the morning shakeout | issue 481
The lies we tell ourselves, a fatigue resistance workout for marathoners, "shooting for the guardrail," and a lot more.
Good morning! A couple weeks ago I hit record on a conversation with my friend and two-time podcast guest Ben Rosario, who last month announced he was stepping away as the executive director of HOKA Northern Arizona Elite, the professional running team he founded, coached, and was involved with in one form or another since early 2014. I’m excited to share that exchange on this month’s episode of the podcast, which you can listen to on your favorite podcast app or at this handy link. Ben has worn a lot of hats in the sport and industry of running: professional athlete and two-time U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon qualifier, co-founder of the Big River Running Company, race director, elite athlete coordinator, marketing director, and author, in addition to his aforementioned roles with NAZ Elite. In this episode he and I talk about the return of The Marathon Project, a race that he co-founded and put on for the first time in December of 2020, his career as an entrepreneur in the running industry, running’s third “boom,” and a lot more. I’ve known Ben for a long time—we even raced each other, without knowing it, a couple times back in college—and I have nothing but respect, admiration, and gratitude for what he’s achieved in the running space. Ben’s not just an idea guy, he’s also an A-class executioner of those ideas, and there are very few people in running who have moved both the sport and the industry forward quite like he has over the past two decades. Anyway, I really enjoyed this one and I think many of you will too, so please give it a listen whenever you get a chance.
OK, I’ve lots more good stuff on tap for this week. Let’s get right to it.
Quick Splits
— Over the past year or so Clayton Young has established himself not just as a reliable performer on the global stage of marathoning, but also as one of the most consistent high-level documentarians of the different paths he’s followed to get there. His latest YouTube series, Beyond the Hill, kicked off a few days ago with Episode 1 and chronicles his buildup to April’s Boston Marathon. If it doesn’t give you goosebumps then you might want to take off your sweatshirt. Young, along with Conner Mantz, and their other training partners, are doing their last couple workouts before the recent Houston Half Marathon, where Mantz shattered the American record to finish second and Young ran a fine 60:52 to place tenth. You also get to watch them do some work in the weight room, see some behind the scenes with Young and his family, and get into his head a little bit before and after Houston. Athlete, coach, or fan, this one is chock full of inspiration, information, and useful takeaways. A few quick closing thoughts on Episode 1 of the series: 1. Just how awesome is coach Ed Eyestone’s mustache? 2. If you want a snapshot into Young’s character, seconds after crossing the finish line at Houston, he asks Mantz if he got the American record while wiping snot off his training partner’s face. 3. It’s kind of scary (and by scary I mean exciting) how fit these guys are 12-13 weeks out from Boston. 4. Kudos to Young and team for how tastefully and seamlessly they integrate the sponsors for the docuseries into the episode.
— This is super niche and nerdy but last week I came across this post from Derrick Dlouhy on Substack in which he, a finance guy in the running industry, made his first foray into writing about the intersection of running and finance. Spoiler: I loved it! He’s calling it “Running the Numbers” (great name, by the way) and in Issue 1 he looks at some high level 2024-25 macro trends in inflation and retail sales, analyzes a few publicly available earnings releases from brands in the space, and links off to some other interesting industry-relevant reads. “I hope to talk about how macroeconomics are impacting the industry, the industry itself, dive into things like DTC versus Wholesale, or even look at the numbers behind things like events, training, or nutrition,” he writes. “I also plan to sprinkle in some stuff on the outdoor industry that isn't specifically running related.” Two things that jumped out at me from this first issue: 1. Probably not a good thing that Lululemon’s Blissfeel 2 running shoe is already on the “We Made Too Much” section of their website and 2. Keep buying my favorite shoes from New Balance! (P.S. Here’s Issue 2, which I haven’t had a chance to read yet.)
