Endurance training – Serenity Through Sweat

What could go wrong

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. I admittedly got away from writing over the summer, and it is well past time to rectify that.

I used to fly quite a bit with a captain who would always end his briefing by saying, “What could possibly go wrong?”

It was said jokingly, of course, but with an all to telling note of seriousness. There are always things that don’t go to plan, especially when flying airplanes.

There are just too many balls in the air. Too many moving parts. Logistics that can seem insurmountable. And yet, flight after flight, day after day, we find a way to make it work.

We thin1k about and brief the things we think may go wrong, and how we plan to react. We train for processes and procedures for responding to unexpected problems. We maintain an awareness of where we are and where we want to go.

The question, though, is ever present. Nagging, like a fold in the sock under your foot. Just enough to remind you with a slight discomfort every step. “What could possibly go wrong”

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately, but not as it relates to aviation. That nagging feeling has been with me my entire adult life. I’ve been thinking about the question with my upcoming bike race.

I have spent more than my fair share of time on a bike over the past decade of competing in triathalon, but over the last few years, most of that has been on an indoor trainer.

The indoor trainer is safer and more efficient. It is far more versitle than what I would have access to in my local area in terms of terrain. It allows for precision training without concern for traffic, weather, time of day, and road condition. It solves a lot of potential problems.

I’ve signed up and have been training for the 6 Gap Century ride. The race runs through the north Georgia mountains covering 103 miles with more than 10’000 feet of climbing. Needless to say it will be a long day.

Over the summer, I was able to scout out the course with some friends. We rode about half the course, including two of the biggest climbs.

Leading up to the ride, I had been simulating lots of climbing on my smart trainer, but descending down steep and winding mountain roads, would be another thing entirely.

Six gap scout ride with a special mountain top surprise

What could possibly go wrong?

The scenic highways in north Georgia are beautiful. Winding roads cut into the majestic mountainsides with spectacular vistas. They also feature very little shoulder, impatient drivers, and a small piece of fabricated metal between the edge of the pavement and a very long fall.

I dont think nervous is the right word. I would get nervous as a kid before riding my bike down a big hill. Knowing that soon, the exhileration would push that feeling aside even if there was a chance I could get hurt.

The calculus has changed a bit from those days. It is still just a hill (mountain) and a bike. But I’m not a kid anymore. I don’t recover the way I once did. I have a family to support, bills to pay.

So, without having ridden my bike not on a stationary trainer in more than a year, and on flat ground in FL at that, I set off with my friends for this mountain adventure.

What could possibly go wrong?

Despite some challenging weather and road conditions, nothing went wrong. We all had a great and very memorable day.

But that nagging feeling was still there. All it takes is one mistake. One unforseen problem. You hope that if something happens, it will only be a minor consequence. That isn’t always in your control.

I have continued my training and preparation throughout the summer, rediscovering my love of riding outside. Especially with the new challenging terrain.

I took advantage of some opportunities to train while on long layovers. With those incredible opportunities came added concern. Not just my health, and my family, but now this is an activity with inherent risk while I have an obligation at work.

What could go possibly go wrong?

I had dreams about it. Not nightmares per se, but the thought of crashing my bike while going down a steep hill is something my subconscious likes to remind me of.

So, it was a pleasant surprise, and a welcome change when my thinking shifted.

Flying down highway 50 at 40 miles per hour, with nothing but open road, cresting mountains, and the clear blue waters of lake Tahoe filling up my view, I had to remember to breathe.

In fairness, I frequently have to remember to breathe when descending. My senses are so enhanced and focused knowing that the stakes are raised. But the truly awesome natural beauty took my breath away.

I remember thinking to myself that I needed to snap out of it. To focus on the road. To avoid any myriad of potential mistakes that could prove catastrophic.

And I did snap out of it. But I also started thinking, I know what could go wrong. I’ve thought about it, dreamt about it, worried about it. But what could go right?

That is a much more powerful question. Even a harder one to answer, I think. We are wired to look out for threats. It is a survival mechanism. It takes a freeing of those powerfully ingrained survival instincts to think about what could go right.

There will still be nervous energy and hightened awareness as I approach each mountain crest, knowing the gravity of the potential consequences that lie ahead (figuratively and literally).

But more and more I find myself thinking, what could go right? It is a powerful shift. It just took a little push down a hill to get there.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

Heart

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog.

Sometimes, you find words that just hit you the right way. Maybe a song, maybe a line from a book or a movie.

The words can be incredibly powerful in their own right. Or, it can be a confluence of events, mood, vibe, context, that enhance the power of the message.

Life size Super Mario Bros made of chocolate

I’ve been thinking about this a lot over the past two days. What is it that makes the same words, the same message, so powerful?

It isn’t some magic spell, that when uttered, affects everyone uniformly. But there is something there. A motivational quote or a song that can give you an extra push, an extra gear.

I had just finished my morning swim in the pool on the twenty fourth floor of my hotel. Swimming indoors is already something of a strange feeling. The thick fog blanketing the streets of Houston and obscuring most of the floor to ceiling pool deck windows made it feel alien.

