Zach Bitter | Low Carb Endurance: Fueling & Training with Zach Bitter | July 24, 2025 Ep. 12 - The Low Carb Consultant

Episode Transcript
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(00:11):
All right, guys, we're rolling. Welcome back to the Low Carb
Consultant podcast. So I'm thrilled to have on Zach
Bitter. So he's an ultra marathon icon
who broke the 100 mile world record.
So just to kind of expand on this just a little bit, this
dude ran 100 miles of an hours and 19 minutes.

(00:32):
And to break that down a little bit further, that's about 6
minutes and 47 seconds per mile for 100 miles.
So this is crazy. So Zach's not only a world
record holder, but a coach, a strategist, a low carb endurance
pioneer. He's optimized elite athletic
performance through data-driven fuel strategies, strength

(00:53):
training and smart periodization.
So I would say get ready for insights from someone who's
really pushed the human limits here.
So again, Zach, great to have you on, man.
Finally meet you. Pleasure to chat with you man.
Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for having me on Max
Looking forward to chatting. Absolutely.
So maybe before we kind of jump into all the the good stuff
here, could you give the listeners who may not know who

(01:15):
you are quite yet, just a real brief background on yourself and
what maybe LED you down this endurance pathway?
Yeah, I would say, you know, I got into endurance sport
relatively gradually consideringlike kind of how I've made a
career out of it more or less. And I I sort of the way I look
at it is. I identified endurance and

(01:37):
running specifically as a sport I was probably better at than
maybe some of the other sports, so that kind of piqued my
interest at an early age. I still loved sport in general
and doing a variety of differentstuff, so I didn't take it
overly seriously until like, maybe you could argue at the end
of high school, I started focusing on it a little bit more
specifically than other things. But it really wasn't until
college that I started really diving into just what it

(02:01):
actually took to build a sound endurance training program and
trying to understand like what the different inputs meant and
where to apply them and things like that.
And then ultimately deciding that running was going to be
something that I was going to kind of keep around regardless
of whether I was on a team or not.
After college, it wasn't until. My my first career, which is as

(02:21):
a teacher that I kind of even really recognized ultra marathon
as a sport of interest that I would get into at an earlier
age. So I ended up jumping in a 50
mile or at I think it was 20. 4 at the time and my mindset was
kind of like, just go check thisout, probably won't do another
one until I'm in my 30s. And then, you know, just kind of
curiosity got the best of me, I guess.

(02:42):
But after that experience, I really actually fell in love
with ultra running as a, as something that maybe focus on a
little sooner. So by that next year, I was
basically all in. This was like late 2011.
I did 350 milers in a pretty short time frame, all within a
couple of months of one another.And at that point I decided, all

(03:02):
right, I'm going to just focus on ultras going forward next
year and just see kind of where that goes.
Around that same time is when I started applying a lower
carbohydrate diet to sort of fuel and support those efforts.
And 12, I did my first 100 Miller.
And then I started learning moreabout kind of the variance and
different events and things likethat in a sport and also

(03:24):
identified kind of the value of just specificity within kind of
the course you're training for. And living in Wisconsin at the
time, I had a lot more access torunnable stuff.
So I found myself doing a 100 mile, It was actually a 24 timed
event in Phoenix, AZ at the end of 2013 where I broke the
American record for 100 miles inthe world record for 12 hours.

(03:45):
And that really kind of like sprung me maybe onto a little
bit more of a national or globalscene within the sport, which
was still very much growing at the time.
So it wasn't really a spot yet where I would say very many
people were like, all right, I'mgoing to try to make this a
profession unless they were trying to do it within the scope
of other things. But it wasn't up to get

(04:05):
attention. You know, I got some sponsors, I
got a lot of people reaching outfor coaching and things like
that. And then over the next couple of
years, that all started to evolve to the degree where I
kind of had to make a choice between focusing on training,
racing, coaching or teaching andbeing that like professional
athleticism is a pretty short window.
I decided to try to jump on thatwhile it was still available to
me. And moving out to California for

(04:26):
a few years, met my wife, we moved to Phoenix for four years.
And then now we've been in Austin for about 3 1/2.
And you know, along the way I'vebeen kind of focusing on all
sorts of different ultra marathons, mostly runnable 100
milers as like the primary focus.
But yeah, over that course of time, I had battered my 100 mile
time a couple of times from thatfirst time in 2013, including

(04:48):
breaking the world record for 100 miles in 2019.
It's now an American record. So just so people are aware,
there's a guy, Alexander Sorokin, who ran.
He, he actually went on a bit ofa tear and he broke the world
records for 100 kilometers, 12 hours, 100 miles, 24 hours, all
within a couple of years. He's got the the top spot on the

(05:08):
100 mile distance right now. So but yeah, I know it's been a,
it's been a lot of fun kind of like exploring kind of what the
limitations I have and just figuring out kind of what path
forward is best to putting yourself on a starting line of a
race as long as 100 miles and figuring out, you know, how
quickly you can get it done. Yeah, I know that's awesome.
And I had a question going back to like what initially got you

(05:31):
into like the low carb type of fueling strategy?
Like like were you at maybe any point questioning the diet, the
fueling strategy and that led tomaybe you experimenting with
like a lower carb, a higher fat,maybe a ketogenic type of diet?
Like were you running into issues?
Were you running into performance roadblocks that made

(05:53):
you start kind of playing aroundwith some things?
Yeah, Yeah. I would say like at the end of
2011 when I had done those 350 milers in a tight time frame and
then like all the training that went with it and then teaching
full time. Still at that point, I was sort
of questioning more so just the overall sustainability of what I

