I used to think I was a patient person and then now I have two young kids and I realized I'm not as patient as I thought I was. Ultra running has unlocked areas of my life. I very likely would not have addressed otherwise and it's made me a better person through the struggle and that's what I love so much about it. Welcome to the Trailhead of Trail Runner Nation every week. We go on a virtual trail run where invite guests that are going to help us motivate ourselves, maybe help us learn how to run better, how to enjoy the trail, and maybe be a better human being. Well, absolutely, Scott, I mean, we're gonna talk about how the obstacle can be the way that it happened to us or that it happened for us. We're gonna talk about that today with Adam Kimball. Stay tuned to the very end of this podcast where we're gonna talk about California biodiversity project, something that Adam is deeply involved in and we can help him. We're having a sale, Don. What's on sale? What do we buy in? Well, the only thing that we sell are one is greater than zero trail runner nation hats that we've been, we've had on our website store for a while. If you go to the trailrunnernation.com, it's the first thing you'll see when you get there. Just click on that. We are going to be selling them for 10 days at the low, low price of $25. Hey, Scott, and this just isn't some hat. It's made by runner. They're the hats that you want to wear on those hot days, on those cold days, on any running day or even offering, they're just the best. I wear mine to church. I'm the most stylish person at church. So for 10 days for certain, but it may take us a little bit longer to figure out how to change the price back to the original price. I think the original price is $39. So you may have a little bit of leeway there, but for sure for 10 days, go get your hat now. Meet the John G Revy Pack, an 18-liter day pack built like a running vest and tough enough for a 20-pound haul. Five chest strap pockets keep flasks fuel and your phone right up front, no digging, no stopping. Two hydropac 500 500mm softflaks come included and those drop-in chest pockets even fit the bigger 650mm ultra flasks. Four point adjustability plus it has a stole ball elastic waist belt that lock the load high for a bounce free ride from city commute to a mountain peak. This pack even has a padded sleeve that you can store a 15-inch laptop and an iPad. While the semi-clam shell opening keeps the gear organized and easy to grab. This is built for the outside too. It's weather-resistant fabric coated zips, daisy chain attachment points, they thought of everything at Junji. That's JohnG.com and as a bonus for listening to TRN, you can get 10% off your order by using the code trail runner. Welcome to another edition of trail runner. Nation, my name is Don Freeman and I'm Scott war and back joining us again is Adam Kimball. He's one of our frequent guests that comes on. He's kind of our philosophical leader. He comes on and we do book reviews and we talk about philosophical things that how running is a mind game and how we can play that better. So Adam, thanks for joining us. Thank you Scott. I just went on LinkedIn and updated my profile to say philosophical leaders. So I appreciate that. Hey, you get some extra looks because of that. This is a fun one because, or at least I thought it would be a fun episode. In the book that we reviewed with Adam Kimball and we did, I think I can't remember how many episodes we did. I think maybe three episodes, maybe four, three episodes Adam. We did three episodes on on this book, The Obstacle Is the Way by Ryan Holiday. But in that book, I was rereading it for the third time because I just think there's the stuff in there so good. There's a story about how NASA trained astronauts to stay calm. They literally trained the panic out of them and I went, man, that is so deep. That is such a good thing. It wasn't just about mastering procedures, it was about creating so much familiarity with the unknown that it stopped feeling unknown. Today we're gonna explore how trail runners can apply the same stoic principle to their own pursuit. Regardless of whether you have a big adventure coming up, this episode will show you how to mentally and physically prepare so that you can have the confidence that replaces the chaos. So go ahead. No, no, I will say, guys, I was excited for this episode, especially because though we've already recorded three episodes Since we first read this book and it's kind of started doing the book reviews This may have been one of the first of the first books that we actually reviewed But in the last couple of years the Person and the idea or philosophy that I have shared the most about with with other runners is Ryan Holiday and the stoic philosophy and so that's what this book is about. Ryan Holiday covers a lot of stoicism and all the things that he does. But I just think that it applies to ultra running as good as any ideology that exists. So I'm gonna throw this question out for both you Adam and for Don just to get the conversation started. Why is Panic the real enemy on the trail? Or how can panic be the real enemy in an adventure or a race or a big endurance event? Well, let me lead with that, Adam, because I only have one thing that came to mind, and I better use it just in case you say it. You can't make good decisions when you have panic and chaos going on in the mind. You can't sort things out, you can't think them through and in the time of crisis, well, you've got to beat your best. And certainly when we get long miles in, we decrease our reasoning skills and our IQ, everything decreases to about our shoe size. So if you add chaos and if you add panic to that, then there's no way you're going to come up with a great solution. 100% in fact that leads perfectly into what I was going to say and I wrote down two quotes from the book that I wanted to chat about at some point during this episode and I'm going to give one of them to you right. And that quote is, perception precedes action. Right action follows the right perspective. So when you panic on the trail, it's going to create action that is not favorable and set off a chain of events that you can't control, whereas if you are able to stay calm in the moment, then generally good things are gonna happen after that point. And it's not just about putting together a plan, say, okay, if I have blisters, this is what I'm going to do. If I have stomach issues, this is what I'm going to do. NASA could have trained their astronauts that way, but instead, they took it to the next level, and they actually trained those situations into their psyche so that they wouldn't get panicked. I don't know if it was Apollo 13 or one of those movies or maybe it was a documentary I saw the astronauts have heart rate monitors and all these biometric sensors on them when they're in training and when they go up in space. And when they're doing these training things, when there's something catastrophically happen, they notice that because they were so trained to stay calm, that their heart rates wouldn't increase hardly that much. They stayed at the same heart rate, even something was catastrophically happening to the the situation in real life or in training. Yeah, as I was going back through this chapter again, I don't know if you guys had this thought at all, but I couldn't stop thinking about when they were talking about how the mental side of it and the ability to remain calm was as important as the skills required for these astronauts. I couldn't help but imagine what it was like being the team or whoever it was selecting these astronauts to go into space and how they were measuring all that. I would have loved to have seen what the pool was, who would have technically been the most skilled and whether those were the people that ended up on the mission or whether it was the people that had less skills, but just for calm under

