#89: How Andy Qualified for Boston: 4:12 to 3:26 with Low HR Training

There's an emotional component to running and there's a technical component to it, and unfortunately, to endure for the long run, you've kind of got to get a minimum technical awareness, if you like. But all of that's pointless if you don't find a way to make running part of your life. If you can build running into your friend network, into how you spend your Saturday morning, into always how you travel for work, that you take your running shoes and you find one really cool spot to go running or something, you'll find it a lot more enjoyable. And if it's enjoyable, the technical and the hard work side of running just comes a lot easier. But mostly find a way to make it part of your life and enjoy it and find some running friends. They're the best friends on the planet.

Quick favor to ask you. 80% of the people watching the videos on my YouTube channel are not subscribed. If you could, it would mean the world to me to like and subscribe to this channel and this video. It really helps me get this video in front of more people and also helps me book more great future guests. So thank you very much for doing that. Today's guest is Andy Wheatcroft. He is a 57-year-old runner from Dallas, Texas. He is also one of the members in our Personal Best Running Coaching Program. He has learned a lot over the last decade plus of marathon running, and he had this big audacious goal of qualifying for the Boston Marathon even though the doctors told him you will I'll never run another marathon again. And so he found his own way, and he actually ended up improving gradually over time. And eventually, after 10 years, he was able to fulfill that dream of qualifying for the Boston Marathon. And in this video, we actually talk through the different things that he learned in his training and in his racing and in his daily life as well. All of the little changes that he ended up making that helped him set himself up for success. This episode was brought to you by LMNT, a delicious electrolyte drink mix that I drink every single day. It helps me replenish my electrolytes without the sugar or other dodgy ingredients. Now that the colder months are here in the US and many other parts of the world, you can enjoy LMNT as a hot beverage as well. The Chocolate Madly is only available for a limited time when the temperatures drop. You can enjoy them on their own, you can mix them in with your coffee, or you can get creative with other recipes. Each box includes 10 chocolate raspberry, 10 chocolate chai, and 10 chocolate mint. For a limited time only, you can get a free sample pack with 8 different flavors when you go to drinkelementtea.com/flow. As always, Elements offers a no-questions-asked refund policy, so you can try it, and if you don't like it, you can get your money back. Hope you enjoy my conversation with Andy Wheatcroft. Andy, welcome to the Extra Miler Show. I'm excited to record this conversation.

Hey, Floris, I'm excited to share a discussion about running with you. It's my favorite subject.

Absolutely. You and I were on a Zoom call earlier this week, and from time to time we catch up, and it's been really inspiring to see your running journey over the years, like just your improvements, your dedication, your ups and downs. And you always share so many good insights that I think resonates so well with the non-elite recreational runner. So I kind of want to start out with, on your Facebook profile, it used to read, ex-unfit tub of blubber chasing the unicorn. Tell me a little bit more about that.

Oh, boy. Yeah, I'll try. Yes. So a trick with improvement is always starting with a low base. I am probably the least talented person you've ever interviewed on this show. I can say that for a fact. So Oh, yes.

There's talents in many different ways and shapes and forms.

Yeah, my talent's more mental than it is physical, and I guess we'll get into that. But yeah, so I know 15 years ago, mid-40s, I tried a couple of times to run, but I always kind of gave up. Life kept getting in the way. I always thought running was super cool because in my mind, the two people I knew that ran were James Bond after he just had a really great date with some attractive lady on a beach somewhere, Magnum P.I., that was my, you know, and so growing up in the UK, that was quite a big impression on me. And I grew up actually in the early '80s seeing the London Marathon being created and watching it on TV and just being in awe of these non-human beings that were doing that thing. And so, So, for me, it was always cool, but I was never consistent. And then, 14 years ago, I promise this story has a happy ending, but again, just like my running, it has quite a low starting point. But I was like a lot of people, I was just a regular guy, not exercised since high school seriously or consistently. I was 50 pounds overweight. My father had just passed away, age 60, about 2 years before the start of this story. With lifestyle-related atherosclerosis. So that was a shock. I just had my second child, and so I was a proper father with responsibilities. I was a relatively senior executive at a US multinational company, and we'd just gone into 2009-10, and I felt like I just had no control over my life, like zero. I was not healthy, I'd got asthma, I was firing people that didn't deserve to be fired every day. The recession was quite a big thing for us, and just something had to change. And around that time, one of the group presidents ran an executive training program and he did a little bit piece on work-life balance and his perspective. And the short version of that story is healthy body, healthy mind, plan the rest of your life with the same rigor that you plan your work life. And he included being a runner. He said he, and the upshot of that was to become a corporate athlete. He challenged me afterwards, just to run for 28 days solid. He said, I don't care if it's a mile, I don't care how far it is, I don't care how quick it is. On your integrity, you just run for 28 days. And on the 29th day, send me an email. You will either fall in love with it or you'll never want to do it again. Either way, you'll make a positive decision. And I don't know how it happened. I didn't email him until like day 40, 'cause I forgot, 'cause I was still running. I'd somehow, I was hating it, and loving it at the same time. As if by magic along that way, and I'd recommend this to a lot of runners who are struggling to get into good races and motivation, my then 7-year-old son came home from school and one of his little buddies needed, had a brain tumor. He needed proton therapy in the US and we didn't have it. And so I decided to fundraise for my son's friend, Toby,. And there was a 5K race coming up. So I had a couple of carrots in there and I subsequently ran a lot for charity. I think I probably raised about 150 grand in my early running career, which is how I got to some of the big races. But before I found a deep love and some sort of routine for running, it helped me on those rainy days because I was training for something that was a little bit more important than I was. And so, you know, I think, you know, that was a great bridge for me at the time and a bigger purpose.

It's interesting how once again there's one catalyst like that, right? And it's often it stacks up on top of each other. It's like literally what you just explained, that part of like your, your second child realizing you're somewhat out of shape. Like there's the recession, there was a lot of stress going on. I remember that time, 2008, '09, '10. Like I worked for a publicly traded retailer at the time, or a publicly traded retail or brand, Volcom at the time. And it was similar. It was a lot of hype, high pressure and people getting fired left and right. And so I think it can be one of those catalysts. And same with me. Like once I became a dad, it was this thing of like, I don't want to be an out of shape dad. I don't want to like, I want to set the right example to my children, to my family and whatnot.

