Live With: Jack Mullaney

Welcome to episode whatever of Live from DreamRun Camp, brought to you by 80/20 Endurance. As always, we're coming at you from the Dream House in Flagstaff, Arizona. I've got my trusty assistant coach Lauren Clement working, uh, the camera. We've got a DreamRunner in the wings, uh, Wade, um, who is here from Seattle area. Uh, he's great with questions. I have found that Good coaches love curious athletes.

Yes, we do.

Can I get an amen?

Absolutely. We sure, we certainly do.

Yeah. So I'll be shocked if Wade doesn't chime in with a question. Lauren, of course, you're always welcome. Um, I love to geek out on coaching with coaches. Um, and I have a fantastic opportunity to do that with you, uh, here this evening. Uh, my guest today is the newly hired coach of the Hoka Northern Arizona Elite professional running team based here in Flagstaff, Jack Mulaney. Welcome, Jack.

Thanks so much for having me.

It's great to have you here. Um, I'm just super excited. Like, you know, I'm, I'm a, I'm a geek and a homer and, uh, like a die-hard partisan for NAZ Elite. Like, they're my team. Um, you know, they, uh, you know, I care a lot about, about this team. I'm, you know, good friends with Ben Rosario, the guy who started the team. And I want only the best for it. And when you were hired, and I didn't know about you, and I just stalked you a little bit, and what I saw I loved, and it just made me feel like the future is bright. That wasn't even the question, but I'm just happy that you're the coach of this team.

Well, it's a great privilege, and it's something that I'm really excited about. I think the thing that sticks out to me the most about The team, and this is something I've kind of said from the start, is just how many great genuine people that there are. There's obviously really great athletes that are part of the team, but the athletes themselves are great individuals who are not just athletes. They embody other identities as well. We have a lot of parents on the team. My first week when I was here, I was at a couple of book events for Matt Baxter. He's an author. And so just between the athletes and the staff and even the support team, board of directors, there's just so many great people around the team that it's hard not to get really excited about what we can do together. Yeah.

You know, it's easy to just say, well, just sort of assume, oh, that's good. It matters. But like, why does that matter actually? If you're like, you know, a professional sports team, And, um, you know, it's, it's a very, uh, goal-directed type of operation. You're like, you're trying to achieve performances on the highest stage. Like, um, that's the mission, at least, you know, the perception of the mission. Like, why does it matter to have good people involved?

Yeah, well, I, I always think about, um, there was a commencement speech that David Foster Wallace gave at Kenyon College many years ago And the title of it—

we're 3 minutes in and we've got a David Foster Wallace reference.

The title of it was This Is Water, and he starts by telling the story about two young fish are swimming in the sea and an older fish comes swimming towards them and basically says, how's the water? And the fish keep— the two fish, younger ones, keep swimming along, and finally one of them turns to the other and goes, What the hell is water? His whole point and what he went on to say is sometimes the most important and valuable things in life are hardest to see and sometimes difficult to acknowledge. For me, it really illustrates just how important environment and community is when you're trying to achieve a goal and just how much that drives the emotions around how you feel about pursuing it. And just the, the collective energy within a team when you're trying to pursue a goal. And every successful team that I've been on, there's always been a great environment and a great energy, which comes from great people. And I think even, even, you know, people maybe that haven't been a part of a team environment, if you've been part of a group project in school, you know that if you've got great group members and you're really excited about what you're doing the project is often pretty darn good. If you're working collectively in a group, so much of your experience is driven by just the interactions that you have. And so, for me as a coach, that's something that I'm always really in tune to is the energy in the room and how to create the right mindset when we go about pursuing the big audacious goals that we have. Yeah.

So, it kind of matters in two respects like, A, A, you're probably gonna be happier in an environment like that, but B, it actually does serve the, the mission, you know, the kind of cutthroat performance transmission. Yeah.

Yeah.

Um, quick aside. So the, uh, I got my first break, um, in, in like endurance sports writing from this guy named Bill Kotowski, who was the original founder of Triathlete Magazine in 1983. He was my boss when he started up another magazine called Multisport Multisport in 1995. Bill, he was kind of slumming it in endurance sports, uh, media. Like, he really was like a literary type of guy. And so he— but between these stints, between Triathlete magazine in 1983 and Multisport in 1995, started a couple of literary magazines, one of which was the first to ever publish a short story by David Foster Wallace.

