From Beginner to Ultra Runner | Fleur Summers’ Inspiring Running Story

Summary

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Podcast Summary: Stronger with Don Saladino

Episode: From Beginner to Ultra Runner | Fleur Summers’ Inspiring Running Story
Date: September 23, 2025
Host: Don Saladino
Guest: Fleur Summers – Ultra Runner, Running Coach, and Community Member

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Overview

In this compelling episode, Don Saladino welcomes ultra runner and coach Fleur Summers to delve deep into her journey from self-described non-athlete to a 100-mile ultra marathon runner and influential figure in Don’s challenger community. The conversation traces Fleur’s roots, battles with weight and self-worth, and her evolution through setbacks, perseverance, and the transformative power of community. The discussion uncovers what “strength” truly means—far beyond physical feats—and how proving yourself “right” with the backing of a supportive group shapes both habit and mindset.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Fleur’s Beginnings: From Non-Athlete to Runner

• Fleur’s early struggles with weight and sports:

  • Grew up as an overweight kid; her mother was 300–350 pounds.
  • Not athletic, always last in school races, would find excuses to avoid running.
  • Quote: “I would always say I left my bat in the car and just miss the entire running warm up.” (06:20, Fleur)

• Turning point (2012):

  • Spontaneously decided to try running—ran 4K on day one, 5K the next.
  • Found surprising joy and peace in running Auckland’s historic Lydia coaching trails.

2. Mental and Physical Transformation

• Community Influence and Belief:

  • Joined Don’s group during a dark period: lost job, mother was terminally ill, felt lost.
  • Drawn to the group for its non-serious tone and support.
  • Key moment: Fleur says the support made her reframe how she saw herself, “I started reframing how I saw myself … when you come into a sport like ultrarunning, you’ve got to be able to back yourself as well. And that’s what was always missing for me.” (02:15, 22:21, Fleur)

• From last place to ultra marathons:

  • Ran her first ultramarathon after two years of running; has since lost 100 lbs.
  • Has run races as long as 100 miles in a single stretch, embracing the “boring” and grinding nature of endurance running.
  • Quote: “I have a high boredom tolerance. Good run training is boring. You just have to put the miles on your legs.” (08:49, Fleur)

3. Building Mental Resilience

• The challenge of monotony and night runs:
  • Fleur thrives in environments and routines others resist due to mental toughness.
  • Discusses night running safety as a woman, including a near-scary encounter where a car slowed and stopped unexpectedly.
  • Insights on problem-solving and using running as therapy or meditation:
    • “If you’ve got a problem and it’s still a problem after a long run, you know it’s real.” (11:03, Fleur)
    • Podcasts help her combat loneliness on nighttime runs.

4. Joining Don’s Challenge Group: The Power of Support

• Origin story:

  • Found Don via Instagram, appreciated his sense of humor. Joined group at her lowest point to focus on health.
  • The group was pivotal: “I couldn't have done it without you,” she tells Don. Don counters that she was always capable—she just needed the support. (20:28, Fleur & Don)

• Proving people right (not wrong):

  • Don’s coaching reframes internal narratives:
    • “We don’t believe in ‘prove them wrong’, we believe in ‘prove them right’. There’s always someone in your life… maybe there’s someone that believes in you—prove them right.” (02:48, 22:51, Don)

5. Embracing the Process: Training, Failure, and Adaptation

• Transformation highlights:

  • Weight loss of 100 pounds while running up to 50k/30 miles per week, even before optimizing training or nutrition.

  • Extreme improvement in both physical endurance and mental fortitude.

  • Learning to handle setbacks: After a DNF (Did Not Finish) and finishing last, she almost quit, but the group and Don’s feedback reframed these as learning experiences.

  • Notable Quote:
    "Your transformation physically is almost as amazing as your transformation mentally." (16:25, Don)

• Importance of strength training:

  • Initially told by coaches NOT to strength train (“it’ll slow you down”), she saw performance improvements, reduced injury, and much faster recovery when adding resistance work.
  • Emphasizes muscle endurance and “body armor” for ultra runners.
  • Encourages runners she coaches to add 2–3 strength sessions per week.

6. Nutrition for Ultra Running and Body Composition

• Caloric needs and fueling:

  • Highlights how under-fueling (1,800 kcal/day) undermined performance.
  • Currently eats over 3,000 kcal/day at her leanest, with adaptive eating depending on training cycles and race weeks.
  • Quote: "It’s ironic that at your leanest, you were eating the most calories.” (25:02, Don)

• Fuelling strategies:

  • Tailors nutrition for races and heavy training—balances clean eating with strategic indulgence (e.g. pizza, creamy pastas before race day).
  • Trial and error helped, as everyone responds differently; what works for one can be disastrous for another.

• Debunking food myths:

  • Points out Michael Phelps analogy: elite athletes can’t get by on “clean eating” alone due to calorie volume.

7. Mindset for Endurance—Overcoming Hurdles

• Coping with pain/mental lows:

  • Ultra races are a series of “problem solving” exercises. It always gets tough, but rarely always worse.
  • “You have to decide: are you hurt, or are you hurting? If it’s just hurting, toughen up and get through it." (34:25, Fleur)
  • Quote: “If you go in expecting it to feel good the entire time, you’re going to crash and burn.” (56:00, Fleur)

• Community’s role in reframing mindset:

  • Moved from being motivated by “proving people wrong” to being fuelled by support—“proving them right”.
  • Don compares her mental toughness to his top celebrity clients and world-class athletes.

8. Notable Running Feats and “Backyard Ultra”

• Backyard Ultra explained (30:10):
  • 4.1 mile loop every hour on the hour, until only one runner remains.
  • Recent world record: 119 hours (500mi). Fleur and Don discuss the mental and physical freakishness of record-holders.
  • Memorable Moment: Fleur recounts creating a “Karaoke Train of Awesomeness” at 70k into Tarawera (singing the Always Sunny in Philadelphia musical and taking song requests while running through the night). (58:08, Fleur)

9. Race Calendar and Coaching

• Upcoming Events:
  • Next up: Tekapo Ultra 50k in NZ, Kepler Challenge (her ninth!), Tarawera 100-miler (aiming for a sub-25 hour), aiming for UTMB in France (100mi, 30,000ft of gain).
  • Coaching business growing; now the official coach for Kepler Challenge.

10. Listener Q&A Highlights

• Mental Hurdles in Ultras (53:24):
  • Acknowledge the pain, remember past hard moments, use support (even something like, “Do you think Don trained someone who can’t run this hill?”).
• Role of music and podcasts:
  • Music by day (old school/80s rock), podcasts by night for company. Maintains a 14-hour playlist for ultramarathons.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Every great athlete, I feel like almost has a little bit of a screw loose.” (07:32, Don Saladino)
• “If you’ve got a problem and it’s still a problem after a long run, you know it’s real.” (11:03, Fleur Summers)
• “We don’t believe in ‘prove them wrong’, we believe in ‘prove them right’.” (02:48 & 22:51, Don Saladino)
• “You run 100 miles like it’s a normal person running out three.” (03:41, Don Saladino)
• “Your transformation physically is almost as amazing as your transformation mentally.” (16:25, Don Saladino)
• “Are you hurt or hurting? If you’re just hurting, toughen up and get it and get through it.” (34:25, Fleur Summers)
• “It never always gets worse.” (27:44, Fleur Summers)
• “I couldn’t have done it without you.” (20:28, Fleur Summers)
• “When you come into a sport like ultrarunning, you’ve got to be able to back yourself as well. And that’s what was always missing for me.” (02:15, 22:21, Fleur Summers)
• Karaoke Train of Awesomeness: Singing the Always Sunny in Philadelphia musical through the night with fellow ultra runners to stay motivated and connected. (58:08, Fleur Summers)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

| Timestamp | Topic or Quote | |:-------------------:|:-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| | 02:15 | Fleur reframes her self-image with the ultra running community. | | 06:20 | Childhood avoidance of running and sports. | | 11:03 | “If you’ve got a problem and it’s still a problem after a long run, you know it’s real.” | | 14:01 | Finding Don’s content and joining the challenge group. | | 16:25 | “Your transformation physically is almost as amazing as your transformation mentally.” | | 20:28 | Fleur/Don on why support is essential for change (“I couldn’t have done it without you.”) | | 22:51 | “Prove them right” vs. “prove them wrong” mindset shift. | | 25:02 | Discussing calorie intake and body composition at peak fitness. | | 34:25 | “Are you hurt or hurting? … If you’re just hurting, toughen up …” | | 53:24 | Listener Q&A: Overcoming mental barriers during ultra marathons. | | 58:08 | Karaoke Train of Awesomeness at 70k into a 100-mile race—singing Always Sunny musical. |

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Tone and Style

• Language/Tone: Warm, candid, humorous; direct and supportive, focused on real stories and practical advice.
• Atmosphere: Conversational, motivating, and at times, vulnerable—grounded in lived experience.