So yeah. Especially if you're an older dad, we like a lot of people, we, you know, people don't have kids age 18 anymore. So it's a bigger deal. So, so yeah. And then, you know, that was a catalyst. We'll probably get into some detail, but then 11 years ago, the Boston Bombs went off, and that was, that was a catalyst for me to kick it up a notch from a happy just less than 4-hour finisher to— I woke up the day after, you know, um, uh, thinking, those SOBs, they're not going to tell me I'm not running. I'm going to run Boston, screw that. And then I went to bed at 4 AM, and the day afterwards I thought, well, I'd run two majors by that time, London and Chicago. And then I realized that actually you've got to do what for Boston? And it was like an hour plus time difference. And I was like, holy, you know, and that helped me kind of kick it up a notch a little bit. So it's a really, you know, too, a big milestone to get me running at all. I'll share how badly that went in a while, but And then my aspirations to be a serious runner was the day the Boston— the minute the Boston Bombs went off. I, I had a friend who made it through the finish chute by a minute, and she, she had, um, all sorts of, of agoraphobia afterwards. I mean, she was luckier relative to a lot of people, but, you know, that affected me quite deeply. And, uh, so, so again, you know, I, I'm a big believer in truly understanding your why, because that's when the going gets tough. To me at least, that's where I've got to go.

Totally. Let's backtrack a little bit. How was your first marathon experience like? How did that go? How was your training leading up to it? How did the actual race day unfold and what was your finish time?

Yeah, so the good news about this is I failed to hit my target, which is the only reason I ever ran a second one. But yeah, from my tub of blubber days, I started off with a with a 5K, and I had a 2.1-mile circuit where I lived, and my goal was to not stop and walk. I think 15 times was my initial. I used to run 100 yards and literally stop and throw up at the side of the road. I was so out of shape, it was unbelievable. So again, I like to think I have a sense of humor, but it's not a joke. I really was morbidly out of shape. It took me about 2 months to a stage where I could run the whole 2.1, which I said I would call myself a runner. And as I ran across the park, which was 0.15 miles from our house back then, I ran past the kids that I always used to run past who hurled abuse at me, you know, because they're British, they had to be sarcastic, you know. Run, Fat Boy, Run was a movie that was on at the time.

I remember that.

So, and then I ran past them and I think I'm going to make this, I'm actually not going to stop. And as I ran past, they shouted, Michael Jackson's dead. And I thought, well, that's an interesting turn of abuse and sarcasm. And so I walked through the door, my wife says, you'll never guess. I said, yeah, I know, I ran the whole way, 2.1 miles. Oh, and by the way, Michael Jackson's died. And she said, how did you know that? It's just come on the TV like a minute ago. I said, oh, my friends in the park just told me. So the day I became a runner was the day, ironically, Michael Jackson died. So I made it through that. I crawled across a 5K finish line sprinted the first 300 yards and suffered the rest in my tennis shoes. I got the wrong shoes on at the time. I then signed up to a 10K and then I remember I felt guilty watching the half marathoners cross the line. And so I signed up for the following year half marathon in 2010. And then I went to a running store and let them laugh at me at my tennis shoes that I were expensive tennis shoes, but the wrong shoes. I did the half marathon. I was quite proud of myself. I did it in like an hour and 55 or something like that. Which was great. I ran it with shin splints and I paid no attention to it and they got worse. My wife's also British, so I wasn't a hero at the finish. She just laughed at me and said, in 4 months' time, because I just got into London a week before, you've gotta turn around and do that again. She said it was highly amusing. And I was expecting ticker tape and, you know, you're a hero, daddy, and all that sort of thing. But apparently, and I actually had a procedure If there's one truth in my story, it's that I'm relentless. I have no talent, but I am relentless. And so everybody told me to stop running. I went to 5 doctors and I met an ex-Afghan War colonel who said, I'm doing this experimental shin splint surgery. What do you think? He said, it's only soft tissue damage. You know, we'll slice you 12 inches, we'll shave all the bone fragments out, we'll stick it back together. He said, The good news is, the nurse was feeling queasy at the time when he was explaining it. They said, the good news is that it's only soft tissue damage, which means you're on a bike in 3 weeks. The staples come out in 2 weeks, you're on a bike in 3, you're walking in 4, you're jogging in 6. And I did the math. He said, do you wanna think about it? I said, no, can you do it tomorrow? Because this was like December. I said, I've got my first marathon in April. So the sooner you do it, the sooner I can start training. So, and then I selfishly said, 'Plus, I've got the Christmas vacation, so I can do nothing on the sofa all over Christmas and my family can do everything.' So, I started running for London late. I tried to do sort of a Hal Higdon type standard, you know, newbie marathon thing. I just about got to 18, 20 miles 'cause I ran outta time. It was a short window of time. And I ran London for the NSPCC with a team that raised $1 million that day. So, that was part of my, I'm not quitting because story. And I really wanted to often, but, and we ran London in 2011, beautiful day. I was heading for sub-4 hours. I kept saying sub-4, don't have to do this again, I can tick it off, life's great. And then I got to about 20 miles and the Gatorade was going sticky at that stage, and it was just enough to trigger the wall.. And then I hated everything about my life for a while. And, you know, I thought about my wife and the boys, and she gave me two beautiful boys, and the second one she did without drugs, and what a hero she was. And that kept me going until I realized, hang on, she had drugs, that's not fair. I get no drugs here. And I suffered. 4 hours 12, 4 hours 15 minutes, just short of, was my first pathetic attempt. But the feeling I felt when I crossed the finish line, I know some of your listeners, most of your listeners will probably know. I know a lot of them don't, they're on the curve. But the run of the mile is like some, something not earthly picks you up and carries you across the line. It's just magical. I remember crying for about a good 5 minutes, you know, because of the, just everything really. It just, I'd never believed that this guy that couldn't run 100 feet without throwing up, it was just magical. So yeah, so that was my first one. So failure was my biggest success, probably.

It is so fascinating though, because when you zoom out and you look at the progress you have made at that point, going from not being able to run for 100 meters and having to catch your breath to finishing a marathon in 4 hours 15 minutes, which is a very respectable acceptable time for, for many people for a marathon. And even if you look at marathon averages, yeah, everyone has a different ceiling. And I think it's so funny how we sometimes put so much pressure on ourselves, even with like, let's say you're going to run your first half marathon or your first marathon. And I think number one goal should be get to the finish line healthy, alive, and well. Should be any time goal. Like, just put it out of the way. Like, just gain that experience of what is it like. And I know it is so easy. Like when we're training at certain paces and we have all sorts of expectations. I did this in the half marathon, so I should be able to do that in the full. And like, 1 1 is not 2. And, and I think when you've never experienced what it's like to get to mile 20 or 32K in, you realize like, oh man, marathons are hard. And you just have to go through those experiences first.

But yeah, yeah, I'm British and I taught myself some new swear words. I already knew what I'm doing.

