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The Relaxed Running podcast is a behind the scenes conversation with the best athletes, coaches and professionals in the world of distance running. From training, hydration and nutrition to racing and recovering, we learn from the best in the world.
Relaxed conversations which are packed with actionable takeaways to help you take your running performance up a notch. Save yourself years of guess work and learn from the people who are doing it at the highest level.
Tyson (00:00.214)
Oh, wait, there we go. Record is up. There we go. Now we're good. I'll jump straight into it now. Phil, it's good to finally have a chance to actually sit down and meet your face to face. I was just saying to you before I hit record, I'm very familiar with your voice based on a number of podcasts that I've been listening to, especially in recent weeks. But I've really started to go deep into a lot of what you have to say in so many areas. It started with running and it seems the further I look, the
The further away in some context or in some regards I get from running and then it just relates right back, which is really interesting. But I've been fascinated because the last couple of years, I've really noticed a trend just even amongst community level runners about this awareness of low heart rate running for as long as I've been involved in the sport now, which is I'm 36. I started when I was about 13. So I'm starting to rack up a little bit of time for as long as I can remember the conversation had always just been around.
volume and intensity and how long you can do that for without getting injured. And if you were strong, apparently it would work. And if you weren't, well, good luck to you. I was curious just to hear from a start point. It must be so strange for you. You started writing about this stuff in the seventies to see it become so hot right now. Like what's been your take the last couple of years on, on the uptake of this approach to training, especially for endurance sports.
phil (01:27.726)
Yeah, it comes and goes. I don't know if it's the popularity or if the trend is that as the injury rates build up, people start thinking more about their health. And then more people get interested in other alternative, other options, so they don't have to kill themselves every time they go out for a run.
And so it's nice. It's nice to see that. You know, my my whole thing in the beginning was as an athlete, I was interested in sports, but as a clinician, I was interested in helping people be healthy and and get more fit at the same time. And the the trend, even when I was in school, still, it was like you say, it was.
Let's go out and run ourself into the ground and if you survive, you're going to be a really good athlete. And that's not compatible for me as a clinician with, you I want to, my goal is to help people be healthy and at the same time in sports to perform their best. So it's this game of balancing.
health and fitness. You can't sacrifice your health for more speed, for example, which is usually the way it is.
Tyson (03:00.502)
such an interesting dichotomy. And I heard you speak about this with Dr. Peter Atiyah on his podcast. I was driving home from Melbourne last night and listening to the episode. And it was really interesting because you made that exact point that a lot of the time a person will decide, okay, I want to get fit or I want to get healthy. And they'll sort of conflate the two or cross the two over and assume they're the same things. And I heard you elaborate a little bit on this and I thought it was actually something I wanted to pick your brain about in this conversation was.
A lot of the time you'll look at distance runners and my own experience was a lot like this for, for quite a number of years. I was always on the brink of being sick and had a very different training structure and method to the one that you've developed. Uh, mom was a lot about, like I said at the outset, just doing as much as you could for as long as you couldn't. My body wasn't responding and for whatever reason, it was just the way that training, especially here in Australia was done. So there weren't many people that I knew who were.
challenging my approach. It was just unfortunate that these things were happening. But I definitely related to this idea on a number of areas of my life around health and fitness. I was very fit for the most part, but my diet was quite filled with sugary products, a lot of refined carbohydrates. And I justified it all by, no, no, but you're running so many K's a week. This is a really good step for you. And I mean, I've got the feelings to prove it, but the...
The conversation for marathon runnings is a really interesting one. And I've noticed this lately, the more I've started to get more involved in marathon running once again in probably the last 12 months. And all of the fueling conversation still seems to be around a lot of refined sugars, especially in the context of staying fueled throughout the longer runs. I'd love to hear you talk a little bit around the nutrition side of things and.
just how this does cross over into the health and fitness topic because there seems to be a lot of blurry lines and a lot of mixed messages, even amongst the so -called experts in the nutrition scene, the running scene. It doesn't really matter where you come from. An expert has something to say that sort of contradicts whatever it is the other expert says.
phil (05:10.478)
Yeah, and it also matters where they come from. Are they affiliated with a magazine, a company that sells a lot of carbohydrate products? And sometimes we don't know. And the media, of course, is going to promote that because, I mean, you never see the media talking positively about
uh, meats and vegetables. Instead, they're talking about carbohydrates for fuel. And, you know, as a student, I was learning that, uh, humans are glucose based animals. Um, and it would, you know, once in a while, like I would trip over a, a, a research project or see something in a textbook that mentions fat as a fuel. And I thought, oh yeah, fat is a fuel. That's, um,
That's really important. That's how all humans, most mammals generate energy. We don't have enough carbohydrates stored and we can't eat enough carbohydrate to use glucose as a primary fuel. And so, how did humans travel these long distances? And the answer is they use fat for energy. That's a very important.
part of energy. And, you know, so as when the running boom hit worldwide, it became a global phenomenon. Carbohydrate was was the thing was the big fuel that we all needed. And protein was was not good. And of course, fat was not good, because if you eat fat, you get fat. And if you get fat, you can't run fast and
you know, it was a perfect storm to promote all the junk food that's still out there. And so for me, as a student, I learned more and more about this idea of fat burning. Generally, we eat food, we eat carbohydrates, fats, and proteins in our diet, and those things trickle down to form ATP, and that's, of course, our energy.
phil (07:36.878)
The question is how much can we get from each of those? And the fact is we can get a whole lot more energy from fat if our metabolism is working well. And if it's not, then we can't burn fat and therefore we have to burn sugar. And the classic running out of sugar in a race is hitting the wall in a marathon. But a lot of people get up in the morning and they've already hit the wall because they've used a lot of their
stored glucose during the night. And if they consume sugar, if they eat an energy bar, a typical energy bar or a sports drink before they go out the door to run, they're suppressing their fat burning even more. So fat is what I've always encouraged people to do. And it was...
