getting more and more hopeful on this topic over the years in general because, well, maybe all along it's just carbs, maybe all along it's just been carbs. Especially recently. Maybe it's carb breakthrough. Which brings us to the main point here is that they released his fueling breakdown. He's partnering with Morton and subsequently the second and third place finishers also released their fueling breakdowns. One from Santa Madre and the third place from Morton as well. And they are all quite similar. Um, so to just summarize this, he had a gel right before the start, which wasn't included in his total across those two hours, but across those two hours was 115 grams of carbs per hour from start to finish. I think we should also include the gel that's taken five minutes before the start because that is no different really than taking it at three steps in. And you add that in so 1/5, you know, 1:15, and then you're adding 12 on top of that. So we're looking at 127.5 grams per hour on the swap formulation for fueling in the sub two hour marathon, which

[B]

is wild in sub two hours when you think about that fueling context. And also like how he's pushing his body and how much power he's putting out and like that makes a difference. The other thing is he used bicarb. So morning of the race. I actually don't see this on our notes here, but you told me it was bicarb 12.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Which is a little bit lower probably than his predicted weight, like, than his weight would predict. And I think that's curious too because sometimes we have seen success with lower bicarb totals.

[A]

Yeah. And I think the big conclusion here is just bicarb. Like there is still a debate from people who are not participating in this end of the sport, who live in studies, which is wild, about whether actually

[B]

it's kind of great. Let that debate.

[A]

Oh no, I agree, I agree. The reason I want to be so public, we've talked about this a lot recently is what we have realized if we are public about something, there will be some people in the world that inherently just go against that thing because we talk about it.

[B]

And that's great.

[A]

It's great. We love it. We love it.

[B]

It makes it easier for us as athletes.

[A]

It makes it EAS year as coaches. Um, and bicarb is something that you're seeing at the top end of almost all these marathons now. And so the studies find that sodium bicarbonate helps on events one hour and below so far. And people have really pushed back against longer distance use. But oh my God, it works. So obviously in the marathon it works because you're still doing a lactate curve equation where these athletes are compressing their zones so that their marathon pace and their threshold pace, like, like what would be a normal person's one hour pace, are the same thing. And at threshold it obviously makes a difference. So at these athletes marathon paces, it should too. But it also helps in ultras. I promise, like having seen so much data on it, it is such a performance benefit. And the, the thing is, if you use it in training to some amount that will help your adaptation and then you get better and better from the bicarb so it's like a feedback cycle that's not just on race day. It's also applied in training.

[B]

And it just makes you feel good. Yeah, it is Z2, like two and a half hour long run with it this weekend. And then I did strides at the end and like 30 meters in I was like, why do I feel so good on strides in a long run? Then I was like, wait a second.

[A]

It's ridiculous.

[B]

It's the bicarb.

[A]

Maybe I should rub it on my foot.

[B]

You should actually. That's so funny. Get some Martin on there.

[A]

Well, I mean, for your foot, you don't need Morton. You could actually probably just use baking soda, which is kind of like what, Epsom salt, Right?

[B]

True. Yeah.

[A]

So you do baking soda baths. What do you think?

[B]

Yeah, what do you think?

[A]

I'm serious, Megan. I'm going to do that when I get home. We have. We have some ph increasing chemicals in the hot tub.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Yeah, right. Sounds like a good idea.

[B]

Oh, my goodness.

[A]

I'm very excited about this. Experiment three. Let's go.

[B]

Don't do any of these experiments at

[A]

home, but the fueling, again, just a fascinating change here. When you're going this hard, that is the thing that pushes everything forward. And so the other element that so many people have pointed to here are the shoes. And the shoes clearly make a difference, right? Like, shoes are pushing the marathon forward in every event forward other than ultras, because the shoes suck. Other than trail ultras, Bistrates suck. But these shoes that Adidas released for this event clearly are doing the technological leap that we predicted on our end of the year episode. The Puma R3 was the one that came along last year and did a 3% benefit. We haven't seen any studies on these shoes, but. Oh my God. Based on my theory of the shoe studies, these are going to test off the fucking charts.

[B]

And that's because they're so light. To me, it was kind of wild actually seeing the shoe researchers and their interview quotes about the shoes and what they're trying to optimize for. And a lot of it was just weight, which is so different than the conversations that we have surrounding trail shoes. And these shoes were 97 grams. And compare that. So that's 3.9 ounces. Compare that to like 10.2 ounces ish of the ASU2s. That's 97 grams versus 290 gram of a shoe. That's like three times the weight.

[A]

And it's just interesting when actual performance is on the line.

[B]

Oh, it's like, we gotta drop these grams.

[A]

Weight is being optimized and based on the studies on running economy, this shouldn't make a difference versus six ounce shoes. But it obviously does, right? Because that's why it's being optimized for at this level. So the Adidas Pro Evo 3, we should give it a plug since I've been shitting on their other shoes. Adidas is at the front of the game. The uppers were inspired by kite surfing sales.

[B]

That's pretty cool.

[A]

Yeah. I don't know exactly why that is. Probably because you want the resilience but also extreme lightness. And they're designed to be used once as far as I read.

[B]

Actually I was just about to get there. I'm like 3.9 ounces. I feel like you get one marathon of those shoes. Actually. It's good. It's kind of like investing in something. It's like on a workout day when you take bicarb, you're like, well, I really gotta do a workout now. You put on, you know, you buy an expensive pair of shoes for one marathon, you're like, well, gotta send it.

[A]

Yeah. When you buy an off brand home shockwave machine, you need to tear your plantar. So you have surgery. Is that what you're saying?

[B]

That's the lesson I'm saying so fast here.

[A]

And so this is a shoe equation too. The shoes are moving forward incrementally. Where does it go from here? We said after the Puma R3, maybe it doesn't have too many places to go.

[B]

I kind of agree. Like you're not going to get much lighter than 3.9 ounces and still have like a shoe that has pop.

[A]

I wouldn't have anticipated this. I wouldn't have anticipated this.

[B]

But this might be, I think this is the pinnacle.

[A]

That's what we said kind of with the R3, I mean, but.

[B]

But the R3 was also a big drop in shoe weight. And I just don't know if we can get much lower than 97 grams.

[A]

Yep. There's other elements other than shoe weight because at those same weights you can optimize for foam return and interaction with the plate. And the plates can get better materials. I think we're probably due for just like probably a decade or two of continued.

[B]

Do you think more?

[A]

Of course.

[B]

But I feel like in a decade we're going to be so optimistic. We're going to be like, we got another decade of shoe improvement.

[A]

My point before was the original super shoes were 4% right. And then Puma R3s came in and was a few percent over that 4% shoe, based on the study we saw. If that's happening, that is not indicative of an asymptote being reached.

[B]

That's fair. That's fair. If you're going a few percent beyond where we were before, yeah, that's very fair.

[A]

Let's say this shoe is 1 or 2% over. Then you can start to chart out. You know, obviously, three lines does not make a trend, but you could chart out where this is going and do some predictions. And then we have to incorporate that into our physiological models. And then you apply carbs and bicarb and some changes in training theory. But really, training theory is only being influenced by carb intake. It's not changing fundamentally over anything else. And so, yeah, it's getting wild. And on the women's side, Tikta Cefa set the women's only record. So you're. You're seeing this across the board. Like, London was super fast at the front end, but it was not super fast for everybody. You know, it was just these athletes were resetting all of what was possible.

[B]

Were you kind of intrigued by the women's record? I didn't realize we actually measured that. So that's just like not having men's pacers in there, which is a great concept. But I was like, it's just a weird distinction.

[A]

Oh, it totally makes sense because if you have a male pacer, you can.

[B]

Oh, it's. I mean, you can draft. And draft makes a huge difference.

[A]

Drafting makes a huge difference. And people don't realize that, like, you know, the drafting effect in running is huge. And so every cyclist that comes into running is so funny. They will sit on your fucking wheel because they understand, understand the importance of drafting. Even at slower paces, like on climbs in the. On the bike, when they're going 10 miles an hour, they still sit on wheels. Um, and so it. It clearly matters. And you look at the studies, it can be 3 or 4%. So drafting at even 6 minutes per mile, but let alone at 4, 33 or 5 minutes per mile, is worth more than the shoes. Even.

[B]

Even with a tailwind. We're talking about that at Boston is like, it matters at Boston with a tailwind, even for athletes go at, like, slower paces, too.

[A]

Yeah. And then the other thing to mention on the marathon is Vincent Mowry. I think that's how you pronounce his name. At Class city Marathon, ran a 2:05:56, I believe, won by 15 minutes. Vincent is not an athlete I knew about. He is kind of just a guy. He's fast, but he's not, like, insane. He just came to the marathon early and ran it at this random event. And I went to his Strava and what did I see on there, Megan?

[B]

Carbs.

[A]

I actually did not see carbs.

[B]

Yeah. Did you see bicarb shoes?

[A]

Yeah, yeah, I saw bicarb and Gnomeo.

[B]

Oh, really? Nomeo pictures. Do you think he took both before the race?

[A]

I have no idea. And I also don't know where. When the pictures are from. I honestly did not do that much research, but I was trying to learn about his training approach because, you know, I'm always trying to understand what the. The best marathoners are doing so we can inform our training theory.

[B]

You're like, how did this guy become a dude?

[A]

Yeah. I mean, 205 is insane, right? Like, there's only a few American men who have ever done that. So this isn't something that's just happening in some training camps or in some approaches. This is happening for everybody at the same time, everywhere. Basically what we've predicted for years. And there's so much room under the curve still as this stuff gets applied across the board. Maybe not at the top end, but for everybody else. And the. The final mention I have here is at Boston. I saw a chart of women's sub 3 hour marathon times, and this was used largely to argue conditions. But the three hour sub three hour times have been increasing by like, monstrous amounts every year. So it's not just the conditions. And the most important thing, I think, for that cohort is not bicarb. Right. Because I doubt that many of those athletes are taking bicarb unless they listen to swap. It's carbs. The carb revolution is starting to hit everybody. Everybody's starting to listen to it and understand it. So. So if you're out there, carbs are for everybody. You don't need to be pushing 1:20. But remember what we say, because it's just driving physiology forward in crazy ways.

[B]

I do think it's slower for female athletes to adopt. I think it's slower also on roads. Um, I feel like in bikes, like in. In bike racing and in trails, right now it's pretty high, but it's just slower in road marathoning for whatever reason.

[A]

Yeah, I think there's just background resistance. I mean, after our podcast last week, you know what I did?

[B]

What?

[A]

I went and made a tweet at Tim Nokes.

[B]

Did you really?

[A]

Yeah, yeah, I did.

[B]

It's like we were coming home from Boston on the flight and you had that reply bar open and just didn't do. And then you felt empowered after the podcast.

[A]

I did, and it was very kind. I was open and then I muted responses.

[B]

So you don't know what happened?

[A]

No idea what happened.

