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Business of Endurance
Previously called Tribeathlon, The Business of Endurance is a podcast aimed at connecting endurance sport with personal and business advancement.
Hosted by Charlie Reading and Claire Fudge, the show provides a comprehensive approach to success, drawing inspiration from athletes, coaches, and motivational figures in the endurance sport domain.
With a diverse range of subjects being covered – from fitness strategies to business advice and life lessons – the discussions are designed to inspire not only athletes or entrepreneurs, but anyone pursuing growth in their personal or professional life. 40-minutes every Wednesday is all that's required to gain insights into how the tenets of endurance sport can shepherd success in business and personal development.
Business of Endurance
Part 2 with Lewis Robling - Running, Nutrition, and Mental Health: A Deep Dive
Today, we have part 2 of our talk with the incredibly inspiring Lewis Robling, a former professional rugby player who has made a name for himself in the world of endurance sports. Drawing from his experience as both a seasoned ultra runner and a former rugby player, Lewis shares insights on how running can be a powerful tool for mental health, the impact of social media on our well-being, and the critical role of nutrition and sleep in athletic performance and recovery. We also delve into the benefits of a plant-based diet and the importance of understanding your "why" in both sport and business.
Highlights:
- Running and Mental Health
- The Two Faces of Social Media
- Nutrition and Performance
- Sleep and Recovery
- Understanding Your "Why"
Links:
Click here for additional helpful content from The 4th Discipline.
Click here to book your free coaching call with The Trusted Team so you can 'find your why'.
Connect with Lewis Robling on LinkedIn
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This episode was sponsored by The Trusted Team and 4th Discipline
This episode was sponsored by The Trusted Team and 4th Discipline
I'm Charlie Redding and I'm Claire Fudge. Welcome to the Business of Endurance.
Speaker 3:This internal world of microbes exists in our gut. That's kind of part of us but it isn't part of us. And the way we feel our microbes influences our performance and our mental health and 90% of serotonin is produced in the gut. Is our performance and our mental health, and 90% of serotonin is producing the gut.
Speaker 1:Welcome back to the Business of Endurance podcast. If you listened to last week's episode, we had the incredible Lewis Roebling on and it was such a great interview we decided to break it into two parts and this is part two of that interview. So if you didn't listen to part one, please go back and check that out first, because there's so much great content in that and great stories and like some amazing inspiring stories. But this is part two. So if you listen to part one, as by way of a reminder, lewis was a professional rugby player that transitioned into ultra running and you know he's made an incredible name for himself within the world of endurance sport. The Lewis story is a testament to the power of resilience and human spirit. After an impressive career in rugby, he transitioned into ultra running, where he not only found a new passion but also a new purpose. His ultra running journey, which began as an accident during lockdown, has led him to complete some of the most gruelling races imaginable, including 125 kilometer ultra with just four weeks of preparation and five 250 kilometer ultras in the space of 12 months. So lewis's story is about so much more than just physical endurance, though he is a strong advocate for mental health, supporting and benefiting from the big moose charity, and he's now using his platform to raise awareness about the importance of mental wellbeing. His belief in the transformative power of running for mental health and his personal experiences in this area offers some incredibly valuable insights. So, like I said, this is part two of that interview and I know that you're going to love this episode with with Lewis Roebling.
Speaker 1:I remember having brutal Claire Smith on the podcast who creates like brutal events and you know these are like sometimes they're 10 times Ironman distance or even 20 times Ironman distance and they're doing it on a relatively short course. But she said actually what ends up happening is we become much more of a team. We're all trying to help each other and nobody's racing against each other. We're all trying to kind of get everyone to to get through to finishing. I mean it's absolutely incredible. It sounds like an amazing, amazing event and and just you know brilliant, brilliantly inspiring. We've obviously touched on mental health quite a bit so far, but I'd love to know why you think that mental health issues are becoming I mean, they're clearly becoming more prevalent than you know. We live in a society where more people, more younger people than ever are suffering with mental health issues.