Easier said than done because when you're saying to an athlete, I want you to reduce your carbohydrate intake, it increase your healthy fats and healthy proteins. They, you know, they kind of looked at me weird, but that's changing too. It's, it's a, it's slow, but sure. But we're, we're bombarded by the, uh, the junk food companies. Um, and so we're reminded every day about that and not the healthy alternatives.
Tyson (08:59.67)
Yeah. Especially in the ultra endurance scene. I mean, I'm fairly well involved in maybe not the ultra endurance scene, but sort of up to the marathon. I've spoken to a whole range of elite athletes, particularly around the marathon in recent months and even over the last couple of years. And one theme I've noticed is Zach Bitter, who was on the show maybe 18 months ago, was a lot more open to this idea of fat as fuel for the ultra endurance events.
But it seems as though the openness to the fat as a fuel for distances less than ultras, whatever distance that might be, starts to close a little more there. Like what do you think that sort of rejection or pushback is to fat as a fuel for the marathon and below? Is it purely marketing?
phil (09:49.166)
Yes, it is. It's, you know, when when we look at even a 5K, even a, you know, even shorter than 5K in a 5K race, our primary fuel can be fat. And if we have fat, then our our energy is literally unlimited because even the leanest among us has enough body fat if our metabolism is working to take us five, six hundred
miles in training, for example. And in racing, when we are going faster, we're still burning a lot of fat. There's this weird idea that when we increase our speed, we burn more and more sugar, which is true, but we don't stop burning fat. We're still burning high amounts of fat. And I've measured people in the lab where the person was running at a
like a 10k race pace and 30 % of their energy was still coming from fat. And that's that's significant in a marathon. Of course, we're going a lot slower. And so we're really burning more fat proportionately to two carbohydrates. And we so we we have unlimited stores of fat. And if we can metabolize them, then we're going to
we're gonna not tap into our glycogen stores and therefore won't bonk. And then we use our glycogen stores later on when we're doing that final kick in the marathon and those stores haven't been depleted. So they're waiting until that time. But I think part of the problem has been that...
Many, many years ago, the trend, and the trend has always been this way in, not just in sports, but in corporate life and in the military and, you know, globally, we have this no pain, no gain attitude. More is better. And so take that distorted idea of life and
phil (12:13.262)
put it into running, for example, and no pain, no gain, more is better. That means we're going to go out every day and run hard and long because that's how we train. And, you know, during the running boom, what happened was a lot of coaches, the running boom, just, it just came out of, it didn't come out of nowhere, but it, it just exploded. And suddenly there were a lot of runners and not a lot of coaches.
And a lot of coaches from track and field, when they retired or when they got bored or whatever, here was this great running market in need of coaches. And they came over from track and field and with them, they brought their training style, which is sprinting and that kind of thing. And so that's where intervals came from.
But that no pain, no gain, more is better attitude is, it's a big social problem that has hurt a lot of people and ruined a lot of careers, I should add.
Tyson (13:20.566)
Yeah, not to even mention it. So this is a conversation I had with, I'm not sure if you know Australian distance runner, Dave McNeil, he's an Olympian over I think five and 10 ,000 meters. He's competed at a couple of Olympics. He was down here, his family's got a holiday house just around the corner from me and we went for a run together. And he was saying to me that over the course of his running career, the amount of things that he's consumed, which have been terrible for his health in the name of just getting himself ready or getting himself recovered.
phil (13:31.086)
Yeah.
Tyson (13:50.07)
is something that he almost looks at, he looks forward to retiring in a way just so he doesn't have to keep feeding his body in this way. And I mean, we've had a fairly open conversation around health and nutrition. So I hope he doesn't mind me sharing that, but it seems to be a common theme. And it's one that I've become more aware of because in recent months, I've bought hook, line and sinker into the whole idea of carbs is the fuel. And especially marathon running is a relatively new event for me. I was never really.
phil (13:56.75)
You
Tyson (14:19.702)
overly interested. I was a track runner, sort of 1500 to 5K back in the day. And the idea of needing gels or carb drinks was something foreign to me. And, you know, whether that was lack of awareness or just lack of research, maybe a combination of both. I sort of found myself a little bit fish out of water. It's the one area or one big area of my knowledge around running that can really be developed. And I've been trialing different things in recent months. And the one thing that I have been trialing has been
the carb gels has been the carb drinks and the sodiums and things. But I look at the ingredients in some of these things, I go, well, surely from a health perspective, these aren't the smartest option, especially if I'm going to be doing marathon running for a long period of time. And I'm told, well, if you want to stay fueled effectively, you need to consume two or three of these on every long run. I mean, the sheer amount of sugar that comes with that from a, like a dental perspective alone, I'm not overly excited about.