[B]

David, that's irresponsible tweeting. Why?

[A]

No. That's so responsible.

[B]

What if it's causing a stir on the Internet and you don't know?

[A]

Why do I care? Why do I care? I'm just being honest. Right.

[B]

Okay, here's a rule. You can't tweet and then mute responses.

[A]

Wait, why? I also did that on.

[B]

You should be informed.

[A]

I also did that on my Instagram on Friday or Saturday. That one, that was about. I. I wrote about, like the idea that on trails I will tell someone they are amazing. Or if it's in a race setting where it's more.

[B]

Oh, that was beautiful.

[A]

I'll tell them I love them or whatever.

[B]

Do you actually want to pull that up? That was really well said.

[A]

No, I don't. Okay, I can do it. I can do it. But I muted it.

[B]

We got. We were always like, yes. And on this podcast, then you're like, no, I don't.

[A]

Well, I muted it subsequently because, you know, there were very kind replies, but there were just enough not so kind replies, which don't bother me at all in this context. But what bothered me was people were standing up for me, and that is my nightmare. I was like, no, guys, I'm fine, I'm fine. I don't need it. But it was. It was very nice.

[B]

This is really well written.

[A]

Okay, well, first, the comment that I posted was. And maybe I shouldn't have done this at all. I didn't run this by you.

[B]

You didn't run it by me. I feel like sometimes you get in these confident states and I like it.

[A]

Yeah, well, thankfully.

[B]

Was this a. This was a day. Did you stare at Constance's robot ass for a long time doing this? Two hours. I knew it. I knew it.

[A]

And I was on the gravel bike that day.

[B]

She gives you confidence.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. Granted, after this, I did very intense shockwaves, so my confidence is low. Again, she had nothing to worry about this week. So the comment I was responding to was, why not just a good morning. All those amazing and awesome make it look fake. And honestly, it's annoying as hell. So that's a mean spirited comment. As soon as you said annoying as hell, I'm like, okay, I don't care about you know, you being put on blast. So my.

[B]

It also wasn't someone's name. It was just their YouTube handle, which is. And a picture of them running and you can't really see who they are.

[A]

Yeah, maybe. I'm sure it's somebody that. That, you know, is. Has very bad things to say about me for some odd reason. Or I may, honestly, maybe they're just right.

[B]

Maybe.

[A]

Maybe this person's correct. But I responded with this caption. We're here for a cosmic blink. When I was a kid, I was overwhelmed by that thought after a teenage existential crisis, which was actually at 11 years old. But I didn't want to explain that.

[B]

Like, it's a little early for an existential crisis.

[A]

I specifically remember I was in the back of my parents car looking out the window on a drive to Easton, which is. Is the big city where I grew up and just was like inky blackness forever.

[B]

Oh, whoa, no.

[A]

And then I thought about that for a good six months and then came to this conclusion. After that existential crisis, I realized that most people are probably screaming right beneath the surface every time they think of that same impermanence that was comforting, but also sad in its own way. So I decided that I didn't want to play it cool. Not that I'd be able to pull that off. Anyway. If you've seen me out in the wild, hopefully you've felt some extra boost of shared humanity or at least gotten a laugh at my expense. At first, people might call you weird, later childish, after that unprofessional. Even if you reach the top of your profession, I think that's all part of it. If it's a choice between dying childish and unprofessional, or dying grown up and respected by strangers, I know which way I'm going. I try to avoid being serious on the Internet. Too often I'm not sure of anything. But if there's one thing I'm almost sure of, it's this. We won't regret making people feel a little bit more loved. Love, you guys.

[B]

That is so beautiful. But then also your comment to the guy, which I wanna read. It says, we all die and I'm not waiting to share love. I don't have enough time to tell people on the trail that I imagine they are going through things that are so hard and reckoning with fear and impermanence in ways that they cannot always express. So I will tell them that they are amazing and loved and it's okay for that to be unconditional and quote simple In a scary and effed up world. Also, David, that's beautiful. Also, I love that it says. So you took a screenshot of it and just says, 0 seconds ago you left this comment. So you left this comment and you're like, I'm gonna take a screens shot. Do you see that?

[A]

Sometimes you leave a comeback that you know is at least in my idea, so good that you're like, they might delete it.

[B]

You're like, I'm gonna immediately.

[A]

No. And the thing is, like, I get it where they're coming from. Like, you know, totally valid to have differing opinions on that. But I think the idea that if you call something amazing, it devalues things is such a zero sum way of looking at the world that it's just kind of sad, right? Like, I think think existence is so inherently amazing in ways that we're just not recognizing all the time. Right? Obviously, like we are multicellular organisms moving through the world with mitochondria that were absorbed from like prokaryotes. And this could be the only time it's ever happened in the universe.

[B]

You really should have written that.

[A]

There are. No, seriously, you know, there are theories that the great filter. So the idea why we don't see alien signals in the cosmos, the idea is that that only happens once, that mitochondria were absorbed by the cell once. And because on Earth it theoretically only happened once. As far as some of the theories go. Like, in one situation did this happen, and that was the bottleneck for human evolution. So it's freaking incredible that any of this happens. And then obviously the natural world is incredible too. And so, you know, you put all that together and now we're here. Shit. Posted on the Internet. That's amazing too. They're amazing.

[B]

Yeah, well, you should have actually. Did a part of your brain just be. I just want to be like, well, some people are not amazing. That's not for everyone.

[A]

But things I want to make everyone feel.

[B]

No, I know. And that was. I would not do that. The right response.

[A]

Yeah. I mean, to you, I might say that. But like, I mean, I want everyone to feel that way.

[B]

Does your brain even think that, though? For a second?

[A]

Oh, for sure, yeah.

[B]

No.

[A]

Absolutely no. I mean, you know, I press the red button. Anybody who pressed the red button understands, right? I'm still that 11 year old screaming in the backseat. I mean, if anything, I'm like even more like that.

[B]

Well, I actually think it's beautiful that you see the world that way and you press the red button. I feel like that's a good way of knowing.

[A]

Well, do you know people or do you not?

[B]

Yeah, but I think it. But I think once you know people and you make that decision, and I think the fact is, yes, it's a decision, but it's an important decision. I love it.

[A]

I would press the red button, but I want to live. Like, I'd press the blue button. I might need to rethink all this.

[B]

Yeah, you're a blue in the street and a red in the streets. Oh, no, no, we're not reaching.

[A]

No, no. Everyone got you.

[B]

I want it back.

[A]

You did it so good.

[B]

I'm in the streets and are red in the sheets. We need to get to a shirt that says that.

[A]

That was incredible. Okay, final thing on the marathon. I saw this tweet by Brad Stalbert this morning. You can tell that, actually, I get a lot of our studies from Twitter. Like, that's why I'm on there. I mostly just follow exercise physiologists and comedians. But a tweet from Brad Stolberg, an amazing author and thinker. Just been supportive of everyone in the community. Like, behind the scenes. He's supportive to, too. He's definitely a blue button guy.

[B]

Oh, he's for sure a blue button guy. I'm sorry, Brad.

[A]

That's a huge compliment.

[B]

No, I mean. I mean, I'm sorry. We're red button guys.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Okay, that makes sense. But he wrote a tweet that the coach of Sebastian Solway, Claudio Baradelli, messaged him, which I just thought was really fun, which is. Hi, Brad. I'm Claudio, Sebastian's coach. Sorry to bother you, but I saw you post on Instagram where he wrote about the marathon record, and I want to say thank you because through your books and podcasts, you have been a great source of inspiration in my job. I'm currently having in my hands the Way of Excellence, Brad's new book, and has been a great help to guide me in helping Sebastian in the last few weeks of his preparation. Quote, confidence is based on evidence has been a guiding concept in the last few days before the race.

[B]

I love that quote, confidence is based on evidence. That's beautiful.

[A]

And also just an idea that ideas, thoughts, mental approaches are just as important in this. And I think people know that intuitively but don't apply it to themselves. Right. Like, what does belief actually mean? Belief is a physiological process that looks psychological only when you zoom in too far. Like, belief changes the way your physiology behaves over training cycles. Thus, something like bicarb. Yes, it is a physiological process, but then it incorporates into belief. Same as carbohydrates. One, carbohydrates actually touch the brain, but it makes it easier to believe in yourself. Easier, easier, easier. The more barriers you can take down in that process, the more, you know, you might be able to reset your own personal two hour marathon. And so I thought that was a beautiful message. And also the fact that he sent that makes me feel really good about coach Claudio. Even though he has a checkered past with some of his athletes. I think I saw a number of doping bans for some of his athletes in the past. I don't want to say that that means anything because, you know, it could be a broader system.

[B]

You never know those associations, his knowledge.

[A]

And that is a concerning thing that is relevant in the earlier discussion. But anyone who would send that to an author on the Internet and, you know, doing it for no reason other than to uplift that person, that is the ultimate coach to me. Right. Like in that message, he's thanking Brad, but he's also coaching Brad. He's saying, keep going. You know, he's saying, believe in yourself. And I think that's a beautiful thing.

[B]

And David, wow, like, what you said there about belief was so beautiful that I feel like I need to re. Listen to this episode. Hang out there for a second and just marinate a minute.

[A]

Can you motivate? Just. He's like, I need you to take over the bullshit for a little bit. He's like, I don't know what it is today.

[B]

You're on fire.

[A]

No, no, no. This looks like the field near our house, which is covered in cow shit.

[B]

It's actually. It's like cow carcasses. They're pretty old at this point.

[A]

Yeah, the cow, the. The old shit.

[B]

Yeah, yeah.

[A]

That's basically what my thoughts are. It's all regurgitated from like Marcus Aurelius or something.

[B]

Nah, it's new shit.

[A]

New shit. Okay, so very rapidly, a case study from Holly Archer, who happened to run a 233pr breakthrough. But a few weeks ago, Holly Archer did a case study on the Science and Sport blog. I believe that this case study is a part of a new carb study on women that's coming out so soon.

[B]

That's what I got from the blog too. Like, it seemed like they have a number of data points that they're excited to share, which makes me happy because we've had research done on high carb and male athletes, but not as much in female athletes.

[A]

And I think it's the companion study. Ooh, I think this is. So we talked last year, one of our top studies was male athletes. 60 vs 90 vs 120 grams of carbs per hour. There's also some concerns I've heard about that study. So, you know, who knows? Don't take it at, like, face value. You know, obviously take the real world. But I think that this is her data from that study.

[B]

Study.

[A]

And so when Holly fueled at 120 grams per hour at kind of marathon effort, she achieved higher carbohydrate oxidation. And so signs of improved running economy compared with 60 grams per hour. Um, and the. The really significant thing here is that she was able to burn more carbs the more she was taking in. So her body was able to access this fuel that pushed her faster. And so I think sometimes there's a misnomer, like a misunderstanding that you want to optimize fat oxidation because it's more efficient. In reality, fat. Fat oxidation is much, much less efficient, like, significantly so. And so it go. Could go all day, but it's nowhere near as optimal for the body to burn. So if you can burn a lot of carbs while still burning fat to support that, that's the holy grail of performance.

