Running Lean with Patrick McGilvray
If you want different results you have to do things differently, right? But doing things differently requires some work, it’s an uncomfortable process, and honestly, this is why most people refuse …
Continue Reading about 170. Getting Started With Habit Change →
My name is Patrick McGilvray, and I’m an experienced marathoner, ultra runner, Sports Nutritionist, Master Life Coach, and weight loss coach for runners. I’ve dedicated my life to helping runners just like you properly fuel your body and your mind. So you can get leaner, get stronger, run faster, and run longer than you ever thought possible. This is Running Lean.
Hey there, and welcome to episode 170 of Running Lean. My name is Patrick McGilvray, the weight loss coach for runners and today, Getting Started With Habit Change. If you want different results, you have to do things differently, right?
But doing things differently requires some work. It’s an uncomfortable process. And honestly, it’s why most people just refuse to change. But what if you could make changing easier? What if you could replace a bunch of your bad habits with good ones that would make change much easier? Right? It’d be amazing.
That’s the basic premise of developing good habits: making things like living a healthy lifestyle automatic, make it easy. But again, most people won’t do the work to change their habits because change is hard. And it doesn’t feel good. Not at first anyway.
So today, I’m going to give you some actionable tips on getting started with habit change. Because if you can just get started, you can start making progress. Change won’t happen if you never start. So let’s get started, shall we?
But first, I think you will agree with me when I say that most fad diets don’t work. Have you ever tried a fad diet? I have, I’ve tried all of them. The promise of a fad diet is that it’s the best and fastest way to lose weight. And a lot of them will tell you it’s the only way and nothing else works, but this way does work.
And every year millions of people get sucked into this idea that this thing is going to be different. This thing is going to be the cure all for everything right. And every year millions of people are disappointed because they don’t get the results that they want. Why? Because fad diets are not sustainable.
Humans are not designed to survive on cabbage soup alone, or just grapefruit or baby food or whatever the latest trend is, baby food diet. That’s actually a thing by the way. I know, weird, right? These fad diets may help you lose weight in the short term, but they don’t teach you how to change your habits.
They don’t teach you how to change your lifestyle. They don’t teach you how to make this something that is sustainable because eating baby food or grapefruits or cabbage soup for the rest of your life is totally not sustainable. Right. A big focus of my coaching program is to teach you how to integrate healthy eating habits into your life for good in a way that is sustainable for you as an individual.
So a rule of thumb, I think we can all follow here is that if you can’t sustain it, just don’t do it. Stay away from the weird fat diets. And just do what we’ve always done as human beings eat real food, food that still looks like food. Food our ancient ancestors would still recognize they can go oh, well, I know what that is. Because you can’t go wrong with this plan, right?
And if you want some help with this, if you want some guidance every step of the way through this whole process, check out my unique weight loss coaching program for runners just go to runningleancoaching.com/join. You can learn all about my program. And I hope you see hope to see you in the Running Lean Coaching Project where the project is always you.
Okay, so today I wanted to talk about getting started with habit change. Because when it comes to changing habits, I think we all know that there’s processes involved, and that there are some things that we can do. There’s been books written about this, to really, you know, change habits and make them last for good. Okay.
But just getting started with this whole process feels overwhelming for a lot of people. And I wanted to take some time today to just go over a few principles and give you a few tips and ideas for getting started with habit change. Because if you can just start doing things differently, if you can just start making some effort and getting some movement happening, then you can start to see some progress happening. Okay.
If you want to change anything in your life, you’ve got to do things differently. All right. I think we can all agree on that and doing things differently is the challenging part because we’re just so used to doing things a certain way, it’s so ingrained into our brain that this is the way I do things that doing something differently feels uncomfortable, it feels scary, it feels foreign to us.
And until those new things become a habit, it’s going to feel uncomfortable and scary and foreign, so just getting started with this process. A lot of people will not even bother, they won’t even bother starting and changing something because the whole process feels too hard, it feels too scary, it’s gonna be a challenge. But if you’re willing to accept the challenge, then you can start making progress, and you can start creating good habits in a lot of different areas of your life.
Okay, today, I want to focus on a few I want to focus on, you know, weight loss is a topic I talk about a lot in here, as a weight loss coach for runners, this is a topic that I’m going to focus on a lot. So I’m going to kind of frame the conversation today, around you know, losing weight and changing your diet, but you can apply these same principles to any habits that you want to change.
The principles will be the same if you’re trying to get stronger, or improve your running or, you know, improve your relationship or, you know, improve your career or you know, better the relationship with your kids or whatever it is. There’s so many different ways that we can apply these same principles in different areas of our life. It’s not just related to weight loss, but that’s my jam. So that’s what I’m going to be talking about today.
So the first thing I want to say is that you have to just start, and I know this seems like too rudimentary. But so many people procrastinate changing. They procrastinate getting started, that they never take action. Have you ever said I really want to lose weight, or I really want to run a marathon, but I’m just going to wait until X, Y or Z happens and then I’ll start?
You know, I want to wait until after the New Year, or I want to wait until after St. Patrick’s Day, or I want to wait until when the summer comes around, or I want to wait until; you know what I mean. And we could just do that forever. Why don’t you just start right now? And you can come up with all kinds of excuses, and all kinds of stories and all kinds of reasons why you can’t start right now.
But it all boils down to you’re just afraid. And that’s it, and it’s okay. It’s okay to be afraid to start. Because getting started with something like this can be a little bit scary. If you’re somebody who’s like, man, I’ve been wanting to lose weight for 10 years. And I’ve got a lot of weight to lose, like 50 pounds.
And you know, just getting started just feels so daunting and scary. Because what if I fail, I failed before, but I do really want to do this, but maybe I’ll just wait until and then you fill in the blank with whatever is going to happen. And whenever the planets align or whatever. Just throw all that garbage out the window and just start right now. Start right now.
If you want to just start losing weight right now, I’m going to give you one tip that will absolutely point you in the right direction. Just stop eating sugar. Do that today. If you do that, starting today, I promise you a week from now, if you stick with it, you’ll feel better and you’ll probably lose some weight. And you’ll be like, dang, why didn’t I start that earlier?
I can’t tell you how many people come to me for coaching. And we start working together. And we start to put together a plan for them and they start feeling better and running gets better and they’re losing weight and they’re feeling amazing and they’re sleeping better. And they’re like I had been thinking about working with you for like two years and I just finally said why didn’t I do this earlier?
Well, gosh, I’m just kicking myself for not starting earlier. I’m like well let’s just, you know, it takes what it takes but I just want to encourage you that wherever you are right now is a perfect time to get started. It is the perfect time to change, it is the perfect time to give up junk food or sugar or whatever it is that is your Achilles heel. Okay, so just get started, stop saying later.
Stop waiting for the planets to align, they never do. Although the whole Mercury being in retrograde thing is just messing with my computer, right? Is that a thing? I think it is a thing. So don’t wait for that to happen just like do your thing and do it now get started now. This idea of later is a killer of hopes and dreams. Later, later, later, because later never happens. Okay, so the first thing is just like start, just start where you are is fine.
And the next thing is that I want you to start simple, don’t overcomplicate this stuff, we have to make things very, very simple. At the beginning, when I’m working with new people, we change a couple of things, okay? I might say like, Hey, we’re going to stop eating sugar, we’re going to stay away from, you know, junk food, we’re going to limit how much you know, carbohydrates, you’re eating, whatever, like it all goes a little bit different for each person.
But we start with a few things, we see how that goes for a week or two, and then we layer on something else, okay? If you try to change 27 things at once, it is going to be too overwhelming for you. And it’s funny, because I’ve worked with a couple people who have told me like, I can handle it, Patrick, just tell me everything right now, I want to start doing it all.
And I’m like, okay, here’s a few things. And I’ll lay out five or six things, you know, that they can change. And, you know, they’ll start doing all these things. And they’ll message me like three days later, and they’re like, okay, that was too much, is too overwhelming for me, I can’t do all this stuff all at once. I’m like, I know.
So we change a few things at a time. First, for a lot of reasons. Number one is like we want to get your body used to doing things a little bit differently. And if you remove sugar, if you’re somebody that’s eating a lot of carbs, a lot of sugar, and we lower your carb intake and stop eating sugar and refined grains, that might be a bit of a shock to your system, you know, and so we want to get your body like feeling good again.
And then we can layer on the next thing, okay. That’s why one of the reasons why we do this also, from a psychological standpoint, we can handle a couple changes at once, one or two things, but much more than that, and we just feel too overwhelmed. And we’re more likely to give up because it feels too overwhelming.
So start simple, start very simple. Change one thing, give up sugar, just stop eating sugar for a week, see how you feel okay? I heard this recently, I like this principle called the ABZ principle. That’s like Alpha Beta Zulu. And the ABZ principle is this. Where you are right now is A and where you want to be eventually, maybe lose 50 pounds, that’s going to be Z.
All right, that’s the end game, where you want to be is the next aligned action. That is your next step. That’s what you’re going to do. Now. That’s where your focus is on B, keep your focus there. Do not worry about steps C through Y. We’ll get there later. Start where you are. Start with here you are at A and I’m going to focus on B right now. I’ll get to C later.
And then D, E and F and so on. But for right now it’s just B, that’s all we’re going to focus on right now. If you can just use that kind of as a basic principle for habit change, this whole process is going to become so much easier for you, because you’re not overwhelming yourself. You’re literally just working on the next aligned action, what is the next thing I can do that will move me an inch closer to Z?
Not three feet closer, just an inch or two. That’s all we want to focus on right now. Okay, so just keep it very, very simple, especially at the beginning. And think about all the different ways that you can simplify the process of habit change, it could be as simple as like, okay, I really want to get in the habit of eating healthy food every day at lunch. And so one way I’m going to simplify that process is to meal prep once a week on Sunday afternoon. And then I’m going to have my lunches all prepared.
You know, when I go to work, I can just grab one of those and I’m done. I don’t have to think about it. I’ve simplified that part of the plan. You know, I don’t have to think about what I’m going to do every single day. I’ve kind of made it very, very simple. And that right there. That simple little tip right there is going to help you increase your compliance every single day.
It’s going to be much easier to stay on track and develop a good habit of eating healthy lunches, if you’ve already prepped them ahead of time, right? So keep it simple. And then make it simplify the process as well as much as you can. If you want to get in the habit of running early in the morning, every other day or whatever; get out your running clothes and your running shoes the night before, lay it all out, get it all ready to go so that when you wake up in the morning, all you have to do is slip out of bed and slip into those running clothes and slip out the door and you’re ready and you’re running.
If you can just kind of get in the habit of putting out those clothes the night before, when you’re thinking clearly and it’s not like cold outside and you’re in bed all snuggled up all warm and thinking about being outside, get yourself ready the night before. That way, when you wake up in the morning, you’re just like ready to go. And you can just get right into the start of developing that habit of getting into running right away. You don’t have to think about it because you’ve already made that decision ahead of time. Okay.
Another way of developing good habits, especially at the beginning, is to kind of ritualize some of the things that we do and, and putting out those running clothes would be kind of an example of a ritual that makes things simple as well. But it’s also a way of building into your day, some rituals so that some of these things can become habits for you.
So I’ve used this analogy of like a sports team, whatever. Like they have pregame routines, right? You’ve seen the baseball players, they’ll go out and they’ll toss the ball around. And they kind of do the same thing. Every single time. Football players do drills, whatever, I guess I don’t really know. But I have seen baseball players go out there and toss the ball around.
Today, by the way, I took a little run through downtown Cincinnati. And it happens to be Opening Day. Opening Day is a big deal here in Cincinnati as like the first official baseball team in the United States, Cincinnati Reds. And we have a big parade every year. And so there’s thousands of people downtown kind of playing in the streets getting ready for this parade.
I didn’t even know it was Opening Day until I was running down there. But I was like, oh, this is so cool. This is so fun, you know, but it just got me thinking about like baseball and how they have these pregame routines, these rituals that they go through. And they do this not because they’re really trying to warm up, you know, that’s probably a little bit of it. But it’s a little bit of just like they’re preparing their mind, and they’re preparing their body to start to do this work that they’re going to do, okay.
So if you’re somebody that wants to change your day, you want to feel a little bit more, you know, mindful during your day and you want to, you know, start your day on the right track every day, create like a morning routine.
So you might get up, you might put the coffee on, you might do a little meditation, you might spend a few minutes journaling, that would be a great way to start every single day. So you’ve developed this ritual, about how you start your day. And if you want to feel better throughout your day, every day consistently, then maybe starting every day with the same morning routine.
Much like baseball players start a game with the same warmup routine, you are going to set yourself up; mind, body and spirit to like, you know, approach that day in a more mindful way. Same thing, like if you want to sleep better at night, maybe have a wind down routine at the end of your day. So you can start your day with a morning routine, you can end your day with a wind down routine, where you might dim the lights for a little while, you might do some journaling or some reading, you know before going to bed.
You know you brush your teeth, you put your pajamas on, you kind of get in bed, like whatever that looks like for you create a little bit of a routine around some of these things, make it a ritual and it will make the process of winding down much easier for you and you’ll probably sleep better if you get into this habit of of this ritualistic routine, okay.
Your pregame routine is what’s going to get you into action that’s going to get you to start the process of taking action when you don’t feel like it. So you may wake up in the morning and you’re like I don’t feel like doing much today, but I’m just gonna go ahead and get up every day and I do my journaling and meditation. So I’m just going to start with that. And just the process of doing that will set you up for a better day. Right there. Even though you may not even feel like it. It’s just gonna make it that much easier for you. Okay.
Another way to get started with changing habits is that you have to make changes to your environment. And there’s a lot of different ways of looking at this and a lot of different ways to interpret what I mean when I say environment. And I’ll give you a couple examples here.
One of them is if you if you want to start eating better, and you want to stop eating junk food, get the junk food out of the house, you have to get that stuff out of your house, the environment that you live in the environment that you spend the most amount of time in, cannot be laden with junk food everywhere you look.