That is something that very rarely gets pushed, gets pushed back on. It seems as though I'm in good company there. And then I look at a number of the elite runners in the world of running and seem to get this confirmation bias, as you say like that, or as I say, the ultra endurance scene is a lot more open to it. But what do you think it is? Is it a fear of just wasting an opportunity to get the most out of yourself or.
going against the grain and sort of failing that stopping more marathon runners in your opinion from actually embracing this more wholeheartedly.
phil (15:54.798)
Well, it's propaganda, basically. That's what good marketing is. Advertising carbohydrates everywhere we go. It's propaganda. And you hear it over and over, week after week, month after month, year after year, decade after decade. And people don't think twice. Oh, yeah. Everybody knows that if you're a marathon runner, you need a lot of...
Tyson (16:16.694)
Yeah.
phil (16:25.042)
carbohydrates. I remember in in I think it was at the Munich Olympics. So that was 1972. ABC News, you know, was was the marathon was about ready to start and they did a little segment on you know, what do marathoners eat for breakfast right before the race and the
the camera pan to a stack of pancakes like this high. And I'm just thinking, oh my God. And so A, even if pancakes were healthy, that's not what they eat right before a race. And B, it just perpetuated the myth that the more carbohydrates you eat, the better. But I think, and by the way, it's interesting you mentioned your teeth.
runners as a group have very poor health, oral health. And so the cavities, tooth decay and gum disease, very, very high in that group. Runners in particular, but athletes in general, more than the, I think more than the general population still as I've read those.
those study and it's interesting during my career, I measured the oral pH, the pH in the saliva, the acid -alkaline balance. There was a theory that began back in the 50s by the dental profession and they said that our oral pH should be more alkaline, we should be not acid and when our pH is acid,
We build the wrong bacteria, which causes tooth decay. And then there was some other research that was showing, hey, the pH of the saliva reflects fat burning and sugar burning. And I thought, wow, what a simple way to do a quick check of an athlete every time I see them and monitor that as their metabolism improves, because now they're training better and now they're eating better. Now they're burning more fat.
phil (18:48.696)
and they're losing excess body fat and which reduces inflammation. I mean, the big picture is amazing when you look at it when it comes to this idea of fat burning, but oral health improves as well. But I think the propaganda is so powerful and I equate it to the tobacco industry.
In fact, I have written in research papers that have been published in scientific journals that sugar is the new tobacco. And years ago, they had trouble with that. The reviewers and the editors said, well, do you really want to say that? Well, yeah, I do. I do. Well, maybe, maybe not. Maybe, you know. And eventually they were open to that. And just recently I read a journal.
paper on, I forgot where it was now, but it was the author said, not only is sugar the new tobacco, but it's harder to get off. And if you've ever tried to eliminate sugar or reduce carbohydrates, you know what I mean. Sugar is really quite addicting. So I think that we're blasted with all that information by
Tyson (20:11.382)
for sure.
phil (20:16.52)
like they did in tobacco years ago by the companies that sell it. And look at who's advertising in the running magazines and at the running events. Who's doing the advertising? That's where all this comes from, not from the scientific community.
Tyson (20:42.294)
Yeah. So for, I mean, I'd be, I'm sure you've got enough information here to fill up a number of podcasts just in feedback alone, but I can almost sense a number of marathon runners just pushing back to this idea. And naturally, I mean, when you've been brought up with a particular idea, as I have that carbohydrates are the best fuel for endurance sports, sometimes easier because so much of the knowledge that you've developed has been around, you know, you know, for the sake of this argument, let's say that lie.
But it's also mind blowing to think you could be that sort of blindsided to a whole other argument. And so with all of that said, I okay, well, with everyone who's listening to the podcast now is like, no, but Phil, like, I don't understand how this could be the case. I mean, elite marathon runners are still using carbs as their main fuel. And yeah, sure. Like the world of fat as fuel is starting to creep in. Like what is the, I guess, what is the response to that?
Or what is the transition, I guess. So one of the things that is daunting to me is this idea that I've had a number of friends who have tried to make the move to like a more ketogenic diet. And one of the things that a couple of them, whether or not they were doing this well, or they transitioned too quickly or didn't give himself enough time. One of the things that one of my friends said, Mark, was that he went out for a long run and he was just shocked.
at his lack of ability to actually be able to maintain any form of pace for, you know, any more than 10 cases. I just felt absolutely exhausted. And for him, that was evidence that, okay, carbs were the right fuel for him. And on a, I've never made the full leap, but when I heard that response, like, well, that makes sense. I mean, that's a great argument for this carb -fueled endurance athlete. And I imagine so many athletes would have that same critique. So.
Like to an athlete like that, how do you respond to that? Because I feel like that would be a big hurdle for a lot of athletes to try and get themselves over.
phil (22:46.03)
Sure, it's a tough, and going to a ketogenic diet is the other extreme. So now you're going from one extreme to another. Your body doesn't like extremes. Your body doesn't even like change. So if we transition from a bad diet to a good diet, your body doesn't like that during that transition period. It's like wearing different shoes. It's like...
you know, going traveling somewhere and being in a different environment with the weather different, your body has to adapt. And the same is true with with diet carbohydrates in particular, in addition to the fact that they're addicting. You have a whole metabolism you've built around carbohydrate as your primary fuel, and now you got to change that. And so it takes a while, it could take a month easily.