So yeah, yeah, yeah. But then again, like, I think that when surrender and you allow some of those emotions to come in, it is a beautiful experience. It really is. Like, I think you're stripped raw from, from sometimes people are so careful of not showing any emotions, like to the outside. And all of a sudden, once you're so stripped raw, you see the realness. That's why I love hanging out at mile 20 or at the finish line of a race because you see the true people within coming through.

So yeah. Yeah. You, you, you found the thing I found was uh, there's a difference between being selfish and self-interested. And I think runners are very self-interested, sometimes selfish, obviously, but because of the time commitment. But, but just that feeling of finding out who you really are, and you can only really find that out when you've got a thousand reasons to quit and you choose not to. It, to me, that's one of the big turn-ons, if you like, of this whole running business. Yeah.

And so what year was that that you finished your first marathon?

2011. I think I'd been running for 2 years by that stage, just about.

So 2011, and you had to shave off an hour, about an hour for you to qualify for Boston. So tell me high level, how long did that take you and what were some of your main learnings across the way to shave off your time from 4 hours 15 to whatever time you needed.

Yeah, so luckily I got older, so it became 3, 3, 3:20, just over 3:20. So 3:26 and 1 second, 3:26 and 1.4 seconds. I don't know why you brought that 1.4 seconds up. It really irritates me, but still. So, but yeah, I, we then moved to the US with the company I was working for at the time in late 2011. And I, I got into Boston and ran with some good friends over here. That helped quite a bit.

But hold on, you said you got into Boston, you moved to Boston.

I said so sorry. We moved to the US in 2011 to a place called Peoria, Illinois, in the middle of the Middle west.

So. Right on. No, I just wanted to make sure you didn't qualify for Boston.

No. 2011. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. That, that was a lot further. I just didn't know about Boston. All I knew about Boston was that it was just one of the, the 5 or 6 majors. I kept forgetting whether it was 5 or 6 because I was a new runner. And so, um, I ran Chicago, and that was fairly easy because back then it was first come, first served, you know. If you dialed in quickly when it opened up, there was no lottery, you got in. So I ran Chicago, thought I was really fit, and Michigan Avenue just kicked my ass. I, I I turned from Chinatown and it just looked like that road went on forever, like it was an optical illusion, like I was never going to finish. But I beat 4 hours at Chicago in 2012, 3 hours 52, I think was my number back then.

And what was the difference then between first marathon and second? Was it just more training? Was it better race day strategy?

How did you improve? It was more training. It was more traditional training, but It was short-term gain training, I want to say. So, you know, I made myself suffer. I tapered too long. There's quite a few errors looking back then. It was check the box training. There we go. So I checked more boxes is all that happened because I had a few more weeks, a few more miles in between. I did probably 1 or 2 extra long runs, which was 18, 20 miles in my mindset back then. And my mindset back then was just checking the box and I've done it. That's all I need to do. So there was no no quality aspect to it or no like strategy for my long run. It was just doing it. And so, and I burnt out, you know, I was just not capable of crossing the wall even then. I failed to get into New York. New York was always my passion to get in because New York's the model for every big city marathon. London copied the model, you know, the argument that you use to get a mayor to close his town, his city down for you for a day, you know, in terms of the charitable aspect and how that, the finances of how that worked. That's all Fred Lebow. And London was modeled on that. So, and New York's really cool. I didn't get in. And then because I raised money for a kids' charity when I ran Chicago, my wife mentioned it to them and they invited me to go give a talk. And the short version of that is that they weren't raising money through running. I'd say, well, I'll start this running charitable foundation off for you, but I need 40 people to sign up before they leave the room, and I get to choose the first marathon that we run. So I applied to New York on behalf of Easterseals Central Illinois, and we eventually got 10, 10 places, and we ran it, and it was awesome. And we ran with, with people like Josh George, uh, you know, the, the Paralympic— he became one of our ambassadors— and Tatiana McFadden as well, who I, I got to through that endeavor as well. So that was great. And I ran New York in 3:51 or something. It was very painful. You know New York, right? So those bridges.

A lot of ridges. Yeah, there was ridges that most people underestimate.

So my training was better, but I paid no attention to the profile of the course that I was about to run in my training. And it caught me. But that was the first race I saw my family, which was kind of nice. That's hard to do.. And that was just wonderful. And then it took me 3 hours 52 minutes, I think, to walk back from the start line all the way back to my hotel.

It felt like anyway.

That is such a long way. But I just felt that was magical. And then I did Chicago a second time the year after that. And then I think I did Marine Corps the year after that, which is a wonderful non-major marathon. Lots of reasons behind that. That was very inspiring. And eventually, I almost got a BQ in 2016. I bonked at the Air Force Marathon, pulled something slightly. So I limped it in and I was so fit and I was so pissed that I ran the Naperville Marathon up by Chicago. It was like, I looked at the calendar, I was like, right, I'm so mad. And before I left, the Air Force Marathon, I'd already booked 6 weeks out the next one because I thought, I'm so fit, I just, I'm so mad. And I did like a 3:31 because I'd just been doing lots and lots and lots of mileage. As it turned out, unhealthy mileage, because I started feeling a pain in my hip later that year. And this is how I get into math, which I guess we'll get to, but I did it. I didn't hit the wall for the first time because I did so much volume. But it was a mixture of Hal Higdon and Fitzinger and, and, uh, Hansons. It was kind of a mishmash of the technical— I was obsessed with the technical nature of it without thinking it all the way through. And, uh, I eventually needed hip surgery. So, oh wow, I thought my career— so, 20s, late 2017, all the doctors were telling me that my running was over. I got a torn labrum in my and I should think about 5 or 10Ks or maybe the bike, which is, by the way, why I'm so anti-cyclist and pickleball.

I just want to say it's not just cycling. I've seen the pickleball too, but that was more your tennis background. The pickleball hate is our ongoing joke in the Personal Best Facebook group where I give my weekly updates, and that usually includes running, strength training, and lately pickleball. And Andy is always the first I just want to point out that pickleball doesn't count.

Yeah, you're too young for pickleball.

They can't take you alive. You just haven't caught on the bug yet. So much fun. No. Anyhow, so the hip injury, that was purely a part of overuse for you? Was that too many mileage, too much high intensity? Was this too much of a possibly running wrong running technique combination of?

