How This Mom Balances Life & Runs Sub 3 Hour Marathons

Instead of training for a pace, I just train by listening to my body. And then when I get about a month out of the race, I start to say, what type of fitness am I in? And that's when I set my goal.

Hey, what's up guys? Welcome to the Extra Mileage Show, where we help athletes reach their full potential in training, racing, and in life. My name is Floris Gierman, and today I'm going to be talking to Nikki. She is a very strong runner. And she is also a mother of a 2-year-old. She has run several marathons, more than 30 in total, including 5 finishes under 3 hours, so very fast. And today we're going to be talking about how she balances busy everyday life with her training schedule, and we're going to be diving into some of her training and racing strategies. I hope you enjoy my conversation with Nikki.

I have to warn you, my 2-year-old who's supposed to be napping is jumping on the bed, so I might have to pause it if I hear screaming.

No worries, we totally— I totally know how that goes as well. It was really interesting getting to meet you last week, and actually really fun, because I was running in the Tunnel Vision Marathon. It came down to the last 4 miles, and I saw a few people right in front of me, and I thought, "Oh, killer, I'm gonna like try to catch up with them." And all of a sudden, out of nowhere, you just got right next to me and we were running for a little bit and then I looked over and I'm like, oh wow, that is a very strong runner right there next to me. So can you tell me a little bit more about your Tunnel Vision experience, how it went? Because you ran a 2:55 marathon PR there, correct?

Yeah, it was fun. I don't know, I was kind of iffy if I was even going to run the race clear up until probably the week before. Just the training cycle, you know how it goes, things just get in the way and I thought, Is it worth it to try? And I think that probably helped me in the race, 'cause I went into it with no expectations, just for fun. But when I caught up with you, I had actually run, I ran with one gentleman for 16 or 17 miles, and another guy came and passed us, and he was trying to beat his brother's PR, so I went with him, probably from 17 to about 21, and then he took off. So that's why I came up so quick, I was trying to not lose sight, but I think I would've died if you wouldn't have been there. Working with somebody at the end and you kept saying, focus, just focus. I said, that's perfect. Just focus. That's all I gotta do. One foot in front of the other.

Mile 24. We're still on pace. And look, I'm running next to— what's your name?

Nikki. Hi, Nikki.

Nikki is an absolute beast. She's gonna smash sub-3 hours here today. 2 more miles to go.

Let's do this. It was great.

No, it was, it was nice. And I always try to keep some energy left until the end of the marathon. And I've noticed it a few times where I just die at mile 18 or 20. And then I learned my lessons over time that I started telling myself a marathon doesn't start until mile 20 and the rest is just a warm-up. And once again, even at this race, I'm like, all right, now we're at mile 20, now we can start running. So you kind of have that reserve in your tank, which I think you had done as well because you were running a very fast pace still at the end.

Well, it's the only way to finish. I mean, I don't know if you saw the girl— there was a poor girl who kept collapsing right there in the finish chute.

Oh wow.

Just everything was depleted, and she, she got a Boston qualifier, but she literally rolled. She tried to crawl, and I think her quads were just shot.

Oh wow.

Literally rolled across the finish line. It was a little painful watching, but I just thought, oh my goodness, it didn't need to be that painful because you do— you've got to measure and give what you've got so that you can finish okay.

Yeah, absolutely. Well, here's the thing too, you have run a lot of marathons, right? Like we were talking before this, and I think you've ran 28 or 29 marathons now?

I think I've lost count. I'm close to 30, I know that.

Wow. So can you describe from the beginning marathons, the first few that you have done, like what have you learned over the years? And then after a while you started breaking sub-3 hours as well. And then like what has made you like a better runner over time?

I think a lesson I ran in college and I always kind of had these unrealistic goals for myself. And that made myself overtrain, push myself too hard, be in the middle of a race and think, "Oh, I'm not hitting my time goal," and had a hard time with that kind of negative attitude. So I think when I first started marathons, I decided I love running, I want to back off from any time goals, any pressure, just go with what I've got. And I think, I think that's kind of been helpful throughout the way. So I always set before a goal, instead of training for a pace, I just train by listening to my body. Then when I get about a month out of the race, I start to say, what type of fitness am I in? That's when I set my goal. That keeps your goals realistic, I think.

How do you do that listening to your body? Can you tell a little bit more about that? Can you describe in what sort of way you do that?

