Fast Talk

Ah, sleep. I love it. Do you love it? If only I could get more of it, and get better at it, and wake up each day well rested. Somes days it works, many times it doesn’t. Sleep can be hard, but does it have to be? Sleep is critical, so are you getting enough? And are you getting the right kind? We all know we need sleep, but knowledge is not enough. The focus of this episode is not to convince you why sleep is important, but how to monitor and change your sleep, to get the most out of every night.  In particular, for athletes who stress their bodies, sleep is critical. How do we make sure we get what we need, and avoid some of the disruptions and issues that can lead to sleep impairments? We’ll dive in. When it comes to monitoring sleep, there are a host of new gadgets that tell us both about our sleep volume, and the stages we’ve hit. Do they work? We’ll discuss the latest findings on sleep monitoring—what works, what doesn’t, and what to do with that data. Finally, we discuss how to take all that information and change our behavior—easier said than done. But hopefully today’s guest will help us all sleep more soundly tonight.  Dr. Shona Halson is an associate professor in the School of Behavioural and Health Sciences at Australian Catholic University. Prior to her current research on sleep, she was a senior physiologist at the Australian Institute of Sport for 15 years. She has a Ph.D. in exercise physiology and has over 100 peer-reviewed publications in the areas of sleep, recovery, fatigue, and travel. Dr. Halson has served as the director of the Australian Olympic Committee Recovery Centre for three Olympic Games. She has helped countless athletes better understand the importance of sleep, and we’re excited to bring her knowledge to you today. In this episode, we’ll also hear from Dr. James Hull, a respiratory physician, who touches upon the importance of sleep when it comes to fighting infection; and Cameron Cogburn and Erica Clevenger both detail their sleep hygiene and routines to improve sleep quality. Time to put on your PJs. Let's make you fast!    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Whenever we speak with a guest of Fast Talk—coach, athlete, or scientist—we always ask them their favorite workout. In this episode, we share the favorite workouts of Cameron Cogburn, Joe Friel, Jim Rutberg, Neal Henderson, Payson McElveen, Amos Brumble, and Petr Vakoc. You’ll hear each guest discuss the specifics of the workout itself. You’ll also gain a sense of the guest’s philosophy—based on how he or she describes the workout—and the “style” that they bring to the execution and prescription.  As a bonus, Trevor, Coach Ryan Kohler, and I also share our favorite workouts.   Get ready to take notes. Let's make you fast!  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It wasn’t long ago that riding inside was something most of us did only when the weather was bad, or the days too dark, or we were pressed for time.  Flash forward to today and indoor cycling is quickly becoming a discipline many people focus on for its own sake. It’s no longer a second-rate alternative. And that’s why, today, we’ll focus entirely on indoor cycling and its many nuances. The author of the famous “The Cyclist’s Training Bible,” Joe Friel has now co-written a new book with Jim Rutberg. “Ride Inside: The essential guide to get the most out of indoor cycling, smart trainers, classes, and apps” is the basis for our discussion today. Friel, with decades of experience coaching athletes, indoors and out, and Rutberg, who has long worked with coaches on disseminating their training philosophies, share their thoughts on the future of the sport and why we’re seeing more indoor cycling. They also discuss the specifics of indoor workouts, and why what works outside isn’t always the best practice inside—and vice versa. That and much more from Joe and Jim. We also hear from three riders from Team Saris-The Pro’s Closet. Jennifer Real, Holden Comeau, and Matt Gardiner, all members of this eSports cycling team, have been racing for years almost exclusively on Zwift, and they help us understand the intricacies of this gaming-like platform: How to use the draft; why knowing the courses makes such a difference; how to set up your trainer, and much more. We also touch upon the all-important training aspects of indoor cycling. Time to ride inside. Let's make you fast!  