[B]

In fact, they showed a pretty beautiful bar chart of just how her oxidation was increasing with higher carb totals. This is where I Wish we had YouTube, because we could just pop it up. But basically, her car oxidation at 60 grams an hour is 1.66. And that increase up to 2.2 grams per minute. Grams per minute at 120 grams of carbs per hour. And it was cool to see with a stepwise increase at 90. And it was cool to see her body oxidizing carbs in that way.

[A]

And RPE was lower at 90 and 1 22, which I think is the biggest finding here overall, is that it just affects rpe. And if you want to simplify it, like, outside of labs, because it's very tough to test in lab, your perceived exertion goes way down. And we get literally 20 messages a day about this, probably across all of our channels of people saying, like, oh, I tried it, and it was great. Maybe not 20 a day, maybe 20 a week. I panicked a little bit there.

[B]

You're like, wait a second. We do get a lot. And I feel like they sit well in our brains too, because it's just kind of fun to see that. I would say, though, we very rarely see female athletes going up to 120. And I think it's time to kind of start pushing that boundary. I don't know if it's like a fear factor of being afraid of GI distress or like how the body's going to feel or even sometimes I still see in a lot of athletes just a fear of calories. And it's like this increases metabolic burn to power the rest of the day. And it's not just a calories in, calories out equation.

[A]

Absolutely. We're seeing it more and more as people get more open. So the winner of Perry Roubaix Femme, she's German, I think Coke, something like that. She did 139 grams per hour. And it was a interview, I think that wasn't in English, so I didn't listen, but got sent it by a number of listeners. So we're seeing that more and more.

[B]

I think that we're not seeing it the in running.

[A]

Well, I also think there aren't that many women that are being open about their fueling.

[B]

That's true, yeah.

[A]

And the ones that are are often in ultra running and I don't know,

[B]

it's often lower totals.

[A]

I don't think ultra running is really pushing the limits yet necessarily in performance as much as some of these other sports. Also, I think we're running into a problem, like a physiological wrinkle with ultra running that becomes complicated. And so should I venture down this path? I'm debating.

[B]

I think we've already said this path. I think I know where you're going and I think we've actually had this conversation before, but I think we should have just gimme a therapist sustain it.

[A]

Okay. So that high fat oxidation seems good, but is actually bad for peak performance. And it's good in ultras because the level is not yet pushed to such a limit that you need to be accessing carbs to be able to compete. Um, you know, if you're good enough, if you're talented enough, you can do it on fat. Um, and we see that more on the women's side because you'll sometimes see fat oxidation numbers that are just higher at baseline. Um, you'll see like exceptional numbers that are so good that they can still go pretty fast. But if someone comes along that is that talented, similarly talented and uses carbs, they'll have an advantage, most likely.

[B]

And this is where I feel like it's not just the front runner of the race, but I feel like we're about to see the top 10 female times at each race really start to explode with hierarchical. And that's where like the equivalent of

[A]

sub 3 marathons or sub 4 sub 5. Like, it's all gonna change, I assume, but difficult here. And so the part I was debating about saying, because I think this got deleted.

[B]

Oh, you should. You should say it. It was on the Internet at one point in time. I clicked on it. Maybe it's just I don't actually have a Twitter account, so maybe that's. Maybe I can't see it for that reason.

[A]

Your ment is fantastic.

[B]

Yeah, I know. Isn't it great?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Strava is, like, my primary form of social media. I'm like, I'll just get to stroll Strava. That's great.

[A]

So good. So a case study with an elite ultra runner found exceptional fat metabolism. Like, exceptional. Like, the numbers are crazy. Um, and a response from a top physiologist that was involved in the testing, maybe why it was deleted, said, yes, the actual implication was impaired high intensity endurance performance in real world conditions. Um, I don't want to get into that part. We tried it. We repeated it, trying to find some way to utilize increased capacity for fat oxidation. Unfortunately, the downside is reduced capacity to burn a higher yielding fuel.

[B]

And I love actually talking about carbohydrates as a higher yielding fuel source and the body's ability to oxidize carbohydrates as higher yield. And this is Louise Burke, who's the nutrition goat, and I. That's a very specific use of that terminology. And I like that she's pro carb.

[A]

In that case, it's amazing and we should move on.

[B]

You're like, I'm worried.

[A]

I'm worried. I'm worried. I don't want to talk about anything.

[B]

I, like, feel. I feel like you're gonna leave this episode and be like, I'm worried about six different things on here.

[A]

You better believe it.

[B]

Are you already worried about six?

[A]

I mean, I'll forget. I love our listeners.

[B]

We love you guys. We're almost an hour in. Is the threshold at which I'm like, things can start to get freaky when we're 45 minutes in. We're close enough.

[A]

Close enough.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Okay. We did start the podcast talking about a magic wand.

[B]

We did. Yeah. Maybe that. Maybe that was not great terminology in the very first sentence.

[A]

Good job, Megan. Okay. Okay.

[B]

That was me being empowered. I wrote on Jacques robot ass this morning. And then the magic wand discussion came out.

[A]

Yeah. You got your guy.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Okay, let's get on to the big study before we do that quick promo for Patreon. Go to patreon.com swap swap starts at $5 a month. You get access to all the training plans, 190 bonus episodes that are so fun. If you can't afford it, we'll get you in for free. And at $10 a month, heart rate zones, tons of questions, unlimited numbers of questions, things like that to ask. So, yeah, it's going so great. I put in a lot of messages.

[B]

Scroll back. I want to go to this one.

[A]

Okay. I put in like five messages we got this morning.

[B]

Yeah, this is your brain. You're like, I just love these messages. So you put in five of them. I think you should read this one. Also, I think you should read it because I royally jacked up your YouTube comment and had to read it twice in my reading.

[A]

That's for those that want to know. I read things because sometimes on the podcast the words are hard.

[B]

Well, here's the thing is, I'd be fine with it, but I feel like you don't love edits. And so I'm like, if we're going to have fewer edits, you should do the reading.

[A]

Here's the difference. Difference. I misread and I'm just like, you're like, whatever.

[B]

I misread and I'm like, popcorn David.

[A]

Now you're just like, I'll do it. Um, thank you both again for spreading the high carb gospel. Um, just a running update for you. I also raced Boston Marathon and I ended up running an almost six minute PR in an astonishingly fast time. Don't want to say it, but it's in the two 30s. Um, I felt absolutely. And this is a female. I felt absolutely amazing during this race. And I credit so much of this to high carb and bicarb. If you count my Pre H gel 15 minutes before the start.

[B]

We do.

[A]

I had 120 grams per hour. Um, and this person is 5ft 2 inches tall. Um, so they said that seems like a lot of carbs. Uh, previous, I also did a beetroot shot from a max. Interesting. Might want to get that a feed. I'll probably want to test that and have bicarb. My friends pre race thought that taking bicarb for a long distance event was insane. And also the amount of carbs I was taking would need lead to a bathroom emergency. But I told them I trusted in the SW swap card carb gods and it paid off. I actually negative split. Um, felt amazing. The whole time was using your training principles from Patreon, et cetera. Thank you again for all you do has been that.

[B]

Okay, Holy cow. This is fast. A six minute PR in carbs. But they should, you know, to run this time. This is not an Olympic trials qualifying time, but close. You should go. Whoever this listener is, please go for that. It would be so cool. I mean, I feel like having a six minute PR in Boston's a tricky course. Like, go for it at CIM and go get that otq. It would be really cool.

[A]

Yeah. Then here's one of someone that dropped their marathon to 2:20 using the marathon plan at only 69 miles per week. That's pretty crazy. They're going to run so fast.

[B]

Kind of wild.

[A]

Then someone else ate kpr. Granted, there's lots of beautiful messages here. They always seem like, oh, our listeners will just want to hear all of these. And then I get there and I'm

[B]

like, yeah, I went to delete them before the episode. I was like, we should just do one. And you're like, leave them all.

[A]

Leave them all.

[B]

I love them all.

[A]

So patreon.com swap these are all my favorite children. Yeah, they really are. I get very excited when people tell me their success stories.

[B]

Okay. I personally, I have a favorite child. It was the Boston time. That's so cool.

[A]

It is so cool. And that many carbs. It points out what we're saying. You know, you push the limits and the body will reward you.

[B]

It's also pretty cool too. Like, you know, we're starting to see athletes go for the OTQ more in the marathon. And did you see Andy Cozarelli this weekend? Ran a 2:36:59. Whoa. In I grew up Andy Race at NC State when I was there. And there's a video of her just like hauling it to the finish and then collapsing at the finish line. And it's one of my. It's just like, you know, seeing athletes chase the OTQ to me is very cool.

[A]

That's so beautiful.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Anything that is like a barrier that you can exceed your limits, you know, I mean, that's why alters are so cool, right? Because just finishing is that barrier. And I think it's one of the reasons that they appeal so much is you get this like, existential journey during the event. I mean, it literally is like a kid in the backseat of the car looking at the dark blackness and deciding to go on anyway. And that's every one of these races

[B]

and athletes that decide, like, Andy has been very public about having reds and then coming back and having major injuries and has been chasing this for a long time. And just to show up and Decide to like keep chasing and chasing and chasing, even when it's not working out. It's like, I love those athletes.

[A]

So cool. Okay. This study, I wish it wasn't at 49 minutes because it is such a good one. I feel like it should lead an episode.

[B]

Yeah. Actually, should we save it? Nah, we can't save it.

[A]

You don't think we should save it?

[B]

I mean, it's one of those things that it's like too good that I just want to do it now.

[A]

Yeah, I think we probably should just. Because this is so cool. So it's a preprint, so that means not subject to peer review yet. That being said, peer review is kind of broken. So I don't really care necessarily about preprint. We just use this as a piece of evidence, not as a disposable positive understanding of the world. Like, that's just not how exercise physiology works. I've read about peer review at these journals now and it seems like, oh,

[B]

it's, you know, I've, it's hard. I've been reviewed, I've been a reviewer. You're always just like, wow, this process is a little interesting, especially for like, I think it's very different. Like, you know, it varies a lot by scientific field. Like, I've heard that like in economics and other fields, it's actually extraordinarily rigorous and publishing is like a year long process. And sometimes with these exercise physiology journals, it's like, here's a paper, let's have two reviewers look at it. And it's, you know, it's, it's interesting.

[A]

I feel like every economist their middle name is, but actually, so they would dream to be the reviewer. You know who would not be a great reviewer?

[B]

Who?

[A]

You.

[B]

That's. I actually, you know what, I did one review.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And I was just busy and then.

[A]

It's not busy, it's just that you're so kind.

[B]

No, I was actually pretty harsh on this one.

[A]

Really?