pressure. Right. Well, this conversation brought a flashback into my mind of back when I was in Little League and, you know, playing ball in a ground ball coming at me. If I panicked, lost confidence, there's a good chance that ball was going to come up, bounce up and hit me in the head, get under my gloves, something was going to happen.

And Adam, you're a big baseball player and division one ball and did that stuff. So maybe you can relate to being calm in the moment at bad or a ball coming at you. Guys, I've always said this, and in fact, I've said this on the show before. I really feel like baseball, the mentality required for baseball is very, very similar to what's required of an endurance athlete in that you have to have a short-term memory good or bad. If something happens, you just got to put it on your mind because that's very much true down where if you start overthinking things, then you're going to be making mistakes all over the place. Whereas you just sort of have to trust your instincts and then take appropriate action and just move forward instead of thinking about everything getting caught up in that. So before we start getting into how we can apply this, I'm thinking back, I volunteered at a couple races this year at the Canyons and then also at Western States. If you volunteered at an age station, especially one that's deeper into the miles, you've probably witnessed what I witnessed, and I'm recalling right now, where a runner will come in that is maybe not as experienced and something's going wrong, and they're freaking out, they're going, I can't eat, I don't know what to do, I can't eat or I have, I can't keep anything down or I have these mussel cramps and they're panicked and you juxtapose that with someone that has done this over and over and over again and they come in and they are just calm. They go, you know what, it's you take, hey, how's it going? And they go, well, I've been having some issues. I can't keep food down, but I know that if I slow down, and I trickle in some food here and there, things will be okay. And it's just fun to see the juxtaposition of someone that is panicking because they haven't either prepared or have the experience versus the person that either has prepared themselves well and has the experience. And I guess my question is, does it just come from experience or can we actually quick charge this? I don't have to have 10 or a dozen hundred 100 miles under my belt before I can get the panic out. Is there a way to train this out of us? I think it's a mindset and I think you can prepare yourself for that. I think about your age station story, Scott, and the veteran coming through, the veteran saying, I'm not eating anything, I know I need to eat. So I'm going to take this with me and eat this as I go. They're not going to panic about not eating. They're going to say, I'm not eating. I've got to eat. Or I can't keep anything down. Obviously, my body is not happy right now. My gut needs to be purged and changed and reset. I'm going to step over by this, this bush, I'm going to get rid of it and then I'm going to get back on track. So the confidence this isn't going to take me out.

