Episode 291: Performance Base Layer Series - Part 1: Pillars of Performance Applied (Endurance)
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This week on the Purple Patch Podcast, we kick off our new 5-part Performance Base Layer Series.
The purpose of this series is to emphasize the significance and value of establishing a solid physical ready state as the foundation for delivering consistent and predictable high performance in any field.
Over the next few weeks, we will showcase important episodes, each focusing on one key element of the Performance Base Layer. It is crucial to comprehend and incorporate each of these elements to improve performance and excel in any arena.
In the first episode of the series, Ironman Master Coach Matt Dixon provides a comprehensive overview of the PurplePatch Pillars of Performance. He starts with Endurance, or Movement for those not necessarily pursuing podiums.
In coming episodes, we will delve into the other three Performance Pillars, which include Strength, Nutrition, and Recovery. Lastly, we will examine the optimizer that ties all of these pillars together and establishes the traits and practices that make up a high-performance mindset.
This series is for everyone. Each episode aims to address the topic with two specific groups in mind - athletes who are training and competing in events, and individuals who are looking to enhance their health, energy, and performance in their personal and professional lives.
We will provide case studies, research, and actionable ideas to help you build your own performance base layer for the year ahead. Our goal is to equip you with the right mindset, perspective, and habits to enhance your performance and achieve success.
Be sure to sign up for our Workshop on Wheels for your access to LIVE, real-time coaching on the bike from IRONMAN Master Coach and Purple Patch founder Matt Dixon, along with a FREE 10-day trial of our live and on-demand bike sessions.
Episode Timestamps
00:00 - 04:44 - Welcome and Episode Introduction
04:51 - 07:51 - Matt's News-ings
07:58 - 52:55 - The Meat and Potatoes - Episode 291: Performance Base Layer Series - Part 1: Pillars of Performance Applied (Endurance)
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Full Transcript
Matt Dixon 00:00
I'm Matt Dixon and welcome to the Purple Patch podcast. The mission of Purple Patch is to empower and educate every human being to reach their athletic potential. Through the lens of athletic potential, you reach your human potential. The purpose of this podcast is to help time-starved people everywhere integrate sport into life.
Matt Dixon 00:24
Today, we're kicking off our series around your performance base layer. That is in any arena in life where you are chasing high performance, you need a foundation that is robust and physically ready. Now we amplify that through some traits and strategies that can help you drive effectiveness and the results that you want. One of the tools that we leverage at Purple Patch is InsideTracker. And that's because by taking a look inside and assessing your biometrics, we can get some really precise focus and an action plan for you to ensure that you're prioritizing the elements that are going to yield your best energy, a platform of health, the best ready state possible. Now, you don't need to be a Purple Patch athlete to leverage the insight and all of the knowledge and wisdom from the team InsideTracker. All you need to do is head to insidetracker.com/purplepatch that's insidetracker.com/purplepatch. And we even have a sneaky code for you: Purple Patch Pro 20. That's Purple Patch Pro two zero, you get 20% off everything at the store. Today, we're going to be talking about the endurance pillar. We're going to have a foundational next few series we're gonna go through all through the pillars and we're also going to talk about that high-performance mindset that I refer to. Alright, enjoy the show.
Matt Dixon 01:39
And welcome to the Purple Patch podcast as ever, your host, Matt Dixon, today, we are kicking off an important mini-series of shows that are going to be important foundational education for every listener, which means you as well. We're going to label this series our performance base layer series. The mission is to highlight the importance and value of each of you establishing a robust physical ready state as a bedrock so that you can deliver predictable and consistently high performance in whatever arena is your focus. Now over the coming weeks, we're going to go through five key shows and they each build on top of each other. And we're going to collectively label them your performance base layer. Each one is nonnegotiable for you to nail down to kick off your journey of transformation. Now transformation is a process that cannot be rushed, but by the end of it, you are a high-performing human being. If you want to achieve, excel, and get consistent in your results, this is going to be some foundational education for you. Today, we're going to kick it off with a global preview and then we're going to dig deep into the first of our pillars of performance. Of course, that is endurance, or perhaps more apt for some listener's movement. By week then, I'm going to dig deep into subsequent pillars in order, your strength, your nutrition, and your recovery. In the final edition of the show, we're going to explore the optimizer of each and all of these pillars. We're going to establish the traits and practices that make up what I like to label a high-performance mindset. So what's the outcome of this series? Well, the truth is that you're going to be equipped with the right perspective, mindset, and habits, to deliver your performance baseline, ready to amplify the results for the year ahead. It's going to be a journey of transformation, as I referenced earlier, and I think it's going to be a lot of fun along the way. But who is it for? Well, the truth is everyone. In each series, I'm going to discuss the topic though, with two distinct audiences. And we're going to separate these because it's going to have applied education for first athletes, those that are training and competing in events. And then the other group is going to be folks that are just interested in what I might label life performance: improving your longevity, your health span, perhaps how you show up in the workplace and broader life, becoming a more effective leader, employee, manager, person, parents. So a much broader application, but very, very important for every one of us. As we go through we're gonna add in some case studies, research, and actionable ideas to help you build your performance baselayer for the year ahead, and transform. I'm excited. But before we dig in, let's do Matt's News-ings