Every time you open the fridge or the pantry, or you look on the counter and you see cookies, or ice cream, or whatever, chips, pretzels, just junk, just, that’s going to make it very hard for you to stay on track, right. So you’ve got to change your environment and clean out the fridge, clean out the pantry. If you only have one option for the food that you have in your house, and it’s healthy food, and it’s food that’s on your plan, you’re going to be so much more likely to stay on track and develop good habits around what you eat and what you don’t eat.
The more you can control your default food environment, the healthier you are going to be. For most of us, our default food environment is our house, our own home. And if you can control the heck out of that you are well on your way to being the healthiest version of yourself. Some other forms of environment that we can change to improve our compliance and to improve our ability to create good habits is things like what we’re reading, what we’re listening to, what we’re watching, the people we’re hanging around, this is all part of your environment, okay.
I’m a person who likes to consume a lot of content. So I read a lot of books. I listen to podcasts, I listen to audiobooks. I watch documentaries, I hang around people, I follow people online. And all these people are like, people that lift me up. The books I read are on topics like habit change, and nutrition. The podcasts I listen to are on things like mindset, and coaching, and improving your health and your fitness and strength and, and all the stuff that I’m constantly immersed in.
This world of healthy, living, healthy eating, I’m always learning, I’m always growing and evolving. One way that you can do this is to join a running group. If you have a local running group, join the group and immerse yourself in this world of running with other people. Because you’re going to be surrounded by other people who have similar goals.
Maybe you’re all training for the same marathon, or half marathon, or 5k, or whatever. But when you’re surrounded by people who get it, who are all kind of doing the same thing. You’re listening to podcasts on that subject, you’re reading books on that subject, and your world becomes like focused on running marathons – you’re gonna be so much more successful, and so much more driven, to stay on track and create good habits.
So immerse yourself in this world of losing weight, healthy living. This is one of the reasons I designed my coaching program the way that I did. It’s designed exactly for this purpose, to help you stay surrounded by people who get it, who will encourage you, who lift you up, who inspire you and motivate you and who help you stay on track.
The people who show up for all my group coaching calls, the people who do the homework, who immerse themselves into this program, honestly, they get the best results. So if you want to get started with habit change, one of the best things you can do is sort of immerse yourself in this world of healthy eating, of nutrition, of running, of losing weight, all that stuff.
And I promise you, it’s going to make changing your habits so much easier because everybody that’s around you is doing the same thing. You know, they say if you surround yourself with that you’re kind of the sum of the five people you spend the most time with. And I love that because if you spend your time around, you know five people who eat junk food, you’re probably the sixth.
If you spend your time with five really overweight people Well, you’ll probably be the sixth. If you spend your time with five people who run marathons, you’ll probably be the six or five people who are losing weight, you will probably be the sixth. Okay? So immerse yourself into this environment of being a healthy person, and you will be.
And then lastly, you know, this is something that is often overlooked. And a lot of people don’t really talk about this. But when it comes to losing weight, and changing habits, and getting healthier and getting stronger, I think people have this presupposition, this idea that it has to be a suffer fest, that in order to lose weight, you’re going to have to suffer your way to your weight loss goal, and it’s going to really suck.
Now, I’ll be honest, there are times when it might, and I talk about this, I say, hey, you know, you have to embrace the suck sometimes, right? But that doesn’t mean it has to be a suffer fest through the whole process. So my last tip for you is that whatever you’re doing, you have to make it fun. You cannot suffer your way to your ideal weight. I mean, you can and some people do, but I do not recommend that.
So you need to find some ways of making the process fun. And in my coaching program, I try so hard to have fun with it and be light hearted. And we laugh and I think we do have fun doing this. Okay, we don’t, you know, sit there and you know mope around about this. There’s times when it’s challenging for us and for me and for you, and I get all that. But for the most part, we have fun doing this, we look for ways of making this process fun.
So how can you put some fun into changing your habits or getting started with habit change? Now fun is very subjective, it’s going to look different for different people. For me, I enjoy trying some different foods, and you know, kind of changing up my diet every now and then. And, you know, still focused on the principles that I teach and, you know, in maintaining high protein and you know, a lower carb approach for the gym, for the most part, you know, in general that works for me, other people, like, you know, eat more carbs and stuff like that.
But I try to have fun doing this. I try to make eating part of the process of having fun. I recently made some green enchiladas with my girlfriend. We made this big casserole dish of enchiladas that were so amazing; chicken enchiladas and with cheese and sour cream and green enchilada sauce and hot salsa stuff. So much fun. Like we had a really good time doing that.
Putting those together and eating, eating can be fun. It doesn’t have to be you know, oh, gosh, we’re eating you know, just kale again. It’s not like that at all. Not like that at all. But I tried to have fun doing this. And I had tried to have fun with my training, with my diet, with the way I approach nutrition, with the way that I approach strength, all this stuff. I try to have fun with this.
So think about ways that you can make losing weight fun. I know it doesn’t sound logical because most people don’t look at it that way. They think of losing weight as being such a tough process and such a unfun process, but I promise you, there are ways that we can make this process fun. You can have fun, while losing weight, you absolutely can. Okay.
And if you ever want to make habit change and weight loss easier, join the Running Lean coaching project. I promise you’ll get all the support that you need to create healthy habits that actually stick. Just head over to runningleancoaching.com/join to learn more, and I’ll see you there. Cool. All right, that’s all I got for you today. Love you all, keep on Running Lean, and I’ll talk to you soon.
If you’re a runner and you’ve been struggling to lose weight or you keep losing and gaining the same 10 pounds over and over again. Or you’re finally ready to get to your natural weight and stay there for good this time then I have something you will love. I’ve created a powerful new training just for you called running lean for life. You’ll learn exactly how to transform yourself into a lean fat-burning running machine. So you can run without bonking, lose weight without calorie counting and develop the habits required to make it last for life. To get this free training right now go to runningleanpodcast.com/leanforlife and start your transformation today.
When you think about “endurance”, what comes to mind? Since you’re most likely a runner, your mind probably conjures up images of slogging out miles and miles on the roads or trails. And you’d …
My name is Patrick McGilvray, and I’m an experienced marathoner, ultra runner, Sports Nutritionist, Master Life Coach, and weight loss coach for runners. I’ve dedicated my life to helping runners just like you properly fuel your body and your mind. So you can get leaner, get stronger, run faster, and run longer than you ever thought possible. This is Running Lean.
Hey there, and welcome to episode 161 of Running Lean. My name is Patrick McGilvray, the weight loss coach for runners. Today I’m talking about the other side of endurance. So, when you think about endurance, what comes to mind, since you’re most likely a runner listening to this podcast, your mind probably conjures up images of slogging out a bunch of miles on the roads or on the trails, and you’d be correct.
Building this kind of physical endurance is one of the keys to being a healthy fit human being. But there’s another side of endurance one that doesn’t get discussed much. This other type of endurance is one of the most valuable life skills that you need to learn and master. So today, I’m going to explain exactly what this other side of endurance actually is, and why it’s so important to you becoming your most badass self.
But first, listen to this. Most people, even runners think that gaining weight is just a fact of life. And I understand why the average American gains an average of one to two pounds of fat per year from early adulthood through middle age. And even if you’re an avid runner, you’re not immune to these stats. The reason most people gain weight isn’t that they’re, you know, they’re not trying hard enough, or they don’t track their food properly, or they’re not running enough.
People gain weight because they’re eating what they think is a healthy diet. But it’s actually not, you know, you’ve probably been told to eat this high carbohydrate diet full of cereal grains and sugars and industrial seed oils based on the food pyramid or my plate or whatever the hell they’re calling it these days. And it just doesn’t work, right?
So listen, it’s not your fault. You’re just doing what you’ve been told to do, but it just doesn’t work at all. Okay, continually gaining weight as you age is not a fact of life, it’s actually something you can control with the right approach. In my unique weight loss coaching program for runners, I’ll put together a personalized plan that works for you based off of your goals, your personality, your lifestyle, your likes and dislikes.
And then I’ll help you stick to that plan so that you can actively hit all of your weight loss and your running goals. And all you have to say is Patrick, yes, I’m ready. Let’s do this. To learn more and apply for coaching, just go to runningleancoaching.com/apply. And you can get started right away.
Alright, let’s talk about the other side of endurance. So most people, especially runners understand what endurance means. And of course, we’re talking about sort of that physical side of endurance, right? If you’re a long-distance runner, building endurance means being able to run longer, being able to run farther, pushing the limits of how long you can last out there on the roads or the trails, right. And I’ve done this many times.
When I first started running many years ago, I could run like a mile. And I didn’t think I could ever run three miles without having to like stop and like completely catch my breath. And so I didn’t think I could ever run like a 5k until I did. And then I never thought I could run a 10k. And I remember training myself to run three miles and four miles and five miles, and then finally being able to run 10k, and so I did that. And then I just kind of skipped the whole half marathon thing and then just went from the 10k straight to the marathon. That’s just me, but I didn’t think I would be able to run a marathon.
Never in my life was somebody who was like, oh, yeah, you know, go run a marathon. I was drinking and smoking cigarettes and eating the crap diet and I was way overweight. And in those days, there was no way I thought, you know, if or be capable of running a marathon, but then I did. BTdubs, I you know, quit drinking and quit smoking and quit eating junk food and stuff like that.
And as part of this whole process of being a long distance runner it’s really hard to like smoke cigarettes and be a long distance runner at the same time, just so you know. But then I pushed myself even farther, 50k, 50 mile, 100 mile. So I’ve constantly pushed myself to see what I’m capable of, how much endurance can I handle?
And so over the years, I’ve actively built my endurance. So how do you build your endurance physically, right? You have got to improve your cardiovascular system, right, you have to build that aerobic engine. And one of the ways to do this is just to run a lot and run a lot of miles and continually increase the miles that you’re running.
And you’ve got to do this the right way, you don’t want to injure yourself, you don’t want to increase your mileage too, too much too soon. So increase your mileage slowly. But over the years, I was able to increase my ability to endure while running. Right. And this means that you’re more aerobically fit, this means you can get out there and you can run longer distances. And you’ve really built a strong aerobic engine, right?
So we kind of understand this whole idea of endurance from that standpoint, right. There’s a couple other things about building endurance that you may not have thought about, maybe you do know some of these things. But getting more aerobic than fit also helps you physically in other ways, for example, you know, you get this improved cardiovascular health.
So your whole cardio cardiovascular system, your body’s ability to pump blood through your system and you know, pump blood to working muscles, and deliver oxygen to working muscles improves dramatically, you can lower your blood pressure. So regular aerobic activity helps to lower blood pressure is why most experienced runners tend to have pretty low blood pressure which helps you to regulate blood sugar.
So improving your cardiovascular system helps regulate insulin levels to keep blood sugar normal. Improving your aerobic engine also helps improve sleep. They did some studies, and they’ve showed that people that who exercise aerobically regularly have better sleep quality and and better duration of sleep. And then obviously, better sleep means less stress.
So, you’ll be more likely to lose weight as well, which is awesome. Having a strong aerobic engine means that you have a strengthened immune system, because being more cardiovascularly fit increases the amount of antibodies in the blood, these antibodies are called immunoglobulins, which is just a fun word to say.
So you get a stronger immune system, you get improved cognitive function, you know, having a better aerobic engine helps to boost brain power. And it helps slow the brain deterioration as you age. And I love this one so much: it makes you feel happier. Improving your aerobic engine will help stave off the feelings of depression, and boost your mood almost immediately and make you feel happier. So you get this immediate mood boost when you do some aerobic activity. I think we’ve probably all experienced that. Right?
So there’s lots of reasons why we want to improve our aerobic engine, why we want to become more aerobically fit, why wouldn’t we want to build our endurance, right? Endurance is about going longer. And just a little sidebar on this. The preferred fuel source for long distance aerobic activity is fat. So when you switch up your nutrition regimen, and you get fat adapted, this is going to greatly improve your body’s ability to burn fat, which means you’ll improve that aerobic engine even more, you’ll become sort of an endurance badass, right?
Fat is an amazing source of fuel for endurance athletes. So the longer you’re fat adapted, the more efficient you become at utilizing fat as fuel, the more your endurance improves. So just understand that, you know, one of the reasons why we switch our diet and get off of all the carbs and all the sugars and all that junk food is that we want to just create a much more efficient fat burning machine in ourselves, right? So just understand that that whole idea of becoming fat adapted has a lot to do with being able to run longer distances being able to endure longer. Okay.
So physical endurance, like we’ve been talking about, like being able to run long distances. It’s important, right? It’s vital to your life if you want to be a healthy, happy human being. But there’s another side to endurance that most runners and a lot of running coaches and people in general don’t really talk about. And that is not the physical endurance required for running hours and hours, but rather, this is the mental and emotional endurance that’s required for accomplishing just about anything that’s worthwhile. Okay?
When we talk about challenge of accomplishing big goals, big goals are challenging, right? If they were easy, everyone would do it, right. That’s why we call these big goals because they are hard, right? An example would be like losing weight and keeping it off for good, or starting your own business, or qualifying for Boston, or passing the bar, or maintaining a healthy, happy relationship with your partner.
All of these things are hard. They all present big challenges. And they all take a while, sometimes years to achieve, you know, I know, people who have been trying to qualify for Boston for years, they’ve put in a lot of hard work to do that. And it’s really hard sometimes to achieve these things, right? Nothing worthwhile comes easy. We have to remember that, right?
It’s the challenges that change us. It’s the challenges we overcome, in the process of going after these big goals that cause us to grow, to evolve, to level up to become those badass runners that we want to become. So, you have to understand that big goals come with big challenges, right?
In order to achieve these things, you have to develop that other kind of endurance, the mental and emotional endurance that’s required to get you through those big challenges. Another way of saying this, another word for this mental and emotional endurance would be mental toughness. Mental Toughness is your ability to endure all of the challenges, all of the stressors that come along with, you know, accomplishing something big.
Mental Toughness is what’s going to keep you going when the going gets tough. And it always does, the going always gets tough, right? Mental Toughness is actually something you probably do already, because it’s required for running, especially running long distances, right? You need mental toughness to get across the finish line. Because sometimes, you know, there’s this point during a race, it could be a hard 5k, or a half marathon, full marathon or ultra, whatever, there’s going to be a time during that event where your body just wants to quit, your body is like this is not a good idea what we’re doing here, your body’s going to tell you this is not something I want to keep doing; your mind has to override your body at that point. That’s mental toughness.