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Conclusion and Takeaways

This episode is a blueprint for personal reinvention—showing how radical transformation (physical and mental) can begin at your lowest moments. Fleur’s journey from self-doubt and “back of the pack” to ultra finishing lines is a powerful case for finding (and leaning into) communities that believe in you. Listeners will leave with a deeper understanding of the discipline, mindset, and joy that can come from pushing past monotony, reframing self-identity, and being surrounded by positive reinforcement.

Key lesson: True strength is about consistency, community, and learning to back yourself—even when the odds (and negative voices) say otherwise.

Transcript

[Don Saladino]

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[Fleur Summers]

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[Don Saladino]

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[Fleur Summers]

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[Don Saladino]

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[Fleur Summers]

Blind Nil Audio I remember the first time I spoke to you on a zoom. I remember I said I'm an ultra runner and you laughed. And then you said to everyone, I'm not laughing at her. It's just that ultra runners are just wired differently. They're wired differently and that's when I started. It helped me to start reframing how I saw myself and I think that when you come into a sport like ultrarunning, you've got to be able to be tough. You've got to be able to back yourself as well. And that's what was always missing for me.

[Don Saladino]

I stole coach Schneider's line. He's the heading coach of Louisville and he says, we don't believe in prove them wrong. We believe in prove them right. There's always some people in your life, maybe there's someone that believes in you.

[Fleur Summers]

Prove them right. Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

Welcome to Stronger. Today's guest is the ultra runner Fleur Summers. Fleur is a standout member of my challenge community, which is my online coaching group. Her story will resonate with anyone looking to reprioritize their health, strength and endurance. I'm Don Saladino. Let's get stronger with Fleur Summers. This is a very special cast for me right now. You know what I'm talking about?

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

You know, I've always had. I've just always had a very great connection with you. I mean, you've been a lot of people who don't know who you are. You know, this is Fleur. Everyone knows Fleur, who's in our community floor Summers. But you've been a part of the challenger group now for how many years?

[Fleur Summers]

Three and a half.

[Don Saladino]

Three and a half years, which feels like 15, 20 years. You are kind of everything, you know, everything that you hope for a challenger to be is kind of. You're like the example. And I'm going to say that I'm not saying that to upset anyone else, but I'm saying that why you're, you're an incredible human being. You an incredibly hard worker, you're an ultra marathon runner. I mean, you run 100 miles like it's a normal person running out three. And you've changed your body composition completely. As once in a while I'll see befores of you. I don't even know who I'm looking at. That's not the same person. You're not the same person. You're 100 pounds lighter, you're faster, you've strength trained. You'd add that in. You and I have literally, I feel like gone to the drawing board. Over the last three and a half years, you've brought me to a place that most strength coaches aren't going to be able to go to. Because when you work in my line of work and you do what I do, working with someone, or even, let's not say working with because you do all the work on your own, but at least Having a little bit of a fingerprint in your path was something that I take pride in because we figured a lot out together. And I think along the way I almost look at you as this NASCAR or this F1 car that would, that's been on a three and a half year race. And every time you pit there's a different conversation and there's different things we have to do and there's different, you know, times of our, things that we have to do in our training. So first off, I just want to tell you how happy I am that you're in my life and in my family's life and you've meant a lot to us, but how proud of you I am. And I think the purpose of today is to show people that this is a process and this has become a journey that I feel like you've fallen in love with. So I'm going to kick it to you right now and I want to know, but I want to say like your running career started 13 years ago and I want to dive in on that a little bit and let's, and let's approach where we are now.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, for sure. That's right. Like it started 13 years ago. I, you and I have talked about this and you've said that I have to come up with a more inspirational story of how I started. But I, I was never an athlete. I was always a very overweight kid. My, my mother was very overweight. She was SOR, 300, 350 pounds. So I was never athletic at school. I would always come last in races. I hated running. I played a lot of sport, I was very sporty. But even when I was playing cricket or netball to a high level, we would always go for runs for a warm up and I would just make up an excuse.

[Don Saladino]

I'd be like, I, I can't, like, I, I, I don't even like, who are you?

[Fleur Summers]

Different. Me. Different. Me.

[Don Saladino]

Keep going, keep going.

[Fleur Summers]

But I would always say I left my bat in the car and I just miss the entire running warm up. I just avoided it like the plague. And then one day in 2012 I woke up and I, I just thought, I wonder how far I could run if I went for a run and I just put on some sneakers and I went out the door and I went for a run and I ran 4K and this is not in any way how you should start running. It's so unsafe. It's, it's not what you should do. But it was fine.

[Don Saladino]

So you went, ran 4K, which is about two, two and a half miles.

[Fleur Summers]

Yep. And then the next day I was like, well, five is a better number than four. So I went out for 5K. 3.1 miles, I think, is five. And I did that. And then I was like, well, this is fine.

[Don Saladino]

How'd your body feel? Fine.

[Fleur Summers]

Fine.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah.

[Fleur Summers]

Like, I was going at a slow pace and I just enjoyed it. I enjoyed, like, being out in nature. I lived at the time in Auckland, out west of Auckland in these beautiful trails, which, for anyone who knows sort of the history of running, it's where Arthur Lydiard used to train all the top New Zealand athletes and where Lydia coaching was sort of founded. So it's a very, very famous place in running history. So I was very lucky to live there, and I just loved it. And then after that, that was it. Like, ever since then, there hasn't been a week that's gone by without me doing some form of running.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah. I mean, ever since I've known you, I mean, I think were I real, and I'm saying this as a compliment, where I. Every great athlete, I feel like almost has a little bit of a screw loose.

[Fleur Summers]

100%.

[Don Saladino]

And when I realized you had. This was at Don. Might have been two years ago. The first school, the first one, you. There wasn't a lot of places to run.

[Fleur Summers]

No.

[Don Saladino]

You had to run. What was the distance?

[Fleur Summers]

I. I had a. I had a half marathon to do. So you had to run 13 miles.

[Don Saladino]

13 miles. And the only place to run was around a school.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

So you. How many times did you run around that school?

[Fleur Summers]

That was 73 times to get 73.

[Don Saladino]

And when you came back and you were. And you did it early in the morning, like, early. And you were like, running, there's all type of creatures out there. It's not. And you just kind of went and did it and came back and you're like, you want to come? And I'm like, no. I don't.

[Fleur Summers]

Know. I had a video of me just, like, looking around, waiting for you to come.

[Don Saladino]

But after. After I saw a human being run around that school 73 times, I realized you could probably do anything you want in life because, like, mentally, I think that's one of the hardest things about running. People. People fall in this mental trap, the monotony of doing things sometimes people find really challenging. I think in a way, you've kind of found it therapeutic.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah. And it's an interesting one because I do. I've got a high boredom tolerance. And I'm finding that when I'm Because I'm a running coach. I coach other runners and I'm finding that that's something that not everyone has. They can't tolerate the boredom. And to an extent, good run training, it's boring. Like you've just got to go out and you've got to put the miles on your legs and it's not, it's not exciting. Not every workout is like an interval workout and you get to do speed work or uphills. Sometimes you've just got to go and like, like ran 13 miles around Central Park. Just like, just.

[Don Saladino]

That's two loops about, right?

[Fleur Summers]

Yep. Yeah, two loops. I did the, the little inner, the reservoir.

[Don Saladino]

That's. That's a, that's a pretty run though.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

You gotta admit, like running through the park. I mean there's no traffic at that hour. Or was that.

[Fleur Summers]

No, no, no traffic. Runners.

[Don Saladino]

A lot of runners.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah. Yeah. There's more runners in Central park than there are people who live in my town.

[Don Saladino]

That's crazy. And what's it, what's the town called again?

[Fleur Summers]

My town. Kingston.

[Don Saladino]

And that's a two hour flight from Auckland you said?

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah. So sort of half, half hour, 40 depending. I'm a very fast driver. Half an hour for me, 40 most people to drive to the airport and then it's a two hour flight to Auckland.