Yeah, so I don't run with headphones. I don't run with a GPS. I just, these days, push the stroller. When I'm by myself, I just run. I've got my watch, so I'll know I'm going to go 45 minutes. I explore. And I'll kind of play with paces, like some days I'll run lighter, but usually if it's by myself, I run pretty hard just because very few runs are done by myself now. Mm-hmm. I don't know, you just listen to your breathing and think, what can I keep? And, you know, guess like, okay, I've got 6 miles, can I hold this pace for 6 miles? And if it seems like it'd be easy, you speed up a little bit. And if it seems like, I don't know if I can hold it, you back off. Some training runs I'll go out there and plop out 8, 9-minute miles and feel like death, and others you're sub-7s and feel great.

One, I think in particular now that you're a parent You have a 2-year-old daughter, right?

Yeah, yeah.

That obviously, like, I have 2 kids myself, a 1-year-old daughter and a 4-year-old, and that completely changes the whole spectrum of training once again, right? Obviously the family comes first, and then there's work, and then there's still spending time with your husband, for me my wife, and then there's running. So can you describe a little bit, like, how do you balance that? Because you said you do a lot of your runs with Estrella these days as well. Like, in what sort of way do you balance family and work life? And running?

I think I consider running my playtime and it's also my me time. So I try to get it every day, but I think since Cora was real little, I first ran with her when she was only 4 months old in the stroller. I pushed her and I didn't have her in a car seat attachment, I just wrapped a towel. My running partner's a neurosurgeon, so I asked her, I said, am I gonna like shake her brain too much? And she said, no, just wrap a towel around her head, she'll be fine. So I felt a little confident in that. She's a neurosurgeon with 4 kids. So yeah, so I just wrapped a towel and I think Cora just got used to it from the time she was real little. And even this morning she kept asking to go run to the big waterfall. So I think I've made it so that running time is family time too. Yeah, like last night, you know, we went to the big waterfall, which is why she wanted to go again. So my husband was holding the dogs, I was pushing the stroller. We take— we call it our Calanity. We all went out to this big waterfall and we made it fun. And you stop and you see deer on the way or bunnies or whatever.

That's That's nice. And what area is that? That is in the Washington area, right?

Yeah, I live kind of by Olympia, the state capital. Much smaller than Seattle. Yeah, it's a nice little area.

Yeah, that's beautiful out there.

We have two Vizsla dogs who love nothing more than to go running with me. I always feel guilty if I leave them. So I think it's just— I think it's all one and the same. Family time, running time, you know, then you get home and play and make it fun.

So a lot of these runs are you with your 2-year-old and the 2 dogs, right? So then at that point, your pace automatically drops down quite a bit, right? So although you're not— like we talked before this, and you're not necessarily focusing on heart rate much, but because you're running with such an entourage, you're kind of automatically dropping your pace quite a bit.

Exactly, it keeps me slow. Otherwise, you know, the dogs will get in the way of the wheels, or I'm tripping on the leash, or— yeah, but it's fun, and that's what's more important. I only take everybody out maybe twice a week on days that I want as recovery days. You can run pretty hard pushing the stroller. I have certain courses that are really hilly, so those are always better with the stroller. Yeah. But if it's a recovery day, then I take what I call the whole Calanity and we all go out, and I'm sure my neighbors think I'm insane. It's really fun. We get back and the dogs are happy and Cora's happy and I've had fun.

That's awesome. Like, I think, I think for me, one of the most important parts is when I became a parent for the first time, At the beginning, like, you have a lot of time to train on your own, and all of a sudden you're restricted on time. And sometimes, like, that takes a bit of a switch that all of a sudden it's more focusing on just getting out there and moving versus necessarily hitting certain splits, or like taking any of the pressure off, and it's just more a matter of going outside and having fun.

Yeah.

And, and I think at the beginning I was also very hard on myself, just like what you were doing when you were in college. And almost beating myself up over not getting enough mileage in or not. But at the beginning, it is hard to be a parent. Like, you don't sleep much. You do, like, have to combine it with, like, a kid crying all the time and, like, all the attention that they want. And you still have to work and do other things. So training often kind of gets this last place. But at the other hand, if you can give it that place of let's remove any of the pressure boundaries and just focus on getting out there, and even if it's for 2 miles, at least you're outside moving.