Your mind has to override the pain and the misery that you’re experiencing. Your mind has to override that natural tendency that your brain has to just seek pleasure, seek pleasure and avoid pain to seek comfort and avoid discomfort. That’s mental toughness, right? That ability to override what your body is trying to tell you in that in those moments, right. So mental toughness is required for running, it’s required for being able to finish a marathon or qualify for Boston or to like I said, lose weight and be able to keep it off for good. It’s, it’s required for all these things that are hard that are challenging for us.
Mental Toughness separates the finishers from the quitters, the people that quit, give up, not mentally tough. The people who stick with it no matter what, mentally tough, they have built that mental and emotional endurance. So this mental emotional endurance, it’s required to achieve any kind of goal that you want for yourself, right. And I mentioned an example of like losing weight and keeping it off for good, this is hard to do.
This is why I coach on this. It’s not something that is easy to do. If it was easy, you wouldn’t need me you probably wouldn’t be listening to this right now. So what would this look like? So having this kind of endurance, developing this kind of endurance is mental toughness means that, you know, let’s say you want to lose 50 pounds, right? It means you’re gonna have to develop a food plan, you’re gonna have to develop a nutrition plan that fits your lifestyle that also helps you achieve your running goals because, you know, we got to be able to do both.
You know, this isn’t about like restricting calories like crazy or doing the cabbage soup diet or something like that, right? You got to focus on protein, you gotta get enough fat in your diet. Like we got to make sure that we’re focusing on the right kinds of carbs and things like that. So we’re gonna put a plan together and then that mental toughness is required for you to stick to that plan.
That mental and emotional endurance is required. If you want to stick to your plan every day, no matter what. It means you’ve developed the endurance to stay on track. Even when it’s hard, even when no one’s watching you, even when you’re having a bad day, even when you’re just stressed out, or when you just don’t feel like it.
That mental toughness means you’re willing to do the hard things, and you do them consistently. That doesn’t mean that this is always hard, it doesn’t mean that sticking to your plan is always hard. There are times when it is hard, though. But you don’t quit. You don’t quit because you’re tired, you don’t quit because you don’t feel like it, you only quit when you’re done.
So that’s what we mean by building that mental toughness, that other side of endurance. And what it really means is that you are being in integrity with yourself. So you’re actually doing what you said you’re going to do. So what most people do is this, they say they’re going to eat right. And they don’t, most people say they’re going to run consistently. And they don’t. Most people say they’re going to you know, they join a gym and they say they’re gonna go to the gym three times a week.
And then by February 1, they stopped going all together, because they made this New Year’s resolution that said they were going to go to the gym three times a week. So they join that gym that had the great special going. And then they quit. This is not being in integrity with yourself, right? This is the opposite of that. Being in integrity with yourself means that your actions, the things you do, your actions are in alignment with your goals.
So if you want to lose weight, you stop eating junk food, and you stick to that plan. You don’t occasionally eat a bunch of junk food, you don’t binge out on junk food, you don’t, you know, swing by Wednesdays on your way home from work just because you’re having this craving, right? You act in alignment with your goals.
Your goals are, I’m not eating junk food, I want to lose this weight, I want to keep it off, I want to change my whole relationship with food, stop eating junk food, I want this to be a thing of the past, then you need to stick with that plan. That’s what it means to be in alignment in integrity with yourself. Your actions are in alignment with your goals, right? This is simple, right?
Not being in integrity is when your actions are not in alignment with your goals. So you want to lose weight. You know, you got to stop eating the junk food, but you keep eating the french fries and the pizza and ice cream. And you keep guzzling all those post run beers with the running group, I see you out there.
These actions are not in alignment with your goal to lose weight, right they are, they are going to keep your body packing on the pounds. So you’re going to keep packing on weight if you keep acting that way. So that’s not being in alignment with yourself that is not being in integrity with yourself. And this idea of being in integrity with yourself, it requires mental toughness. Because it’s hard to stick to your plan.
It’s hard to not eat the french fries, it’s hard to not eat the pizza, it’s hard to not drink all those beers after a run. It’s hard to eat right and do it consistently. But this is the work that you have to do. You have to learn how to develop this mental toughness not just for running. But for every goal that you have for yourself, everything that is important to you. That’s just like another type of training that you have to do. Right, you want to run longer distances.
So you train your body to run longer, you continually push yourself a little bit you build up your mileage, you improve your cardiovascular system, you improve that aerobic engine, and you keep doing the training so that you can build that endurance for running so for running longer and longer distances. Well, you have to build mental and emotional endurance the exact same way.
So with all my clients, we work on this we work on developing mental toughness. We work on developing the emotional and mental endurance required to help them stick to their plan to help them to stay on track to keep them moving in the direction of their goals to keep them making progress toward their weight loss goals and their running goals to so we work on doing the hard stuff of consistently acting in alignment with their goals.
And here’s the thing I wish I could tell you that this was super are easy, and it doesn’t take much time. And you’ll get it right away. And you’ll never fail. And it’ll be perfect. I wish I could say all that. But that is not the case at all. This is the hard work that we do. And sometimes this takes a while. You know, I mentioned someone that was trying to qualify for Boston has been trying for years. And they keep trying, they’re not going to give up. And you know what, they’re going to accomplish that at some point, because they’re not giving up.
Here’s the thing I have to say about this, though, this is probably the most rewarding work that you can possibly do for yourself. When you work to build mental and emotional endurance, then there’s almost nothing that you won’t be able to accomplish. You’ll set your mind to accomplish some huge, quote unquote, like impossible goal, something that today feels too big for you to too huge, it’s impossible for who you are today. And then what you’re going to do is you’re going to get busy doing the work required to get you there. And then staying on track with that plan, it’s not going to be a question. There’s no question.
Of course, you’re gonna stay on the track, of course, you’re gonna stay on the plan, because that’s what you do now. That’s who you have become, you’ve become a mental toughness, badass. You’ve developed the mental and emotional endurance you need to stay on track no matter what. And that big, huge impossible goal will be possible for you someday.
So, improving endurance. Improving your endurance means you improve your cardiovascular system so you can run longer, yes; but it also means building the mental and emotional toughness required to stick to the plan so that you can accomplish hard things like being able to lose weight, once and for all and keep it off for good.
Yes, endurance will help you continually improve your overall health and fitness, you’ll be able to run longer be fitter, you’ll even be happier. But when you think of endurance, I want you to think about this other side of endurance, the mental and emotional endurance, the mental toughness, and start building that along with your ability to run longer, start training yourself to develop that kind of endurance, okay, because that mental toughness will enable you to confidently accomplish anything you set your mind to. Cool. All right, that’s all I got for you today. Love you all. Keep on Running Lean, and I will talk to you soon.
If you’re a runner and you’ve been struggling to lose weight or you keep losing and gaining the same 10 pounds over and over again. Or you’re finally ready to get to your natural weight and stay there for good this time then I have something you will love. I’ve created a powerful new training just for you called running lean for life. You’ll learn exactly how to transform yourself into a lean fat-burning running machine. So you can run without bonking, lose weight without calorie counting and develop the habits required to make it last for life. To get this free training right now go to runningleanpodcast.com/leanforlife and start your transformation today.
There’s a bit of a debate going on out there in the running community around whether or not runners should be lifting heavy weights. Some people think no, runners should never lift heavy weights …
Continue Reading about 160. Should Runners Lift Heavy Weights? →
My name is Patrick McGilvray, and I’m an experienced marathoner, ultra runner, Sports Nutritionist, Master Life Coach, and weight loss coach for runners. I’ve dedicated my life to helping runners just like you properly fuel your body and your mind. So you can get leaner, get stronger, run faster, and run longer than you ever thought possible. This is Running Lean.
Hey there, and welcome to episode 160 of Running Lean. My name is Patrick McGilvray, the weight loss coach for runners and today should runners lift heavy weights? So, there’s a bit of a debate out there in the running community around whether or not runners should be lifting heavy weights.
Some people think no, runners should never lift heavy weights. And they give a bunch of valid sounding reasons why others think that runners should always lift heavy, and they have their own logical point of view on the topic. And the two sides both have some good points. Today, I’m hoping to clarify this for you and give you my stance on the subject.
So in this episode, I’m going to definitively answer the question should runners lift heavy weights. And before we get into this topic, I want to give you a quick recap of my personal weight loss journey. I’m sharing this with you today because I want you to understand something I want you to know that I get it that I’ve been there and that I’ve come out the other side.
So a few years ago, I found myself around 40 pounds overweight. Very recently, I was running like a madman and I was trying to burn off all these calories. And it just wasn’t working. I was logging all my food. I was doing these like whatever the latest fad diets. I was running every day, and still nothing was working for me.
My cravings for sugar and junk food were like crazy off the charts. And I was seriously riding the struggle bus. And then I did something that changed all this for me. So I went against everything I’d been taught as runner like you need sugar to run, you need carbs to run. And I finally got off the struggle bus.
I started fueling differently for running, I began lifting weights consistently. And I fixed my mindset so that I could make all of this a sustainable way of life. I ended up losing the 40 pounds, running became way easier. I’m stronger now than I’ve ever been. I have more energy than I know what to do with and my cravings for junk food are basically gone.
So, this is what I do. Now I teach runners like you how to stop struggling with your weight and start living like the healthy, strong, lean, badass runner that you know you can be. Of course, it’s up to you, you can continue to struggle like I did for a long time there. But listen, when you’re ready to be done with all that, I’m here for you.
If you want to learn more about coaching, just go to runningleancoaching.com/apply fill out a quick application, we’ll have a quick chat, see if coaching is a good fit for you. Cool! runningleancoaching.com/apply I hope to see you in the Running Lean Coaching Project.
Okay, so let’s talk about this: should runners lift heavy weights? So, the reason I’m bringing this up today is because I think there’s a little bit of a debate out there. And if you look up, you know, hey, should runners be lifting heavy weights, I think you’re gonna get some mixed opinions about this subject. And especially if you talk to other runners, or you talk to people at the gym, don’t talk to people at the gym about this kind of stuff.
I get it, butI always hear people say oh, I was talking to this guy at the gym and I’m always like, oh boy, here we go. Right. Some expert quote unquote expert at the gym. So why am I talking about this? Well, a lot of runners think that they should never lift heavy weights like they should always do very lightweights lots of reps and others you know have a different opinion they think you should always lift super heavy and so like what are you supposed to do?
Like how do you decide as a runner, what you should do? And it doesn’t matter which you know, side you kind of fall into. I want to help you kind of make this decision clear today. Okay, so the first thing I want you to think about is this. What are your goals? What are your goals?
First of all as a runner: so, are you planning on running your fastest half or full marathon? Are you running your first ultra or your fastest 5k? Maybe you are you’re a miler, maybe you’re running your fastest mile. Maybe you just want to run every day, maybe you just want to run and continue running forever and that just wants you just want running to be part of your life forever. And you want to stay strong for that. Because your goals as a runner will a little bit determine like which way you want to go with this. Okay.
The other thing I want you to consider is what are your overall health and fitness goals? Like, are you trying to lose weight? How much weight; 10 pounds, 50 pounds? Are you trying to get stronger? You should be. Are you trying to build some lean muscle to improve your body composition? Like lose some fat and gain some muscle weight? Or you just want to live longer, like be very, very clear on your personal health and fitness goals.
Okay, because at the end of the day, you get to do this however you want. And I’m going to give you kind of my opinion here today. And I feel very strongly about certain what I think about this in my certain approach. But I just want you to think about what are your goals, okay.
So how you lift, how often you lift, how much weight you lift will largely be affected by your goals. So, think about like what your personal goals are, as we’re talking about weightlifting and talking about how much weight and how many reps you should be doing and stuff like that. Because if you want to build some muscle or maintain the muscle that you have, there’s a little bit of a different approach you want to take to this, okay.
But whatever your goals, whatever your goals, there’s a place for strength training in your workout regimen, or at least there should be. Lifting weights should be something that you do all the time no matter what. So, there’s nothing really inherently bad about weightlifting. But the interesting thing is that most runners are notoriously bad at weightlifting, they just don’t do it or they don’t do it right. They think that they don’t really need to lift weights because they run. This is very, very wrong. And I’m going to tell you why in just a second.
If you want to be a healthy fit runner, if you want to be a healthy fit human being, you need to be doing some sort of resistance activity, you need to be lifting weights, right? Running is just not enough. In fact, running is catabolic. It’s a catabolic activity, it breaks down muscle, long distance running is amazing. I love it so much. It’s like my life, you know, I love running.
And there’s a lot of people who think that running is enough to build muscle like, Oh, I’m just you know, I run a lot. So, I’m good to go there. And I’ve got some bad news for you. Running is what’s considered a catabolic exercise. So, anything that is cardio considered like cardio or aerobic exercises, especially over long, longer durations. These are great activities, cardio, aerobic exercises, these are great for helping you to improve your cardiovascular system, helping to build a healthy heart helping to improve your lung capacity. But they also cause you to lose some body mass both fat, which is good, and muscle, which is bad.
Running effectively breaks down muscle over time, this is very important for you to understand: is that running is a catabolic activity. Over time long distance running will break down muscle tissue. In order to offset this, you need to be doing anabolic exercises regularly. Anabolic is in the state of muscle building that’s building muscle growing muscle getting stronger.
So, what you really want is a good balance of the two to maintain a healthy, strong, fit body to maintain that lean body mass and we’re talking about not just you know, bigger muscles, we want stronger muscles. So too much catabolic exercise without enough anabolic exercise and you lose muscle you lose strength. And this is going to affect running negatively, too.
Okay. So it’s very important that you understand this concept that running is a catabolic activity. It will break you down over time. So you need to be doing something to offset that. So here are some of the here’s the flip side of this right here. Here’s some of the positive benefits of weightlifting of doing regular strength training for runners. Right, so the first thing you have to understand is that when you do regular strength training, regular resistance training, you’ll lose more weight and faster so the more muscle mass you have, the more fat you burn.