[Don Saladino]

So you spend all this time building this physical and mental tolerance to running. Because I think everyone thinks about the physical tolerance of running and being in shape to run. But what I even find is when you get distracted by something or a thought, like it's amazing how quick time can go and you could turn around and you know, a few miles can go past where if you're sitting there thinking about, you know, you know what I'm talking about, your time. Yeah. Or like people will get on a treadmill and they'll run for 30 minutes and they're like, it's gonna be over. Yeah. It's like, well that could be. But you also have to find this place in your head. What are your. What are some of the places that you. That you have to go to? Is it just focusing on your breathing? Music? Is it. Or do you just kind of get out there and it just becomes this meditative state because that's something people don't talk about. Also, like running becomes a form of meditation for many.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah. 100. I'm not like, I'm not a meditative person. Like my mind's too busy. I like I did a float tank once. I lasted five minutes before I Had a nervous breakdown. But, yeah, I do get into a bit of a monona state. You. You think about all sorts of things. Like, there's a famous saying that if you've got a problem and it's still a problem after a long run, you know it's real.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah.

[Fleur Summers]

Because you'll just. You'll think about it and then you'll just get over whatever's happening. But I'll think about weird things as well, and my mind will just go on a train of thought for an hour, and then it's like an hour later and things are okay. I do as well. Like, I. I take the time to listen to a lot of podcasts on my runs, such as this one. I did actually listen to it this morning on my run, and I find that, especially if I'm running at night, I love podcasts because I feel like I'm around people because nighttime running is so lonely.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah. And also you've talked about in the past how it can get a bit dangerous. Also, like, you're out in the middle of nowhere. Like, give me some examples right now. And sometimes.

[Fleur Summers]

Oh, yeah. And this is something especially female runners have to think about a lot. Um, so I had one run in particular where I was running overnight. Um, it was a training run for a hundred milers. So you do need to do a lot of night running for that, because naturally, when you run through, like, sort of 3am Your body wants to be asleep, so you kind of need to train into that to know how it feels, know when it's coming. And I remember I was out on the cycle trail in my town and. And I was running along, and there's a bit where it goes beside a road, and out of nowhere, a car came up and it slowed down when it went past me. It went maybe a hundred yards down the road and then it stopped. That was probably one of my scariest moments as a runner. And I turned around and I just hightailed it out of there. It was the fastest I ran all night and I ran back away from the road, but. And someone said to me later, they're like. They probably just wanted to know if you were okay or if you were running away from something. And in New Zealand, the odds are that's what's going to be happening, but you just never know. And so it is. I find running at night by myself scary. In a race, I don't mind it. I sure. I don't really get that low, period. I run very well through a night. I don't slow Down a whole lot. I find hills easier at night. And it shows how.

[Don Saladino]

Interesting.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, it shows how psychological hill running is.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah.

[Fleur Summers]

Because I. I slow down more if I can see the hill, whereas if I can't see it, I can't see.

[Don Saladino]

How it's on it. And you can't see how hard it is. Makes sense. So much is built upstairs. So backtrack it right now. Three and a half years we've been connected through my group. How did you get into the group again?

[Fleur Summers]

I don't think we've ever talked about this.

[Don Saladino]

I don't think we've ever talked about it. This is why I'm asking the question. This is real right now. This is not like I'm not sitting here with a list of questions, like, this is me. Everyone who comes on. I'm just interested to talk to. But there's questions. You and I talk about so many other things and we communicate a lot.

[Fleur Summers]

And we don't know our own origin story.

[Don Saladino]

Come on, fill me in. What's going on?

[Fleur Summers]

I've actually avoided telling you this.

[Don Saladino]

Oh, no.

[Fleur Summers]

So it was. I came across you on my Instagram algorithm, just randomly, and I saw some of your content and I thought to myself, he's quite funny.

[Don Saladino]

Interesting.

[Fleur Summers]

There's a little.

[Don Saladino]

I like it.

[Fleur Summers]

And it was. It was because your. Your content, you didn't take yourself too serious.

[Don Saladino]

I think I'm funny.

[Fleur Summers]

I love how I'm like.

[Don Saladino]

I think I'm funny. She said that, like, I was hard to believe. I do think I'm funny.

[Fleur Summers]

No, you are. You don't take yourself too seriously. And that's something that New Zealanders really connect with a lot because we don't at all take ourselves seriously. And so I was like, I'll give this a go. And at the time, I. We haven't talked about any of this. I just lost my job. I'd just been redundant from my job. I was at a huge low point in my life. My mother had been diagnosed with terminal cancer. She was a few months away from passing away. And I remember I had no idea what I was going to do. I. I was so overweight, I'd put on so much weight.

[Don Saladino]

And this is right after Covet, right? It is like, I mean, early 20, when I say after Covid, I mean, was it 21, 23? People are still kind of wearing masks at that. Been coming out of it. This is not. When I say it's after Covid, I still think we're in co at times.

[Fleur Summers]

People we're barely after it now, but I remember I was just at such a low and I had no idea what I was going to do with my life. I didn't know what my next job would be. And so I said to myself, I looked at what you were doing with the challenges and I knew I'd seen about the community. And I said, well, you're not doing anything right now. You've got no job. What are you going to do? Said, maybe use this opportunity to start something like strength training. And. And it was justifying, like, the financial outlay to myself. I was like, no, this is the time. This is the time to give it a go. And so I just. I haven't looked back. I haven't missed a single challenge since then.

[Don Saladino]

But it's amazing what you've done with your body comp, because I still see the pick. And Chris, I would love it if we can overlay. There's an incredible before picture of Fleur kind of taking a selfie of herself from an angle where she's 100 pounds heavier. And we have to throw that in right now to show people. Amazing. But you were running a lot at the time.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, I was. I was still doing all my running. I had given up racing at the time, right, because I DNF'd 100 miler. And then I had a really bad experience at a race. I came. I came last. There's no shame in coming last at a race because there's so many people who'd never put themselves out there, like, sure, of course. But for me, it was unexpected and it was such a blow to my ego and I didn't take it very well. And I was like. I was looking back, I was depressed. There was all sorts going on. And you can see in that before photo, like, I look miserable compared to how I am now. But, no, I was. I was still running. I was still trying to be a runner, but it was so difficult. I mean, the amount of weight I've lost is more than what my dog weighs. And I just think of trying to, like, carry him and run.

[Don Saladino]

It's unbelievable. I. I mean, there's so many. I'm going to go all over the place on this podcast today because there's just. Things will pop into my head and I'll just think about it. Your transformation physically is almost as amazing as your transformation mentally. You. Two years ago, I'll never forget, we were out at the pool and you looked at me and you were like, I tried to curse on this, but you went, fuck. I thought I was an introvert. And we were laughing and we had the best time. But that is why, like, when I think of challengers now, you're like, you're like the golden child on that. Like, you're one of the people, like we've, you know, you're one of the people that I go to first. And that's the reason why I wanted you on, on here. It's not just about the fact that you run ultras. It's about the adversity. It's about turning around and taking a really shitty time in your life. And you said, I am going to face this and I am going to pivot in a direction where you are such a different person. This episode of Stronger is brought to you by ExpressVPN. We live such a large portion of our lives online, yet for many of us, privacy is an afterthought. Internet service providers, including your mobile network provider, know every single website you visit because all your traffic flows through their servers. And in the us, these companies are legally allowed to sell that information to advertisers. That's messed up. I had no idea about that. That's insane. With ExpressVPN, 100% of your traffic is rerouted through secure encrypted servers, so your service provider can't see your browsing history. ExpressVPN is like having tinted windows for your Internet connection. You could see out, but no one else can see in. It's easy to use and works on all devices, phones, laptops, tablets and more, so you can stay private on the go. Right now, listeners of Stronger can get up to four months of ExpressVPN free. So head to ExpressVPN.com stronger to check out their plans. Secure your online data today by visiting expressvpn.com stronger that's E X P R E S s v p n.com stronger to find out how to get up to four extra months free. Expressvpn.com stronger this episode of Stronger is brought to you by Mitopure. With Mitrepure, you're getting more than just a supplement. You're getting a product that's been proven by over 15 years to target the effects of aging from inside out. I use MIT Appear because this helps my mitochondria, which is my power plant. So I have noticed since using MIT appear for over, it's probably over two years now, and that was referred to me by Dr. Gabrielle Lyon. I've noticed that my skin has improved. I've noticed that my energy is even better. And these are things that I wish I was paying attention to decades ago. You know, once you see results like that, you're never going to shy away from using this supplement. Timeline is offering 20% off your first order of Mitopure. Go to timeline.com stronger. That's T I M E L I N E.com/ stronger. Getting back to, you were running, you were 100 pounds heavier. Well, people would think, well, how is that? She's running all the time. She's running, you know, probably, what's your average run? What was the amount of mileage at that time? Were you 100 pounds heavier? How much mileage were you putting in a week?