Exactly my philosophy. It's what can you— and that's why it's a month before every marathon that I decide what, what time can I do. You can only give so much if you got a sick kid. Like this fall, Cora had 3 ear infections. You can only give so much, you know. And then so you have to just be honest with yourself and what kind of shape am I in and be okay with it. My cute grandpa was always like all through college my biggest fan, and he'd say at the end of every race, well, did you do your best for today? But with the time pressure, it kind of helps too, because then if you do have 30 minutes to go out for a run and you want to hit X number of miles, at least for me, those are the runs that turn into good tempo runs. I want to I gotta get in this many miles or finish this course, and then you end up running hard and maybe even with some time to do extra loops in the neighborhood.

Yeah, perfect.

The time crunch can sometimes help.

Yeah, exactly, exactly. And so the one part that I was most impressed about is that you at this point have already run 5 sub-3-hour marathons. Can you describe a little bit of what it took for you, like from your first marathons, they were all longer than 3 hours, to all of a sudden, like a lot of people wanna hit that that sub-3-hour mark, right? So what did it take for you to get there? How did it all of a sudden happen? I believe in 2012 it was.

Yeah, it was 2012, and I think my first marathon was run, I guess, 2008. But I didn't start with that as a goal. So my first goal was to qualify for Boston, and I ran a 3:31 on my first one.

Wow, that's fast for your first one.

It was. I ran with a friend, and it was definitely— it was rough. And then I moved up to Seattle, and it was just really fun running, and I was training for Boston, I thought, I think I can run a 3:15. I just told myself, if I have a good day, I think I can pull that off. And sure enough, I pulled off a 3:15. That was probably the first time that I told myself I'm training for this time, just because I was motivated. So then I got, I think, a 3:08 in my third. It was just kind of like I took chunks off every time. Um, but I didn't— so breaking 3 hours, I, I decided I wanted to after I broke 3:05 because I thought, I don't think I've peaked yet. I think I've got more in me. And I trained really, really hard for that, and that's probably my best race. It was a lesson learned, but I, I still think I might have been right. It's kind of a long story, but it was the 2012 Shamrock Marathon. And before the marathon, I noticed on their website they say the top 5 males and females go by gun time, not clock time. And I tend to start slow, and I usually start in the back because I I just, I speed up as I go. And my husband kept telling me, you need to stand on the line. And I kept saying, well, no, because there's going to be all these— first of all, I wasn't sure I'd be top 5. I looked at last year's results and there was a chance I would be, but I wasn't sure. And second of all, I just, I don't want to clog up the path, right? There's a lot of males who are faster than that, so I don't think I, as a female, even if I'm going to be the top 5, if there's going to be 30 males in front of me, I should probably be behind those 30 males so I'm not blocking the way. So I started 17 seconds behind the clock. So I'm running and I was running my guts out because that was, that was probably the only marathon that I started and I was like, I'm breaking 3 today. I mean, every other race it's been, if it happens great, if it doesn't, great. But that one I started and I'm breaking 3 and I was running so hard and it was a really windy day. And at one point I was in a pace group and I realized they were too slow, but at the same time they were blocking my wind and I decided to go for it. So I passed them in that headwind and I'd run hard and it was like, I think with like 5 miles left, I kept hearing, I kept passing people and then I kept hearing I was the 6th girl. I thought, oh crap, you know, because I was 17, my gun time and clock time, there's a 17-second difference and I was really cutting it close. But I thought, that's okay, as long as 5th place girl stays ahead of me, I'm fine. And sure enough, it was, it was somewhere after mile 24, I see the 5th place girl and she's like I'm hitting the wall and I'm thinking, oh crap, because I truly didn't think I had 17 seconds to spare. I thought I was going to eke it under. I came up and I came alongside of her and just being a little selfish, I was, come on, let's take this in, a mile and a half left, we've got it together, thinking we run together, I let her get a hair in front of me and I'm actually technically would have beat her, but I would have gotten my clock time or my chip time. She was, I think, a little grumpy and wasn't having a good day and I think probably muttered some cuss words and clearly wanted nothing to do with running by me. And so I was sitting there watching my watch and she slowed a lot and I was like, I'm going to miss it. So I think from about 24 and a half on, I just went in like a dead sprint. I was just counting my steps, kind of like how we were when you're just really— 1, 2, 1, 2, except for I was hurting a lot more that time. And, and then the whole last stretch, I can see the clock and I could see 2:59, dying. And my clock time was 2:59:58.5.

Wow.

1.5 seconds to spare, but I really ran a 2:59:41.

Yeah, exactly. You had a buffer there.

But they told the truth. I mean, they gave me my clock time instead of my chip time. So when you look at official results, they did strip those 17 seconds.

Wow.

