Evergreen Endurance Coaching

08/11/2018

BIG congrats to Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete Heidi Flora for completing her first 100-miler at the Javelina Jundred Endurance Run! That's 100 miles, in the desert, with highs in the 90s. So impressive! Nice work Heidi!

04/11/2018

Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete Elly Searle absolutely crushed her first 100k last weekend. She finished the Javelina Jundred Endurance Run 100k in just over 15 hrs - almost a full hour faster than her stretch goal! Here she is holding up her hard-earned buckle while her awesome pacer and bf Adam G Hewey looks on.
Photo credit: Marna Kagele

10/10/2018

This is Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete Elly Searle coming up the North Kaibab trail on her Rim-to-Rim-to-Rim crossing of the Grand Canyon last week. Yep, that's out, and BACK, across the Grand Canyon in just one day. 48 miles and more than 10k of elevation gain.
In addition, this was the longest distance Elly had ever run, and she did it self-supported (no aid stations or crew)! Pretty amazing!
I ask all of my athletes to fill out a debrief after any major event/race, and one of the questions on the debrief is "What went well?"
Elly's answer: "All the things. I ate enough. I drank enough water... I owned my own pace and plan for the whole day. I'm in awe at how well the whole day went. It's now 3 days later, and I barely have lingering soreness."
I love this answer! I think it really captures what can happen when you train hard, and smart, and everything comes together on the big day! Congratulations Elly!!
Photo credit: Peter Litwin

21/09/2018

Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete Marna Kagele has thrown herself into adventure running this summer, completing FOUR UPWC routes (http://ultrapedestrianwildernesschallenge.com/) in less than 2 months. She's done Easy Pass, Chinook Pass, Loowit, and Owyhigh Loop: 28 - 40 miles each, unmarked, and unsupported. Keep crushin it, Marna!

20/09/2018

Congrats to Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete Sara Larkin Bennett - she Beat the Blerch last weekend on both Saturday (marathon) AND Sunday (half-marathon)! Sara is training to run 7 marathons on 7 continents in 7 days....!!! So this past weekend was definitely "just a couple of training runs" for her!

19/09/2018

Don't be fooled by that friendly smile. Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete Jp Bartoletti Walters is tough as nails and an absolute beast.
Last week she finished the Tor des Geants, an incredibly challenging 205-mile race through the Alps, with approx 80,000 FEET OF ELEVATION GAIN.
Congrats JP, what an amazing achievement!

15/09/2018

Congratulations to Peter D. Spear - Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete and my Dad! - for completing the Epic2Estes Buffalo Bicycle Classic. At 74 yrs old, he and one other man tied for being the oldest to complete the full Epic route of 100 miles and 7887 ft of climbing. Nice work Dad!

09/09/2018

Five strong women, including two Evergreen Endurance Coaching athletes (Heidi Flora and Marna Kagele).
One day.
32 miles and 6000 ft of elevation gain.
Congrats on your Mt St Helens circumnavigation, ladies! Just another weekend run. ;)
Photo by Sarah Lauby Brouwer

04/09/2018

Love this pic of Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete Elly Searle tackling the Rut 28k this past weekend! She missed the last aid station cutoff by 5-10 minutes, but accomplished many other goals and logged a big training day in prep for the Grand Canyon Rim to Rim to Rim this fall!

14/08/2018

Tis the season to experience the Wonderland Trail! Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete Heidi Flora also completed the Wonderland in three days - that's 93 miles and 22,000 ft. Definitely NOT just a walk in the park. Well done, Heidi!

09/08/2018

Congratulations to Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete Jp Bartoletti Walters for completing the Wonderland Trail in 3 days! Another successful block of training as she prepares for the 2018 Tor des Geants!

07/08/2018

Lovely pic of Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete Marna Kagele near Easy Pass in the North Cascades. Marna and her friend Dre Skofstad did this route as part of the Ultra Pedestrian Wilderness Challenge (UPWC). The very next weekend, Marna went out and completed the Chinook Pass UPWC route!
Congrats, Marna, on these two unsupported wilderness adventure routes! "No aid stations, no course markings, no start/finish, no lemming lines, no cut offs, no set date; in fact, it's all up to you." http://ultrapedestrianwildernesschallenge.com/

02/08/2018

Congrats to Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete Rob Demick for his podium finish at Chelanman triathlon last week!

22/07/2018

Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete Mary Beth Foster continues to achieve amazing results - a few weeks ago she competed in Duathlon WORLD Championships, and earned herself a top 10 finish in her age group, as well as 1st American in her age group. Very impressive results on the world stage!

10/06/2018

Congratulations to Evergreen Endurance Coaching Mary Beth Foster for her age group WIN at the 2018 Olympic distance Lake Wilderness Triathlon. Awesome racing, Mary!

09/06/2018

Last weekend was the second edition of the Mount Baker Ultra, a 55-mile race up and down Sherman Peak on Mt Baker. By all accounts, race director Daniel Probst pulled off an excellent event with assistance from mountain director Richard Kresser and a slew of incredibly helpful volunteers. But of course, this is a mountain race, and the weather behaved accordingly. Wind, white-outs, pouring rain... it was perfectly awful out there.
Which means it was also perfect training for Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete Jp Bartoletti Walters, who is training for 2018 Tor des Geants.
Here she is making her way up the mountain during a very brief break in the weather. I am so proud of her mental and physical toughness during a challenging race, in brutal weather. Congrats on your finish, JP!!

