Stay ConnectedHost Dirk Friel, Co-founder of TrainingPeaks, talks with expert guests about endurance training and racing topics. We’ll explore coaching methodologies, compelling research and leading tools that can benefit sport performance for coaches and athletes.
To learn more about how TrainingPeaks can help your training goals, visit us at trainingpeaks.com.
An athlete like Alison Tetrick brings a lot to the table. Not only does she have a long history of athletic ambition (playing NCAA tennis and dabbling in triathlon), but she is also an absolute beast on gravel.
Her coach Adam Pulford matches her completely. He calmly helps her navigate healthy recovery practices and enables her to be her truest self, even if that means turning a blind eye to her riding seven hours when she was prescribed a two-hour workout. Together, they make an undeniably successful team and a killer CoachCast episode.
If creating a true champion requires a special cocktail of raw talent, mental toughness and dedicated mentoring, Coach Jim Miller is exactly the kind of bartender you're looking for.
He comes from a long line of coaches, but never originally planned on getting into the business himself. While racing on the pro circuit as a young cyclist, Jim met his first client, Chris Baldwin at a stoplight. From there he was hooked.
Jim has worked with numerous top-level athletes and undoubtedly has a knack for finding talent in unexpected places. Listen as Dirk and Jim chat about the evolution of sport and the upcoming challenges facing Jim in 2020 and 2021.
A true legend not only in the cycling arena but in sports history as well, Kristin Armstrong has had one of the most prolific careers of all time. She began as a walk-on high school track athlete plagued by injury, transformed into a triathlete and finally honed her craft in cycling. She has finally landed with a successful coaching business, guiding the most promising young female cyclists on their journey to Olympic gold.
In the world of triathlon, Julie Dibens has pretty much done it all. From going top three in Kona, qualifying for the Olympics, winning a 70.3 and bagging many Xterra trophies, the laser-focused athlete is now a Boulder-based coach. She is dedicated to her local and remote athletes and fuels the squad with patience, empathy and cookies.
Listen to Julie and Dirk review her career achievements and explore the present-day training challenges presented by COVID-19.
If you're stuck indoors with plenty of motivation and time to train, this is the episode for you! This week we interviewed the loquacious Michael Lovato, voice of IRONMAN Live and former pro triathlete. Michael discusses what it takes to be an IRONMAN commentator—from talking for nine-and-a-half hours straight to keep an eye on athlete power output, to even strategizing around limited bathroom breaks.
He and Dirk also review his career highlights and biggest mistakes made during his time competitively racing. He even touches on how he's advising his athletes during the time of quarantine and distancing.
What do racing an IRONMAN and climbing the Rupal Face of Nanga Parbat have in common? Perhaps more than we originally thought. This week, co-author of Training for the New Alpinism and Training for the Uphill Athlete, Scott Johnston sat down with us to chat about the training commonalities between 'traditional' endurance athletes and elite alpinists.
We'll also explore the science behind Aerobic Deficiency Syndrome (or ADS) and how it feels to work with athletes such as legendary Alex Honnold and Kilian Jornet.
Coaches should always strive to build training according to their athletes' unique physiology, but how many of our training practices are weighted toward the male experience? Are you thinking about how nutrition and hydration affect performance? What about even coaching practices to increase beneficial bacteria in the gut?
Dave sat down with Dr. Stacy Sims to discuss the topics above and many more. They spoke about bad and outdated science that has led to one-size-fits-all training, how hormones affect training in performance in both men and women, and about resources that can help coaches and athletes get to the bottom of claims from supplements and nutrition claims.
Anyone who has ever stood at the starting line knows how important confidence can be for athletes embarking on a difficult race. But, as a coach, how do you help instill that confidence in your athletes before race day?
Dr. Nicole Adams has wrestled with that question much of her career as an endurance coach, sports psychologist, and an athlete. Adams recommends working with athletes to develop a healthy confidence, or self efficacy, based on training and preparation. Among other things, one of the tools discussed in this episode is a "confidence resume" or a list of all of the things an athlete has already accomplished in training that has prepared them for race day.
You have probably pushed yourself to your limit before during training or racing, but what if you could push further? As science continues to unlock mysteries about human limits and performance potential, evidence supports the idea that maybe our mind is much more important in endurance than we previously believed.
Dave sat down with Alex Hutchinson, New York Times best-selling author of Endure: Mind, Body, and the Curiously Elastic Limits of Human Performance, to discuss his career and the findings in his new book. They covered how Hutchinson approaches sports journalism, what science tells us about human endurance, and how athletes can use that information to improve their performance.
Let's face it. Even driven athletes only have 24 hours in the day.
Every athlete has limitations when it comes to how much they can train, but you should be taking more than just their available hours into consideration. Are you thinking about life stressors, recovery, and balance? All too often, athletes "burn the candle at both ends" as they try to make every workout count, and coaches sometimes only make matters worse.
Coach Shayne Gaffney explores his approach to maximizing his athletes' time while training, even if that means taking some time off.
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