Matt Dixon 04:51
Yes, Barry, it is Matt's News-ings. Now, folks, I'm going to invite myself if it's okay with you. What would you think? Can I invite myself over to your house? I'm just going to be there for oh, I don't know, about 90 minutes or so maybe two hours tops. But while I'm at your house, what I'm going to do is I'm going to coach you, on the bicycle, just me and you. And we're going to finish the session, and you're going to be empowered to become a better bike rider. You're going to have some key habits around your posture and pedaling, you're going to be equipped to navigate any sort of terrain, and you're going to be able to manage and pace your efforts. And most importantly, perhaps, you're going to be equipped with a tool kit to get the very best speed out of whatever fitness you have. Now, along the way, I'm going to bring my little jukebox with me, I'm going to play some cracking tunes. I'll even spend some time having some tea with you. And some Best Day nonalcoholic beers, the very best of nonalcoholic beers, I should say. Does it sound like fun? May be valuable to you. I'm committed willing, are you? Alright, let's do it. Now, all right, it might come as a little logistical challenge for me. But why don't we get as close as we can? On November the 18th. That's a Saturday morning, I'm going to be offering a free workshop on wheels, as we call it, it is at 7 a.m. Pacific. So that's wonderful breakfast time from us our west coasters, the east coasters, it's still in the morning, my European folks, you've got late afternoon there. And my Australians are coming home from the pub and ready to be primed and bring a little bit of energy into this party. But everybody is welcome. You don't need to be a Purple Patch athlete. And it is free to attend the workshop on wheels. And with our two-way video, and your riding platform I can and most importantly, you will deliver on everything that I mentioned, you on your bike trainer at home, me from studio one in San Francisco. And just by joining us for that workshop on wheels, I'm going to give you 10 days of free membership to all of our other training sessions. And so if your strategy is to get faster and better at riding, but you've only been focused on fitness improvements, maybe some equipment changes and positional elements, then you are missing out on the thing that can drive your performance needle. You're missing out on the most important element of speed changing, mastering how you ride your bicycle. And I want to help. It's free. It's fun. It's open to all. The link is in the show notes to register. If you get lost at all, just email me, at info@purplepatchfitness.com, and I'll send you all the deets folks. All right. With that, we are grounding ourselves. It is your performance base layer. Ladies and gentlemen. It's the meat and potatoes.
Matt Dixon 07:52
Yes, folks, it is the meat and potatoes. Growing up, I was a swimmer. And I had what I thought were all of the attributes to secure my dreams. I had some talent, I worked incredibly hard. I was committed. But I fell short of my goals. I never really had that feeling that I performed to my potential on race day. And in fact, neither did most of my teammates. Because we were part of a performance culture of the times that solved high performance by simply throwing hard work at the challenge. We didn't think about much else. Show up, do the work, period. Well, after my swimming career, I turned to swimming coaching at the youth and collegiate levels. And I retained the norms of the time, I applied many of the same approaches that were given to me in my swimming career. And all of the swimmers that I guided were very, very fit and globally, pretty successful. But I never truly felt like we hit predictable and sustainable high performance. Some years they showed up to their important meats, and they just looked tired when it counted. I then returned to my athletic journey. This time in triathlon. I was just as committed, I doubled down on the hard work. I was tough. I went all in the only way that I knew. And I ended up in pretty much failure, deep chronic fatigue. And it was at that moment that the light bulb went off. My journey and experiences were not unique. There was nothing special about me. Everywhere. I looked at all levels, I saw underperformance. I saw equally highly committed folks frustrated with their lack of high-performance yield and results at least in a predictable manner. I thought there had to be a better way. What was clear is that I, most coaches, and almost all of the athletes were ignoring the many aspects that made up high performance. It was so easy at the time to ignore elements such as components of sleep, recovery, proper nutrition, hydration, and of course, the components of integrating strength training into it. The culture was basic throw work at the problem, and the results are surely just going to take care of themselves. I was determined to right a wrong. I wanted to go about things differently. When Kelli, my wife and whom I lead Purple Patch with, asked about my goals for the organization, I wrote down on a napkin, that I want to evolve the way that endurance sports are coached. sounds pretty grandiose aye? But it was honest, it was my purpose. It was my passion. The first place that I got to apply my coaching principles was the Purple Patch pro athletes. In the early years, the adherence to these principles was sporadic at best. And our results were while pretty good, also unpredictable. And that was unsurprising in many ways. I was a young coach with a healthy dose of imposter syndrome and my asks of these athletes were so different than the norm of the times. No other coach at the time was obsessed with recovery as much as I was I was so obsessed with recovery, that I cared about it as much as the hard work that they were doing in their swimming, cycling, and running. But it was when I began coaching Chris Lieto in 2009, that I found myself in a coaching moment. if I couldn't get my young developmental pros at the time to adhere to my coaching ask, how was I going to get Chris, who was already a household name in the sport, to adhere? Unsure of how to approach things, I ultimately made a decision. And I sat down and I met with the seven athletes, six young developmental pros, and Chris and I laid out a promise. If you adhere 100%, to my ask, I promise you, you will get great individual results. The ask was the adoption of some basic habits under four pillars that I designated: endurance training, strength and conditioning, nutrition, and recovery. And I said these four pillars have equal status and value. No one is more important than the other. That is our recipe.
