Episode 120: Competing with Joy, Nervous System Training, and Mid-Season Check-Ins
In this week’s episode, we start with some great listener questions on swim data, VO2 max testing, maintaining speed as a Masters athlete, and avoiding injury. We then dive into mid-season check-ins as a way to avoid later season burnout and outline key questions you should be asking yourself and discussing with your coach as we progress through the base period. Next, we hit takeaways from Olympic figure skating, exploring what happens when you choke versus find flow, how identity can amplify pressure, and what it looks like to compete with joy, freedom, and process-driven focus. We also zoom out to discuss why racing feels so different from training, how competition shifts the nervous system, and practical ways to introduce controlled chaos during base season to train your nervous system to handle race day more effectively. Finally, we hit Katie’s reflections on Peloton vs. Zwift in the postpartum era, covering when it’s a great aerobic and mental health tool, where it falls short for specificity, and how to align any platform with your goals and intentions. Check it out!
Athlete questions & housekeeping
Swim data question: How much are you tracking the data?
Jim: Close to zero. In Jan/Feb and even March, the focus is on getting to the pool and getting in high quality, technically sound strokes.
Is swim video better than data?
Jim: Yes! Send video! That’s where the magic happens.
VO2 max/ lactate question: Should I do a VO2 max test?
Katie: I don’t find vo2 max testing on its own all that useful but lactate can be if you have a place to do it and want to spend $$ on it! For me, it was useful and reassuring to know that my Zone 2 ceiling was higher than I thought. That said, it didn’t fundamentally change my own training approach (and doesn’t radically change my approach for athletes). Feel and other data still win!
Jim: VO2 max test - nope unless you want to spend the money to get the experience. There are many basic ways to determine your training zones. You’ll actually find the HR calculators/zone in TrainingPeaks to be right on.
The more useful number you get from a VO2 max test is caloric burn per minute at different intensities. This can be an interesting number to see what substrates (fat / carbs) you are using at which power zones or paces / HR.
But, then again, our fueling guidelines, and free online calculators, provide nearly all information you need to properly fuel your pre, during and post workout needs.
In sum, it’s an interesting experience but it rarely leads to any fundamental information and shifts in our training/fueling.
I’m a Master athlete and noticed in the last few years that my marathon and 5K paces are nearly the same. Why is this?
Jim: This is due to several factors, many of which are present in most older Master athletes I coach. Master athletes tend to be fairly aerobically and metabolically fit i.e., most can go all day but just at one steady pace.
Most Master athletes, if they are uncoached, tend to cluster their training in the middle, usually in that low Z3 area where they aren’t going slow enough to all themselves to have easy days and not at all fast enough to maintain neuromuscular connections.
And if you continue to cluster in the middle, you start to develop a narrative that you are slow. The longer this goes on in years, the more powerful this narrative becomes.
The solution is often polarizing their training; getting them to slow down a little more on the Z1/Z2 days and really start to challenge them with short, faster neuromuscular work such as flat strides, uphill strides, hill intervals, sprints on the bike, sprints during swimming. And over time, start to build up their ability to go harder further. The other factor is many of these athletes have lost a fair amount of muscle mass. So, we get them into an appropriate strength routine to build back their muscle and therefore their force production capability.
And you need to be mindful that your narrative should and will change. You can get faster! But you have to be open to change in training and a change in who you think you are.
So, if you find yourself clustering toward the middle of everything in any sport, consider polarizing your training and getting some professional strength and mobility help.
Don’t wait on injury
Or tiredness. Let’s address it early to prevent any long term damage. 2 -3 light days could mean avoiding a 2-3 week wash out period.
I recently did a lot of running on a family vacation (a lot being a relative term as I’m not running that much). I felt a couple small niggles after an afternoon run. I had planned to do another run the next morning but instead I moved it to the afternoon and made it 10-15% slower and about 20% shorter than planned. Turns out that’s all the room that niggle needed to resolve itself. Changes can be subtle and often we can continue our routine if we approach it wisely i.e., talk to your coach!
Main content / Insights
Katie:
Mid-season check ins:
Getting towards the end of February and for many people, well into the seasonal grind (but still far away enough from races that it feels like the season is long)
A few questions to ask yourself to avoid burnout down the road:
How are my workouts feeling? Specifically, what percentage feel great, fine, and bad? Remember the rule of thirds: about a third should fall into each of these categories. If you are deviating far from this regularly (i.e. all/most of your workouts feel great or bad), talk to your coach about dialing things up or down.