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today’s episode, we catch up with our friends at The Pro’s Closet, Spencer Powlison and Bruce Lin, to discuss their recent four-week Strava PR Challenge. In the lead up to their attempts, we helped them with training advice and “race-day” strategy tips. No doubt, this has been an unusual year for cycling. Many of our favorite races were postponed or canceled. And while bikes aren't the most important thing in the world, and public health and safety should always be our priority, as cyclists we thrive on the motivation that comes from training for a big race or event, or setting our sights on a particular challenge.Thus, The Pro’s Closet Strava PR Challenge was born. To reinvigorate their competitive juices and get a dose of competition, Bruce and Spencer turned their attention to local Strava segments in Boulder, Colorado. Trevor gave them some training tips on how to prepare most effectively given their timeline (a mere six weeks), and we also coached them on “race-day” strategy.  Today we recap all the tips, tricks, and training advice, and talk about how their attempts went. Let’s make you fast! Check out the series of videos produced by The Pro’s Closet: https://www.theproscloset.com/blogs/news/the-four-week-strava-pr-challenge-pt-1 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How do you, as an athlete, combine your understanding of sport science and your training and racing experience to most effectively map out your training? That question is the basis for today’s episode, one in which we drift between the philosophical and the practical.  Essentially, we’ll dissect the different ways science and experience can influence how we train. Where does the science shine? Where does experience come into play? How do we best balance the two? And how can we use so-called scientific thinking to improve how we digest and analyze each and every experience we have in our training and races to become a better athlete? Remember that even when we’re talking about your experience as a rider, you are essentiallyJame experimenting on yourself – it's just an N of 1. We’ll talk about all that and much more, on today’s episode. Our primary guest today is former pro racer turned Ph.D. student Cameron Cogburn. After years of racing for teams including Smart Stop and Jelly Belly, Cameron took an academic turn. He’s now a Ph.D. candidate in theoretical physics at Boston University.  We also hear from physician Dr. James Hull, who appeared in our last episode on breathing; pro racer Erica Clevenger; and our friends from The Pro’s Closet, Spencer Powlison and Bruce Lin.  Let's make you fast!  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today’s episode, Colby Pearce, a Steve Hogg Certified bike fitter, sits down with Chris Case, host of Fast Talk, to dissect the minutiae of how to pedal a bike. Saddle position, ankling, dead legged drills, plantar and dorsal flexion of the foot, all of this and much more is unpacked in today’s episode.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You’re breathing, I’m breathing. But neither of us is probably thinking about our breathing right now. Do you ever think about your breathing during your workouts or races? Do you ever wonder if you should be "training" the act of breathing as a skill? Or whether you should do something differently during rest and recovery, or between intervals, or even on long endurance rides?  In some ways, breathing is a much-discussed topic—often, however, that’s in the context of meditation or in the practice of yoga or other such disciplines. Breathing for performance, in the context of training and racing, however, is not something that gets a whole lot of attention. And that’s the focus of today’s episode. While Trevor was sitting in Toronto and I was in Boulder, we caught up with a leading expert on the science of breathing, Dr. James Hull, who joined us from London. Dr. Hull ‘s experience is vast and varied, and all of it focuses on breathing. He is a respiratory physician at Royal Brompton Hospital in London and the clinical lead looking at unexplained breathlessness during exertion. He also works at the Institute of Sports, Exercise, and Health at University College London. He also works with elite athletes, both as part of the English Institute of Sport working with British Olympic athletes, and as a contributor to the International Olympic Committee’s respiratory guidance committee. Dr. Hull takes us through the science of respiration, from the state of the system—is it overbuilt or underbuilt?—to pathological concerns for athletes. Think you have asthma? There’s a good chance that’s a misdiagnosis. Finally, we discuss the things you can do to improve performance through breathing. Not to be forgotten, also on today’s episode, we talk with several guests about the meditative side of breathing, as well as the practice of breathing. We hear from coach Colby Pearce—catch him on his own podcast, “Cycling in Alignment” if you haven’t already. We catch up with Erica Clevenger, a member of the Tibco-Silcon Valley Bank women’s pro team, and someone who suffers from asthma. And we also hear from two elite coaches: Julie Young and Neal Henderson. Inhale, exhale. Let's make you fast!  