Hey, there we go.

Yeah. And Infinite Jest came out that year. And I went to a book signing in San Francisco and he signed a copy of Infinite Jest for me.

Yeah, it's a long book.

Yeah, it is.

Have you read it?

Uh, I've— I, I did try. I made an attempt many years ago. I gotta, I gotta get back around to it.

Yeah, it's like Ulysses. It's like a lot of people started it, right? Not so many, right?

Right.

Uh, thank you, Lauren. Um, but yeah, uh, on that, um On that note, actually, so I know that you are a prolific reader, or at least you pose like one on Twitter. You read a lot, right?

I do. Yeah.

And you also enjoy writing as well. How does that feed in? Like, if we're just going to get into like the art of coaching, you know, are a lot of good coaches big readers?

Um, the ones that I'm surrounded with certainly are. Um, and I think reading is such a good, um, it's a good exercise. I think it's always good for a coach to be curious and always trying to learn more. Um, the more that you read, the more you develop your perspective and the more that you make connections between the things that you've read. So oftentimes if you're reading something on training philosophy, you can read a book And then read another book on training philosophy. And then you kind of start to see, create this inner web of how everything connects. Right. Um, and, and so I think that's, that's something for me, uh, I would say why I read is just this thirst for knowledge and always wanting to get better. You know, I think as a coach, we're always asking our athletes to do everything that they can to continue to get better at running. And for, for coaches, you know, we're hired for our mind and our perspective. And I think you continue to get better. One of the ways you do that is by reading. And then as it pertains to writing, I think writing is a really good exercise for making sure that you're synthesizing your thoughts and, um, kind of distilling down what's most important and making sure that you're really clear on what you think. Um, cause oftentimes we've got a lot of things going on up here. Um, but what an athlete needs is something that is concise, and direct and to the point. Because something I've learned with athlete communication is you give them a whole lot of stuff. One athlete might cherry-pick point A, the other might listen and hear point B, the other might hear point C. And all of a sudden, the messaging that you're passing along is not necessarily, you know, each athlete is getting something a little bit different.

Right.

Yeah. Yeah.

Um, have you read, uh, David Epstein's Range?

Yes. Yeah, yeah, good. Very good. I would have been a little bit shocked if you hadn't.

Yeah, but, uh, I mean, you know, like, I found it very validating, you know, because like, you know, he, you know, he, uh, I mean, it's empowering if you're sort of like a generalist and like, you know, sort of like a big picture type of person. But, but in my observation, I've been around a lot of really good coaches, and there is a pattern there where it's like they're kind of polymaths and their curiosity is very broad. Um, and I find, you know, like I read all over the place and it's like, everything's relevant. You know, like if, if you're, if your professional focus is like endurance performance, but you're just sampling all kinds of other things, like everything's relevant somehow. Right. Do you find that as well?

Yeah, absolutely. Um, that's, it's actually one of the reasons, uh, during the pandemic, I started a blog called Beyond the Stopwatch and Um, for those that don't know, I, I, my background, um, is maybe a little bit different from, uh, typical running coaches in that I didn't run at the collegiate level. And, and so I had a lot of other experiences. I was a musician, um, kind of all the way through college and, uh, did a couple of other things, played a number of other sports. And, uh, the more I get into coaching and, and The further along I get in this career path, the more I realize that there's so many learning points from venues or walks of life outside of track and field that can be applied to coaching. Because at the end of the day, so much of it is relationship-based and understanding people, and also just the pursuit of a goal. Even in music, right? You're working on something over and over again and trying to perfect it. And consistency is a really important piece of that, having a consistent practice, even kind of being competitive with yourself in terms of trying to master something. There's so many through lines in many different walks of life that I think apply to coaching. And that's what I tried to express in starting that blog.

Yeah. And that's where I went to. Straight away when I stalked you. That's basically what it means. You don't have like the— you don't have like a gigantic online footprint, so it's like, yeah, the Twitter feed takes you to the blog, and, uh, um, that's kind of what got me excited about you. Um, you know, just I guess drilling down on that a little bit because like, and I come at this from— I know you've done a number of interviews since you've been hired, and like I feel like sometimes like I'll ask the same question someone else will ask but in a different hear it.

Sure. Okay, we'll see how much my responses align then, right?