It can take two months. I look at it as a two month thing, but I don't look at jumping from one extreme to the other. I have something called the two week test. First of all, I want to go back just to confirm something. We've been talking about jails and things during a marathon, for example. And then we've been talking about diet.
Those are two very different things. If we're in a marathon, there are times that I recommend people consume some type of glucose product because that can be very helpful. However, when you become a better fat burner, you don't need as much of that. And if you don't need as much carbohydrate during a marathon, your gut is not as stressed as it normally would be when you're eating a lot more of it because the gut...
is adversely affected by carbohydrates, especially disaccharides like sucrose or starches, any starch, because we have to digest those things and we can't. In the middle of a marathon, our guts trying to be left alone and you put stuff in there and it...
phil (25:06.478)
doesn't go well, as many people know. It's probably the most common side effect, negative side effect in a marathon. Runners in general, gut stress is very common. So let's leave that separate. Now we've got to look at what do we do in our day -to -day eating habits. And I have something called the two -week test where people can...
make a list of their signs and symptoms. I have injuries, I have fatigue, I don't sleep well, I'm a little depressed, I have these problems, high blood pressure, whatever. Make a list of those and then get rid of all junk food for two weeks. No sugar, no refined carbohydrate, which is essentially...
all carbohydrate. It's hard. Most people have never heard of or seen the product called wheat berries. Wheat berries are those little berries that grow and that's where wheat comes from. But by the time we get it, it's highly processed. So it's junk food. And so we eliminate all that for two weeks and we monitor our signs and symptoms. Hunger and energy are
are two big ones, we shouldn't really be hungry a lot. We certainly shouldn't have cravings an hour after we eat or two hours after we eat. So you monitor that and then you could find this article online, just search mafetone two week test. And the question is how carbohydrate intolerant are you as an individual? Everybody.
is a little different. We're all unique individuals and I don't have a diet to give people. I don't say everybody should be in ketosis. I don't say, you know, this is how it should be because we're all different. We're all individuals, but we have to figure out what works for us. And so carbohydrate is the biggest stumbling block in the diet because it affects our metabolism instantly.
phil (27:27.982)
It affects our energy levels instantly. And so if we can get that figured out, the fat and protein parts of the diet fall into place very quickly. And all you have to do is go to a race and you know what I'm talking about and see how many runners today have excess body fat. It's just, it's an epidemic. And so...
to me, that's a metabolic injury. Your metabolism is really screwed up. And because you're not burning fat, you're storing it. That's how the body works. It's an important survival mechanism. And so how can we burn more body fat to A, get more energy, B, faster, and C, reduce our excess body fat, which by the way, promotes inflammation, and that's where a lot of injuries come from. But how can we...
get rid of that excess body fat because now we're gonna be lighter. We're gonna lose weight because excess body fat is usually associated with excess water, holding more water and we can get rid of weight. And if you're one or two or five kilograms lighter, 10 kilograms, I mean, it's amazing how much weight people lose, you're gonna perform better.
That's obvious. And so this health fitness thing is really one thing. It's not separate things. But what we do in our daily diet is really where it all begins. And once we develop that, and I would say that without a doubt, foods that we're eating, the makeup of our diet,
Tyson (28:54.742)
Yeah.
phil (29:23.342)
is much more important than our training routines, how we train, when, why, and distance, and this and that, and heart rate. It all starts with food because if our metabolism is not set well, everything we do in training is a little bit difficult to get through.
Tyson (29:44.374)
That makes so much sense to me. And it's interesting because for, I mean, some athletes here have this conversation and I kickstarted our conversation by speaking about the obsession with intensity and the obsession with volume and gradually, yeah, or I've at least started to see things like recovery become far more of a conversation more recently, not so recent for you. I know you've been on the ball with this for many years, but technology, especially in its current forms and its accessibility to so many athletes have.
become real hot talking points as well. But it seems that even on this show, honestly, I've had a couple of people from different backgrounds share very different ideas around the subject of diet and fueling. And what I really like about what you've said is, yeah, okay, well, a two week trial is good because as an individual, the idea of just trying to give out some blanket rule to every athlete is probably not gonna be terribly effective. So would.
Would there be exceptions to the rule, do you think, when it comes to the fat -fuelling? Would some athletes actually be better off maintaining a carbohydrate -fuelled endurance performance? Or is that purely a lack of time or commitment to a transition period that allows their body to actually make that adjustment?
phil (31:02.062)
Yeah, we can't just one day decide to reduce our carbohydrates significantly and, you know, like the ketogenic diet. I hate diets, but, you know, say, I'm, you know, so -and -so is on the ketogenic diet and he's running really well, I'm going to do that. And then you go out the next day or even the next week and you're feeling miserable. Of course you're feeling miserable. That's the expected result of making that radical change. So you have to go through the transition.
Tyson (31:12.246)
Yeah.
phil (31:32.174)
Um, the other part of it is, and I know you want to talk about heart rate. Um, but the other part of it is, are we training our aerobic system or are we more than, more than, uh, uh, the anaerobic system? So are we training our aerobic system because we're endurance athletes, which is really something that's very important. I mean, what else would you train?