I didn't stay with the 5th place girl because I think she finished 3 hours flat and 33 seconds, I think, or something around there. So I would have been about 15 seconds off.

Yeah, that would have been a bummer on that day in particular, huh?

Yeah, well, I just thought I've come this far, you know, I mean, it was, I had just been so focused and trying, I thought I can't lose it now. And I, partly my anger at that girl for not coming with me helped fuel me. Cause I was like, come on, I, I lost 17 seconds. I mean, how do you make up 17 seconds?

And it is interesting because when you and I ran the last 4 miles together, I feel we both benefited so much from each other of just keeping that pace. Because honestly, how I saw it, I was like holding on for dear life trying to keep up with you. But then hearing you afterwards, you're like, oh, thanks, you helped me so much. I'm like, what did I do? I just tried to hold on to you. Whereas I know, like, you kind of see it from your own perspective, right?

Yeah, no, I, I don't think I would have run a 2:55 if you wouldn't have been there because I was trying to keep up with you. Yeah, like you were focusing it, like we're working, we're focusing, which then I was like, oh yeah, we're focusing because I tend to be a little more At one point I remember you started talking, I'm like, let's keep our energy, let's talk after the race. I think I was asking like where you were from or something and you're like, shut up, just keep going.

Because I was even holding on for dear life. It was funny, but no, I'm glad it all worked out that way. So then once you had done one, like did it become easier for you to do multiple sub-3 hours after that? Was every experience different again?

It was probably a confidence thing that once you've done it once, all of a sudden it's like the mental, can I 4-minute mile, you know, once you've done it once, it's, oh, I'm a— I can do sub 3, I'm a sub 3 marathoner, you know. So I think it's a significant mental barrier.

So how do you overcome tough spots in your, in your race? Because we all get to them. Like, what— like, do you have anything like a mantra you tell yourself? Is there anything like that you eat or drink in particular that helps?

Yeah, I, I only do water and Gatorade, sometimes a Kellogg's Rice Krispies Treat. Um, but my stomach's a little too finicky when I'm running. Um, but I think it's just like focusing on why I'm doing that. Like in, in the tunnel one, that's just a gorgeous course. So I just looked around us and thought, this is gorgeous. I am so blessed to have a healthy body. I can do this. And, and just tried to get back to a gratitude, you know, factor with it. Other times I'll think about, you know, like, like I think the first time I ran a 3:01, my husband was deployed. So I think I was just venting all the stress when I was running. You know, and it just all came out. And so it just kind of depends on the situation. But yeah, you know, you either run with gratitude, just anything but negative, whatever you can do to keep negative. So whether it's like how you kept me the last 4 miles, we need to focus, take it in. You know, that reminded me of old days when you do speed work and you focus and take it in. Or, or other days I just need to— this is fun, relax, it's enjoyable, don't stress, your time doesn't matter. You know, whatever you can do to stay away from the negative.

This was my first race in 2 years too, so although I talk about running quite a bit and I've run quite a few races in the past, it was kind of a reminder for me as well. Like the first 20 miles, I was taking it all in and looking around, and then I think once mile 20 starts, at some point you really come to this, all right, you notice your body is starting to hurt, you know that you're going to start running a bit on empty, but at that point it's also, you almost get in the zone and it's about executing. You've worked for months to train that far, and then it's purely a matter of the last bit. This is where it really comes down to, right? Because the rest was really all like prep work, and then it's purely executing at that point.

Yeah, no, I think that's where you helped me focus on the— and that's when I, you know, it just reminded me old tempo days, like, yeah, you're executing, you're executing a plan and you're going with it, but you have to have fuel left in the tank at that point to be able to.

Yeah. Exactly. Can you, can you tell a little bit about your nutrition during training? Like during races that you stick with water and Gatorade. What about during training? Is there anything in particular that works well for you? Is there—

I'm like horrible. I'll just eat, like we had frozen pizza last night. Like I, I guess my philosophy on nutrition is I try to cook from scratch and use fresh vegetables. Um, lots of meat, you know, the red meat, the red beans, whatever. Yeah, no, I'm pretty, I've. I can't say I have any pearls of advice. I have ice cream pretty much every day. Perfect.

Well, if it works for you, that's the thing. If it works for you and you feel good with it, like, why, why not? So the night before, like, what was your pre-race dinner like? And what is your normal routine pre-race dinner?

