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Some Work, All Play

298. Ultra Training Philosophy, What Shorter Distances Can Learn from Ultras, Black Canyon 100k Records, a Weird Brain Study, and Metabolic Flexibility!

Some Work, All Play

David Roche and Megan Roche

Running, Sports

4.82.1K Ratings

🗓️ 17 February 2026

⏱️ 96 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

We put our hands down our pants (for warmth) before this amazing episode! The main topic revolved around the Black Canyon 100k, where Jenn Lichter and Hans Troyer set course records, and the ultrarunning took another major leap forward. We discuss what we learned before laying out an overview of our ultra training philosophy.

The sport is changing so fast that we’re almost certainly wrong (and biased) in some places. But it’s so fun to learn at the edges, and to see how that might apply to any athlete trying to see what’s possible! We finish it off by looking for lessons that we can learn for shorter distance training theory. Hint: it’s mostly carbs.

And this one was full of great topics! Other topics: eating “real food” in workouts, Megan unleashing the speed on the treadmill, David’s foot progress, Nomio back in stock, the debate on pacers in ultras, a wildly cool study on neurons and endurance adaptation, a weird cycling study that tricked participants with financial incentives, Tadej Pogacar accidentally (?) publishing his power numbers, and a question on metabolic processes and body image.

We love you all! HUZZAH!

-David and Megan

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Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Woo!

0:01.4

Welcome to the Some Work All Play podcast. We are so happy to you with you today. Happy Tuesday. It's Tuesday. And I'm ready to get my spaghetti on on this Tuesday. Get your spaghetti on always, but what are you talking about specifically? I'm talking about our treadmill video that we have coming up, which is going to be me running. We haven't determined what speed yet, but kind of fast, trying to eat a variety of different real foods, including spaghetti. Yeah, well, we're planning it out.

0:23.7

We're going to go to Trader Joe's tonight, and we're going to get frozen foods, and we're going to cook them all up. So what are you planning to actually try to eat? I'm planning a variety of different things, some of my favorites. I think spaghetti and meatballs, chicken noodle soup. Perfect. Maybe a cheeseburger. I like it. I would love actually just like a foot long sub from Subway. Okay. How great would that be? And then compare that to gels. We have the task of making a video for the feed. And we're like, we got to make it spicy. Your solution is to just deep throat a footlong. Yeah.

1:14.5

Well, it's always like, you know what someone's like, okay, how do you do real food options in Ultra? And you're like, well, have you seen Black Canyon and these athletes running six-minute face on rocky trails? Imagine trying to do that, eating a footlong stuff. My brain can't stop thinking about it. Are you like that too? Yeah, I mean, I just think things have totally moved on from quote unquote real food.

1:24.2

You know, like the reason that we love feed and all that type of stuff is that if you're not doing that, you simply cannot physically achieve the things that the body is capable of.

1:27.6

And we're just seeing that be pushed more and more that altars are getting rethought. And I think short distances, absolute no-brainer. But my favorite part of this is that

1:34.4

we're tasked with doing essentially a corporate video, right? Like an introduction to being

1:38.7

sponsored that is just something that's required of us. And they're instead getting you doing

1:44.0

chicken noodle soup on our treadmill. Well, it's going to be you. So I've had this video idea for you for a long time. It's like, let's put David on a treadmill at four minute pace and see what he can consume. But your foot's hurt. I don't think we should. It's actually healing quite well, but not quite ready for four minute pace. So I got to step up and do it. I'm so excited.

2:00.9

You have just expanded your horizons and you're doing all these new things. Making serious question, what's gotten into you? You're just willing to put yourself out there and be silly. It's just fun. As soon as you run one, you know, one stride and eat a thing of spaghetti, you're like, oh, God, this is fun. This is silly. No, I actually, like, genuinely enjoy it.

2:17.3

I think it's fun to think. It's like, once you start to turn on that creative part of your brain,

2:20.3

you're like, what enjoy it. I think it's fun to think.

2:18.1

It's like, once you start to turn on that creative part of your brain, you're like,

2:20.7

what else can we do here? I'm really excited to see if you can do it. What pace do you think I should go? So my plan was to go sub five minute pace, so like 450, 455 pace. I'm however though like a little concerned about holding a bowl and spooning stuff into my mouth that I might fly off the back of the treadmill.

2:37.0

Yeah, you know, Megan. I'm however, though, like a little concerned about holding a bowl and spooning stuff into my mouth that I might fly off the back of the treadmill.

2:37.2

Yeah. You know, Megan, me tearing my plantar and running on it for two months is kind of a sad story. You tearing your hamstring, eating spaghetti on a treadmill for a reel.

2:46.7

At 450 pace. Might be even dumber. So I say we do under six minute pace and make it a little bit more reasonable. 530 face. I feel like 530 pace would be much more control to try to eat. I could actually, it would be interesting too, because at that pace I could actually probably eat some things. We're evaluating what things you can do with that face. Honestly, just to put it out there, I think you can probably deethro the foot long at any pace.

3:07.7

You think I can?

3:08.3

At any pace. Do you have data on this? You're like, no, I'm like, where are these assumptions coming from? Yes, divided by six. From Subway or Quiznos? What kind of sub? This is very important. Oh, Quiznows, always. Quiznos? Oh, my God. That can get it. Or firehouse.

3:24.9

Oh, fire?

3:25.3

I don't really know that one very well.

3:26.7

That was a,

...

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