02/06/2018

Happy 74th birthday to Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete Peter D. Spear! He was my first coaching client way back in the day, when he decided to ask his daughter (that's me) for training advice. And now he's 74, and is shown here half-way through his annual birthday ride, 74 miles this year.
He rides with a group of guys called the Seniors on Bikes (SOBs) and they divide into three subgroups based on pace. The fastest group is the Tigers, hence my Dad's jersey.
But he's not just fast compared to the other old guys - my Dad has actually INCREASED his functional threshold power over the last year. At 74, he is continuing to get stronger as he ages. And he was already pretty damn fit to start! I'm lucky and proud to have him as a coaching client, and a Dad!

30/05/2018

Evergreen Endurance Coaching helps people prepare for all kinds of adventures - definitely not just races! For example, here are coached athletes Heidi Flora and Elly Searle hanging out in Stehekin, a small town that is off the road system and only accessible by boat, plane, or on foot. They ran 17+ miles one-way along the Chelan Lakeshore Trail to reach this gorgeous view. I love helping folks brainstorm, plan, and execute grand adventures!
Photo courtesy of Sarah Lauby Brouwer

25/05/2018

Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete John Fogliani, keeping it fun while running his way to 5th overall and 3rd age group in the the Northwest Trail Runs Tiger Mountain 5k!
Photo by Yutaka Suzue.

16/05/2018

This is some good stuff right here! Thanks for sharing, Heidi Flora!

Take transit from Capitol Hill to Mount Si: Second Trailhead Direct service starts this weekend May 16, 2018 Summary The popular Trailhead Direct service will start its second route this weekend, beginning at Sound Transit’s Capitol Hill Link light rail station with service to Mount Si and Mount T...

27/04/2018

Definitely proud of Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete Rob Demick for his podium finish at last week's SAC Tri. But I'm even MORE proud that he stuck with his race plan and didn't overdo it. Very disciplined and great work, Rob!

22/04/2018

Interesting opinion piece in the NYT: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/20/opinion/boston-marathon-women-nurse.html

Despite awful weather at the Boston Marathon, women seemed to hold up better than men.

21/04/2018

Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete Heidi Flora had a busy winter, with lots of fun travel that limited her ability to run. We focused on quality rather than quantity, and made sure she got in her key long runs with plenty of recovery in between. The result? A 30-minute PR at Diez Vista 50k + 100k Trail Race AND a shockingly quick post-race recovery. Nicely done Heidi!
Also, nice work Wendy Blain Abbey capturing not one but two great pics of Heidi on race day! :) I couldn't pick one so I used them both.

20/03/2018

Big congrats to Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete John Hammack, who completed his first 50k this weekend! Here he is approaching the finish line of the Chuckanut 50k. Great job, John!

11/03/2018

Fascinating article about how long-term exercise impacts your immune system:
The study compared the immune systems of healthy young people, "old master cyclists," and clinically healthy but sedentary old people. Generally speaking, they found that there was NOT a significant difference in the immune systems of healthy young people vs. old master cyclists, while there WAS a significant difference in the immune systems of healthy old people vs. old master cyclists.
In other words, if you participate in endurance sports you will maintain the immune system of a 20 yr old! It's the fountain of youth! OK, that's an oversimplification, but you get the idea.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/acel.12750/full

It is widely accepted that aging is accompanied by remodelling of the immune system including thymic atrophy and increased frequency of senescent T cells, leading to immune compromise. However, physical...

07/03/2018

Congratulations to Evergreen Endurance Coaching athlete Elly Searle - she ran a 5k last fall, and then again this winter to see how she improved. In a little over three months she dropped 40 sec off her 5k time, which is very impressive! Even better, her average heart rate was the same for both races. This means she ran faster, yet her body wasn't working any harder. A great illustration of the saying: "It never gets easier - you just get faster." Nicely done, Elly!

01/03/2018

There are many ways to approach an adventure:

Joe Grant writes about the different value systems of races and non-racing adventures in trail running.

05/02/2018

It's been awhile since I've posted a Monday Morning Motivation, but this article was forwarded to me and I had pass it on: https://www.wsj.com/article_email/the-mental-tricks-of-athletic-endurance-1517583851-lMyQjAxMTI4NzA0MzcwNDMzWj/

In particular, I liked the study described below. Positive self-talk might seem cheesy at first, but it actually works. I use it myself, and if I'm alone I'll even go so far as to say things out loud - something about hearing the words drives them home even more.

"A 2016 study by Stephen Cheung, an environmental physiologist and avid cyclocross competitor at Brock University in Canada, gave cyclists two weeks of self-talk training before an all-out ride in a heat chamber at 95 degrees Fahrenheit. Replacing negative thoughts like “I’m boiling” with motivational statements such as “Keep pushing, you’re doing well” boosted their time to exhaustion from eight minutes to over 11 minutes. Most tellingly, it allowed them to push their core temperatures half a degree higher, on average, before quitting."

Olympians often seem to achieve the impossible in competition. But what about the rest of us? New research suggests that even weekend athletes can dramatically extend their physical and psychological limits.

03/02/2018

Pretty much!