Matt Dixon 12:20
Now, there was no hierarchy in this. swim, biking, and running, aka - endurance training is critical to the bullseye, but strength, nutrition, and recovery, and the elements that fall under it, we're going to carry equal weight. I also told them that I wouldn't be counting the weekly miles or hours of their training. That wasn't how I was going to validate. My goal instead was consistency over many, many months. I wasn't interested in how much training they could do. I was interested in how much effective training they could do. Now, this moment, that time that meeting marks the official founding of the Purple Patch methodology. And it still drives all Purple Patch programs to this day. I didn't realize it at the time. But I had sent a marquee rallying call to my athletes, I'd organized my principles into a clear, understandable, and actionable methodology. It kick-started a decade-plus success of the Purple Patch pro squad, we applied the same core methodology to our time-starved athletes with great success as well, including more than 1000 World Championship qualifiers. We guided countless C-level executives to better sporting results, but perhaps more importantly, improved health and effectiveness across life and the workplace. Now, we support people seeking to improve their health span, their longevity, and how they show up across life. And we even apply the very same principles to executive and leadership teams to drive more resilient, effective, and high-performing teams and organizations. But at the heart of it still sits the four pillars of performance. It makes up the Purple Patch method.
Matt Dixon 14:04
And so today, we're going to get applied, we're going to break down each pillar and discuss them in action. And we're going to leverage some case studies to bring them to life. And remember that in each pillar, we're going to break it apart into two main aspects. Number one, how it applies to the training athlete getting ready for competition. Number two, a person who is seeking to feel better, to be healthier, to live a better life and longer, to show up as a better leader, and a better executive, better performance across life. And so what we're going to do today is we're going to kick it off with our first pillar. Now remember, they have equal standing, they build a web together that is your base layer, your absolute baselayer of performance, or as I call it, your performance baselayer. And so we're just going to go in order with the most intuitive, we're gonna start with endurance today. Now we're going to have this discussion in a mutually exclusive manner, I'm just going to talk about endurance. But I do want you to remember that just because you crack the code and develop habits and practices out of today, doesn't mean you're going to be successful. What we're going through over the next five weeks, is a narrative that builds and builds and builds that by the end of the fifth week, then you are equipped to implement. And over the coming year, you transform. That's what we're looking to get done. Okay? So this is important.
Matt Dixon 14:05
So without further ado, let's get going. Fasten your seat belt, folks, we're going to talk about endurance. And what I thought we would do today is we're going to go in reverse order. Okay? We discuss athletes so much, there's a long history of this. And so you folks that are competing, you're going to have your time in the sun. But we're gonna begin with what we're gonna label life performance. So folks that are interested in life and work performance, how to be a better leader, how to improve your health span, how you can show up the very best version of yourself, no matter the arena that you care about parents, CEO, anything. Athletes, you have to be patient. We're gonna come to you. But I still encourage you to listen up. Because while you are an athlete, you are also a human being. So part one of today's show is important to every single person, including you. Endurance or movement in daily life. That's what we're going to talk about.