You know, we're training for endurance. We're training for this longer event, whether it's 10K, which is considered a long event or a marathon or beyond. The aerobic system is our slow twitch red aerobic muscle fibers, and they take us for long periods of time without fatigue.
That's why we could walk around all day without getting fatigued because we use our aerobic muscle fibers and those fibers burn fat for energy. So now if we want to be in a sport that emphasizes its slow twitch muscles, we want to make sure our metabolism is set up so that those muscles get all the energy they can get, which is fat. And so if we...
If we reduce our carbohydrates, if we say, well, I'm not going to eat junk food anymore because it's unhealthy. There's no scientist in the world that would disagree that junk food is not unhealthy unless they work for a junk food company. And there's plenty of them. So if we go out and train our anaerobic system, in other words, if we
if we run too fast for our body's need and our heart rate goes up, now we're training our anaerobic system. We're training for the 1500 or for the, once you get beyond that 1500, the aerobic system really increases. A 1500 meter event is half aerobic and half anaerobic. So there's a huge amount of aerobic.
phil (33:54.41)
endurance, slow twitch muscle fibers working in that 1500 rays. And as you get above that in your distance, 5K, 10K, you know, we get to the marathon where 95 % of our energy comes from the aerobic system. That's our fat burning system. It's really as simple as that. So are we training that system when we go out to run? And that's where the heart rate comes in. That's where
quality training is a big factor. We want to train our aerobic system. And if our aerobic system is not working well, and we say, well, I'm going to see how good my aerobic system is, and you get tested, which you could do in a lab, but most people don't have access to that or want to spend that kind of money, they'll find that their aerobic system is trashed. So, I mean, if you're a runner,
and you've been running better and better year after year and you haven't been injured and you feel great and everything and your times are improving. Don't listen to anything I say, whatever you're doing is working. But if you're not happy with the amount of body fat you have and your energy levels and your times and you're getting injured too frequently, any injuries, this is not a contact sport. So if you get injured,
It means something is wrong. And, you know, the metabolism can cause you to be injured. Just an example is what I mentioned earlier. We store excess body fat and now that promotes inflammation. What are half the injuries that athletes get? More than half. They're ITIS injuries, Achilles tendonitis. You know, we have ITIS meaning inflammation. And so that kind of says it all.
Tyson (35:41.054)
Hmm.
phil (35:50.99)
We need to look at the big picture and all of those things fit into it. And if we're not happy with what's happening, we need an alternative. We need something better. And that's something better is get healthy.
Tyson (36:04.822)
Yeah, it's really interesting to hear you say that you've noticed throughout the years, this come in and out of trends. I mean, I'm at that age now where I've started to witness a couple of trends come in and out of fashion. Right now I've been absolutely shocked to see that those Crocs shoes have made a return on the stylish kids from university. So I've got uncles and grandparents who have somehow just found their way back into being fashionable again, but it's the first time I've...
phil (36:21.902)
Oh, really? Ugh.
Tyson (36:32.278)
I've really witnessed something that I remember from years ago coming back in. But this is another example, the low heart rate training at the moment. I'm on YouTube quite a lot. And I noticed that a lot of the trending videos are around low heart rate training for endurance performance. And I think part of that has been thanks to the likes of Jakob Ingebrigtsen and the Norwegian method and just Gustav Eden, like a number of people who have had a.
really big focus on the volume aspect of training with much less focus on the intensity or at least the intensity in the sense of what we see, at least in reference to the training that I told you I was doing for a long period of time. And so it's become a little bit sexy, like the 80 -20 method. And as a result, I mean, 12 months ago was when I pretty much made a return to running and...
Besides the odd illness and things that I referred to, I was relatively lucky as a young guy not to have too many injuries. And I mean, at the time that was a blessing maybe, but fast forward the clock eight years where I hadn't been doing any regular intense running. My attitude was, okay, well, I know how to train. I'll just train like I used to train. And I pretty much just stepped back into it and I made the adjustment way too quickly. And as a result,
I struggled a lot for about six months just with constant calf strains and not really knowing or having any awareness on how to make a return. Long story short was I gradually increased my training, started incorporating a whole lot more strength work into that. But then along the way, learnt about your method, which is how I was first introduced to you in a big way. And over the course of the last, maybe the last six months, it's been the most consistent running of.
I've probably ever done like granted I'm currently only training four days a week. I'm doing about 35 miles a week. And my goal was kind of encouraged. I'm not sure if you're familiar with, do you know Gordo Burn?
phil (38:38.56)
Names familiar?
