Podcast
The Athlete's Compass
Hosted by Athletica · EN
The Athlete’s Compass Podcast is your compass for navigating endurance training and health. In this show, we explore the cardinal directions of training, nutrition, recovery, and mindset, delving into the dynamic relationship that drives athletic success.
Athletes are more than numbers; they're individuals with unique lifestyles and mindset challenges. Coaches who understand these personal nuances play a vital role in their athletes' journey. While training details and data are important, tools like Athletica provide a solution to streamline the technicalities, allowing coaches to focus on the human connection which makes the human coaches the best they can be.
Each week, renowned sports scientist and researcher Paul Laursen will be our teacher and guide as we break down training principles so you can understand how best to train for your sport! We take a no-bullshit and practical approach to support age-groupers, masters, and everyday cyclists, runners, and triathletes like you as you find your direction as an athlete.
The hosts are Paul Laursen, sports scientist and founder of the Athletica.ai training platform, Marjana Rakai, coach, sports scientist, and triathlete, and Paul Warloski, coach and cyclist.
12episodes
Episodes
Newest firstAll episodes
Why 50% of Girls Quit Sport (and How to Stop It)
3d ago00:29:48Tap to summarizeIn part two of the conversation with Dr. Julia Casadio, the team explores why so many adolescent girls leave sport during their teenage years and how coaches, parents, and support teams can better respond. Julia explains how female puberty affects performance, injury risk, confidence, menstrual health, fueling, and enjoyment, while emphasizing that many girls simply need better education, patience, and practical support. The episode highlights the work of Her Strength, including coach education, menstrual cycle awareness, training load adjustments during growth spurts, and simple nutrition tools such as PFC eating: protein, fat, and carbohydrate at each meal.Key TakeawaysTwo out of three girls are lost to sport during the teenage years, making adolescence a crucial intervention point.Female puberty can temporarily disrupt performance through growth, changes in body composition, wider hips, injury risk, periods, and hormonal fluctuations.Coaches should avoid treating adolescent girls as smaller versions of boys; their physical and psychological needs can be very different.A rapid growth spurt combined with a sudden training-load increase is a major injury-risk red flag.Menstrual health is a key marker of overall health, not an inconvenience to ignore.Missing periods, severe pain, heavy bleeding, or not having a first period by age 15 should be investigated.Male coaches can still create safe, supportive environments by normalizing conversations and making period products available.When performance plateaus, coaches can shift focus toward skills, strength, nutrition, recovery, and confidence rather than only results.PFC eating — protein, fat, and carbohydrate at each meal — gives young athletes a simple framework for better fueling.Keeping girls in sport requires practical behavior change, not just awareness.Her Strength - Dr. Julia CasadioDr. Paul LaursenPaul Warloski - Simple Endurance CoachingMarjaana Rakai | Nordic Performance Lab
Transcribe →Heat Training for Female Athletes: How to Adapt and Perform
1w ago00:34:14Tap to summarizeIn this episode of The Athletes Compass Podcast, Dr. Julia Casadio explains how athletes can use heat training as a powerful performance tool, especially when preparing for hot and humid races. Drawing on her experience with Olympic athletes and her research in applied sport physiology, she explains why women often need longer heat adaptation windows than men, how “thermal memory” allows athletes to reacclimate quickly after an earlier heat block, and why heat should be treated as a meaningful training stress rather than an afterthought. The conversation also covers practical strategies such as sauna or hot-tub exposure, timing heat blocks before race day, managing training load, supporting youth athletes in hot conditions, and recognizing signs of heat illness.Key episode takeawaysFemale athletes often take longer to adapt to heat than male athletes, with women commonly needing closer to 10–14 days rather than 4–7 days.Heat training should not be added casually to a hard training week. It works best during easy-to-moderate training blocks.Heat is an extra physiological load, so sleep, fueling, hydration, and recovery matter even more during heat exposure.A true heat stimulus requires getting genuinely hot: elevated core temperature and heavy sweating are key signals.Living in a hot place does not automatically mean an athlete is heat-adapted. The body has to experience repeated, meaningful heat stress.Heat blocks can be periodized. Athletes can do a proper block several weeks before an event, then use shorter top-up exposures closer to race day.