Matt Dixon 16:33
Now, I want to kick off with a little case study, I'm going to talk about a real person, his name Jesus. Now Jesus is, on paper, incredibly successful. Originally from Mexico, longtime US citizen C-level executive, and is now in his mid to late 50s. financially secure for the rest of his life, a lovely family, and two teenage kids. About four years ago Jesus had an executive panel as they call it. So, an overall medical and it was a big physical, and as a part of it, they did a blood draw. Now he asked me to run his blood results through InsideTracker. We were good friends. And when it came back, it was somewhat unsurprising to me but he had a landscape of red flags and massive warning signs. In fact, under the 10 designated sections related to improving quality of life and longevity, all of them established by the team at InsideTracker and of course, backed by peer-reviewed research Jesus was flagged in almost everyone, from heart health to inflammation to cognitive function, and so on and so on and so on. Jesus was dangerously close to being diagnosed as a diabetic had a metabolic disorder, cholesterol current levels that were far from favorable, plummeting testosterone, and general poor in his hormonal profile, absolutely baseline levels of things like ferritin, iron levels, the B vitamins, and D vitamins and other associated indicators of both fatigue and impaired cognitive function and many more besides. Not only was he clinically unhealthy and at high risk, but objectively, through my lens, he was performance impaired. So simply put, objectively, there's no emotion around, jesus was not showing up in life or at work, the best version of himself, period. Now, let's pause here. And let's consider the state of affairs a little bit. By definition, in the workplace, Jesus was successful, had risen through the ranks, and provided value to his team and his organization. But is he, in this place that we find him, bringing his best? Is he doing everything that he can, as a leader, to meet the demands of his role, and blow those demands out of the water, and Excel? Imagine someone who's constantly sleep-deprived, following an incredibly poor diet, and then saying, I want to go to the Olympics. It's pretty hard to conceive of this, no professional athlete would prepare in that sort of way. But similarly, Jesus or any business professional, following this same routine, is not going to be equipped to show up at work and be able to make sound decisions, constantly delivering positivity and creativity compared to someone who has this incredible foundation of health and ready state. That's the performance base layer that we're talking about here. But Jesus's story is more the norm than the exception. And he found himself, at that moment, after that blood panel, right in the fork of his life. The fork in the road was here because not only was he going to be impaired in the future to keep performing at work, but also was going to be impaired in his opportunity to lead a truly fulfilling and thriving life physically and even mentally with the years ahead of him. It was shocking for him. They didn't know what action to take, or what to do. He'd always claimed that he was too busy at work to focus on himself. And he wasn't concerned about eating habits or exercise. And he knew that his sleep habits were basically at the whim of his work demands. But this was the wake-up moment for him. He knew he had to evolve.
Matt Dixon 20:38
And so he came to me for help. Now, to kick this off, what I did is I asked Jesus, what was important to him if he paused, and he truly reflected personally, what were the most important things in life? Now his initial response quickly was to dive right into the financial goals of his organization. And so I quickly stopped him, bollocks. That's not true. That's just a business goal. What's important to you, Jesus, what's important? And he pondered. And he listed some compelling answers. My family, especially my kids, my health, being a great leader, and example, to my team, and also my kids. When he said those three main things, and I stayed silent, I let it hang. And he looked at me. And we waited. And we waited. And then I waited a little more. He broke. He broke first. He knew. I'm not prioritizing what is most important. And ultimately, he was right. Because on his current path, his behaviors, and his actions, were putting him at massive risk from every major illness out there, the things that killed most of us. He was also setting himself up to build a foundation for years ahead, where more than likely he was going to be functionally impaired, there's no way he was going to be equipped to get joy out of life, have a high quality of life, be there engaged and vibrant with his kids as they were moving towards adulthood. And he certainly wasn't currently equipped to truly show up as his best with stable energy optimal cognitive function, and a great sense of resiliency. He was committed but he hadn't cracked his recipe for sustained high performance across work and life.
Matt Dixon 22:58
Now, we're not going to go on and extend this story and go through all of the ups and downs for the next four years of Jesus's life. I will tell you that he hasn't run a marathon. He doesn't have an Ironman tattoo on his calf, nothing of the sort. But what he does do every day, consistently, is move his body in structured movement, and exercise. I will also say that all of his biometrics, those big red flags that we looked at, have all U-turned, they've radically improved. And he also tells me that he feels better, he's happier, and has a sense of control. He's more effective as a leader. Now, by definition, his actions right now, he's investing in his future self. No matter what arena you're in, equipping yourself with the performance baselayer is essential. It's the first step to getting the most out of your commitment and hard work. It's true, in anything, to achieve sustained high performance, it's fricking hard, and you do best if you have a physically ready state, bringing your best physical self and mental self to that commitment and hard work. There's no easy route to do it. But this is a foundation and bedrock on which you can build it on and a key component of your performance baselayer, what we're talking about today is movement, or the endurance pillar, as we like to call it. And so let's dig in.
Matt Dixon 24:35
Now, you probably don't need this next part of education, but let's at least refresh ourselves. Why should you care about movement? If you're listening to the show, you've likely already bought off on the value of endurance activity, but I just do want to highlight a few of the most important benefits of committing to daily movement. Yes, daily movement. Number one, as we already mentioned, is a reduction of risk of all the major illnesses cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, dementia, Alzheimer's, and so on. Your number one preventative measure is engaging in daily structured movement, period. Do you know that saying move it or lose it? Well, that applies to your life as well.