Yeah, I think all of the above. I think So after going to 5 doctors, I found one who was apparently the best in the US at Northwestern University up in Chicago. And this guy took care of the Olympic team, the Bears, the Blackhawks. So the dude knew what fixing people was all about. And there was a little small bone nodule in there that might have been a little stress concentrator, but he said that's not normal. And so, so he fixed me. He laparoscopically fixed me. And I remember, I remember him saying to me, are you going to go in straight lines or are you going to zigzag when I've fixed you? And I said, what do you mean? He said, well, if you tell me that you're only going to run, there's a way I can put the, the calcificating stitches in there that means I probably will never see you again. If you tell me you're going to do basketball or Pickleball wasn't invented then, it wasn't even a thing. He said, "The zigzag thing is more stressful and I can't give you the same guarantee." So I said, "No, no, I'm only running." Part of my zealousness reason really. And so he fixed me and it was a long, slow recovery 'cause it's cartilage. But my running career was over. This is me probably running a 5K again again, probably, maybe. But that was 2017? 2018. And I don't know, I was so pissed one day 'cause the recovery was going so slow, I entered the New York Marathon lottery for 2019 not expecting to get in. And I got in. And around that time he was telling me to start exercising and he said, 'Look, you need to be smart and careful about that.' I said, 'What do you mean by that?' He said, 'Well, whatever training you did before, don't do that.' So I said, 'Okay, I can train, but I think I've checked all the boxes of all the major training programs.' And that's when I found you, 2018. You've been doing it a year or two, and, and the first one I, I remember was Josh Sambrook. I think, um, that was particularly impressive to me.

And Jeff Silver, I think I saw a Canadian, I think, as I remember, from Toronto.

Yeah. And, um, because what I needed was something more intelligent. I needed to safely build miles and to work on smart, smart efficiency, if you like, or be smarter about efficiency, and not necessarily rely on no pain, no gain, or all pain, hopefully some gain. It was that injury that that did a couple of things for me. It was one, you've been posting to a couple of folks on your Facebook page today that I swear that injury is running's way of making you fall in love with it again, make you appreciate it. You know, a long-term injury, you know, however much you're suffering on a hot day, all you've got to do is think, well, I couldn't run at all this time last year, so why am I being such a wimp? You know, get over it. So there was that. I went on a business trip, had too many martinis in the UK, left my favorite 2013 New York City quarter zip jacket, a coat, sweater, sorry, in a bar somewhere and I lost it. I just thought, well, the only way I can get another New York top that I can credibly wear is I've got to go run it again. So all of that added up and I got in. And like I say, I was looking for, I can't remember what the Google search was that found you. It was maybe it was a smart Dutch guy does awesome training and coaching. Maybe that's what I put in Google. I can't remember. But that's what it gave me. And, you know, listening to Dr. Phil, for some of your listeners, if you've not, go back and listen to podcasts 1 through 20. I'd still replay some of them even today, as good as the Kipchoge interviews are, but some of those early ones.

It's funny you say that because I'm in the middle of writing my first book and it's basically a summary of all of the podcasts done so far on top of some of my own lessons learned over the years. But it's been fascinating. I have about 2,000 pages of transcripts that I've been going through for months and months, and many of those are from the first podcast episodes. And it is interesting indeed, like some of this stuff, it's so timeless because literally like some of these first conversations with Dr. Phil Maffetone or like you're saying with Jeffrey Silver or some of these, that's a long time ago, yet these lessons, they don't expire. And so a lot of these, like whatever worked back then still works back like at this point.

So the thing that really got me was, and it's probably why I was injured, Running was about watching Paula Radcliffe beat the world record. It was some sort of like time-based, no pain, no gain enterprise. But the type, the mix of guests you had on early on, it was like, hang on, Jeff Silver ran slower than me on his first marathon and now he's doing 3 hours 15, or I can't remember exactly, but it was something like that. And I think, oh, maybe it's me, which as a male and older of the species, that's a difficult thing to, maybe I I could do this and I'm just, maybe it's my fault. Oh no, if it is, then I can do something about it. So, you know, it was kind of that. And because of that, my sort of desire to try and run Boston from 2013, and I was still, I couldn't get beyond 3:45, 3:38. And then I had that run that got me injured at 3:31. I just, I'm I'm just never going to get there. And in training for New York, through primarily math, I don't think I did any aggressive hard tempo runs at all because I was nervous about the start line and making it so I can buy another sweater, a logo there. But, you know, I was just shocked at the— on race day, I just felt so calm. Up to that point, at the start of every marathon set, I was doing what people do wrong, but I was obsessed. I was obsessed with the goal. And not obsessed with the process. And, and, you know, a lot of new, new marathoners, it'd say to me, okay, it's my first marathon, what pace should I run? It's like week 2 of their training. And I just said, well, have a range first of all, don't have a point, and don't make that call until you're about 4-6 weeks out and see where you are. And then you can make an intelligent call. Because one of my old bosses used to say Who gets to choose what sort of day you have? That's true on marathon day. If you say, I've got to Boston qualify and you're 50 minutes short of it, you're a failure in your own mind. If you say, I want to do a 3-minute PR and you do a 7-minute PR, then you're a success. So happiness is largely down to your mindset in a lot of this.

And to add to that, I don't even think it always has to be a PR either. I've literally had it where I'm coming back from having certain injuries are coming back from like not training consistent for a while and just getting to the finish line of a race to gain some more race experience again, to gain some more of what does it feel like to get to mile 20 of a marathon or to mile 10 of a half marathon? Like just those things alone, right? I feel like sometimes we're so indeed obsessed with the goal finish time versus that process.

That's very well said. And I'm glad you mentioned that because the funny part of that, that New York story actually is that I was 6 years older. I'd only run MAF. I'd had a year and almost a year and a half off really by the time we'd got through the issues. And I ran a 6-minute better than my 6-year younger self finish time in New York. And I didn't bonk. I bossed the pain in the last, on Fifth Avenue. I waved to the crowd. It was a beautiful fall day. I can remember the trees. You know, the difference between when, and that's something I tell I tell new marathon runners as well is the biggest wolf is often having the courage to try and negative split, you know, not banking anything and even being prepared to run a worse time. But either way, just figuring out being conservative and the start means that you'll have 100 times better experience beyond mile 20. You'll love every step, you'll slap every hand, you'll smile at every face, you'll stop and hug your family if you see them. And you'll finish well, and you'll finish with a big smile on your face. But it's tough. And I would say of the many things that maths taught me, it's actually that, you know, the ability to link my pace with my heart rate over an extended period of time. You know, my 2-hour math runs, you know, I used to play with being present and breathing and all sorts of different things on the track and just seeing if, if on that lap my heart rate was lower and just to try and figure out what worked for me. You can't do that in a tempo run. You can't do that on a hill set. You can't do that on a summer long run when you're dying because you just want to survive.