Speaker 1:So, why do you think that is? But also, what role do you think running can play in supporting people's mental health?
Speaker 3:I think we're spending half of our time on social media nowadays and it's become part of our lives for better or for worse, and it's just adapting to what life is right now. The problem with social media is and it absolutely depends on the individual, and I think people need to take responsibility in how they use social media. But what you? When you scroll, you see people's highlights, you see the best of people's worlds. When you're seeing the best of everyone else's worlds, you obviously are comparing, because it's natural to compare with human beings. Like that comparison isn't necessarily negative either. Like if we're back in the day, if we saw another tribe hunting in a way that helped them catch more food, yeah, we're gonna, we're gonna go and copy them and try and hunt more food ourselves. So, like comparison is not always a negative thing. It's inspiring, it can be aspirational, right. But I think when you're comparing the best of someone else's life to how you're feeling in that moment, which isn't always the best, it can really it can send you in a bit of a negative loop. And I think social media has a and how you, how we use it, as a big part to play in it. We humans have a negative bias as well. It makes sense because back in the day, if we, for whatever reason, if we were surviving in the outback and there was a saber to the tiger hiding behind a tree and there was a flutter of movement, yeah, our negative bias, we're going to be a better runner. Or you're trying to run from. You're trying to run your first marathon or half marathon.
Speaker 3:The other positive side of run is that it's the act of improvement. It's understand. Okay, I'm trying to improve x. What else do I need to do to improve x? So what you find is usually a really positive snowball effect things that happen Like you're actively choosing to, it's a conscious choice to be better. That I think that's the kicker behind it all. Like it's a conscious choice to be better as a human being. And if running is the vehicle to do that, great, what a fantastic tool. Because, as a result of getting better at running, you're naturally going to start to look at your nutrition. Okay, if I know nutrition is going to be a great way to improve my running, well, I'm going to. I'm going to start eating more of this, more of these vegetables, more of that. I'm going to change this a little bit. I'm going to I'm going to sleep better, and then, when I sleep better, I'm going to improve my running. Oh look, wait, if you sleep better, if you're getting fitter, my productivity and the day-to-day basis feels better, like everything improves as a result of you changing just one thing, which could just be I want to be a better runner, but it's the, it's the, it's the ripple effect that it causes on like the entirety.
Speaker 3:That's that's kind of the short term, long term, the way I kind of see how running can help address that mental health. And it's the same thing with mental health. You're running, you improve over time, you take control of your health and if running is that vehicle that helps you take control of your health, you have, your mental health will improve as a result of that. But I think I need to be very careful in how I word this, because I don't think running is the answer. Running isn't the answer.
Speaker 3:Like I tried that running away from things just suppresses all of these thoughts and feelings and at one point you might just explode, and that that and that can happen. So I think the real way to address your mental health is to face it head-on. It's to be brave, it's to put up the mirror and to start actually asking questions as to okay, why am I feeling like this? And if that means speaking to friends, that means speaking to people that you trust, that means speaking to a therapist, great, go and speak to people about why you're actually feeling the way you're feeling and better understand where that comes from, because that's the only way that you're really going to get over like these, these thoughts and feelings that are tormenting you, that are causing this, this pain. Um, because it is pain, emotional pain, physical sometimes. Emotional pain is much worse than physical pain. So that's my take on it. Yeah, excellent.
Speaker 2:I love in particular. You know what you talk about in terms of running can help and certainly help process sometimes some of those thoughts in terms of mental health. But you're coming back to the same thing, aren't you? You're not. You can't run away from yourself, so to speak. One of the things I guess I just wanted to pick up on is, obviously, my background is nutrition, so there's going to be a slant here, moving into nutrition, but moving from rugby into and the importance of sleep and recovery. Certainly in rugby and you know nutrition has always been a big factor in in rugby what have you brought from the world of, like your knowledge from nutrition from rugby into the world of ultramarathon? And second question like, what have you learned about the importance of sleep and the impact of having sleep on recovery and doing ultramarathons?