Matt Dixon 25:23
Number two is cognitive function. Structured movement and endurance activity have a direct positive impact on all elements of cognitive function, things as long and short-term memory, information processing, the ability to focus, decision-making, and more. If you need to think and focus in your life, then move your body.
Matt Dixon 25:44
Number three, associated with it, is mental health. Do you know that depression and mental health is rampant in the US and the developed world? A quarter of women over 40, are on antidepressants, 15 to 20% of men. There's a whole field, a whole field working in action right now, that shows the positive impact of daily structured exercise on most of the symptoms of depression. Some clinical psychologists are in fact, prescribing movement and other healthy habits. So instead of going straight to the pills, that becomes important. Now, there are some instances, of course, I should say, that require drug intervention, but there is little doubt, and all of the peer-reviewed research shows a direct link between mood, depression, and an improved state of happiness when you consistently move your body. Endurance.
Matt Dixon 26:39
Number four is daily energy. If what you love to do in life, and how you want to show up in it, requires you to show up with stable energy, bringing your best self to it - movement is massive. Exercise in itself might sometimes be fatiguing but ultimately, it's energizing. It's going to help you feel better. And it's going to build staying power across any arena in your life. Number five, it has a huge impact on stress reduction. When you elevate your heart rate through exercise, it's a huge stress to your body, it helps decompress some of the accumulated stresses that come up from the physical and emotional stresses that we have to navigate through life and becomes a detoxing impact, not using it in a very unscientific way. But they call it in scientific terms, the dishwasher effect of the brain, it does have a direct impact on your stress reduction. And then finally, there's one other component that I think is important. And it's something that's observed from years and years and years of working with time-starved individuals. And that's the commitment to daily movement becoming a highly effective organizational tool. It's quite interesting. Prioritizing and committing yourself to daily movement creates a framework to build and synchronize all of the other elements of your life, it fosters effectiveness. Remember that old saying, if you want something done, then give it to a busy person? Well, it has merit. Adding a commitment to daily movement is not just another thing that you need to add to a life that's already full of demands. It's a tool, an organizational tool, to leverage capacity to equip you to show up more, and better.
Matt Dixon 28:35
And so do we all need to coming off of this suite of benefits that I outline, run out and enter a 5k or an Ironman? No, we don't. Let's frame what the insurance pillar looks like. Each of us has different starting lines. And we must begin from where we're currently at. And from that starting line, we just build small victories. With this said a few things that you can take away today. Number one, move your body every day, at least six days weekly. Now, this doesn't mean going to the gym, structure training, or doing really hard movements, but moving your body every day. If it's a day that you're tired or you just run out of time, at least go for a walk after dinner, but move your body every day. I'd love to see a consistent pattern of somewhere around 60 minutes of daily designated prioritized structured movement. Now, next week, we're going to talk about integrating strength and resistance training. And I'm going to ask then, for you to commit to that twice a week. And so as a little prelude to that, on those days that you do strength, you'd probably drop the endurance component or movement component, and maybe just do a 10 or 15-minute walk after dinner. But in general, move your body every day. Most of the days that effort on those sessions that you're committing to, can be conversational. You should be able to talk about anything that you like. The majority of the benefits that I outlined above, don't come from having to do hard work. It's just a slight elevation, a slight demand on your body. And so getting a little sweat is good, it makes you feel better but it doesn't need to be hard. And I think that's important. Most of the benefits come from just the steps that you take, but everyone, unless medically contraindicated, should perform at least one day a week of some higher-intensity exercise. So most of these days can be conversational, but at least once a week, you want to hit the hammer a little bit. Now, what does this mean for you? Well, for someone who's just seeking life performance, not necessarily athletic performance, you want to push your body to an uncomfortable level. It elevates your breathing, to where conversation is a challenge. And it's optimal if you do that with short little intervals. Now, this might be something like going for a 30 to 40-minute walk. But in the middle, you do eight little intervals or rounds of one minute of power walking, where you get up there and get strong, one minute of easy walking between back and forth, back and forth, like a seesaw, very strong. An alternative might be doing your 40, 50, 60 minute walk on a nice hilly loop and every hill you come up on you push it a little bit you walk up very strong. Now an athlete might be going 10 by one minute best effort on the bike, or three rounds of six by 30 seconds, very hard on the rowing ergometer, and that's great. But at least for you once a week, you want to get uncomfortable and be comfortable being uncomfortable. Very important. Okay? It doesn't matter, the venue, but the high demand and tough short intervals are critical for your development and full of benefits. And that's it.