[Fleur Summers]

Probably 50k a week.

[Don Saladino]

So 50k, 30 miles a week.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

So that's like five miles a day, six days a week.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

I mean, on average, that's what you're looking at. Then suddenly start talking about the things. So you come into the group and this is not a promotion, but I want you. The purpose of this is whether someone ever buys a program of mine or not. Honestly, I just want people to be healthy. I want them to take this information, do it on, run with it on your own. Right. Start. Start going through. What was that transformation process like? Not physically, but like more internally.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah. This is an interesting one because you and I have disagreed on this in the past because I've said I couldn't have done it without you. And you always say, yes, you could have, but I. I couldn't have. I didn't. I love you.

[Don Saladino]

I love you, but. I love you. But I believe. I think you're a way stronger person than you ever led on to be. And I think whether it was with me or someone else, I believe you're one of those people that we're going to find it. I'm lucky enough to be along for that journey with you and I'm happy because I. I'm still learning from you.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

And you know, when we have conversations, I'm like, again, this is unchartered territory. You're running 80 miles tomorrow. Not too many coaches who have my background who get to work with someone like this. So start talking about, you know.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, this was an interesting thing because I do see what you're saying with that and it's. You've said it before, like, whether you have different people who are. Who like to prove people wrong or prove people right. And always in my life and my background, I was always told I wasn't good enough for things. And my mother in particular, I remember she took me aside after I DNF'd at the hundred miler. And she said. She said to me, she was like, you're not good enough to do it. And she just straight up said to.

[Don Saladino]

Me, mom said that to him?

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah. Oh, I know. Thanks, Mom.

[Don Saladino]

Maybe it was the motivation you needed.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, she. She didn't want. Because she saw how heartbroken I was and how badly I took it, because I'm ferociously competitive, which means that when you have a loss like, you do take it hard, which I don't think is a bad thing necessarily. But that's what I was always surrounded, this messaging that you can't do this. You're not good enough. And then I was never motivated by proving people wrong. If someone tells me I'm not good enough, I'm like, not good enough. And then I came into the group and I met you, and I'm suddenly surrounded by these people who say the opposite. And I remember the first time I spoke to you on a zoom. I remember I said, I'm an ultra runner. And you laughed. And then you said to everyone, I'm not laughing at her. It's just that ultra runners are just wired differently.

[Don Saladino]

They're wired differently.

[Fleur Summers]

And that's when I started it Help helped me to start reframing how I saw myself. And I think that when you come into a sport like ultra running, and you've said this before, you've got to be. You've got to be a gamer like you. You've got to have a bit of. At home, we'd say you've got to have a bit of mongrel in you. You've got to be able to be tough. You've got to be able to back yourself as well. And that's what was always missing for me. And then suddenly I was surrounded by these. This community and these people, yourself included, who I. You just cheered me on and you.

[Don Saladino]

Thought, he just believed in you. Everyone. And I steal. I stole Coach Schneider's line from the universe. Louisville. Louisville. Joe. My buddy Joe Yeager would kill me if I didn't pronounce that right. But he's the hitting coach of Louisville, and he says, we don't believe in. Prove them wrong. We believe and prove them right. And I looked at him and I was like, I think I know what you're on to. He's like, there's always some people in your life, maybe there's someone that believes in you. Prove them right. Yeah, the ones. And I think you went from almost taking that mindset of proving them wrong and I'm not sure you were there, but I think there was a little chip.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

But I think you got into a community where the chip didn't push you as much as the people supporting you. And I think your gasoline into that vehicle became that much more abundant, that much more powerful when you started having people support you. And I think it became prove them wrong. Oh, my God, I'm gonna prove them all right.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

So I, I do believe I was probably the, the Mufasa at the front of the the line saying, yeah, I know you got this. I know I would look at you and be like, you, you, you got this.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

But you start strength training, which is something that they told you not to do.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

And you know, we start thinking about differently, about nutrition elements are way different than what's in the book. Yeah, right. I mean, this is a little unconventional, but you really started understanding the importance of body armor, the importance of moving competency. If you're going to be running in a certain, how do we get those hips to open up, those ankles, the body to kind of rotate and floss a little bit? Nutritionally, you had to start thinking about things way differently. And then what started happening with body.

[Fleur Summers]

Composition, it started changing pretty fast. And I'd always thought a lot of people say this, right? I thought I ate pretty well and ultimately I was under fueling for what I did.

[Don Saladino]

I wonder how many calories you were getting back then. You weren't even really counting at the time.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, I just started counting and I was like, I'm getting 1800 a day. And I remember you and Dr. Jackson just both go, what are you doing? What are you doing?

[Don Saladino]

Go to the height. It's kind of ironic how at your leanest you were consuming what was the highest amount of calories you were consuming at one point.

[Fleur Summers]

Well, at the moment, I'm at my leanest body comp of all time right now.

[Don Saladino]

I mean, you look amazing.

[Fleur Summers]

Thank you.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah. Seriously.

[Fleur Summers]

And I'm. I do it differently depending on what I'm running that day, but I'm averaging out over 3,000 a day.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah. Which is right now like a little bit, maybe a little less than what I'm consuming.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

But it just shows like, you are burning fuel calories or units of energy. It's like you need. If you don't have enough calories, you can't perform. And it's almost like I always tell you, like, well, I'm trying to always keep you grounded a bit because like every week it's like, I'm Hitting a pr. I'm hitting a pr. I'm in a pr. And I'm like, all right, listen, let's just. Let's just. Let's just take it easy for a second because, like, PRs are amazing, and I want you to ride the wave, but, you know, keep. Keep going. But if and when it stops, you know, let's talk. And don't just be optimistic that this will happen at some point. Hasn't really happened.

[Fleur Summers]

What did Last year, actually, and you were fantastic. Because I ran a marathon, and last year, my. My run training wasn't right. Last year I wasn't running enough, and I hadn't really adjusted for the way I wanted to perform. And I remember I came into a marathon and I massively underperformed compared to what I expected. And I was gutted. And I remember talking to you the week after, and you just turned around and go, that's all right. Let's figure out what happened.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah.

[Fleur Summers]

And that was what I needed to be shown that, like, okay, it didn't go right, so we'll fix it for next time.

[Don Saladino]

And part of the process, it's that mental resilience, too, with you. I just think that you now realize that sometimes you can just have a bad day and.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, and it happens with. When you're racing. It happens because running is one of these sports where it's endlessly frustrating, much as I love running, because you can just. You sometimes have those runs where it's like you've never run a step in your life. Like nothing works and it feels wrong from the first step. And sometimes that falls on race day. And it's being able to reframe that as well, because a lot of ultra running is just problem solving, and it's problem solving over a really long period of time. And I ran 100k at tarawera this year in February, and it was the best race in my life. Unbelievable. But even in that race, it was at 20k, so 20k into 100k, you're early on. And I was just like, oh, I don't feel good. And then I said to myself, no, look, just. Just go through what it could be. Are you drinking enough? Are you eating enough? Is it just that this is like. And what it actually was was it was a new course, and so we'd come across a piece of trail I'd never run before. It was more technical, so more roots than I expected, more rocks than I expected. And it slowed me down. And it was getting in my head a little bit. And as soon as I realized what it was, I was like, oh, that's fine. Because you learn that you can solve these problems. And something I say to the athletes I coach as well, terrible grammar. And I don't think I made this up. But it never always gets worse. When it gets bad like that, it's going to get better again. And I know in a race as well, I tend to have a low point around 70k. It's when my stomach usually starts to feel, yeah, off. What are we doing? And what I told myself, I was like, this happened at 20k. That's awesome. It's over with. The rest of the race is gonna be.

[Don Saladino]

But it's also, it's also interesting how you mentally can, in a way divert what starts becoming a of part. I don't want to say panic, because you don't. You don't panic, but most people would, Most people would have. And I do believe there is part of this element to training running where if we start getting into that negative mind frame of, this hurts. This is hard. This is only going to get worse. Oh, my God, 20K. How am I going to do 80 more?