I still had my goggles lightly perched above my brow, and my waterproof swim headphones in, when I climbed into the hot tub. I fiddled with the strap on the back of my head so I could lay my neck into the crook in the corner of the hot tub paver stone floor.

I instantly relaxed as I sprawled out. My arms and shoulders floating in the steamy water, welcoming stillness after exertion.

My eyes closed as the song started to wash over me. “Somewhere in middle America. When you get to the heart of the matter, it’s the heart that matters more”

I hadn’t heard the counting crows song in quite a while. The music downloaded onto my waterproof swim music player is something of a time capsule. Closed and sealed somewhere after the fall of Napster, but before the rise of Spotify.

The next day, on my long layover in Albany, it was time to revisit my slightly stupid holiday tradition. For the 12th year in a row, it was time for the Christmas half marathon.

I queued up the live album to start my treadmill run in the dingy hotel fitness center, knowing I would need more than a little heart to get me through.

This tradition has come to mean a lot of things to me. One year it was a time to grieve after a loved one had passed. Another year, it was an ill advised death march, when I knew I was sick, and pushed on anyway. It has been a welcome adventure in new towns, and it has been a stale and stagnant trot on hotel treadmills.

Endurance sport, especially this particular event, has a lot to offer in the form of self exploration. What I kept coming back to this year is that emotions are not linear and rarely predictable.

I think it was Yogi Berra, who said predictions are hard especially about the future. Here is one prediction that isn’t so hard. Almost every endurance event will have some sort of low point, some place of self doubt or questioning.

Made it home to see these smiling faces on Christmas

You start to ask yourself, “Why am I doing this?” No one else is here, no one really cares, you can stop the treadmill now and get on with your day.

Humans tend to forecast current conditions out into the future, even when there isn’t great evidence to support that trend line. Look at the housing crisis of 2008 and the inflation that has plagued the past few years. We think things will continue on just the way they are, in spite of changing conditions, until we are smacked in the face with change.

It is especially easy to get into this mental space with some miles behind you and some fatigue in your legs. You start to think, “if I feel this bad after (however man) miles, how am I going to make it the rest of the way?”

If running got me feeling this way and thinking this way, how is more running possibly going to make me feel better?

And yet somehow, like those magic words, or songs, that have the power to change our state of mind, pushing through can make you feel better.

I was struggling around the hour mark at just under 8 miles in. I slowed my pace to a brisk walk and took the opportunity to talk to my wife and kids who had called to check in. Finishing was never in doubt, but the shape those last 5 or so miles would take was still to be determined.

Making the best of an unscheduled LAX layover

Before our quick conversation had even ended, I found myself pushing the pace wheel on the treadmill back up.

I worked my way back towards my target pace while still continuing our quick Christmas conversation.

It is a strange thing, that an endurance event isnt linear. That there will be highs and lows, ups and downs, while covering the miles. But thats a lot like life. Its not predictable. It’s not linear. It depends a lot on the mindset you are willing to approach it with.

Some climbing miles and sprint win on my new bike, the still be named newest lady of the house

And, when you get to the heart of the matter, it’s the heart that matter more.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe, and stay sweaty my friends.

Unable

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. Last night I was squeezing in a short Peleton ride at the hotel gym in the MSP airport after a long, reroute induced day. My favorite instructor (partly because she is so often quotable), Robin Arzon, said something that stuck with me.

I decided I needed to get some additional movement in after eating a late dinner and spending most of the day butt in seat. It was just a short twenty minute hip hop ride, but Robin was able to work in this gem. “no, is a complete sentence”.

El Duderino making Play-Doh medicine so daddy can feel better (may or may not have pushed the limits last week)

She then went on to say, something along the lines of “if it isn’t increasing my bank account, or increasing the vibe of my tribe, the answer is no, and that is part of self care”. While I think the latter part of the statement is a bit more crafted and word smithed, the first part felt more organic and resonated with me.

It is also something that we hear on repeat in the aviation industry but struggle with both inside and outside the cockpit. “Unable” is also a full sentence, and it is one that is extremely important to use.

Speedy getting in some jungle gym action at Crayola

Pilots tend to be not only a mission oriented bunch but also type A personality predominantly. This often leads to pushing beyond a sense of personal comfort to complete the mission.

This is a common occurrence amongst the triathlon and endurance community as well. Pushing past the comfort zone is something that is inherent to those sporting domains and seeps into the everyday decisions that those members tend to make.

Enjoying the splash pad in the land of endless summer

I know I have more hobbies and responsibilities than time, and I often find myself trying to “do all the things”. Not wanting to give up the things that are priorities, but also not saying no when other requests pop up is a real struggle for a lot of us. Doing all the things is never an achievable goal and even aiming that high, knowing and accepting, that you will fall short can still lead to burnout.