[B]

Yeah. Whoa. I mean, it was like, I was like, science is on the line, dude.

[A]

This is my red button girl.

[B]

I want red button on this. But then I was like, I don't have. The problem is it takes so much time and you literally get nothing from it that I was like, I don't have time to be a red button girl. And I'm, I'm. I have to be in the name of science.

[A]

Blue button in the streets, red button in the sheets. That's the reason we're married.

[B]

It really is.

[A]

And I hope that our listeners understand that like that's where the. You're amazing is coming from. Right. Like it's coming from this idea of like I think most people would press the red button, including myself. So. But obviously there's a lot of hypothetical particles that you could do off of that game theory equation that could make it seem good or bad to choose either one. So don't think about it too much.

[B]

That's the thing is I actually spent. So I came after a run. I was carved up when I looked at this. And I spent way too long before I gave you an answer is that,

[A]

you know, people would mischoose the wrong button not understanding that red is the survive button. So that's the reason that people should choose blue.

[B]

But I understood it. But I still, I took way too long thinking about the ethics of it.

[A]

No, for sure. I mean it's tough. I mean the thing I'm partial to is the blue button is the wood chipper button that you're jumping into a wood chipper. Unless more than 50% of people jump into the wood chipper and in which case it clogs, which is true.

[B]

I mean I feel that's.

[A]

If you look at it like that, I think most people choose the red button.

[B]

I would actually love to have. You know how you can have like two YouTube like photos or what is it called? The COVID image?

[A]

The thumbnail? Thumbnail.

[B]

Thumbnail.

[A]

A B test.

[B]

Yeah, you can do like an a B test. We should do an a B test with that and have the wood chipper. And I think the answers would be

[A]

but you could do the same thing.

[B]

But it's the same thing.

[A]

But you could reverse it the other way too. Like you could make it so that the obvious moral decision is the blue one. Um, so you know, that's the complication. So back to the study that was really important, really important digression. Um, sprinting as a plyometric stimulus. An exploratory comparison of kinetic outputs with two reference tasks. It took 16 participants and it had them do three different conditions. One was a 30 meter sprint, so I can all out sprint. The second was a submax sprint. And 90% of that max speed, kind of similar to a stride. We'll talk about that in a second. And then the third was a plyometric condition of double leg drop jump, hurdle jump, foot ankle rebounds and in place single leg skipping.

[B]

And those are plyometrics. And these were done in 14 male athletes and two female athletes. And then what they were looking at overall was average ground reaction force and contact Time. So essentially looking at how much lower leg impact you were getting from these

[A]

sessions, how much force you're putting into

[B]

the ground, how much force you're putting into the ground, which is relevant for when you think about adaptation, which is relevant even when you think about like bone health. And a number of the different things that you get in terms of like the strength value of plyometrics.

[A]

Yeah. And a lot of arguments for plyometrics.

[B]

Right.

[A]

You can really only get this from these types of activities, et cetera. And we have come in and said probably not.

[B]

And also probably those might cause injury. Like the number of stress fractures that I've seen from an athlete with reds doing depth jumps, I'm like, please do not do that.

[A]

Honestly, don't jump up.

[B]

That's.

[A]

Should I. Should we end with that?

[B]

No. Okay. That's your blue in the streets.

[A]

I deserve. Because you said earlier you're not a strength guy, coach, but I'm confidently going to say don't jump off. Off the box.

[B]

Yeah, you know, I'm going to say that too. You know, no matter the height of the box.

[A]

I have seen so many femoral stress fractures, mid shaft from jumping off box or femoral neck, like across the board. Like so many. I mean, we're talking dozens of them that can only be attributed to that intervention unless they're getting it from like 20 miles a week. And there's some ideas that strength coaches provide. And this is why, you know, it's good to come into any field and push it a little bit. Like poke on where it's hard.

[B]

Okay, but you had song. There's a song. What is it? The Megan. This is the six feet from the edge. And I'm living.

[A]

This is. Okay, you just walked into my wheelhouse. I'm six feet from the edge that

[B]

I'm living, thinking, thinking, living.

[A]

Maybe six feet ain't so far down.

[B]

And it's like, just don't fucking jump off the box. Don't. Every time you're about to jump off a box, sing that song. Unless your bone density is outstanding, don't do it.

[A]

It's Creed. Our younger listeners might not know who Creed is. You got to go back and just listen to the hits of Creed and you'll understand what 11 year old David was listening to while I was having existential crises.

[B]

So probably. I mean, I did a lot of box jumps as a kid.

[A]

Yeah, exactly. So the big findings here was that there was no significant difference first between the max sprint and the submax. Really, really interesting. So the argument that we often hear is like, oh, should you do 5 second sprints or 8 second sprints where you go all out? We say no, because that's a huge injury risk. And also doesn't seem as relevant for long distance running. 90% of max. Much more similar to a stride where you're pushing but not fully sprinting like you're at the NFL draft. And it leads to the same changes in ground reaction force and contact time. Very interesting. But then most significantly, there were often better outcomes on ground reaction force. So higher outputs for the sprints versus the jogs. So the submax and the max sprint, um, and the sprint showed a greater advantage for all of them. But the hurdles jump, that really points out why strides are not just a, like, amorphous thing that maybe you should be doing. It's like they are the power stimulus. They are what allows the muscles to put out power. And so one, they can almost certainly replace plyometrics. There's no need for plyometrics, though. It's fine to do them, it's just not necessary. But two, they will be the thing that distributes your power at all effort levels. Strides are the path to developing your mechanical output.

[B]

And this is a sentence that they wrote. And I've had this as like music to my ears. The way that they frame this submax and maximal sprinting, when programmed and performed correctly, can also be considered as a very high quality, fast plyometric stimuli from a mechanical output standpoint. So, yeah, that is a strong sentence. Maybe that will get edited in the review process. Maybe a reviewer too would be like too strong. But I agree. And that's like music to my ears. The other sentence that they had that I loved was about the equivalence. And this is like one of the annoying things that we get. Actually. We love all questions, but sometimes we get questions about like, how is cycling equivalent to running? How is elliptical equivalent to running? And it's like, well, they're different. Yeah. And you really. We can't make mathematical equations to make them equivalent.

[A]

Nor do you need to.

[B]

Nor do you need to. But they made equivalence here. And I kind of like this. A single submaximal sprint session with approximately 10 repetitions of a 20 meter sprint is therefore equivalent in terms of the number of lower limb impacts to a session with 10 sets of four to five drop jumps.

[A]

Wow.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And drop jumps are also going to tear you up probably. Um, which is interesting. So, yeah, this is a pretty fascinating study, I think, think this one. It emphasizes what you see in the Real world plyometrics are by no means universal. In fact, I would estimate that very few of the elite athletes are doing them.

[B]

Some are, but they could be valuable. I mean, I think, I think like

[A]

skipping it doesn't hurt. Like, I'm, I'm saying like plyometrics, where we're like major power output, where we're jumping off box. As you're developing power from running, you don't need to develop it from plios. Plios develop neural pathways, I think a lot more than they're developing actual power pathways. And if you're developing power pathways through plio, plios just go do hill strides.

[B]

And some plyos like, you know, used to give me for my, like, little single leg hops. Um, but I think those can be very productive from like a bow and health stimulus. And so I think it's just about finding the plan that works for you. And I do. I have, you know, a few very, very, very small number of injury resilient athletes that are doing plyometrics, and it seems to be working. And so this is not like a universal thing.

[A]

Oh, no, for sure. This is more of an optimization thing. With low time availability.

[B]

Yeah, with low time availability and perhaps like low stress absorption too.

[A]

Well, strides are universal, universal amongst everyone that's pushing the true limits of human performance. So all these marathoners we're talking about, of course there's still ultra runners that push against that, but, oh, they are universal at the very top end. And plios, you know, they might be done, but they're not at all the prerequisite that. And I think that this just shows why you can get a lot of stimuli through different means. This doesn't mean don't do PIOs. That's just David being intense. Remember, this is a podcast. We're trying to say things that are interesting, which sometimes means, you know, turning up the nozzle just a little bit.

[B]

Actually, if you've agreed with us on every single point in the last hour, that might be a problem for you.

[A]

Yeah, you should probably talk to your therapist about it. Honestly, I should be curious. Maybe a little straw poll comment on Patreon. What percentage of things have you agreed with so far?

[B]

Just.

[A]

Just ballpark it.

[B]

I would actually love to know over time too. Do you agree more with David or do you agree more than Megan?

[A]

Yeah, it's like when people watch presidential debates, they're given a knob.

[B]

Oh, true. Yeah.

[A]

Turn. Either way, people listening to the podcast,

[B]

I feel like it probably varies a lot by episode.

[A]

I bet there's a silent majority party that agree with me.

[B]

Oh, for sure.

[A]

You think so?

[B]

I mean.

[A]

I mean, no. No one would say it publicly.

[B]

There's been times that you're talking and I'm like, yeah, I agree with you. Okay, maybe not in this podcast, but literally.

[A]

Literally. We have, like a lot of messages all the time about David being immensely wrong on different things. Not science things, for the most part. More. More like my hot takes about, like the cosmos.

[B]

The cosmos. The dad facts.

[A]

The dad facts. Granted, you brought up Creed. Megan. Oh, my God. God, this is the best thing I've ever heard.

[B]

Are you happy? This is.

[A]

I'm so happy.

[B]

I know I'm about to go on a trip, so I feel like I need to leave you with a gift.

[A]

Oh, yes, you're right.

[B]

You're about to solo parent for three days, so I gotta leave you with all the Creed gifts.

[A]

I think it's Scott Sapp, I think is Creed Singer's name. But he's six feet from the edge, right? And then it's six feet down. Maybe six feet ain't so far down. So you can draw the hypotenuse of that triangle to determine exactly how far Creed Singer stop is from the point on the bottom.

[B]

Important question for you. Is this an on the spot thought or have you actually had this thought before?

[A]

I've thought this a million times in my life.

[B]

You're definitely not thinking about the hypotenuse thought on the spot.

[A]

It's probably not an original thought either because I feel like everyone that heard the song when you're 11 years old and learning about hypotenuses is like, wait

[B]

a second here, I'll diagram this out.

[A]

Wait a second. What other Creed songs are there? My Sacrifice.

[B]

What song is.

[A]

See, that probably came through really intensely in the mic. I'm sorry. Okay, so just a really interesting vote for strides. We've written about this a lot. You can find it on Patreon. Past episodes. You don't need to do a ton of them. I usually think anywhere from one to three sets per week. Four to six repetitions. Usually, though it can vary anywhere from 15 to 30 seconds. I think you can go a little bit farther because that allows you to really ease into the effort. Can be fantastic. I actually might write an article article on the implications of this study along with another study that we're not talking about here on Patreon.