So that was questionable because I usually am pretty— again, because of the finicky stomach when I'm running that hard, I usually stick with kind of bland things. Like, I'll just get a a turkey sandwich, or something, you know, that's just gentle and nothing too seasoned, nothing hot. And we went out, my husband was going to Chipotle, and I thought, that sounds actually kind of good. And I thought, well, I'm just going to stick with my carefree attitude. So I had a Chipotle bean burrito bowl. I was a little nervous. I'll try it again. I don't know.

It's honestly, for me, a whole bunch of vegetables with steak works very well. Like it's been a race tradition for the last 5 races. And like, so that's typically what I end up eating as well. So before my Boston Marathon, I also had a Chipotle steak burrito bowl.

Yeah, there you go.

A whole lot of veggies and everything in it.

But was that where you ran a 2:44?

Yes, that's right.

Chipotle is what we—

yeah, exactly, Chipotle. Yeah, so we'll have to stick with whatever works. That's the main thing though. Typically I try not to do anything new on race day, purely like I try to train everything in long training runs just so there's no surprises because I've had it before. Like I've, I've made some Phil Maffetone Clif Bars and I thought, oh, killer, these, these are all the right ingredients. They had dates in it and some honey and some almonds and, and then I ended up taking it on a long run and it really made my stomach upset. And then I tried it again on another run and it did the exact same thing. So at some point You have to be careful with some of that as well, right?

I agree completely. Don't experiment before race day. And that was my thought with Chipotle. I thought, well, I eat Chipotle pretty regularly and run long the next day and it's fine. But you know what else works good is baby food packets.

Yeah, I can see that. It's actually already— yeah, does it?

That's great fruit.

Yeah, and it digests easy probably, right?

It totally does. So they sit well. I don't do goo. It doesn't— it goes right through me. But the baby food packets They tend to do okay.

Yeah. So with the whole, like, the extra mile group that we have put together, we have quite a few people that are looking to improve their marathon time. They're looking to qualify for Boston or run, run a sub-3-hour marathon. Are there any recommendations, any tips that you feel they can benefit from, like from, from the learning experience that you've gone through over the years?

Yeah, I think honestly the biggest thing I've learned through the years is don't overtrain, don't overdo it. If you go out and you are supposed to hit paces and your body feels like crap, just say, that's it, call the run, you know, or, or run and remind yourself while you do it, slow down the pace, enjoy it because your body needs, needs a rest day clearly. So I think when you can get into the overtraining trap of, I have to hit this, you know, pace on these intervals or this pace on the tempo and your body doesn't feel like it, you just do more harm than good. Um, it's like, I've also had days where I expected to go out 6 miles easy and find out, oh, I feel really great. And being able to do an impromptu tempo run. So I think people get too into their training plans, too strict with it, and life happens. Some nights you're up all night with a sick baby and you don't sleep at all, and that might be a day that you need to adjust and say, okay, well, I'm going to run easy today, but I'll try again Friday or Saturday. If you have a scheduled workout and you don't do well, don't give up on it. Don't just drop it and go back with the same plan. Maybe try it later in the week. Do some adjusting. I guess be flexible, listen to your body, and don't overdo it.

What is your training mileage like for your sub-3-hour marathons? What training volume, how many days a week?

I usually run 6 days a week, and then I walk on the 7th day. I used to be more like 50 miles per week, but as you know, with the stroller, it slows things down. I think I'm probably more between 35 and 45 now. Actual time physically running is probably pretty equivalent. I run a lot of hills with the stroller.

And to those people listening to this who might not have experience with it, when you push a stroller up a hill, it is significantly harder, right?

It's killer. I have a route in my neighborhood, I named it, I live on the top of a big hill and it's 400 feet from the base to the top, and I have a route where I go all around the base of the hill. I named it the Beauty and the Beast route because That was what was playing one day that my daughter was listening to. But it's up and down these steep, killer long hills and I average about 10:30s on it, but I finish pretty wasted every, like legs shaking every time, but it's fun.

So yeah, and that's where I think there's something to be said about calculating the amount of time that you're running versus mileage, right? Because if you really look at training volume, if that would be a flat course and you're running it without a stroller, you would probably cover half or double the distance.

Exactly. So you have to kind of equate the distance. Yeah. Or if you're on trails, trails are a lot slower, but they're technical and you're still breathing hard. You're still getting that cardiovascular. Yeah. So I just kind of equate to whatever on the road by myself that mileage would've been. I'll equate to that. I probably average 50, but in actuality it's probably literally 35 to 45.