Yeah, just if you— all I ask is that you be genuine.

Yeah, of course.

But, you know, like, you know, I think, you know, maybe, you know, like, um, you know, you know, the running media, running punditry, whatever, considered you a surprise hire, you know, just like, oh wow, I mean, who's this guy? That was my reaction. Like, I didn't, I didn't know your name, didn't know your background. Um, and, and so that's what led to like, I want to find out about this guy. So, um, you know, because Ben was here in that seat, you know, 2 weeks ago, and he gave his perspective on it. Um, you know, you know, what is your perspective on like why why this came about. Like, honestly, like, you know, like, clearly, like, these folks who made the decision to hire you know what they're doing. Like, it was a very long, very thorough process, right? Uh, you can take that to the bank that they did not hire you accidentally. You have to have your own perspective on, like, um, I mean, were you a little bit surprised to be selected? And if not, why?

Um, well, it's That's a good question. And, you know, I can't speak to fully what, what was going on on the other side of the equation, but I think there's, there's kind of two things for me as I think about the whole process. The first is that I've been really fortunate the last 6 and a half years at the University of Portland to have a really unique opportunity to develop my expertise in coaching. And what I mean by that is I was a coach that was assisting both a separate men's and women's program. So there was a head men's coach, Rob Connor. There was a head women's coach, Ian Soloff, and I was assisting with both of them. So my, my days were very interesting in that my mornings were primarily spent with the women's team. My afternoons were spent with the men's team. And then in the evening, I also over time was given the unique opportunity to coach a lot of our alums. So, um, the, the coaches there have done a great job of building a culture where the athletes want to continue running beyond college, pursue Olympic trials qualifiers, or even kind of run, um, at the sub-elite level. And, and so I had this, this unique opportunity where I got to start trying my hand at coaching and a variety of different events. So getting to coach the marathon, but also getting to coach, you know, 1500 up to the 10K as well. Um, so I was, I was kind of getting this real multifaceted crash course in coaching because I would get to see two different coaches and their coaching styles and have the opportunity to kind of loft ideas back and forth between us, uh, in terms of how we would approach things. And then I also was getting to kind of cut my teeth on my own, um, with, with these sub-elites. And so it was kind of a way where I could develop my expertise in a very unique way. And, and so I think that, that was a piece of it. Um, but the other piece of it was I'm very used to a collaborative approach and, and working with other people in, in coaching. And that's kind of the second part where I don't think that this team needed somebody to come in and totally blow up the operation, right? There's a lot of really good things going on with the team. And, um, you know, just looking at what, what the team accomplished this year, right? Putting, um, you know, having Chrissy win, win the U.S. title in the steeplechase, having Adrian make the world championships as well. There was just so many great things that happened with this team, and, um, I think the— they were looking for somebody to come in and collaborate with the great wealth of expertise that's already there with, with Jenna, our assistant coach, and and Ben, I think they, they proved this year that there's a lot of good things going on.

Yep.

And so I felt like I was somebody that could come in and connect with them and, and, you know, more kind of plug my expertise into what's already there rather than try to totally start something from, from fresh. And, you know, and, and kind of the last point is I, I'm not naive to how my hire was perceived. And so for me, I wake up every day with the motivation to earn the post, you know, earn the position. And that's fueled me since the day I signed on the dotted line. But it's going to fuel me moving forward, is I want to earn the trust of the athletes first and really build a good connection with them. And over time, if that happens, I think the results will take care of themselves.

I have a quick follow-up to that, and then I would like to invite questions from folks in the wings. So, like, prepare your question. But I'm curious to know what role confidence plays in this, because that's often what you see. It's interesting, like, you know, with the passing of Bobby Knight just the day before yesterday or whatever, like, legendary, you know, college basketball coach. And I was making this point yesterday with you, I think, Lauren. It's just like when you, when you rewind the story, like, of a legendary coach, or not even just a coach, but, but people who really made their mark in a field, it's like, it's like time after time after time you see like their first big break came when they were quite young, you know. And, uh, and with, with Bobby Knight, he was a head coach at West Point at 24. And it's like, yep, there's another one. It's like, that's how it is. I think, okay, well, what's behind was it— is it luck? Well, you know, luck plays a part in life, but like usually like people who are, are gifted and driven and really have something to offer, um, they know it, you know what I mean? Like there's like, like, and that's part of what gets people's attention and gets like, you know, when a door is open, well, the person on the other side of that door opens that door for a reason. It's like, I like this guy, this guy, or this gal, you know, might be quite young and, you know, their best days are ahead of them, but I really see something there. And that's something they see, like, you know, the person who has that gift isn't an idiot. They know they have it too. And so they're like, I feel like almost without exception, like, there's a kind of a confidence or just a centeredness, like knowing who you are and what you're about that's like there already, even when you are early on in your career, like You know, are you a confident person, or do you have a strong sense of yourself, your values, what you're about, what you do have to offer?

