Love Letters to My Crew

Hi Gang!

Hope everyone’s hanging in ok. One thing I’ve been thinking about this week is grit and endurance. Timely, eh? Basically, what gives us the strength and energy to persevere when things are hard?

There are many theories about this, as well as what causes some people to “quit” when things get hard while others seem to have some undefinable thing that keeps them going. In Navy Seals training, nobody is kicked out – the people who don’t make it through are the ones who self-select out by quitting. And it is impossible to know from the start who those people will be. The best ultra-endurance runners are not the strongest or fastest or better by any measurable quality in a gym. These people have just figured something out that allows them to keep going.

I was listening to a very interesting podcast which offered some insight as to what this thing might be. Back to neuroscience. When we do hard things that require effort and focus, our brains release noradrenaline. This is a chemical which builds up over time. Eventually, enough noradrenaline builds up that our brain shuts down cognitive control and we quit. This can be the result of anything from enduring being in cold water, running mile upon mile with little sleep, practicing a tricky musical passage, … really anything that’s hard.

But there is a way to tramp down this noradrenaline to give ourselves more gas and mileage – the ability to endure and not quit. That is with dopamine. Dopamine is our brain’s reward mechanism. It makes us feel good. It is our brain’s way of telling us we’re on the right track. Keep going. So how do we get a hit of dopamine in the middle of enduring something hard? That is the brain hack trick that the grittiest people have figured out.

Basically, we have to self-reward with our own internally generated sense of accomplishment. It’s growth mindset in action. This is not just positive self-talk though. If I am bonking and slowing down in a race, I’ll know I’m lying to myself if I say “you’re doing great!” It’s not delusion. It’s really acknowledging and making a meaningful connection with your milestones. Remember, it’s just chemistry – your brain is a generalist and is designed this way to keep you going when you’re on the right track. YOU decide what that track is. If it’s running a marathon it might be making it to halfway, then 30K, then looking forward to racing the last 5K. If it’s staying in cold water it might be making it until sunrise, and then to lunchtime. Every time you hit a milestone your brain surges with dopamine and pushes back that quit response. The milestone could even be “I’ve fallen down this ladder, but my god I’m still holding on!” Dopamine surge. You can keep going.

On that note, I think we’re all doing awesome and look! … we’ve made it to almost mid-January in a pandemic! Once we make it through February we’ll be able to see spring and things will get much easier. We got this.

Onto workouts for this week:

Hills! Lest we forget these. I think it’s been a while. Any combo – long, short, a mix of both. So good for our strength and power.
Tempo: 3 x 10 min w 3 min easy – keep the tempo pace in check. We’re still mid-winter base building. No need to go red line.
Fartlek: 3 sets of 5 x 1 min w 45 sec rest; 4 mins bw sets

And here is an update from Monica on our Power Hour!: (hint: this might be next Wednesday’s workout)

LES Power Hour: Next steps

We’re looking for ONE MORE runner to fill out Team #8. Please connect with Monica if you’d like to be added
Step 1: Find your team below
Step 2: Run as hard as you can for 15 minutes…like, 15 minutes exactly.

- All legs to be completed between January 18-24

Step 3: Once you’ve run, submit your distance

- Submit your distance in KM’s

Step 4: The distances of all your team members will be added together to get your team’s total distance
Step 5: The winning team will be the team that covers the most distance

Thanks all and chat soon!

Seanna

Hi Everyone!

I guess this is officially my first newsletter of 2021, so welcome back and let’s get at it!

What I’ve been thinking about this week is about habits and behaviours. SO much has been written about these recently, but as it’s a new year and we’re taking a good look at ourselves and what we want to do, be, accomplish, I figure it’s a good time to examine it.