Yeah. If I look at my last training cycle for this Tunnel Vision, I made a perfect training schedule, training 5 days a week, and that was like 35 to 53 miles a week. And then real life happened to me as well, and I calculated on average I ran for 21 weeks, I ran 31 miles a week. So the training volume was much lower than I wanted to, but then again, some of it was in hills, so it did slow me down. Some of it was on days where the kids and the family had the priority. You just have to kind of balance that. I have noticed as well the importance of rest and recovery. Sometimes it's better to just get the full 7 or 8 hours of sleep in when you can versus going out there for a late night run or a very early morning run.

Yeah, I've skipped more early morning runs based on a daughter not sleeping, I think, the last year than my whole life before. It's probably better for me to get this extra hour and a half of sleep. Yeah.

How do you do it with sleep? How many hours of sleep do you get? Is there any strategies? Do you nap with your daughter? Is there anything you can share there?

It depends. Since I work 12-hour shifts, there's literally physically not enough time to sleep when I'm on a work stretch. I'll go 4 or 5 hours and it's— I'm pretty beat by the, by the end of it. So then my first day off, I'll nap when she naps. I'll sleep as long as she sleeps. I just, I'll just shag jog with my daughter and the 2 dogs, you know, for the run just to recover. But we— I believe in 8 hours of sleep. It does not happen as much as I like, but that's always my goal.

Yeah. So you work 4 days on and then you have several days off, right? So it's a bit of an irregular schedule.

Yeah. Yeah. I like it.

Right on. That's good. You've experimented with ultra running as well, right? You've done 5 ultras.

Yeah, I've done 5 ultras. Those are fun too. I guess my training for those was always just running a marathon, but I guess my tip is just like what we've talked about. Be flexible. Don't be so strict with the plan that you can't adjust. Listen to your body and enjoy it. I think if you don't enjoy it, then it's something you might not keep doing. It's worth it to enjoy it because at the end of the day, we're really blessed, and most of the population doesn't do things like that. Breathe the fresh air every single day and hear the birds in the morning or see the raccoons or whatever at night. It's kind of an ability to have, so just remind yourself why you do it. If you can't remember that, maybe it's time to take a step back.

Absolutely. Absolutely. Or it might be time for a rest day as well. Sometimes if I'm in peak training mode, especially when I was doing higher volume, like 70-80 miles a week. At some point I would start to get quite grumpy, or I would just notice my body was off, and then if I would take an extra rest day, I would just come back and be that much more motivated once again.

Exactly, but then on the same end too, it's also important to be consistent. A lot of times once you get out there and start, you'll find— so I think it's better to assess into the run. A lot of times you'll get out there and start and find out you feel great, and You know, if you get out and start and realize you feel crappy, that's when you can call it.

One other one I noticed, especially for the young parents out there who have like a 2-month-old or a 3-month-old, when you're really kind of in that baby mode still, at the beginning I would just go outside with my little one, put her in the stroller, and start walking. And then I would see a light pole like 100 yards away and I would just start slowly jogging just to get some momentum. And then once I was at the light pole, I actually wanted to go to the next one. You really remove that pressure of I'm going to have to run 3 miles and instead you're just going to run 100 yards and then you can walk again. So I think that way as well too.

Yeah, yeah. Just make it natural.

Exactly. Do you do any cross-training or any strength training?

Yes. So that's probably the biggest key for my fitness now since I don't run as much as I used to. So like if it's an easy day, I'll do a lot of— do you know the Les Mills system? They do like Body Pump, Body Combat classes.

Yeah, I've heard of it, but can you maybe clarify a bit more?

Well, they teach it a lot in gyms. I know the gym that I used to go to, they had Les Mills classes, and basically it's this, I don't know, I guess an exercise business, and they've crafted certain classes that are anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour long. I used to go to them. They have like a Body Combat. It's just kind of fun, but it really works on your core. Body Pump, where you do weights. I don't do weights for my legs. I like body weight more. I feel like they get beat up enough running. But so if it's a work stretch and my husband's out of town, I can't really go out and run. I'll wake up early and I'll do one of those workouts. They have an on-demand, so I have the app. I'll click on the app, find a workout, and do it before I go to work. That's what I do on the days that I can't get out for a run, that I would like to get out for a run, but I just can't. I think those have been good, and it's kind of fun to do something different every once in a while.

Does that feel like a good strength workout as well, or is it—

The body pump is outrageously hard. They have some high-intensity trainings where you're doing a lot of burpees and jumping. Sometimes I feel like those are harder than the runs.

Oh, for sure.