Totally. One of the main benefits I feel from the whole journey of starting to train with low heart rate or high heart rate or a healthy heart rate, whatever heart rate zone really, I think just becoming more aware of the signals of your body. When you wake up in the morning, what's your resting heart rate? How are your energy levels like? But even when you're running, like what you're saying there, when you go to a track and you experiment with running form, breathing technique, running with or without music, and just seeing how much of an impact that can have on your state of relaxation, your state of running. And realistically, if you're able to go out there on a 2-hour run and you're able to run at a heart rate that's 5 beats lower, it, it will be like your, your recovery from some of those is it's gonna be beneficial. Even, even on race day, that experience that you had running New York time that second time and being able to race, probably your heart rate was 10 or 15 beats lower because all of a sudden towards the end, you still have the energy left and you're still able to like, And that's purely you training enough time in a low heart rate zone and still going out on race day and running a smart race. Because there's plenty of people who go out and train a certain way, but then on race day, it's not that you're not racing at a higher heart rate, it's just how are you evenly distributing some of that energy?

Yeah, I think when I got beyond that, I still was failing from a Boston perspective. I still really wasn't making a dent on it. And it's just, you know, I think, um, there was a point in time I used to love running sunrises by myself with Math because surviving the run, you're experiencing the run. You can listen to the birds, you can see the sunrise, you can watch the sun reflect off the lake and, and just appreciate, you know, the crunch of, of, of the leaves under your feet and those sorts of things. So So I used to solve all of my difficult work problems while I was running. I used to figure out something that had been troubling me while I was running. But typically it was only ever when I was doing math because I was in this sort of flow state, I suppose, but almost meditative state. I subsequently moved to Dallas in early '22 and there was a couple of transformational things that happened then. I arrived and straight away ran with a local running group, a big running group, the White Rock Running Co-op, a big shout out to those guys. But they're a huge running group. We'd often run 100+ people in summertime, 200 people sometimes with other groups.

And is Andrea Hudson, does she sometimes run there as well?

And that's how I met Andrea. So Andrea's part of my journey too, completely randomly, completely randomly, that crazy German chick.

That is one of the— She's early 60s. She has been on the Extra Mile Show as well. We'll make sure to link to that as well on the show.

Yeah. And people should listen to that because she's very, very wise. So I was in Boston qualifying shape for the 22 Miza Marathon. I picked it because it was a mostly downhill marathon with a flat, and I bonked. I completely screwed it up. So when I got back, On a math run, I went through this inventory. I said, okay, we've gotta figure this out. I came up with a 10-point plan, which I'd be happy to share. I wrote it down, I put it on a PowerPoint slide, I put it on the wall, and I just said to myself things like, you know, I've gotta stop worrying about this time. Boston might happen in 20 years from now. Let's stop worrying about it being this race. Let's just be in Boston shape and it happens whenever it happens. Large US company I used to work for, when we were doing strategy, we used to talk about blue dot strategy. So once every 5 or 10 years, you do your version of a man on the moon by the end of the decade. But we used to say, well, the planet's so far away, all you can see is a blue dot. You can't see any detail, but you know which direction to head. Doesn't really matter when you get there. What matters is that every year you're getting an inch closer. That's all that really matters. In fact, if you never get there, it doesn't make any difference. It provides provides whatever spark you need to get to the moon. I mean, JFK said that. There was lots of problems to solve, but essentially they just had to solve life support, navigation, and propulsion. I mean, so if you can take all of your running problems and boil it down into what are the three legs of this stool that I've got to figure out, then all of the other— So for me, I had that moment and it was like mind, body, and execution. And then I created a couple of sub-goals under that, but it was like, focus on the process. Let's, let's focus on the process. And from that day, whether I was training for a marathon or not, I was running 6 days a week. I had hills on Wednesday, track on Tuesday, long runs Saturday, and everything else was easy runs. I just— the mileage went up a little bit. So I created a habit that was part of my lifestyle. Smart training, you know, the 80/20 stuff. Andrea, again, you— I'm not sure if she talked about this on the podcast or not, I stumbled into her the set that I was trying to BQ on for Glass City. If you want to BQ, by the way, Glass City is an awesome race, right time of the year, but right profile. But I just started doing a long run and she was targeting going sub-3:30. 3:35 was my time at the time. So I said, yeah, my goal was 3:30. And so she said, oh, let's do the long runs together. I'd only met her a week or two before. And Andrea always beasted me harder than I wanted to go. I said, okay, I've got 22 next week. She says, oh no, I'm doing 24. I said, okay, anything for you. And then I'd show up, I said, how are we doing this, Andrea? She said, well, okay, we're going to do 2 easy, and then we're going to, we're going to negative weight some, some tempos. So what does that mean? He said, well, we're going to do 2 easy, then 3 hard, then 2 easy, then 3 hard, then 4 easy, and then we're going to do the last 6 hard to replicate, you know, the back end of a marathon. What? What? So, so, so I, I clung on with with, with Andrea, and, and, and my long runs all of a sudden had a real specific point, and I started to enjoy them, actually. I, I, I stopped just seeing it as something that I got to check off. I, I, I look forward to them, you know. I, I prep better for them. I took them seriously. I used to carb load a bit before these because they weren't just long runs, they were going to be hard long runs. And I thought about nutrition, and, you know, and she just introduced me to LMNT and proper hydration, I couldn't believe it. I just— it was overnight. I would have needed 3 days off.

What some proper nutrition and hydration can do to you, the difference, difference alone. Like, we can train for months and months, and then like, just that part can make or break training runs or races for sure.

