Episode 648: Our Current Training Blocks

0:09Nick Hilsabeck: Welcome to The Running Public with Bracken Crocker and Kirk DeWint. Whether you are a brand new runner or you already have a great mustache, we're here to help you increase your running knowledge and present it at a practical level. This is The Running Public.

0:30Nick Hilsabeck: When you're ready to take your training or racing to the next level, go to the running public.com. We have both monthly subscription training plans,$19.99 a month. And Bracken and I both offer one-on-one customized coaching. Again, go to the running public.com and check out our offerings.

0:48Brian D. McKenzie: It took like three or four seconds after I clicked it for anything to happen.

0:52Nick Hilsabeck: That was weird. Everything's operating a dial slow today, except our brains. Well, actually mine is maybe a notch below normal. How about yours?

1:02Brian D. McKenzie: I'm peaking right now. I nap this morning. Oh, do you not teach on Fridays? I do, but we have, I think I've said it on here, Monday through Wednesday, we have normal eight class periods and I teach three of them. But Thursday, Friday, we do block classes, which is double. So you have four even classes Thursday, four odd classes Friday. But because I only teach three, one of the days I have two double classes, but then Friday I only have one class. So it's one 96 minute class.

1:32Nick Hilsabeck: Almost not long enough to even be worth your while. But kids.

1:36Brian D. McKenzie: It's weird because 96 minutes of gym class is a long, it's an eternity if you get a student, like a population in there that doesn't want to do stuff

1:47Nick Hilsabeck: or doesn't have any fitness. I suppose it's the same kids for an hour and a half.

1:52Brian D. McKenzie: And it's not like you can be like, all right, we're done with that. We're going to go like work on a worksheet or do a project. We're in the gym. What am I going to do?

2:01Nick Hilsabeck: You have to do stuff. We're playing broomball for an hour and a half. Suck it up.

2:06Brian D. McKenzie: So early in the year, we do multiple different things and we take a break every 10 minutes. And by the end of the semester, they have the fitness to do two by 45 minutes with five-minute break in between.

2:17Nick Hilsabeck: Sounds like what unit are you on right now?

2:19Brian D. McKenzie: We're sampling things right now. So for the first quarter, we go through and just do a week of things. We were on playground games this week. We finished up with Friday's game. We work on skills throughout the week and then we compete on block days. We did all goofball rules this week. Weird ruled, kickball, and four square today. That sounds like fun. With my senior class. The older they get, the more they like the little kid games. My fondest memory

2:52Nick Hilsabeck: My fondest memories of high school education was senior gym, honestly. Just people who wanted to be there. Usually some pretty good athletes, too. So you could actually get into some real competitive games if you wanted to. I enjoyed that.

3:09Brian D. McKenzie: It's interesting. This group, we have very few athletes, but they're all competitive equally. And they like competing. So they're not very good at most things, but it's good competition because they're all equal. So it's a lot of fun.

3:23Nick Hilsabeck: A lot of competitive average athletes.

3:25Brian D. McKenzie: Yeah, but it's like, it's real self-deprecating because everyone can laugh at how we're doing, but they're all on the same level. So it's okay. So it's actually a lot of fun. We did mini golf this week, but with floor hockey.

3:38Nick Hilsabeck: The only... It's doing all atypical rule stuff. We traveled a lot for senior gym and the week of sectionals, we went to the driving range every day. We were golfing. so we'd get bust over hit the you know and it culminated uh on the last day like this is like last week of school culminated and we're gonna go play 18 holes on a real golf course it's a half-day field trip and we're walking and that happened to be the day of my sectional track meet and so what'd you do i asked i said hey you have to understand like i have the most important meet of the year this afternoon and we're supposed to walk 18 holes carrying our bags you know we didn't have carts or anything.

4:20Nick Hilsabeck: And I said, so is there any way I can do this some other time? I've been a pretty good student here. And she said, absolutely not. I will fail you if you do not show up today. So I showed up and golfed and walked the whole 18 holes. And it was one of those sunny, hot days. And I was like, I'm totally screwed. Turned out just fine. I raced just fine. But the ironic thing is, is I put up a stink about it. And then my mother, who was over-involved, called the school and was like, my kid doesn't need to be playing golf today. He's worked all season and years for this. And they still said, I'm sorry.

4:54Nick Hilsabeck: He has to participate. This is mandatory. And then the very next day, we had our senior awards banquet. And I'd qualified for state in the open 800. And we set the school record in the four by eight. Anyways, next day is the school's senior awards banquet. And I think I've told the story on here, but they call up like eight students and I was one of them and all of the other kids were brains except me and I was like me and one other kid Weston and I was like why am I up here with these guys couldn't figure it out because I wasn't one of the brains necessarily and this is voted on by the teachers and I won the senior class they're like you know the history award goes to smarty pants and the math award goes to smarty pants and the physical education award goes to Kirk DeWint voted on by the teachers and the day prior I threw a stink about not wanting to do.

5:46Nick Hilsabeck: And those same teachers were the ones who voted me for the most valuable gym goer. And I felt a little bad about it.

5:54Brian D. McKenzie: I, putting on my teacher pants now, would never make an athlete participate on game day.

6:02Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah.

6:03Brian D. McKenzie: Never.

6:03Nick Hilsabeck: I'd give them an alternative thing to do. That's what I proposed, I believe.

6:08Brian D. McKenzie: not a chance in the world. For someone who works hard, has trained for four years, would I risk them for a game day if it was important to them?

6:19Nick Hilsabeck: Not a chance in the world. And I also simultaneously felt a little goofy. There was also the Tech Ed Award given to another guy, and I was like, yeah, that makes sense. I could see now, because he wasn't a brain necessarily either. But you also felt kind of silly. These kids get these legit science awards, and then you get the physical education award. There's some, I don't know, it's a little goofy.

6:37Brian D. McKenzie: That is my gym class story of someone not understanding anything was when I got to gym class and we had a new basketball coach and he was just like a real hard ass. And he was also the gym class teacher and we were in track season. And he said, what did you run last week? And I was like, well, I doubled. So I ran like four 50 in the mile and like 10 or five in the two mile. So he said, okay, we're doing the mile test today. If you don't break five, you don't get an A.

7:08Nick Hilsabeck: Why?

7:09Brian D. McKenzie: That'd be like telling a math kid you're a genius. If you ever get a problem wrong, you're failing. There's not a sliding scale. The standard is blank. Go run. He said no.

7:19Nick Hilsabeck: Do you think 450 is genius status in the running world?

7:23Brian D. McKenzie: To the average person, it might as well be. But he said if you don't run five minutes, you're not going to get an A.

7:28Nick Hilsabeck: He wanted to make sure you were putting out effort. I'm sitting here in whatever shoes I wore to school that day.

7:36Brian D. McKenzie: We just got in the class. He's like, all right, line up. We're running a mile. The lack of understanding that A, why would you grade someone? Why would you punish them in season by making them run a one mile time trial when they have track that night? And B, you don't need to warm up. You're good at running. You expect me to run a five minute mile right now on 60 seconds notice? What did you run? I ran like 5.22 or something and tied up.

8:04Nick Hilsabeck: Because I went out at 75 seconds for the first lap and the second lap, and I started tying up in third.

8:09Brian D. McKenzie: And I was like, I didn't run a step of warming up. We just walked to the line and go run a five-minute mile. It's hard to do. And I was a 450 miler at the time. There's not a chance in the world.

8:20Nick Hilsabeck: And he said, ah, you tried hard. Well, that'll be a B+. I was like, that might be the hardest run I've done this year. That's skewed thinking.

8:27Brian D. McKenzie: We're an indoor on a 10-lap to the mile, 160-meter flat, smooth track, just pounding in like and one basketball shoes. Shorts over your knees. Maybe my best performance that year. Oh, boy. I was running 1 ,200 meters at five flat pace with no warm-up as a 450 miler.

8:47Nick Hilsabeck: When he saw the strain on your face in the home stretch, he said, I'll give it to him.

8:52Brian D. McKenzie: Yeah.

8:52Nick Hilsabeck: But just like running doesn't make sense to non-runners, right? Mm-hmm. Do you know in all of our episodes, I don't know what we're on, 700? What are we on? I don't know where we're at.

9:02Brian D. McKenzie: 640. I think this is 648.

9:05Nick Hilsabeck: Okay, I'm giving us some credit. Do you know this is only the second time we've recorded on a Friday?

9:10Brian D. McKenzie: No. Yes.

9:12Nick Hilsabeck: I'm nearly positive. Because I remember the only other time we did. And the only other time we did is when you and I recorded an episode together. And remember afterwards, we said that was not our best work. and Bracken and I collectively decided, you guys don't know this, to rerecord the episode because we got done with it and we were like, we sucked, didn't we?

9:35Brian D. McKenzie: I remember that day, we were both brain foggy and just like, not that we're the most entertaining people, I'll never like claim to be a showman, but we got done, we're like, that was bad. That was the least entertaining thing we've ever done.

9:48Nick Hilsabeck: So we collectively decided we cannot put this out into the world and so we rerecorded the same topic with our game faces on, and we did it on a Friday. But otherwise, we've never recorded, I don't think, to my knowledge or remembrance, on a Friday other than that.

10:04Brian D. McKenzie: I would have failed that on a trivia night. Not me. Steel trap. There you go.

10:10Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah. So it's kind of my fault. I figure I'm going to fill the listeners in on what I've had going on with my wife this week, if you don't mind. Go for it.

10:18Brian D. McKenzie: It's been a run. You said before this, I share a lot more of my personal life than you do, which is ironic because I post almost nothing about it online, but I share it with everyone here. Now it's your turn.

10:28Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah. Well, well, yeah, I feel like I don't, I don't know why I don't share. Like I got a lot, I got stuff going on. I just, I don't know. I feel like people just get bored. If I like tell them non running things,

10:37Brian D. McKenzie: I'm just needier.

10:39Nick Hilsabeck: You're not needy at all. That's the funny thing. Yeah. You're like very not needy, but part of the reason that we've been a little inconsistent just this last two weeks has mostly been on my end. because I think we only released one episode last week. Do you know that people assume it's me and they message me? Well, you're the one who edits, and if it's late, it's because of you, right? But if we don't record, it's not like it can go either way. But last week, my episode didn't upload because my computer decided to turn off on me mid-upload, so that held us back, and I was out of town. But this is like a perspective conversation, I think, for me, a little bit more because how long ago was it I shared?

11:21Nick Hilsabeck: My wife, Jess, wrote some children's books called Outdoor Kids. When did we release that? A year ago, maybe? Feels like a year, year and a half, but maybe less.

11:32Brian D. McKenzie: This podcast has destroyed my sense of time.

11:35Nick Hilsabeck: No, especially in relation to episodes. It could have been six months ago or four years ago, and I couldn't tell you when the conversations happened. I've had some perspective this week. Like running is important, but it's like not that. It's not that important, right? It's a hobby.

11:54Brian D. McKenzie: For 99.99 % of us, it's a hobby. And the hobby may be beneficial to our physical and mental health, but it's a hobby.

12:00Nick Hilsabeck: I've just never felt so disconnected from my own running as I have this week. Apathy might even be a generous word. Apathy certainly towards even like what other people have going on with their running at least. because I had some perspective stuff happen this week with Jess. And so I'm just going to fill everybody in because it's been a stressful time. It also makes me think like I'm kind of the guy who's like, just suck it up and get it done. I don't care about your bad day at work or your kid's tummy ache or whatever. Just like find an effing way. But like now I feel like I've had a week where I'm like, maybe sometimes not finding a way is okay.

12:45Nick Hilsabeck: You know what I'm getting at?

12:46Brian D. McKenzie: There's a difference between I want to do this, but I'm letting stuff get in the way, valid or not. And this doesn't matter to me anymore one bit.

12:56Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah, that's fair to say. So fill people in. So we had been trying to get pregnant and we had tried three years without much success. Finally, we decided to get some surgeries, a hysteroscopy as it's called, which is they go in there and clean up endometriosis tissue and she had a laparoscopy. So they went in there and cleaned stuff up, hoping it would help symptoms and get pregnant. Well, lo and behold, this was like six months ago, Jess had those surgeries. She's pretty miserable afterwards, recovered all right. And we got pregnant. The first cycle after these surgeries. We've been trying for three years and we finally got a positive pregnancy test.

13:36Nick Hilsabeck: After my superior 50K victory. She sprung it on me and said, guess what? And it was just this wonderful day. Fast forward and within the first few weeks we miscarried. So it was quite devastating, especially on her. And then the miscarriage process. I don't know. I guess Lisa has never had to go through that or you, I assume.

13:58Brian D. McKenzie: No.

13:58Nick Hilsabeck: The aftermath, the week after is awful.

14:00Brian D. McKenzie: What comes out of you, the whole deal, it's bad.

14:03Nick Hilsabeck: Anyways, we decided to do IVF and say, we're done with this. Like it's been too many years of frustration. So we've been doing like the shots and the pills and you know, the woman has to go through everything and I do nothing. I have to provide a sample in a cup one time. And other than that, I have to drag my knuckles and I've given Jess two shots in her abdomen every night, a bunch of pills, yada, yada. So all this has just made things seem like, like I've been pretty disconnected from my running. Like, just like I'm doing it cause I know no other way, right? Like I wake up and you eat breakfast and brush your teeth cause that's what you do.

14:33Nick Hilsabeck: But like, while I'm doing the things, I'm not even thinking about the things or engage with the things, nor have any feelings, sorts of things, because everything just seemed a little bit more, like other stuff seemed more important. If you look at my shrav, I'm still doing work, folks. Don't worry. There's no other way. But we went down to Sarasota, Florida, also got my ass kicked by the humidity. Try going from fall weather to 90 degrees and 98 % humidity. Holy smokes, Bracken, I turned into a JV athlete. It was unbelievable.

15:00Brian D. McKenzie: Our weather fell off a cliff these last two weeks. We are suddenly in the 60s.

15:05Nick Hilsabeck: It's been unbelievable, but that's besides the effort. So we finally, it was time. We got the call to go down to Sarasota. We were using a clinic down there and it's time to retrieve eggs, get them out of there. And then they'll bring the little spermies and the eggs together and see what we got, right? Well, Jess has some crazy condition where she has too many. So they took 59 eggs out of this woman on Monday this week. and after the procedure said her ovaries were the size of grapefruits they took 59 eggs which is unheard of and she's probably going to have a rough few days well that turned into the day we got back she was in so much pain and lightheaded she gained 12 pounds of water weight overnight her stomach was so distended she couldn't like move or function she was in so much pain so we went to the ER and they found there was like blood pooling in her abdomen cavity, right?

16:01Nick Hilsabeck: From like the procedure aftermath. And Bracken, I talked to Bracken about this already. So he's heard this. So if I don't get a strong response out of Bracken right now.

16:08Brian D. McKenzie: I'm letting you go. This isn't my, well, no, I know.

16:11Nick Hilsabeck: But, and so she was in really rough shape. Her blood pressure was 190 over 130. She was like kind of non-functioning, but we went in, they said, you don't have quite enough fluid in your abdomen to drain it. That's not worth the risk. And so we're not going to do that. Your liver functions, kidney functions, her hemoglobin was okay at the time. They're like, if it gets worse, come back, but I don't think we should do anything.

16:34Brian D. McKenzie: Tell, say what the standard was for how much liquid you must have pooling in your body before they'll, they want to drink.

16:41Nick Hilsabeck: So, uh, you need a liter of blood or more just pooling in your abdominal cavity. Two 500 milliliter flasks. Extra blood. Yeah, people can really... Bleeding from her... She's bleeding internally. And so she's crippled over in pain all day. We come back home. She's so distended. She can't even stand up straight. She's so miserable. I've never seen her look so bad. And finally, we get home. We're trying to just exist. She's trying to get minute to minute. So finally, I'm like, are you okay, honey? if I go upstairs and take a shower. So she's lying on the couch in paint, sitting on the couch. She couldn't lie down because they're afraid of asphyxiation from fluid in her lungs, so she has to be upright.

17:23Nick Hilsabeck: Anyways, butt-ass naked in the shower. I hear her screaming downstairs for help. I come down. She's on the floor. She's sweating through her clothes in an instant. She's white as a ghost, and I call 911. The ambulance come over. This is two nights ago. It was terrifying when you think your wife is literally going to die in front of you because the risks of this. She has this OHSS syndrome, which is very risky if it goes wrong. With her oversized ovaries, you ought to die with this process. So we had all that. Had to go back in again. So we decided not to take the ambulance ride. She stabilized, mostly because of cost.

18:02Nick Hilsabeck: They checked all her vitals, took blood right there, said she kind of normalized again. Went back in for ultrasound the next morning, which is why I had to bail on you for the recording. and she's got still just under a liter of blood in her abdomen, but her hemoglobin's dropped to nine, which means she's still bleeding internally, yada, yada. Thank God, as of today, she's feeling much better. And so we went to the grocery store today. It's a pretty fun outing. So we're monitoring that. But I think all I'm getting at this is, one, for the listeners, I don't know if you recall, but I pushed books on you to help fund our IVF journey.

18:39Nick Hilsabeck: We've got a couple big bills coming our way too. So Outdoor Kids, Jessica Peterson on Amazon. The books are great. Consider buying some if you haven't. Look up Jessica DeWint. You'll see them. And then two, I have never experienced this perspective in my life on running while Jess is going through this. And I guess you've experienced this with sometimes you get involved with Brayden's carding, right? Or some other things where suddenly it doesn't matter. Like when you distill it down, your bad workout, your shitty race performance, you didn't get your workout in. I'm like, none of it mattered.

19:17Nick Hilsabeck: And we talked about this offline and I'm just going to tell the audience. And I know some of my athletes listen, but amidst all this, I'm getting athlete messages and none of them know this. And I just couldn't care less at the time. I was like, you're running doesn't matter right now. Like there are way more important things in the world and that's not fair. And I've come around on that, but I'm 43. I've never felt this before. perspective. I don't know what to do with it. It makes me feel weird. I got two miles down the road today on my run. I was like, I just want to walk home. I don't even want to be doing this.

19:47Nick Hilsabeck: What the heck is that?

19:49Brian D. McKenzie: This will sound the wrong way, so I'm just going to preface it. But you've had a life of you. For most of your life, the main thing in your life was you and your pursuits.

20:02Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah.

20:03Brian D. McKenzie: And in the best way possible, just got in the way. Right? Like you're living for something other than you right now. And as soon as that happens, their life ends up mattering more than yours. Yeah. Most of the time, as soon as things go wrong. Like you still think about yourself a lot during the day, but like when things are bad, the things you'll push through aren't worth pushing through for them. And you're like, you're approaching the family man stage of your life. And you're kind of in it. Like you have a wife now. You guys are codependent. And that's, this is your, you haven't felt this before because you haven't had this before.

20:40Brian D. McKenzie: It's not that you haven't had relationships and you haven't had people that mattered, but you never had someone else that mattered more than you.

20:45Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah. I suppose that's probably what having kids certainly would feel like.

20:49Brian D. McKenzie: Yeah. And then it's just, it's not worse or it's just different. It's just, there's more ways for it. It sounds like fatalistic, but like there's more ways for it to go wrong once there's more certain factors in the equation. But yeah, it's, that's what you're experiencing. You're experiencing a life that's not yours that you are codependent on. And that's, it makes your things matter less. Even though when you were, if you were going through this, you would be trying to find a way to get your stuff in. So that's true. She is going through it. Your stuff doesn't matter anymore.

21:19Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah. It's kind of just feels trivial a little bit. And I think it'll be temporary. Right. I think I'm like, I'm having like an adrenaline, not adrenaline dump. I'm on the other side of it now. Do you know? Like after you get done with a big race and then the come down from it is sort of like, I just got nothing. Maybe that's what it is. but I don't know. And I still listen. I'm going to, I ran 50 miles last week. I'm going to run 45 to 50 this week. Still like I'll go through the motions of course. Cause I don't want to set myself up for poor fitness in the future. And I'm disciplined enough, but like I pulled the plug halfway through my quality session down in Sarasota on Tuesday.

21:51I just wasn't,

21:52Nick Hilsabeck: it wasn't in me. I don't do that. Right. Today I ran, I know cause I would have beat myself up if I just turned around and walked home. So I ran the full eight miles, even though it's the last thing I wanted to do. It's like, I've never felt so like empty towards running and I hope it changes. This is very short blip on my radar. Right. Um, which is kind of vulnerable to say as like a running podcast host who the guy always gets his crap done. Right.

22:13Brian D. McKenzie: Um, I mean, you're already the exception to the rule. Statistically, you should have had way more of these moments in your life.

22:21Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah.

22:21Brian D. McKenzie: You've running's been your constant where most people flake on their hobby or their workout or their, none of our listeners do that. Well, I'm the opposite, right? It's the first thing that goes up. From the moment I moved home from Colorado, it's been the first thing I cut out. Yours is not. Yours is the last thing you cut out. And you've stayed the course on that probably stronger than any other real person I know. Like pro runners who are part of a camp and have their whole world as a cocoon for them to run. It doesn't make the running any easier, but it makes getting out the door a whole lot easier.

22:58Brian D. McKenzie: so outside of those like of the real people i know i think you're the most disciplined runner i know so you're overdue for one of these but it doesn't change the fact that it's gonna rock your world for a little bit yeah you know i was wondering and i was wondering

23:12Nick Hilsabeck: because i'm gonna i'm gonna take i think i'm gonna just take a i didn't take a break after my last ultra right where i went for the record and failed miserably i've just been pushing through too so it could be part of that so i'm due for i think just like a break too to crave it again but But I started wondering because also it is fall and I spend a lot of time in the woods and outdoors. And I really, that fills my cup immensely. It's what I'm going to do this afternoon, honestly. It's my first chance to just go decompress. And Jess is finally feeling okay. I'm going to go get some me time for like two hours.

23:42Nick Hilsabeck: But then it got me thinking, how much fitness would you lose? Let's say I just hobby ran by feel for three weeks. Would you lose much or would you come back to it and probably be a few weeks away from having all your fitness right back? I was just wondering. A few weeks away. You think so? That's what I think too. Especially with that much money in my fitness piggy bank.

24:03Brian D. McKenzie: Yeah.

24:04Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah.

24:04Brian D. McKenzie: As the resident expert on taking breaks, three weeks is not a real break.

24:10Nick Hilsabeck: It is, but it's not.

24:13Brian D. McKenzie: It's interesting. We talk about how hard races just fry your nervous system.

24:18Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah.

24:18Brian D. McKenzie: But it fries a portion of your nervous system. Nothing fries your nerves like stress and anxiety. Because you get done with a big, big race, good or bad, and you can still find pleasure in life. You're fried. You may not be able to move, but you can watch a movie and just enjoy it. And you can slip off to sleep and wake up and be like, that was good. And then you can eat something and be like, oh, I want some more of that. Or a loved one comes over. You're like, hey, it's great to see you. And if you get done with a two-day stretch of not sleeping well and worrying about the one you love, like intensely worrying and not even realizing how stressed you are over it, nothing's enjoyable.

24:55Brian D. McKenzie: You don't enjoy things. You don't look forward to things. You could plop your favorite food in front of you. Like, it fries your nervous system way more completely than any race ever does.

25:05Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah. And I think the whole thing, we have a conversation like stress is stress. Like, yes, physical training specific stress can absolutely affect your running for days. But I think like to a certain level, a job that is super demanding and you're not sleeping in a family crisis. Yeah, that can absolutely affect even if it's just like your nervous system's ability to fire the way it should or your emotional F's given that are left. You're just like, I just don't care about my 12th interval in this of these 400s. I just don't care right now. Like, so I think I'm learning stress is stress, I think.

25:37Brian D. McKenzie: Yeah. Yeah.

25:39Nick Hilsabeck: But I do think this whole apathetic saying, I had a few messages from athletes that I was just like, this doesn't matter right now. But it's so wonderful. How privileged are you to be so nervous for your race or so upset about your bad race or your bad splits or I'm such a POS because I had to cut my run from eight miles to six miles due to time constraints. like what a privileged position to be sad about your stupid run like your your life is pretty good if having a bad race ruins your week like wow what what a great and that's where i normally live right it's like a good or bad like so it's just like that perspective is interesting to me like i hope i have a bad race coming up and everything else is good great things are good so it's just interesting, which is not normally my perspective.

26:32Nick Hilsabeck: It's weird me out. I'm weirded out right now.

26:35Brian D. McKenzie: Yeah. I mean, whatever plane of existence you have, the biggest bump is your biggest bump. And when they're small bumps, they're your biggest bump. And then you get a big bump and the small bumps don't matter, but the big bump is your biggest bump.

26:48Nick Hilsabeck: That's just the way it is.

26:49Brian D. McKenzie: It's all relative. But as soon as you hit something bigger, the small one doesn't feel big anymore.

26:54Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah. I don't know why this made me think of her, but Ellie Perrier St. Pierre, been cranking out babies. I don't know if you're right. She's in the middle, really our next big woman prospect. She won worlds in the indoor worlds in the 3K, I think it was. Like our best female mid-distance.

27:16Brian D. McKenzie: That was coming off baby one.

27:17Nick Hilsabeck: Correct. And even before that, just an incredible, like, have you heard Ellie Puryear-St. Pierre's name recently? No, you haven't. Because she has decided that running isn't as important as creating a family with her husband. And I think it's number two and three now or something. And she's like the perspective, even a pro athlete who makes her living doing this is like, listen, there's things in life that matter just a little bit more. And I mean, who could running matter more to than a professional athlete? I'd love to see her come back, by the way. But anyways, I just, I don't know why I thought of her.

27:49Nick Hilsabeck: I'm like, she made some businesses. So some personal non-business decisions there, which in hindsight, maybe I oddly respect somebody who chooses that. I don't know. Came to mind. Yeah.

28:00Brian D. McKenzie: Yeah. All right. Anything else? I can leave that alone, but... Well, do you want the most rude, selfish pivot possible?

28:09Nick Hilsabeck: What's about your training, I assume?

28:11Brian D. McKenzie: I'm in such a good place with my running right now, Kirk. Before we pivot to that.

28:16Nick Hilsabeck: I love running right now. Oh, I'm so happy. That really makes me so happy to hear. I just want to remind people to support us by my wife's books, Outdoor Kids, on Amazon. Look up Outdoor Kids or Jessica or Jess DeWint. You can find her books here. The kids love them. Now, on to Bracken, just light on his feet, skipping through life. What's going on with you?

28:41Brian D. McKenzie: I mean, we couldn't be in more different places. You're sitting over here. You got a text right as we started with her hemoglobin update. and I got a new hydration vest in the mail that I cannot wait to run in right after this.

28:54Nick Hilsabeck: Hey, Bracken, I still feel confident I could go run you into the ground right now. That's never been a question. We're not comparing.

29:03Brian D. McKenzie: I'm just saying that we are in opposite planes of existence right now.

29:07Nick Hilsabeck: I love that for you. So tell me what's been going on because you and I haven't really had a good chance to connect in two weeks with what I've had going on. We haven't done episodes. So I'm curious to hear.

29:14Brian D. McKenzie: So I've been doing this training block where it's training to train. That's what I'm preparing for. The training block is preparing me for real training. And I've been trying to just treat myself. I've said this on here before, but I'm trying to do this like the most holistic, good job that I've ever done with this is treat myself like a new athlete. And I went through and I talked how I went through all my old training plans and looked at the things that work. but I've also gone through and looked at all the things that have gone wrong physically and what I did during those blocks and what my mindset was and went through and kind of like, again, to overuse the word, but holistically tested my body.

29:55Brian D. McKenzie: Checked for all the imbalances I could personally check for. All the weaknesses, the weak links in the chain, range of motion, tolerance to stress, figured like right hip versus left hip, right glute versus left glute, right hamstring versus left, all the way up and down the chain. Where are my big imbalances? Dorsiflexion, flexion of ankle.

30:17Nick Hilsabeck: So you're getting that microscopic with it.

30:19Brian D. McKenzie: Well, is it microscopic or is it just like the natural thing to do when my body keeps breaking down is try to figure out like, is it obvious why I keep having injuries pop up?

30:30Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah. I think you're pretty zoomed in right now.

30:32Brian D. McKenzie: I am. But because I've been running into the same wall, Kirk over and over and over. So here's what I've figured out. I've figured out a couple of things. One on one side of the coin, I've realized that my right ankle is so locked up and bound up compared to my left. I have like 50 % less range of motion in every direction on my right than my left. As a result, I'm trying not to draw conclusions, but either as a result or concurrently, I have a much different level of strength and stability and then mobility in my calves, hamstrings, quads, glutes, and hips. My upper body is relatively decent in terms of its balance, but from glutes down, I have a huge disparity.

31:21Brian D. McKenzie: For example, one of the tests is just like get loose, get warm, and then perform the deepest pistol squat on each side that I can do comfortably within that range of motion. From the floor, not elevated? Starting standing, foot on the floor,

31:35Nick Hilsabeck: and then just start going down until my leg gets to that point of like, oh, this doesn't feel great anymore. Or this doesn't feel stable or I feel pain.

31:46Brian D. McKenzie: And on my left leg, I can get down to like, glued to a couple inches below my knee before it's like, this isn't like a real stable position for me. And on my right side, it's like four inches above my knee. I hit that and there's pain in the front of my knee and there's big instability in that leg. Like exercises like that, separating them and just taking them through what they can do and finding out what is talking. Were you aware of any of these imbalances at all? Like, oh, I kind of know this, but I... I knew that my left quad did more of the work and that my right ankle always got more sore afterwards, but not checking it this deeply.

32:26Brian D. McKenzie: I went to the Cairo as well and had him take a look at some things. Anyway, so there are significant breakdowns in the actual structure. And then the other thing I realized is that there just hasn't been a flow of training, like a weekly schedule that I've been able to settle on that satisfies both physically and mentally what I need. If on paper, it all feels and looks good to me, I can't sustain it. and if I can sustain it, I feel like I'm just treading water, not even progressing, not able to do real work. If I just try to lay base down, I'm not getting enough stimulus mentally and if I do the stimulus I want, I get hurt.

33:08Brian D. McKenzie: Anyway, I haven't settled on a weekly schedule that works for me. I can't make it work in seven days. I've tried it. I just haven't come up. I shouldn't say can't. I haven't in years come up with a seven-day schedule that I love.

33:20Nick Hilsabeck: Are you referring to like, if we're talking about like moving parts, like, okay, making enough time, I think what you're calling the piddly stuff or your prehab, making enough time for true threshold work, finding a day for a longish run, also making sure your strength days are in there. You're trying to cram all of these components into seven days, but you haven't found anything that seems to fit the way it should.

33:40Brian D. McKenzie: Yeah. Because then on days where I have more time, we have podcasts or days I have less time. It actually makes more sense, but that doesn't align with the day before is my best day to get something in. So even though the day after works, it doesn't make sense to do it there from a recovery standpoint. So I just haven't found what makes sense, but last weekend, carding ended. And I said, you know what I just always keep coming back to, but just say I can't do it because of life is a nine day.

34:08Nick Hilsabeck: Is day 10 off or is day nine off?

34:11Brian D. McKenzie: There's a 10th inserted anytime you need it. Okay. So it's just easy, easy quality, easy, easy, something big, just three day, many, many, many cycles, just three day cycles repeated and three main quality types over the course of three of those cycles. So nine days, three quality.

34:32Nick Hilsabeck: Um, so that'd be a longer effort every 10 days then only once every 10 days, uh, almost irrelevant right now.

34:40Brian D. McKenzie: Okay. Whatever the three types of things I need are. It might be threshold, threshold long. It might be high rocks, high rocks, threshold. It might be speed, strength. It doesn't matter what they are, but I generally find that if I don't have three points of emphasis in my training, I have this itch that I'm not getting enough done. But for me and my durability right now, I can't fit that into seven days because I can't recover from it.

35:08Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah. See that, that I'm not going to call it a hack. It's not a hack, but on the seven day schedule, you're outlining a lot of what I do, which is basically pillar sessions, just long runs right now include quality every single time. They're just not truly, truly long. Like you're going to need to go. Yeah. Right. For grindstone. I keep forgetting what it's called.

35:28Brian D. McKenzie: Ironstone. Ironstone. Why keep calling grindstone? Well, grindstone is also East coast. Well, correct. Just happened about a month ago.

35:33Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah. So really it's, it's, that is the weekly schedule that many would follow. like Sunday, Monday, easy, Tuesday quality, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, easy, big Saturday, rinse and repeat with a Sunday off. But I do think that I still fall short on a few things that I'd like to get to in quotes.

35:52Brian D. McKenzie: And I'm not durable enough to do the work you get done in those seven days or that I used to be able to get done in seven. But when I was at my absolute best and happiest, it was just this rolling three-day cycle. This is what I did in Colorado. Loved it. I just packed a lot more into those three days. So we finished carding. I thought, what better time than now to just try it out? And I scripted out several weeks of what this could look like. And just like instant, like, ah, that's, that's really, I like this, this, I write, I write too many where I get all the pieces, what I want. And I, this could work on this day and this, and they're great.

36:29Brian D. McKenzie: This checks all the boxes. I like this. And then I look at it and think, I'm not going to get this done.

36:34Nick Hilsabeck: I'm not going to be able to execute this. Is there a floating complete rest day when that day is floating for you? Well, that's a theoretical. Once I'm fit in doing significant work, then it's going to have to, the decision becomes,

36:51Brian D. McKenzie: does that just disrupt the three days and you get back to work so that you can get your volume in? Or do you just move on with the day? Right now, early on, I'm not running all nine of those days anyway. So it's more fluid to just, if I need two days to get ready for it, the point is to get back around in 72 hours. So if I can't run that day, like whatever, I'll try to lift. The rules are more flexible now because I can't fill all those nine days anyway.

37:16Nick Hilsabeck: I mean, isn't that really the ideal way to go? Or as flexible as like once we're not handcuffed to seven days, like most people run that schedule because they have Saturday and Sunday with more free time and they can rely on that. And so there's plenty of good reasons for a seven-day schedule. I've been on a seven-day schedule. Um, but if you're not so stuck on having to get it done on a certain day, there's also this like intuitive, listen to my body. Like, Hey, I don't think I'm quite ready for my quality today. So I, you can bump it one day further down the road and pivot without any, like there's no confinement to what is done when, um, and that's gotta be a little bit liberating.

37:50Nick Hilsabeck: Like it could be dangerous in the wrong hands, meaning like I got to get my long run in Saturday. So it happens then if you allow it, you could start kicking things too far down the road. Do you know what I'm saying? Yeah. So you have to be pretty disciplined with it, but it's got to be oddly freeing

38:07Brian D. McKenzie: if you can pull it off. It is. And I've always been a bad recoverer. All the way back to high school, I always recovered the slowest. I got beat up the most in my peer group. I got beat up the most by training and I recovered the slowest. I didn't double well. I didn't, I didn't like doubling at meets, running two races. I struggled to get going in the second race. I just don't do well with that. In OCR days, I've really struggled if I ever had to race two days in a row. Recovery is just not a strength of mine. It's not a superpower of mine. So I am instantly relieved when I'm guaranteed two days in between any effort that's going to tax me, which then makes it more likely to get work done on those days of, of an aerobic nature or of a lifting nature, because I'm not like, ah, what I have to cut this down or I'm not even going to be able to do my quality tomorrow.

39:00Brian D. McKenzie: So I don't have that feeling. So again, we're early in this,

39:03Nick Hilsabeck: but already it's a weight off my shoulder and I've had a great week of

39:06Brian D. McKenzie: training.

39:08Nick Hilsabeck: Um, so the question I would have is let's call it those every three or four days sessions is the idea to, for you to stay available? Meaning I'm never going completely to the well, the availability is the best ability, we'll call it. And so is that your approach or is this a, I want to swing pretty hard and find out on some of these days and know I'm going to need more time so I can't fit it in a box?

39:34Brian D. McKenzie: It's a good question. I'm going to surprise you by answering in a very roundabout way. I know that's shocking. A thing I've realized and I talked to Lisa about yesterday, I think is I've gotten worse at running, in particular, the act of running slow. Like I have a late, my strides gotten sloppier and lazier and saggier. And when I run fast, I still run well. I don't have any stamina at it, but fast running is my best form of running. The slower I go, the worse I've become at running. I used to be a pretty like elite jogger, I would say.

40:08Nick Hilsabeck: I would agree with that running with you, by the way. You had no issues shuffling around efficiently.

40:13Brian D. McKenzie: Yeah, a super efficient jogger. And I've become less so. And I know it's either because of or causing this big imbalance in my stride is manifesting the slower I go. The slower I go, the more ground contact, the more these things don't do well and then sag. But if I run fast, they do their thing. They just fatigue out quickly. So one of my points of emphasis here is to prioritize the number of good strides I can run or the minutes spent running well every single session, primarily the pillar sessions. So I'm trying to maximize volume in the session. And the thing that gives is pace. So, for example, on what would it have been?

40:59Brian D. McKenzie: Was it Monday? Let's see. Monday, I did a double session because I had a day off the day prior and ended up getting 12 miles of work in on Monday between the two sessions. I did eight and four and did four by 10 minutes in the morning. And then in the evening, I don't remember what I did in the evening. I think it was uphill like two by 20 minutes at 10 % or whatever it was. I ended up getting 60 minutes of above aerobic work, but it was all below lactate threshold. And it kept getting, I kept moving down a notch or two if I needed to, staying within the zone of these are good. It was all at least sweet spot work, right?

41:39Brian D. McKenzie: It was above aerobic threshold, but I wasn't trying to keep a pace. I was trying to keep us a good stride. And if I had to slow down a little bit to run better, I just kept doing more reps at slightly slower because that's all money in the bank for me right now, but I don't want to run sloppy, bad form. I think that's part of the quad tendinopathy issues I've had of one side starts taking a real beating and the other side's not pulling its weight.

42:03Nick Hilsabeck: That's one of my favorite things. We have pounded down your guys' throats enough, the power of like incline work on the treadmill and how we believe it keeps you available. Speed work in disguise, yada, yada. But I think my favorite thing is I don't have like emotional relationships or ties to what speed it says I'm going. And so like the beautiful thing when you're trying to do threshold work or like zone four type work, I do the same thing you're talking about. Okay. I'm going to do two by 20 minutes. I commit to a pace early. My heart rate rises. And then I have no problems bumping the speed down to keep a heart rate cap on my effort.

42:38Nick Hilsabeck: For some reason to me, that is no problem at all. My heart rate's at 164 to 168 and I don't want it to go above heaven forbid i have to slow down i have no emotional tie to the speed on the treadmill at incline put me outside on flat on real ground and suddenly i'm shoving that square peg in a round hole and i'm like i don't care fine the heart rate's gonna drift great 180 i don't care i'm keeping pace the treadmill for me is like such a hack that way and i don't do you feel the same way 100 yeah it's a it's the best threshold tool out there to make sure you just stay right where you need to.

43:11Brian D. McKenzie: Yeah. Yeah. I agree with that. Um, I'm also trying to only run one to one and a half of those quality sessions and super shoes. And, uh, I've switched to a three zone training model. Okay. So it's, if zone one, zone two, zone three, that's it. Zone one is everything up to aerobic threshold.

43:34Nick Hilsabeck: Which for you is probably like 140. 148, 150. Yeah. Okay.

43:38Brian D. McKenzie: Yeah. Zone two is just above aerobic threshold up to lactate threshold. It's nice big zones there. Big zone. And then zone three is above lactate threshold.

43:49Nick Hilsabeck: You're not even looking at your watch when you do it. Who cares what your heart rate's doing at that point? You're basically working hard on effort. Yeah.

43:54Brian D. McKenzie: It's pacing above at that point. Correct. Correct. So what I'm doing is two out of every three of these pillar sessions is zone two. It's just above aerobic threshold, below lactate threshold. That is the only definition. So for me, it's a success. If I start, let's say like yesterday, I was going to do six by six minutes, but I did a leg builder in the morning with skier and rowing at above threshold. And so I was okay moving it down a little bit. I started just having that imbalance show up. So I cut it to five by six minutes on the treadmills. And I started right around threshold. And by the end, I was like eight beats below threshold.

44:36Nick Hilsabeck: But I was still above aerobic threshold. And so it was a win. It was all sweet spot or above.

44:42Brian D. McKenzie: It was all gray zone or above. And it was a bunch of good running strides. And I'm not at the point where I need to be in a 5 % window of threshold. If I'm running at all, it's really good fitness work for me. So I'm just staying in that zone two of the three zone model for my quality work when I'm running. All my erg stuff is above.

45:06Nick Hilsabeck: Basically your zone one is now zone two and below in the five zone system. Your zone two is zone three and four. And then zone three is just anything past lactate threshold. Yeah.

45:17Brian D. McKenzie: That's simple. Um, like it's bumper bowling. It is a big target to hit and I'm okay. Slowing down or changing throughout in order to find the stride that's feeling good and efficient in that moment. And sometimes it changes throughout the workout. Like on Tuesday, I had to get faster to keep running well. And yesterday I had to slow down a little bit to keep running well, but it was all like, it was all money in the bank. And so I felt happy the whole time.

45:45Nick Hilsabeck: This might be helpful for people listening. So what are some of the cues that you, whether it's physically, I know you listen to your breathing, how your feet are hitting the ground. What are some of the cues to tell you that you are running well? And what are some of the cues you use to tell you that you're beginning to not run well?