How am I feeling physically? Any niggles or trouble spots I should be aware of or have been ignoring? Run down or really fatigued? Heavy legs?
Importantly: Do I feel energized and ready to hit it again after a rest/easy day?
How am I feeling mentally? Most of the time am I excited about my workouts or dreading them?
Do I still feel excited about my original goals?
Do I still feel like I am in alignment with my purpose?
Related, take a look at your TP data and comments:
How often am I missing workouts, and which ones?
What types of workouts am I finding the most physically/mentally hardest vs. easiest? Even if I found something really hard, was I still glad that I did it?
Insights from Olympic Figure Skating
Ilia Malinin choking at the Olympics (and the science of choking in general)
I have watched a lot of olympic figure skating and something I saw a lot was skaters making many subsequent mistakes if they made an initial mistake. Best example of this was the quad god Ilia Malinin
Of course Steve Magness had a great post on it!
Past experience + current environment + story you’re telling yourself = predicted state. When predicted state is a threat, your brain protects by latching onto confirming evidence and ignoring the rest.
Malinin stumbled in team event → brain coded “Olympics = danger” → loop cemented by the free skate
Under threat, his conscious mind started to control what should have been automatic (landing quad jump) → massive rounds of mistakes
“This threat gets turned up to 11 if our sense of self is deeply intertwined with the outcome.” Ilia = the quad god.
“When your identity IS the performance, your brain treats failure as existential. The brain doesn’t register ‘I might lose.’ It registers ‘I might lose myself.’”
We only choke when we are being evaluated and judged in front of others. When something meaningful is at stake and we have an audience.
How to get out of protection mode:
Acknowledge the moment is big.
Build an identity broader than any single performance.
Be the defense attorney, give yourself evidence.
Find something you can control; the smallest thing you can impact that moves you forward.
Surround yourself with people who love and care for you no matter what.
Simulate the worst case scenario so your brain doesn’t freak out if it actually happens.
Alysa Liu wins gold
Amazing story -- quit the sport because of too much pressure and lack of autonomy, fun
Came back 2-2.5 years later and won gold, ending a 20 year medal drought for the US in this event
Observations from the commentators:
“She’s figured out how to compete without carrying the weight of it, she stays so loose and herself out there”
“Nonchalance to the way she jumps and performs”
“Through it all she’s kind of just been like ‘oh this is fun’”
Themes:
Joy
Doing it for her
Focused on process over outcomes
What we saw on TV:
Alysa’s reaction to her score was nowhere near as big as her reaction to her own performance. Finishes the set and goes “that’s why I’m fucking talking about! That was so great!”
When she wins gold, just smiles and does a little nod and then congratulates and hugs her competitors
“Casual” or “nonchalant” = how people describe her skate compared to elegant, delicate, powerful, etc. → casual = smooth!
“Childlike beautiful joy and innocence” → fun!
Some quotes from Alysa:
“I don’t care about performances or results. I skate now to show my art.”
Post from Katie Arnold:
“Liu’s program was hypnotizing (watch it here). She twirled and leapt and jumped. She landed the jumps. That marvelous thing that sometimes happens in sport and art was happening. She’d closed the gap between who she was and what she was doing. She’d disappeared into her activity. She wasn’t simply skating. She was skating itself. I’ve experienced this when I run in the mountains. It’s an exquisite feeling, a deep flow state where time stretches and vanishes, and I do, too. I’m not running to win or to prove myself, nor for time or speed, results, accolades, or adoration. Running this way isn’t a performance, it’s an expression.”
“have a little mental ritual I do before every race or difficult endeavor. I imagine flicking a switch on my arm to “Receive” mode. If I’ve done my training and prepared to the best of my ability, I can relax into knowing that the only thing left to do is receive whatever the experience has to offer me. Every scenario—bad or good; win, fail or quit—teaches me something I’m meant to learn. When you embody this mindset, when you run free, there’s nothing to lose, only to gain. It’s so liberating when you realize there’s no such thing as failure.”
Thoughts on Peloton!
Context on why I am on Peloton right now instead of trainer/Zwift/TPV: goals, purpose, intentions
Current life era: need seamlessness; it takes me less time to get on Peloton than Zwift/TPV and I haven’t actually set up bike/trainer in our new place yet/ don’t really have time for the troubleshooting.
Related: need a good option for 20-30 min exercise snack
Peloton is also a lot quieter than Zwift, helpful for baby!