I think I've always been somebody that is pretty grounded in my values. And one of the first things that I shared with the team when I first got here, we had a team meeting on my first day, was my 5 values that I try to stick to as much as I possibly can. I think in a world like elite-level running, there's so much unknown and I always find that when you come back to the things that you are— that are within your control and how you're going to show up every day, that's when you do your best work. And you tend to stray from that when you think too much about the things that are beyond your control, results and just external factors that that you really can't. And so, for me, the 5 for me that are most important are connection, for one.

Take notes, folks.

And that's really just because, again, my ability to impact athletes is gonna be directly correlated to the quality of my connection with them. And so, individual meetings, you know, at workouts, anytime I see them, really, having a good quality connection with them, it really aligns our efforts. So, That's, that's the first one. The second one is competition. I don't, I don't think I'd be in, in sports at all if I wasn't a little competitive. But it— what I mean by that is I want our training to be oriented around the idea that we're here to compete and that it's preparation for competition. And, and really also just having a good dialogue around what competition is, it's really an opportunity to get the most out of yourself. And, and I see it that way. Sometimes, especially again at the professional level, there's so many external factors that can get in the way of that meaning. But I like to bring it back to that because it's very centering and I think it's calming. It's just, hey, this is an opportunity for me to get the most out of myself and being able to put on a really cool looking kit, being able to perform in front of a crowd Being able to be around other people that are at my level, that those are just things that help me channel my efforts towards that. Um, so that's, that's second. Um, the third one's consistency. I have a bias. They are, yeah, they are. Um, consistency, uh, I think is really important, especially as a coach, um, for athletes to trust how you're going to show up every day. Um, I think that's when they build trust in you is when they know, hey, this is what I'm going to get out of someone every single day. But also in training, I think it's, it's always good to have a bias towards that consistency piece. So I'm especially now, right now in like the fall winter timeframe, um, uh, we're not taking too many chances in training because it's more important that we're here for the next workout than it is that we hit another rep or we go a little bit faster right now. Um, so that's, that's third. I just think consistency is, you know, sows the seeds for success. Um, the fourth is curiosity. We talked a little bit about that already. Um, but I just think for me, especially as I'm building a training plan and understanding what an athlete needs best, is really being curious about their background, what they prefer, what their strengths are, what their weaknesses are. Um, and really being curious rather than being married to a specific system. I think that's really key, again, especially at this level when we're talking about the razor's edge and that last 1 or 2%, really being dialed into what an athlete needs specifically is important. And then the last one's compassion. And that really derives from this is hard. Running is hard, especially at this level. It's hard. And I think what athletes need is they need to know somebody respects them and appreciates them as an athlete, but also as a person. And that almost above all is what's really key for me, is expressing that compassion both in the highs and in the lows. They don't need you when they win the race, right? If you're a coach, because everybody wants to talk to them. They need you when they don't finish or they get last or whatever it is, because that's— those are the loneliest points in the sport.

Yep. The great Bobby Dodd said, either love your athletes or get out of coaching.

That's right.

That speaks to the compassion piece right there.

That's it. That's it. Yeah.

Yeah.

Cool.

Um, can I get a question from someone in the room? Wade, you ready to go? Yeah.

So, um, I'm finding a lot of what you're talking about applicable even beyond running. Like I'm even thinking about my own career relationships with people in my team, building trust and so forth. And you really started to touch on, I think, components of the question I wanted to ask, which was, you know, coming into this program and building trust with the athletes. Like, I think your 5 principles are a great foundation and it sure sounds like it'll set you up to be able to do that. But even in terms of the execution, like how you go about building that trust, I'm, I'm, I'm taking notes because I want to know how I can even do it better with the people that I work with. And so if you had more that you could dig into there, I'd find that super valuable. Um, not just to understand how you do it with elite athletes, but what I can do with, with the people that I work with as well.