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

You've found you've mastered a way now, I think, I think you're probably one of the people that I know that are as good as anyone else I've ever met. And, and I truly mean that in, in. In being able to kind of compartmentalize where you're at and really just push aside the negativity and find a way to get through that barrier. Because 100k, when someone says it's about mental toughness, that's like an understatement. Like, there's, there's so many variables. One, one, you have to be in the shape to run. Your joints, your skin. It's like, what's going to be able to handle the chafing? Like, there's so many elements. Weather changes, climate changes. How about the fact that you're running what you're, you're, you're run that, that one day where the challenge community came in and supported you. I think you ran for 31, 32 hours. So the fact that you ran for 32 hours, I want someone to, who struggles to run for an hour to think, all right, try and do that another 31 times. That's not made for the faint.

[Fleur Summers]

No. And it's not. And I, I almost forget. It's not normal. And what's funny is in this niche sport, because this is, this is a niche corner of a niche Sport, because ultimately 10 of the world's population can run a 5K. I think to run 100 miler is 0.0001% of the world. It's tiny. And then there's even more niche than that because now there's this thing called the Backyard Ultra, which tell us about this. Yeah, so this was invented by an American.

[Don Saladino]

Damn him.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah. Probably the most notorious race director in the world. He does the Barkley marathons, which everyone knows because of the Netflix documentary. And he invented, I think in 2011, this thing called a Backyard Ultra, where it's about endurance, not speed. So what competitors do is every hour on the hour, you run 4.1 miles, 6.7 K, and you run in however long that takes you. And then you rest till the hour is up and then you go again.

[Don Saladino]

Interesting.

[Fleur Summers]

And you keep going until you can't go anymore. And the race keeps going until one person is left standing and that's the winner. And they recently, the world record got broken a few weeks ago by an Australian, Phil Gore, and a New Zealander came second, Sam Harvey. And they ran 798km. It started on the Saturday. They were still running, I think Thursday morning.

[Don Saladino]

I break that down to mileage. I never even thought that was 798 kilometers.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah. I think it's 500ish.

[Don Saladino]

So hold on. They went and they ran 500 miles.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah. 119 laps. So 119 hours.

[Don Saladino]

All right. Which is for someone in. Who lives in New York. That's like running to certain parts of Vermont and back.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

In one shot. That's bananas.

[Fleur Summers]

It's incredible. And it was just the most amazing phones. And he looked at the end of it. He could have run another week. Like, he just looked like, I look after 5K.

[Don Saladino]

What did he. What did he say days later? Because what I was surprised about you. What I was surprised about you is the second you finished. I obviously call at a terrible time. Right. I think I call it like three in the morning. I never have called you like during. I call you like three in the morning and you're like, oh my God, I woke you up. I'm so sorry. You're like, no, it's fine. I can't sleep more than 45 minutes. I'm like, did you eat anything? You're like, I had like a half a slice of pizza and I felt like sick and went back to bed. And talk about, talk about what he said. And then I want to hear your experience as well. I know I'm jumping around.

[Fleur Summers]

He was Ridiculous. So he finished and the guy, Sam, who came second was sitting at the finish line in a chair because he's called the assist. So he did 118 laps and everyone forgets about that effort. But that's incredible. Like, he ran almost as much. It's just that he failed on the last lap and we have no idea how much longer Phil Gore could have gone for because he needs someone to stay with him.

[Don Saladino]

So it wasn't really close. So Phil Gore was like, could have kept going and the other guy, Sam, was. Sam. No, no, no insult to you. I mean, 118 laps is incredible, but this other guy could have just kept.

[Fleur Summers]

Going and we have no idea how much longer he could have gone. And he was just standing there and Sam was in this chair and Sam was like, do you want to sit down and focus? No, I'm going to go have a shower. And he went out for a run the next day. Just unbelievable. He's.

[Don Saladino]

But like days later, anything happened, any aftermath, like what he doesn't.

[Fleur Summers]

I'm not convinced he's human.

[Don Saladino]

Well, I, I hope he's just not admitting it.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, I know.

[Don Saladino]

Like, just be that tough.

[Fleur Summers]

And there is a bit of that because they are at the top, the boys in that sport. I mean, even Sam Harvey, before the race, he was like, I'm going to run a thousand kilometers. And he just puts it out there because he knows it'll intimidate people.

[Don Saladino]

And yeah, it also motivates you too.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, yeah. You've got to, you've got to like.

[Don Saladino]

I'm going to do something in this. It's like that kind of puts you on and everyone's like, holy shit.

[Fleur Summers]

But yeah, for me, for, for normal humans, which you're not.

[Don Saladino]

But let's, let's just, let's just, let's.

[Fleur Summers]

For relative normal human.

[Don Saladino]

Chris, please pull that comment.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, blasphemy for. On the Phil Gore scale, normal humans. So after I was the worst. I've been after that 100k this year because it's the fastest I've run for that long because I knocked three and a half hours off my 100k time, which is.

[Don Saladino]

That's, that's insane.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, my, my 100k PB was 1740.

[Don Saladino]

And you were very like. I remember going into it, you and I were communicating a bunch through WhatsApp. And I think I was just trying to get in your head in the sense of, like, you listen, you know, you're like, with you, I'm like, you know, you're getting through this. Like, you're not going to not get through this because of the stuff you've gone through in life and the obstacles you've. You've. You've overcome. I'm like, you know, you're going to get through this, like, squish. The only way you're. The only way you're not going to get through it is if you, God forbid, get hurt and you go down because of an injury. But I think from a pain tolerance standpoint, I'm convinced that you'll just push through it. And I think that's something that you actually remember during your runs, and I think that actually fuels you a bit.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, you do. I. I always say, are you hurt or hurting? Because those are different things. If you're hurt, then you need to think about stopping. If you're just hurting, toughen up. Yeah, toughen up and get it and get through it. And coming into that race, I was actually more anxious than I've ever been because I. Because of that. Because I knew I could get through it. I'm like, I can run 100k. It's no problem.

[Don Saladino]

But that was coming off that marathon. That was.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

That wasn't subpar for, for you. It wasn't. Because I remember when you got through the marathon and again, jumping ahead, you and I had a conversation. I'm like, you know, at some point you're going to come back better and you're going to be okay. This will be actually a good thing.

[Fleur Summers]

And I knew. I knew I was. I knew the shape I was in. I knew, like, I knew I could do it. And I remember I woke up that morning and I was just like, why. Why don't I have a normal hobby? Why don't I do something that's fun? Because I knew, like, my only worry was that I know I've set myself up perfectly. Like, I've had the perfect lead up to this race. If I don't achieve, I know it's because of something I do today. I know that I'm. I'm up for this.

[Don Saladino]

And I knew, which gives you a lot of confidence. When you're prepared for something, it gives.

[Fleur Summers]

You a lot of confidence and anxiety at the same time. And also because you know you're going out and you're going to be. At the time, I thought I was going to be in a lot of pain for about 17 hours. I. It didn't even enter my head. I could run it in 14, but that's the worst I've ever felt after a race. Like the race went phenomenal. I was running strong at the end. I was, I. I placed higher than I've ever placed.

[Don Saladino]

But you also pushed another barrier.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

So I think that's kind of expected.

[Fleur Summers]

And I remember afterwards, because you can never sleep after an Ultra unless you're folk or I guess, but you. I was lying there that night and I was just like, every part of my body is killing me and like I could barely. I got straight in the Normatec, which almost made me cry. It hurts so much.

[Don Saladino]

Did you jump an ice bath? I'm just curious. Did you try this?

[Fleur Summers]

I didn't. I. I would have if I'd had.

[Don Saladino]

I wonder if I, I wonder how that would have actually helped. Because people, I'm tired of people like are. They're either for it or they're against it or a blunt hyper hugely for it. I'm like, I'm hugely for it. Especially if your body, if you put yourself under that much pain or stress or you're playing a sport, a professional sport, and afterwards you need that immediate it almost kind of.

[Fleur Summers]

Because that's what I do throughout the summer especially like it's a wee bit harder in the winter, but like I live on, on the edge of a lake, like a mountain feed, like, and that's cold.

[Don Saladino]

That's a cool lake.

[Fleur Summers]

Cold. Yeah. But I love, at the end of a long run, just, just going straight in. And then my dog gets angry at me because he thinks Loki.