Finally, goals are not really to get faster on my bike and race on it anytime soon. I have running race aspirations but am mainly looking for mental health boost, “me time,” and aerobic stimulus
When and where it works well to sub for trainer (and generally what works well with Peloton)
Z2 volume! Lots of rides that are more fun than just free riding on Zwift/TPV, and enough structure to make it go by quickly
Anything under 60-90 minutes, especially short workouts
X-training for run training, especially if you are not a primary cyclist or have elite triathlon aspirations
Saddle and position can be a nice break from your bike and are more comfortable for some (but note that as always you’ll want/need to nail down the right combo of saddle and shorts; I like no padding or tri short padding with peloton)
When you should really prioritize getting on your actual bike (and generally what works poorly)
Specific prep phase
(Usually) really hard rides/workouts
Really long rides/workouts
Race simulations
How to sub Peloton for Zwift/TPV
Thoughts on different types of workouts:
Climb and rolling hills rides are great for low cadence
Low impact rides or any of the fun music rides IF you keep the resistance on the low end of the ranges
HIIT is ok in moderation but I tend to prefer some of our interval workouts on Zwift/TPV (again, comes back to goals)
Adding warm up and cool down
Warm ups and cool downs are WAY too short on Peloton. Highly recommend adding a 5-15 min warmup ride and 5-15 minute cool down ride if you can; cool down is usually only one minute and warmup is <5
BIKE FIT
Just like on your regular bike, a bike fit goes a long way!
Some places offer virtual Peloton bike fitting, e.g. from one of the peloton coaches Matt Wilpers
You can do a lot just by making adjustments based on how you feel (do your knees hurt? Upper back? Lower back? etc.) -- make adjustments and see what works
Take note of your measurements/settings if you are sharing a bike or will use peloton elsewhere
Quick video on how to determine the proper height of your bike saddle: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/IkL1cyRhA7I
Note that I put the handlebars all the way down and still feel like the bike is much more upright/ way less aggressive fit than my outdoor bikes
Pitfalls to avoid:
Going to the max resistance/power offered if that is not the intention of the workout; I found it hard if you are competitive in terms of the instructor egging you on, the leaderboard, and power/resistance “ranges” to shoot for. Need to go in with a very clear intention and choose workout appropriately
I am skeptical of some of the arms/tabata/up down seat/stand movement stuff on the bike; cadence 120+ is also way too high
Average peloton workout seems pretty hard; not that many that are a good Zone 2 stimulus (makes sense as most users want to sweat and feel like they are doing something)
No HR cues in e.g. power zone rides (e.g. Olivia Amato saying your HR should look like this up down up down -- but what values?)!
Uploads/saves as different activities on strava which annoys me, and no direct syncing to TP (so I usually save as a Garmin indoor ride but then you don’t get credit for power/miles)
Bottom line: All comes back to goals, purpose, intentions through different eras of training/life
Related: you will get better at what you train; ultimately spending a lot of time on Peloton will get you better at generating output on the Peloton. There is probably some crossover to cycling fitness and aerobic training, but I’m not sure how much; always come back to the intention of the workout and your season
Jim
Why racing and competition feels different (adapted from Puni Neural Engineering)
For a lot of athletes on race day, their aerobic and metabolic fitness is not the limiter. They struggle because competition switches the nervous system into a different mode than training.
What your nervous system feels in training, your nervous system knows. (You are what you do.)
In training:
Outcomes are reversible.
Mistakes are private.
Effort can be adjusted or stopped.
In this environment there is low friction and low consequences for exploration, curiosity, rhythm and flow. We have almost no skin in the game during practice.
But in racing, your nervous system detects:
Irreversible outcomes.
Public consequences.
Permanent results (time, ranking, record)
That changes the governing question from:
“Can I do this?” to “Can I afford this if it goes wrong?”
That single shift changes performance.
How Does this show up on Race Day?
It could show up as a full blown panic attack (like many of us have had in the past open water).
Or it could should up in more subtle ways like:
Tighter muscles, timing and cadence.
No rhythm or flow, fighting the water, the bike, forcing the run.
Conservative pacing choices.
From the outside it may look like you are racing but internally you are fighting through with no flow or expression.
Why Training Can Be Misleading
Most training:
Has no permanent consequence
Doesn’t threaten identity or ranking
Allows do-overs
So your nervous system learns:
“I can do this safely.”
But it never learns:
“I can do this when the result is permanent.”