Yeah. Yeah. No, that's, that's a great question. Um, For me, it all comes down to having a structure. If something's important to you, schedule it. That's something I was taught when I was, I was younger and that I've really tried to adhere to. So, like I said, the first, first day I was on the job, we had a full team meeting and we got everybody together. That's something that we're going to do every single month and more often if we need to. The individual athlete meetings that I had, Um, the, that was kind of week 1 and 2, um, with, with all the athletes that were in town. That's something that we're going to be doing twice a month. Um, it's scheduled. Right. And, and so I also, on my own, I will schedule in my calendar, um, uh, to text or call, uh, certain athletes to make sure that I am communicating with them. To me, uh, again, building that connection with with them comes down to touch points. It's how many touch points can you have throughout the day? So something that's also important is when athletes come in to lift weights, because they, um, we have a weight setup at our performance center, is trying to make time so that I'm there being present with them, um, as, as much as I can. Anytime where they're coming into our space where we're doing all of our work, um, trying, trying to connect with them as much as possible. Um, and then another exercise that I do that, uh, I heard Tony La Russa talk about, a longtime baseball manager, was every night before he goes to bed, uh, he goes, he would go through his roster and think, okay, how is this person doing? When is the last time I connected with them? And do I need to, do I need to check in? Um, because most often than not, I think, especially when athletes are going through low points, is they really need to know that somebody cares. And, and it's not, I think sometimes with coaches, when we mess this up, it's not that we don't care. It's just so often you're focused on the here and now and things that are in the schedule that you don't always remember to reach out to the athlete that wasn't at practice because they're on a bike. Um, and, and so again, for me, it just comes down to scheduling, scheduling, like create structure creates the freedom to do the things that you want. And so if something's important to you, I would say create a routine or a ritual around it so that you make sure that you're, you're doing it not as a way to check the box, but just to make sure that you are really aligning the emotions and the feelings that you have within you with the actions and the words that you're actually putting out into the world.

Boom. Lauren, would you like to ask a question? Yeah.

So a while ago we had Jenna come and talk and something I found interesting that she talked about was the authenticity piece and kind of her style of coaching and interacting with the athletes and how for her, if she tried to take on a different approach or a different style, it just felt off and it, then it came across as ingenuine with the athletes. And you've talked about being able to kind of take bits and pieces from other coaches and form your own approach and your own style. Um, could you just like elaborate a bit on your specific style, how you feel it is, and did it change much as you learned and worked with other coaches, or did you kind of have a style that you kind of stuck with throughout?

Yeah, that's, that's a good question. So, um, again, I came here from the University of Portland and The men's coach, Rob Connor, was the one that hired me there. And the best thing about Rob, bar none, is that he is the same person to me as he is to the athletes, as he is to our athletics director, as he is to a random person that he meets on the street. He's just a very, very unique guy, and he's not afraid to express some of his unique interests. He's really into 1970s Portland wrestling. He's really into— there was a quarterback for the Los Angeles Rams named Roman Gabriel. And when I first moved out to Portland, I didn't have a place to stay. And Rob being the kind, compassionate guy that he is, is just like, oh, you can stay in my basement. And I go down to his basement and I open the bedroom door and it's literally a museum to Roman Gabriel.

Yeah.