(06:14):
was doing as much as I was the dietary side of things.
But at the same time, I was alsokind of trying to learn a little
bit. While training, so, you know, I
was investing a couple hours every morning basically running.
So at one point I thought like, well, maybe I should like listen
to some podcasts while I do thisand, and, and try to learn
something as I'm doing it. So I'm not just spending time

(06:36):
running, teaching, eating and sleeping during the school year.
And that sort of led me into like a lot of different topics
within the endurance world. And it also introduced me to a
lot of Jeff Bollock and Steven Finney's work on low
carbohydrate stuff. And at that time they were
starting to like push into the world of endurance a little bit
with their approach. So a lot of their stuff kind of
sort of made sense to me based on kind of what I was doing.

(06:58):
You know, given the fact that myrace distances were longer and
my aspirations were to get into longer events yet than the 50
miles I had done at that time, something to, you know, the idea
of maximizing fat oxidation justsort of made sense and.
You know, on top of that, like Iwas doing these 50 miles, I was,
I was probably hitting somewherein the neighborhood of 70 to 80
grams of carbohydrate per hour for those.

(07:21):
And, you know, I wasn't having any like severe issues with it
to the degree where I felt like it was costing me in the events
themselves, but. It was something where I was
looking at it through the lens of like, if I had to do this for
50 more miles, I'm not sure digestively I was going to
tolerate that because it was getting to like by the end of
those races, you could start noticing like, all right,

(07:43):
there's an end of this. Like I can't just keep
mainlining this much fuel and have it, you know, continue to
work for twice plus as long. So I was kind of questioning
maybe the sustainability of thatside of things a little bit.
Interesting. Yeah.
And that kind of let down. You know, this was all 14 years
ago at this point now. So it's like there is there's a

(08:04):
lot more knowledge in terms of what we know about like gut
training and things like that and maybe things that could be
done to make that more sustainable at the time.
But back then, I don't think guttraining was even being talked
about. So like, you know, it was more
just like, all right, I. Have a limitation that seems
appearing here. Going beyond it doesn't seem
like something I'm going to be able to do.
So what's the next step in? You know, for me, that was like,

(08:25):
well, let's lower the amount of interest inner workout or inner
race fueling needs that I would maybe have by leveraging more of
a fat based diet in my day-to-day life.
And that's kind of what jump started a lot of that.
Yeah. And it's kind of funny going
back to, you know, maybe 10 years ago, 14 years ago, it kind
of seemed like and you you you're probably going to know

(08:47):
better than than than me with your endurance experience.
But like it kind of seemed like,you know, a lot of the intra
workout fuels the gels, like thedigestive disorder that people
would get kind of seemed like that was normal almost.
It's like, yeah, this is going to happen.
It's like, yeah, I'm doing this Iron Man.

(09:07):
And I know I'm probably going toshit my pants or probably like,
you know what I mean? Like have to pull off to the
side and like, you know, find a porta potty along the way.
Like I felt I feel like that waskind of normal.
Like what are your thoughts on that and how do you think it's
kind of have progressed up to this point?
Because now I feel like with lowcarb, it's like people are kind
of playing around with differentthings.
Like, OK, like if I train and and I train my gut in a specific

(09:32):
form and fashion that on race day, I don't have to make those
pit stops along the way. And I feel like that that's kind
of shifted a little bit. And what's your opinion?
Yeah, you know your digestive issues were, were and continue
to be an area of concern. So like when I look at these
different. Ways of fueling these races,
you're sort of looking at what are the positives and what are

(09:53):
the negatives of this approach versus the other one and trying
to figure out at the individual level which is going to serve
you best and. That's that's how I generally
look at. I mean when we see, when we see
the just the data that we have available with single day
ultras, it's like about 50% of the participants are going to
have some sort of digestive issue during the event.

(10:15):
And of that 50%, about half of those are going to be severe.
So it is sort of like a coin flip opportunity, I guess in, in
terms of just Gen. pop stuff. Now to the what degree that
that's manageable, like in termsof like, well, some people are
probably not doing it properly or doing it a textbook based and
getting digestive issues from itor maybe dehydration is playing

(10:36):
into that and things like that. So like people should be just
like mindful of just like, OK, what have I actually done from a
practice standpoint and got whatever results?
So for example, some people I'llwork with, they just can
mainline a ton of carbohydrates generation.
They very rarely have a fuel issue.
So for them, like the opportunity cost of switching is
much, much different than say someone who's done a handful of

(10:58):
ultra marathons, always get digestive issues and just cannot
seem to finally get over that hurdle.
In which case for them, it's like they kind of have a, they
have two directions. Can they, can they train their
body to be able to tolerate what's not working?
Or do they find a way to reduce that to a degree where they
don't have to try to hit the numbers that are resulting in
the digestive issues? So a lot of times there's a,

(11:19):
there's a little bit of a, of a,of a paper trail from the
person's prior experience as to maybe what direction is going to
make the most sense for them with, with the kind of that
fueling standpoint. And you know, from my experience
as a coach is that's usually where people end up kind of
finding themselves. Is, is, are they looking at it
through the lens of, hey, I'm going to enjoy my experience and

(11:41):
get to the finish line potentially quicker than I would
otherwise by limiting the amountof fuel I require during race
day? Or is this something I can, I
can learn and, and, and do differently and not have to
change that stuff? So, you know, personalities,
preferences, like, you know, when you get into the world of
diet, there's also adherence within specific diets and people