Tyson (38:40.63)
Yeah. He's, he's been away from the sport for a long time, but he was Ultraman 2002. He's a really interesting guy to talk to. I think, I know you'd both enjoy what each other have to say. I think you have points that cross over into other scenes like each other, which is one thing I respect about you both. But I was explaining this to him on the podcast. And one of the things that he was saying is, yeah, with a focus on, you know, far less intensity, but that consistency over time.
phil (38:45.784)
Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Tyson (39:09.686)
You'll start to see some really big improvements. And I mean, this is what you've been saying since 1980, but what I've noticed is just the truth of that. I haven't been doing a lot, a lot of intense running. A lot of it's been around sort of mid zone too. And my fitness is improved rapidly. And more than that, my, my confidence in my ability to actually be able to go out there and run without injury has improved. And without any real focus on speed work, like my, my more tempo run or threshold style runs of.
have dropped significantly, which blew my mind because years ago I would have thought I had to be doing a lot of two hundreds and a lot of four hundreds at high pace in order to see any correlation to a faster running speed over a session like a tempo. And that was one thing I was really keen for you to explain to the relaxed running audience was just this phenomenon. Because I think a lot of people, again, have that misconception that you want to run fast. Well, you have to make sure that a lot of your work is just fast. Whereas,
What you say in many respects is the complete opposite of that. You can see dramatic improvements just by doing slow running relatively regularly.
phil (40:15.63)
For sure, yeah. Yeah, it might've been 1980 that I was realizing all these things were happening in what I was discovering because I was using heart monitors. I was using heart monitors before they came out. I had a cardiac monitor that was used in the hospital for cardiac patients. And it was this big bulky thing. And that's what I would test people with out on the track or out on the road.
And I realized that if they slowed down to build their aerobic system, I was trying to get them to be better fat burners and develop the aerobic system. And as they slowed down over time, as the weeks went by, they would race faster. And so I wrote an article called, Training Slow to Race Fast. And...
I've modified it over the years, but it's still one of the most popular articles I ever wrote because that concept of slowing down to get faster is just so bizarre to a lot of people. And I have a track and field background as well. And so, you know, everything was fast. That's what you do. But the difference between track and field and marathon running,
is night and day. They're not the same sport. It's not running. It's two very different states physiologically. And we need to get away from that mentality of sprinting. We need to get away from the images of, we watch a marathon on TV and we see the lead pack and they're striding out like they're running 1500 meters. That, you know, no.
Most people can't do that and they shouldn't try and they do try and they get injured and that's another discussion. But if you wanna know how well your aerobic system is working, get a heart monitor, figure out what based on your health and fitness, what your aerobic maximum heart rate should be.
phil (42:39.054)
and I have something called the 180 formula. You can look that up, go to the 180 formula, plug yourself individually, plug yourself in and determine your individual heart rate. So if you're coming up with 140 as a maximum heart rate, the question is, put your heart monitor on and go in and do your normal run, but don't go over 140 heart rate.
and see how different that is from your previous runs when you weren't trying to stay under 140 heart rate. And a lot of people get depressed because they run so slow. Well, don't blame it on me. It's because your aerobic system is trashed. And if your aerobic system, now you're saying aerobic system, you do the run today. We're not going to rely on those fast Twitch fibers. Can it do that? And...
For many people, no, it can't do that. And because the aerobic muscle fibers haven't been developed, they don't burn enough fat, and now you have to develop it. And so any sport, any activity, if we pick the wrong level to start, we're in trouble. It's like sending a kid to school, oh, let's start him in the third grade instead of kindergarten. Well, that's not a good idea.
So we need to start where our body is at. If our body's aerobic system is really just not good, then we start there. We run at a very slow pace. And what's interesting is as we develop that aerobic system now in training, and if our diet is not full of junk food, then what happens is we get faster and faster and faster.
at that same 140 heart rate or whatever your heart rate is over time. And so in the beginning, people are complaining they're running too slow.
phil (44:45.934)
after six months or a year, whenever, they're complaining they're running too fast at the same heart rate. And I've seen people go from, you know, 10 minutes a mile to seven minutes a mile over a period of time. It could take a year to go to change that much. But even if you're going from 10 minutes to nine minutes a mile,
man, you're excited and you're healthy and you're energetic. And you know what? You also race better. And I've recommended people do a base and aerobic base training period of three to six months before they do, where you don't do any anaerobic, you don't do any hard training, you don't race. You say, okay, I got to start all over. Now you're going to build a base. And I've seen,
I did a study, 229 runners, shorter distance, five to 10K runners. I gave them an aerobic base period. They trained slow. They all complained. Every one of them complained. But at the end of the period, the end of the, I forget what it was. It might've been a five month period.
77 % ran a personal best. These were all seasoned racers. And I've seen this in professionals as well. People who are injured, they're trashed, they're thinking, I guess I gotta retire. No, let's build the aerobic system. And now, okay, now we're gonna race. Well, how could I race? I've been training slow for these months. I wouldn't know how...
Your brain knows everything, actually. And so you jump into a race and I've seen amazing results because most of that race depends on the aerobic system. And the anaerobic system, the speed stuff, we always have it. We don't have to train for it. We always have it. You know, look at some people who are not training and they're walking on the street and there's a big rainstorm.
phil (47:14.862)
they sprint for some cover. They could turn their sprint anaerobic system on instantly because we're hardwired for that. But it's the aerobic system that has to be trained and the diet plays a huge role and then the training plays a huge role as well.
Tyson (47:26.166)
Yeah.
Tyson (47:35.094)
I'm so comforted to hear that you have athletes who complain that they feel like they're running too slow at the start. So as an athlete that I coach, yeah.
phil (47:41.454)
Oh, it's a universal, it's a, I mean, I'd have people call me in the, you know, in the middle of the night, you know, I can't sleep. I'm thinking about tomorrow's run. I couldn't run with my training partners. They made fun of me. I mean, that was the way it was way back. It's not so, it's not so much like that now because people, people have heard about this.