One of the things I love about being a runner is I am both the most honest person you will ever meet and the most direct and blunt person you'll meet. But I'm also the biggest liar, mostly to myself, that you'll ever meet. You know, this is the last hill, just one more set, you know, just another mile, all that rubbish. But anyway, but yeah, so there was things like, you know, eliminating stress. I just realized my base volume had to go up to 50 to 70 miles a week. It couldn't be 30 to 50, that wasn't going to cut it. You know, unfortunately, if you want to be in the running business, you've kind of got to run. You know, you can do other things, but you've got to run. On. It was things like I just got a new Garmin so I could track my sleep. More importantly, if I had 3 bad nights' sleep, I would reduce my workload the next 2 days. And if I wanted to do more mileage mentally, I would make myself get more sleep. I would say, well, if you want to do more mileage, Andy, you've got to have more sleep because I'm on prohibition. I realized I was 14, 16 pounds still too heavy at the start line every time. I ran with 2 bags of sugar just to prove that to myself one day. I'd recommend people do that, by the way. Get a really tight backpack, uh, put 2 bags of sugar in the back and go for a run, and then tell me that losing 2 pounds won't help you. It will. You don't need to be obsessive about it, but you don't need to be way above your BMI, which I was by about 10 pounds still. Bikram yoga, uh, I added to the routine for strength because I just used to run. It also helped me with my breathing as well and my mind as well a little bit. And then I, I wrote a short list on 3 controllables. I get to choose what marathon I run, what time of year it is, what the profile it is. Is it a 50,000 marathon or 100-person marathon that's not very well organized? All of that's in your control. You can Google and search for that. So that's, that's how I got to Glass City. Confidence to neg split was the big one. You know, I, I said to myself, I'd rather fail trying to neg split than fail trying to be a hero. And that actually transpired to Glass City run, I had an ABC pacing strategy. Hopefully most of your listeners will get it, and I really hope that everybody gets it eventually. But everybody said to me, what's your ABC strategy? And I said, well, my BQ time's 3:35, and I've been failing at just trying to hit that a few times. So my A strategy is 3:30, because I need to have a cushion. There's a cutoff point. I've seen so many friends in tears because they missed it by a few seconds. So I said, there's no point in me just targeting the time, because if I make the time by 5 seconds, I'm probably not going to Boston anyway. And I said, so my B strategy was 3:35, and my C strategy was 3:25. And everybody used to look at me with a quizzical face and say, well, why is your A strategy not 3:25? I said, because I've tried that 10 times and it kills you. It kills you. And I said, so in my mind, I got this routine that was, okay, easy run to mile 20. I want to try and hit a pace and a heart rate target, which was like 7:55 or something. And it went well because my training went well because of the other things. I got to mile 20 and I was still feeling okay. And so my mindset was, well, if I'm struggling at mile 20, I'm going to die, but I am going to do 3:35. So that becomes my B goal.. And then I had this whole little subroutine where I said, okay, at mile 30, if I'm on slightly better than 3:30 pace, if I'm feeling good, if I've not breached my heart rate, uh, limit anywhere, I can then go into a mental filing cabinet and open a top drawer. And in that drawer there's a shoebox, and I can take the shoebox out and I can open the shoebox. Inside the shoebox there's, there's a little parcel, and inside that little parcel there's a, there's a little Post-it note which says go see dickhead. So I kind of created this whole little visualization process to say, I can go for my sea goal, but only if I've earned it. And it was about quality as much as it was quantity. And I remember doing the math. I was 4 miles out and I thought, I could do 10-minute miles here and I'm still going to qualify. But then I remembered my sea goal. I said, no, but I think I can pay a visit to the Hurt Locker. And, and, uh, and we did. And, and the irony of that is it was quite a big cut that year. So all of my friends who had run Boston like every year forever had made it by 3 or 4 minutes or whatever. They were all stressed. I made it by 9 minutes and I was chill. I was going to Boston. There was nothing stopping me going to Boston whatsoever.

So what was your finish time that year in Boston? No, no, no, your finish time to qualify for Boston.

Oh, so both 3 hours 26 and 1.4 seconds. Incredible. Incredible. Which is like a 10-15 minute— it was just— it was— I knew I'd got it from mile 3 is the interesting thing. I just knew how I felt. It felt like an easy run. The weather was perfect. You know, it was— it feels like an out-of-body experience. It was just so joyful. It was just a wonderful day. I even enjoyed the pain in the last 3 miles because, because it me dictating the pain. I visualized lactic acid being broken down into lactate and fueling my muscles even more. I imagined I'd invented perpetual motion or something, but it was wonderful.

And then what was going through your mind when you crossed that finish line at that point?

Gratitude, actually. It takes a village, and that's another reason why it's really important to have a big circle of running friends, because, you know, it helps you to help somebody else train even if you don't have a race in 3 weeks. It's a wonderful thing, an experience. But I didn't stop smiling for days. One of my Dallas running friends needed to do a marathon in that state. He traveled with me to help me, a guy called Scott, Scott Mannis, really good friend, you know. So I got to celebrate it with We went around to the BQ Bell and I broke the clanger. There's a picture of me looking at the clanger somewhere 'cause I think I broke it 'cause I rang it so hard.

It was just—

You were that guy. Yeah, it just, it just, just one of, I'd said this on your podcast again for people looking for extra inspiration. You have normal friends, I'm sure we all have normal friends, but running friends that you run with a lot. That can't be anything but the best definition of friends. I mean, you know, how many friends, whether it's raining or 85 degrees out, will show up at 4:30 AM to go for a run with you? They'll be there. You know, how many of them have you shared, you know, your worst moments with on a Saturday long run? You know, who are your biggest cheerleaders when you're running a marathon, whether they're just tracking you or whether they physically come with you? Who have you discussed all of your toilet-related issues with? I mean, there's not many friends that are on on that list, right? So, there's a, I don't know, running friends of people that are mentally tough like you are. They show up, they're genuine, haven't got any time for BS generally. They're not cyclists or pickleballers, but that's just me. But yeah, so, it was just magical and I, you know, I, it was just, It was almost as good as the day at Boston, but in a very different way. It was just, I can achieve anything in life. I felt that when I crossed the line in London, by the way, and that gave me the confidence to do all sorts of tough things like 2 and a half years to get my pilot's license along the way. I never would've had the confidence to do that had I not taken that on, for example. I'm sure my career wouldn't have been half as successful as it was. I managed to retire last year, age 55, and that's partly because of the mind games and the toughness, the resiliency that you build, can-do attitude, impossible goal broken down into small bite-sized chunks. If you're paying attention, that's what you get from running.

At least that's what I got from running. It is really eye-opening how so many of the learnings from running apply to daily life too, and vice versa, and how it's all connected. Knowing what you know now from going after your Boston Marathon goal to qualify for Boston for, what was it, 10 years?

10 years.

Yeah, 10 years to qualify. So knowing what you know now, what advice do you have to your younger self, to your or someone who's listening who might be very far away from going after a big goal, whatever that might be, that might be qualifying for Boston, that might be running their first marathon, what high-level advice do you have?