(12:01):
range widely on what they can adhere to and what they can
adhere to or prefer to adhere toor not adhere to.
So there's a lot of moving partsthere.
But I think when you kind of explore the person's
personality, their goals, their strengths, their weaknesses at
the challenges they presented, you can start to kind of like at
least list limit or get get a list of like a shorter list of
things that are worth exploring and then figuring out what's

(12:21):
going to work best for them. Yeah, No, that makes sense.
And going back to the when you were training for the world
record of the 100 Miller. So what was your training?
What was your diet strategy up like leading up to that event?
And then what was, and I think because you mentioned this
earlier, I think you were maybe at that time the cut of it could

(12:43):
have been lower intracarbs like maybe you were doing like 30-40
fifty carbs per hour. But what was your like in race
fueling strategy or in event fueling strategy while you were
running that 100 mile or to break the record?
Yeah, yeah. So my, my, my day-to-day diet
was low carb leading into that. So what I did?
And what did that, what does that entail?

(13:03):
Like what did you eat? Like were you specifically
eating like, were you trying to keep it like like potatoes,
sweet potatoes, carrots, like kind of keep it away from low
complex carb or not long, but like ultra processed foods like
bread and stuff. And we're like, what were you
eating in terms of the carb source?
Yeah. At that point, you know, so I'll
back up just a little bit quickly just to kind of share
with the listeners. They have a perspective like

(13:23):
within the content. Text of the low carbohydrate
stuff I've done over the last 14years that's ranged from like
mostly plant based to mostly animal based and then everything
in between. But like depending on what year
or what race can kind of dictatethose inputs.
What's remained pretty constant is sort of the macro nutrient
ranges that I'd be targeting during those.
So for that particular race I was skewing further towards

(13:46):
animal based products for the majority of my intake, but then
the carbohydrate side of the equation was where more of the
plant type stuff would come from.
So I was doing a lot of potatoesand fruits as kind of the carb
sources leading into into that particular race as like
day-to-day fuel. And then on race day, I was
using a more like engineered product just to eliminate the

(14:08):
stuff that was going to be unnecessary for that short time
frame, relatively speaking. And and just just supplement the
the amount of carbohydrate that would be required for my fat
oxidation race at the time. And the product I was using the
time was this product by a company called X Endurance
called Fuel 5. And the target was about 40
grams. And I arrived at 40 grams

(14:29):
because I just went in and got a, got a metabolic heart test
done. And based on the pace and
intensity that I found to be sustainable or predicted to be
sustainable for 100 miles, you know, my, my fat ox and my
carbohydrate oxidation rates were like 80 to 90% fat, 10 to
20% carbohydrate. So I just kind of hedged on the

(14:50):
side of like, well, I'm going to.
Fuel the carbohydrate side of that equation to the highest I
could possibly need within that number, which was around 40
grams. And I knew from prior experience
40 grams wasn't likely to createa sort of digestive issue for
me. I mean, we see guys going 3X
that now. So it's like, you know.
It's a pretty low amount of carbohydrate intake relative to

(15:11):
what you would see someone, you know, running, running those
sort of paces for that duration.And, and that's just kind of how
I kind of set things up. And it worked well.
I mean, I, I negative split thatrace, meaning I ran faster in
the second-half than in the first half.
So there wasn't really any like clear signs of fuel based
degradation that that I could tease out of kind of the results
from that one. So I felt like I, I, I sort of

(15:31):
had a pretty good strategy goingin.
I had some data to support it from my own individual testing.
And yeah, just kind of trusted it.
And thankfully the everything that I did logistically during
the race worked out about as well as you can expect for one
of these things. And I think my non moving time
was maybe like. 2 minutes, 3 minutes at most, with just a
couple of bathroom breaks and things like that along the way.

(15:53):
But yeah, pretty smooth as far as as far as 100 miles go.
Yeah. And when you stop to go to the
bathroom, obviously like the clock stops and then you
restart, right. Or how does how does that work?
Or the does the clock keep running and whatever time it
takes for you to go to the bathroom or eat or whatever,
switch shoes, whatever the case is like how does that work?
Yeah, clock keeps running. So like you can stop as often as

(16:14):
you want, but that just means like whatever.
Time you end up getting is goingto be a little bit slower.
Or another way to look at it is to arrive at your final average
pace. You're going to run faster, so
like. For.
If you kind of run the numbers on that particular race, my
average pace was 647 1/2. If you look at just how fast I

(16:35):
was actually moving when I was running probably closer to 640
flat just with like the the stoppage.
And then also, you know, I was on a 443 meter track that had
people doing everything from 12 hours like what I was doing all
the way up to six days. So you pass on the outside in
track. So because you can't really

(16:55):
expect someone running on lane one to know if someone's coming
up from behind it and move out of the way.
So nor is it necessarily fair for them to disrupt their race
for someone else's. So when you're going to be
running the faster paces or the shorter duration event within a
context of a multi day like that, you're just going to spend
a lot of time in lane 2 going around people.
So, so there's like, you know, when you look at it, if you

(17:16):
really want to like run numbers in terms of like actual output
and things like that, which to some degree is, is important to
do because like I was saying before, like I'm basing my
fueling strategy on the actual intensity I'm running.
And if my moving pace is faster than what the actual pace is at
the end of the day, then I need to be able to account for that
if it's going to be a large enough variance.