“Thermal memory” means the body can reacclimate faster after prior heat adaptation.Passive heat methods such as post-exercise sauna or hot-water immersion can help athletes who do not live in hot climates.High-intensity sessions are not ideal for heat loading; easy aerobic sessions are usually safer and more effective.Youth athletes need extra caution in the heat because their cooling systems are less developed and they may be less likely to speak up when something feels wrong.Warning signs of heat illness include dizziness, lightheadedness, cool clammy skin, sudden performance drop-off, fainting, and, in more serious cases, hot red skin.Her Strength - Dr. Julia CasadioPaul Warloski - Simple Endurance CoachingMarjaana Rakai | Nordic Performance Lab
Transcribe →How Sleep Timing Impacts Recovery, HRV, and Endurance Performance
2w ago00:53:06Tap to summarizeIn this episode of The Athletes Compass Podcast, Dr. Kristen Holmes, Global Head of Human Performance at Whoop, explains why sleep-wake consistency may be one of the most powerful yet overlooked drivers of performance, recovery, and long-term health. Drawing from years of athlete and wearable data, she shares how regular sleep timing is linked to better physiology, improved resilience, and stronger performance outcomes across sports. The conversation also covers practical circadian habits, including morning light, moderate exercise, breathwork, and time-restricted eating, plus strategies for athletes racing early, parents navigating broken sleep, and women experiencing perimenopause or menopause.Key episode takeawaysSleep-wake consistency may be more predictive of performance than many athletes realize.Even Division I athletes may show declines in resting physiology with as little as 45 minutes of sleep timing variability.Sleep consistency helps drive sleep quality, restoration, and autonomic robustness.Four free habits can support better sleep consistency: morning natural light, moderate activity, slow-paced breathing, and time-restricted eating.Low-to-moderate intensity exercise can act as a recovery-promoting tool, while high-intensity work should be used strategically.Breathwork after stress can help prevent stress from accumulating across the day and disrupting sleep onset.Eating most calories during daylight hours may support circadian alignment and reduce competition between digestion and sleep.For early races or travel, athletes can “bank resilience” by staying consistent in the days and weeks before disruption.Parents with young children should treat poor sleep as a temporary phase, use strategic naps, protect early-night sleep, and avoid bright light during night wakings.Fitness appears protective across many contexts, including shift work, menopause symptoms, and general resilience.Four core circadian behaviors that improve cardiorespiratory fitness through consistent sleepPaul Warloski - Simple Endurance CoachingMarjaana Rakai | Nordic Performance Lab
Transcribe →System Engagement Explained: How Much Is Left in the Tank?
3w ago00:32:57Tap to summarizeIn this episode of The Athletes Compass, Paul Warloski, Dr. Paul Laursen, and Marjaana Rakai explain Athletica’s Workout Reserve and the new Systems Engagement feature. Workout Reserve is described as a battery-like metric that shows how close an athlete is to their historical best across different durations, from short sprint efforts to long aerobic performances. The team discusses how athletes can use it in real time through Velocity or Garmin, how negative values can signal breakthrough efforts, and why good historical data is essential. They also explain how Systems Engagement helps athletes and coaches see which physiological systems were stressed in a workout or race, making it easier to reverse engineer training toward the actual demands of an event.Key episode takeawaysWorkout Reserve acts like a “battery” showing how much capacity an athlete has left relative to their recent historical bests.A value near 100% suggests the athlete is fresh relative to that effort, while 0% means they are approaching a known personal limit. Negative values indicate new, uncharted territory.Workout Reserve can be viewed retrospectively in Athletica, live in Velocity sessions, or through the Garmin Workout Reserve data field.Systems Engagement shows which energy systems were stressed during a workout or selected segment, such as neuromuscular sprint, anaerobic, VO2 max, threshold, or aerobic systems.A 30/30 interval session may engage both VO2 max and threshold systems, which matches the expected training adaptations.The tool