It should. and changed and reset. I'm gonna step over by this bush and I'm gonna get rid of it and then I'm gonna get back on track because of the confidence this isn't gonna take me out. It's just an obstacle, get through it and move on I go. Yeah, my answer, I think it's some of both. I think you can do everything in your power to be as prepared as possible, but I also am of the belief that experience can trump almost anything else. So having not done it doesn't necessarily put you at a disadvantage, but having done it puts you at an advantage. No question about it. And I think the more that you put yourself in those situations, the more you can simulate it, go through it. And sometimes for me, you know, a lot of times when I'm working with athletes, they'll ask me, hey, I'm training for this 100 mile race.

Do I need to run a 50 mile or 100 pay race before that? My answer is always, no, you don't need to. But if you want to work on things ahead of the big one, it's a great opportunity to do so. I think that's what running B in C races are for is the dry run, the run through, allowing you to prepare yourself for the one that is most important to you.

And so while you can totally do the one, do the a race without any lead up and stick the landing and deal with all the obstacles, I think that has happened a lot and totally can't happen. I also think that experiencing it had a time will prepare you better and give you more opportunities to sort through those issues. So the new runner coming into the aid station where things are broken will think, ah, I'm done. This race is over. I just got to figure out a way to cut my band and get hair lifted out of here. Or the veteran runner saying, I'm in a low spot right now. It's going to last for a period of time. I know it's maybe going to be a mile or four miles, but but I'm gonna get through this and I'll be back on top. I need to be patient. I've got to I've got to look at my spreadsheet numbers that I have and realize that you know some of that's blown and I'm gonna miss some of those marks but I'm not gonna miss the race. I'm just gonna work through it and continue on. Are our brains over-react? They overreact to unfamiliar situations. So if you've never been out running and had your stomach turn and thrown up as you're running down the trail, if you've never had that happen and it happens for the first time, your brain can overreact. And because it's not normal, I guess the key thing to know is you're not in danger. It's overreacting and saying, hey, you need to stop doing this. You need to sit on the trail. You need to quit the race or whatever. But you need to know that that's the brain overreacting because it hasn't had this situation before and that you're not in danger. One thing that really struck a chord with me on that note, Scott, was Ryan Holiday said something to the effect of a lot of times overreactions can be something that we do because it's easier to just overreact than it is to problemsolve. You can just get emotional and say, I can't handle this instead of actually taking the actions to improve the situation and move forward. And I'd never really thought about it that way before. Hey, Scott, the attorney team that listens live during the recording. I knew you were going to bring this up. So, yes, please. They came in and said, sometimes you need to listen to the body and you are in danger and you just need to make a sound assessment. I told them that I would mention it to you while we were recording and so they've released the issue. Not a problem. We can keep it in right. I lost my forearm. I got a compound fracture. But trail runner nation said, I'm not an any danger, just keep going. Listen to the body just not too much, you know? Right. You know, so I think that by putting usself, ourselves in situations where we can gain familiarity with common things that can happen, I think that, I'm not saying that you should put sandpaper in your shoe so that you have blisters or anything like that. But I think that the more you go out and you train, some of these things will happen and learn from them. I think that that confidence comes through experiences. Adam, I'm gonna throw that to Atchie. This was some lore that I heard early on that there was some very accomplished runners that practiced this. They'd put a rock in their shoe and they'd run with it so they could tough themselves up and be ready for whatever happened to them. And I thought early on since this this source seemed to be pretty credible and they were faster than I am and they have more bump-up goes in on a liver dream of having it must be right. You just got pranked for him. Adam, am I right to lose that as a strategy for becoming a tough ultra runner? Yeah, I would lose that strategy, Don. I think I've always thought that the best way to go about these things, and we've talked about this on different episodes before, but just generally picking your spots. I think in general, you can think, how do I become more mentally tough or how do I handle Adverse conditions better and the tendency can be to think always be putting yourself in situations where you can work on that But there's also a willpower effect there where if you're if you're just like banging your head into the wall too many times You can start to get overwhelmed with that or not be as ready to problem solve. So I like to do things like that every so often to hone the skill, to work on it without overloading myself. And I've found that doing that I think is a lot more effective than just trying to, you know, throw rocks in your shoes and intentionally hurt yourself whenever you can. Yeah, I think what separates the veteran from the person that's soon to become a veteran is learning to recognize those problems early on. There's usually a small clue that comes in. If you listen to it, you can catch it and divert it and experience it. But if you miss those small clues, another one will come. It'll be a little bit larger. And it keeps getting larger until it puts you on that rock that Scott was talking about. You get plenty of clues before things happen to you. Someone that says, I don't know, it just happened. No, no, you missed about 10 clues before that just happened. If a rock fell on you and trapped you, that just happened. But there's cramping, this thirst, this not enough calories, this paces to, that didn't happen. That's a good point. That's a good point. I wanna say a quick comment and then I have a question for Adam. And we've talked about this. I'm sure on the previous episode. But I I remember I don't know if it was you, Don,