(17:37):
That makes sense. And I know, I know we were
chatting a little bit about thisbefore we had recorded and I had
brought up a self self recorded podcast that you did.
I want to talk about your podcast here in a little bit
human performance outliers. But you had done a podcast on
Lionel Sanders. And I think what was going on
was, and I, what's happening here is a lot of these endurance

(17:58):
athletes are playing around withhigher and higher and higher and
higher carbs, but potentially they are running into more short
term issues like higher glucose levels, pre diabetic numbers,
all those types of things. And you know, I was, we were
talking about like Nick Baer. And you know, obviously I'm like
I said earlier, I'm a huge fan of Nick Baer.

(18:20):
He's got a good company called BPN Cell Supplements, but
they're going into the endurancespace pretty heavily because
they see the demand in the market, right?
Like more people are signing up for marathons and half marathons
and a lot of these ultra distance races more than they
ever had. And the popularity is growing.
And I'm curious because what popped up in my head when I was

(18:40):
listening that podcast is just basically like, OK, well, these
these races are clearly with more and more athletes competing
in them, They're definitely going to get more and more
competitive. And we're seeing this influx of
people going higher and higher carb to, you know, increase
their performance. But do you, do you ever think
about or do you ever see that people are maybe jeopardizing

(19:05):
long term health, long term longevity for shorter term
performance, performance times or higher performance in a
shorter time frame? Like, like I was just curious,
like what your thoughts on that and where you kind of see things
going at this point? Yeah, it's a it's a great
question. Think like where where it gets

(19:27):
interesting is when we look at just what the demands of like
the lifestyle of a professional athlete is for someone like
Lionel Sanders. You know, the competitive
pressure within the triathlon world is such that.
You're going to probably make some health compromises in order
to reach full potential just because like if you don't

(19:50):
someone else's and then you're going to you're just going to
not be at the top of the sport eventually at a certain point,
if you don't do those things. It gets a little interesting
though, because like when we look at just like longevity and
health outcomes of professional athletes within the endurance,
well, they tend to be better than average, but these are also
likely some of the most. Like physically and potentially
medically robust individuals we have on the planet or they

(20:13):
likely also would have gotten weeded out of, you know, the top
tier spots in some of these endurance events.
So, you know, comparing them to the average person is maybe
selling their actual potential short.
So even though maybe we see themdoing better health wise than
average, we may not see them do as well as they could with like
a more subtle approach to their their efforts, which to a degree

(20:35):
I think it's like, yeah, so yeah, that makes sense.
When you take your your body to the absolute limit and you train
as a way to put it in position like that, you're probably like
doing more than what would be required for just general health
and longevity type of type of things.
So, so I think there's probably,it's probably worth starting
there. And then from there it's like,
well, OK, so we're we're fighting this kind of at least

(20:55):
some uphill battle when it comesto maximizing performance that
may come out of some trade off to like general health and
longevity and things like that. So how do we minimize the
detrimental side of that? And this is where I think it
gets interesting because like you have, you have, you know,
athletes like Lionel Sanders whowere doing, I mean, he eats an

(21:17):
insane amount of food in general.
I think his like some of the videos I watched where he just
kind of outlines his daily needsand things like that.
And just the numbers he's run based on his training.
It's like the guy's eating six 7000 calories a day and and he's
using all of it and then some insome cases probably.
So it's like in order to say in that lifestyle, like that level
of food consumption is kind of anecessity to make it something

(21:40):
he can continue to do. But then what do you, what are
those inputs in? So it's like you sort of have
like, you know, you meet your protein needs at a certain point
and then it's like, OK, the restof this is going to come from
fats and proteins. And, you know, given the way
protein works, like he's probably not going to benefit
from taking in more than like, say, a gram per pound of body
weight at the extreme. But that still leaves in his

(22:02):
case, like still like price 6000calories.
Worth of carbs and fats. So how do you make that up and
and then you kind of get into the world of just like his
training is going to do some level of fat oxidation, his
training intensity is going to range.
Low on average from like a percentage standpoint versus
anything in kind of the higher intensity side of things like

(22:23):
short intervals at VO2 Max or longer intervals at lactate
threshold and things like that, that would constitute as like
intensity work and things like that, that are going to be more
glycolytic. So if if you're looking at it
through the lens of just carbs, carbs, carbs and more carbs to
supplement that energy output, eventually you're probably going
to cross a threshold of where your body actually is requiring

(22:44):
more carbohydrate to meet the glycolytic needs.
And when you're eating that muchfood in general, like your body
has to process that and deal with it.
So like having a scenario like Lionel Sanders where he
essentially had pre diabetic levels of fasting blood glucose
is probably not something that you're going to like.
You're not going to look long and hard to find those examples.

(23:04):
I think if we would test people like him with that.
In fact there was a recent studythat came out that looked at I
think it was 10 male endurance athletes.
They weren't professional, but they were like consistent
training and they were, they were doing quite well as far as
like amateur athletes go. And they ran kind of higher

(23:25):
carbohydrate approach and a ketogenic approach for them.
And three of those 10 had pre diabetic levels of fasting blood
clues level when they were doinga high carb approach.
So to the degree that there's maybe just some variance from
one person to the next is probably worth exploring because
like, just because you know, I can go and find an athlete who

(23:46):
you probably feel pretty similarto what Lionel Sanders was doing
prior to his his blood work and,and doing just fine.
And as long as they make adjustments post career where
there's going to be a day where Lionel Sanders is probably not
burning 7000 calories a day. And I think a lot of the
problems we see with professional athletes and, and
food is like, you know, they have this lifestyle that is just
not going to match their, their,their prior energy intake.