Speaker 3:I think sleep. Sleep is the easy one to answer because it's so widely known to be such a performance enhancer. If you're not getting those kind of whatever it is seven to nine, seven to ten, eight to ten hours of sleep every night, you're missing out on that key part of sleep where the most growth hormone is released and most recovery is really done. So I think if you're skimping out on sleep, there's enough data, enough research to know that you're never going to fully recover and you're never going to then be able to kind of continue to output that same level of performance that you would do had you not get sleep. I think nutrition is. Nutrition is a little bit more, um, a little more nuanced in that, as a rugby player, I was always interested in nutrition, because I've always been interested in how can I be the best rugby player, how can I, how can I get the most out of my body? And and at the time as a rugby player, I used to, I used to a lot of me used to eat so much protein to the point where it was just far too much and I think that I'd missed out on. I think I got my nutrition wrong as a rugby player, and the reason I say that is because the more I've learned about nutrition now as an ultra runner, the more I look back and I realize well, actually, I've missed out on so many carbohydrates and so many fuel sources that I would have been using on the rugby field that I never really ate in a way that would best serve me. So in fact, it's probably worth saying that in 20 I think, a 2018 um, I went from stereotypical rugby player to spiritual vegan after a three-week hiatus in bali in an off season. But over that time so 20, 20, yeah, 2018 I started to listen to a lot of podcasts about plant-based nutrition. You'll be aware of simon hill, the australian nutritionist who has the podcast plant proof. It was the first time I was introduced to kind of gastroenterologists in alan desmond and dr will bolshevich, and I'm listening to their podcast on the microbiome and how fiber is this super fuel and how, how might this? This internal world of microbes exists in our gut. That's kind of part of us, but it isn't part of us and the way we feel our microbes influences our performance and our mental health and 90% of serotonin is producing the gut and all these things and it really kind of blew my mind. And so when I did turn towards plant-based food and I kind of reflected and recognized what had actually happened like why?
Speaker 3:Because I came back from Bali, went straight into pre-season not ridiculed by my teammates, as you can imagine and I was committed to trying to seeing how I'd feel in pre-season, because I'd only done it for three weeks in Bali and I felt amazing. And the food's going to be fresh, it'll be out the back garden. There's so much variety of different foods, like the fruits and the colors. It was all amazing. So I came back and thought can I do the same thing in pre-season? And brain of mine is 28 years old at this point, it was my last season and I have never felt so fit. I've never felt that I could recover so quickly. I was thinking more clearly on the rugby field, I was making better decisions, I felt lighter, I felt more energized and I found myself doing extras at the end of sessions when everyone else was finished and I just felt so alive.
Speaker 3:So what has actually happened here? And I think, put simply because my diet revolved around so much protein and so much animal protein. But once I removed all of that animal protein, all that saturated fat and replaced it with carbohydrates, fiber, protein. I still eating protein, but plant proteins. But because and I was quite at the time I was quite um I was a little bit obsessed with my fitness pal, so everything I was doing is kind of like for like swapping or whatever, and maybe eating slightly more carbohydrate, but also I'd learned to cook tofu. You can't eat tofu on its own, is pretty bland. So what I was doing I was doing is kind of like for, like swapping or whatever, and maybe eating slightly more carbohydrate, but also I'd learned to cook tofu. You can't eat tofu on its own, is pretty bland. So what I was doing I was learning these new dishes. I was adding spices to this, different veggies here, making this taste nice with that.
Speaker 3:So I think what has happened?
Speaker 3:I'd removed this saturated fat and added so much more carbohydrate like fuel that I actually be using to recover and perform, but also the spices fuel that I actually be using to recover and perform, but also the spices.