[B]

You should. And also I have a question too, is I wonder how this translates into bone density gain. So I'd love to Take this a step further and look at, like, long term use of hill strides versus plyometrics and see if we're seeing changes in bone density versus either of the two. Like, I wonder if the body adapts better to strides, though, over the long term compared to plyometrics.

[A]

Well, maybe if there's the ground reaction force or ground, you know, all of the. That maybe you're also getting the bone stimulus from the hill strides.

[B]

Well, that's what, that's what I'm trying to say. But how does that change compared to plyometrics? And how does that change as the body adapts in time?

[A]

True. I think the adaptation equation here is the tricky one because, like, the counter argument could be cool. All well and good, but what happens

[B]

when you they're taking athletes that, like, aren't necessarily sprinting on a daily basis?

[A]

Well, they are. They were trained. They were conditioned to it. But what if you improve at those things long term? Would there be more room for improvement in plyometrics? I think not. And I also think, why would you want to improve in that? That's not going to help you, like, the best.

[B]

Oh, David, there is a whole cohort of the population that would love to improve in plyometrics. It's just not you.

[A]

It's just NFL players.

[B]

I mean, can you. Okay, every time I go to a gym, I get like all into lifting and I'm like, I want to improve at this. And I. I mean, if I, like, kept that up consistently, I would for sure want to improve. Plyometrics.

[A]

We're not a plyometric podcast. We're not like.

[B]

Yeah, but there are people out there.

[A]

Yeah, for sure. There's. There's a lot of people out there doing a lot of things. I don't know if they're listening to our podcast necessarily.

[B]

Some work. All plyometrics.

[A]

That's true. Okay, I think we should skip the ketone study. Right.

[B]

We'll move it to next week. We skipped it last week, too. We should briefly comment on the sex study, though.

[A]

Oh, yeah, this is a very brief one. So I always do my searches of all the different journals each week, and usually, like, I would say, 5% of the studies make it into the pod or even into Patreon. But here's a study that I just thought had a fun quote in it. Acute and delayed effects of sexual activity on athletic performance. Blah, blah, blah.

[B]

A scoping review across sex, age and ethnicity.

[A]

Got a scope.

[B]

They really scoped this one. They took a wand to Scope, as

[A]

always, you know, there wasn't any big change seen in greater than 10 to 12 hours. But here's the quote I wanted to read. Critical gaps include female underrepresentation. 99% male samples.

[B]

What? That is nuts. We need some more. That is truly nuts.

[A]

That is nuts.

[B]

We need some female representation in these studies. To be fair though, it's like it is slightly harder to measure, you know, So I understand from a researcher's standpoint, but that means you should still do it. It.

[A]

Yeah, but I mean, are they volunteering for these studies too?

[B]

Like, that's also a good point.

[A]

The average woman is probably less likely to volunteer for a masturbation study than the average male participant.

[B]

Come on, women.

[A]

Come on, step it up.

[B]

Also, why are they always looking 10 to 12 hours? I feel like we need more that are like 30 to 60 minutes.

[A]

I think there are. I think they're a little bit more uncertain.

[B]

That's true. Yeah. So it's like it's easier to do a scoping review on. Yeah, yeah.

[A]

Like that you introduce more confounding variables and some of the studies can find just kind of mixed things. There's no need to talk about that. But I thought that was very funny. 99%.

[B]

That's nuts.

[A]

Coming back to it, you can't stop. Okay, so let's do the Q and A. Anything to promote or talk about before we get there? No, I think we're good.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Okay. Let's start with the Women's Gear index. This is not a question, but I wanted to promote it because they have an amazing Instagram page. We're going to link to this in the show notes. All wonderful people attending. Been talking to them in various contexts over the years. Coached a couple of them in the past. And their Instagram is awesome. So it's for women about all these different gear. They have great, like fun reviews. They're also just real as shit. So go follow the Women's Gear index. Now let's give them a big boost because I think this is. It is a gap. It is a critical gap. It's a critical gap in a 99% male dominated field.

[B]

Okay. And I went down this gap. I went down the deep rabbit hole. I literally watched every single YouTube thing they made this morning. And they're great.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

Actually the tagline on their Instagram is will you be our gear friend? Which I appreciate. But then I was like, I really loved them. Like they were giving authentic gear reviews and just funny people and I wanted to be their friends. But they didn't say which location they were. So I was trying to figure out based on the mountains, I was like, these don't look like Colorado mountains. So I was trying to figure out where they were located based off of how the mountains looked.

[A]

I think that's creepy. I'm sorry.

[B]

Yeah, I just.

[A]

I said that if I said that, there'd be a problem.

[B]

Okay. But I'm a woman. I can say that.

[A]

I mean, I don't.

[B]

I want them to be my friends.

[A]

If I said everything, I. I just want them to be my friends. So I looked at where their mountain was. I geolocated them on Google.

[B]

I'm pulling up this mountain right now. You tag their Instagram. I believe this is Salt Lake City. I know my mountains. Check this out. See, that looks. Those mountains are. The relief is too high for Colorado.

[A]

Yeah. Okay, Megan, we got to stop.

[B]

I was gonna make a joke. Feel like you've gone too far. Megan. Okay, long story short, Women's Gear index. Can you be my friend?

[A]

Okay, next question. On Satisfy, I checked out the Satisfy run year. So it's kind of related. After hearing Molly Seidel signed with them. What the f. Their pricing is ridiculous. Am I missing something? Do you guys know more about this brand?

[B]

Okay. I linked it. I haven't been on Satisfy in a hot second. Do you want me to show you this shirt?

[A]

I do.

[B]

So. I love me a tie. Oh, no, no, no. I love me a tie dye shirt. Yeah, I'm close. Covering up my screen. How much do you think this tie dye T shirt costs?

[A]

Can you give me any detail about it?

[B]

It's a tie dye T shirt. Oh, my God. It says page not found. That's hilarious.

[A]

That is so funny. There's probably a period in it. No.

[B]

Oh, no. Okay, well, I can tell you.

[A]

You can tell me.

[B]

So I. I mean, it was. I don't know any. I don't know shit about shirts. Theoretically. It's like a merino wool t shirt.

[A]

Yeah. 125 bucks.

[B]

320.

[A]

What?

[B]

For a tie dye T shirt. I mean, it was beautiful. I love me a tie dye T shirt. It's great. I would wear this all the time. That is cool. Expensive.

[A]

Super interesting. Yeah. So.

[B]

But also at the same time, too. Let the market speak. All the power to them. If they want to create a luxury brand, that's great for them.

[A]

Yeah. Red button for sure on that one. Yeah. So I think that this gets to a broader discussion about, you know, the economy overall is when you're behind the scenes of Some of these conversations and you know, we have been as it relates to fueling products, and we've heard the discussions of pricing in gear or coaching or literally any field. Probably there is a race to be defined as a luxury brand. Because if you can be defined as a luxury brand, you can jack up prices for no reason other than vibes, unfortunately. But that's.

[B]

You are hustling to create those vibes. Like, there's a lot of, like, marketing. And you have to. In order to sustain that, you have to create the aura. And so it's a hustle.

[A]

Yeah. I mean, aura requires labor. It's a thousand percent true.

[B]

Also, it requires pressure. Like, maybe this is me being more of a blue button girl than a red button girl, but if I sold a t shirt for $320, I'd like be. Be like there would be a lot of pressure on me to feel good about the athletes wearing that and like the experience that they're getting. And so that part of me is like, I don't have enough confidence to create a luxury brand myself because I just like. Yeah, I. I think too much about the consumer.

[A]

We're not luxury brand people.

[B]

No, we're not.

[A]

Right. Like with coaching, I mean, you know, we've been criticized because, you know, there are coaches that charge a ton of money. Like, a ton. Like, you'd be shocked.

[B]

All the power if they want to. That's great. All the power to them.

[A]

But you'd be shocked. It's equivalent of a $325 shot.

[B]

Yes. Yeah.

[A]

And viewing that as a, like, asset in the same way that I'm sure satisfy views that as an asset and more power to them also. Great. But we specifically decided, in fact, we agonized over whether to raid raise prices from 80 to 110 and then 110 to 140 over the course of 10 years. And then after that, I think we're not going to ever increase it from there.

[B]

Yeah, I think we're. We're good.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. And so.

[B]

But I mean, but we're lucky.

[A]

Because we're lucky. But the point is, even when we weren't, that that's.

[B]

That's fair.

[A]

Right. It's just not our style a while. And that's an economic downfall of us participating in the market rather than something that's good for us. Right. So it goes either way.

[B]

But I mean, maybe this is me and maybe I should talk about to my therapist about that more. Like, maybe I should have the confidence to own myself more and be like, I'M going to charge athletes more, but I just don't. I care too much about them, you know.

[A]

True. No respect.

[B]

And that's like, that's a problem with me.

[A]

And so it gets back to just luxury brand economics. Like, you see this in fueling. Right. Like, everyone wants to be defined like Morton, where Martin can charge so much, much because they've created an aura of incredible marketing and it's a good product.

[B]

But now they're probably panicking as fly carb and all these other products come on the market.

[A]

The aura is so good that luxury brands are in the best spot because your margins are fucking fantastic.

[B]

Right.

[A]

So you're making so much money because you're gouging the consumer. If I'm being honest.

[B]

Right. Like, but the consumers are. I mean, if they want to be gouged.

[A]

No, for sure, of course. But that's, that's the, the reason that, I mean, I'm showing my biases, obviously. More power to them. Right, right. Like, you know, even though I'm saying I wouldn't do it and that again, I, maybe I need to talk to my therapist about it. But you see this in like any luxury brand like Gucci or whatever. Some of the biggest companies in the world are these random luxury fashion brands, you know, not so random, but like, because. And some of their founders are many billionaires so many times over because they, you know, optimize in that space. And when you get margins that are that good for something that costs you nothing, which is most of these areas, it's great. You see this in fueling too. Like there's a race to become luxury brands where everyone wants to increase prices. I mentioned science and sport Beta fuel earlier. They increase prices for a product that costs nothing to make.

[B]

Well, it's also really hard when you start. I feel like if you're going to be a luxury brand, you should be a luxury brand from the start. No, it's really hard to go from

[A]

like, oh, no, it's unfortunate because they make such a good product.

[B]

Exactly. Yeah.

[A]

And so the hard part here, and you know, they're not pricing like, you know, Morton, but they increase their prices without any substantial increase in the underlying cost of goods. Right. Who created their ara? We contributed so much to science and sport. Beta fuels a aura in the broader scope of the sport. Right. Like the demand for that product. Where's our cut?

[B]

I'm just saying you're coming back. You're like, I'm six feet from this.

[A]

So long story short, satisfy seems. I mean, I actually Kind of like their vibes. I. I don't follow them closely.

[B]

Oh. And I think it's great just to have a range of products and opportunities. And I think, you know, supporting athletes, like, athletes should sign with companies that pay them well. And, you know, I think that's awesome.

[A]

And yeah, the. The. I've deleted part of this question because it was talking about Molly sighing with them and.