Carrying around muscle requires more energy than carrying around fat. So, your metabolism actually increases just by getting slightly larger, stronger muscles. Building muscle also speeds up the whole fat adaptation process, which will help you burn even more fat. And you know, like everything we talked about here, we’re all about fat burning, right?
So, lift weights, get a little bit stronger, build some muscle, and you increase your metabolism, you burn more fat, boom, this is awesome. Building strong muscles also means that you’re at a much lower risk of injury, especially from what we call connective tissue issues. So like, most runners’ muscles adapt pretty quickly.
But your connective tissues like ligaments and tendons take much longer to get strong. That’s why you see most running related injuries are ligament and tendon injuries, not necessarily muscle injuries. So, building strong muscles will also improve and strengthen those connective tissues and prevent running related injuries. So if you want to run injury free, one of the biggest things you can do, one of the best things you can do for yourself is to get stronger.
Also, when you get stronger, your endurance improves. So your ability to run longer distances before fatigue sets in is vastly improved when you’re stronger. So you can become a long distance running machine. But you need, you know, good strong working muscles in order to do that. Also, you get faster, carrying around a little more muscle means that you are stronger and your power to weight ratio improves the stance substantially.
So you get a little bit leaner, you lose some of that fat weight, you gain some muscle weight, and now your power to weight ratio has gone up, and you’re more powerful and lighter, and you’re able to run faster at higher intensities for longer distances, right. So as far as improving your running performance, getting strong is one of the best things you can do for yourself, you’ll get faster, your endurance improves, you get lighter, your power to weight ratio goes up, all those things are amazing.
And then lastly, when you lift weights regularly and you get stronger, you will live longer. Evidence continues to point to the benefits of strength training. And a new meta analysis in the British Journal of Sports Medicine has concluded that people who do strength training regularly are less likely to die prematurely than those who don’t, even when they don’t do any aerobic workouts. So they’ve kind of factored that even if you don’t do any aerobic activity whatsoever, strength training will lead to a longer life.
And of course, doing some aerobic activity, improving your cardiovascular system, helps you to live longer as well. So you want to live longer: strength training. Okay. And so there’s all these amazing benefits to weightlifting for runners, right?
So here’s what I hope for you. I hope that your biggest takeaway from this episode right now is that you have to get into some sort of regular strength training routine, like you just have to get stronger. This is what I want you to take away from this, it doesn’t matter what your goals are, it doesn’t matter, you know, where you fall on the line of whether or not you should be lifting heavy weights or not.
I think the most important thing is that you are doing some sort of regular strength training, it has to be part of your weekly workout plan. Doesn’t matter what you’re training for. Make time for it. It’s that important, okay? Okay, so what happens when you lift weights, so let’s get into kind of the, what’s happening in your body when you lift weights, okay.
So before we talk about how heavy you should lift or how light you should lift, I want to explain what happens when you lift weights like, or at least what you’re trying to make happen in your body, okay? So your muscles will grow as a response to stress. So, you stress out a muscle or a group of muscles, essentially, you overload them. And then because of that overloading, they have an adaptive response.
So they grow more muscle fibers are produced those muscle fibers band together, they get stronger, the muscle grows a little bit and, and they grow. So you have this adaptive response. This is called the overload principle. Overload a muscle and in response, it gets stronger. Do this over and over again and you get bigger, stronger muscles, right? But in order to overload the muscle, you need enough resistance.
So resistance can come in many forms. Resistance could be your own bodyweight: hold a plank for a minute or two. See how long you can hold a plank just with your own bodyweight, or do push ups. Do some pull ups, these are all bodyweight exercises that are pretty hard, you know, you’ll find yourself getting pretty fatigued pretty quickly. With some of these bodyweight exercises, right.
Then we have free weights, we’ve got dumbbells and kettlebells, and barbells. And all kinds of machines at the gym, they’re designed to work certain muscle groups. And then we have resistance bands, things you can attach to a door or two, or you don’t even have to attach to anything, you can just pull on them, step on it, lift it up and create the resistance. That way, you can even use logs or rocks or heavy books or milk jugs filled with sand, it doesn’t really matter, you can literally use just about anything to create resistance, right?
The important thing is that you have to have enough resistance in order to over load the muscle if you want it to have that adaptive response, if you want it to get stronger. So the way you overload the muscle, as you get to muscle failure, you have to get to muscle failure in order to create that adaptive response.
So you can get to failure a couple of different ways you can overload that muscle in a few different ways. But you’ll you know that you’re there, when you can no longer lift that weight, like you cannot do another rep with good form, like you just your form breaks down, you start cheating, so to speak, you know. So for example, you can get to overload by lifting a one pound weight lifted like 100 times I promise you, you know, at some point, you’re going to probably get to overload with 100 with a one pound weight if you if you lift it 100 times or you can lift a 100 pound weight once or whatever amount of weight you can lift one time that will get you to that failure place, right?
So then we say like, okay, which is better? Should you lift 100 times should you do 100 reps? Or should you do one rep, like, what’s the right number? Like should you be lifting heavy? Should you be lifting super light? So, let’s look at what each of these kinds of looks like. Kind of looks like here.
The first one let’s talk about light weights; light weights, lots of reps. So, think about what it looks like and feels like to do a lot of reps with very light weights. So, lots of group workout classes are based on this approach, right? Everybody grabs some light little dumbbells and you’re lifting them and you’re like, you know, doing a ton of reps. And at the end of the workout, you’re like, oh, that was fun, you know, and you’re tired and you know, you’re probably, you know, pretty sweaty and things like that.
So you’re doing a ton of reps, you’re using very light weights. But what is this? This is mostly a cardio workout, right? Here, you’re really working out the cardiovascular system, you’re adding a little bit of resistance. But really, you know, it’s a cardio workout, right? And there’s nothing wrong with this, right? But as a runner who does pretty much nothing but cardio everyday when you go out and run, do you really need to be doing another cardio workout? Do you need to be lifting super lightweight a million times and making it some new some other cardio type workout? I don’t believe so.
I don’t believe you want to be doing that. You don’t need to do a bunch more cardio. Remember that you’re already engaged in a catabolic activity. And you need to be doing something to offset that. So more cardio is not going to be the answer. Even though you might be using some weights, it’s probably not enough resistance to make a difference and offset the amount of catabolic activity you’re doing from already. Right.
So the other thing to think about is you’re probably never going to see someone in a workout class like that get to muscle failure, you’re just never going to see somebody get to failure. So that’s, that’s a sign that that’s probably not the most ideal approach. Okay? So if you’re doing some kind of workout and you’re lifting, let’s say 10 pounds for the duration of the workout, and you really never get to failure, there’s no overload happening. There’s no adaptive response happening.
You’re not growing muscle fibers. You’re not getting stronger. What’s the point of all that? Yeah, it’s a good cardio workout. But you don’t probably need to be doing more cardio, okay. It’s good to improve your cardiovascular system, right? It’s good to do that, right, but that should not be your goal from weightlifting. Your goal with weightlifting should be to overload your muscles so you get stronger period.
Okay, so let’s look at now the other side of this, which is lifting heavy weights, right? And you’re probably thinking, I’ve kind of figured out, Patrick, this is probably your preferred approach. And yes, it is. Yes, it is. And I’m going to explain why. So when you lift heavy weights, you will absolutely get to muscle failure. So I want to make this very clear: to failure doesn’t mean it’s hard. Failure isn’t like, oh, man, this is really hard. I can’t believe I, I’m doing these reps, oh, gosh, this is really hard. This must be failure. No failure means you cannot do another rep with proper form. Failure means you’re trying with all your might as hard as you can to lift that weight, and you just cannot move it any longer. It should hurt. It should look ugly, feels terrible. And it’s pretty amazing, all at the same time. Okay.
So failure means you cannot move the weight. Again, you cannot finish that rep. That’s what failure is not oh, it’s hard. It’s like you cannot do it. Okay. And then heavy, lifting a heavy weight heavy is relative for you. It’s just, it’s heavy for you. It’s how strong you are, it’s relative to how strong you are. Heavy means that you can only do around six to twelve eps before you hit failure. Six to twelve reps is a good amount of reps to fatigue the muscle enough to stress the muscle enough to produce that adaptive effect.
You don’t have to aim for a one rep max like bodybuilders do and power lifters do. Although I do like doing this sometimes just to see how strong I’m getting. I’ll do a one rep max on bench press. And what have I been doing like bench press and deadlift? I’d stopped kind of doing the squat one rep max because my knees are a little bit jacked up right now. But I want to get back to that as well. And I’m seeing some progression happening.
So I can see that I’m getting stronger with the one rep but you don’t have to just do a one rep max. That’s not what we’re getting into here. Six to twelve reps is where you want to be. So aim for six to twelve and do a full body workout. And you only need to be doing this twice a week, you don’t have to become a gym rat, you don’t have to spend two to three hours every day in the gym.
And I have this very specific strength program that I teach my runners, my clients, and it’s a full body workout, it’s twice a week should only take you about 20 minutes each time. And it’s enough, it’s plenty. Like it doesn’t have to be super time consuming, okay. But the important thing you have to understand here is that you really want to get to muscle failure. And in my opinion, it’s just much more efficient and better for you to get to failure with fewer reps. So aim for that six to twelve rep range, lift heavy weights, there’s you don’t have to worry about getting too big.
This is one of the biggest fears around lifting heavy weights that I hear from runners is that and you’ll hear people say this all the time. I don’t want to get all big and jacked and like I don’t want to be carrying around tons of extra muscle weight. You know, I don’t want to look like one of these big bodybuilders. Listen, remember I said running is catabolic. Lifting heavy weights is a great way to offset this.
In fact, it is very, very hard to look like a bodybuilder it takes years of very hard work to look like a bodybuilder they lift five, six days a week, they’re in the gym for hours, they eat a ton of extra food, you know and they really limit the amount of cardio that they do in order to gain all these muscles and stuff. Okay, so please do not worry about getting too big. Do not worry about gaining too much muscle or looking like a bodybuilder, it is extremely hard to gain that much muscle.
We want to offset the amount of running that we’re doing with some good strength training, we want to build some muscle we want to get stronger. So lift heavy weights, aim for that six to twelve rep max, get to failure with each exercise. If you really want the best bang for your buck, from resistance training, lift heavy weights, save the cardio workout for all the running that you’re doing.
If you want to become a stronger, faster, more powerful runner, if you want to burn more fat, lose more weight. And if you’re interested in living longer, lift heavy weights. Alright, that’s all I got for you today. Love you all keep on Running Lean, and I’ll talk to you soon.
If you’re a runner and you’ve been struggling to lose weight or you keep losing and gaining the same 10 pounds over and over again. Or you’re finally ready to get to your natural weight and stay there for good this time then I have something you will love. I’ve created a powerful new training just for you called running lean for life. You’ll learn exactly how to transform yourself into a lean fat-burning running machine. So you can run without bonking, lose weight without calorie counting and develop the habits required to make it last for life. To get this free training right now go to runningleanpodcast.com/leanforlife and start your transformation today.
I get a lot of questions about how to improve running performance and one concept I keep coming back to is building your aerobic engine. Before you can run longer or faster you have to improve your …
My name is Patrick McGilvray, and I’m an experienced marathoner, ultra runner, sports nutritionist, Master life coach, and weight loss coach for runners. I’ve dedicated my life to helping runners just like you properly fuel your body and your mind. So you can get leaner, get stronger, run faster and run longer than you ever thought possible. This is Running Lean.
Hey there, and welcome to Episode 158, of Running Lean. My name is Patrick McGilvray, the weight loss coach for runners and today, building your aerobic engine. So I get a lot of questions from people in general and clients about how to improve running performance.
And one concept I keep coming back to is building your aerobic engine. Before you can run longer, or run faster, you have to improve your aerobic fitness. So building and maintaining a solid aerobic base should be the goal of every runner, regardless of your running experience. But many runners skip this step, because they just want to get to the faster running the higher intensity running.
So in this episode, I’m going to explain how building your aerobic engine is essential to helping you improve both your running speed and your endurance. And Happy New Year everyone. This is the first episode of 2023. And is this going to be a new year and a new you or a new year and the same old, same old you?
So I want you to think about this, where do you want to be this time next year? When you look back? Over 2023? What do you want to have accomplished? Where do you want to be with your health and your fitness? Do you want to make this year the year that you finally lose the weight and learn how to keep it off for good?
So I really want you to think about this, what do you really want for yourself this year, because here’s the truth. Whatever you want for yourself, it’s available to you, it’s achievable for you. So let’s get you there together. When you sign up for coaching with me, you get all the knowledge, support and accountability you need to achieve everything that you want for yourself in 2023.
So let’s make this year 2023 your best year yet, to learn more, just go to runningleancoaching.com/apply fill out a quick application. You and I will get on a call, we’ll see if coaching is a good fit for you. If it is, boom, we’ll get you started. And we’ll start making this the best year yet for you just go to runningleancoaching.com/apply.
Okay, so lots of people who are new to running, especially the newer runners, want to kind of skip the part where they have to focus on building their aerobic base, or what I like to call the aerobic engine. And this is a good time of the year to be talking about this, because I think a lot of us are just about to start marathon training, or maybe half marathon training, a lot of spring races happen in the United States.
And so the beginning of January is when a lot of training begins. The problem is that most runners don’t do a really good job of building their aerobic engine properly. At the beginning of a training cycle, lots of runners, even very experienced runners who are maybe following some sort of training plan.
So they may have some sort of marathon training plan that they’re doing. They just begin by, you know, doing all their miles at a kind of medium hard intensity, and they end up kind of maybe getting burned out or getting injured. A lot of overuse injuries happen, especially with new runners, but even with experienced runners.
And a lot of these overuse injuries happen kind of at the first half of the training cycle, which leads me to believe that when we start our marathon training or start our half marathon training program, you need to be you need to have developed a good solid aerobic base, you need a good solid base on which you can build, right?
So you want to start with a good base, start with a good aerobic engine, and then you can get faster and build your intensity levels on top of that. So what does it mean when I’m talking about your aerobic engine? So really what I’m talking about here, as I’m talking about increasing the efficiency of your cardiovascular system, right?