[Don Saladino]

Loki, the most fit dog on the planet, by the way.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, the dog who trains for 100 mile race and then gets annoyed, which is amazing.

[Don Saladino]

He. So he just runs with you, right?

[Fleur Summers]

He does. He comes on and you don't need a leash, right? No, he's, he's not big on leashes.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah, but what's, what's the. I mean we actually joked around a few times. What was the longest run he's ever done with you? And by. Want to be very clear here. She doesn't force him to go. Like, he just follows her.

[Fleur Summers]

He gets angry if he doesn't go.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah, but what's the longest run he's done with?

[Fleur Summers]

So he can. If we're in the mountains. He's done 12 hours in the mountains. Relatable stories.

[Don Saladino]

God, that is crazy. My freaking dog, Sambuca can't run it, walk a thousand feet without embarking for me to pick him up. He weighs 8 pounds soaking wet.

[Fleur Summers]

Feels like I'm done. Yeah, but on the flat he can do about 30, 50K. So about 30 miles.

[Don Saladino]

That's unreal. That's pretty special. So getting back to it, you start implementing resistance training in something that you know you're told not to do because carrying muscle is heavier and it's going to weigh you down.

[Fleur Summers]

But yeah, it'll slow you down.

[Don Saladino]

It'll slow you down. And, and I'll be honest, I think the type of this is where it really is dependent on the individual. Right. Because if you told me to design a running program for runners who are running what you're running, giving them the challenge program is probably not what I would do. But we've done such a good job in varying the program in varying volume and frequency and adjusting intensity that I think the variability of movement, I think a lot of the unilateral meaning one legged, one arm rotational work. I feel like I love the term flossing. It's a made up term by the way. It does not exist. But like we're getting that body to floss. So your running is very linear, right. Very like almost sagittal plane. And now we're mixing in all this rotation or lateral motion. And I feel that's actually really, you know, you put muscle on. Yep, you've burned a ton of body fat. I mean, putting aside, you've lost a hundred pounds. I think even your body composition changes. Even more impressive than just the weight loss, but your strength. So the fact that you'd be doing these runs and I mean, and I'm not lying, at least maintaining strength I think is a testament to you really understanding your body and knowing how to communicate. Because if it's just me writing a program and giving it to you, I'll be honest, it's inconclusive. It's the fact that you understand how you feel and you kind of analyze how you feel and you're able to talk to me about it and say, I'm thinking about doing this. Very rarely am I like, don't do it. I'm like, but sometimes we're like, try this take this day out or no or you'll don. I'm increasing distances right now or I'm doing more hills. What do I do? I'm like, I still want you to get the movement in. You got to get one to two sets in. Just let's cut the volume in half. And I think that's something that people make a mistake on. I think they just immediately assume that they have to remove it entirely. Talk about how that's kind of changed you a bit. It really has changed how your body's responded. I think throughout the years, yeah, it's incredible.

[Fleur Summers]

And I started seeing it within a year of us working together. When I, when I went back to racing because I'd quit, I only started again because we were working together and because of the community and everything, I got inspired to go back to racing. And I saw it straight away. I'll never forget in the September that first year we were working together, I did a 50k. And I remember at the back half, I started noticing people around me who had the same running fitness as me. I would start taking them down in the back half. And it's strength training. It's because I have like the muscular endurance to keep going. And you see it a lot in, especially at a hundred miler, they, they have a thing called a Myla lean, where right at the end of 100 miler you'll see a lot of people who, they've got no core muscles and so their core completely collapses. And you can see they're running like over to one side. And I've got a strong core, a strong back, so I can carry a pack all day. It just means I've got more resilience as a runner, especially for these long distances. And it's so funny because even my running coach at the time was against me strength training. Whereas I now with the athletes I'm coaching, I encourage them, put it in, they all avoid it. But at least three times a week, I think is, I think, I think.

[Don Saladino]

I think that's a good number. And it's funny, I've worked with other runners where they, they're not, they just don't enjoy it. No, some of them just aren't into it. I feel, I think if you can accept it and you can really, I mean, even if it's just two days a week, like it's, you know, I think two to three days, okay, get that minimally. And I think that's going to really pay dividends. But I've worked with certain people that, you know, you write a program for and they're just, just. And I understand they're not passionate about it. I think we need to go back to the drawing board and find, well, all right, you don't like working with weights. Maybe we'll do body weight or maybe there's other movements that we could start throwing in that are going to pay dividends.

[Fleur Summers]

And, and it's different at different times of the year as well. I, I have an off season. It's like two and a half months long. It's always after Tarawera. Each year. So mid February to mid April.

[Don Saladino]

But you don't stop running.

[Fleur Summers]

No, I'm still running that sort of at least 50k a week. Week.

[Don Saladino]

So you're back now. You're back down now to that five miles a day type of thing. Yeah. Which, which for you is like brushing your teeth.

[Fleur Summers]

It's like.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah.

[Fleur Summers]

And so that's fine. And that's the period where I'll be like, oh, I'm gonna work on body comp for a while. And so I'll go quite hard at.

[Don Saladino]

The strength training, which I think is really good.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

And it gives your body, gives your body a break. Yeah. And you get stronger. And so nutritionally, this is where it's not about just eating chicken, rice and broccoli. But that's why I think you've done it.

[Fleur Summers]

It's like the Michael Phelps thing. Right, right.

[Don Saladino]

I mean, we talked about that, but I, you know, you, you still eat well, you still make good choices. But I think, you know, as you need more calories, the foods. And it's not just about the volume. No, the foods have to change.

[Fleur Summers]

They do.

[Don Saladino]

You're not going to start. Michael Phelps is not getting 12, 000 calories in a day eating the way that I eat.

[Fleur Summers]

No. And I found that as well as the volume increases and it's fiber. Right. It's the fourth, fourth macronutrient. As soon as my fiber gets above 50 grams a day, I start to have trouble.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah.

[Fleur Summers]

So I know that I need my food quality and the types of food I'm eating has to be amazing.

[Don Saladino]

Has to drop a little bit. Yeah, it does.

[Fleur Summers]

Which is great because also I'm an ultra.

[Don Saladino]

It gets tasty. What am I gonna do?

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, exactly.

[Don Saladino]

But so many people were looking at Phelps's diet during the Olympics.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah. And people were horrified.

[Don Saladino]

People were like, oh, my God. People were calling me up, could you imagine if he ate like you? I'm like, are you out of your mind?

[Fleur Summers]

He couldn't.

[Don Saladino]

So actually, funny story. So there's a bodybuilder named Sadiq Hatzovic, competed in the Olympia. Very well accomplished bodybuilder, a little bit younger than me. He, I, I'm quoting this wrong, but I think he did like a 20,000-calorie a day challenge.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

Where one day he went in and he showed what 20, 000 calories would look like. And he did it and obviously was ice cream and pizza and as much, you know, high calorie food as possible. And I think he turned around and Again, I might be getting this wrong, but he said, all right, now I'm going to cut the calories in half, but try and do it off of clean eating. And he. And he tapped out.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

And he couldn't get to 10,000 or whatever. It was 8,000. And he's. And it just showed how filling and fibrous. You know, I just, before we came in here, I had 6 ounces of chicken, 4 ounces of broccoli, and 8 ounces of sweet potato, which, calorically, I can go eat double that if I go order Five Guys right now. I get 2000 calories in easily and feel fine eating. That's filling.

[Fleur Summers]

Yep.

[Don Saladino]

Because the food's got a lot of bulk to it. So when you're having to consume those calories.

[Fleur Summers]

Prioritize calories.

[Don Saladino]

You got to prioritize calories. But you do. What I think you do a good job of is you still get in some of those healthier foods. Right. Like, you still will turn around and you'll kind of eat some of the healthy foods and then you'll actually factor in. Well, I got to go this much over. So I'm going to do that through burger and fries or a shake or whatever it might be. And most people don't do that. Most people just eat crappy all the time and they're getting no real nutrition in where you're building strategic. Right. You're. You're like bringing in this healthy nutrition, but then you're already. You're also bringing in these other calories.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah. 100. I've even noticed that this week, like, because I'm on holiday, my nutrition out the window.

[Don Saladino]

Sure.