(24:10):
And they have to make a pretty abrupt adjustment without having
a scenario where now all of a sudden they're just being
overfed constantly. But like even within the
framework of of before that point, you know, there may be
just be some percentage of the population that just doesn't
tolerate that much carbohydrate and then some that do.
And then it becomes kind of an individual exploration as to

(24:31):
like where you land on that. And, and, and to the degree, I
mean, this is, this is a pretty deep rabbit hole from my like
understanding to where like there's also a percentage of the
population who are going to havepre diabetic levels of blood
glucose, but never progress intodiabetic ranges.
So it's like, is Lionel Sanders someone who can just tolerate
pre diabetic levels of blood glucose and it just will never

(24:53):
evolve into the point where now he's got type 2 diabetes?
It's possible, you know, so it'slike there's a lot of kind of
moving parts within it. But yeah, I think it's probably
worth considering and, and testing yourself to kind of see
where your, what signals your body's giving you and what
adjustments can possibly be madeto kind of put yourself in the
best health position possible tobe able to take on the rigors of

(25:13):
training for performance. Yeah.
And while we're on the topic of some of these elite athletes, so
your podcast, the HPO podcast, Human Performance Outliers for
anyone listening, it's a great podcast.
And honestly, man, when I think of your podcast, it kind of
reminds me of the Joe Rogan podcast.
Like Joe Rogan has on like the best of the best, the elite

(25:33):
people, top of their field. And that's kind of what I see
when you're interviewing individuals, you have some of
the best and the brightest on onyour podcast.
But when you're in when you're when you're interviewing some of
these elite endurance athletes, in your opinion, right what what
separates people from like who can survive and do 100 mile race

(25:55):
to who ends up like winning themand then winning them on like
consistent and maybe a dominant basis?
Yeah, it's a great question. And I think it probably ranges
dependent on the event because if we get into kind of like if
we get into the shorter side of the ultra running space, you're
going to have some kind of threshold of like just either

(26:17):
natural ability where they have like.
The They have a ceiling that's high enough in terms of their
genetic potential to be able to kind of compete and kind of
match the pace is required to find themselves on podiums of
some of the higher highly competitive races.
So I think you're going to get kind of like a similar a similar
framework as you would for like any other professional sport

(26:38):
where like, you know, like therewas no real path forward for me
to be like a starting player in the NBA for a lot of genetic
reasons. You know, there wasn't there
wasn't really like a program in basketball that would have got
me into the NBA and in a way that was probably realistic.
But you know, is there a similarthere's probably similar
scenarios there from the reverseangle.

(26:59):
Like if you're if you're built like an offense alignment,
chances are you're not standing on the top of the podium at the
Western States 100 either. And you know, that's going to be
partly genetic. But then when you kind of get
into the world of just what can you do with what you have?
I think it opens up a little bitas we get to getting into kind
of some of these really long stuff like, you know, these

(27:20):
multi day fastest known times, these longer endurance events
that take days if not weeks to finish in some cases where it
opens the door a little bit. Because there's just other,
there's other, there's probably other selective criteria that
kind of makes those athletes as good as they are, whether that
be they're really efficient withlike electrolyte and fluid loss,
or they can tolerate sleep deprivation and a lot better

(27:42):
than the average person. Or maybe they just have like a
lot higher ability to kind of stay focused for long periods of
time. And they don't have that kind of
lapse that could potentially result in, you know, ADNF or a,
a stoppage to the degree where they're no longer competitive
and things like that. So I think there's like there's
a lot of variables that we're looking at there.
And ultimately, I think as a sport gets more competitive,

(28:03):
it's just going to be like the people that select well for the
most variables that are important are going to be the
ones that kind of rise to the top.
And then on top of that, just like the consistency of training
too. So it's like that's like the big
driver for performance is how consistent can you be within
whatever training plan you're you're applying.
The sport gets higher competitive.

(28:25):
That probably narrows the amountof approaches that are going to
be sustainable because we start getting into like fractions of a
percentage making a difference. I mean, we look at Western
states this year, we had like less than 10 minutes separating
1st through 3rd. So it's like, what small
variances could you do that moves you from 3rd to 1st in
that scenario when we're talkingabout less than 10 minutes over
the course of, you know, 14 hours or 100 miles?

(28:47):
Yeah. So I think it probably just gets
more difficult and more selective the more competitive
something gets. And that that just it makes it
less realistic that people are going to have a chance to win
these things despite their best efforts.
But they're still, you know, thethe most people are doing these
things as a like a as a way decide to say like, what are my

(29:09):
potential here? And there may be a little less
concerned with whether they're on the top of a podium or not.
So there's always going to be that side of the sport too.
What about from the mental side of things, like when you're when
you're interviewing people that are consistently winning or that
you're seeing people consistently win and you've
interviewed a lot of these people.
I was just kind of curious to see like what traits you're

(29:30):
seeing. Just people with like massive
amounts of grit, determination. I feel like all those types of
things go into a race like that.But what are you typically
seeing from just like personality traits?
Yeah, yeah, they, they definitely have like they have a
really good why as to what they're doing.
Because when you have something where, you know, these races are

(29:52):
long, so it's easy to kind of get like distracted by just the,
you know, how long it takes to finish an event, even a short
ultra marathon. But the reality is like the vast
majority of what's getting them to where they are at at these
events is the training that they're doing consistently.
So you almost have to have a driver in there that kind of