The cardiovascular system is the different functions of your body that can combine to enable you to run for longer distances, right? Your cardiovascular system is, you know, your heart, your blood, carrying oxygen to working muscles and organs to every working part of your body. So it’s mostly, you know, how, how efficient is your heart? How much blood can your heart pump out at a time, like how much blood volume can you pump out?
Because the more blood volume in your heart can pump out, the more oxygen you will be delivering to working muscles, the better you are at delivering oxygen rich blood to working muscles, especially those muscles used for running, that easier running becomes. So we want to improve this system. And it’s something that you can absolutely improve.
Now, if you’re a new runner, and you’re just starting out, and you get out there, and maybe you’re training for your first 5k, and you get out there and to run a mile is takes everything you’ve got and you feel completely winded at the end of that mile, that is fine, that is normal. If you’re just getting started with this, then that is something where if you continue running, and you continue doing the right kind of running, you will find that running a mile becomes very easy.
And then running two and three miles becomes a no big deal. And then all of a sudden, you’re like, I’m just gonna go ahead and, and run a half marathon or trust our training for a marathon, right? But don’t get ahead of yourself. Work your way up to that slowly. And I’m going to be talking about that in a minute here.
So really, what we’re talking about when we’re talking about your aerobic engine, is your cardiovascular system, you know, your body’s ability to deliver oxygen rich blood to all the working muscles and organs and all the functions in your body that help you to improve your running efficiency and your running performance.
Okay, so why do we want to build an aerobic engine? Like why is it important to build this? Well, you know, you just can’t expect to go out there and run a fast half marathon or a fast marathon. Without doing the work to build your cardiovascular system, you can’t improve your running performance, if you don’t start with a good base, right?
So you need to first build a solid aerobic base, then you can work on getting faster, and increasing the intensity of your running over those longer distances. But I want to make sure this is very clear, do not skip this step, do not skip the part where you build that aerobic base. And something that is actually kind of counterintuitive. But I’ll explain why this works in just a minute here, you will actually get faster, just by improving your aerobic engine.
So by doing more slow, easy running and improving your cardiovascular system, you will become more efficient at running and you can actually run faster at the same intensity levels. This is one of the huge benefits of building a strong aerobic base is that you can improve your running efficiency, you can improve your running speed.
In fact, there are many benefits to improving your aerobic engine here. So when your cardiovascular system gets more efficient, when you improve your aerobic fitness, running becomes easier. This is like one of the number one reasons why we want to do this, it just gets easier, right? You can run longer distances and you can run faster at the same perceived effort level.
So let’s say you go out there and you run out a perceived effort level of a three or a four and you’re like this feels great, it feels pretty easy for me. And you might notice your pace is a 10 minute pace. For example, over time, if you build your cardiovascular system the right way, if you build your aerobic engine properly, over time, you can run at that same three four effort level.
Oh, this feels pretty easy. But now your pace is a 9:30 or a 9:00 minute pace because you’ve improved how your body is fueling itself and how your body is using oxygen and and how much blood volume you’re pumping out there. Okay, so you actually get faster at the same effort level, which is amazing.
Another reason why we want to improve our cardiovascular system, or our aerobic engine is that it actually increases the number of mitochondria in your body. So this is the powerhouse of your cells. And you can actually increase the size and strength of your mitochondria as well. So this right here is going to give you an edge and this is one of the reasons why you run easier and you can run faster at the same effort level.
You also get denser capillaries and you can deliver more oxygenated blood with more capillaries working in your bloodstream. So your working muscles will actually get more oxygen, which makes running easier. Another kind of benefit of improving your aerobic engine is that it helps to build mental toughness. So as you improve your cardiovascular system, you start to feel more confident. So you can go out there and run three miles and it feels tough.
But as you, you know, increase your running volume as you increase your distance as you increase your aerobic capacity and your aerobic performance, then running becomes easier and becomes more confident you can run 8, 10, 12 miles and and feel like well, yeah, I can do this. And it makes you more mentally tough because it pushes you, enables you to push yourself a little bit harder, enables you to shoot for higher and higher goals. And next thing you know you’re running a half marathon or you’re running a marathon, you’re starting to train for an ultra marathon.
Another benefit of improving your aerobic engine is that it helps to improve muscular strength, you know, you’re delivering more oxygen to muscles, you’re able to run longer, you build more muscular strength, you improve your running economy, you improve your running efficiency, you become more energy efficient, you know, you’re using the same kind of you have the same inputs, but your output is much more efficient. And then you get faster, you know, you’ll be able to perform better at races.
So all these reasons are why we work hard to improve our aerobic engine, okay. So do not skip this, we absolutely want to make sure that before you begin your training, or the first phases of your training for any kind of endurance events should be to really build a strong aerobic base. Now some people like to do this in the offseason, they like to spend, you know, four to six weeks building that aerobic engine, even up to 12 weeks, you know, really building a strong aerobic engine before they get into their training cycle.
But you can absolutely do this at the beginning of a half or full marathon training cycle. So how do we do this? How do you start building your aerobic engine? What are the keys to improving your aerobic fitness and improving your cardiovascular efficiency?
So the first tip I’m going to give you here to improve your aerobic engine would be to increase your running volume. Right? The simple fact of running more will help you to increase your aerobic capacity, increase your running efficiency, just running more and increasing your volume helps to improve your running form and helps to increase your cardiovascular system.
You build stronger muscles. Running becomes easier, just by running more. But the caveat with this is you don’t do too much too soon. This is one of the biggest rookie mistakes that new runners make is increasing their volume too much too soon. So the standard sort of rule of thumb has always been to increase by no more than around 10% a week in your weekly volume.
So that means if you’re starting out and you’re running about 10 miles a week, you know, for the first few weeks, I would only increase that by like a mile each week. So maybe week one you’re at 10 miles and then you build up to 11, 12, 13. Maybe you can jump up to 14.5 or 15, 16, 18, 20. But you don’t really want to increase volume too quickly.
So people get excited when they start running and they’re like oh running is amazing. I feel so great doing this and your muscles might be ready to take on the miles but your connective tissues, your tendons and ligaments are not quite ready for that yet. And a lot of the running injuries that people experience are tendinitis issues or strained, you know ligaments or tendons. They tend to be more connective tissue issues than they do with muscular issues.
It’s pretty rare to strain the muscle from running in the beginning especially. It’s more common to have these connective tissue issues so definitely be careful and don’t do too. Too much too soon try to keep it around that 10% increase in weekly volume, then, you know, if you’re a more experienced runner, you can increase that from 10 to maybe 15 or 20% per week. The idea is that you have to do what feels right for you. And don’t overdo it. That is the key here. Less is more in this case, right. So just slowly build your volume, but definitely increasing your volume is going to be one of the best ways to improve your aerobic engine.
Another way of doing this is to run slower. So when I talk about running slower, there’s different ways we can look at this. So running slower means you’re running in, maybe you’re running in a zone one or two. From a heart rate standpoint, maybe you’re someone who likes to just use RPE, rate of perceived exertion, the scale of 1 to 10. And you might like to stay in the one to four range.
That would be nice, easy running, maybe you’d like to just run at a conversational pace, you’d like to just, you know, go by if you can carry on a conversation or not. The idea here is that you need to slow down, and you need to do a lot of running slower. When you do a lot of running slower, you increase your distance, but if you keep the intensity levels very low, you are at lower risk of injury. And you put less stress on your systems, you put less stress on your bones and muscles and those connective tissues like I talked about.
So slow running is one of the best ways to build your aerobic engine, it’s one of the most effective ways to build your aerobic engine, you’re not going to be able to get more aerobically fit by just cranking out every workout, you can’t go out there and do every workout hard or medium hard, you know that you have to spend a lot of time running easy and rolling slow.
So something I noticed here, so I took about three months off of running. And since August, so August, September, October, getting into November, I’ve been running very consistently since the middle of November in my room or maybe like Thanksgiving, let’s just say. And I’m noticing that I’m paying very close attention to my effort level and my heart rate.
And I’m noticing that I’m staying very consistent from an energy standpoint, very easy running most of my runs, I would say 90% of my runs right now or at a very easy conversational pace, probably that one to two zones, and the heart rate zones, and maybe three to four on the RPE scale, or two to four somewhere in there and that our RPE scale.
But one thing that’s interesting here is I noticed that my effort level is staying the same, my heart rate is staying the same, but my pace is increasing. So I’m getting faster, at the same effort level. So this is a sign that I’m building a strong aerobic engine. And this is what I want for you too. You should notice that over time, doing a lot of running 90% 80% of your runs at this slower pace, just slowing things down, will help you to increase your aerobic engine and help you to get faster.
So now as I get to the place where I’m you know, going to get into marathon training here, and I’m training for an ultra marathon event here in May, I will continue doing a lot of this slow, easy running and see my pace continually increase, you know, to a certain degree here, okay? The other way that you can really increase your aerobic engine is by running faster.
And I know that sounds a little bit counterintuitive here. But doing higher intensity, like short, higher intensity workouts is another amazing way of building that aerobic engine, right? So why these work is that these workouts put a very high amount of stress on the cardiovascular system, very high amount of stress for very short intervals. This elicits an adaptive response where your system improves.
Think about it, like you know building muscle, like if you lift heavy weights, and you do you know six to eight reps of a very heavy weight. And you get to the point where you just cannot lift one more rep of that weight.
And then you stop and so that’s a short interval but very intense. Your muscle is going to have been put under a high amount of stress for a very short amount of time. That muscle is going to have an adaptive response. It’s going to get stronger. It’s going to grow. You’re gonna see some growth rather than that muscle, and the next time, you’ll be able to lift a heavier weight.
The exact same response happens in our cardiovascular system. So we put high stress for a very short amount of time on that cardiovascular system that improves, this isn’t there’s an adaptive response, your body’s like, hey, we need to, you know, change the way we’re doing things here, we need to increase the amount of blood we’re pumping out per heartbeat. So increase our blood volume, you know, we need to deliver more oxygen working muscles.
And this is another very effective way of improving that aerobic engine. And especially when you combine it with your longer slower runs, right, your very easy lower stress run. So very low stress, long runs, and then very high stress, short runs. So running fast and hard for short intervals, like this could be like, one to three minutes, a very hard running 4-10 minutes of moderate intensity running maybe 12-30 minutes.
For tempo type workouts, these are just examples of different intensity levels that you can add in there. But you know, anything short is one to 30 minutes, maybe. And it just kind of depends on the event that you’re training for. But high stress for short intervals, and low stress for the long runs equals a badass aerobic engine, right there. Okay?
So those two combined are a really, really good way of improving your cardiovascular fitness. So the slower runs focus on 80-90% of your runs at that slow pace, and then higher intensity, shorter workouts, you know, 10-20%, depending on where you are in your training cycle, when we’re talking about building your aerobic base here, I would I would focus on more of a 90/10 breakdown there, okay.
And then probably the most common method people think of when they want to improve their aerobic fitness would be the long run, like improve the length of your long run. And when I say long run, it depends on what you’re training for, again, so this could be 30 minutes, if you’re training for your first 5k, that could be a long run for you, or six hours, if you’re trading for for a 50 miler, you know, so, long run is very subjective. So it just kind of depends on what you’re training for.
Most of us, if we’re training for a marathon, let’s say, most people are going to be doing a long run anywhere from an hour to three and a half hours, something like that, okay. So when we’re talking about in increasing the distance of your long run, the effort level has to be low. So we’re talking about, you know, heart rate zones wanting to wonder for on the RPE scale, this is a conversational pace, this is a easy, I could run all day at this pace.
Okay, this is gonna be one of the most powerful ways of improving your cardiovascular system. So we’re, we’re not just doing one of these things. By the way, we’re not just picking one of these things and saying, like, Oh, I’m just going to improve my long run, I’m just gonna increase the distance on my lawn, or I’m just going to do some HIIT workouts or I’m just going to run slower.
No, you got to do a mile, you got to increase your running volume, you got to run slower, you got to run faster for shorter distances, and you got to increase the distance of that long run, you got to do all these things. But when you do and you combine them all, you’re going to find that your aerobic engine is pretty badass. Okay.
And then the last thing I’ll add to this list is really just getting better at burning fat. You need fuel for running. And when you’re especially running slower and running at these lower intensities, the preferred source of fuel your body’s going to want to use as fat, the better you can get at burning fat, the easier running is going to feel for you.
Listen, we as human beings, we’re naturally good fat burning machines, we’ve just gotten very far away from that state. You know, we’ve been eating a diet that forces us to use glucose as our main fuel source. And granted, it is a very easily available and very quick burning source of fuel especially for running but you run out of that fast and your body isn’t using a whole lot of glucose. When you’re running at these lower intensities fat is going to be the main fuel source, so you got to get good at burning fat.
I suggest you get fat adapted stop using sugar and carbs as fuel. stop relying on glucose as a fuel source. Start training your body to tap into your own stored body fat as a source of fuel for running run in the fasted state. That means you don’t need to fuel up before you run. Maybe for a long long run or a high intensity run, yes. But for the most part, you know, you don’t really need to feel up before the runs, train your body to get good at burning fat.
And this isn’t about like zero carbs or anything like that, this is just about using the right kinds of carbs and using carbs properly. Keeping the carbs pretty low, though, okay, so get better at burning fat. Listen, we’re great at storing fat, right? We’re really good at storing fat, we’re just not good at tapping into our own body fat for fuel. And if you’re somebody who has, you know, 10-20 pounds to lose, you’ve got way more than enough body fat to get you out there and run for many, many, many miles for days, days.
I’m pretty low in the body fat percentage, and I’ve got hundreds of 1000s of calories of body fat on my body right now that I could use, I could literally run for, you know, weeks at a time or something like that. So get better at burning that fat. And you’ll find that your aerobic capacity, it gets better too. And just running just becomes so much easier. Okay.
So remember, we want to build our aerobic engine, we want to, you know, we only want to be delivering more oxygen to working muscles. The way we do this, as we increase our running volume, we run more just more often, we want to run slower, keep it in those zones wanting to keep it in the fat burning zone, right? You know, RPE should be, you know, one to four, run faster, do some HIIT workouts, do some high intensity, but short workouts run longer, like increase the distance of your long run, and then get better at burning fat.