[Fleur Summers]

And straight away, I was like, this morning I was running around Central park, my fastest ever, training 20k, and I was just like, God, I love, like, running when I've got so many calories.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah, you got some fuel in your body, but I think that's where the balance is. Someone would say, well, why don't you just do that all the time? I'm like, I get it. But you, you can't because then you start kind of putting on body fat, then that fuel. I, I think, I believe, and this is a total theory, this is not scientifically backed, but I think you start almost recognizing that poor nutrition and your body. Yeah. Your, your sleep quality starts diminishing. Right. And your hormones start not responding the way that they would be if it was a, you know, healthier nutrition in there. You're not really getting the vitamins and the micronutrients, nutrients that's really what it comes down to. It's really a lot of those micronutrients. You're not getting anything nutritionally dense.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah. And you get to the point where you can do it strategically for races. So, you know, you. You behave. You do things normally up until the week of the race. And then you're like, all right, let's get some calories on board. And you step it up as you slowly go towards the race. And there's a. The New Zealand running community says, like, we have fat Friday right before a race.

[Don Saladino]

I love it. I love it.

[Fleur Summers]

You just get all the carbs. It's a great. But.

[Don Saladino]

But do you ever feel like that backfires on you? Because some people.

[Fleur Summers]

I think you've got to experiment. Like.

[Don Saladino]

Right, okay.

[Fleur Summers]

For the first time on RA Day.

[Don Saladino]

Explain. Because I would imagine some people, inexperienced runners will call me and be like, I got my first marathon.

[Fleur Summers]

We've had challenges.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah. And they're like, what do I eat Friday? And I'm like, I think last Friday. But what the mistake they make is they'll go and they'll eat all this crap, as you know. And then the next day they're like, cramping and, you know. So talk about that a little bit.

[Fleur Summers]

Absolutely. Because this was like. This has taken me a long time to get down. Like, I know if I have red meat the night for a race, it doesn't sit well with me. So I know, like, I can do a creamy pasta. I know a lot of people can't. Then I look for a rice because it's too heavy.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah.

[Fleur Summers]

So I can tolerate that. I can do. I will often do pizza. Pizza is really.

[Don Saladino]

I think it's a really nutritionally dense. I think pizza is, like, a very underrated cheat.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

Bread, sauce, cheese, protein, maybe meats on top of it.

[Fleur Summers]

Yep.

[Don Saladino]

I. I think it's actually, like, a really nutritious cheat.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah. So I get my snacks and. You're a bit 20 this morning.

[Don Saladino]

Where'd you eat pizza at last? In the city. Okay. Don't tell me. It was like sparrows or something like that.

[Fleur Summers]

It was. It was riding last night, so it was the first one I hit when I walked. Right.

[Don Saladino]

You can't go wrong. Really? Down there. I mean, what is ruberosa? That's down a little. It wasn't ruberosa, was it? Go check that out this week.

[Fleur Summers]

Okay. All right. That's on the list. I'll do a tour of New York.

[Don Saladino]

Joe's Pizza. They got some good pizza. They got some good Pizza in New York.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, they really do. But so it took a lot of like trial and error because I have the same with people I coach who will have their first race and they'll suddenly to me they'd be like, what do I eat on race morning? And I'm like, what do you normally eat before a long run?

[Don Saladino]

Yeah, they don't want to hear that. They want to be able to go gorge themselves.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah. Like I'm not going to tell you to go out and have like McDonald's breakfast when you've never had it before, but you have to try these things. So I, I mean I've even got down. I know on morning of an ultra I have a protein shake and most people would say like that's too much dairy because I have like full fat cream milk.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah.

[Fleur Summers]

In New Zealand, like it comes straight from a farm.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah. Super healthy.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah. Really different. I know I can tolerate that. I know I feel great because it's like it will be slow burning protein component, a couple scoops of protein powder. I can do like almond butter on a banana, things like that. But it takes so much trial and error and it takes getting it wrong. Like every, every ultra runner will have a story of like when they got gastro on a run.

[Don Saladino]

Oh, it's not fun.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, it's not fun. It's a long day.

[Don Saladino]

So on your race schedule now, coming up, what is like what's on the horizon for, for you?

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah. So when I, when I go home from this, I've got my first ultra after the winter is Tikpo ultra which is 50k in southern New Zealand and like child's play.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah, 50k for you. That's like, come on. That's like, that's like a walk in the park. It's not a big deal anymore.

[Fleur Summers]

Like it's in a beautiful, like New Zealand's beautiful. I, I think we all can hopefully think that.

[Don Saladino]

Oh, it's cool. I mean for the pictures you sent me, I'm like, where the hell is this?

[Fleur Summers]

You've stopped replying now. You just react.

[Don Saladino]

No, I just. Heart, heart, heart. I like I'm depressed now.

[Fleur Summers]

Like I don't want to see this.

[Don Saladino]

No, it's gorgeous. It's gorgeous.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, it's amazing. It does. It's in a beautiful part Lake Tapo. It's absolutely gorgeous. So I have that coming up and then I've got Kepler challenge which is a race, like amazing race. It was my first ever ultra marathon. I ran it In I think 2014 for the first time. I was 2 years into running before I did my first ultra 60k through the mountains. It's stunning race. Um, I've got big goals about how quick I want to do it this year. Um, and it's actually I finally, I'm the official coaching partner for them this year which is so cool. Cause it's a way for me to give back to this race that's like meant so much to me. I mean this will be my ninth time running it.

[Don Saladino]

Wow. And your coaching business is taking off. I mean that's something you're starting to do a lot of now.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, I, I absolutely love it. So getting to, getting to partner with Kepler and coach people through their first Kepler is so special to me because it's, it's considered like the greatest mountain run in New Zealand. It's, it's incredible. It's round one of our Great walks. It's 60k. You go up and over a mountain and then you run 30k on the flat. So it's. Some people find it difficult to train for because you've got to be good at hills, uphill and downhill and it's very rough and then you, you've got to have legs. And I remember vividly I saw when the race record was broken the year before I started doing it. And it was a guy who was the Australian marathon champion and he looked, when he finished, he just looked dead because he'd never run for five hours in his life because his marathon's like just over two hours. So it was all very new to him. So I've got that in December. Then Taraware 100 miler in February again hoping to take my time down from 32 hours to around 25.

[Don Saladino]

Wow. That's the one that you already shocked. You surprised yourself last year with that. I think you beat about what would you say, three hours?

[Fleur Summers]

Hours, three and a half for the 100k hours. And, and they say your 100k time is around about half your 100 mile time. So if I took three and a half there, I think I did the rough math. I was like, I'll take seven hours off the myla. We'll see. But then my big hope is that I get into UTMB Ultra Trail Mont Blanc, which is in France next August.

[Don Saladino]

Wow, that's going to be incredible.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah. It's 100 miles, 175k. It's got 10,000 meters of elevation gain, so 30,000ft. Oh my God, it's huge. It's considered like the, the jewel of international 100 miles. It's the.

[Don Saladino]

Is there anything in the States like that where you would say, oh, I want to do this? Yeah, so the, like, Leadville 100 or something.

[Fleur Summers]

Like, I'd love to do Hard Rock. Hard Rock would be the one.

[Don Saladino]

What's that? What is that in Colorado?

[Fleur Summers]

Yep. Yeah, it's pretty special. Very difficult to get into. Same as utmb and utmb, the company who run that, they run races all around the world. There's a few in the states, and so you have to run these races is to get what are called running stones, which are entries into the lottery, and then you have to be drawn out of the lottery. I think I have 17 stones at the moment, so if I don't get in for next year, then I'll be coming over to the States to do a few of their runs. I think there's one out in Utah. There's. Yeah, there's a few really cool races that I like to do.

[Don Saladino]

That's. That's fun.

[Fleur Summers]

That'll be fun. So that's. Ever since I started running. That was the race I wanted to do, so.

[Don Saladino]

All right, so you got a good year ahead of you. But, yeah, one of my favorite things about. About this podcast is that we actually take callers in. So.

[Fleur Summers]

Awesome.

[Don Saladino]

We've got a few recorded questions. Let's rock and roll. I think, you know, you might know a few of these people. So let's see. Let's see who's on. I don't even know yet. But I. But I. But I heard you might know someone.

[Fleur Summers]

Hey, this is a question for Ms. Flair Summers, amazing ultra marathoner. Still don't understand how that's even possible, but I'm more interested in the mental side of it. Right. So the physical, physical side, whatever you're doing, it's all relative. Right. The ultra marathons, Even your first 5K triathlons, whatever it might be. Mentally, at what phase in an ultramarathon do you hit your first mental hurdle? And then how do you get over that hurdle? Do you hit more? Is it the physical pain or is the mental. I feel like mental, like, physical obviously is painful, but mentally feel is the harder one to get over. What do you use to get over that?

