Pushing Your Limits Too Hard
Jackie 0:04
Welcome back to the body’s build better podcast. This is part two with Simone brick where we left off mid race, she was running a 15k p b. And not everyone believes she could finish strong. Here it is.
Simone 0:22
and wanting to prove people wrong mid race because I told a guy mid race that I just ran a 15k and for the first 15 K’s of the marathon, and he looked at me and told me that I was gonna die. And so I pretty much just then sprinted off away from him. Pretty much I was like, well, I’ll preview. And so, and I didn’t. And that second marathon in particular surprises me because I had I know in that marathon, I drank a baby 100 mils. And I didn’t eat anything. Like I didn’t know I was supposed to drink anything or eat anything. And so that probably showed me that I could do distance. And I could do fairly well at distance. Because the last two cases were two of my fastest cases, even at the back end of it. And I think one of the I that time I ran three or seven.
Jackie 1:05
How so?
Simone 1:06
That was a bad point.
Jackie 1:10
To stomach surgery.
Simone 1:12
Yeah, it was three months. It was again, like it was off stupid training where every long run like I ran a marathon on the track four weeks before the marathon just to prove that I could still run the distance to myself. Yes, I am meant to be the way you’re looking at me right now. 40. What, like 100 laps of the track or something. And so it was Yeah.
Jackie 1:35
Well, I mean, that makes sense. That sounds so boring. Like, I got to do this as quick as
Endurance and Speed: From Marathons to 10Ks
Simone 1:41
When I ran, I ran it along there around the mat. And then the track that I did very slowly that I enjoyed. Okay, yeah, that Oh, that I just jumped. But then the Yeah, the actual marathon. And it was just after that, that I got put in touch with my coach who has been my coach ever since. And he kind of looked at my marathon and went, Oh, that was decent. And then he taught like he convinced me that you’re young, you shouldn’t run marathons anymore. You should be doing like five K’s 10k isn’t getting faster. But yeah, the first thing he actually got me to do was run a 10k. And this was my merit. My 10k pB at that point in time was the first 10 K’s of that marathon and just ran. And then he got me to do a 10k. And he’s like, surely if you can run a three or seven marathon, you can break 40 minutes for 10k. And to that point up until running that 307 marathon, I’d never broken four minutes for a single kilometre. Like I didn’t even know what that pace felt like because I’ve never trained at a faster pace than four minutes per kilometre, or even like, as far as I knew my PB for 1k was 401. And I’d never gone below that. And that was a one all out 1k Rep. And so yeah, he put me Not long after the marathon, I think it was about four weeks after the marathon, he put me in, or maybe it was six in the 10k. And he just told me this, he pointed out another runner and to just stick on the back of her. She paced me through for 40 minutes. One of my good friends, Brian. And yeah, and I didn’t have the heart to tell him because he was adamant that he’s like, you clearly can run a 40 minute 10k because you’ve just run through a seven for a marathon. And I didn’t have the heart to tell him I’d never broken four minutes for a kilometre. And so I didn’t tell him he was asking me to run my one kpb 10 times in a row. But I think I wanted to prove to him again that if he thought I could do it, then I bloody well go try. And so that was one that taught me that it was sort of you can always do more than even you think you can because I was convinced I couldn’t run under 40 minutes. In my mind. That was what superhumans did, like No One No One that’s like a normal human like I was, could do that. But then, yeah, I just stuck on the back of my friend Brian, who I just met. And I remember that case, being convinced I was having an asthma attack and being convinced I was about to die and that I wasn’t going to finish. I wasn’t going to finish the race, and was just absolutely panicking. But then just going I just remember Tim yelling out just stick to the back of it. And so I just stared at the back of Brian. And I managed to literally. This is just typical of me. I face planted over the finish line. Like I tripped over the finish map. But I ran 3959 so it was all good. Okay that I fell over and faceplant.
Jackie 4:24
Like what time did I do? Yeah.
Simone 4:27
No, no, but I just knew it was close because I’d looked at my watch with like 200 metres to go and I was like, Oh my god, I’m not going to do and so yeah, I’ve literally like that was it was embarrassing, but it was just that was typical me just faceplant over the finish line Matt.
Jackie 4:43
Yeah, that was fun. Remind them like you’ve just achieved something that you thought you couldn’t
When You Feel Like You Can Do More
Simone 4:47
I was like an ignorant self of noxious little prick if you ask me but in my head, I was just going oh, I can do so much more. I can even run faster. I can do this. Like we got this I can go so much faster. And I didn’t know what Our training looked like. I didn’t know what heart was like the hard work that I was doing. Now, if you had told me that that was involved, I would have been like, Oh, well, maybe not. But it’s all sort of added to itself a little bit at a time. And so my God, I got a very big head after that. And I was like, yeah, I’m gonna run so much faster. And I’m going to be so good at this. You wait, and then, and then lo and behold, it’s like I get trapped in that, like some of their short 5k races or the FCR season, which is like the competitive Victoria Cross Country season. And I’m literally having my ass whooped by like 14 year olds. And so yeah, yeah, it’s very humbling. Like, I’ve been humbled in many, many other aspects of life. But at the same time in running, it was almost like, I then just went, I think I always had that idea of looking at other people. From then onwards, in particular, I’d look at other people, and I go, Well, if they can do it, then why the hell can I like, why can’t I at least try? Surely if it’s physically possible for them, it’s also physically possible for me, I may have to do it differently. But that doesn’t make it impossible. And so I think I’ve always, like applied that mindset to running because I still do that, where I’d look at some times other people have run or people that I’m trading with, and that sort of thing. And I’m like, Well, I’m keeping up with them in training for the most part. So surely, I can run similar to them in races, or, and so I still apply that of going. And if someone else can do it, then I’ve just got to find a way but it’s going to be possible.