And when you do these things, and you combine all these things, you’re going to be well on your way to being a fit faster, more efficient runner, running is going to become easier for you, you’re going to be able to get faster, and your spring marathon or spring race, whatever it is that you’re training for, will be a huge success for you. Cool. Awesome. That’s all I got for you today. Love you all, keep on Running Lean and I will talk to you soon.
If you’re a runner and you’ve been struggling to lose weight or you keep losing and gaining the same 10 pounds over and over again. Or you’re finally ready to get to your natural weight and stay there for good this time then I have something you will love. I’ve created a powerful new training just for you called running lean for life. You’ll learn exactly how to transform yourself into a lean fat-burning running machine. So you can run without bonking, lose weight without calorie counting and develop the habits required to make it last for life. To get this free training right now go to runningleanpodcast.com/leanforlife and start your transformation today.
As a runner, you’ve probably been told that if you want to avoid hitting the wall, you need to consume a whole lot of one main fuel source - sugar. This approach does work for some, but for others …
Continue Reading about 135. The Benefits of Becoming Metabolically Flexible →
My name is Patrick McGilvray, and I’m an experienced marathoner, ultra runner, Sports Nutritionist, Master Life Coach, and weight loss coach for runners. I’ve dedicated my life to helping runners just like you properly fuel your body and your mind. So you can get leaner, get stronger, run faster, and run longer than you ever thought possible. This is Running Lean.
Hey there, and welcome to episode 135 of Running Lean. My name is Patrick McGilvray, the weight loss coach for runners and today, the benefits of becoming metabolically flexible. As a runner, you’ve probably been told that if you want to avoid hitting the wall, you need to consume a whole lot of one type of fuel: sugar basically, right?
And this approach does work for some, but for others, it spells metabolic disaster leading to incessant weight gain, insulin resistance and a host of other health issues. If you fall into this latter category, you may want to consider becoming metabolically flexible. Metabolic flexibility means you’re able to use multiple fuel sources effectively, this approach will help you lose weight, run longer and run faster.
So in this episode of the podcast, you’ll learn exactly what metabolic flexibility is, you’ll learn all about the benefits of metabolic flexibility. And I’ll show you how to get started with it. And you have to understand something: metabolic flexibility is not a one size fits all type of solution.
Okay, this does not work the same for everyone. Everyone’s a little bit different. We all have our own goals, we all have our own metabolisms, we all have our own likes and dislikes. You know, we all have our certain food preferences, body types, genetics, all these things factor into how we approach nutrition from an athletic performance standpoint, and metabolic flexibility, you know, choosing different sources of fuel for different types of activities is going to be the same it’s going to, it’s going to be different for every individual.
Okay, this is one of the reasons why I created the Running Lean coaching project. This is my immersive coaching program. And in my program we work together. So I work with you as an individual to help you come up with a personalized plan that works for you. You want to become metabolically flexible, you want to become more efficient at burning fat, you want to, you know, lose weight, you want to get faster, you want to be able to run longer than you ever have before.
All these things require some level of metabolic flexibility is what we’re talking about on the podcast here today. But also, if you want to take things a step further, and you want a little help with this, then consider joining the Running Lean coaching project. And what we do together is that we will put together a plan that works for you. And that will help you to get to your individualized goals, whatever those are for yourself.
So it’s really about you becoming the best possible version of yourself, the healthiest version of yourself, the most badass version of yourself and making it last. This is about long term, sustainable results, not about quick fixes, okay.
So if you’re ready to lose weight, get stronger, run faster, run longer, then you’re ready for the Running Lean coaching project. Just go to runningleancoaching.com/apply. You’ll fill out a short application, you and I will jump on a quick zoom call. We’ll talk about your goals. We’ll see if this is a good fit for you. I would love to have you join me in the Running Lean coaching project. Just go to runningleancoaching.com/apply. Put in your application and we’ll see you soon. All right on to the topic.
So what is metabolic flexibility? At its simplest, metabolic flexibility is your body’s ability to use whatever fuel is available to it at the time. It means that your body’s metabolism is flexible, the ability of your body to metabolize different substrates, meaning different types of fuel. So different types of fuel could be food that you just ate could be used as fuel. It could be fuel that is stored in your muscles like glycogen.
It could be fuel that is stored in your fat stores could be stored body fat that you use as fuel. And so for most people, and I’ll get into this in just a minute for most people, though, they are only using like one source of fuel, mostly that stored glycogen, okay? And we want to change that we want to be able to tap into multiple sources of fuel, the two main sources of fuel we’re going to be talking about.
And the two main sort of preferred fuel sources that your body prefers to use, especially for exercise, like running, are going to be carbohydrates stored in your body. So sugar is stored in your body as glycogen in your muscles, and fat that’s stored in your body’s fat cells. Okay, so these are the two preferred fuel sources that we love to use it we’re very well adapted at using.
So the science calls this glucose oxidation and fat oxidation, okay. And something you have to understand about, you know, fat burning or a sugar burning is that we are always burning both at the same time. So it’s never just one or the other. Or very, you’re always burning a little bit of one or the other, okay? But what we’re talking about here is, is maximizing the amount of fat or, or glycogen that you’re burning, okay, so it’s never an all or nothing when it comes to fat and glucose oxidation, you’re always burning both.
But for example, the longer you’re out there running, the more fat that you’re actually burning, your body will, you know, if you’re running at a lower intensity, you will start out burning more carbohydrate, but that fat oxidation will continue to go up. And so what’s nice about you know, being really well fat adapted, is that you can burn much more fat much more efficiently.
And you can run for longer and longer distances without having to, you know, refuel, because you’ve got plenty of fuel on board at all times. And if you are a fat adapted athlete, so if you’re a low carb athlete, and you’ve become fat adapted, then you can even run at higher intensities, and still be very efficient at using fat as your main source of fuel. This is one of the reasons why we get into fat adaptation.
It’s because we want to be able to burn fat very, very effectively for long distance running. But also we can get into some pretty intense running as well. So they did a study a while back, it’s called the faster study and you can look it up. And one of the things they did was that they found that for the most part, most athletes that are, you know, the carb adapted athletes, so just your standard athletes, not fat adapted athletes, that once they get over 65% of VO2 Max, that they they tend to stop burning fat and start burning, mostly carbohydrate. Okay. So this is the majority of people out there.
Once you get over 65% VO2 max, you’re burning mostly carbohydrates up to 65%. And you’re burning mostly fat. And this goes across the board for most people. With the faster study, they found that the fat adapted athletes could burn much more fat than the carb adapted athletes. So their peak fat oxidation was 2.3 times higher in the fat adapted group.
So over twice as much fat they were able to burn. And they found that they could increase their intensity and still be burning mostly fat so they could get up to 76% of their VO2 max and still be burning more fat than carbohydrate and really didn’t need the carbohydrates in order to the carbohydrates in the form of fuel in order to achieve those kinds of numbers.
So just understand that one thing I think people get into this idea of becoming fat adapted, and they think that they’re just burning fat, you know, and that’s it. That’s the end of the story. Or if you’re not fat adapted, you’re only burning sugar, you’re only burning carbohydrates.
And really, it’s not the case, you’re always burning both, okay? Just understand that. But as a fat adapted athlete, you can take advantage of your levels of fat oxidation, which are going to be much higher than the standard of carb adapted athlete. And it’ll give you a bit of an edge.
So why am I even talking about this? Well, I’ve been really on this kick this whole month about talking about ancestral living, you know, and what we’ve done as human beings for millions of years. And really, for since like 2.5 million years ago, to about 10,000 years ago, humans have been very metabolically flexible, we’ve been able to, to burn fat very, very efficiently, we’re able to take advantage of other types of foods when they were available to us, you know, think about, you know, times when certain types of foods would have been scarce, we had to have different types of fuel, and we had to be able to metabolize those different types of fuel.
So for example, when we would hunt and you know, eat meat, or we are eating things like fish and eggs, very dense, nutrient dense types of foods, we could eat, we could hunt and eat a lot of meat, you know, and share that with the group. And then we might go for days without food. So in that case, we are consuming fuel in the form of, you know, meat and animal protein. But then we would go days, without food, where we would be basically using our own stored body fat as fuel, right?
This is the way we are designed to operate as human beings. We are very efficient fat burning machines, we always have been. What has happened in the last 50-60 years is that we’ve gotten away from that? And we’ve gotten more into just relying on very quick sources of energy, like carbohydrate, like sugar, like grains, like really concentrated refined carbohydrates, refined grains, that kind of stuff.
And the problem with that approach is that we really well, there’s all kinds of problems with that approach. But from an athletic standpoint, we’re only using one source of fuel when we do that, we’re not able to take advantage of the fact that we are really efficient fat burning machines. Okay, so back in the day humans would eat sporadically, we would take advantage of the fact that we could find things like tubers and nuts and seeds and fruit and things like that. And we would be able to use those things as fuel as well.
So we became really good, really efficient at being metabolically flexible. It’s one of the reasons we’ve survived. Whereas a lot of other hominid type species did not, you know, because we were able to have that flexibility. Okay. And all I’m proposing here is that we get that back. That’s it. That’s all I’m saying.
And especially if you’re a runner, then you are absolutely leaving a lot on the table. If you’re not taking advantage of metabolic flexibility, you absolutely are leaving a lot on the table. Our bodies are well adapted to feast and famine. Our bodies are well adapted to a variety of fuel sources, especially using stored body fat as a fuel source. Most people do not do that. Most people, most people are good at storing fat, but not actually using it as a source of fuel.
But we humans, we are really good at burning fat. We’ve been doing it for millions of years, I just want us to get back to being really efficient at burning fat, okay. And as a runner, you absolutely want to be taking advantage of this virtually unlimited source of fuel that you have on your body. stored body fat is an amazing source of fuel. And I talk to runners every single day and I coach runners on how to become fat adapted every single day.
And I get a lot of skeptical runners out there. They’re like I just don’t see how this is possible. I don’t see how, you know, not taking in all these gels and stuff and sports drinks that I’ve been doing forever. I don’t see how I can possibly run without all that stuff. And then they do it. And then they’re pretty surprised at how amazing they feel, okay?
But it’s not about just doing just using that one source of fuel. This is the thing I want to kind of drill home here today is that metabolic flexibility means you can use multiple fuel sources. So yes, that does mean that you can use carbohydrates as a fuel source as well as fat. But most runners don’t take advantage of the fat side of things. They’re only interested in the carbohydrate side of things.
But why would you leave a tool on the table, so to speak, you know, why not become fat adapted and get really, really good at burning fat? And also, you can use carbohydrates strategically, in order to have that flexibility for different types of activities, different intensities of running different distances, all right.
The problem is that most people are just metabolically inflexible. So most people, especially here in the United States are eating the standard American diet. It’s interesting that the acronym for that is SAD because it’s a sad diet. It’s so sad, it’s making us sad, it’s making us unhealthy, or it’s creating a nation of sick, weak, unhealthy, overweight people.
And one of the issues with this is that it’s a very, very high carbohydrate diet. And it means that you have to rely on just one fuel source for energy. So if you’re a runner, and you’re eating the standard American diet, you are relying on one source of fuel carbohydrates for energy for running, and you’re not taking advantage of being fat adapted.
So that standard American diet with all the carbs, you might be eating six, seven times a day, you know, you are relying on one source of fuel and you need it, you need it every couple of hours, or else you’re going to crash and burn.
Not to mention you’ve got to carb load before running the night before you got to carb load before you get out there and run you got to carb up during runs. You’ve got to carb up after runs or else you’re going to crash and burn. And this might work okay for you for running like it might help to fuel your runs. And you might be okay with that.
But eating that much carbohydrate, especially eating every few hours, it does a few things. Not good things by the way. For example, It ramps up your cravings for more carbs. So you just want more and more and more of that same stuff, same sugary goodness, you know, it causes your body to keep storing a lot of that excess energy as fat in your fat cells.
And because you’re not fat adapted, you can’t really tap into that fat for energy. So you just keep storing more and more fat in those fat cells. It causes massive spikes and dips in your blood sugar, and therefore your energy levels throughout the day.
And you end up being hungry all the time you feel fatigued, you have these massive cravings for more sugary foods, more carbohydrates, you get what people call hangry because you’re hungry and angry at the same time. And really, it just causes a host of issues not just weight gain, but it can lead to things like insulin resistance, which means your body is producing so much insulin that your body has become accustomed to that much insulin and so it’s no longer bringing your blood sugar down the way it’s supposed to.
Which means your body just keeps storing more and more fat in your fat cells. And insulin resistance is something that causes type two diabetes, and it leads to gaining a lot of weight and obesity and things like that.
And not to mention that eating that standard American diet with all the carbs and you know, eating just a ton of carbs, especially for running means you’re going to be hitting the wall at some point during a long run because you’re going to crash and burn unless you keep the sugar intake coming in.
But even that can have all kinds of digestive issues, it can cause digestive stress, and a lot of people cannot handle that much sugar while they’re out there running. And so they end up just sort of like either having to find a portapotty or they end up just crashing and burning. And you’re hitting the wall.
So that’s kind of the problem with the way that most people do this thing, right? They’re not metabolically flexible. So they have to rely on one source of fuel only for running. And you end up running out of fuel, you end up with insulin resistance with weight gain, and with a host of other metabolic issues, right. So that is the way that most people do it.
And I’m just saying here, listen, there’s another approach that you can take and you can become more metabolically flexible, you can actually train your body to use fat and carbohydrate as your two main fuel sources. very effectively, you can do this very effectively. So here are some of the benefits of metabolic flexibility.
So first of all, you can tap into different fuels and use different fuels for different types of activities, more intense activities, you can increase your carbohydrate intake, you can use different types of carbohydrates, you can use, you know, very concentrated forms of carbohydrates. So you can use slow burning types of carbohydrates. And you can use carbs for long distance activities, or for higher intensity activities. But one of the benefits is that you have this flexibility, and you have the ability to use different fuels.