[Don Saladino]

All right, you got that.

[Fleur Summers]

That. Yep.

[Don Saladino]

Fire it up.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, absolutely.

[Don Saladino]

Christy Carney, by the way. Love her.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, we love her. One of our favorites. Absolutely right. That physical is much easier. You can, to an extent, you have to. And you can just ignore the physical. Like, when it starts hurting, it's just going to keep hurting that much for the rest of the race. But mental es and flows. It's like life, right? Like it's going to get hard and then it's going to get easier and then it'll get hard again and you've just got to get through it. It. And a lot of it is just acknowledging it. And someone gave me this advice saying like early on, when you notice it happening, just acknowledge it, say, yep, okay, this is the time that it's going to get tough. That's okay. I've been here before. I can do it, I can get through it. And reminding yourself of that. And I like, I use you sometimes. I used you in the 100k in February where there was a bit where it was really, really hilly and really, really rough and I was struggling a wee bit and everyone around me was walking and it's quite hard to keep running when everyone around walking and starts playing games with you and you're just like, do I really think I'm better than these people around me that I can just keep running? And I said to myself, I'm going to have to swear for this because it was. This is what I said to myself, like, do you think Don trained some little who can't run this hill? And that made me run again? So you find whatever it is to motivate you to get through this.

[Don Saladino]

Which is, which is kind of I. This is, this is, this is where the irony is. Right. Because if someone was resistance training and they felt a pain in their shoulder, I'd be like, all right, stop.

[Fleur Summers]

Yep.

[Don Saladino]

Running for someone who's training for an Ultra, it's not their first run. Like, let's let, let's be very clear. This is not someone going out being like, oh, I'm going to run one to three miles for the first time and we'll see how it feels. This is someone that's incredibly experienced. This is someone who understands.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, randoms don't turn up at the start.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah, it's exactly. So when we're saying push through it, these are. When you're doing these ultra, you know, these, these, these ultras, these high volume events. Yeah. No, you have to push through it. I mean, unless you're, unless you have like serious damage to a limb in your body or something happens or you roll an ankle. Like if there is this mental component where. Yeah, it's, it's this no pain, no gain component. I would not tell a newbie to take that because they're not experienced. It's not like the juice ain't worth the squeeze.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, it's that hurt versus hurting thing. You've got to decide which one it is. And I always say when I'm coaching people who are coming into their first ultra, I'm like, you've got to understand it's going to hurt.

[Don Saladino]

This is going to be painful.

[Fleur Summers]

This is. It's not going to feel good the whole time. And if you go in expecting it to feel good the entire time, you're going to crash and burn and you're going to quit when it starts getting hard. But you've got to understand, can. It will. It will suck. It'll suck for a long time.

[Don Saladino]

And, and, and. And sport at this level, no one said it's the best thing for your body either. Let's be very clear here. Like, it's not, oh, I'm gonna run an ultra. It's really good for you. You're like, well, maybe it's not. Maybe it's not me. Maybe someone like you responds differently. Or, or that gentleman who ran 119, what was his name?

[Fleur Summers]

Phil. Ghoul.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah. Maybe Phil's just a freak. And maybe he wakes up the next day and has an Egg McMuffin. He's like, hey, I'm gonna go run a marathon today. Like, it's no big deal. But I think, you know, that's also a lifetime of resilience and a lifetime of training, and those are special. You guys are special people. All right, good deal. Chris, let's go on. Christy Carney, thank you for that. Great question.

[Fleur Summers]

Thanks, Chris.

[Don Saladino]

Chris, what else do we have? Anything? Yep. So I'm going to do one from Mitch, who is based in Australia. I don't know if you know Mitch or not, Fleur, but I do know Mitch has a really fun question. So here comes question from an Australian trail runner. What's Fleur's go to? Karaoke songs, particularly when running her ultra marathon. Oh, my God.

[Fleur Summers]

So this needs some explanation.

[Don Saladino]

Sure, I'm waiting on this right now.

[Fleur Summers]

So, Mitch, I met at the hundred miler at Tarawera last year. We. We met early in the day, and I remembered him because. Great mustache.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah, the best.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah.

[Don Saladino]

First thing I noticed, by the way.

[Fleur Summers]

And so I remember I lost track of him throughout the day. We were back and forth a wee bit, which always happens during a race. You always have the same people. You sort of stay around and there's a boat ride in it, and. And we caught up with each other at the boat ride. And I remember I saw him and I was like, oh, thank God. Like, I was Wondering what happened to the Australian with the great mo. And then.

[Don Saladino]

I love it.

[Fleur Summers]

So this is 70k into the race and the next segment killed us all. Like, it was just. It's a segment that normally on the normal course hits at 29k and this time it hit at 70 and it was just. It wrecked us all. So we'd all lost the will to live. By the time we came into the next aid station, it was getting dark and Mitch and I met up again. And so we created this thing called the Karaoke Train of Awesomeness.

[Don Saladino]

Oh, okay.

[Fleur Summers]

Where we met up with this other guy, an older gentleman called Bruce. And we decided as it got dark, we started singing karaoke because you're going a little bit crazy at the time.

[Don Saladino]

Oh, yeah. No, you're losing your mind. Any songs we would recognize or are these like.

[Fleur Summers]

We sang the entire musical from It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia at like top volume. As we were running through the New Zealand bush and pitch.

[Don Saladino]

Were you guys laughing or were you just dead serious?

[Fleur Summers]

We're dead serious. We took a. Was very serious. Like, we were very good. I want to add as well. And then it was an out and back section and so we were going past people who were running in the 100k or people who are way ahead of us in the 100 miler. And every time we saw someone coming, we were like, request a song. Request a song.

[Don Saladino]

They're probably like, oh, yeah.

[Fleur Summers]

And they'd panic and then they'd come up with a song and we'd sing it. So we did like, we did Finger Boys, we did abba, we did acdc, we did everything.

[Don Saladino]

But yeah, I love the fact that you guys were dead serious. I would have loved to have had a camera.

[Fleur Summers]

You. Yeah, we took it dead seriously. So to answer that question, there is only one answer. It is the Always Sunny in Philadelphia musical.

[Don Saladino]

Well, now we know. Now I'm going to be listening to that on the train ride home because now I'm like, I know, I know songs off of that. I definitely know the musical, but I got to listen to it. Well, how else does music play into being an ultra marathon runner? I mean, that's kind of my question as a follow up to that one. Do you listen to music? What do you like to do when you run other than listen to podcasts? Anything.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, that's a great. That's a great question. So during the day I like to do music. It's actually been proven that you run faster with music on. So I like music during the day. At A race, and then it's always podcasts at night, so I'm less lonely. I like old school rock. Like, I do have a lot of, like. I think I also. I've asked you before. You've chucked AC DC on there for me.

[Don Saladino]

Yes. So you. You. You like those 80 rock, 80s rock.

[Fleur Summers]

I like 80s rock. But, yeah, I. I love music. I've. This is another relatable story. I have a racing playlist that's like 14 hours.

[Don Saladino]

Yeah. About to say. How long is that gonna be? My. My playlists are like, you know, two, you know, maybe 100 songs.

[Fleur Summers]

Yeah, yeah, no, this is. And I know it's 14 hours because I know exactly where I was when it ran out at the 100k last year and I was 15 minutes from the finish line.

[Don Saladino]

Did you. Did you like, just restart it?

[Fleur Summers]

I didn't. I actually said to myself, no. You know what? I'm so proud of how I'm doing. I want to be alone with myself. Thoughts until I get there.

[Don Saladino]

I like it. Thank you for coming on. Thank you to have you. Since I. Since I literally. We decided to do this podcast. I told you early on. I said, when are you coming up here? You said, well, right before Don Connor says, we're going to schedule you in. And we made it happen. And I'm so proud of you, really.

[Fleur Summers]

All the way from Little Altero.

[Don Saladino]

Listen, you've done great stuff and you're going to continue to do it. And hopefully I'll always be a voice in your head because that means a lot.

[Fleur Summers]

But we're a team.

[Don Saladino]

Love it. And everyone, thanks for joining us. See you next episode.

[Fleur Summers]

The views, information or opinions expressed in the series are solely those of the individuals involved and do not necessarily represent those of Chip and Joanna Gaines by now Audio nor Magnolia.