And the whole basement, too, is promotional posters of all of these wrestling matches that happened in Portland, but also kind of around the Pacific Northwest back in the '70s. And so, for me, one of the things that I did when I was getting to know him was every day I'd get up and I'd look at one of the promotional posters and I'd memorize a couple of names. And then, I'd go and we'd be out on a walk as the guys were out doing the run or something like that. I'd be like, "Hey, RC, tell me about Missouri Mauler. Tell me about Bobo Brazil," or these random wrestlers that I picked up off the wall. And that was kind of how we got to know each other. And it just illustrated for me, he's a unique guy, but because he's not afraid to really just be who he is, it creates a space for for everyone else on our team to also express who they are because they look at him and they're like, oh, he's doing these things that maybe people think are weird or whatever it is, but that means that I can do whatever, be whoever I am too. And so to answer your question, for me, I think that I've always tried to not be Rob, because I think that's the biggest mistake you can make is trying to be somebody else, but kind of take that freedom that he's given me to really just dig into who I am. And again, for me, it goes back to that curiosity piece. So a lot of times for me, in terms of connecting with an athlete, it's, it's kind of figuring out some kind of hook about them that, that I can create a conversation around. Tyler Day on our team is a big Arizona sports fan. So, for me, getting to know him, a lot of it has been around the Diamondbacks because they were just in the World Series and making this incredible run, or talking about the Coyotes because there's always seemingly every year this risk that they might leave town. And so, it's finding those, again, those hook points or those interesting points about people. Again, for me with Rob, pulling names off a wrestling poster, finding something that's interesting to someone else and almost using my curiosity to be interested in it and learn more about it. I always want to learn what, what people are interested in. Um, and so I think that's, that's my style on a, on a personal level, but also from a coaching perspective too, is really understanding from an athlete perspective, like, what do you like? What's worked well for you in the past? And, and not necessarily strictly catering to that, but just having an understanding of when you write a workout, how the athlete's going to perceive it. I think that's really helped me a lot.

That was a great question. Love the answer. Um, and it teed me up to, I mean, I coach as well. I, it's not my gift, but I love it. And I strive to get better. But one thing I have found, it just bootstrapping my way toward getting better at the craft is that, um, athletes, like all humans, they tend to hold some things inside. And it's just like, I guess it's kind of fear-based, right? Just like, how will I be perceived? It's like, I'm not okay with this thing about myself, so like, why would I share it with anyone else? And if you're going to take a whole human approach to coaching athletes, and I think they are investing all of themselves in it, they're not just machines that exercise, getting them to open up can really, I mean, it's nice because it deepens the connection, which has intrinsic value, but also, you know, when you get back to that, you know, the performance orientation, it helps, you know, when that stuff that's, that, you know, is, is inside, you know, it, you know, that whatever barrier is, is holding inside comes down. And I have found that like the coach needs to go first, like the coach needs to tone set. In that regard. And often it's just a matter of like showing vulnerability or just like being a little bit unfiltered, honestly. Just like, hey, we don't need to read off the usual scripts in, in this dynamic. Like, and if, like, if you go first, um, then you can just almost see it happen. Just like, there's this exhale. It's like, all right, I'll start to share some of my stuff as well. And it seemed like you were touching on that a little bit where, um, you know, you, there's a little bit of psychology there, right? It's just like, you know what you need to draw out of the athlete and you're the coach. And so like, you know, can you, can you talk about a little bit about your approach to like the tone setting and setting parameters where athletes feel okay being themselves and being open with you?

Yeah, for sure. Um, your question makes me think about something that I, uh, introduced when I was at University of Portland with our men's team. We started this weekly tradition of— it was on Monday, now it's on Thursday— of doing something that we call 5-minute talks. And every week it was somebody different on the team got to give up and get up and speak to a prompt that we had selected at the beginning of the year. And it was something that was a little bit more of a personal question, but it allowed you to have the flexibility to kind of choose the depth that you wanted to go, right? And, and so, um, you know, we, we— one, one year it was, you know, tell us about something that you failed at and why, how that impacted you and, and how you responded to it. One year it was like, hey, what are you trying to get better at? And, um, you know, when did it first become apparent that it was a weakness for you? Why is it important to get better at it? And how can the team help you? You know, and, and, and so those moments or those spaces, anything that was ever shared was— we always kept internal. Like, it was— and that was, that was the promise that we made. And, um, I think especially for, uh, young men, this is a challenging task, uh, to be vulnerable, to be open. But when you have, you know, our senior leaders set the tone and go first, it created the space for other people to do the same. And when people do it and they get the response of empathy and a lot of people going, you know, oh shoot, like, I'm feeling that too, right? Like, I, I'm so glad that you said it, but, but like, we're all feeling this. I think it, it does take the guard down a little bit, and, and we recognize that, you know, we all have the things that we're trying to get better at. We all have the things that we kind of hold inside that we're we don't want to project to other people. But when we do, if we do it in the right space with people that we trust, there's a huge support network for it. We feel a lot better for it. And, um, to get to your question, I just always try to, with my coaching style and, and just personality, is, is try to create the space for somebody to be open and vulnerable. And, you know, I think you do that by continuing to show up and prove to them that you can be trusted. I think, I think that's so key. But you never, you never force it out of them. You never pry it out of them or whatever. It just— I think it happens organically. And when they feel comfortable and when they feel like they trust you, that's when they, that's when they open up. And to your point, that, that oftentimes will start with me, you know, showing up and, and being open about what's going on in my life, right? And, and, and I think when, when you do that, people like, oh yeah, he's just a guy, he's in my corner. And that's the type of communication that I try to create.