(30:14):
motivates you to want to do thatstuff, even when it's not like
necessarily like going to produce the best race results
that you had. So you almost have to have like,
like, I mean, trying training with a goal to win is a
motivating thing, but it's not asustainable why, in my opinion.
It's not like a why that's goingto be there for you every step
of the way. And if it is, you might have

(30:37):
some success, but it's usually going to be shorter term where
as soon as you hit a roadblock and race results and things like
that, you're going to start losing interest and maybe get
distracted by something else andgo a different direction.
So these people that are kind ofroutinely showing up and doing
well, they generally get some sort of gratification from the
process outside of the results themselves.
And, you know, whether that be just like the self improvement

(30:59):
they see along the building process of starting from day one
to getting to a race or just, you know, they're just like very
energetic people and crave movement and things like that.
And it's just the outlet they identified as the most
motivating. Some people like, especially
when you get to the trail side of things, it's about just like
exploring new places and things like that.
So they see all the training input as an opportunity to go

(31:21):
out and check out new places andthings like that.
But yeah, these people tend to have like this, you know, this,
this more evolved why than just like, I want to be the best.
Yeah, I would agree with you 100%.
Just from like, what I see and like the main characteristics
that kind of pop into my mind when I listen to different
podcasts around about, like, elite athletes, what goes into
what they're doing. Like, honestly, like most of

(31:42):
them, most all of them absolutely enjoy the training.
Like, they love to train. Like you said, it's more about
the journey than the destination.
But they're putting in the work and they're putting in the work
consistently. And they're actually putting in,
in most cases, more work than the next guy.
And that's what I'm seeing too. So 100% agree.
I wanted to kind of switch gearsand talk about protein, go into

(32:05):
like weightlifting, strength training, how you're coaching
people now, those types of things.
But before we jump into that, gointo the protein side of things.
So because I was listening to another self recorded podcast
that you did and I think it was in the beginning of the year,
you were kind of laying out the game plan for 2025 and you were
talking about strength training,what you're trying to do.

(32:25):
How has your, because we're we were also talking a lot about
like fueling strategies, carbs and fat, right?
How has your protein targets changed over time?
And then how have they changed while implementing more strength
training? I was just kind of curious to
see the evolution of protein. Like are you typically going for

(32:46):
a gram of protein per pound of body weight per lean mass?
And then how are you shifting that now based off the strength
training that you're trying to kind of introduce here?
Yeah, yeah, it's a great question.
I think like when it comes to protein, my general kind of
thought about it is if I'm getting a gram per pound of body
weight, I'm probably getting at least enough if.

(33:07):
Not more than I technically need.
Is that is that your, but do youshoot for that or or is that
maybe too high for you or you kind of you you?
I was kind of curious to see like what you ultimately shoot
for. Yeah, No, it's a good question.
I, I definitely I, I, I put thatas sort of like a loose target,
I would say like. I don't stress if I'm a little

(33:28):
lower than that because I know that I'm I'm at a gram I'm
probably in a surplus of what I actually technically need from
just like skeletal muscle side recovery side of things.
But it it's also not something where I feel like if I hit say,
say I weigh 140 lbs and. I hit like 120 grams of protein

(33:50):
one day, 150 another day. 35 another day and things like
that. I think it's like, you know I'm,
I'm not going to put myself I'm not going to find myself in a
position where I'm doing myself any noticeable disservice by the
few grams above what I technically need at that point.
Just like I'm probably not coulddo myself any disservice by
being a little bit under that atother times too, given that

(34:11):
that's kind of the high end of what it would, what would be
required. Where I try to be mindful is
like if I start getting up consistently above 1g per pound,
that's where I try to kind of like titrate it down a little
bit just because. Because it is a more expensive
nutrient to breakdown and use asa fuel and excess proteins get
that's what you're going to do with it essentially.
So gluconeogenesis. Yeah, yeah.

(34:33):
So like when I think about just like how I can best fuel when
I'm like really active and I'm asking my body to do as much as
I'm ever going to ask. It I don't necessarily want to
create any extra steps or hurdles for it to get over with.
Like fats and carbohydrates are just going to be a much more
direct source to actually fuel the non recovery side of energy

(34:55):
of my energy output. So if I start getting to a point
where like protein is crowding out fats and carbohydrates,
then, you know, there's a potential that I would be like
having a harder time hitting my training targets because I'm
asking my body to, you know, usean inferior fuel source for
those things. So, you know, it's, it's one of
those things where like I find with coaching clients.

(35:18):
It's a more of a when it comes to like not enough protein that
becomes more of a question usually in like offseason or
times where they're less energy expensive or they're just lower
energy output for one reason or the other.
Because they're just eating less.
And then it's just like if they're not paying attention to
it, it can be a lot easier to end up just getting lower

(35:38):
amounts of protein. But when you're in kind of like
the higher range of training, unless you're going out of your
way to eat foods that are like void of protein, like I'm going
to probably accidentally given the foods I typically choose,
I'm going to accidentally get upto like my 1g per pound of body
weight pretty easily. So it almost becomes more of a

(35:59):
making sure I'm not choosing toomany of the foods from the
groupings that I tend to favor that are protein rich because
then I could end up with 250 grams of protein in a day.
And if I do that consistently, I'm probably crowding out fats
and carbohydrates. That would be a better, better
version of what I'd be needing for for the purposes of just
doing more. Yeah.
No, that makes sense. And that kind of brings me to a

(36:20):
thought that just popped in my head in terms of like, because I
want to get into what you're doing now, what you got in front
of you, strength training, how you're coaching clients.
I want to get there. But like, like, right now,
because I know your diet's evolved a little bit in terms,
and it's always going to evolve based off like, what you got
coming up, what you're training for, all those types of things,
like take me through like a day-to-day.
And like how Zach Bitter is eating right now.