It's usually, again, just on those work days when my husband's gone and that's my only exercise chance. Yeah.

When I was talking to Mark Allen, 6-time world champion triathlete, he actually mentioned once he got in his 30s that he started noticing some of his muscles becoming weaker, like especially then he started increasing his strength training. And even for myself, now I just turned 35. And I did start noticing, especially my upper body becoming not as strong as it used to be. Yeah. So that's where, like, I have a kettlebell in my office that I swing around from time to time. And I do, I do definitely feel that I need to do some more strength training. For me, one for my legs that works really well is that sometimes I go hiking in the mountains, on really steep mountains. And even there, it's like 3 or 4 hours and you're basically just doing It's like walking stairs pretty much, that's how steep it gets. And those are very good solid workouts as well.

Absolutely, no, I think any core workout because I think the stronger your core is, the better you can lift your legs, the longer your stride can be, so I think those are huge too. So I try to do a little core maybe 4 days a week.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. One more thing I was wondering is you take your daughter out running in the stroller a lot, right? How do you get your daughter to sit still? Or do you have to take a lot of breaks, or what is your strategy be there?

You know, I think that it depends on the kid because I think I'm really lucky and she just loves to sit in the stroller. She'll sit there and eat treats, you know, I'll fill a treat bucket like every parent does and a juice bucket. I've, you know, we'll play music sometimes. I'll never let her watch anything because I want her looking outside. I mean, I've taken her 14 miles 3 times. I mean, she'll just sit along. She'll doze sometimes, but not so much anymore. But we talk and play games. But I've also heard from people that said they started their baby like young and their child still hates the stroller. So She sits pretty still in there though, so I think I'm just lucky.

Good.

Do you have a hard time keeping yours still?

It is a certain age, like I think at the beginning when they're baby baby, they actually tend to sleep quite a bit. And then at one point, once they learn how to crawl, they just start standing, all they want to do is move. I've noticed that part in that phase as well. But then now that my daughter is 4 and she sits next to my 1-year-old, they can kind of entertain each other a bit. When I'm on like the bike path, I'm like quite wide, but they're like talking to each other and keeping each other company. So I think it's also, I never give them the phone when they're in the stroller. And I think once you start that habit, they're going to always want it. And I want them to also take up the outside and just enjoy it to the fullest extent.

So yeah, that's me too. But yeah, she doesn't wiggle too much, but you also have to time it, which is nice when I, um, since I'm blessed and I only work part-time. So I'll time it, so my days off, I'll just, you know, she'll play and get some wiggles out, we'll walk the dogs before we go, so then she's good and tired and hungry and we'll eat.

Do you stretch at all after, before any of your runs, or do you just do like a slow warm-up and a cool-down? What do you do there?

You know, I never used to, especially when you work and it's hard because if you have like 10 extra minutes, you're like, I can get an extra mile and a half in versus stretching. So I used to never do anything like that, but after pregnancy, my hips have never quite been the same. So I've recently taken up yoga, which before I thought was too boring. But so I did that a couple times a week for the stretching, and it does help. If I feel my hips tight, I'll make sure I do it the next morning or that night. And this is like the first time in my life, so just literally the last maybe year and a half I started doing that. I blame it on pregnancy, but maybe it's just getting older, I don't know. But the hips aren't like they used to be.

Yeah. Did you have to take— so when you were pregnant, were you able to still keep running, or did you have to take a break at that point?

Yeah, I ran the whole way through. I ran the day I went in labor.

No way!

I didn't realize— I must have had the nesting impact because I actually ran 6 miles that day and I hadn't run anywhere near that far for like months at that point.

That's crazy.

A lot more like, I'm gonna run a minute, walk a minute, run a minute, walk a minute, choosing paths with bathroom like every mile so I could stop. But yeah, I just kept trotting along just because that's me and it's a a big part of my identity and it made me, despite all the changes going on, it made me still feel like me. But I definitely trotted pretty good. It was a little pathetic, but it was fun. So, and then I, she was breech, she was upside down, so I had to have a C-section.

Oh, that's scary.

But you know, it was kind of, I actually first ran, I asked my doctor, I said, well, when can I get to running again? I'm a healthcare provider, so I know the rule is 6 weeks, but I was just thinking, I've always been in good shape my whole life and does that Lessen the time. And he was really cool. He said, just when you feel like it. So it was 10 days later I went out and I only made a third of a mile.

10 days later?