I'm going to circle back around, but I can't help myself. I have watching the clock behind us there. But there's one question I have to ask before— well, I hope to have you back sometime.

I'd love to be.

Yeah, not burning any bridges here, but I would like to ask a question about innovation. And for me, part of the reason maybe I will never be a great coach is I'm really wired for creativity. And in my writing, I'm always like, I get excited about saying the thing that hasn't been said yet or hasn't been said enough, pushing the conversation forward. Um, and, and honestly, like, trying to influence the sport. Like, even things like, you know, AI, this whole AI revolution. I'm like, well, it's here. I'm not going to put my head in the sand and pretend it's not happening. It's like, all right, if it's going to be here and if it's going to penetrate our sport, like, how can I shape it so that it, like, it influ— its influences is good rather than evil? You know, you're in a spot where, like, you know, and you articulate— articulated it well, that you didn't come here to blow it up. And like impose, you know, the philosophy of Jack Mulaney. Um, but I have a feeling that you— well, I just, I know from having read some of the things, uh, well, your interviews and, and things you've written, that you have ideas, you know, about like, you know, the idea is not like, here's the formula and we're just going to run it back and run it back and run it back and see how far we can get it. Like, right, you'd like to like go somewhere that there's like a vector to this whole thing. Can you say a word or two about how you look at innovating and moving the art and science of training for performance forward? Yeah.

I think the first thing that's important and that's on my to-do list and we've already been doing is really have a good understanding of all the processes that are currently in place. And what's working. I think you really have to first listen a lot, learn a lot, and gather a lot of information. I think that's, that's really important because I do have all of these ideas, but what you have to do is make sure that whatever idea you want to implement is a good fit for the situation that you're in. And if you don't understand the situation, then you're just coming in again and imposing, and that might not be the right— you know, you might be trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. Yeah, with, with some of the ideas that you have. And so that's, that's been how I've approached these first couple weeks, and honestly how I'm going to approach, you know, the next couple of months is really try to understand what's working well, where there could be spaces for improvement in our processes, and then that's where the ideas will come in. And, and so yeah, again, I have, I have a lot of ideas, but I also have believed that it's important again to establish trust first because if you come in and change things right away without trust, there's not going to be a whole lot of buy-in. Again, with change, change is hard, right, for anybody, and so I think you have to— if there's going to be change, it has to be done incrementally so people can adjust to it. The other thing you never want to do too is change too much too quickly to the point where you can't, you can't either see if the idea was good or really account for the impacts of the changes.

Yep. Yeah. Right on. Yeah. So yeah, I'll be fascinated to see how it all unfolds over time. Yes. Wade's ready to go. Always.

All right.

All right.

So I got a question mostly about the kind of data that you as a coach especially as part of this team, might look at day in, day out, the kinds of data that you would use to inform decisions. Just, uh, especially like, just, I'm aware of all the technology that's out there, all the things that you can track. Um, there's probably an overwhelming amount of data. And so just curious, um, for you, like, what are some of the things that you pay most attention to? Like, how do you incorporate data into the decisions that you end up making in terms of training and everything else.