Tyson (48:06.198)
Yeah, it's, it's so funny. I had this exact conversation with one of my athletes today. So about three, two or three weeks ago, I had a call from her and she goes to us. I just want clarification on exactly how slow I'm running. So have a look at the training that I've been doing before I got to you and have a look now. And granted, I'd been listening to people like yourself for a little while. And so many of your, your methods have crept their way into the way that I write training programs.
And, and just guide the athletes that I'm working with. And this girl said the exact same thing. She goes, I just feel as though I'm getting unfit. And coincidentally, I spoke to her today and because I had her on training peaks, I'd had a look through some of her times and I've started to notice exactly what you say. You'll start to notice that there's not much of a change in heart rate, but there's a big change in pace. And she brought it up to me. She goes, I've started to notice something's changing. That's interesting because I was comforted by that.
because for quite a while I had sort of been guided by people like yourself. And it's so comforting because I think a lot of the time from a value for money perspective, I often feel pressured to throw something at an athlete, which is, you know, especially for a base period, like this particular athlete, she's aiming to run, she was going to try and run the Melbourne half marathon, which has recently sold out. She missed her spot. So we're, we're on the hunt for a race in around September or October here in Australia. So we're.
We're very much in a base period, which is even more so a stage where I just like to really develop her aerobic base. And it's so just to hear the excitement in her voice that, oh, there's another way to train that I just not heard about was just a wild experience. And to be honest, like I said before, I'm kind of midway through that realization in my own running in many respects.
phil (49:58.446)
Yeah, and you know, here's something else. If you if you say, Okay, I'm going to do this aerobic base running, I'm going to get rid of the junk food in my diet, and that's going to help my aerobic system build even faster. And I want to become a fat burner. And now you, you start getting faster, you see yourself, and you can test yourself. I like people testing themselves once a month on a course, a flat course, 140 or whatever your your heart rate is.
140, how fast can I run now in a month? It might be noticeably faster. By two months, it should be noticeably faster. Otherwise, you're not doing something right. But here you are getting faster and faster as the weeks go by, as the months go by at the same heart rate. And as you get faster, it means you're going to race faster. Why would you want to stop doing that? And so,
The question is, well, how long do we build a base for?
I encourage people to build a base for as long as they keep getting faster. Because as soon as you start speed work, your aerobic system is gonna sort of hit a plateau, which is a normal thing. Why would you wanna do that? Why wouldn't you wanna get faster? We're in a sport which is dependent on the aerobic system. But yeah, everybody, pros and beginners, they all have the same, you know.
I can't run this slow. I had an athlete, a professional triathlete, and he was training, he would average 630 pace a mile with his training friends. And he was always injured and he couldn't quite do it in competition and it was always a problem. And so we were on a track running and he had a heart monitor on and I said,
phil (51:57.166)
Okay, this is the pace you need to train at. And he's clocking the time and it's like 8 .20 a mile, two minutes essentially slower than his normal training pace. And he said, how could I run this slow, that whole thing? And I knew what he was saying. How could I be seen out there running this slow? And I'd say, well, train at night. Nobody will see you.
Tyson (52:26.294)
Hehehehehe
phil (52:27.662)
And so he got faster and faster and faster. Actually, he trained on the hills the next morning and he was averaging nine minutes a mile, but he got faster and faster and faster. And as the years went by, he was at one point years later, he was running at a 520 pace at the same heart rate. I mean,
And you don't always see those extremes. This is a professional athlete who didn't have a job. So he could be disciplined, he can put the time in, but that's how it works. I've seen people who are amateur runners who will go from that 10 minute pace to a seven minute pace or a six minute pace sometimes. And now they're amazingly healthy and amazingly fit and they're great runners for.
being an amateur.
Tyson (53:25.91)
Yeah, I can see one of the obstacles and perhaps this comes back to the umbrella of no pain, no gain, or perhaps it's more of a fear of what your coach or your other training partners are thinking of you. But a lot of my running was done with a big training group and it was always my goal, especially in sessions or tempos like thresholds or 400s or whatever it was that we were doing, that I was closer to the fastest run of them what I was last week. And I know for a fact that looking back at the way that I used to train now,
There was at least two sessions each week, which may as well have been called a race pace effort. And there was no way I would have been recovering regardless of what it was. I was telling my coach, but the idea of actually going to a training session, being guided by heart rate. Um, it's a humbling experience, whether you're out for a longer run or whether you're in a more intense environment like that, because not only does that psychological sort of game come into it where the rest of the group goes, Oh, like.
Tice or whoever it is is way off the back of the pack today, but the coach or whoever it is that's guiding you starts to ask questions as well. And so what do you say to the athlete in that situation? I'm not sure how much comfort there can be other than just wait it out and trust me, because it seems that the proof is in the pudding over a longer period of time.
phil (54:45.166)
It is. But that's the discipline of training. Training is, you know, there's a number of facets of training. The diet part is very important. The effort, the distance, the schedule, how you modify it. But discipline is a mental thing. And the discipline of training is all about monitoring your body and seeing what your individual needs are.
That's a very important thing. And you get a group of runners together to train. That's called a race. And you don't want to go there. You don't want to race every day or every week. And so, you know, do I do I am I taking the social joy out of out of all that? Well, I'm saying be disciplined and be true to your your body's needs.