Yeah. And then I just, from there I just kept building, building. I don't think I ran more than a mile until it was probably maybe 2 and a half or 3 weeks out. But from 3 weeks on, I just continuously felt better, better, better. And I think part of the reason the recovery went so fast is because I did push that activity, the walking, the jogging, the I think it helped a lot. Yeah. Yeah. So, but you do get back into it slow. I mean, for a woman really having a kid, I felt like it took me out a good 2 years of like peak fitness, but it comes back. I mean, it's muscle memory and it comes back.

Yeah.

I think honestly it's been harder for me the last year just with the sleeping difficulties with her. That's when it gets a little bit harder because, you know, so.

Like the whole, how the body feels, I have no clue. I have noticed it from my wife going through pregnancy as well. She actually had a very difficult pregnancy. She was throwing up a lot and she was in the hospital quite a few times. But then also her going through labor and then it took her quite a while to actually get back to where she used to be. But yeah, I think now the next whole step is just whole adjusting to the new life of sleep and all of those kind of things. And even there, I'm surprised how much you can actually do on very little sleep. And although it's far from ideal for optimal athletic performance, still, like where there's a strong will, like we can accomplish quite a, quite a bit as well.

So absolutely. I completely agree with that. That's, that's how it is with recovery from pregnancy too. If there's a strong will, you can get back, you know, it's hard. It's difficult. It's not ideal, but if you've got a strong enough will, you can do it. Yeah.

Last question over here. What is your next race? Like you've just broken 2:55, new PR. Do you have any other races coming up?

I'm— yeah, I don't know. I tend to sign up for races at like last minute, so— but I'm working on all 50 states. I've just— I've got my eye on a few that I'm interested in, and I'll just kind of see how I'm feeling. Because, you know, if you're kind of searching for a goal time, you want to choose fast courses, right? There's a lot of really fun courses that are maybe at altitude but hilly that are not PR courses, and they're some of the funnest. So now that I hit that time, I think a whole new group of races has opened up because I'm like, well, there's this one in Colorado, looks pretty fun, and So it's just kind of seeing when my husband's in town and when I can get a babysitter. So got my eye maybe on one in Bozeman. I'm not sure, we'll see.

Are you gonna make it out to Boston 2018?

Probably not, because I have a rule, no repeat courses.

That's right, but you have run Boston twice, right?

I've run Boston twice, and I technically, you know, they have the marathon course we just did, they call it a different name every month. So last year I ran it in, I think, June, this year I ran it in August. It was the same course, but technically a different race. But those are the only ones I've ever repeated. So I think I'm done with Boston. I think more races to be run.

Yeah. There's so many good ones. I am. Yeah. I'm going to be running Long Beach in October and then I'll be running Boston in April. So I'm very excited for that one. How many states have you done now? You said you were going to try to do all 50.

I've only, I think I've done 13 states. So I think I need to stop repeating, you know, I'll do like 5 in the state I live in or whatever. I think I need to start reaching out more to experience different places in the country and different courses.

And so that's, that's good. So you've already ran for like 20 years and there's many more running years ahead.

That's as long as the body stays healthy. That's, that's the goal.

Yeah, exactly. Exactly.

Yeah.

Good. Awesome. Well, this was very, very nice to hear a bit more about you.

Cool, thank you.

If people want to follow along some of your running journeys, do you post any photos anywhere? Do you post any— nothing?

I blogged for a while. There's the Salty Running. It's a girls running website. I wrote about my C-section recovery there. I did race reports last year, but I admit I'm not very good at contributing there either. It's trying to minimize life and, you know, whatever.

No, but I will be interested to read some more about that, so I'll put in a link to that They all have names, so I'm Coco on Salty Running.

I should probably write a race report there.

Alright, well, thank you very much for sharing all your tips and information. I think this was very beneficial for other people as well. I think there's a lot of runners out there that are parents that are recognizing some of these challenges that we all have. But I think you said it very well about actually truly listening and not being too hard on yourself and focusing on the fun element. That is very important.

Yeah, cool. Well, I hope it's helpful. So, and I'll follow your journey. And now that I know your website, I'll, I'll watch.

All right, perfect. We'll stay in touch.

All right. Thank you.

All right. Thank you so much.

Bye.

Hey, what's up guys? I hope you enjoyed this episode of the Extramilest podcast. Many more episodes are coming up soon with world-class athletes, coaches, and progress makers from around the world. So make sure to subscribe via my website extramilest.com/subscribe. My name is Floris Gierman. Thank you for listening and hope to connect with you guys more soon.