Matt Dixon 32:05
There are two more things that you might consider how to get a little bit of gasoline and amplify your results even more. Number one, if you can do some of that activity, that structured movement, your endurance pillar, with other people. Really good social engagement and a little bit of team aspect help your enjoyment, a little bit of accountability, and even your performance. And secondly, if you can mix modalities, that's an amplification of the power of all of this stuff as well. Like to think of yourself as a multi-sport participant. Now, whether that comes from hiking, cross-country skiing, running, riding, rowing ergometer, whatever it might be, it doesn't matter. But mixing it up is beneficial on many, many levels. Now, when we get folks to build this, as a habit change, to shift their weekly operating model across work in life, the benefits are always present in both a quantifiable and qualitative way. Now we can measure some of the quantifiable stuff through programs such as InsideTracker. But what about the qualitative? Well, let me finish my pitch here on a very simple thing. In the 20 years, that I've been helping folks around performance, I have never, ever, ever had someone commit to this type of approach and report no positive impact on their happiness, their effectiveness, and their energy. I have never had someone say, 'No, don't feel anything.' Equally, I have never, ever had someone to commit to this approach and not feel like they don't have more, there's a lot of double negatives there, that they don't feel like they have more control, and more capacity in their life. So by doing this, it's stabilizing and increases capacity. So hang on, they always feel better. They've always got more control. They feel more effective. Fantastic. Over 20 years, I have never had someone decide to go back to the old ways, their old operating model ever, 20 years. Now, to me, what that smells like and I am no mathematician, ladies and gentlemen, that smells like 100% success. Now, it ain't my pixie dust. It has nothing to do with me, it's just the truth. No matter what you're chasing in life, building a business, trying to be the best artist you can be, committed to being a super present parent. Maybe aiming to rise through an organization and get more promotions. The only 100% never-failed, full-proof performance catalyst you couldn't have is this - It has never been a negative. It is always additive in your performance journey. Let me be stark. Let me think about it in another way. If you're not fully on board with this premise, daily movement, or structured exercise, you are leaving performance on the table. You're not doing everything under your control to be your best, no matter what your arena is. Now, you might say, I know, I know, I get it. I know it's important. And I'll get round to it. But the truth is, I just don't have time. Look, I've got family. I've got kids, they've got loads and logistics, I'm coaching Johnny's soccer, and work is incredibly busy. I'm training all the time. I just don't have time. And I'm afraid if you do tell me I can tell you that I've heard it all before. You're just gonna get silence from me because I don't want to be rude. And the reason for that is I have never, ever, ever equally met anyone who doesn't have time. I've met plenty of people who don't prioritize but that's just a choice. I've never met anyone. And I have worked with many of the busiest people in the world. I've never met anyone that doesn't have time. Your endurance pillar - performance at your best. Simple and actionable. Now I ask you, will you join me in your journey of transformation?
Matt Dixon 36:14
Let me circle to Jesus, he transformed. That's the truth of it. It took a couple of years. And Jesus being Jesus, well, he's also brought others along for the journey. Now his whole leadership team is under our coaching and guidance because he wants to bring performance readiness to their operating plan. And they're committed as a team, they hold each other to account they support one another, which's perhaps even more powerful. And they're experiencing the same individual and team benefits. The first step, the very first step is to commit. If you are looking for your best if you want to develop a performance baselayer, and then take a step into your insurance pillar. Now over the coming weeks, we're going to dig in, and we're going to build onto that endurance pillar. Because just because you exercise daily, doesn't mean you're automatically in the arena of high performance in you get great results. There's more to it. But this is a great place to start. Alright, so that's the big meaty one.