(36:41):
Like, are do you like what? Like when you wake up in the
morning, like what's the first thing that you eat?
Electrolytes like how you train?What does, what does the pre
workout or pre meal training or fueling strategy look like?
What is the intra workout strategy look like?
And then like what does like recovery look like?
Just out of curiosity. Yeah, yeah.

(37:01):
So I'm actually, you caught me in like a in a test phase.
So it's maybe going to look a little bit different right now
than what it has the last 14 years.
I'm actually trying a moderate carbohydrate approach for 100
Miller this fall. Because I've never done 100
Miller on anything but low carb.I switched while I was just
doing 50 Millers. So I'm going to try it, see how

(37:22):
it goes and then kind of see what we'll see what that what
that yields. So my, my, my intake is actually
looks quite a bit different the last few weeks since kind of
trying that experiment versus what it maybe had looked like in
the past. So right now I'm eating quite a
bit more like fruits that are more water based because I don't

(37:43):
want to get too much fiber in when I'm specially training
heavily and things like that. I'm favoring a lot more rice
than I would have in the past from a carbohydrate source
standpoint because again, it's apretty digest, easily digestible
source of carbohydrate honey that's are still a lot of
fruits, starches, potatoes, maybe like at the in the
evenings and things like that. A little bit of sourdough bread

(38:03):
here and there as kind of the carb sources.
And then like the fats and proteins are kind of pretty much
more standard to what I would have done in the past with that
where I'm eating a wide range ofdifferent kind of animal source
proteins from I like beef, salmon, eggs, like yogurt and
things like that. Those are making up kind of like
a pretty high proportion of the the day-to-day stuff.

(38:26):
If you go back to kind of like my more like carbohydrate side
of things or I'm sorry, my low carburide side of things, then
essentially like I'm going to besubbing out like the majority of
that rice, pretty much all of the sourdough bread, a good
chunk of those fruits, a good chunk of those potatoes.
And I'm going to be favoring things that are just going to be
like more fat based and stuff. So to some degree I'll replace

(38:49):
some of those like carbohydrate dense sources with like less
starchy kind of like that, or like low low carbohydrate
vegetables that can. Kind of be vehicles for fat were
a lot more like olive oil and higher fat animal products and
things like that as like pretty big like inputs from the the
caloric side of things. What?

(39:10):
What's remained pretty consistent, at least at this
point, is I I still usually. Do my, my biggest training
session in the beginning of the day.
And I have even before when I was, because, I mean, I was high
carbohydrate through high school, college and before I
started doing ultra marathons year Round 2.
So like I have some background and just like how I sort of went
about those approaches too. And you know, I've never been a

(39:32):
huge fan of eating much before morning training sessions.
So yeah, I've kept that pretty consistent.
I'll be, I'm going to have to play around with it maybe a
little bit when I get into kind of some of the higher volume
phase. I'm actually pretty early in my
training build for, for my next race.
So like there are some things I haven't like had an experience
with with with this protocol as to how I'm going to actually do

(39:54):
it and how my body's going to respond to it.
So like there's going to be somelike I'm playing around with
that as I get into it, but I still kind of like like to kind
of go out for that morning session without a lot of my
stomach. So that's usually like coffee or
tea. I'll usually try to get in
close. To a liter of fluid from when I
wake up to before I head out andthen get in some electrolytes.
So like for me, I've had my sodium loss tests done and

(40:15):
things like that. So I know I'm losing about 614
milligrams of electrolytes for every liter of fluid.
So usually with that liter of fluid, which is going to be some
combination of like coffee, tea and water, I'm going to have
like, you know, 6-7 hundred milligrams of electrolytes with
that too, just to balance that all out before I head out the
door and. And I feel.
That changes too, because you and I both live in Texas and

(40:37):
it's it's hot and humid as hell out in Texas.
So I'm sure though that fueling strategy will change as it gets
close to like, you know, November, December and then end
of the colder months, correct? Will it?
Change. Yeah, to some degree.
Usually what changes the most iswhat I'm doing during the run.
So like if I if it's a little bit.
I might pull back a little bit on that fluid intake just so I'm

(40:58):
not stopping to use the bathroomlike constantly during the run
or anything like that, especially if I'm well hydrated
from the day prior. But the thing that's going to
change the most is what I take with me.
So like if I go for like a 2-3 hour run out here this time of
year, like I'm probably getting close to a liter of fluid and
then, you know, another like another like 6 to 700 milligrams

(41:19):
of electrolytes with that liter every hour during that session.
Whereas, you know, during the winter I go to two and a two to
three hour run, I can kind of get by on like maybe 500 to 750
milliliters and, and not really have to worry about performance
that much. And, and I'll have some space to
catch up on that the rest of theday because it's not warm out or
anything like that. So I don't have to worry about

(41:41):
like getting behind and then also trying to catch up in the
midst of being hot and, and, and, and more fluid lot or
higher fluid loss rates just in general.
So that would be the biggest change is probably what I'm
doing during those events or during those training sessions
as much as anything. Gotcha.
What is your strength training look like right now?
Yeah, so usually I'll try to getin the gym and do like lower