Speaker 3:So the diversity of my diet, the amount of nutrients that my body had versus what it had before it, it was just like my cells felt alive and that was enough for me to really commit to that kind of lifestyle and with the coconut bowl business being a plant-based business and eco-friendly and whatnot, the more the more I kind of learned about that world of sustainability and the ethical side of things and also the health implications of a plant-based diet, the more the more I realized, okay, this, this, this feels good, I'm, this is the. So anyway, that was, that was that part of the journey and I think, as as an ultra runner now, with carbohydrate being such a just, such a such a prevalent macronutrient that is so important for performance, you learn a lot more on how to fuel and run and with that you know when you don't get it right as well. You become so in tune in how you feel when you've not eaten enough carbohydrate versus when you have.
Speaker 2:It sounds like you've learned a lot and by changing to a plant-based diet it's actually opened up a world of cooking and actually thinking about food differently, and it's interesting how it makes us more intuitive as well about what we're eating. You suddenly recognize, you know what your body needs and I wonder whether you know running ultra marathons also lets you listen to your body. Maybe you know a bit more as well In terms of recovery and just thinking about you know recovery strategies from rugby. You know now there's some really good evidence around recovery and a lot of research has been done in sports like rugby. What, what do you find works for you from an ultra marathon perspective and being presumably being plant-based? Now, just from what you said, tell us a little bit about your recovery strategies. What you found work really well for you?
Speaker 3:really is keeping it really simple. There's no need to overthink recovery. I think managing training load is a huge factor when it comes to recovery. Sleep is a huge factor making sure that you're sleeping enough really hard to to manage the quality of your sleep. So it's with sleep, it's making sure that the environment is set up correctly, so there's enough darkness, it's not too hot, all of those like not eating too late before bed, not training too late before bed, leaving enough of a window and stuff like that, just like tying up and that. And that comes with knowing how, how best you, that's knowing your own kind of rituals and routines as well.
Speaker 3:I suppose from a nutrition perspective, with recovery, again, rest is. Rest is a key, key part of it, and I tend to think about rest in terms of hours rather than days and if I've got a particularly tough training week or any training week. To be honest, it's really looking at the training week from a perspective okay, can I be really smart with timings and and I'm I have the luxury of being able to put my training in the calendar first and my life can fit around my training calendar, which is really important to me. But it's like, okay, well, if I've got a really tough session I've got, maybe I've got some hill intervals on a Tuesday Can I do those intervals midday and can I save my recovery run to the following evening. So I've got enough windows in between that to not only have a full night's sleep but also I've got two meals after my session at midday and I've got three meals throughout the day. So it's really just being smart with that in terms of if, if you've got really busy schedule and timing your sessions correctly from a nutrition perspective as well, with recovery, eating enough is is numero uno.
Speaker 3:The way I think about is eating enough is no, and I'm not a nutritionist, a dietitian, so I've got a caveat that but the way I think one is. One is my energy balance. So am I eating enough? Because if, if I'm not eating enough, I'm never going to recover. So that's that's one.
Speaker 3:Number two is kind of the balance of macronutrients. So am I getting enough protein from, from a recovery perspective and a performance perspective for endurance athletes, which I think is one point gram per kilo of lean body mass You'll correct me if I'm wrong and from a carbohydrate perspective, if I'm in a period of particularly high volume, am I up to like the eight to 10 grams of carbs a day and what does that look like? And that's quite getting quite granular and I think from now that I've done it for so long, I'm able to kind of ballpark and eyeball what that looks like and how it feels as well. The third aspect, then, is from a diversity perspective. Are there enough colors on the plate? Am I eating enough veggies a week, whether it is? Am I getting 30 plants a week, whatever? And that's just ballparking, but it's just eating enough macronutrient and like the quality of it. So that's from a nutrition perspective.
Speaker 2:I like the simplicity and covering all areas there, which is fantastic. I think it can become quite difficult to meet certainly meet energy needs, can't it with a plant-based diet. So it sounds like you know what you're doing sounds amazing for you in terms of recovery. I'm also, you know, thinking about those changes that you can make in your diet to help with mental health. Do you think that some of the changes that you've made has been beneficial to you in terms of your mood and mental health and any tips for sort of business people who want to kind of get some clarity and help their mental health in terms of food, anything that you've done?
Speaker 3:Again, I need to be careful because I'm not a nutritionist, but I think, from a common sense perspective, one of the one of the um, one of the principles I kind of live by is like the closer it is to being pulled from a tree or grown from the ground, the better. But I think, from from a mental health perspective, I know there is a connection between, like the health of our gut and the health of everything from like skin health to brain health, to to even and I need to again need to be careful from like a happiness perspective, when it comes to like with serotonin and how the center and it's released. But I think, put simply, when you feel good and you can achieve that by eating a balanced diet that makes you feel good, not like from a making sure that like the nutrients are there and making sure that you're actually fueled correctly and you're recovering correctly, you'll naturally feel better about yourself. I think you'll naturally feel better as a result of just fueling yourself correctly, not being overly hungry in the evenings and little things like that.
Speaker 3:But it's never just one with mental health. It's never just one with mental health. It's never just one pillar, but it's really is a combination of everything from life stresses to your training load, to how well you're sleeping, to what you're putting into your body from work stress. It really is. You can't, I don't think it's fair to to boil it down to just one thing. So, just to put nutrition, I don't think it's put in one bucket. If that makes sense, if you consume a diet that is healthful and makes you feel good about yourself, it's definitely not in the right direction, for sure. And again, in terms of advising on what to choose and what to eat, again, I'm not a nutritionist but colorful foods with enough energy, enough carbohydrate, like our brain, our brain uses 25 percent of our energy every single day and the main fuel source from carbohydrates.
Speaker 1:So if that's not enough to make you want to eat more carbs, then one of the things that lewis talks about in this interview is the power of knowing your why, and that applies to us in sport, because going through a tough part of a sporting endurance challenge, knowing why you're doing something is really kind of what gets you to the finish line. But it's the same in life and business and knowing your why in business is really important. You know, simon Sinek talks about starting with why. If we know our true why, we can deliver better marketing, we can have a more empowered team and we can have more purpose in what we do.
Speaker 1:So at the Trusted Team, one of the exercises that we take our coachees through is called the why beneath. It's really getting to the underlying why we're doing what we're doing within our business and how can we relay that to our customers. How can we get our team to understand and embrace that why. So if you want to know more about how you empower your team and empower your marketing through the power of why, then if you want to book a free coaching call, go to the trustedteam wwwthetrustedteam and book a free coaching call and we'll explain how we can use why to empower your business and take it to the next level. What books have you found really helped you, or you find yourself recommending to others?
Speaker 3:Do you know what? I've learned more from self-help books than I have from anything? They have been such a superpower for me over the last four or five years, from when I was in my entrepreneurial phase with the business and um, from that time it was very much the. In fact, the first self-help book I ever I ever read was a book called um, unfuck yourself, and I can't remember the author, it was. It's brilliant. And the first chapter and I'll never forget the type of the first chapter and it's uh, I am willing and it was, was all. Each chapter is written by a self-development coach or a life coach and each chapter is a question that you ask. So the first question is am I willing? And that was a phenomenal book. The other type of books that I've really gained value from are the Go-Giver by Bob Berg, very small, short book. It's five chapters. Each chapter has a lesson and it's about an insurance professional that is trying to sell and essentially each chapter is a different life lesson and that's a really easy short read and the idea that it's like the more you give, the more you receive, and that for me it was a really fantastic book. The two other I'm only going to give four the two, the two other, really impactful ones from a self-development perspective. One was called the values factor by dr john d martini and the the.