So as you get into that higher, you know, intensity exercise closer to 65-70-80% of your VO2 max, when your fat oxidation starts to go down, you can actually increase your carbohydrate intake. And in preparation for that, you’ve got to do it ahead of time. But you can increase your carbohydrate intake, and maintain high intensity levels, without as much carb intake as you would need if you were not fat adapted.
Okay, so that’s one amazing benefit, obviously, you’re gonna burn more fat. One of the biggest benefits here is that you burn fat very efficiently. And when you burn fat, you know you’re losing weight, it’s much easier to lose weight. If you become fat adapted, if you actually train your body to be a really efficient fat burning machine, right. And you use fat as a source of fuel for running, then you’re going to lose weight much easier, and you’re no longer going to be storing so much body fat, you’ll be burning that body fat. Okay, so losing weight becomes much much easier when you’re fat adapted.
You know, one of the other benefits is that you can improve your athletic performance not only running longer, but running faster again, because you can tap into different types of fuel, you’re not relying on just fat, or just carbohydrate as a fuel source.
One of the other things is that you become more insulin sensitive. So instead of becoming insulin resistant, your body becomes more sensitive to the effects of insulin, meaning your blood sugar’s will normalize, you won’t have those spikes, and crashes and blood sugars, you’re going to have more all day energy. So you’re going to have more steady energy throughout the day, which is amazing.
You’re going to be able to think more clearly because your brain uses fat as a source of fuel. So your cognitive function will be improved. You will sleep better at night, you will feel more rested when you wake up in the morning. And going forward with your weight management or weight maintenance. That becomes much much easier if you are metabolically flexible. It’s much harder if you’re relying on just carbohydrate as a fuel source, because it just it makes managing your weight much more of a challenge because then you have all these other things the insulin resistance and the weight, you know the storing body, storing of more body fat, and incessant weight gain and hunger levels and things like that.
So being metabolically flexible means that you have the ability to tap into multiple sources of fuel, and you have the ability to improve your athletic performance and just become this amazing fat burning machine as well as having the ability to use carbohydrates as fuel.
One thing a lot of people one mistake a lot of people make when they become fat adapted is they don’t regularly use carbohydrates as a fuel source for certain athletic endeavors. And you got to kind of train yourself to use carbs as well as you know, your stored body fat as fuel, you don’t want to just become fat adapted and wait six months, and then, you know, try carbs for a race, because your body at that point is so used to using fat as fuel. It’s not really used to having that carbohydrate glycogen stored as fuel the way that it used to when you were carb adapted.
So you have to actually train yourself to become more carb adapted as you get into some of the more intense running and things like that. So that’s just something to keep in mind. So how do you do this? How do you become more metabolically flexible?
There’s a couple things you can do to get started, number one, is getting fat adapted, this is really important. So you gotta get your body burning fat more efficiently. And most runners just don’t do this. Right. So you got to get off the sugar, you got to get off the refined grains and things like that, and start training your body. To use fat as a fuel source, one of the easiest ways you can do this is just train in the fasted state.
Don’t eat anything before you run, like let’s say you run in the morning, don’t eat anything after dinner the night before, you know, just get out there and start running in that fasted state. And that will force your body to start using stored body fat as fuel. And of course, you have to lay off the carbs too, that’s going to kind of hinder this process.
But getting fat adapted is one of the best things you can do to become more metabolically flexible, because now you’ve taken advantage of this fuel source that most runners are not using. Okay. The other thing you can do to become more metabolically flexible, is to exercise regularly. And you gotta do it the right way, you have to be doing both aerobic type exercises. So long distance running would fall into that category beautifully, right.
But also you have to include some form of high intensity exercising, so something like weightlifting or HIIT training, or sprinting, all those things are going to help increase that intensity that you’re putting on your, your systems, you know, your muscles, your aerobic system, you’re, you’re gonna help to increase your lactate threshold and things like that. All those things will help you to become more efficient at burning fat and help you to become more metabolically flexible. Okay.
So getting fat adapted, and then doing both aerobic type of exercise and higher intensity, shorter duration, but higher intensity exercises, is going to kind of kick things into gear for you there. Okay? So think about this this week, I want you to think about becoming more metabolically flexible. There’s so many reasons why you want to do this. You don’t want to be doing things the way that most people are doing things. Because the way most people are doing things does not work. It does not work for the majority of us, okay?
And if you’re one of those people, and you find yourself wanting to lose some weight, and you find yourself wanting to improve your running performance, and you find yourself not wanting to rely on all the carbs and having all the negative things that go along with that thing, consider becoming fat adapted, and taking advantage of that metabolic flexibility that we as humans have developed over millions of years. Let’s just get back to that. Cool. All right, that’s all I got for you this week. Love you all, keep on Running Lean, and I will talk to you soon.
If you’re a runner and you’ve been struggling to lose weight or you keep losing and gaining the same 10 pounds over and over again. Or you’re finally ready to get to your natural weight and stay there for good this time then I have something you will love. I’ve created a powerful new training just for you called running lean for life. You’ll learn exactly how to transform yourself into a lean fat-burning running machine. So you can run without bonking, lose weight without calorie counting and develop the habits required to make it last for life. To get this free training right now go to runningleanpodcast.com/leanforlife and start your transformation today.
I’ve been thinking about this podcast topic for a while now and finally just felt ready to share my thoughts with you. This is one of those “tough love” episodes, so fair warning in advance. If …
Continue Reading about 126. Are You Eating Like an Athlete? →
My name is Patrick McGilvray, and I’m an experienced marathoner, ultra runner, Sports Nutritionist, Master Life Coach, and weight loss coach for runners. I’ve dedicated my life to helping runners just like you properly fuel your body and your mind. So you can get leaner, get stronger, run faster, and run longer than you ever thought possible. This is Running Lean.
Hey there, and welcome to episode 126 of Running Lean. My name is Patrick McGilvray, the weight loss coach for runners and today, are you eating like an athlete? I’ve been thinking about this podcast topic for a while now. And I finally just felt ready to kind of organize and share my thoughts with you here.
So this might be one of those tough love episodes. So just a little fair warning in advance if you’re the kind of person who just wants to keep doing whatever you’re doing and, and just stay where you are, then this episode may not be for you. Okay, but if you’re somebody who’s interested in making changes to the way you feel your body, for not just your overall health and fitness, but you want to improve your athletic performance, then today’s message is definitely for you.
And I’ll be talking about the disconnect. There’s this disconnect that I think a lot of runners experienced when it comes to their diet and nutrition the way they eat. The truth is a lot of runners eat like crap all the time. And then they expect something amazing to happen on race day. And this is just not reality. Okay, so by the end of this episode, I want you to honestly know whether or not you’re eating like an athlete and understand why or why not. You might be or not be, okay.
Fair warning, a little bit of tough love is coming your way today. And listen, eating like an athlete seems pretty straightforward, right? But it’s not, there’s a lot of extra stuff that gets in the way of stuff. Like, you know, peer pressure marketing messages from food companies, worrying about what other people are doing, or what other people are gonna think of you.
And then there’s all the mental and emotional stuff that comes up, like just wanting to eat something amazing. So you can feel good, and all this stuff can work against you, it can make it very hard for you to actually make progress towards your health and fitness goals. This is why I decided to become a coach to help you navigate all of the BS that’s out there and in your head.
So that you can actually stay on track and hit your goal. So you can unleash that badass, it’s lurking inside you right now. So if you’re ready to become more, if you’re ready to take your health and fitness to the next level, and you gotta be ready to show up and do the work. That’s important, then you’re ready for the Running Lean Coaching Project.
In my coaching program, you’ll get all the knowledge, support and accountability that you need to make realistic lifestyle changes, mindset shifts, and start getting sustainable results. If you’re interested, cool, just go to runningleancoaching.com/apply. To get started, you’ll fill out a short application schedule call with me. We’ll talk about your goals and we’ll see if this is a good fit for you. Cool. Just go to runningleancoaching.com/apply. I would love to have you join us in the Running Lean Coaching Project. Cool.
So first of all, are you eating like an athlete? The first question I want to kind of propose to you here is are you an athlete or not? Do you consider yourself an athlete and if you do, or don’t like why or why not? So the definition of an athlete is a person who competes in one or more sports that involve physical strength, speed or endurance. So that’s pretty much all of us, right? I would imagine.
I mean, if you run, you’re an athlete, if you lift weights, if you do yoga or CrossFit or you swim or bike or row or skate or ski or do Jazzercise or hike, or climb or play golf, softball, hockey, soccer on and on and on. Like there’s so many different ways that we can classify ourselves as athletes, you know, if you’re, if you’re competing or participating in anything that involves, you know, the use of endurance, strength or speed or any combination of any of those things, then you should consider yourself an athlete.
But I think we get it into our heads that oh, I’m not a real runner because I just run marathons for fun. Come on, you are an athlete, you know, or I just started running so I’m really, I’m really not an athlete. You know, maybe someday but no, no, no you’re an athlete. If you’re, you know, participating in any kind of endurance, strength or speed, exercise, then you’re an athlete.
You’re not an athlete. If your idea of a marathon is like binge watching Netflix all weekend, that’s a different type of athlete. That’s a non athlete. But that’s not you. I know that’s not who you are. So if you’re listening to this podcast, chances are you’re a runner of some form, maybe you’re just getting started. Maybe you’ve run 25 marathons, it doesn’t matter. If you run, you’re a runner.
And if you’re a runner, then you are an athlete. Okay, so I want to make this very, very clear upfront. So to answer the question, are you an athlete? I’m going to say probably yes. For most of us, yes. If you’re doing any kind of exercise on a regular basis, that involves speed strength, or, or endurance or any combination of those than you are an athlete. Okay? So let’s make that distinction upfront. All right, let’s all agree that we’re athletes, okay.
And the thing that I really want you to get out of this podcast today, is that you are an athlete, and you need to start acting like one. Okay, specifically, you need to start eating like an athlete. Think about that. And I want you to really ask yourself, honestly, this question, are you eating like an athlete? Are you fueling your body the way an athlete would fuel their body? Or are you just eating a bunch of crap and eating whatever you feel like whenever you feel like it? That’s not what athletes do.
So you’re an athlete, but are you eating like one? I’m gonna go out on a limb here and probably say that most of you the answer is probably no, no, I know, some of you are on board with all this stuff. And you’re good. And that’s awesome. Go you, keep doing you. But I talk to people every single day who tell me their diet is crap. They have, you know, they binge out on sugar and processed garbage.
They’re out of control, they feel out of control with their eating, right. They know their diet sucks, but they’re just they don’t know what to do about it. And they just feel out of control. And I get it. You know, you’ve been told to eat like, all this junk, all these high carbs. And whatever it jacks up your hunger, hunger signals, it messes up your body, it causes inflammation, it causes you to gain weight, but you keep doing it, because that’s what everybody says you’re supposed to do.
Especially if you’re a runner, you’ve got to eat all the carbs and all the sugar, eat the doughnuts, carb load pasta, fettuccine Alfredo the night before you run all that stuff, right? And if that stuff works for you, that is amazing. Love it, keep doing it. But I’m gonna guess for most of you, it doesn’t work. And if it doesn’t work for you, and you consider yourself an athlete, then stop doing that to stop it.
Now, stop treating your body like it’s a garbage disposal and start treating it like you are an athlete. So what would an athlete do? Like think about this, so maybe we should get little wristbands that say, well, what an athlete too. So think about any given situation where you find yourself needing to make a choice around food or nutrition. And, you know, ask yourself, what would an athlete do in this situation?
So let’s say you’re in training mode, right? You’re training for a marathon. And you’re getting leaner and stronger, and you’re, you know, you’re feeling good, you’re sticking to your schedule, your diet is pretty much on point. And then somebody’s like, hey, you know, I made these homemade cupcakes, they put a couple of them on your desk and, and they’re like, I made these cupcakes, and they’re homemade from scratch. And, you know, they’re made with love. So I just wanted to give them to you, and I really hope you enjoy it.
And what would you do? Are you going to eat those cupcakes? Maybe cupcakes are not on your plan. They’re not on your part of your training plan. And you know, that eating those cupcakes is moving you away from your goals. As an athlete, it’s moving you away from your health and fitness goals. Cupcakes, not on the plan. Okay.
So what do you do? Do you do what you always do, which is like, I just don’t want them to feel bad, they spent so much time and they put so much love into making these cupcakes for me. So I’m just going to eat them, even though I will regret it and feel guilt and shame for a few days afterwards. And you know, my weight will probably go up with all the inflammation and water retention, but I’m going to do it anyway. Because you know, I just don’t want to feel.
Is that what you want to do? No, this isn’t complicated. All right. Let’s not make this more complicated than it needs to be right. If you’re an athlete, and you are then start eating like an athlete. Let’s just stop with the eating the garbage food, okay. I’m not saying you can never eat a cupcake. I’m gonna get into that in just a minute. I’ve got some thoughts about that.
But what I am saying is that you need to treat yourself like the athlete that you are, okay? So I could just stop right here, stop this podcast and stop talking. Because this is the main message I’m trying to get across today. In every situation, I just want you to be honest and ask yourself, am I fueling my body like an athlete would in this moment? Yes or no? Yes or no? It’s a very cut and dry black and white type of situation here. It is not complicated. Am I fueling myself? Like an athlete or not? And if not, I want to, I want you to ask yourself, why? Why not? Why aren’t you taking your health and fitness seriously? Why isn’t this important to you?
Because when you just eat garbage, you are basically saying to yourself, my health and fitness is not important to me. It’s okay. If I keep gaining weight, it’s okay. If I feel like crap, it’s okay. If my health continues to decline, it’s okay. If running continues to be hard for me. But that’s not what you want. I know, that’s not what you want. And you know what, I’m coming at this from a place of like, experience and empathy because I get it. And I’ve been there. And I did the same thing. And I had to ask myself, why am I doing this? Why am I treating myself like crap?
You know, I was training for marathons and ultra marathons. I was eating a terrible diet. I kept gaining weight, right there, that’s a sign that something is amiss, right? If you’re training for ultra marathons, and you’re put on like 40 pounds and that process over a couple of years, it’s like, whoa, something is not working right here. But I just was so stuck on eating all the sugar and junk food and, you know, processed food and just highly palatable food, all the foods, it’s like, amazingly delicious.
