The Distance Dr: In Practice

If you are a runner, triathlete, or endurance athlete who has ever walked into the gym and thought, how much weight am I actually supposed to lift? this episode is for you.
In endurance sport, we usually have clear intensity markers like pace, power, heart rate and cadence. In the gym, it often feels much less obvious. In this episode, I break down the 3 main ways to measure strength training intensity: percentage of repetition maximum, RPE, and reps in reserve.
I explain what each method means, where each one can be useful, and why I generally prefer reps in reserve for endurance athletes. We also cover how to apply these methods to heavy strength work versus muscular endurance work, why gym intensity often gets confused with cardio effort, and the common mistakes that can leave endurance athletes underloading their strength training.
If you want your gym work to actually transfer to performance, durability and meaningful adaptation, this episode will help you stop guessing your loads and start training with more intent.

If you’ve been told to stop running because of injury, illness, travel, surgery, or just life being life, your first instinct is usually, “I don’t want to lose my fitness.”
That makes sense. But fitness is only one part of what makes you feel good when you run.
In this episode, I unpack the four key ingredients that help you still feel like a runner when you return:
aerobic fitness
strength
tendon stiffness and elastic energy return
tissue tolerance to running loads
We cover why cross-training can maintain fitness but still leave you feeling flat, clunky, and heavy when you get back to running, and what to focus on instead so your return feels smoother, stronger, and more springy.
If you’re in a phase where you can’t run right now, this episode will help you think differently about what to train and why.

A lot of endurance athletes have heard the same message for years: lighter is better, leaner is faster, and body fat is the thing standing between them and better performance.
But is it really that simple?
In this episode, I am joined by Dr Grant Landers, Senior Lecturer in Sport Science at The University of Western Australia, to unpack one of the most deeply ingrained beliefs in endurance sport: that lower body weight automatically means better performance.
Together, we discuss what body composition actually means, why endurance sport has historically become so focused on fat mass and adipose tissue, and why that conversation is often far more simplistic than the science supports. We also explore the roles of lean mass, bone mineral density, fuelling, robustness, recovery, and athlete health, plus what tools like DEXA, skinfolds, ultrasound, body fat scales, and standard scales can and cannot actually tell you.
This is a thoughtful and practical conversation about moving away from “race weight” as the goal, and towards something much more useful: performance readines

Zone 2 is everywhere right now, but the more people talk about it, the more confusing it seems to become.
In this episode, I am joined by Rob Merrells and Nick Baldwin to unpack what zone 2 training actually is, why there is so much disagreement around it, and how endurance athletes can apply it in a way that is practical, realistic, and evidence-informed.
We discuss thresholds, heart rate, pace, power, RPE, and the talk test, as well as what to do if “easy” running sends your heart rate through the roof. The conversation also digs into whether zone 2 is really as magical as social media makes it sound, how much of it time-poor athletes actually need, and why lower intensity does not automatically mean lower injury risk.
This is a thoughtful, practical episode for runners and triathletes who want to understand zone 2 beyond the hype.

Most runners know they “should” strength train. Far fewer know how to do it in a way that actually helps performance.
In this episode, I break down the 5 most common mistakes runners make with strength training and show you exactly how to fix them. We talk heavy strength vs high reps, calves vs glutes, single-leg work, progressive overload, rest periods, and what a smart runner strength session should actually look like.
I also give you a practical anti-mistake strength session to help you put the ideas into action.
If you want your gym work to improve your running rather than just make you tired, this one’s for you.