is most useful when athletes have enough valid historical data, including power or pace tests such as FTP tests, 5K tests, or sport-specific calibration sessions.Workout Reserve and Systems Engagement are based on external load, such as pace or power, not internal load measures like heart rate, lactate, or RPE.Coaches can use Systems Engagement to check whether an athlete actually trained the intended system.Race analysis can help athletes identify which physiological systems were most taxed, then design training to target those demands.Not every session should push Workout Reserve to zero or negative; easy aerobic sessions still have a purpose.How a ProTour cycling coach uses Athletica Workout ReserveWorkout Reserve: A New Way to Understand Performance with Dr. Andrea ZignoliScientific Paper in Sports EngineeringRace Analysis - Volta ValencianaGarmin Connect IQ | HomeTrain and Race with WR on GarminAthletica Workout Reserve | HomePaul Warloski - Simple Endurance CoachingMarjaana Rakai | Nordic Performance Lab
Transcribe →Can You Be a Mom, Work Full-Time, and Train for an Ironman? with Dr. Iris Nafshi
Jun 1100:57:21Tap to summarizeIn this episode of The Athletes Compass Podcast, Dr. Iris Nafshi joins the team to discuss her research on “Iron Moms,” endurance athletes who train for Ironman while navigating motherhood, work, family expectations, and guilt. Drawing from her PhD dissertation, Beyond Grit and Guilt, Iris explains that athletic identity does not compete with maternal identity; it can expand it. The conversation explores how moms persist through complex schedules, emotional pressure, limited support, and societal expectations by reframing guilt, building systems, practicing self-compassion, and embracing the mindset that “something is better than nothing.”Key TakeawaysAthletic identity and maternal identity do not have to be separate or competing roles.“Balance” may be the wrong word; integration and seasons of focus are more realistic.Mom guilt often comes from societal expectations that mothers should be endlessly selfless.Many Iron Moms reframe training as role modeling strength, commitment, and self-respect for their children.Grit helps athletes start, but it is not enough to sustain long-term training through real life.Iris adds self-compassion to the HERO framework — hope, efficacy, resilience, and optimism — creating “SHIRO.”Support systems matter. As Iris says, nobody does Ironman alone.Flexibility is essential: shortening a workout, moving it, or doing something imperfectly is often better than skipping entirely.“Something is better than nothing” becomes a powerful mindset for training, work, creativity, and life.Children are watching, and they often notice the dreams parents pursue — and the ones they give up.Dr. Iris NafshiPaul Warloski - Simple Endurance CoachingMarjaana Rakai | Nordic Performance Lab
Transcribe →A Stoic Philosopher's Guide to Endurance Training with Dr William Irvine
Jun 400:52:45Tap to summarizeIn this episode of The Athletes Compass, Dr. William B. Irvine joins Paul Warloski, Paul Laursen, and Marjaana Rakai to explore how Stoic philosophy can help endurance athletes train, race, and live with more resilience. Irvine connects rowing, coaching, discomfort, failure, and competition to practical Stoic ideas such as focusing on what you can control, reframing setbacks, practicing negative visualization, and valuing process over outcomes. The conversation moves from “keep your head in the boat” to “one more stroke,” offering athletes a grounded mental toolkit for handling race-day adversity, physical discomfort, self-doubt, and the temptation to tie self-worth to results.Key Takeaways“Keep your head in the boat” is a powerful Stoic metaphor: focus on what you can control, not the weather, competitors, or external conditions.Irvine’s practical Stoic advice: “Do what you can with what you’ve got where you are.”Athletes can reframe setbacks as “Stoic tests” rather than disasters.Discomfort and pain are not the same; endurance athletes learn to tolerate discomfort as part of growth.“One more stroke” is a simple mental strategy for surviving hard moments in training, racing, illness, or life.Failure is valuable when it comes from attempting something difficult and learning from the result.Competitive athletes can stay healthier mentally by focusing on process goals rather than outcome goals.Negative visualization helps athletes appreciate what they already have and prepare for what could go wrong.Last-time meditation can deepen gratitude: every race, ride, row, or run may someday be the last.Stoicism is not about suppressing emotion; it is about maintaining equanimity when life or sport gets hard.More Better Thinking | Dr. William B. IrvineJoin the Athletica 5K Virtual RaceDr. Paul LaursenPaul Warloski - Simple Endurance CoachingMarjaana Rakai | Nordic Performance Lab