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today’s episode, we formally introduce our new head coach, Ryan Kohler, and put him in the spotlight for a classic Q&A. (Don't worry, Trevor is not going anywhere! He’s merely stuck in isolation amid the tundra of northern Ontario at the moment.) Ryan brings a wealth of experience as both coach and nutritionist after years of working at Carmichael Training Systems, as manager of the University of Colorado Sports Medicine and Performance Center, and while coaching several MTB development teams, as well as working with individual athletes. We have exciting new offerings in the works that Ryan will be spearheading, so sign up for our newsletter for the latest developments. Today, however, we’ll stick to your questions.First, we tackle a complex series of questions from Ryan Bates in Ann Arbor, Michigan: “I have read that cutting more than 500 calories per day from the total needed to maintain your current weight will actually slow down your metabolism, and make weight loss harder overall. Is this true? If so, does it matter, for the purposes of potential slowing of your metabolism, if the deficit is produced by exercise versus calorie restriction? If true, how many days of 500+ calorie deficit (approximately) are needed to trigger metabolism slowdown?”Next we take on a mountain bike question, specifically about descending, heart rate, and ways to improve recovery during descents.Finally, we follow up on our discussion on recovery periods between intervals by answering a question on the different ways of executing 5x5-minutes intervals.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In today’s episode, we’ve assembled a fantastic group of coaches to discuss the differences, similarities, nuances, and challenges of coaching beginner athletes versus veteran amateurs. This episode is filled with myriad topics, all related to the coach-athlete relationship. And it starts by defining some terms. What constitutes a beginner, and a veteran? Can you be a beginner if you’ve ridden for 10 years but don’t know much about how to train? We’ll discuss. What should beginners focus on most? What should veterans focus on most? How does a good coach most effectively work to identify each athlete’s needs? How can an athlete get the most out of working with a coach, and how does that differ if you’re a beginner or a veteran? These questions and so many more, today on Fast Talk. Our guest coaches today include Grant Holicky, someone you’ve heard many times before on Fast Talk; former pro triathlete and XTERRA world champion turned coach, Melanie McQuaid, who appeared in episode 99; and Ryan Kohler.  Ryan is the former manager of the University of Colorado Sports Medicine and Performance Center and—exciting news here—the new Head Coach here at Fast Labs. With Ryan on board, we have exciting things coming, so don’t miss it – get our email newsletter by signing up at fastlabs.com. You’ll be first to know what Coach Kohler is up to. Now, get ready to roundtable, let's make you fast!  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, our favorite physiologist Dr. Stephen Seiler is back on the program to talk about something that many of us get wrong: the distinction between overtraining, overreaching, and burnout. Often these terms are used synonymously, but there are many nuanced differences between these conditions, and that’s what we’ll explore in today’s episode.  We’ll dispel any myths about these terms, point out the scenarios that lead to each, and talk through how to avoid the worst outcomes. While research on overtraining syndrome is still in its nascent phase, we now know more about the complex hormonal and physiological complications that can lead to this debilitating condition. On the other hand, while the term hasn’t long been defined in the science literature, overreaching is a training method with a long history. We’ll differentiate between functional and non-functional overreaching, and how to differentiate between the two. Then there’s burnout, that lack of motivation or mental fatigue that most likely all of us have experienced at some point. Is burnout an inevitable part of being a bike racer? We’ll discuss. In addition to Dr. Seiler, we’ll hear from a host of great names in the endurance sports world, including Seabastian Weber from INSCYD, Jim Miller at USA Cycling, pro mountain biker Payson McElveen, and coach Neal Henderson from Wahoo. One final note before we dive in. In this episode you’ll hear Coach Connor describe his bout of overtraining syndrome. When we were recording the show, Trevor thought back through the haze of 25 years to try and remember the training volume that led to his Issues. You’ll hear him say it was only 10 hours. On later reflection, he feels it was more like 15 hours per week. And that’s a massive difference, given how he was training at that time. Stay tuned for that discussion.  And with that, let's make you fast!  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices