Mile High Endurance Podcast Rich Soares

Welcome to Episode #339 of the 303 Endurance Podcast. You are listening to your weekly connection to coaches, experts, and pro athletes to help you reach your endurance goals. We're your hosts coach Rich Soares and 303 Chief Bill Plock. Thanks for joining us for another week of endurance interviews and discussion.
 
Our guest this week is Robyn Benincasa. Robyn is a World Champion Adventure Racer, Fire Fighter and top Keynote speaker sharing the skills that transfer from Adventure Racing to the corporate world.
 
Show Sponsor: UCAN
Take your performance to the next level with UCAN Energy and Bars made with SuperStarch®  UCAN uses SuperStarch instead of simple sugars and stimulants to fuel athletes.  UCAN keeps blood sugar steady compared to the energy spikes and crashes of sugar-based products.  Steady energy equals sustained performance and a faster finish line!
 
Use UCAN in your training and racing to fuel the healthy way, finish stronger and recover more quickly!  Use the code 303UCAN for 20% off at ucan.co/discount/303UCAN/ or ucan.co
 
 
In Today's Show
Guest: World Champion Adventure Racer and Top Keynote Speaker Robyn Benincasa Endurance News Alistair Brownlee is out of the Pho3nix Sub7 Attempt due to injury! Ironman N. America Championship in Des Moines Course Recon What's new in the 303 Triathlon and Run Races this weekend Ride the Rockies Video of the Week Robyn Benincasa and Project Athena CNN Hero  
Feature Interview: Robyn Benincasa
Robyn Benincasa has made an art form of extreme performance by competing and winning at the highest levels of sport and business. Robyn is an award-winning keynote speaker, a 20+ year veteran San Diego firefighter, a World Champion Adventure Racer, a 2014 CNN Hero, a Guinness World Record Endurance Kayaker, a New York Times best-selling author, and the Founder of The Project Athena Foundation, a non-profit dedicated to helping survivors of medical or other traumatic setbacks achieve their adventurous dreams. Robyn is known as an inspirational force for leadership, teambuilding, and extreme performance. Her game-changing keynotes have earned Robyn accolades as one of the Top 50 Keynote Speakers in the World, the #1 Female Speaker for Meetings.net, and one of the Top 10 Speakers featured by Harvard Business Review. For the past 15 years, Robyn’s keynotes have received rave reviews from user groups, associations, and Fortune 500 companies, including Starbucks, Walmart, Boeing, Johnson & Johnson, Yahoo, Intel, and more.
 
When the challenges are steep, the goals audacious, and the competition fierce, Robyn gives individuals and organizations the tools they need to inspire themselves and one another to their greatest heights and across their most challenging finish lines.
 
Post Interview:
Firefighter faces down osteoarthritis and FOUR hip replacements to break world paddleboarding record, paddling non-stop for 90 miles around Californian harbor
Robyn Benincasa broke the record in Huntington Beach Harbour
The 47-year-old is a lifelong triathlon competitor and adventure racer
But she was diagnosed with severe degenerative disease in 2007
It forced Mrs Benincasa to give up on racing altogether
So she took on paddleboarding as a new test of her endurance
 
Robyn's contact information:
robyn@projectathena.org
robyn@worldclassteams.com
 
 
Our News is sponsored by Buddy Insurance.
Buddy Insurance gives you peace of mind to enjoy your training and racing to the fullest. Buddy’s mission is simple, to help people fearlessly enjoy an active and outdoor lifestyle. 
 
Get on-demand accident insurance just in case the unexpected happens. Buddy ensures you have cash for bills fast.  This is accident insurance not health and life insurance.  Go to buddyinsurance.com and create an account.  There's no commitment or charge to create one.  Once you have an account created, it's a snap to open your phone and in a couple clicks hav

Welcome to Episode #338 of the 303 Endurance Podcast. You are listening to your weekly connection to coaches, experts, and pro athletes to help you reach your endurance goals. We're your hosts coach Rich Soares and 303 Chief Bill Plock. Thanks for joining us for another week of endurance interviews and discussion.
 
Show Sponsor: UCAN
Take your performance to the next level with UCAN Energy and Bars made with SuperStarch®  UCAN uses SuperStarch instead of simple sugars to fuel athletes.  UCAN keeps blood sugar steady compared to the energy spikes and crashes of sugar-based products.  Steady energy equals sustained performance!
 
Use UCAN in your training and racing to fuel the healthy way, finish stronger and recover more quickly!  Use the code 303UCAN for 20% off at ucan.co/discount/303UCAN/ or ucan.co
 
 
In Today's Show
Training Discussion: Lactate Threshold Test Endurance News 2022 Escape from Alcatraz Triathlon New Garmin Varia RCT715 tail light has a camera to record your crashes Why Running at Night Feels Harder What's new in the 303 Ragnar Snowmass June 9-10 Without Limits Productions Inglis Cup - SHIMANO Cyclocross Series Video of the Week Ragnar Snowmass  
Training Discussion: Lactate Threshold Test
 
Last couple of weeks we have discussed how regular testing and consistency at the correct intensities improve performance. To improve our endurance, we want to be more efficient at an aerobic intensity. To improve our speed, we want to have a higher anaerobic capacity. Besides doing "field testing" like the Swim CSS, Bike FTP and Run TT, one scientific way to test is how well the body processes muscle lactate. If you've ever done a Lactate Threshold Test (LTT), here's how the test administrator interprets the lactate measurement to determine your training zones.
 
The LTT is performed by starting the athlete a warmup at a very easy intensity. We'll use the run discipline for this example. The athlete will walk on a treadmill for 10 minutes before starting the test and once the test starts, the intensity is increased every 2 minutes. At the beginning of the 10 minutes, the test administrator takes 4 metrics - pace, rate of perceived exertion (RPE), heart rate (HR) and lactate millimoles per liter of blood with a blood sample and lab kit. The lactate compared to the pace is the primary metric and the HR and RPE are secondary but useful to confirm and interpret the data. The administrator takes those same 4 metrics at the end of the 10 minutes and every 2 minutes there after. Every 2 minutes the treadmill pace is increased by 30 seconds of pace (11:00, 10:30, 10:00, 9:30 and so on).
 
There are two key inflection points the test administrator is looking for. When the intensity is increased and the lactate level remains the same as the previous level means that the subject athlete is predominantly aerobic (zones 1-2). When the lactate level increases and levels out after each increase the athlete is in between aerobic and anaerobic (zone 3). When the lactate level continues to rise without an increase to intensity, the athlete is above lactate threshold (zone 4-5).
 
Our News is sponsored by Buddy Insurance.
Buddy Insurance gives you peace of mind to enjoy your training and racing to the fullest. Buddy’s mission is simple, to help people fearlessly enjoy an active and outdoor lifestyle. 
 
Get on-demand accident insurance just in case the unexpected happens. Buddy ensures you have cash for bills fast.  This is accident insurance not health and life insurance.  Go to buddyinsurance.com and create an account.  There's no commitment or charge to create one.  Once you have an account created, it's a snap to open your phone and in a couple clicks have coverage for the day.  Check it out!
 
Endurance News:
 
Olympians and World Champions Lead Field of Professional Triathletes Set to Compete in 2022 Escape from Alcatraz Triathlon
May 26, 2022
Reigning Champi

Welcome to Episode #337 of the 303 Endurance Podcast. You are listening to your weekly connection to coaches, experts, and pro athletes to help you reach your endurance goals. We're your hosts coach Rich Soares and 303 Chief Bill Plock. Thanks for joining us for another week of endurance interviews and discussion.
 
Format recently has been less interview focused.
 
Show Sponsor: UCAN
Take your performance to the next level with UCAN Energy and Bars made with SuperStarch®  UCAN uses SuperStarch instead of simple sugars to fuel athletes.  UCAN keeps blood sugar steady compared to the energy spikes and crashes of sugar-based products.  Steady energy equals sustained performance!
 
Use UCAN in your training and racing to fuel the healthy way, finish stronger and recover more quickly!  Use the code 303UCAN for 20% off at ucan.co/discount/303UCAN/ or ucan.co
 
 
In Today's Show
Feature Coaching Topic How Consistency Makes You Faster Endurance News New Garmin Varia RCT715 tail light has a camera to record your crashes What's new in the 303 Colorado Connections in Costa Rica Video of the Week Coast to Coast Costa Rica  
Training Discussion: Consistency Is Key
 
Last week I spoke about how regular testing of your threshold intensities in each discipline will keep training zones current to make sure you are training at the correct intensities. In that discussion I used the example of training in your threshold training intensity zone. If you want to increase your threshold power you need to train at that Z4 Threshold zone to train your body to process muscle lactate efficiently. The more time you spend in that zone, the more adaptation you get. Without the FTP number or accurate substitute, you may be training in the wrong zone (eg Z3 or Z5), neither of which create the same adaptation of teaching your body to improve lactate processing and increasing your capacity to do work.
 
I also mentioned that training regularly and progressively overloading the correct training zones over the course of 3 weeks will set you up on the 4th week for your retest. If things are working, the next FTP test is at a higher average power than the one 4 weeks earlier. You then adjust the training zones. In this case increasing the power ranges for each zone. Another 3 weeks of training at the new (accurate) zones causes another adaptation, another test, another increase, another adjustment to training zones, etc.
 
This week I'd like to build on that concept and talk about the importance of consistency in training and how inconsistency can sabotage the process and will likely result in no improvement in the month over month testing.
 
Lets first discuss the concept of progressive overload and we'll use a simple example. Last week we used training at threshold as the example, but I want to be clear that the concept of progressive overload to achieve adaptation is not limited to the threshold training zone. If we break it down to a fundamental level, there are just a few adaptations that we are trying to affect in our training. We want to adapt our body to have greater endurance (go longer) and we want adapt our speed (go faster). The faster we go for longer, the better our race performances will be.
 
To improve our endurance, we want to be more efficient at an aerobic intensity. To improve our speed, we want to have a higher anaerobic capacity. Besides doing "field testing" like the Swim CSS, Bike FTP and Run TT, one scientific way to test is how well the body processes muscle lactate. If you've ever done a Lactate Threshold Test (LTT), here's how the test administrator interprets the lactate measurement to determine your training zones.
 
The LTT is performed by starting the athlete a warmup at a very easy intensity. We'll use the run discipline for this example. The athlete will walk on a treadmill for 10 minutes before starting the test and once the test starts, the intensity is increased e

Welcome to Episode #336 of the 303 Endurance Podcast. You are listening to your weekly connection to coaches, experts, and pro athletes to help you reach your endurance goals. We're your hosts coach Rich Soares and 303 Chief Bill Plock. Thanks for joining us for another week of endurance interviews and discussion.
 
Show Sponsor: UCAN
Take your performance to the next level with UCAN Energy and Bars made with SuperStarch®  UCAN uses SuperStarch instead of simple sugars to fuel athletes.  UCAN keeps blood sugar steady compared to the energy spikes and crashes of sugar-based products.  Steady energy equals sustained performance!
 
 
 
Use UCAN in your training and racing to fuel the healthy way, finish stronger and recover more quickly!  Use the code 303UCAN for 20% off at ucan.co/discount/303UCAN/ or ucan.co
 
 
In Today's Show
Feature Coaching Topic How Testing Makes You Faster Endurance News IRONMAN World Championship Results Utah Sports Commission Expected To Create Total Economic Impact Of More Than $35m Dollars PTO Pro Am, to be held this Sunday 15 May at the Herbalife24 Triathlon Los Angeles What's new in the 303 Triathlon Races in Colorado this Season Video of the Week TBD  
Our News is sponsored by Buddy Insurance.
Buddy Insurance gives you peace of mind to enjoy your training and racing to the fullest. Buddy’s mission is simple, to help people fearlessly enjoy an active and outdoor lifestyle. 
 
Get on-demand accident insurance just in case the unexpected happens. Buddy ensures you have cash for bills fast.  This is accident insurance not health and life insurance.  Go to buddyinsurance.com and create an account.  There's no commitment or charge to create one.  Once you have an account created, it's a snap to open your phone and in a couple clicks have coverage for the day.  Check it out!
 
Training Discussion: Regular Testing
 
Regular testing to determine your threshold intensities in each discipline is an important (arguably essential) practice to getting faster. This works for new and experienced athletes. Newer athletes may find this a bit demanding, but it will help you get faster, faster. Testing regularly is particularly helpful for athletes who have some experience and find themselves plateauing in their performance.
 
Here's how the cycle works. Take bike power for example. You want to take a baseline FTP test to determine your  Functional Threshold Power. FTP is theoretically the power in Watts you can average for 45-60 minutes. This FTP becomes an anchor point for determining your training zones. Having accurately determined training zones is important for making sure you do prescribed training in the right zones.
 
For example, if you want to increase your threshold power you need to train at that Z4 Threshold zone to train your body to process muscle lactate efficiently. The more time you spend in that zone, the more adaptation you get. Without the FTP number or accurate substitute, you may be training in the wrong zone (eg Z3 or Z5), neither of which create the same adaptation of teaching your body to improve lactate processing and increasing your capacity to do work. Training regularly and progressively overloading the correct training zones over the course of 3 weeks on the 4th week you retest. If things are working, the next FTP test is at a higher average power than the one 4 weeks earlier. You then adjust the training zones. In this case increasing the power ranges for each zone. Another 3 weeks of training at the new (accurate) zones causes another adaptation, another test, another increase, another adjustment to training zones, etc.
 
Swim:
Perform a 400 time trial effort from a push (not dive). Recover for 10 to 15 minutes with easy swimming and rest. Perform a 200 time trial effort from a push. Looking to calculate CSS or CV as Meters or Yards Per Minute. The higher the number the faster your are. If you go real fast o

Today is our interview is with Suzie Snyder. Suzie Snyder (Boulder, Colo.) . USA Triathlon in March announced Suzie earned top honors for Women’s Elite Off-Road Triathlete of the Year. Snyder, 39, placed sixth at the XTERRA World Championships, and picked up wins at XTERRA Beaver Creek and XTERRA Oak Mountain. Snyder also took fifth at the XTERRA Pan American Championship in Ogden, Utah.
 
Show Sponsor: UCAN
Take your performance to the next level with UCAN Energy and Bars made with SuperStarch®  UCAN uses SuperStarch instead of simple sugars to fuel athletes.  UCAN keeps blood sugar steady compared to the energy spikes and crashes of sugar-based products.  Steady energy equals sustained performance!
 
UCAN Chocolate Peanut Butter Energy Bar is going away! It’s your last chance to get our delicious bar packed with natural peanut butter and a rich chocolate. Get it while you still can!
 
Use UCAN in your training and racing to fuel the healthy way, finish stronger and recover more quickly!  Use the code 303UCAN for 20% off at ucan.co/discount/303UCAN/ or ucan.co
 
 
In Today's Show
Feature interview with Suzie Snyder Endurance News IMWC St George What's new in the 303 NYC Ride Ride The Rockies Comparing federal eMTB rules and directives What You Need to Know About New Colorado Safety Stop Law New Bike Day and High Grade Ride Video of the Week Suzie Snyder Xterra Profile  
Our News is sponsored by Buddy Insurance.
Buddy Insurance gives you peace of mind to enjoy your training and racing to the fullest. Buddy’s mission is simple, to help people fearlessly enjoy an active and outdoor lifestyle. 
 
Get on-demand accident insurance just in case the unexpected happens. Buddy ensures you have cash for bills fast.  This is accident insurance not health and life insurance.  Go to buddyinsurance.com and create an account.  There's no commitment or charge to create one.  Once you have an account created, it's a snap to open your phone and in a couple clicks have coverage for the day.  Check it out!
 
Feature Interview: Suzie Snyder
 
SUZIE SNYDER Boulder, CO, United States
EXPERIENCE:
15 years
CERTIFICATIONS:
XTERRA Certified
Masters Degree in Exercise Science, Springfield College, MA (2006)
B.S Physical Education, Springfield College, 2004
NSCA Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist (CSCS)
USA Triathlon Level 3 Certified
USA Cycling Level 1 Certified
USA Track and Field Level 1 Certified
 
HIGH LEVEL COACHING EXPERIENCE:
My coaching experience includes athletes of all kinds; XTERRA and Ironman triathletes, road, mountain bike and cyclocross riders, and elite level tactical athletes (FBI Hostage Rescue Team, SWAT Teams & K9 Units, and US Army Special Forces teams). I've also enjoyed the challenge of coaching tactical athletes who are also competitive endurance athletes as the demands of each are significantly different and difficult to balance. 
 
PHILOSOPHY:
My passion lies in coaching anyone with a goal and a drive to challenge themselves, but feel it is also very important to emphasize balance. Endurance athletes tend to set high goals and rather than needing to be pushed, they sometimes need to be held back a touch in order to maintain balance in all aspects of life-  work, family, hobbies, training and racing, as well as balancing endurance training with strength and injury prevention. For most of us, attention to detail and doing "the little things" that we don't like or want to do can make a huge difference in both our daily lives and athletic performance, but need to be held accountable by someone else in order to actually do them!
 
Endurance News:
IRONMAN World Championship presented by Utah Sports Commission, both the female and male professional triathlons will have live race-day coverage globally via IRONMAN Now™ available on Facebook Watch as well as on NBC’s streaming service, Peacock. The live coverage will offer millions of

Welcome to Episode #334 of the 303 Endurance Podcast. You are listening to your weekly connection to coaches, experts, and pro athletes to help you reach your endurance goals. We're your hosts coach Rich Soares and 303 Chief Bill Plock. Thanks for joining us for another week of endurance interviews and discussion.
 
Today is our St George IM WC Preview Special.
 
Show Sponsor: UCAN
Take your performance to the next level with UCAN Energy and Bars made with SuperStarch®  UCAN uses SuperStarch instead of simple sugars to fuel athletes.  UCAN keeps blood sugar steady compared to the energy spikes and crashes of sugar-based products.  Steady energy equals sustained performance!
 
UCAN Chocolate Peanut Butter Energy Bar is going away! It’s your last chance to get our delicious bar packed with natural peanut butter and a rich chocolate. Get it while you still can!
 
Use UCAN in your training and racing to fuel the healthy way, finish stronger and recover more quickly!  Use the code 303UCAN for 20% off at ucan.co/discount/303UCAN/ or ucan.co
 
 
In Today's Show
Endurance News Ironman Texas last weekend Sam Long still racing St G despite being hit by a car while training IMWC St George What's new in the 303  Primal NY Bike Ride the Rockies Video of the Week Ben Hoffman & Magnus Ditlev Sprint Finish - 2022 Memorial Hermann IRONMAN Texas  
Our News is sponsored by Buddy Insurance.
Buddy Insurance gives you peace of mind to enjoy your training and racing to the fullest. Buddy’s mission is simple, to help people fearlessly enjoy an active and outdoor lifestyle. 
 
Get on-demand accident insurance just in case the unexpected happens. Buddy ensures you have cash for bills fast.  This is accident insurance not health and life insurance.  Go to buddyinsurance.com and create an account.  There's no commitment or charge to create one.  Once you have an account created, it's a snap to open your phone and in a couple clicks have coverage for the day.  Check it out!
 
Endurance News:
 
Sam Long Still On For St G
samgolong
You can’t keep a good man down.
After my 🚗 🚴 incident yesterday I am happy to report I will definitely still be at St. G in top form. It’s a reminder that there is no perfect training plan and that things happen. My team and I have modified the plan to make sure the body will be ready. One plus side is that it helps shape the mental landscape in a positive and beneficial way.
samgolong
10 days till race day. Catch up with me on @lsanderstri YouTube channel. I am fired up to race!
 
IRONMAN World Championship in St. George
Bill's readout on Mark Allen's
Mark Allen picks – Women
I think Laura Philipp is going to be the one to beat. She had an amazing 2021, she won IRONMAN Austria at 8:35, running 2:44 in the marathon. She knows how to do the distance really really well.
 
This year she crushed her opening race at IRONMAN 70.3 Dubai, winning handily. She’s on a roll and may well be the woman to beat in St George in May.
 
Laura Philipp looks perfectly placed to make a big run for victory.
Then we have Kat Matthews, who was fourth in St George at the IRONMAN 70.3 World Championship in 2021. She has experience on that course and has shown that she knows how to race in those conditions.
 
Kat was also second in 2021 at IRONMAN Tulsa behind the great Daniela Ryf – probably one of the few races last year where Daniela performed to something like her usual lofty standards.
 
Mark Allen picks – Men
Top of my list for the men is Gustav Iden – he’s showed he can put it together on the big days. He won 70.3 Worlds in Nice in 2019 and in St George in 2021. He debuted at the full distance in IRONMAN Florida in 2021, going 7:42. Not a bad time for a first Ironman I would say!
 
Gustav hasn’t raced yet in 2022, but I have seen some of the training days he is putting in and he will have no lack of fitness in St George.
 
Joi