[B]

Oh, did you not read that?

[A]

No, no, no, I know. I read about Molly. There's another part that you didn't even read that I didn't even put in the podcast because I thought it was not something. It was more of a private message about, like, you know, feeling weird about that. And I mean, I don't. I think, like, you know, athletes are going to sign with the companies that give them the most support, as they

[B]

should, and as female athletes should, like, female athlete contracts have a long way to go. And. And, like, Molly deserves a great contract. She's awesome for our sport and I'm, like, really excited to see, you know, hopefully she has a great contract from Satisfy.

[A]

Yeah, absolutely. And it's kind of like shoes. You know, every road company makes an amazing super shoe now. So, you know. Yeah, you might. If you're with Adidas or Puma, you may have a slight advantage, but they're all great. So, you know, and it. It becomes about so much more similar with fuel. Like, you know, we're with the feed, which is so fantastic. But if we weren't, would we sign with Science and Support? Yeah, it's an awesome product. Would we sign with Amax? Yeah, it's an awesome. Like, there's so many awesome products.

[B]

Amex probably wouldn't sign us after I gave the gel review.

[A]

So. Yeah, I mean, it's complicated. Sponsorships are complicated, and I'm influenced by them all the time. Like, I've been running with Hans Troyer, and I have found myself buying things that Hans uses.

[B]

Hoka shoes.

[A]

Yeah, no, I mean, I bought the Hoka Rocket X Trail, and I like.

[B]

And Hyper Light.

[A]

Yeah, and Hyper Light, because Hans uses them. So sponsorships work, right? Like, they even work on people that understand the numbers behind the Matrix.

[B]

Okay, here's my hot take. I feel like you're especially prone to that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[A]

It's because. Because I'm. I'm trusting. Gullible as fuck.

[B]

Just wait until we see Jim Wamsley with a shockwave machine.

[A]

Oh, my goodness.

[B]

Oh, my goodness.

[A]

Please don't buy one of those things. I feel very ashamed about myself right now. Okay, let's do as many as we can here.

[B]

Oh, go up. That was a good one.

[A]

I know. I accidentally scrolled down past it. Okay, it's. This is the end of a broader message. It's tempting to keep pushing for better performances in personal best at all the distances or going for wins on Dragon trails, but it's a huge sacrifice to my family, friends and career to keep chasing these athletic pursuits. The pursuit of excellence is addicting. Running has given me confidence and purpose, but my marriage is strained and my kids need me. I have a new big boy job that demands the attention I've been given my training. How do we balance the love of the sport without compromising our dedication to all other aspects of our lives? Is there a sustainable and balanced way to maintain excellence without losing touch with everything else?

[B]

This is a beautiful question, and I feel like it's one that we talk about often, especially now with kids. And I feel like that is one of the most important parts of this question is kids. It's like they really do change the equation. Equation on time demands and training and how you think about your energy. And it's been something that we, like, constantly talk about.

[A]

Yeah, it's so challenging. I mean, we face this all the time. And what I said to the listener is like, we're right there with you with this thought. But I think everything feels this way when your life gets busy and wild. Like, I. I know it seems like it's a running thing, but it would be about anything that makes you a fully actualized human in the world. Right? Like, you are not just getting through the day. You are something so much more. And so having. Having things that you can direct yourself toward is a way to push back against that inky blackness in a really beautiful way. And so running can be a part of that. And that doesn't mean you need to go in for like, the very peak of your possible human performance. And running a hundred miles a week, it can mean that I'm going to go out and try to be healthy and get stronger and have purposeful purpose in my body and, you know, be healthy and all those other things in the context of this other place. And what I mentioned, my challenge to this was that last part of his question without losing touch with everything else. So losing touch is not implied in dedicating yourself to something. And what my challenge is, is like, well, you know, how are you showing up for your wife? How are you showing up for your kids? Like, the. The time demands of anything are rarely the full limiter. I mean, maybe with kids to a certain extent, but, like, often it's how we're able to show up in those spaces. And I know I mess up all the time, especially when I'm busy where, like, you know, I'm like, I. I try to be wake up each morning like, I'm going to be the best partner to Megan today. And then I get busy and stressed and it. That falls by the wayside, you know, so it's difficult. But, like, try to think about how can I show up as the thing I want to be with the time I have rather than lamenting the time you don't.

[B]

Okay, that was beautifully said. Also, you are crushing it as a partner, so don't cut yourself down.

[A]

But thank you, but I mean, I'm not as good as I was before kids.

[B]

I mean, everything's harder with kids. And I think the most important thing is talking about it. Like. Like we had actually a really important conversation. It was like a five minute conversation because Ollie was screaming down the canyon yesterday. He just has this association with driving down the Boulder canyon while you scream for 25 minutes as we drive. And for me, I think sometimes the tricky thing is, like, how the narratives in my head get applied to achievement and thinking about things. And I was kind of lamenting the fact that, you know, I haven't raced since November and it feels like a long time. And my brain wants to have this narrative structure of, like, what have I done this year? I haven't done any races. Like, you know, it's been a year from my heart in terms of how it's responding to training and long runs and workouts. And we kind of talked about, like, reframing that. I was like, oh, but this year, like Leo and Ollie, we go back and watch videos of them in November and have so much nostalgia for them growing up. And I think sometimes you just need to, like, adjust the narrative structure in your head and think about other narrative structures that can be more productive.

[A]

Yeah, absolutely. And just know that everybody's there with you. And I think what's so beautiful about caring about things is the caring about things. And, you know, your wife and kids will recognize that as long as it's like being additive to the type of human you're. You are. And while that is not a choice, there are elements of volition in that that are so hard to address because we never want to say, oh, am I being a bad person? And there are times that I'm like, I am being a bad partner. I am being, you know, Like, I know that for a fact and it's because of these things on external, I hope. But still I, I need to change that. Right. Like, and so, you know, this question was a great way for me to think about myself. Right. I think I'm better with the kids than I am as a partner. And like, I don't think so.

[B]

What gives you that?

[A]

Well, with the kids, I'm, I'm. I think I'm good in a. Because they're easier, right? It's not complex.

[B]

They're easier than me. No offense.

[A]

Well, no, I mean psychologically like.

[B]

Well, I mean, I guess psychologically the kids love you throw a ball with

[A]

them and they're like, they think you're like infinite infallible.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I mean it's a different situation.

[B]

I think you're relatively infallible. See, already different. You're right.

[A]

Good place to end that. But, but to be serious, like, I also have insecurities about the type of coach I am now. Right. Like it's, it's all more challenging. It's all, there's all resistance in all of it. And you know, I think practicing non resistance and seeing where that resistance is manifesting itself in the type of person you are on a day to day basis and the way that you show up for people is a tough inquiry to make, but it is so important lest we become, you know, bitter with time, you know, and jaded and just, you know, withholding of the things that make us actually enjoy life. And so maybe the best test of all is just the laugh test. How much you laugh in each day. Like as simplified as that is. Like if you can go and just be like, I'm going to laugh as much with my wife as I possibly can can. Sometimes that smooths away some of the rough edges that come with a just terribly stressed out like existence, which is just normal for I think a lot of people listening. And I know it is for me

[B]

the laugh index, it's a great, it's a great measurement. Yeah. I feel like ours has been high, relatively high recently.

[A]

Yeah. I mean I hope you listen to the podcast.

[B]

You're like, guys.

[A]

But I mean it's hard. It's easier for us because you know, we work together, we have all this time together. So it's not just logistics though. I mean even for us it ventures into that sometimes, you know, and I need you to stick wands up my butt.

[B]

Apparently tomorrow with 499 lubricant. Actually I'm traveling tomorrow and so we were like delicately planning out The Shockwave schedule. This is. I feel like this has been in your head. You're like, megan, what time is your flight?

[A]

I'm just so worried I'm gonna need surgery. And this has nothing to do with Shockwave? Um. Yeah.

[B]

What makes you think that, you know,

[A]

you're talking about your insecurities about, like, not racing and stuff. It's like, I just. You know, everybody could see this coming a mile away, and I did it with eyes wide open. But, like, I pushed too hard to try to get to canyons, and now that it's passed, I'm like, ah. I just wish I, you know, didn't do, like, it was fine. How I came back was great, but then I just pushed too hard to be ready for the race. And then, you know, we just, you know, again, like, I never would have achieved the things I've achieved unless I was the type of person that pushed. But it's the same thoughts you're having about your heart, and so I feel for you, man. But I also.

[B]

I understand it. You know, I understand the push. I don't think, like, you would have done the things you've done in life if you didn't have that drive. And it's always easier in retrospect. And, you know, I think you did get a little unlucky with, like. Like, a step on the foot. I do think you should get an mri, though. I'm gonna be the. Yeah, you're like, I don't want to hear it.

[A]

I have decided I'm just gonna wear chunky shoes all the time.

[B]

Yeah, we're gonna go get some zoom flies for you. Right?

[A]

I'm currently wearing the Adidas.

[B]

Oh, those are the king of chonks.

[A]

I love this shoe.

[B]

It is. I mean, I feel like it's too chunky.

[A]

I mean, it might not be for running, but it's definitely good for making me feel like I could be in the NBA. Things, like 8 inches off the ground.

[B]

Do the name of the show shoe.

[A]

It's like, the edge speed or. I don't know.

[B]

I can't decide if it looks like a dad shoe or if it looks like a fly shoe or if it looks pure chunk. Yeah. Where. Where are you going with that?

[A]

The shoot is six feet from the edge, and it's thinking.

[B]

I mean, it really. It puts you legitimately six feet off the edge. It's a stack out of six feet.

[A]

Okay, next one. I'm reaching out for research project ideas for a small addition to my master's program. I talked to my MA advisor today and really his only input was wanting to use the new treadmill. They have the ability to do steep incline and decline.

[B]

That's fun.

[A]

I remember you recommending a bicarb study to a Patreon member a few weeks ago, but I'm not sure on the feasibility of using bicarb on this little project. I'm curious if you guys have any other recommendations or ideas. No worries. If not, you're the best.

[B]

It would be funny if this person took the bicarb study that the other person was planning to do and publish it first.

[A]

More bicarb studies the better.

[B]

That would be hilarious. Um, okay. My first thought. I'm curious to see where your first thought is. I feel like we need more studies on slight downhill inclines on the treadmill and seeing how those like feed into the repeated bout effect in terms of like trail runners and runners getting stimulus from that. Because I do feel like a 4% downhill grade on treadmill, which is where most like commercial grade treadmills go, can be helpful. But I still have like some questions about how useful that is. And so I feel like doing a repeat about effect and comparing it to like steeper versus outdoor running and doing some CK measurements would be interesting.

[A]

I like the idea that it's not going to find any change. It's not strong enough statistical power, I think.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So I think that that one just is. It's not. You're not pushing the effect size high enough. So for a small project I think we'd want to do something.