Speaker 3:The basis behind that book is to discover what your true highest values are. So, for example, not thinking about values in, in a, in a, in in the way of like our honesty or integrity, or blanket terms don't really they're meaningful but they don't really mean a lot. Thinking about your values from a sense of okay, from a sense of actions, so that the the simplest and situational as well. Situational value. So like if, for example, I was going to the cinema with Steph and I wanted to watch a film, but she wanted to watch a different film that was on at the same time, which meant I couldn't watch my film, and at the, the time, I chose oh actually, it's okay, let's go and watch your film. So in that moment, my value would have been one of like. The value in that moment was like to make sure that I wanted to serve Steph instead of me.
Speaker 3:So like it's, it's understanding your tendencies and values from different life perspectives. And and the other one was okay, what? Even when shit's the fan and life is chaos, what, what do you always turn to? What's that thing? You, you, no matter what. It always happens, even when life is chaos and arms. It's exercise for me. It's exercise so, like that has to be one of my highest values, so it's something I need, like that's what I want to be part of my life. So that's a great book. Um, and then the final one, brené brown, daring greatly. A fantastic book about how, what it means to be strong and vulnerable, that real connection between vulnerability and strength.
Speaker 1:Excellent, I love that, and three of those are going on my reading list because I haven't read three of them. So that's brilliant, thank you. And then we have a tradition on the podcast where the previous guest asked the next guest a question without knowing who that is going to be. Our previous guest was Heather Jackson, the former ironman professional and now ultra runner and gravel rider and everything else, so I think claire's got heather's question lined up yeah, so heather um asked which is a great question for you actually um is there a race that um should definitely be on our bucket lists if ultra running is your your world, I suppose, and you love the mountains, then Ultra Trail Eiger has to be on that list.
Speaker 3:I did the 53k last summer from and it. It's essentially up for two and up for maybe 2 000 meters. You go up for a thousand meters, back down 500, up for another thousand meters until you reach a 2 500 meter peak. But all the way up that climb and all the way throughout the race you're surrounded by a wall of 4 000 meter peaks, and they are. It is one of the most spectacular places because we you start in grindelwald, in sw Switzerland, and in Grindelwald you're looking at the north face of the Eiger and it's just spectacular that's definitely going on my bucket list that sounds.
Speaker 2:This list is getting longer if I have to do anything that is.
Speaker 1:That sounds fantastic, and I know that we haven't talked about it at all, but I know you recently did your first Iron man. I want to ask that. I want to ask two questions around. That one is so why did you decide to switch or try iron man? And then what's next?
Speaker 3:I spent the last like two or three years of like exploring this ultra distance world and I think there is a freedom now as a non-professional athlete to be able to do whatever the hell I want without any pressure. And I think for ultra marathons, for me it was about experience. It was about seeing new places, seeing new things, seeing meeting new people and the difference between this ultra world, which is less about performance and more about the experiences, that, like the Ironman world, is very much the opposite, in that it's all about performance and I'm a I was a professional athlete and I and I'm I'm a competitive bloke as well. I'm a competitive person and I think the idea of competing again in an event as prestigious as an Ironman and having the feeling of running down that red carpet, it was really cool to me. I mean, I swam as a kid as well, so I was a swimmer from three years old to about 12 years old until I stopped doing it, and I swam originally because I was asthmatic, um to, and also me and my brother were lunatics, so it was the only way to calm us down. So swimming, I knew, was in my back pocket.
Speaker 3:Running, I knew I developed the skill to run and all I had to do was learn to cycle and that feeling. I really wanted to know what it felt like to to go back and really compete, because ultra running is very much about picking your eyes up and looking at the world around you and like, wow, look where I am, whereas Ironman is like tunnel vision. I need to move from point A to point B for three different disciplines as fast as you possibly can, and I loved the idea of my potential, like what is my current potential? What can I do? What are my limits from? Like a physical potential of a swim, bike, run and it gave me all of those answers and more brilliant, so will you do another one?