Without that evidence, the system protects you. (The brain’s number one job is to protect you and will do everything in its power to govern around this.)
The governing truth of your brain
Your performance may not be limited by fitness.
It may be limited by whether your nervous system treats the moment as:
Reversible (training) or Irreversible (racing)
Competition makes it irreversible. Most athletes never train for that.
In sum, you don’t race the way you train.
You race the way your nervous system governs irreversible outcomes.
How do we begin to address this in the Base season?
We talk about being robust and ready for race season. A definition for robustness could be holding smooth, rhythmic training patterns during chaos.
We want to be smooth when everyone else is breaking down around us.
In the Base season, we need to introduce a little bit of chaos in the system. We need to create some unpredictability regularly to develop neural patterns and processes to deal with the chaos.
Here are five suggestions to add to bump you out of your comfort zone and add a little chaos into your nervous system:
Attend a weekly group run / track session. Even if you run with your appropriate race group, there will often be a lead runner(s) and a pack. Pacing will probably surge here and there. Someone leading will go out too hot or you may need to go full gas on the back half to make the split. There are a lot of subtle things happening in a group and it’s not at all predictable and you will need to respond under stress.
Zwift or TrainingPeaks Virtual racing: From the safety of your pain cave, you can race all types of events. Find ones that best match your interest and throw yourself into a race. Yes, it will go off very hot. Yes, you will suffer the first few minutes. Yes, you will dig way deeper in the race than just doing a controlled workout. This is an excellent way to model racing but in a very controlled, low consequence environment. Develop yourself a checklist before each race so you hit the start firing on all cylinders.
When I do my virtual racing, I’ve started a pre-race checklist. For context, I usually race at 2pm or 3pm. My checklist goes like this:
Morning breakfast - big one. Usually oatmeal/hot muesli and greek yogurt / coffee
Morning hydration - drink a bottle with PH 500 tab
Morning snack - carbs and protein
Lunch - sandwich usually, drink another bottle with PH 500 tab
2 hours before race (usually around lunch time): Maurten bicarb and/or Nomio
45’ before race: Fill race bottles with PH tabs, grab SIS Beta gels, go to pain cave, put on bike kit and chest HR and ensure all my technology is working.
35’ - 30’ before race: On bike, all systems go, warming up.
7’ - 5’ before race: Do I need to run upstairs to use the bathroom before race?
2’ before race: Join pen
1’ before race: turn off Apple TV, connect AirPods to iPhone, start FTP playlist on Spotify
10” before race: rev up the watts and hit race start at a very strong effort
A checklist removes nearly all mental friction to racing. I just execute the list.
Attend a Masters swim: Like the group run, even within your currently paced lane, there will be surges, pacing challenges and working in a tight spaces with other moving bodies. My first Masters swim group was all 6 - 8 per lane in a 4 foot pool. I didn’t know it then but this was perfect training for open water chaos with all the waves and moving bodies, avoiding crashing into others in your lane, avoiding crashing hands/arms into the people in the next lane, avoiding hitting the lane lines. It was pure chaos and perfect nervous system training.
Sign up for a local 5K or 10K: If you are like me, I want to show up at every race to give it my best. What better way to go through the motions than at a local run race where the race conditions provide a great physical and mental stimulus while in a low stake environment. Racing is a skill and local, community races are a perfect way to move from training to racing skills.
A group strength class: There are many gyms offering Crossfit, Hyrax or other types of strength training. These can be very challenging as you don’t know what’s coming, how to pace yourself and it’s public in a fairly small space. In other words, there is a lot of nervous system training happening here and it is not like your pain cave strength session.
Finally, why aren’t more people talking about this?
We can’t quantify neurological systems. We can’t quantify coordination, rhythm and flow. If it’s not a number on a chart, a graph or our smart watch doesn’t track it, we tend to discount its importance. But this might be the single most important quality we focus on before our “A” race.
We are saturated with aerobic workouts, planning, fueling and pacing guidelines. Anyone half serious about their support will show up fit and with a good race plan. But what separates the good performers from the best performers are the ones with a trained nervous system. That’s the invisible, important work.
Challenge of the week
Katie: Mid season check in per above!
Jim: Repeating myself: Jump in a race. Go find some chaos.
Gear pick or resource of the week
Katie: A few more items to complete my home gym setup! Box and mirror
Jim: The Three Energy Systems You’re Actually Training (And Why Your Fitness App Has No Idea)