One of the most interesting ideas I’ve heard recently is that we can’t wait for a mood, feeling, emotion or thought to compel us to do something. These things are not well understood and are even harder to control. What we have to do is to act first, and the moods, thoughts, emotions will follow. Many of us wait until we are motivated, or feel like doing something, but that is not how learning or neuroplasticity work. In order to create a new neuropathway, we need to act first. But here is the important part: we need to act with focus, and with some adrenaline in order to set the learning into motion. That is just how our brains are wired, and not by accident. If you were wandering happily through the woods and stumbled upon a stream and took a drink of cool water, you’d get a little dopamine hit, but you probably wouldn’t remember much about how you found the stream. If you were lost in the woods and dying of thirst and stumbled upon the stream, you would remember every single detail about how you got there. We are wired for survival. But, since we know what we know, is it the worst thing to hack our brains to make us better athletes, musicians, writers, leaders, … ?

Stress leads to action, leads to dopamine release, leads to learning (or behaviour change). Interestingly, our brains’ initial response at focusing on something new is to release chemicals that make us feel stressed, anxious and confused. You know the feeling – when you are reading a dense, difficult passage, or trying to learn a new chord, or starting in a new role at work. Knowing that this initial response to learning or behaviour change is going to feel uncomfortable is important. This is simply the gateway we have to walk through. Resist the urge to move away from it, but rather embrace it as the sign that you’re on the right path. It’s like the feeling in the middle a 5K when you think “oh no – this is way too intense – I have to slow down or stop” and then you remember – wait; it’s supposed to feel like that. So you don’t panic and you keep going. The stress, anxiety and confusion of focusing on something new and difficult are a good sign that you have started on the path. Don’t get turned off.

(I also think this is why racing is a great way to fast-track us to becoming better athletes. The direct focus mixed with adrenaline causes deeper learning than anything we can mimic in training.)

Eventually our internal reward system of dopamine kicks in, and we actually learn to like the new behaviour. And it becomes easier to do as we repeat it and the pathways become stronger. But just remember that starting is not easy, nor should it feel easy. I’m not sure why I find that comforting, but I do. So don’t wait until you’re motivated or in the right mood – ACT FIRST! The rest will follow.

On that note, Monica has come up with a team event which can kick off our spur to action. Don’t think too much about this – just sign up 😉 Here are the detes:

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What is the LES Power Hour?

Teams of 4, teams will be selected at random
Simple: Run as hard as you can for 15 minutes…like, 15 minutes exactly.
Goal is to cover as much distance as you can in those 15 minutes – so quick legs and burning lungs 😊
Each runner will submit the distance that they ran (so I’m guessing the distances will range from 3km-6km)
The distances of all your team members will be added together to get your team’s total distance
The winning team will be the team that covers the most distance
4 people x 15 minutes = 60 minutes of running = THE LES POWER HOUR
All legs to be completed between January 18-24
Runners must follow provincial regulations and social distancing guidelines
Record your run via Garmin or Strava (honour system will also be accepted)
And remember … wear your LES gear, post to social media, encourage your teammates!!

Next steps:

People who are interested please email before Sat Jan 9
Once all names are received, teams will be selected at random. Each team will consist of 4 people
You will have to run your leg between January 18-24
Once teams have been created, a Google Doc will be shared with races so you can enter your finishing distance
Winning team will be announced shortly thereafter Jan 24^th

Example:

Runner 1: 15:00 for 3.00km

Runner 2: 15:00 for 4.00km

Runner 3: 15:00 for 3.50km

Runner 4: 15:00 for 5.25km

TOTAL TEAM DISTANCE: 15.75km

As for workouts for this week, I think we should go back to just getting together in groups of 2-3. I’m so sorry about this. I just want to err on the side of caution – and I don’t think this will last long.

Option 1: 4-5 x 1200 w 2 min rest (20 sec per k faster than tempo pace)

Option 2: 6 x 600 w 1:15 rest, 4 min rest, then 6 x 1 min Hard, 1 min Easy

Fartlek: 4 x 4 min Hard, 2 min easy, 4 min easy, 6 x 1 min Hard, 1 min Easy

Tempo: 3 x 8 min tempo w 3 min easy

Enjoy and hope to cross paths with some of you on the roads!

Seanna

Jan 12, 2021 – Endurance and Self-Reliance

Jan 6, 2021 – Behaviour Leads Thoughts