[B]

What if we change the grade to like. I mean this is a. Seems like a beefy treadmill. I, I think, I think if we did like, I mean there have been studies though that have looked at that of like 15% or 20% downhill on the, on the treadmill.

[A]

Yeah. There aren't that many that look at the exact decay in performance. So what I'd love to see is I actually wouldn't use the decline. I think it's a little too complicated.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

For a small study because if you're using incline and in your decline and incline it's just way too much going on. Um, but I'd be really interested in having visit one be a time to exhaust or not even time to exhaustion because then you'd have to have another baseline. Um, just a time trial at like a certain gradient and then repeating after two sessions separated two weeks apart with a downhill trial like a downhill 30 minutes at 15%. That's not that interesting. I think you should just use the Incline on the this one for a simplified study and do a carb study and how it relates to fatigue resistance. So have someone run or, you know, at a certain pace, at you know, 15% grade for whatever 90 minutes or two hours. And at like, you can just make it simple and do 20 grams of carbs per hour versus 90 grams of carbs per hour or something like that and get some data that's just interesting to pump publish, but won't take too much of your time and probably will see a pretty cool effect size.

[B]

Agree. I feel like it's fun to do time to exhaustion tests too. And I feel like mixing in carbs is easy from like a financial perspective too. So.

[A]

Yeah, and it seems just fatigue resistance is the easiest thing to look at. I think in these types of studies. The problem is then you often need a baseline to determine the level that they should be going on to get the fatiguing protocol. And then it is a lot of visits. So all of this is quite difficult,

[B]

um, research in general. Quite, quite difficult.

[A]

No, no, research is easy.

[B]

You're like, I'm gonna apply my entrepreneurial instincts to research.

[A]

Megan, Megan, pitch. Luxury research. Yeah, luxury.

[B]

Luxury research. Yeah.

[A]

Doing funny thing with my fingers. Right?

[B]

I mean, I feel like that's what Stanford does. Cause it takes freaking a year and a half to pass an irb.

[A]

Yeah. Okay, next one. Uh, in a recent episode, you shared a story about cutting the lugs off your shoes to make them lighter, which gave me an idea. I have a small local 10k race I'll be running in just over a month. I told you before that I've been running in barefoot shoes for five years. Why shouldn't I run the race totally barefoot? You talked about making your shoes 3.6% lighter, but I can make mine 100% lighter. Um, assuming my feet are conditioned enough to be able to handle the 10k race, kilometers of pavement, would I actually be much faster? To be clear, I'm not comparing barefoot to super shoes. I'm comparing barefoot with barefoot shoes.

[B]

Ouch. Can you imagine? I've actually had some athletes that I've coached that like really wanted to go barefoot. And I was like, you know, shoes are great. Super shoes obviously have. That's where the data is at in terms of improving. And they're like, you know, barefoot is kind of related to my identity. It's related to my why of running. And I'm like, great, I'll support you. Let's do it. But it's actually quite tricky to go from running in A barefoot shoe to running barefoot. Just from a like the perspective of like, like cuts and everything that's on the ground and trails and the trickiness

[A]

of that being said, it's fine, you know, if your feet are strong enough, which I'm sure this person is.

[B]

And you've built it up over time.

[A]

I used to do enough of this that I probably could have done it.

[B]

Um, I don't know about that.

[A]

No, I, I did long runs in just socks when I was young. Like influenced by Born to Run, you know, before I was a. Long before I was a coach. But you know, when I was just building up, I once did I think a 13 mile run on the like one of those paths in Durham.

[B]

What? Yeah, it just sucks you never told me this. I mean Durham we would have been. I was either close enough.

[A]

Okay, you wanna hear an embarrassing story?

[B]

You, I mean you probably told me that, you didn't tell me that because you're like, Megan's gonna get the ick.

[A]

This might have even been before we met.

[B]

I mean I had no idea.

[A]

It might've been in that two month window when I was at in Durham, but hadn't met you yet. So what happened? And this is like embarrassing, but it just shows when you're desperate and you're self judging, a lot of things can happen. So you know, I was just, I, I wasn't like a particularly good athlete or anything at that point. Longer term compared to what would happen. And I was friends with Lauren Bond.

[B]

Oh yeah.

[A]

Who was incredible. My God, I need to reconnect with her. She's just one of the best people I've ever met. Brilliant lawyer. And she was an all American track runner, I think at Kansas or Kansas.

[B]

Kansas. Yeah.

[A]

And she gave me her GPS watch. I'd never run with a GPS watch before. So I said, okay, I'm gonna go out and hammer. So I went out to this path and was like, I'm gonna go on hammer. After like half mile I stopped because having the GPS and seeing my paces was so discouraging. Knowing like, you know, people are out there running fast and I'm here struggling to run, you know, whatever pace I was running. And in frustration I just took off my shoes and did the rest of the run just in socks.

[B]

That is wild. How have I not. I mean, I feel like I've heard most of your life stories. I haven't heard this one.

[A]

And my socks ripped on the bottom obviously and tore up the bottom of my feet, but it showed that I would have been okay. Probably at that stage to go barefoot. Would that have been good? No. So barefoot versus barefoot shoes. I would think barefoot sho shoes probably are more economical because it allows there to be slightly more stiffness through the arch that will then transfer power a little better. So human feet lose power via the arch and Achilles pretty substantially. Hence why super shoes can be so effective. It's less about generating power, though. Some of it is through the plate. A lot of it's about decreasing the amount of power lost. Hence why I think flexible shoes are actually kind of not a great thing. But that's neither here nor there. So probably barefoot shoes make more of a difference than the weight reduction would when it comes to economy.

[B]

Plus, just the resilience of having. I mean, I keep getting back to this. Maybe this is a person that, like, I walk around the house constantly in shoes.

[A]

When do you take off your shoes?

[B]

Very rarely. Yeah, it's. I mean, I feel like I just grew up in shoes, which is really funny. And I wish, you know, I kind of grew up a little bit differently of more barefoot time. But it's like my instinct is to grab a pair of shoes. Well, now, like, I wake up in the morning, and when I come downstairs, I put on a pair of shoes.

[A]

Who does that? Yeah, put it in your room. And I. I've made enough comments over time that I'm like, this is about being a good partner now. It is part of her identity.

[B]

I'm gonna support Megan's shoes. But we're very much like, we wear sh. The house. That's kind of how it. How it goes. I don't. Yeah, you're wearing shoes right now.

[A]

I'm wearing shoes because we left the house. Okay, so what does our three and a half year old do now?

[B]

He wears shoes all the time, including to bed.

[A]

To bed. What does he do?

[B]

It's impossible to get them off.

[A]

What does he do if we try to take him off?

[B]

He screams.

[A]

And you know what else he's doing? What? He's singing before bed.

[B]

Six feet from the edge. Great. At bedtime recently, should we do iron dosing?

[A]

We teased it earlier. Maybe I can just very rapidly talk. I don't need to talk about this question, but I do want to talk about some co things associated with iron levels and globin that I've seen recently to throw out. First is creatine. If you've had low, you know, hemoglobin levels, especially creatine, I've seen be associated with higher hemoglobin levels across athletes. One thing I Want to track with you. Will your hemoglobin go down now that you're not taking creatine?

[B]

I did stop creating creatine, mostly because I was like, I'm taking these creatine pills, and they didn't really seem to be doing anything. And so I stopped taking them. And then I just haven't gotten back to a powder because they seem to cause GI distress. And I just haven't been willing to make that leap.

[A]

So let's monitor.

[B]

Do you think I should get back to it?

[A]

No, no, I say let's monitor. Right. It's an interesting study. If. If it goes down one element that's.

[B]

Yeah. My hemoglobin's actually been quite high, but we've been spending a lot of time at altitude, so it's hard to know what's what.

[A]

Yeah. So I'll be curious.

[B]

Okay. My favorite two brands of iron supplementation are Hemoplexin and Thorn. Um, and then maybe if you don't tolerate either of those, Nature's Made would be like, the third option. Um, I see good iron absorption results.

[A]

Okay, I'm gonna keep going to the bad David paths.

[B]

Oh. Oh, great.

[A]

Well, they're good paths, but spicy. Uh, number two is for female athletes in particular, but also male athletes a. Like Ashwagandha. So specifically Pure Sport, because that's the only informed sport brand I've personally found. So that's means it's clear of all contaminants and it's clean for sport. Um, but the KSM 66 variety has some evidence that it can improve testosterone levels in women in particular, though it's very mixed. So please don't take this at face value, but I've seen that associated in three athletes now with higher hemoglobin levels. Granted, they're also making other interventions. Just something to note. Pure Sport Ultra Ashwagandha.

[B]

Okay. I don't co sign that, but I like that swing.

[A]

Yeah. Just. Again, these are swings.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

Um, others are vitamin A and copper. So I think one of the places I've seen increased levels of chemoglobin involve athletes taking First Endurance Multi. V. I've written about this a lot before. That first Endurance multiv only has 25 milligrams of iron, which is not crazy, but I've seen anomalous leaps in iron. And so I was going through some of the micronutrients. The. The three that I've seen associated with iron absorption could be vitamin A, copper, and boron.

[B]

On.

[A]

Actually, so those three are all in that supplement. And so that supplement is a good way to get them. Um, I would consider something like first endurance multiv in addition to an iron supplement if you find yourself chronically low.

[B]

Okay, that's a little bit.

[A]

Okay. And again, I don't know.

[B]

I don't know.

[A]

And it's probably all wrong and more reasonable. But to be clear, you do not co sign this.

[B]

You're just hearing I co signed some of that.

[A]

This is desperation situations where athletes have 11 point whatever hemoglobin and they're trying to compete at the national. National or national level. Like you know, which is hard to do actually. Very hard just from an oxygen processing capacity. And like at that point, you know, if they can't go to altitude or if they are at altitude, you're looking for other types of options.

[B]

And as always, energy availability is literally, I think it's very challenging to improve iron levels and improve hemoglobin levels without adequate energy availability. Okay. And then the other thing is we get this question all the time is do you do every other day dosing or daily dosing? And there's some science. I actually remember the first like scientific paper I saw of this was at a medical conference as a med student of looking at every other day dosing and how that interacts with the hormone hepcidin, which is an iron regulator. And the theory is that like there's some small, like some small benefits for absorption if you're doing every other day. But that being said, I feel like every other day often translates into like every third day or every fourth day. And my philosophy, as long as you're not having like side effects from the iron is just like get in the substrate.

[A]

What if it's not every third day or every fourth day, it's actually every other day.

[B]

I still think I. This is where I still think I

[A]

still pushing you because I know your answer.

[B]

You know my answer from the evidence that I've seen, which is obviously anecdotal. I evidence. I think every day is still better

[A]

from a Hepcidin has done damage.

[B]

I think it has done damage. I'm saying that officially you can take that statement. I don't code sign, but I agree.