or if it was Jeff, it may have been Jeff, one of our running buddies. And he would inevitably get a small pebble in his shoe. He didn't proactively put a pebble in his shoe. But he every, and he said he actually would have fun with that. And he'd play around with it as he's running. He'd kind of move it around with his toes and get familiar with it.

And I think the old saying, at least my memory, if I remember right, said, you know, I even gave it a name. I gave it a pet name. It was my pet and that was my partner as I ran the six miles to the next aid station. That wasn't me Scott. I wouldn't have done that. You would have taken it out of your shoe. Yeah. To take a tangent here and just tell you guys, I've made... I can never see because we've recorded so many episodes. I can never remember what I've set on each episode. But during the 2018 Western States, which was the first time I ran the race, so I've run the race twice. I've come over the escarpment. So for those who don't know, the escarpment is basically the race starts with a three mile climb to the highest point on the course

and then you kind of go... I've come over the escarpment. So for those who don't know, the escarpment is basically the race starts with a

Three-mile climb to the highest point on the course and then you kind of go over the other end and then into the wilderness and begin your descent into Auburn from there and so both of the times that I've run the race I've come over the escarpment in second place the first time and then in first place the second time and And not intentionally, just was prepared to,

because a lot of the thought is,

you've gone out too hard, right?

But I was prepared for both of those situations.

But anyway, the first time I come over and this is 2018 and I'm running in second place through mile six or seven, something like that. And who comes up right behind me, Jim Walsley and Jim's a friend of mine and he, we're chatting for a second. Then he said something like, like yeah I've got like a little pebble in my shoe I'm not sure if I should like mess with it yet pretty early you know and I was like I was like Jim take the pebble out and then go win this race and then he pulled out to the side took the pebble out went and set the course record and so I always joke that I'm claiming like 100th of a percent of Jim's win from 2018. Yeah, it would have if he wouldn't have done that, it would have taken him out, right? And it's one of those things. And I mean, to this point, I think sometimes you can overanalyze, you know, should I do this? This is this that big of a problem, should I address it? And you have to, to Don's point, I think you have to know yourself and to know to know the signals right and sometimes you can run with the pebble in your shoe for 10 miles or to the next eight station it won't cause a problem sometimes it's going to cause a blister and that's going to derail you you have to know generally how you respond to these things and take the best course action. If you've ever had a smartwatch die in the middle of a long run, go dim in the sun or freeze up when the weather gets tough, the Amaze Fit T-Rex III might just be your new favorite gear. This watch is built for endurance athletes and adventures. It's rugged enough to handle a negative 22 Fahrenheit cold and 158 Fahrenheit heat and waterproof down to8 feet. So whether you're on a snowy summit or sweating through the desert, it keeps going. And here's what really sold me, the giant one and a half inch AMOLED screen with 200 nits of brightness. You can actually see the data in full sun without squinting. Let's talk about battery life, Scott. Have you noticed this? 27 days on typical use, or up to 180 hours in GPS max mode. You can go on a multi-day trek without packing a charger. Check it out at amazfit.com slash trail. And right now you can get 15% off the T-Rex 3. Adam,'m gonna put you on the spot here. I wanna know if you can give a story or an example of how you train the panic out of yourself as an athlete. Yeah, I think for me, I can't think of like a specific moment where I've tried to train the panic out so to speak, but I'll give you an example. So at the Badwater 135, which today is a month since I finished the race, we talked about this race during our last episode together. Early out in the race, I was having some issues that I wouldn't normally have. My feet were bothering me a little bit, which normally doesn't happen in races this long. And I was probably 10 miles in and I already had to do a shoe change. And I remember my brain and I've run a lot, you guys know I've run a lot of these races just like you have. And my brain's instant reaction was to go to, this shouldn't be happening this soon in the race.