Speaker 1:oh my god, yeah, awesome. This has been absolutely brilliant chatting to you. I've really loved chatting to you. We've got so much wisdom in there, but I love your enthusiasm and energy and and also, you know, it's been brilliant to kind of get a better understanding for how Big Moose have done such an incredible job. So absolutely brilliant, loved it and wish you amazing success at UTMB and qualifying for Kona in due course.
Speaker 3:Thank you guys, I really appreciate it.
Speaker 1:So, claire, what did you make of that episode with Lewis?
Speaker 2:Well, rugby players can make ultra marathon runners and Ironman racers. Fantastic. I think kind of the freshness of him and the stories he told, of sort of coming into a different world of sport. I really kind of loved that part of like hearing that enthusiasm as well yeah, magic of him talking about doing his first Ironman, which is obviously so.
Speaker 1:He's done it the other way around, isn't he? You get a lot of people going from Ironman to ultras. He's gone from ultras to Ironman, and just hearing that I took me.
Speaker 2:It took me back to the finish line in ironman, italy, where I did my first I think also you know that that kind of real vulnerability of somebody who's come from a renowned kind of world of sport, of it being quite I want to say sort of man is maybe the wrong word but that kind of coming from a world of rugby and now he's talking about actually, you know what I struggled with my mental health and the support that he got from from Big Moose and I think talking around mental health is, you know, particularly at this point in time, is is really interesting. So that vulnerability that that comes across and just hearing about how, you know, ultra running has has actually helped him and how he's now helping other people with his coaching.
Speaker 1:It's so difficult from a psychological perspective when these guys retire from their sport because they're essentially going through the same emotions that I saw clients of my financial planning business going through when they retire. They've had until their 60s to get ready for this. These guys essentially go through the same psychological battle, but in their late 20s, 30s, et cetera, and it's really, it's really challenging from a mental health point of view and I know I know a lot of professional sports players have that, that battle. I think it's interesting how endurance sport whether it's Ironman, whether it's ultra running, whatever it is it helps so many of them.
Speaker 1:So many of these guys end up doing lots of cycling, lots of something like that, because I think it's such a powerful way to help them through what is clearly very difficult from a mental health point of view. And I think it was really lovely to hear how how much big moose helped him get through what was clearly such a you know, a challenging time for him. You know it's. It's great to get that perspective. Having to chat it to to chloe and and Chloe and Jeff about what they're doing with Big Moose and then to hear from somebody that has benefited from the work that Big Moose has done is really brilliant. What did you make on the nutrition piece? And obviously his approach to being vegan and his approach to nutrition.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it's interesting. I think you know, now, certainly professional rugby and like international sort of rugby has a lot of support and I think the world of nutrition professionally has changed quite quickly. So it's interesting to hear that actually when he was playing he didn't potentially have as much support as they maybe do now. I think it's always, you know, always interesting when you see somebody who's performing really highly to be following a plant-based diet and it's certainly possible now to be able to meet all your needs. And you know, I love the way that he talked really simply about you know what it is about getting enough energy in your diet. It is possible to get enough protein in your diet.
Speaker 2:But you know, what I sort of heard from that is that simplistic part really which he didn't say. But I'm kind of putting two pieces together here is you know, when you change your diet and you bring in more, um, less processed foods and you're bringing more color into your diet, essentially it's going to make you feel better because you're bringing more vitamins and minerals, you're bringing in more nutrients, um. So actually what I heard is actually, when he changed his diet, essentially it did help him to feel better because he brought all of those antioxidants in as well. You know that were helping with his gut health but also helping with recovery, so it obviously works for him. So I love to hear somebody you know talk about it in kind of very holistic way, but also, you know, a really simplistic way as well, so that for me, as you can imagine, ticked the boxes for me.