Yeah. One of my favorite books is called The Signal and the Noise by Nate Silver. And the whole thesis of the book is that we're, especially in today's day and age, we're overwhelmed with the amount of data that's coming in. And so much of it is noise. And the task of Somebody that's able to make good predictions, or really, I think the task of a good coach is to be able to find the signals within that noise. What's cutting through, what's actually useful in terms of informing the decisions that you're making from a training perspective. Um, I think one of the things that's, uh, you know, had popularity over time, but probably blown up in popularity because of the Ingebrigtsens is, um, lactate threshold testing. Um, that's something that we just did with our athletes this week. And, um, that's to me, that's an important metric, um, especially in terms of, I always think when you, when you set about doing a certain session, you really want to be intentional with it. And, um, there's been a lot of research on what happens if you're working out above the threshold, above the anaerobic threshold and how much additional muscle damage you're doing and how much longer you're prolonging your recovery from, from those efforts. So for something like that, that's where, you know, when we can figure out, okay, right now, this is exactly where an athlete is at. Um, it helps us in terms of prescribing appropriate training paces. And then it also gives us space within a workout to do some lactate testing as well, just to make sure if we're in the middle of doing a threshold session that we can check in and actually see where an athlete is at. Um, again, it's not, it's not a panacea in terms of, uh,, you know, getting you to an Olympic medal or whatever it might be. Uh, like some people are making it out to be, but again, that's, that's a tool. So that's, that's something we would use in terms of informing, um, informing our, our decisions. Uh, I think, um, geez, what kind of other data? I, I, I'm, I'm somebody that does tune into heart rate, um, a little bit more than, than maybe others. There's a lot of things that influence heart rate, right? If you get up and have a cup of coffee and then go do a session versus if you get up and don't eat anything and go to a session or whatever, right? Or you get up and you have a child that was screaming all night and you didn't sleep well, that's going to influence. So I think there's a lot of, there's a lot of data points that you can look at. Even something as simple as RPE, I tune into a lot. Like, I think me just within a session asking a workout how something is feeling, I think that's really great feedback. Um, because again, it gets back to this point of how they're perceiving it. And, and, uh, it's, it's almost like that this is water thing again is how they're perceiving it. Um, I think is, is a little bit more important sometimes than maybe what a heart rate would say or what a lactate number would say, because that's the prevailing thoughts. That they're going to have after the session. Um, so I tend to, I tend to keep it somewhat simple. Um, RPE during the workout, heart rate occasionally when we're trying to especially determine how well someone's recovered. Um, and then lactate testing, um, and lactate values are important in certain, certain circumstances. Uh, those are some that I would key into. There's, there's others too. Um, Sometimes if someone's having trouble recovering, tracking sleep I think is important. We know that sleep is by far the most important recovery tool bar none. And so that's always where I start rather than, you know, how much time did you get in the NormaTec boots or something like that. But yeah, I think, I think that's, those are kind of the main ones.

Yeah. Would you like to? All right, cool. Um, yeah, I would just— I like, uh, I like to close with a gotcha question. It's not really— go for it, we're all friends here. Um, so, um, have you ever thought of writing a book?

I, I have. I have thought about it. Um, and I honestly, I don't know how you do it, uh, doing 31. I mean, that's That's impressive.

Most of them are bad. It's easy to write a bad book.

Well, I think even within the process of being able to write a good book, right, you probably— I don't know what you think is your best book, but the more that you do it, the better you probably get at it, right? So I think there's a little bit of that nervousness around doing it the first time. But it, it is something that when I had the time and space or can create the time and space to do it, is something I'd love to do.

Cool. Well, it so happens that 80/20— so I'm wearing this 80/20 Endurance. This is a company I co-founded and we have our own book publishing imprint. So when you're ready, let's talk. Let's do it. Yeah. I mean, yeah, I mean, you have a voice, you know, just this is the writing coach coming out, like that you have the part you can't teach just from having read your blog and obviously you speak well. And yeah, I think it's gonna be, you know, there's like the angle and the hook and like, what's your shtick? You know what I mean? It's like, what do I actually have to say that is needed? Because there are a lot of books out there. But I think, yeah, the broader running community will— you have your team, that's your number one responsibility, but your influence can ramify beyond that through the written word. So I encourage you, don't give it up.

Well, I know, I think it was Ryan Holiday, might have been another author, said, you know, you don't write the book you want to write, you write the book that you have to write.

Yes.

So when, when there's, when there's something where I feel like, hey, I got it, I got to say this, yeah, then, then we'll be in touch.

Yeah, that's, that's a good test. All right, so we've got some, uh, stir-fry, uh, and spring rolls on tap. Uh, those of you tuning in, especially in the future, can't partake, um, but we do welcome people to come here in person, enjoy these occasions. Thank you so much for your time. I really would love to have you back at some point.

Yeah, well, thanks for having me. And yeah, would love to come back. This is, to those watching, this is a special place. This house is, I was telling Matt, I think it's one of a kind.

So would encourage anyone that's interested to come out here and give it a shot. Sweet. All right, that's it for episode number whatever of Live from Dream Run Camp. We'll come back whenever we feel like it.