Like I just couldn’t get away from that stuff. It had its claws in me, you know. And that was hard for me to like, break away from that, but I did. So I get it. I’m not being unsympathetic. But I do want you to have this moment with yourself where you’re just like, you gotta be honest with yourself, am I feeling myself like an athlete or not. And that’s the moment I had, where I had to say, I’m not, I’m not feeling myself, like an athlete. I’m feeling myself. Like, I don’t care about myself, like, I don’t care about my physical health, or my mental or emotional health. And I had to make a decision. And that decision was not doing that anymore.
I’m not going to keep treating myself like this anymore. I am going to do something about it. I’m going to start acting like the athlete that I am, I’m going to start fueling my body like the athlete that I am. I am training for ultra marathons here. I cannot afford to treat myself like garbage 90% of the year and think that everything is going to go perfectly right on race day. It doesn’t work that way. Okay, so that’s the main message today. Just ask yourself that question. Am I fueling myself like an athlete or not?
An athlete sees food as fuel, right? The food that you put into your body as an athlete should help you to run longer, run faster, it should help you to build strong bones and muscles. It should help improve your cardiovascular health. It should give you steady energy. It should help you sleep better at night. It should help you recover from hard workouts and rebuild muscle tissue. That’s what food is designed for. For human beings for human consumption.
Especially if you’re an athlete, you put your body under all this stress, you’ve got to have the right fuel coming in to replace that energy to repair the muscles to continue to build strong, you know, bones and strong cardiovascular system and all the energy that you need. You have to like be fueling yourself properly. So the food that you eat as an athlete should be in alignment with your health and fitness goals. So here’s the next question for you. Is it be honest, it’s a yes or no question, right? Is the food you eat in alignment with your health and fitness goals? Is the is the food that you’re putting into your body helping you become a better athlete or not? Or is it just keeping you stuck? Or is it like moving you in the opposite direction? Right? Why? Why if not why?
Why are you choosing a diet that’s working against you? Why are you continually to Using foods that keep you gaining weight and feeling like crap, why the hell would you do this to yourself over and over and over and over again, you are an athlete. So start acting like one. Because when you do, I promise you, you’re going to feel so much better, you’re going to feel stronger, you’re going to have all this energy, you’re going to recover faster, you’re gonna feel better about yourself, you’re gonna feel like a total badass.
But if you don’t feel strong, if you don’t have all day energy, if you kind of feel like crap about yourself a lot of the time, why are you doing this to yourself? You deserve better. You deserve to love yourself. Better than this, to treat yourself better than this. You deserve to be the fittest, healthiest, most badass person that you want to be. It’s just a choice you get to choose. It’s a choice that you get to make with every decision you make around food.
And then it’s just recommitting to that choice every day. It’s a recommitment to that mentality of just like, hey, I’m going to feed myself like an athlete today. And then tomorrow, you sort of make that commitment again, and so on. Athletes don’t eat like crap 90% of the time, and then just clean up their diet for, you know, a short period of time, right before they have a race or something like that. They pretty much stay on track, they pretty much stay lean, and stay strong and stay healthy all the time. Because they know how hard it is to like, quote unquote, like get back in shape.
You know what I’m talking about? Have you ever tried to get back in shape, that sucks, that’s really hard. It’s so hard to like, gain and lose the same thing, like 20 pounds over and over again. Right? It’s very difficult to do, it’s very bad for you to actually do that, it’s really not good for you, it’s better to just stay overweight, to be honest with you than it is to like gain and lose. Obviously, the best choice is to just lose it and be done with it. Right.
So most athletes, what they do is they stay lean and strong all the time. You know, there might be a couple of pounds difference between offseason and training season or something like that, but it’s minimal. So they know how important it is to just stay on point all year long. Okay. And I’ve done the whole yo yo dieting, yo yo weight gain loss thing for years. And I gotta tell you, it’s, it’s frustrating.
And you’re, I was always in this state of like, never feeling good about myself, because I was never where I wanted to be. Or if I was, I knew that it wasn’t gonna last. But I’m done with all that now, I made a decision some years ago where I’m just not doing that anymore. And so today, I eat like an athlete all the time. I maintain my weight effortlessly.
And I still indulge in it on occasion. Alright, once I got to my goal weight, and I and I got to this place where I felt super confident in my ability to maintain my weight. Then I started to allow myself some indulgences here and there, something that you have to kind of experiment with a little bit. So I’m going to say something here that I’ve really never really talked about before. And maybe you never thought you’d hear from me, but this is what I call the 90/10 rule. Some people call it the 80/20 rule, but I think that’s too, too loosey goosey. So I call it the 90/10 rule.
So 90% of the time, you need to be disciplined about your diet, you need to be fueling your body like an athlete. And then 10% of the time, you can indulge so what this looks like, typically is about one meal a week, something like that. I maybe even do it less than that. So maybe twice a month, I indulge in a meal that would be considered a little indulgent or off plan.
You know, I talk a lot about going out for Mexican food because I just grew up on Mexican food. I’m from you know, LA/Southern California and I just love Mexican food, especially like good traditional Mexican food. And with that, I know it’s chips and salsa and guacamole and tacos and I love all that stuff. Right? And instead of like saying I can never eat that stuff again. I do it minimally, I do it like once a month, you know and then I might go out for sushi and some other kind of you know, indulgent foods, another time or whatever.
So I like this 90/10 rule because I know it’s hard for people to not eat a burger or to eliminate stuff from their diet. And when we get into this place where we’re feeling deprived, like we can never eat corn chips again in our life, that just makes you crave it more, right, it makes you one and even more. I’ve seen this over and over again with people. So you know, at the beginning, we’re a little more strict about our food plan because we got to get ourselves off of the sugar, we got to get ourselves off the processed foods, we got to get ourselves off the refined carbohydrates.
Once we do that, and we sort of, you know, balance our hormones, we’ve kind of gotten to our goal weight or are closer to it, and we feel confident or ability to to maintain our weight, then we can start indulging a little bit. And this is where the 90/10 kind of principle comes into play here. Okay. So I understand it can be very hard for some people to do this. For example, eating sugar can be very addictive. And if you have a problem in this area, it’s something you have to be very careful with.
Because for some of us, for me, it’s the same thing with sugar. For me, once I start, it’s very hard for me to stop, I had the same issue with drinking alcohol too like, I can’t just drink one I drink until I’m passed out basically, is the way I’ve always done it. And so there’s this phenomenon of craving that happens as soon as I get some alcohol into my body, I just want more and more and more, and I can’t stop.
And I have a very similar kind of dysfunctional relationship with sugar, I guess, you know, so instead of dabbling in sugar and trying to moderate it, I just don’t eat sugar, I really don’t. I can’t remember the last time I ate sugar was probably like, a year and a half ago or something like that. So I just don’t eat and it’s fine. It doesn’t bother me at all. I don’t crave it. So for some of us, just total abstinence from some of this stuff is on point. It’s like what we need to do. If you can dabble in this a little bit and apply this 90/10 rule and eat some sugar and things like that. And you can do it in a way that is intentional, purposeful, and not like binging then good for you do it, okay, let’s not, let’s not deprive ourselves of things, but understand that some of these foods are not moving us in the direction of our goals that they will actually set us back, we might gain a little bit of weight, we might feel terrible, it might affect our training negatively.
So just know that that’s all part of it. Okay? Athletes, they do this too, they indulge in some of these things every now and then. And they do it at strategic times when it’s not going to affect their training when it’s not not before a race not before a long run or whatever they’re doing right.
So just know that if you’re if your goal is to lose weight, that you know indulging and things like this is going to you know, it’s going to kind of throw out your progress. It’s hard to eat sugar and lose weight. It just really is right? The whole idea of like putting your body into fat burning mode, getting it out of fat storing mode, sugar puts your body into fat storing mode, we got to limit the sugar for sure. Okay.
Okay, but all of this is to say that if we apply the 90/10 rule, and one meal a week, two meals a month, whatever you want to do, you can indulge, but then the rest of the time you stay disciplined, you’re gonna be fine. You’re gonna be fine. Okay? Athletes don’t use these, like cheat meals, and I don’t even like the word cheat meal because they’re planned. They’re intentional. They’re purposeful.
A cheat implies that you’re engaging in something that’s deceptive. Like, you’re tricking someone, you’re not tricking anybody here, you’re just making a choice for yourself. You got to feel good about that choice you’re making for yourself. So do this intentionally. Right? We’re not cheating. Anyway, so we want to play in our exceptions, we want to plan these indulgent meals, okay.
So, athletes will allow themselves this on occasion, you know, to celebrate to feel a part of but it’s a minor exception. It’s not the rule. So that’s why I say 90/10. So my, my taco night is like one of my, it’s like part of my 10% right. Come on chips and guacamole. So amazing, right. It’s also a way for me to connect with people I love with family, with friends, and I do it in a way that is very intentional and planned.
And then before that indulgent meal, and after I eat, like super clean. This is the way an athlete would do it. Right? They’re not going to just binge out on you know, burritos and stuff for a week straight. You know, they’re going to just do a meal, feel good about it, do it intentionally and then get back on plan with the next meal. Okay. So this isn’t about deprivation, this is about 100% of the time you have to fuel your fuel yourself like an athlete food can still be enjoyable food can still be you know, amazing and all that stuff, you know um, but we got to do it a minimally, we want for the most part, we want to be fueling ourselves like an athlete. Okay.
So back to that question I asked at the beginning of this episode, you know, are you eating like an athlete? Yes or no? What’s the answer? And if you’re not, why not? Why are you choosing to eat in a way that goes against your long term health and fitness goals? Why would you continue to eat like crap, and then hope that somehow everything’s gonna work out on race day or whatever? Right. And I did this too for my first few marathons. I was trying to run out a certain I wanted to run like a 9 minute mile on race day, all my training runs were way slower than that, like I never ran faster than a 10 minute mile.
And then somehow I expected something magical to happen on race day, like, all of a sudden, I was going to be able to run a minute faster per mile for 26 miles. Like, that’s ridiculous. But we do the same thing with our food, we think we can eat like crap all year long. And then somehow around race day, everything’s going to just magically fall into place. It doesn’t work that way. It really doesn’t. Okay. So just know that you’ve got to be honest with yourself and ask yourself whether or not you are eating like an athlete. Okay?
And if the answer is no, like, really ask yourself, why or why not? Like, are you afraid that you’re gonna feel like you’re missing out on something good? How much pleasure is that cupcake can actually give you? How about being a fit, strong, badass runner, how much pleasure you’re gonna get out of that. My guess is a lot, a lot more than that. Very temporary, cupcake pleasure you’re gonna get, don’t get me wrong, the cupcake will make you feel good for a minute.
But how about being a fit, strong, badass runner. That’s gonna last, that’s what you’re after. Right? Maybe you’re worried that you won’t be able to make it last, maybe you’re worried that like, this isn’t gonna, you’re not gonna be able to sustain this. And I get that that’s super common. It’s a very common worry, among people that I work with, like, I just don’t know if I’m gonna be able to make it last. But listen, what if you applied the same mindset to your nutrition that you put into your running schedule? Think about this, you are super good at sticking to stuff already.
Like, you get to work on time. Every day, you hit all your runs, like you never miss a workout, right? You never cheat on your husband or your wife or your partner, you always pick your kids up from school on time, right? You are very disciplined in many, many areas of your life. But when it comes to food, we’re all like, totally loosey goosey. And we’re like, I’m at a control. I’m like, dude, you are so disciplined in every other area of your life. Why aren’t you just applying that same mentality to your food plan?
Just copy and paste that same mindset over here to your food, and you’re gonna be a total badass and no time? I promise you. Right? That’s how you make it last. But maybe you’re afraid it’s going to be hard. It’s going to be too hard. And I can answer this one for you right now. Yes, it will be hard. At first anyway, all change is hard at first, right? Until it isn’t. You’ve got to embrace the discomfort of change. Get through the hard part.
Because the only way to become the badass version of yourself is to go through the hard stuff, you can’t go around it. You can’t avoid it. You got to go through it straight through it. It’s the challenges that change you. You want to see the view from the top of the mountain, you got to climb the mountain. There’s no other way to do it. It will be hard. But you can do it. So accept this, accept this fact that it’s going to be hard and do it anyway. Just because something is hard doesn’t mean we don’t do it. We do it anyway.
Or you might be afraid to try something new because you’ve already tried quote unquote, everything in the past and nothing ever works for you. That’s totally cool. I get that two people tell me this all the time. And I used to think this way too. But now I have a very different approach to things I do in my life. I keep freaking going. I do not stop when it gets hard. I do not stop until I’m done.
I don’t quit when things get challenging. I don’t stop when it seems like it’s not working. I don’t give up until I reach my goal of relentless forward progress. I keep going no matter what Because if it’s going to work, I have to make it work, period. And I’m committed to reaching my goals, no matter what. No matter how many times I stumble and fall, no matter how long it takes, no matter how many times I fail, I’m not in a hurry. I’m not about avoiding failure. I am absolutely freaking relentless in my pursuit of my goals, and you should be too. So ask yourself, honestly. Are you eating like an athlete? Don’t fool yourself. Just be 100% honest with yourself. Yes or no? Are you eating like an athlete? Why or why not?
And if you want some help with this, I got you. We’ll do it together. I’ll help you get through the hard stuff. I’ll get you up that mountain. But you got to commit to showing up and doing the work, right? You’ve got to make this daily commitment to yourself when you do that. There’s nothing you can’t do. I love you all. Keep on Running Lean. And I’ll talk to you soon.
If you’re a runner and you’ve been struggling to lose weight or you keep losing and gaining the same 10 pounds over and over again. Or you’re finally ready to get to your natural weight and stay there for good this time then I have something you will love. I’ve created a powerful new training just for you called running lean for life. You’ll learn exactly how to transform yourself into a lean fat-burning running machine. So you can run without bonking, lose weight without calorie counting and develop the habits required to make it last for life. To get this free training right now go to runningleanpodcast.com/leanforlife and start your transformation today.