Speaker 1:I thought it was music to your ears as you were saying it, but but I thought it's interesting, isn't it? Because, like yes, as soon as he said that I was eating more plants, I was introducing spices. You know, all of that kind of stuff makes sense, doesn't it? Because you're introducing way more diversity, way more healthy nutrients, which makes a lot of sense. I also wonder whether I mean he said, for the last year of being a professional rugby player, he was, he was doing the vegan approach and it worked really well for him. I wonder if that would have always been the case, if he'd been vegan from 15. Let's say whether he would have never. You know, maybe whether he would have developed the power and the muscle and the strength that got him to being a professional rugby player. I don't know, I'm sure it's possible, but I suspect it might have been more difficult. What do you think? I think it's.
Speaker 2:Don't know, I'm sure it's possible, but I suspect it might have been more difficult. What do you think? I think it's really interesting and actually just been doing some work with kind of youth athletes and cycling and British cycling and we were talking a lot about this. Like you know, the rise of plant-based eating has increased, but with that we've not only now got a better knowledge so we know how to meet protein needs and energy needs better, we also know a lot more about youth and youth development and how to fuel that. And also, of course, there's a lot more availability.
Speaker 2:I'm not talking about sort of processed plant-based foods, but well, essentially they are processed plant-based foods but you know, if you wanted to add in to get some extra protein and it's much easier now to do that if you needed to use, you know, a plant based protein powder to be able to do that compared to, you know, many, many years ago.
Speaker 2:So I think it's easier now. I think there's more knowledge now and I think the other thing is there's a lot more support. So you know he brought up about, actually made him cook a bit more, which I love. You know at the age of 15 if if a boy's going to be more involved in thinking about food, knowing how it benefits him so that he can help to fuel himself enough, and really it's about energy, getting enough energy into your diet to be able to help supplement sort of making muscle. But it would be interesting, I think, now because there's so much more knowledge. I think, you know, certainly younger people coming into the world of rugby absolutely can do it. But it's all about meeting energy needs because of course energy needs are huge, not only you know through growth and puberty, but actually to be able to make muscle.
Speaker 1:There are so many elements to that but I also think that it's he did it in the way that he became healthier as a result of switching to a vegan diet. Of course, we've all heard plenty of other people switching to a vegan diet and end up having deep-fried vegetable things that have barely seen a vegetable in their life, and so, yes, you can do it well and you can do it badly, and I think that's the important thing, isn't it? It's about doing it with all the information and making sure you've got the right amount of carbs, the right amount of protein, which he was clearly very good at but it's also about taking it as an opportunity to eat better, not eat worse. But oh, it's vegan, so it doesn't matter. Um, no, so I think that's.
Speaker 1:I think I thought it was a brilliant episode. It was really, really interesting, with so many amazing takeaways, um. So, yeah, I'm looking forward to seeing his success in the UTMB and his future demands. And, for all the listeners out there, keep on training. Jeff and Chloe from Big Moose Charity, who we featured in episode one of season seven, made such a great impact on the both of us, we decided to make them our charity sponsor for season seven. Now, they really touched me in the sense that I lost my brother-in-law to suicide in Wales, and these guys are working their socks off to help prevent situations like that. So, claire, why did Jeff and Chloe really make an impact on you?
Speaker 2:Coming from a background in clinical nutrition and working in mental health, to me also it hit a spot in terms of the charity and how they are building therapy to help support people with mental health difficulties, and they've saved over 50 lives now and already met their first target of a million and their new target, 15 million, that they're trying to get to.
Speaker 1:It's absolutely incredible and 15 million is a huge target they've set themselves, but they're speeding up help that people in desperately in need get, and this help is needed more than ever and I know how problematic mental health issues are in today's world. So if you think you can help Big Moose Charity and they're particularly looking for corporate partners to help them raise that 15 million, if you think you can help Big Moose Charity and they're particularly looking for corporate partners to help them raise that 15 million, if you think you can help them or link them into a company that can help them, the best place to go to is bigmoosecharityco, or you can find them on Instagram as bigmoosecharity, or you can even email Jeff at jeffatbigmooseco.