You can still meet with a bunch of runners. You know, we're going to meet at eight o 'clock at the park and we're going to do this run. And then afterwards we're going to mingle and socialize and well, great. So you meet at the park. Everybody goes for a run. You go on your run. You both run an hour or you're all run at one hour. Now you're back to where you started and you can socialize. So.
You know, I understand the social aspect of running. It's a big social sport. But when we look at the surveys about, for example, people who join a gym, look at the surveys. They've always been the same. Why do people join a gym? To get fit, to get healthy, to build muscle, to do, you know. No, it's for social reasons. If you've become a runner for social reasons, you know, join.
join a bridge club or something because you're going to get hurt. And I've just seen so many people in my career that I'm sitting in front of and I'm hearing these horror stories and you've heard them, these injuries and these, you know, how they get, they hit the wall in a marathon. And I have to say, you know, you should have stayed a couch potato because you...
phil (57:10.894)
you wouldn't have been this bad off. And it's true. People get into a sport and they run themselves into the ground and it becomes like an obsession. And there's enough of that in the sport, but we need to use our brain and we need discipline. And it's really, really simple. The problem is when things are not working,
You know, what's wrong? I'm going to try this. I'm going to try. You know, it's really simple. Keep it simple. We're in an endurance sport. Build the endurance system, the aerobic system. Burn more fat. If you store too much body fat, you're obviously not doing something right. If you're injured, something's wrong. If you're not improving on a regular basis competitively, something's wrong.
You know, genetics is no, it's not genetics. It's it's we're humans and humans should improve over time.
Tyson (58:14.838)
for sure. It's amazing how many fields this correlates to. As you talk, I'm thinking about, I used to work as a day trader here on the ASX and it was very short -term trades. And I mean, it was incredible how much advice goes into making a good trade. But one of the most simple bits of advice that was the hardest to grapple with or hardest to grasp was never make a trade that's based on emotions. Like always look for a particular setup.
on a, like, depending on what way you were trading. And the best days that I had were days where, for whatever reason, I was able to get on top of the emotions and see something more clearly. And often when I journaled after a bad day, it was like, I got so excited. I was just desperate to be involved. I heard other people talking about it. And it, I mean, that's just one example. I'm sure that that crosses over into many fields, just that impact that emotion has on your capacity to do something well.
phil (59:10.99)
without a doubt, you need emotions, but we have a brain that does everything. And if one part of our brain goes astray and we follow that, we get in trouble. And I'm glad you got out of day trading because I had, when I had my clinic up in New York, I had a lot of day traders. These people were crazy.
Tyson (59:37.494)
Hehehehehe
phil (59:39.406)
And the good ones were good because like you say, they weren't trading on emotion, but the intensity, the stress of those days, so yeah, the end of the day, you don't have any, you're out of everything. So your day ends and now you're okay. But during that daily period, I mean, these people were eating four and five power bars for lunch because they couldn't,
take their eyes off the computer, you know what that's like. So all the sports are similar, but all the jobs people have, all what humans do is similar. We're human, let's be human. Let's not try to be a cheetah or something, we're not. We're humans and we wanna be the best human we can be. We can reach our individual potential.
really quite easily. We just have to balance our emotions with rational thought and individuality.
Tyson (01:00:47.798)
Yeah, I feel like I could speak to you for another 23 hours, but I know you've got plenty more to get through in your day over there. It must be what pushing eight o 'clock in the morning where you are, 7 .30. I can't remember what time it was when you started.
phil (01:00:58.094)
Yeah, 740. But you know, it's good to talk to you. I like doing things in the morning. Most people don't want to talk this early. It's great for me because my brain is, you know, my brain is going, my subconscious mind is going all night and I'm thinking of all these ideas and I'm a very creative person. So when I wake up, I've got all this stuff on my brain and this is my creative time of day up through lunch, really.
And so it's good to be here.
Tyson (01:01:26.774)
That's awesome.
Tyson (01:01:31.19)
Ah, great, it's the flip side for me, but I've got two boys under three who are sound asleep right now. So it might not be the most creative time of my day, but at least it's the quietest. And nonetheless, it was great to catch up with you. I really appreciate you making the time to come. And I was really excited to have this chat and I'll shoot you a message again soon, because I'd love to do a round two with you if you're open to it.
phil (01:01:41.346)
That's it.
phil (01:01:54.318)
Sure, sure, this is a good time of year. I don't have any big projects. You know, get done a big project and then you think, gosh, is this it? Is this it? Is my life over now? And I mean, I've thought that way my whole career. I thought, wow, I've got this heart rate stuff now. I guess that's going to be it for my career. Oh, wait a minute, I'm only 25. So I still do that. This is a good time.
Tyson (01:02:19.574)
Heheheheh
phil (01:02:23.95)
You know, I'm not stuck on the, um, in a research project or though that can change in the coming, coming weeks, but yeah. Yeah. Keep in touch and, uh, give me, uh, give me a shout when the podcast comes out and I'll help promote it.
Tyson (01:02:40.566)
Awesome, Phil. Hey, thanks again. I'll leave it there.
phil (01:02:43.246)
Thanks, Tyson.
Tyson (01:02:45.174)
Beautiful man. That was a great conversation. Thank you so much for that. That was a