— Fan favorite of the morning shakeout, Sabrina Little, has a new column out for iRunFar and, as usual, it will make you sit back and think a bit. Entitled, “Are We All Just Liars?” Little examines the tiny lies we often tell ourselves in the middle of a sloggy run, challenging workout, or tough race to keep ourselves going, or maybe just to get out there in the first place. Perhaps more accurately she’s describing the various mind games we all play with ourselves, and/or sometimes others, at some point in our journeys as runners. I know I’ve had to “fake it till I made it” on more than one occasion to get through a race, which could be considered a form of lying to myself, but I’ve also told competitors not to worry about me because I truly did feel like sh*t, even though I still ended up being able to perform well. Is this a form of deception, even if unintentional? And/or is lying to yourself necessarily a bad thing if it helps you to make progress in some way? I don’t know if there’s a definitive answer to either of those questions but for me, I guess it comes down to whether or not my lie causes harm to, takes advantage of, and/or takes an opportunity away from someone else. That’s never cool or justifiable, but if I tell myself I’m not tired even when I know I am because it helps me to keep moving forward, or call a 10-miler “easy” in an effort to normalize it, well I can live with that as long as it stays in my own head.
— I’d never heard of the poet, short story writer, and novelist Ron Rash, much less read any of his work, until I came across this Garden & Gun profile on him last week. But I quickly developed a love and respect for his approach to the craft of writing, which, it turns out, parallels the approach he took to running as a former 1:53 800m runner who regularly ran 10-12 miles at a whack to clear his head. Bronwen Dickey, who penned the piece, called him “the Blue-Collar Bard.” “What struck me most was his unwavering commitment to the daily act of writing,” Dickey writes. “Many writers claim to work every day, but I can count on three fingers the ones I know who actually do. Rash is more disciplined than any, writing six days a week, fifty-two weeks a year. Like Dale, the aging dock builder in one of his new stories, he focuses more on process than results: ‘Even if they never notice,’ Dale tells his impatient son, ‘it has to be done right.’ Faced with clumsy first efforts, stalled drafts, and painful rejections, Rash has maintained a stubborn, even irrational belief that if he sits with a story long enough, he might approach that vanishing horizon some call transcendence. ‘The days you’d rather stick pencils in your eyes than write,’ he says, ‘are the days that’ll make you a writer.’”
— My favorite band of the last 10-15 years, The Lumineers, have a new album, Automatic, coming out in a couple weeks. Here’s the first single off the record, “Same Old Song,” which, I’ll admit, I didn’t love the first couple times I listened to it. But, it’s grown on me and has me excited for the rest of the band’s upcoming release. One of the things I love about The Lumineers is that if you’ve listened to them long (and close) enough there’s often an Easter Egg or two to discover, whether it’s a re-applied lyric, a sample of a past song in a new one, or a storyline that continues across a few of their tunes, and “Same Old Song” is no exception.
— From the archives (Issue 63, 8 years ago this week): Since he’s on the podcast this week, and there’s a lot of NAZ Elite love in this issue already, I loved this old blog entry, “Shoot For the Guardrail,” from the aforementioned Ben Rosario. It totally resonated with me on a couple different levels. When I write hill workouts for my athletes (e.g. 10 x 45 second hill repeats, 12 x 1:00 hit repeats, etc.), the one "guide" I give them is to set a mark (their "guardrail" so to speak) on the first rep and to "match or better it” with each rep. This is an effective way of testing yourself in training and gauging the effectiveness of a workout, but, as Ben writes, it also means “raising the bar in terms of expectations. It means working together toward a common goal. It means teammates supporting and rooting for one another to accomplish greatness, even at their own expense. And it means embracing the level of pain and suffering that it takes to smash personal bests, to crush your opponents and to achieve things even you yourself once thought impossible.” This week’s homework assignment: Find your guardrail—literal or figurative—and chase after it with all you’ve got!