[A]

You know, this became the buzzword a number of years ago and I think it has caused people to do weird things with iron approaches.

[B]

They've just get it in. Yeah.

[A]

Yes. After exercise.

[B]

Actually when we look at some of those things, like when we look at the timing on like you know, an hour's level before exercise, after exercise, we're talking about Very small percentages of changes of absorption. And I feel like that often leads to not having taking it because of like trying to be perfect and just take it.

[A]

It's so scientifically uninteresting to say people are not taking it. I feel like that's true.

[B]

I mean they say that's what real world what happens.

[A]

But, but like I, I think more give the optimal and then if people mess up the optimal, it's up to them. I think post exercise, 30 minutes post exercise, big dose with all, with some with vitamin C and just like loading up.

[B]

But always before you do big doses of iron or doses of iron, know your blood.

[A]

Oh yeah. This is for people that are low. And if you're not low, don't worry about it. I think we should go on to listener corner. I, I don't listen to anything I just said.

[B]

You' turn the dial to me. I will say though, I was working with a top physiologist and they were recommending levels of iron that I was shocked about. And it did actually kind of change my viewpoint on how I help athletes that have low ferritin levels, like supplement. And that's, you know, something I, I can't go on the record of. But it was interesting to see how they were approaching iron and it was, it gave me new perspectives.

[A]

Absolutely. Yeah. And a lot of the studies that are doing like weird interventions will also dose very high iron, like heat studies and things like that. So yeah, that's where like some of the higher doses might be options for people that have a need. But if you don't have a need,

[B]

that need actually high iron can have very similar symptoms as low iron and so it can be tricky.

[A]

Yeah. On Patreon we'll talk about iron. Otherwise again, listen to Megan Nani. Um, you wanna go on a listener corner?

[B]

Krina, we did just delete something very spicy that I said.

[A]

That is true. I was trying to stand up for you.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Trying to be a good husband over here. Good partner.

[B]

You're like, guess what Megan just said. We can't even put that on air

[A]

at the very end. The podcast will just depend. Megan's laugh after she realized what she said was not okay.

[B]

Oh, shit.

[A]

Okay, listen, Horner, before that, anything to talk about.

[B]

John Gianji. Yeah. John G's been rocking my life recently.

[A]

So J a n j I.com they're sign up for the John G Collective. You get 15% off. Tell them we sent you if you want. You don't have to. What you got to talk about okay.

[B]

The long bra. I love the RD bra. I've actually heard multiple people describe it as the Unicorn Brawl, which is nice if it's a soft flask in the back, gels and ice in the front, so. So lots of options there. Also, David, I'm wearing your pants.

[A]

Oh, yeah?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

The Atlas Multi.

[B]

The Atlas Multi. They're comfortable. I think they're actually the men's pants. Cause you take a lot of my clothes, and so I get lost on what's men's versus women's. Yeah, they're comfy.

[A]

I took the women's extra small from you. Yeah, I don't know why. It just fits me perfectly. But the men's medium works best for me, so it's very strange as it relates to my particular body. I have a weird body. I've learned in all of my clothes buying over the years.

[B]

You have a beautiful body. I mean, you do shop at Target Kids sections. I. So perhaps that's why you have a weird body.

[A]

An XL? Well, XXL Target Kids saves me significant

[B]

amounts of money I can waste on a chocolate machine. But the sleeves are all short.

[A]

Yeah, but, like, why does my wrist need to be that hot? It's worth it, Megan. This is how we ball.

[B]

This is how we ball. Okay. But I also love the trail short. So many pockets. And the tees are great too.

[A]

Yeah, the best. You can't go wrong with John G. So go there now. Get your race short for the season. It's gonna be what drives you forward. It's awesome stuff, actually.

[B]

I can carry, like, nine gels across the trail short. And the brawl, which is. I mean, that can sustain me for a long run.

[A]

Yeah, it's incredible. Okay, on to Listener corner. We have two of them. The one of the. You didn't read the second one, but it's so beautiful. But it's also quite long, and we're pretty late.

[B]

Let's do the first one.

[A]

Okay. We'll save the second one for next week. Oh, but it's about their journey through partying in their 30s and cutting over addiction. Okay, we'll get.

[B]

We'll do the first one.

[A]

It's just so beautiful. All right, here it is. Uh, super random and not at all training related, but your podcast opening with a Happy Tuesday. It's Tuesday every week inspired my partner and I to do Affirmation Tuesdays. We started over a year ago, and it's been a super special way for us to connect. We'll write little notes to each other and of Affirmation and appreciation of things we noticed the week prior. And every week we go, it's Tuesday. Happy Tuesday. Anyways, I thought you would get a kick out of knowing that love is alive and well in your listener community.

[B]

I get a big kick out of that.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I'm on honored. It's Tuesday. They're celebrating Tuesday with us. Yeah, we should do this.

[A]

I think that's. We basically do it at baseline.

[B]

I know. Actually, my, like, one of my love languages is writing notes. I write notes in Leo's lunchbox every day. And they're drawings, actually. You always have super shoes in those drawings.

[A]

Yeah, I do write. I do put super shoes on them. Yeah. Actually, the more I think about it, this would be a fantastic thing to do.

[B]

It's a great idea. Yeah. We already kind of do it. Like, we write each other a lot of notes randomly. Yeah, but, but they're more, Sometimes they're more like logistics based. Like, Addie, I love you.

[A]

It's a little different than the affirmation notes. Your notes can go over the top sometimes in a beautiful way. Okay, let's do this.

[B]

Let's do it.

[A]

Okay, all listeners, here's a challenge. Do this with your, your partner. Like an affirmation Tuesday, and we're gonna report back. We did. Yeah. Just have like a post it note or a thing where you just. Or dry erase board and write like two or three things. How about three?

[B]

Just start with one. Keep it. I feel like whenever you're making changes, just start with one. Okay. I'm gonna write you a note tomorrow. You'll wrote me a note tomorrow, and then we'll continue doing it or report back.

[A]

Okay. I like this idea.

[B]

What are you gonna, are you gonna draw or write?

[A]

If I drew, that'd be an act of aggression.

[B]

No, you draw for Leo all the time.

[A]

That's true.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I would just draw you super shoes.

[B]

You drew a whole soccer scene for his lunchbox on, I think, Wednesday.

[A]

Oh, yeah, No, I do. I try to draw really elaborate scenes.

[B]

Yeah, I like it, actually. Sometimes I pick him up at school and he's like, mom, why didn't you pack my lunch?

[A]

Usually have lunch.

[B]

I mean, he varies. I feel like whoever, he just likes it when we put cookies in. So whoever put cookies in, we're about 50. 50 on. Who does?

[A]

Well, the thing is, I have trouble drawing boundaries with him in food at home. Right. Because I, I, I understand. It's not like this for kids. You need to draw boundaries, but I just don't want him to have any weird Things with food. And I understand. Maybe I'm giving it to him.

[B]

We've started. I mean, he asked for ice cream for breakfast the other day, and we're like, we need to draw that.

[A]

For sure. For sure. But at school, I'm like, not my problem. That's your problem.

[B]

Well, see, for me, I'm like, this is my excuse to put oranges in a lunchbox. Because he'll do anything at school.

[A]

Yeah, but exactly.

[B]

So he'll take his shoes, he'll like, do whatever they ask him. So I'm like, I'm going to put as many fruits and vegetables in here as possible.

[A]

Oh, no, same. I'm giving him, like, the most beautiful Instagram approved plate every lunchtime. And then at home, I'm like, you're going to have a cheese stick, a couple oranges, and yes, something from Trader Joe's that I shouldn't be giving. Mochi rice nuggets, unfortunately. I love them so much. They're so good for me.

[B]

Mochi rice nuggets. Yeah, yeah, they're great.

[A]

But if they're in the house, Leo's like a little addicted kid.

[B]

Well, it's actually, that's the thing. It's like, you'll pull out a snack and then he's going to be like, dad's having it. I'm going to eat it too. Yeah, it's become a problem because you just. Just eat like mochi rice nuggets and ice cream.

[A]

And I eat vegetables, but he doesn't grow them on the vegetables. Yeah, well, of course I'm not eating carrots. He's not like, oh, I want a carrot. So, yeah, they do model your behavior. You gave me. I gave you about shoes. Maybe I deserve that. What other Creed songs are they? Let's look up Creed songs.

[B]

Okay, I need to look up my chat.

[A]

Oh, what? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll give you my example.

[B]

What was. What did you ask it?

[A]

Okay, I'm gonna go to my exact thing. This is what we do on Patreon.

[B]

This is really funny to see your. What's. What's an ice maker guide?

[A]

Well, I was looking up a guide for my parents.

[B]

You can see your recents on here.

[A]

Okay. I'm trying to see where the David Roach thing is. Let's see. Oh, no. The runners in creatine. Okay, okay, okay.

[B]

I'm gonna ask it the same exact question. It's definitely not gonna give me.

[A]

We do this on Patreon.

[B]

This is a very. Okay, this is Patreon vibe.

[A]

Okay, so it said for Me. If you want, I can break this down specifically for how someone like David Rich would. And my question was, are there any elite. Oh, actually, no. This was on male runners. Are there any elite male runners taking creatine? Because I wanted to see if we could search the Internet and just. Fine.

[B]

There's no way it's going to give me the David Roach prompt unless it's listening to us.

[A]

Yeah. Okay. Go down to the bottom. Okay. It's still. It's still doing. This is not compelling.

[B]

We're waiting.

[A]

We're waiting.

[B]

No, we're waiting. We're waiting, we're waiting. I don't see David yet. It's coming with arms wide open. David's not gonna be coming unless he sees his name.

[A]

Oh, man. They didn't say my name.

[B]

No, see, it knows you. Okay, now ask it. Yeah, now ask. You're. You gotta ask it. Who am I?

[A]

Well, no, of course it knows. There. I'm gonna ask it. Okay. I'm just gonna say. I'll ask it.

[B]

I should say, do you know. Do you know my name?

[A]

No, it knows my name. Did you know I was David Birch? I didn't know that for sure. I just saw the name on your

[B]

account and answered in that voice. Since you asked if you are David Roach, then I just explained your own philosophy back to you, which is a risky game. Oh, no. That's hilarious.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Ask it to draw a picture of you.

[A]

Why, it does do that?

[B]

Oh, yeah, it definitely doesn't.

[A]

Okay, well, we're going to stop this. This is what we do on Patreon. This is not for the main part. We love you.

[B]

All right. Afraid. You're afraid of what it's going to draw.

[A]

I'm not afraid. Megan, make it.

[B]

Draw it.

[A]

I'm not afraid. I'm not afraid of anything. I'm not afraid of being sick or one last breath or my sacrifice or. Can you take me higher? Bye. Bye, guys. Sorry. Oh, Megan's last coming.

[B]

You can figure out a way.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

No,

[A]

Yeah. We'll put that laughing at the end.

[B]

This.