Transcribe →Power & Pace Profiles: What Every Endurance Athlete Should Know
May 2800:35:36Tap to summarizeIn this episode of The Athletes Compass Podcast, Paul Warloski, Dr. Paul Laursen, and Marjaana Rakai break down the concept of power and pace profiles — the personalized performance fingerprints hidden inside your training data. They explain how these profiles reveal an athlete’s strengths, weaknesses, critical power, and sustainable race pace without expensive lab testing. The conversation explores how Athletica uses real-world wearable data and AI coaching to prescribe training zones, assess race readiness, and predict event performance. From marathon pacing to hill-specific preparation and anaerobic profiling, the episode offers practical guidance for endurance athletes looking to train smarter and race more effectively.Key TakeawaysA power or pace profile maps your best efforts across different durations and acts as a “performance fingerprint.”Critical power and critical pace help determine sustainable race intensity and training zones.Real-world wearable data may be more valuable than isolated lab testing because it reflects actual training environments.Athletica uses historical performance data to estimate physiological markers like VO2 max and threshold power.Accurate profiling requires maximal efforts across multiple durations — “garbage in, garbage out.”Profiles can reveal whether an athlete is more “twitchy” (explosive) or “diesel” (endurance-focused).AI coaching can analyze historical workouts and race-specific sessions to estimate realistic race pacing.Race specificity matters: athletes should train in terrain and conditions similar to their target event.Weekly training consistency and frequency may matter more than one extremely long workout.Monitoring threshold trends over time provides insight into long-term fitness progression.Join the Athletica 5K Virtual RaceDr. Paul LaursenPaul Warloski - Simple Endurance CoachingMarjaana Rakai | Nordic Performance Lab
Transcribe →How to Train With Limited Time
May 2100:34:31Tap to summarizeIn this episode of The Athletes Compass, Paul Warloski, Dr. Paul Laursen, and Marjaana Rakai discuss how everyday endurance athletes can make meaningful progress with limited training time, especially when balancing work, family, and life. The conversation centers on the “minimum effective dose” of training, why context and goals matter, how to use intensity wisely, and why consistency is often more important than perfection. They also explore the role of strength training, aerobic base work, walk-run programs, HIIT, recovery, habit stacking, and practical scheduling strategies for athletes training around five to seven hours per week.Key episode takeawaysThe best training plan depends on the athlete’s goal, background, fitness level, and available time.Five to seven hours per week can be plenty for some goals, such as a 5K, 10K, half marathon, or gravel event, but may be unrealistic for many athletes targeting an Ironman.Consistency is the first priority: spreading workouts across the week is better than cramming all training into one day.For newer athletes, walk-run sessions can produce major aerobic gains without any high-intensity training.HIIT is time-efficient, but it is not necessary or appropriate for every athlete.Three hard training days per week is likely the upper limit for most athletes.Strength training is worth the time investment, even if it is only 10 to 20 minutes at a time.Recovery counts as training, and sometimes performance improves after backing off.Calendar blocking, commuting, dog walks, playground workouts, and habit stacking can help busy athletes stay consistent.Doing something is usually better than doing nothing.Paul Warloski - Simple Endurance CoachingMarjaana Rakai | Nordic Performance Lab
Transcribe →The Best Recovery Tools for Everyday Endurance Athletes
May 1400:41:05Tap to summarizeIn this episode of The Athletes Compass, Paul Warloski, Dr. Paul Laursen, and Marjaana Rakai explore recovery strategies for everyday endurance athletes, emphasizing that sleep and nutrition remain the foundation while tools like cold water immersion, sauna, compression garments, massage guns, foam rolling, forest bathing, and active recovery can all have a place depending on context. The conversation highlights how cold and heat therapies may support mental clarity, resilience, and heat adaptation, while nature exposure and low-intensity movement can help restore the nervous system. The hosts also discuss gender differences in recovery, especially the mental load and sleep disruptions many women experience, and identify red flags of under-recovery such as declining HRV, flat mood, loss of motivation, and reduced joy