How Simone’s Approach to Running Has Changed
Jackie 6:27
Exactly. Yeah. make it possible for you. That’s Yeah, amazing. So how has your running changed from then to now? A lot.
Simone 6:40
I have a coach. So I went through a long and good and slow process of taking the distance I was trying to run right back down. So focusing on the three K’s, the five K’s, the speed, the cross country, every all the foundations of because I ran those two marathons, not having any idea how to run my form was nothing like it was now. And so I got into sort of, I was already a PT, so I got into more strength work, and that sort of thing. But it was more than that. Everything was structured. My coach and I had people to train me. They had a group to train with the good old Crosby crew, like, they were my family for that entire, like, year, two years. And so everything changed in so many ways. I got taught what a temporary session was and what a speed session was. And I got taught what it meant to run easy. And to actually have a rest day and all those sorts of things.
Jackie 7:35
So you weren’t, you weren’t resting yourself.
Simone 7:38
I was out of pure necessity. But my rest days were still. I think one of the things I was getting wrong is on my rest days from running, I’d go to the gym, and I do body pump classes and spin classes and stuff. Because that’s just I don’t know. Yeah, exactly. It’s not running. So it was a rest day. Whereas now it’s like, I’ll do my gym on the same day as the hard day. But yeah, it was a very long slow transition because my mileage wasn’t very big, obviously in that first year. And it was just a long year of foundations. And that was 2017. And I got a very good solid year of running, which was then why 2018 went so well for me, because I was like just mid pack in a lot of the races. I was running in 2017. I wasn’t doing anything special. I was training damn hard. And I was still in many ways all in the fact that I was treating every race like I was a bloody elite athlete. And I literally had people questioning why I was trying so hard. But I was also of the mindset of like, well, and if you’re gonna if you want to try and be as good as other people, then you’ve got to already act like the people that are better than you like you’ve already got to act like an elite before you’re going to be elite, because that’s how you get there. And I could see that. So I didn’t mind too much. But it was just like, I’ll show you one day. And so yeah, 2017 was just a boring year of study and trading was good and beautiful. And then 2018 was when I went to my first state championships for steeplechase. So I was doing track training at that point in time and went to steeplechase. And then the week after the state championships with steeplechase, where I ran my steeplechase PB, I ran my first mountain run, trail and mountain run. And that was the one where I entered the path because I was like, hey, I want to see if I can do this. And I went to my coach and he’s like, yeah, you’re the sort of person that might be stupid enough to do well at that. Because it was straight up and down and down and running and there was a sponsorship prize from Solomon. And so that was a week after though state champs just to see how it went. I went on and raced at the Donner double and literally like was my first proper trail race. I don’t want to trail a half marathon that was very flattened on a base side trail. But it was my first proper trail race. I’d known I didn’t know what massive feels like we’re like up until that point, and I very much had the Road Runners mindset of must run up the hill, even when it’s better to hike up the hill. So, yeah, it was brutal, but I won that race. And so in winning that race, all of a sudden, I was, I wanted a sponsorship. And then four weeks later, my coach had them because I did well, he was like, well, you do, okay. And that one, so in four weeks is the National mountain running championships. And I had literally like, I just became what fifth or sixth states in the 3k. And in the 3k steeplechase, and then yeah, within five weeks, I got a sponsorship for trail running, and then won the national championships four weeks later for mountain running. And so all of a sudden, I was then preparing to go to the World Championships in September, which, yeah, after everything. After everything I’ve been through in the previous four years, that was probably the most beautifully intense and scary month of my life. Because I was like, No, this shit just doesn’t happen to me. Like, I’m the one that’s always sick. I’m the one that’s always the one that’s left behind them, or the one that’s always like, shit goes wrong in life. And everyone leaves like, that’s just what happens to me. And that was that was like, so self defeating mindset, obviously. But then I had to keep reminding myself going, No, but what if what if this goes well, what if we actually make this happen? What if you actually invest in what if like, like, work hard enough to make it work, and if it goes wrong, well, you’ve dealt with where shitting your life and losing, running, like losing it and even getting injured, all that sort of stuff. It’s like, you’ve got to risk getting injured to get really, really fit. Like, that’s just they go hand in hand.
Where To Find Simone Brick
Website: www.stillwerise.com.au
Instagram: @theflyingbrick_