46:02Brian D. McKenzie: So I am checking cadence. I'm not shooting for a high number, but I'm trying not to see it drop. So for example, but when I'm running easy on the treadmill, I'm in the mid one sixties. I'm trying to nudge it towards one 70, but if I drop below like one 65, I just bring it back up a little bit at the incline I'm running. And at the pace I'm running one 65 to one 68 seems to be like a very clean, good aerobic run for me on my treadmill. There's no science behind it. It's just like a good feeling run. I know I'm not, if I look at my stride balance metrics on my devices, it gives me my best little balance in that area.

46:45Brian D. McKenzie: Second is I have mirrors front and side of my treadmill. So I'm watching my hips. So vain. I'm watching my hips. If I start seeing some hip drop happening, some hips kicking out to the side, I instantly need to quicken my running right away. And then arm carriage helps for me focusing on that but i'm like i'm checking in on a lot of things all the time because i am rusty at running well you know one of the things i'm glad you're focused

47:13Nick Hilsabeck: on that so i was if you saw i wasn't paying attention to you for a second i was looking up strava okay and so i don't know what's happened to me because i was a 160s cadence runner for sure much like you um on my easy days anyways once i started going quick i'd get up there and so i just got curious and something, maybe it's a natural progression, but I think it's part of it is so today, this was a true recovery run, 130 beats a minute, 713 pace. And my cadence is now 174 average for a 713 pace for me, which would have, I would have never, I would have been 165 to one. And so part of me is wondering, I've learned to run slow more efficiently is just like you're talking about.

47:59Nick Hilsabeck: And if I'm listening to my intuition here, Bracken, I think that's part of my recent health longevity is that thing you're talking about right there. Because I would have never seen one cadence in the 170s for a seven plus minute pace run ever in any world. And so I just find that fascinating. I just looked at that. And so you might be on to stuff.

48:20Brian D. McKenzie: And then outside of that, I am kind of doing the same thing on my easy runs. I'm taking 10 to 20 second breaks anytime I get sloppy. And I'm doing a couple of quick calf raises or a couple of quick like pigeon stretches, getting my hips loose again, and then getting back on and running because I just feel like I can't afford spending time running poorly because that's when the old injury sites start to get mad at me. But as a result, my volume is way up because it's easier to get 70 minutes in running well than it is getting worse every step after 40 minutes. And anyway, my body feels good. It's obviously a short sample size right now, but I've had two quality sessions this week and I'll have another one on either Saturday or Sunday.

49:14Brian D. McKenzie: And this nine day just keeps rolling through. The other thing is that all the little things that I've wanted to always do but haven't done have just been programmed into workouts. So I have a skier that sits. I have a high rocks in February. I have to get on the skier. So now part of my warm-up for my quality days is skier.

49:32Nick Hilsabeck: Grease the groove philosophy.

49:34Brian D. McKenzie: It was 3x1000 at race pace or race effort prior to the 4x10 minutes. So suddenly that's a big session.

49:45Nick Hilsabeck: It's a huge session.

49:46Brian D. McKenzie: But the first one kind of ease into it and focusing on form. And then on the leg builder, I probably got 4K of rowing in during that because instead of using the assault bike, it's like, well, we're going to use the rower instead. And the leg builder session included glute and core work rather than I'll get to my prehab stuff. Well, I'm just going to exercise the prehab stuff into this workout. So maybe not best practice, but the way I'm going to get it done. because I realized I can't be trusted to just, yeah, get that in. No, it's going to have to be programmed in. And the easiest way for me is quality days.

50:20Easy days I have no desire to start with like,

50:24Brian D. McKenzie: let's do some glue bridges. But if I'm warming up for a quality day, I'll add that into the warmup and it seems to work because my mind's already in like take care of business mode.

50:33Nick Hilsabeck: It's an interesting position you're in because honestly, when you get into like you were back in your Spartan pro days, let's call it when you're living in Colorado, um all of this goes out the window meaning uh it becomes so autonomic that you don't think about it anymore you just put on your shoes you go for a run and your brain's almost empty and void of all of these cues that you're thinking about if you if you know what i'm saying like yeah like when you're in a good groove and you haven't don't have ptsd from surgeries and injuries and coming back and things have been clicking like i just i think what i'm trying to trying to say for listeners is like a lot of you don't need to be thinking about all these things I think if you have a good rhythm going, right?

51:12Nick Hilsabeck: Like if you're not having to think about these things, that doesn't mean you're not caring enough or you're not dialed enough. It means maybe you're just, you've had a good run of things going and things are clicking and smooth. It's for the athlete who has had some speed bumps that needs to start paying attention again so they get it right this time.

51:27Brian D. McKenzie: Yeah.

51:28Nick Hilsabeck: Right? But I don't think this approach is for everybody, but I think it's very important for people who are ramping back up or have had a bumpy road.

51:36Brian D. McKenzie: Yeah, I'm not only out of shape, I'm out of skill. and that wasn't a thing I ever had in my life. I was always good at the act of doing it, but skills are perishable and so it has to be renewed. So I've always been and I probably until I really age, I always will be a responder to work. So that's not the thing I have to focus on. I have to focus on get the durability back, get the skill back, do movements cleanly and just rebuild volume in a way that's sustainable. I shouldn't reach for a single stride for probably like eight weeks, 10 weeks. How much fight for a rep for probably like eight, 10 weeks.

52:15Brian D. McKenzie: If you had to guess, um,

52:18Nick Hilsabeck: uh, what did you, what was your 5k time trial? 18, what? 32. 1832. What do you think just with this? Like let's stay available. Let's be smart. Do you think you've taken time off of that?

52:30Brian D. McKenzie: I mean, it's been a week,

52:32Nick Hilsabeck: but a week. Oh, the state of I've been doing the stay available, stay smart thing. I've just been on the nine days for a week. I was like, you didn't time trial a week. You didn't time trial a week. No.

52:40Brian D. McKenzie: I'm probably just by the seven more weeks of running. Correct. 45 seconds faster. That's a lot. Right? That's a ton. Yeah.

52:52Nick Hilsabeck: And not doing anything terribly sexy. When's the last anaerobic type repeat where you said, I'm going to go six by 600 and I'm going tasting pennies effort. Not once. Right.

53:04Brian D. McKenzie: I've done 6x20 seconds starting at 5k and moving up to 400 meter pace over the course of 20 seconds.

53:16Nick Hilsabeck: Probably still not breaching lactate threshold during that.

53:19Brian D. McKenzie: No.

53:19Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah. So when's the last time that... How many minutes have you spent in zone 5 or your zone 3, whatever, in the last week? And if so, are you doing it on the ERGs?

53:29Brian D. McKenzie: Oh, if we count the ERGs, probably 40.

53:34Nick Hilsabeck: right so i was hoping you'd say that so the so the formula in your position is really beautiful it's you know what minimal risk when i'm on the bike ski and the row and if i want to touch i know my system will be there i can hit break lactate threshold get the punchy work and then be smart when i'm on my feet because that's what matters the most and it works really well that way what

53:59Brian D. McKenzie: What am I going to hurt going anaerobic on the assault bike or the skier?

54:03Nick Hilsabeck: Maybe your ego when you see the splits.

54:05Brian D. McKenzie: And when I fade really quickly in the workout.

54:10Nick Hilsabeck: No harm.