This is a problem, what's going on, starting to feel the emotion of it. And what I did in that moment was I said, listen, you've done this a lot of times. There's different things that are gonna happen. Sometimes it's at mile 80, sometimes it's at mile five. There's different things that are gonna happen. You just need to respond to it keep putting one foot in front of the other. So don't get all flustered about how early

in the race it happened. Do what you would do at mile 80, problem-solving, keep moving forward. And then by mile 15, 20, I'd forgotten about it and it didn't cause a problem again, the rest of the race. Boy, to Ryan Holiday's title, the obstacle is the way that obstacle is what allows you to finish that event strong and healthy and without a big problem.

It was that moment, that obstacle is what allows you to finish that event strong and healthy and without a big problem. That moment that obstacle cleared out then opened up the rest of your race because who knows you made some adjustments that obstacle was part of your overall strategy. I was just going to say how impressed I am by that story because if you're having foot trouble that early in the race you you could easily say, it's not my day. Let's pack it up, fellas. Let's pack it up, crew. We're not going to, we're not. But you didn't do that. You said, you know what? If this would have happened at mile 80, it's almost expected. So it's not that big of a deal. I love that you didn't panic and put put yourself in a bad spot. That's brilliant. Yeah, I think one of the biggest things that I've learned over my years of running long races and being in this sport is sometimes you have to give things time to resolve themselves. You have to take action, but then you have to give it time. So for example, you're behind on calories, you're feeling super, you're feeling super depleted. Well now you know you need to get more nutrition in, right? So get the nutrition in, but don't immediately say, well, I still feel dead. The legs are gone. Give it a little bit of time to see once that nutrition's in. Is it going to take effect and help you resurrect a little bit? So again, it's the emotion side of it. I think the emotions are going to happen. You just have to recognize that you have to let it settle.

What the- resurrect a little bit. So again, it's the emotion side of it. I think the emotions are going to happen. You just have to recognize that you have to Let it settle what the dust settle take your actions and then see what happens after that and continue moving forward. Scott, we've heard a bit better to scribe what that is in a sense. You found it and sent you have launched it. on your own, you didn't get a whole vote from the team here. Ryan didn't even have who is consulted. What is that and why do we have it? So this sound effect, I have added to our soundboard because I've been threatening to do something that could recognize Goldnuggets in an episode. We've talked've talked about gold nuggets. And these gold nuggets are judged by really only one person and that's me because I'm the only one that has that button on the sound board. But so every time that I think there's a golden nugget or it's a golden nugget for me, you will hear that sound effect. But I want to say how brilliant that is that it's not only putting it in perspective, but giving it some time. And I'm going to, you made the perfect analogy or the running example. But let's bring that into our lives. If something uncomfortable is happening in your life, don't panic, find a solution, and then give it some time to resolve itself. We're in this, in this, I need it now, immediacy, Uber eats, I need it now, I need to, I can look at Google and ask them who played John Travolta or who played, whatever. It's all this information is immediate. I think it's brilliant what you said Adam that we need to give it some time. Give the fix some time. My goodness God, I think you set it up that Eureka sound effect is has a high bar at this point I'm not gonna overdo it Don Maybe I will right can always edit it out But I was thinking back as as Adam was telling his his story about Angeles Creston and about mile 18 and that range all the sudden I started getting these cramps in my legs I don't get cramps at mile 18 L18. I mean, I've trained, my training runs were, three times that long, what am I doing with this cramp at this point? But it forced me on that day, based on the body I was in, the elevation we may have been at at the moment, the amount of sleep that I had. When are all the other conditions that I didn't have control of? Maybe it's just all the hormones and chemicals that are released for race day, I started cramping. And so I had to, at that point, that obstacle was, here's a little hint, slow down, because right now you're not going to finish this entire race. Your central governor said, I'm taking over here and I'm going to shut you down

and anyway I can, it looks to me like a cramp is something you might listen to. And so that was an obstacle that was my way to the finish line. I love that. And I'm curious to hear if you guys do this as well. But you know, we've talked about this idea before of it never gets easier. You just get better at dealing with it, right? So all the experiences that you have prepare you better for the next one, but I'm curious

if you guys do this because this is something it, right? So all the experiences that you have prepare you better

for the next one, but I'm curious if you guys do this,

because this is something I actively do and race is all the time. If I'm in a tough spot and something is going awry, there's so many times when I will then, my mind will go to a previous race that I've run where something different and often worse was happening. And I'll say to myself, you made it through that.

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