This is where “No”, and “Unable”, find their essential place in the conversation. Pilots are very familiar with the term when it comes to the limits of their aircraft. If a controller wants a speed/altitude/heading that isn’t possible or safe, pilots don’t hesitate to play the “unable” card. But, being mission oriented, pilots are more reluctant to assess their own limits the way they would the aircraft.

To be fair, the aircraft comes with a manual, black and white criteria that it can and cannot perform. They are also tested in safe conditions to find their limits, and then placarded, with an appropriate safety margin or course. How familiar are you with your own limits and safety margins? Are they fixed and placarded, or more fluid and malleable?

Getting back in the saddle after race week and a brief cold

With many of my hobbies, part of the draw is testing those limits, finding where they are and how far they can be pushed. The endurance/triathlon community knows all about this. So to does the grappling community, because there is nothing like testing your skill against a brother or sister who is also trying to test themself whilst trying to render you unconscious.

There is something about pushing limits, that pushes the throttle up on life. Life becomes amplified, in way that is addictive. Pushing that throttle up, is not without it’s costs, and limits inevitably need to be pushed further to find that familiar feeling.

Putting in work on the trail and the book on the long DAY layover

It is ok to be unable. It is ok to say No. They are both complete sentences. In spite of the little voice telling you to keep pushing, there is serenity to be found in respecting your limits with complete sentences.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.

Pacing

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the SerenityThroughSweat blog. This week I am very excited to talk about pacing.

After signing up for Ironman FL 70.3, and trying to follow a more primal approach to both my diet and my exercise, I have spent the last eight weeks in an aerobic base building phase.

Eight long weeks of limiting my heart rate to 180-age beats per minute. There were times when I felt like I was crawling. There were times when I wanted to spit out the bit, rip off the bridle and let my legs loose. There was more than one occasion where I considered smashing my fancy gps watch with a heart rate monitor, that chirped so innocently at me, reminding me of my departure from aerobic training zones.

Finishing up that base building phase and entering a speed phase felt like being released from a cage. My first sprint workout, the singular focus, the tunnel vision, the wind rushing past my ears, the awareness of the restraint that had been removed to let my legs explode, propelling me down the pavement produced a primal liberation. A liberation not just of my heart, lungs, and legs, but also my mind and my mood.

Endurance training is its own special kind of masochism. There is no way around a little suffering if you want to complete long and hard physical challenges, normally however, they come with a chemical/hormonal reward pathway. This is our body’s way of initiating the fight or flight response, and become better suited to complete those same challenges again in the future. Testosterone, human growth hormone, cortisol, and insulin like growth factor 1, are all elevated after endurance training sessions.

This chemical reward is a notable component of SerenityThroughSweat. I’m not above a little chemically induced serenity, I just prefer sweat as the acquisition currency.

And right back to low and slow miles on a long CAE layover

Limiting yourself to the aerobic zones, removes a significant amount of that chemical reward. Studies show that reduced relative work intensity, especially in trained, as opposed to sedentary individuals, will produce a corresponding reduction in hormonal response.

This meant eight weeks of long, slow, miles in the saddle or on the trail, with an incessant heart rate monitor chirping, and a diminished chemical return at the end. Nonetheless, this aerobic base building is an essential part of my training program, one that requires appropriate pacing.

Typically, pacing is used in the connotation conserving energy, so as not to tire out before the finish. This aerobic only pacing was more like completing the session using only half the tank. This was training with an artificial, and annoying, constraint.

Getting underway on the next SerenityThroughSweat project

There is a purpose to the pacing though. Even at anaerobic sprint intensities, upwards of 70% of your energy come from the aerobic production system. At sub-maximal efforts, like those in most endurance events or everyday activities, that percentage is even higher.

Building your aerobic engine, slogging through those slow, laborious miles, is training the engine that powers the vast majority of your activity. It may not be glamorous, but it is the work that pays dividends.

Training primarily aerobically also paces your body to respond to the chemical and hormonal rewards we mentioned above. The body is much better at noticing relative change, than it is overall levels. Said another way, if you are constantly chasing the a runner’s high into a red zone heart rate, your body will adapt to those elevated chemical levels. If your training is primarily aerobic, those high intensity sessions send a powerful chemical signal because the levels of the suite of growth hormones are elevated, relative to normal training response.

Recovery work and an MAF test, all 150 bpm or below with constant reminders

I see a lot of similarity in my interactions with my boys, especially El Duderino. The emotional and chemical reward I feel when they learn how to do something for the first time is a high I will keep chasing.

But the majority of our interactions seem like a crawl toward progress, (often with the same reminder to keep my heart rate down).

Maybe you are less familiar with burnout from a training regimen, but I think every parent has felt burnout at some point. Pacing, of energy, effort, engagement, and expectations, can make all the difference in finishing a day with hugs and smiles versus resentments, and frustrations.

When in doubt remember that pacing is your friend, and no matter how annoying it is, that incessant chirping reminder to adhere to your pace can help guide you towards serenity.

Thanks for joining me, stay safe and stay sweaty my friends.