54:11Brian D. McKenzie: Who cares? But it does mean the system's being primed and used and maintained and even grown a bit because I couldn't do 40 minutes of zone five work, right? Running in a week safely right now. So I hadn't been doing it. But so I'm actually getting more work in and I'm feeling better. and all the running is done in a stride type that's clean. And so I'm actually taking less damage. So my volume has bumped up just over the last week. This will end up being my biggest volume week of training by far in the last however long. But my overall inflammation and body feeling is significantly improved.

54:49Nick Hilsabeck: I like your timeline too. I like your timeline because February and High Rocks is just far enough away to change something and just close enough away where you got to start now. And then that is a stepping stone to Ironstone, what, June? Is that right?

55:06Brian D. McKenzie: July.

55:07Nick Hilsabeck: July is, again, just that sweet spot window again where it's like, hey, far enough away I can change fitness, but close enough where I got to be diligent right now. And realistically, I don't know. What did you say? Which one scares you more? Because High Rock's very exciting.

55:24Brian D. McKenzie: I'm going to Hyrox because I've tasted it. Correct. I figured you would say that. I know how bad it goes when you're not prepared.

55:32Nick Hilsabeck: You know how bad it can go when you are prepared sometimes. Right.

55:35Brian D. McKenzie: Ironstone is daunting, but it's also theoretical.

55:39Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah.

55:39Brian D. McKenzie: Hyrox, I can still taste it, and that scares me. But I know myself. I know I'm going to want more soon, and I'm going to have to keep fighting that. But realistically, I may get to high rocks not having left much of this stage of running yet. I may just make one of those three efforts per week highly compromised, but still running gray zone. I may not really put in what people would consider like peaking run. I won't put in peaking run workouts. I'll crank harder on the stations and the ergs, but I may get to race day not having my run heart rate go above 160. In the entire training block. And just knowing like, this is what it is.

56:24Brian D. McKenzie: And there's going to be a second high rocks that follows this. Because races are my, like, are my trigger. My tendency is I get in range of a race and then I start doing the things that I used to do to get ready for the race. And I can't handle it. So it's not, again, maybe not best practice, but I may not breach lactate threshold on an entire interval one time between now and February. You're talking when you're running, just to be clear. When I'm running in a run interval. I may not do a single ski erg interval below lactate threshold. I may crank assault like 30-30s. I may hit some highly compromised row lunge wall-wall workouts, burpee broad jumps, where I just burn it down.

57:08Brian D. McKenzie: But I may not run above 160 BPM one time prior to high rocks.

57:14Nick Hilsabeck: What are you registered for in Chicago?

57:16Brian D. McKenzie: Pro.

57:16Nick Hilsabeck: Pro solo.

57:17Brian D. McKenzie: Yeah. in the like 63 to 65 range or whatever that thing was. I was pretty, I know that's actually aggressive based on my PR, but I think I was pretty relaxed with what I entered myself in. I didn't enter myself as a sub 60 guy or like 60 to 60, whatever.

57:36Nick Hilsabeck: I didn't use that. I didn't know if you were dabbling with doubles.

57:40Brian D. McKenzie: No, this is a pro. I need to do a pro. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

57:45Nick Hilsabeck: I'm this winner. I'm entertaining. I'm entertaining starting to play around a little bit on the ergs and maybe doing a little bit once the weather turns. I might start dipping my toes a little bit. So you and I will have to talk for real about something potentially. I'm not there yet, but once the weather turns, I think I'm going to probably invest in the equipment and just start seeing where my metrics are at and if I want to do the thing or not. So we could have some fun maybe.

58:13Brian D. McKenzie: It's instantly shown me going to nine day how much better it is for me for a high rocks. perspective and it will be from an ultra perspective. I just get the other things in more. I've already skied more in this, this fall than I did for any high rocks race I've ever prepared for. So I didn't even own a skier until the one I did with Joyce and I didn't use it much for that. So I've already, even this week I've been on the skier three times.

58:38Nick Hilsabeck: I hadn't,

58:39Brian D. McKenzie: I didn't touch a skier other than one time I did a day pass so I could go with Cali to do one. And before my first race, I went and did one day pass at a gym. Not my first race, my second race. I did one day pass at a gym. So I did two skiergs prior to my first two races. I didn't see you at Kelly's wedding.

58:59Nick Hilsabeck: I wasn't invited.

59:01Brian D. McKenzie: Do you know why? Because you would have said no, and she knows it. I still have her High Rock shirt. I picked it up at registration, and I cannot find it, and I have to send it to her.

59:12Nick Hilsabeck: Holding it against you. Grudges be held.

59:15Brian D. McKenzie: So anyway, I'm not predicting greatness for any of these things, but I am on the first what feels just right. It feels like the first good balance of volume, intensity, sustainability that I've had in a long time.

59:32Nick Hilsabeck: Yeah, we got the best couple of months of running ahead of us. You're one of those psychopaths who enjoys winter running as much or more than summer running. Yes. You got a good bit to look ahead to. That's good. I mean, we haven't had one of these updates from you in quite some time.

59:47Brian D. McKenzie: No. And you're right about winter. Because I like indoor work and I love snow work, it's going to be a really nice big indoor session, two beautiful days of snow running. Big indoor session, two beautiful days of snow running. It's going to be a really nice balance.

1:00:04Nick Hilsabeck: Well, I think this makes our listeners very happy to hear.

1:00:07Brian D. McKenzie: Me as well. Long term, when Braden's racing comes back around, the fight will be, can I make a nine-day work with that? Which is going to mean early mornings or late night workouts.

1:00:18Nick Hilsabeck: When does that start again?

1:00:19Brian D. McKenzie: Well, usually late April, but he is 14 now. And at 14 and a half, with the correct waiver and the blessing of someone in the race community who is respected, you can get into a car. so he now has an opportunity there's a race team in the area who is going to let him do some race weekends in their Mini Cooper and maybe a Miata starting in January

1:00:49Nick Hilsabeck: real vehicles

1:00:50Brian D. McKenzie: yeah it's going to escalate quickly now we didn't talk about it he ended the season on a heater he went first, second, second and was fastest or second fastest in all the sessions so our season's done now and he ended positive and now he's fired up to get in a vehicle.

1:01:09Nick Hilsabeck: That's fun. And he ended with a bang too. This mechanic got his crap together.

1:01:13Brian D. McKenzie: Unfortunately, that was his Achilles heel.

1:01:16Nick Hilsabeck: All right, we got to wrap this thing.

1:01:18Brian D. McKenzie: Yes, we do. It's 2.59. We got to be done at 3. It's good timing.

1:01:23Nick Hilsabeck: You're going to have to do little weekly updates for us,

1:01:26Brian D. McKenzie: I think would be good. Will do.

1:01:28Nick Hilsabeck: All right, folks. Thanks for listening to my story to start. It was a little bit of a selfish episode on both of our halves. So appreciate you sticking with us. See you next week.

1:01:42Brian D. McKenzie: If anything resonated with you on today's episode and you're curious about taking your training to the next level, check out therunningpublic.com where we have a training plan to fit your needs.