Well, certainly in my case, it was my less older self. That's true. Yeah, I think, I mean, for me, I'm not sure if if this has come through with the chat, but I had 3 or 4 really big whys. Some of it was selfish, some of it wasn't. I think really taking the time to understand why you're doing it, and the why can change. You know, I mentioned that the charity thing got me through not quitting early on. Today I just run to be with people. I really like to run. You know, I can run 3 hours by myself and entertain myself quite happily, you know. So, but finding out what the why is for you is really, really important because when it's raining tomorrow morning and it's 5 AM and there's 3 reasons why you probably could excuse running, you need to go there. You, you need that because the only runs you regret are the ones you don't do. I, I guess the other thing really is with my injury history, especially if you're older, you ought to be wiser better, which I clearly wasn't. But you should really listen and look for red flags and try not to fix the flagpole after it's broken, but to kind of avoid breaking it in the first place. I tell new runners that the most important run you're ever going to do in training is the one that you're going to do tomorrow. Today's run, you'll forget that. But if you risk tomorrow's run, it might be the the next 3 weeks run, might be the next 4 weeks run, might be the next 18 months run if you have a hip injury. So I think, you know, the why and listening to yourself is the other thing. The third probably big thing for me was what I was talking about, the, we used to call it a big hairy audacious goal, the blue dot syndrome. Part of you, I ought to be a better version of you, however you want to describe that. For me, it was my Olympics was qualifying for the Boston. That's kind of how I visualized it, if you like. That's as close as I can get to it. So in the end, it didn't actually matter if I ever— I made progress on Boston when I stopped caring about running Boston next week. I said, okay, I still want to run it. It's still my dream. But what I have to do is just get a little bit better all the time. And it will happen when it happens. The marathon's not a fair lady. I assume it's a lady. I don't know. That's my age and prejudice. I don't know what it is. But she's not always fair to you. She won't give you anything that you've not earned for 100% sure. But often when you've earned it, you don't get it. You don't get to control the weather, the water stations, an injury you might pick up. There's a thousand things that could go wrong. But if, if, if you're happy to take away from a race the fact that the finish line is just the next step on your life journey, and the fact that there's— there should be 3 lessons that you write down, and probably only 1 lesson from a successful marathon. But a poor marathon means you've probably got 3 or 5 things that you probably want to write down and do differently next time. So it's the why and the learning, and it's just this quest to be a better version of you, however you just mentally and physically is for me what switches me on.

I love it, Andy. I think the part where you're talking about the blue dot in the distance of that being like a far, audacious, big, hairy goal. And very often, even if you accomplish that goal, it, like, going back to what you were saying earlier, it was the journey that actually really mattered. Like, once you have— like, even, even now, right, I have the 6-star medal, and I'm like, yes, that's a great check in the box, that's a great accomplishment, I'm very happy with that medal. Like, after wearing that for 48 hours straight, I stopped wearing it, and then it's like, now it's just sitting in a drawer somewhere. And like, it was the whole process, that whole 10-year journey to get there that, that mattered. So there you have it.

Boston Marathon medal. This one's never far from me. The rest are, but this one's a little special.

So, yeah. Yeah. But it is one of those things. And I think sometimes we had a conversation the other day. Sometimes people get to the end of their life and they're talking about the good old days where it's like when you live in the middle of the good old days, like sometimes people don't realize these are the best days of your life. Like realize right now you're living the best days of your life. As much as you might not think of it because you're chasing this big, far goal, like just stepping back and sometimes realizing that part.

Yeah, one of my favorite Mae West quotes is that you only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.

So good. So, so good. When you were talking earlier about your why, in what sort of way do you go about this? You were talking about your 10 things that you printed out and like that you hung somewhere. But how about your why? Is that like you write it down somewhere and you review those goals on a certain cadence?

Or tell me more about that. Yeah, I think I did initially for sure. I think as I've become a more experienced runner, I pretty much know what I want from the next 3 to 5 years. But initially I did. So initially I did, I wrote it on my whiteboard in the office. I put check marks 'cause I told my team that if you don't see it, so from an emotional intelligence perspective, I had to do that because for most of your listeners who are on this curve, running's great, but the first 10 years are the worst. Sorry to tell you everybody. 'Cause if you think about what happens, 'cause you kill yourself to do a 5K and then you kill yourself again to do a 10K and you kill yourself again to do a 100K. It takes you 4 or 5 years until you're at this place where you're in control of your growth curve sometimes. So I found out I needed that. So I wrote it down, printed it out, I stuck it on my whiteboard in my office and I put little silly rules in there. Like when I was in the UK, the best kung po chicken on the planet was at this takeout on the way home. And the rule with my wife was that if I didn't have 6, as in 6 days of running, checked by Friday, I would call her and say no and she would make me a dry cheese sandwich for my dinner on Friday night. If the answer was yes, I got to call this Chinese takeout and bring kung po chicken. The funnier part of that is that for 3 years my wife didn't know that I got prawn crackers as 'Cause I used to eat them in the car on the way home. But yeah, so I used to use a couple of mental sort of carrot stick, self-imposed carrot stick things. But my why was, it was largely about raising money for children. I mean, I started because of my kids and because of the fact that they would never know their grandfather. And goddammit, if he was fitter, he still would've been around and, you know, in those moments when you, when you're mad with people that you love. And so I, I was all about the NSPCC and children's charities and Easter Seals. And so, um, I had that as a large part of that, that I'm running for my kids, and I'm also running for kids who don't have somebody like me in their life. Look at them, maybe, who knows. But, um, that was my bad day why. Why? It's raining, it's 31 degrees and raining in the UK and it's windy. It's like, suck it up, buttercup. That was my wife. But my other why was about being James Bond and Magnum P.I. When I was able to travel with work, I would also have my running kit with me. I would visualize myself as James Bond when I was running around the Imperial Palace in Tokyo or Park Fundidora in Monterrey, Mexico. Or I used to travel a reasonable amount for work and some of my most cherished memories are meeting friends in São Paulo when I evaded our security that told me I couldn't go for a run. But, and running into running other running people at 5:00 AM in the morning and how, and making a running friend in a corner of the world, you know, that I used to do on a regular basis. So yeah, so, so my, my why was, was sort of being a better me. And then it became Boston because of the bombings, because those assholes and they didn't have the right to do what they did. And they've got no right to mess with the running community and they affected my friend and they don't get to tell me I don't run Boston. So I eventually had like 3 sort of whys and that helped me at different times.

Yeah. Yes. For those listening who might have gone after a big goal and they've been at it for 3, 4, 5 years. And even though they're making some progress, they're hitting a plateau or they're going backwards or they kept getting injured or they're losing motivation or they're having a tough time showing up.