in training.Key TakeawaysSleep and nutrition are the “big rocks” of recovery; everything else is a smaller tool to use strategically.Cold water immersion can help with mental reset and acute inflammation, but it may not always be ideal after strength work or heat-adaptation sessions.Sauna and heat exposure can support plasma volume expansion, cardiovascular adaptation, and mental resilience.Compression gear may be most useful in specific contexts, such as travel, swelling, plantar fasciitis, or after hard race weekends.Massage guns, foam rollers, balls, stretching, and massage therapy are all useful ways to pay attention to muscle tone and tightness.Forest bathing and time in nature may support mood, immunity, parasympathetic activity, and nervous system recovery.Women may not necessarily recover differently physiologically, but lifestyle load, hormonal changes, sleep disruption, and the “third shift” can affect recovery capacity.Red flags of under-recovery include low or abnormal HRV trends, loss of motivation, lack of joy, persistent heaviness, poor sleep, and mood changes.Active recovery can sometimes be better than complete rest, especially when it involves gentle movement, time away from screens, or lower-impact modalities.Running is often more neuromuscularly stressful than cycling, swimming, or rowing, so changing modality can help maintain movement while reducing load.Sex Differences in Self-Reported Causes, Symptoms, and Recovery Strategies Associated With Underperformance in Endurance AthletesRandomized controlled trial on the efficacy of forest walking compared to urban walking in enhancing mucosal immunity | Scientific ReportsIsolated and Combined Effects of Cold, Heat and Hypoxia Therapies on Muscle Recovery Following Exercise-Induced Muscle Damage | Sports Medicine | Springer Nature LinkPaul Warloski - Simple Endurance CoachingMarjaana Rakai | Nordic Performance Lab
Transcribe →Carbs for Endurance: How Much Do You Actually Need?
May 700:35:54Tap to summarizeIn this episode of The Athletes Compass, Paul Warloski and Dr. Paul Laursen unpack the current high-carb fueling trend in elite endurance sport, sparked by reports of top marathoners consuming 100–120 grams of carbohydrate per hour. The conversation challenges the traditional idea that carb intake primarily boosts performance by sparing muscle glycogen, instead highlighting emerging research suggesting that even small amounts of carbohydrate may work mainly by protecting blood glucose and preventing hypoglycemia. They explore whether high-frequency carb dosing may act more like a brain signal or “performance unlock,” why everyday athletes should be cautious about copying elite fueling strategies, and why training fundamentals still matter far more than gels, shoes, or marginal gains.Key TakeawaysCarbohydrates do improve endurance performance compared with placebo, but the mechanism may not be simple “more fuel equals more speed.”Emerging research discussed in the episode suggests that preventing low blood sugar may be more important than sparing muscle glycogen.Very high carb intakes, such as 90–120g per hour, are being used by some elite marathoners, cyclists, and triathletes, but that does not automatically mean they are right for everyday athletes.High carb dosing may have a brain-mediated or mouth-rinse-like effect, potentially signaling that energy is available and allowing athletes to access another “gear.”More carbohydrate can sometimes increase glycogen use rather than spare it, which complicates the traditional fueling model.High doses of carbohydrate may increase the risk of gastrointestinal distress, especially when not practiced in training.For many age-group and masters athletes, a more moderate fueling approach may be safer and more practical.The hosts emphasize that training, aerobic development, preparation, and consistency matter far more than copying elite nutrition headlines.The role of advanced glycation end products in aging and metabolic diseases: bridging association and causality - PMCCarbohydrate ingestion eliminates hypoglycemia and improves endurance exercise performance in triathletes adapted to very low- and high-carbohydrate isocaloric diets - PubMedCarbohydrate Ingestion on Exercise Metabolism and Physical Performance - PubMedNonenzymatic browning in vivo: possible process for aging of long-lived proteins - PubMedLiver and muscle glycogen oxidation and performance with dose variation of glucose-fructose ingestion during prolonged (3 h) exercise - PubMedCarbohydrate dose influences liver and muscle glycogen oxidation and performance during prolonged exercise - PubMedThe effect of carbohydrate mouth rinse on 1-h cycle time trial performance - PubMedPaul Warloski - Simple Endurance Coaching
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