— I’ve been using Final Surge to run my coaching business since 2017 and I can’t say enough good things about the platform. One of my favorite new-ish features allows athletes with Premium accounts to be able to upload photos to their workout comments—and for me to reply back with one, if/when necessary. I’ve been taking advantage of this feature quite a bit and have found it super helpful when an athlete is trying to describe an injury location, or if they want me to take a look at something form-related, or to simply get something visual across (e.g. what a particular training environment looks like) when words alone won’t suffice. There’s more coming that I’m excited about and will share with you in the next month or two. (More on Athlete Premium here, including how to start a free trial.) Fellow coaches: Head over to finalsurge.com and take advantage of a free 14-day coaching trial today. Use the code MORNINGSHAKEOUT when you check out to take 10% off your first purchase. Any questions? Just reply to this email and send ’em my way!
A big thank you to Tracksmith for supporting my work throughout 2025. We are in the thick of what I call "Brighton Base Layer Season" right now and I'm wearing this shirt most days of the week. It’s made from a merino wool blend, it wicks moisture and regulates temperature well, but best of all: it doesn’t smell when I sweat in it! It’s snug but not tight and I’ll wear it on its own or under a jacket when it’s really cold and/or precipitating. They just got a bunch back in stock to get 'em while they last! If you buy the Brighton Base Layer, or anything on Tracksmith.com for that matter, and you’re doing so for the first time, use the code MarioNEW to save $15 on your order of $75 or more. If you’re already a Tracksmith customer, use the code MarioGIVE and you can get free shipping on your next order (and 5% of your purchase will go to support the Friendly House in Worcester, Massachusetts, an organization that is near and dear to me).
Workout of the Week: Jack Mullaney’s Marathon Fatigue Resistance Session
This week’s Workout of the Week comes from Jack Mullaney, the head coach of HOKA Northern Arizona Elite, and it’s timely given that so many folks are in the early stages of a spring marathon training block right now. The "fourth dimension" of marathon performance, along with VO2 Max, Running Economy, and Lactate Threshold, says Mullaney, is Fatigue Resistance. "The final miles of a marathon are the most telling of an athlete's fatigue resistance, and often are the difference between a PR and a performance that leaves more to be desired," he explained to me. "Since you can't run a marathon every week in training, I look for ways to create fatigue in a workout where the athlete is forced to hit their target marathon pace on tired legs." The following workout is a fatigue resistance session that Alex Masai of HOKA NAZ Elite did last fall in his buildup to the Chicago Marathon, where he ran 2:08:51 to finish 9th overall in his debut at the distance. It consists of a tempo run at marathon pace, followed by some 1-mile repeats at 10K pace, followed by another tempo run at marathon pace. Mullaney told me that Masai ran the first 3 miles in 14:45 (4:55/mi), then split 4:26, 4:24, and 4:25 for his mile reps, and finished in 14:21 for his final 3 miles (4:47/mi). Now, while Masai's splits are likely out of reach for the rest of us, the spirit of the workout is something you can effectively emulate in your next marathon training block. Here are the details.
+ Jack would also like me to share with you that NAZ Elite is hiring a full-time Director of Operations to work with him and the team from their homebase in Flagstaff, Arizona. (Ed. note: This looks like a super cool gig!) For more details, and instructions on how to apply, check out the job listing here.
The bottom line.
“Discipline without freedom leads to rigidity. Freedom without discipline leads to chaos.”
—Stu McMillan, top sprint coach and the CEO of Altis, in the most recent issue of his newsletter (n.b. Listen to Stu and I talk about systems thinking, creativity, the "philosopher-coach," and more on Episode 230 of the podcast)
That’s it for Issue 481. If you enjoyed it, please forward this email to a few friends and encourage them to subscribe at this link so that it lands in their inbox next Tuesday.
Thanks for reading,
Mario
As always, phenomenal read. And special thanks for the shoutout!
Thanks for sharing Sabrina Little's article. It did make me think. Right now I'm thinking of all the times I told myself I could BQ. It's always been, "When I hit the next AG." I'm 63 now and at NYC I ran a 5:20, 20 minutes slower than the year before. Boston isn't happening unless it's through a charity, a hard truth I've finally accepted.