Matt Dixon 37:18
Now let's take our focus, and let's get a bit more narrow. Let's talk about the insurance pillar with well, the group that it all started with endurance athletes. Now, for endurance athletes, if you're listening, it's pretty obvious that endurance training is a central part of your performance readiness in your sport. It's the bullseye. And so I don't need to come on today and say, hey, it's very important that you move your body in a structured and progressive manner. If you want to be better at endurance activity. That's the bullseye. But if you're listening today, as an endurance athlete, you probably have your plan your approach to training. And so what can I possibly add to that? Well actually think I can give you some important context, to try and help you frame your approach so that you can facilitate sustained high performance. Let me tell you a story about athlete evolution. And it's via an athlete that I coach called Miles. Now, this is an athlete who is a wonderful guy, actually pretty experienced as an athlete. And by nature, he's successful in life. But he's also a little bit of a perfectionist. He's highly committed. And he trains not for triathlons but he trains for swim run races, and they tend to be a little bit shorter in duration. Now, every week of training I would deliver a map for Miles, and he would come at the end of the week, and give me his report. And he would always say things like, I had two high-quality training sessions. The rest of the sessions just worked for him. Forgettable, maybe sometimes failures. And I realized over time, that his barometer of success, how he viewed training, was trying to get as many perfect sessions as possible breakthrough sessions. And what he saw as high quality, were really strong ones, that had better output than the session before. He got a lot of validation from going faster, and stronger, almost daily. I also observed another behavior from miles away. And that was whenever race day crept forward, two or three weeks before, he tended to dial up the intensity. He would go a little bit harder on the easy days, extra effort on the more intense days. I want to be primed. 14 days out. 13 days out, 10 days out, let's dial it up. Let's get ready. I need to be ready. And it took me 2, 3, 4 races to start to see this pattern. What he was doing was chasing perfection. He was validating his readiness through his training sessions. But an outcome of it is perversely sabotaging his race performance, because he was up ticking and leading to overload within the context of his life in those last weeks before race day, it's no wonder that for three races in a row, he was debilitated with cramps. He had tight calves. He had disappointing performances. What Miles needed was the dirty truth. Now I would present it to him, I said, Miles, you're trying to hit a bullseye, when all you need to do to be successful is just get it on the dartboard. That's it. That's all you need to do. Because here's the dirty truth that I told him. Great performances in racing, emerge from threads of training, that include a whole bunch of meh. Pretty average stuff, forgettable sessions. The truth is, with highly successful training, there's a lot of mundane stuff that you don't think about, you just check the box, because the keyword is consistency. If you want to build performance, the pursuit should be to layer on and layer on and layer on consistent training, not just over weeks, sometimes not even months, sometimes years. And by definition, if you're gonna do that your body of work that you're creating is going to include probably 85 to 90% of all of those sessions are relatively forgettable. They might be tough, they might be challenging, you might be fully engaged in them, and they might be executed as best as you possibly can, but generally pretty forgettable. And then you've got maybe 3, 4, 5 percent that you could designate as bad sessions, where they were just tough days, that for whatever reason, fatigue accumulation other stuff going in life, it just didn't go well, you tanked. And that's pretty normal as well. And on the flip side, you've got the other three, four, or 5%, that you sparkle, you feel like Superman. That's the breakthrough. It's validating and that's great, and you can celebrate them. But when you roll that together, the lion's share is pretty forgettable. But that is a normal high-value training load. And so if you're taking the Miles approach, and always thinking and validating successful training being built around that 2, 3, 4 or 5%, that you have a breakthrough, it's a fool's errand, it's going to start to lay the groundwork to poor training behavior.
Matt Dixon 42:40
So when Miles took this on board, he shifted his lens a little bit. He stopped chasing race performances in training. Instead, he got to not only enjoy training more, but he stabilized his fatigue levels. He started to establish control, and when I asked him to turn it up, he was equipped to do it mentally and physically. He started to develop the courage to go easy when it was called for. And that sense of control is another word for predictability. He also gained perspective on the impact of the other sources of stress. He had a heightened awareness of things like poor sleep, travel, bad eating too many competing demands, because he had a better sense of control over his training. He used to barge through those sensations just dumping hard training into that mix no matter what the life situation was. But he's suddenly become more pragmatic. He evolved. And what he built was a through line, a through line of consistency, the magic word. And guess what? He got faster. Lights and Gentlemen isn't that positive, he evolved from doing nothing radical, outside of building consistency, and not chasing daily heroism. This is an incredibly common mistake of mindset. Many athletes make it, it was my mistake, and I ended up in the gutter with chronic fatigue. But Miles is now unshackled and evolved. And the reason that I tell you this story is to set the stage for a few key principles for the endurance pillar for the athlete.
Matt Dixon 44:21
Here are some truths, no matter what program you're on. These are truths and let them be your guiding light as you build your program or execute the program from a coach. Number one. Your mission as an endurance athlete under endurance training is to build massive consistency of, underlined, effective training over many months. That's it. It's not about how much you can do. It's how much effective training you can do. Your ability to remain consistent will be dependent on you integrating that training into your life and acknowledging the ebbs and flows from all of those external stresses, not chasing, validating breakthrough workouts every day or week, instead just leaning into the process and realizing that transformation takes time. That's why we say at Purple Patch, embrace the journey. Love it, have fun with it.