What, what high-level recommendations do you have there? Yeah, I think I, I, I would say like I did with my Mesa marathon failure in '22 is just have a little bit of honest introspection about why you're not doing it. I run with a lot of people who have really unrealistic goals, and therefore the only reason they're a failure is because they're defining themselves as a failure. First of all, I know lots of people who automatically say, I want to run Boston, because they run with 100 people in our group that run Boston, and they don't put in the work. You know, you look at their Strava and it's like 20 miles one week, nothing for 3 weeks, 10 miles another week. It's like, you know, your life is going to be a permanent disappointment if you're not able to connect where you are to realistically where you might want to be. It's okay to push that back. So, so I would say just, just reassess where you are and have an honest appraisal about, you know, what, what a reasonable medium-term goal might be, and is that on a glide slope that's going to get you to some sort of long-term long-term ambition. Because the thing with goals is if you do better than them, you can reevaluate them. They're not forever. They're up to you. You decide what your goals are. And if you do that, you then have the opportunity to create some micro goals. And that's the process thing for me. It's like the question for me is not, can I run a 3:26 marathon so I can qualify for Boston again? Which I did in Berlin 2 weeks ago. So I'm happy about that. But it's not, can I do a 3:26? I've got 70 miles on my schedule today. Can I get hills done on Wednesday? And what does success for my hill work look like?

You know, my long run. That was 70 miles in a week, I hope, right?

Not in a day. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm not there yet. I don't think even Kipchoge's there. But yeah, so yeah, my goal is to run 70 miles a week. That might be all I'm focusing on. I'm focusing on the controllables. And I think a lot of people get disarmed because they worry about things they can't control. And actually they don't control their pace. Yeah, they don't control their half marathon time. What they control is how many miles they run today and how they run it and how they sleep. And so if the emphasis can be shifted a bit more towards that. And then the third thing probably would be you set your own goals. But you also get to decide what goals you set. So that could be running with friends 3 times a week. It could be running at sunset on Wednesday because you don't have an early meeting. It could be, and I did this more when I moved to Dallas, it doesn't always have to be running from your back door through the subdivision and dodging the traffic. You can get up 10 minutes earlier, get in your car and drive to a reservoir or a lake, you know, somewhere that's beautiful. And go, you know, start running half an hour before the sun comes up. So goals aren't just numbers, they could be qualitative as well. You know, with friends and run with some friends and have a tequila and a taco afterwards on a Saturday is one of my weekly goals, for example. Yeah, I think you've mentioned it on your show a few times. Whilst I'm not a big condoner of the whole pickleball madness, anything that gets you fit is a good thing.. And so if you need a break from running for a little bit, scale it back a bit, go do some basketball for a couple of weeks. But I promise you, when the time's right to come back to running, you'll be driving in your car one day and you'll look left and you'll see a runner smiling, chatting, having a great time, and you'll feel jealous the day after you need to be running again.

Totally. And creating that environment that inspires you, right? And for some people that is running road, for some people that might be more trail. Sometimes that's running with friends, running sunset, running sunrise. Some people are like morning people, others are not. And I think like playing into that, that is very good. I loved how you touched earlier on the topic of taking a good hard look inside. If things don't go according to plan, being honest with self and being really realistic. And I've seen this even in a part of, let's say, mobility, for example. Oh, I will be the first to say that I know the importance of mobility. I often don't do it until I start feeling niggles. Whereas it's like, if on a consistent basis you can do some maintenance, yeah, that you prevent it versus like only trying to catch up with things. But that goes, that goes to all of these things. Last week we had a, we had a Zoom call and someone was getting ready to run a race and was asking me, do you think I'm in X, Y, or Z shape to run this pace at this race? And so I was like, okay, let's do a screen share. Let's look through your Strava. Let's look at some of your tempo runs. Let's look at your, some of your long runs and let's see where was your heart rate at? What was your effort level at? How did it feel for you to maintain that? And he was about 30 minutes off from what he thought his fitness level was and where he really was. And I was like, there's no way you're going to run this time if you're not able to hang on to some of these intervals even. And so sometimes I feel that, yes, you can have this goal of wanting to run sub-4 or sub-3 or whatever it might be, but you have to be realistic of like, how do some of those miles feel at the end of a long run? Or how does it feel as you run faster than that in a tempo run? Are you really able to hold that? Or are you just kind of like, don't underestimate mile 20 of a marathon.

Yeah, yeah. And you're really not going to enjoy those last, even if you could, you're not going to enjoy those last 6 miles. They're going to be hell. I mean, both my 2 3:26s, I was just beaming for the last 6 miles. I was in a bit of pain, obviously, because it's hard, but that's what you sign up for. But it's just setting yourself up for failure. And it's Given that it's a self-imposed choice, it feels like one of the most foolish things you can do. Why would you want to be a disappointment to yourself? The famous Oprah Winfrey line is you should make a promise to yourself and keep it and then worry about what comes next.

Totally.

In the airplane, you put your own oxygen mask on first so that you can then help other people. If you spend your life not putting your own oxygen mask on, you're going to suffocate and not help anybody, including yourself in the long run.

Yeah, absolutely. Andy, one more question before I ask that. Where can people find more about you?

Are you active on any social channels, Strava? I'm an avid Strava person, so you can find me on Strava for sure. Obviously, I'm in the Facebook group, so you can find me through there, which means you can find my Facebook profile. I've not yet done anything that looks like coaching, although I did informally coach a friend of mine who beat 4 hours at Chicago this year, so I'm really happy about that. That conversation was about doing more miles too.

But yeah, so Strava and Facebook primarily. That's quite a few people listening looking to become a stronger, healthier, happier athlete. Can be in any race distance really.

But do you have any closing thoughts here, any recommendations you would like to share? As I said earlier, there's an emotional component to running and there's a technical component to it. And unfortunately, to endure for the long run, you've kind of got to get a minimum technical awareness, if you like, down to shoe sizing and stuff like that. But all of that's pointless if you don't find a way to make running part of your life. If you can build running into your friend network, into how you spend your Saturday morning, into always how you travel for work, that you take your running shoes and you find one really cool spot to go running or something, you'll find it a lot more enjoyable. And if it's enjoyable, the technical and the hard work side of running just comes a lot easier. And for the latter, for people who've recently joined you, some of your earlier podcasts I mean, the later ones are great, don't get me wrong, they really are. But some of the early ones with Dr. Phil talking about exactly how math works. Josh Shandbrook, I think, was the first guy that talked to me about fasting, for example, and ketosis and how that worked for him. So I tried it. So again, there's a treasure trove on your podcast list of technical aspects of running that are worthy of further research. So yeah, but mostly find a way to make it part of your life and enjoy it and find some running friends.

They're the best friends on the planet.

Absolutely.

So well said, Andy. Thank you very much for sharing all this. Really enjoyed it. Excited to see the continuation of your running journey and your updates along the way. Next time you're in LA, let me know. We'll go for a run. Or next time I'm in Dallas, I'll do the same as well.

You must. You must. So yeah, that would be fun.

Nothing better than running with someone Exactly. All right. Have a good rest of your weekend. Talk to you soon. Take care.

Bye.

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Bye now.