Matt Dixon 45:19
Number two, any smart endurance training program is going to have a hierarchy of session emphasis, on focus. You could call it A sessions, B sessions, or what we like to call key and supporting workouts. In other words, if you're an endurance athlete, not all of your weekly training sessions are viewed equally. A smart program is going to include one, two, or three days of higher demand. And the rest of your days and sessions are important. They play a role, but they're supporting. Now, if you're time-starved, this becomes even more important for you Critical key and supporting workouts, understand the intent, and have that as a leverage point. Number three, related to this, the most successful athletes that I've observed, know when to show up, when to bring it. And that doesn't always mean the battering ram, they know when to show up. Now, I've mentioned that we shouldn't chase or expect breakthroughs every single session or every single week. This doesn't mean that you shouldn't have focused on engagement. Alrighty, folks, and engagement is a good thing, you're going to get the most out of training sessions, if you understand the intent and how to execute it, and then focus on executing that intent. You also want to do it with the very best form and focus that you possibly can in all of your key workouts, but equal to that, the other side of it is that some sessions can offer you something else, they can provide something that is in many ways, equally powerful in the big context of your life and that's decompression. If you're time-starved, as most of you likely are, you're asked to be present a lot in life, all of the work demands family and friends. And from the time you wake up, you're under demand to stay focused, to be engaged. And if you try to stay wholly engaged and focus every single minute of every single training session, all that's going to happen is your sport, ultimately, your hobby is going to become a second job. And so in those key sessions, you do need to understand the intent you do need to execute it and you do need to be focused and engaged. But, the other side of it is to give yourself some leeway to designate a few sessions of the week, that are what I like to call soul-filling. These are lower structure and easier. And they are valuable for you. They give you general conditioning and tissue resilience. You can also sometimes focus on a bit of technique, but they are decompression tools. It's my time. Ladies and gentlemen, I love my time. It is it's important, something that you own, that you can go out - so for me just to give you context, it might be a 50, 60, 70-minute trail run. And I go and listen to my Scandinavian crime thrillers on audiobook, maybe I run in silence and look at the streams in the trees or even let my workday marinate, sometimes even practice upcoming speeches that I have to make, or without notes, but it's soul-filling, I enjoy it. It's me. Whatever it takes to make these sessions fill their role, very easy effort and a decompression from life's demands.
Matt Dixon 48:54
The final component, when you know you're getting your endurance pillar, right as an athlete, is when your recipe, your training plan, feels like it is a part of your life. When fatigue is indeed a part of your training life. But it doesn't mean constant fatigue. When you step back and you reflect on yourself, your training program will sometimes get you tired. But overall, committing to your training program should amplify your daily energy. It should help you consistently feel better and show up better. That's a huge component. That's probably the biggest value of this journey that you're on. So if you're committed to consistent training, then you're gonna know that you're getting it right when it helps you show up better. It's also going to help you be more organized and more effective. You're also going to be equipped to be present when it counts on the important ship, work family loved ones. If your endurance training leaves you constantly fatigued or sore, or your training is wildly inconsistent. And then you are going from bulletproof to bullet-ridden. And that's not a good thing. You need to evolve your plan, you need to evolve your approach. As a time-starved athlete, success on the endurance pillar is anchored around three words: consistency, integrated, and additive. And that is additive to your broader life, consistency, integrated, so it's dancing with life, and it's addictive, it amplifies life. That's when you crack the code. And that's how you get your best race results as well. And so I encourage you to consider that when you commit to your athletic journey. And that folks is our initial pillar, endurance. Next week, we're going to go and move some heavy things, because we're going to be talking about everything under the banner of strength. Yes, it is high-load resistance training, but it's also explosive movements, core and control, and stability, balance, and synchronization, it is going to be a healthy discussion. And again, we're going to break into our two components - life performance, and athletic performance. A fun one, guys, I hope that it helps you put everything in perspective, and I'll see you next time. Stay healthy and look after each other. Take care.
Matt Dixon 51:23
Guys, thanks so much for joining, and thank you for listening. I hope that you enjoyed the new format. You can never miss an episode by simply subscribing. Head to the Purple Patch channel on YouTube, and you will find it there and you can subscribe. Of course, I'd like to ask you, if you will subscribe, also, share it with your friends, and it's really helpful if you leave a nice positive review in the comments. Now questions that you have, let me know. Feel free to add a comment and I will try my best to respond and support you on your performance journey. As we commence this video podcast experience, if you have any feedback at all, as mentioned earlier in the show, we would love your help in helping us to improve. Simply email us at info@PurplePatchfitness.com or leave it in the comments of the show on the Purple Patch page and we will get you dialed in. We'd love constructive feedback. We are in a growth mindset as we like to call it. And so feel free to share with your friends, but as I said, let's build this together. Let's make it something special. It's really fun. We're trying hard to make it a special experience and we want to welcome you into the Purple Patch community. With that, I hope you have a great week. Stay healthy, have fun, and keep smiling doing whatever you do. Take care.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
performance, life, athlete, pillar, training, endurance training, sessions, committed, patch, equipped, purple, high performance, folks, Jesus, run, years, endurance, week, build, movement