(42:02):
body stuff like twice per week with one of those being kind of
more of a heavier lifting day where it's like I'm usually
using like a trap bar or something like that.
Trying to pull like a heavier amount of weight with like kind
of more like a, a three set from5 to 10 reps somewhere in that
ballpark off the ground and doing like weighted like
hamstring curls, like weighted hip thrusts and weighted lunges

(42:25):
and things like that for, for kind of like a lower body
strength session. And then I'll also I'll do a
second one usually during the week.
And depending on what time of year, if it's like a kind of
offseason, I might do another heavier day.
But once I kind of get into the kind of the the higher training
stuff, I'll usually do somethingthat's just a little bit more
kind of like a banded base workout or looking call, maybe

(42:47):
like a muscular endurance type of training workout where it's a
little more explosive, but lowerweight more, more endurance
focus just with it. So things like box steps,
forward lunges, jumping, split squats and things like that.
I'll usually phase in some like sled pulls and pushes and things
like that too. Just as as a kind of a

(43:07):
supplement way to kind of work on some lower body strength and
things that are going to be moremaybe a little more mechanically
specific to, to running and things like that.
So that that's that's what I'll do for kind of the lower body
side of things. Then usually I'm doing I'm a
little more basic with like the upper body core stuff versus
having as much variety, but I will do like a session or two of
those every week as well. Yeah, that makes sense.

(43:30):
And then and then based off likethe individuals that your coach,
whether they're like a hybrid athlete or they're training for
100 Miller or more than that, doyou basically prescribe similar
movements based off of like whatever it is that they're
trying to accomplish? And I'm sure the movements will
change, right. Like if you got an athlete
running like a very hilly mountaine terrain, their

(43:52):
strength training might be a little bit different than
someone that's going for a, for 100 mile or a personal record on
like a flatter course. Like would it change at all
their their strength, Their strength movements that you
would prescribe? Yeah.
And especially if they don't have access or a really good
access to kind of core specific terrain.
So like if someone's like livingon the side of a mountain and

(44:14):
they're training for a race likethat, we're going to get most of
the value out of them just running on that terrain.
But if it's like someone lives in the Midwest and they're
heading out West to do a race that's got like, you know,
climbs that are multiple miles in duration and the descends
too, is that we might kind of focus some of that lower body a
little bit more on like eccentric stuff just to kind of
get their quadriceps ready for like that eccentric loading.

(44:35):
Then again, on like the downhillrunning and things like that,
you know, you usually the starting point for most people
just like figuring out kind of what they have available and
then what their schedules like. I find with like training,
there's like what looks best on paper isn't always what's going
to end up working out best because consistency is always
going to rule the day. And if I program more than what

(44:56):
they have time for or movements that they don't have access to,
it's just going to breed inconsistency.
And then that's going to be something that ends up being a
net negative in the long term. So for my coaching clients, you
know, I've got some that have like very little access to
things that are like like like afull gym type of equipment.
And we're going to be doing morebody weight stuff, more, more
resistance stuff with bands and things that are a little more

(45:17):
accessible at home and things like that versus someone who's
like, I got a strength background.
I go to the gym three days a week already.
I've I've got some coaching clients who are like, they come
to me and they're going to trainfor 100 mile and their current
inputs are some running, but they're at the gym six days a
week. So for them it's almost like,
all right, maybe at least we would talk about kind of like
non negotiables in is as kind oflike a starting point where it's

(45:39):
like, let's figure out what yournon negotiations are and start
planning around those. And anything that's negotiable
we can put in a bucket of is this negotiable permanently?
Is this negotiable in the short term?
And we need to determine like what spots we can pull it out
and can't. And that goes from like just the
training inputs as well as just other life obligations and
things like that. So, you know, once we kind of

(45:59):
get all that stuff in order, then we start kind of looking
at, OK, what's the best option based on what's available to you
in terms of reaching whatever goal it has.
So, you know, for some of those folks, I might be like, OK,
well, let's just peel back on the gym work a little bit.
So we're not like investing too much training load into us a non
specific activity and get you running a little bit more other
people. It's like you haven't been to
the gym or done strength work atall.

(46:21):
So for me to throw you under a squat rack or even on the with
the with the with the trap bar might be too aggressive.
So let's just work on some basickind of movement patterns that
are in strength and then, you know, develop some consistency
with that. And then maybe start trying to
pull some weight off the ground and, and kind of see where
things are AT and listen to yourbody in terms of what kind of

(46:41):
signals they're giving us from like a soreness standpoint and
start building up from there. So there's quite a bit of range
with that. And I think that that's just a
testament to the world of ultra running and and running in
general right now, where when I got into ultra running, it was
like, you know, most people, it was almost like talking
traditional runners into trying an ultra marathon.
And that it's really not that much different.

(47:01):
There's some, there's some, there's some variances and
things like that, but they can'tdo it versus now it's almost
like you got people coming that have done very little running at
times and they're like all sold on finishing 100 Miller or
something like that, which is great.
But it's just a different type of like approach when it comes
to kind of programming for theirneeds and where they want to get
versus what what we would have had 10 years ago in most cases.

(47:23):
Yeah, for sure. And maybe for some of the
listeners who may ever want to think about working with you,
like, so staying on this maybe coaching topic.
So with your coaching services, like maybe what is the first
like data point or points you establish when you're working
with like a new athlete and you're trying to build progress.

(47:45):
And then do you work with just about anyone or do you typically
work with elite athletes? How does that work?
Yeah, I work with just about anybody from training for 5K up
to multi day ultra marathons andall different ability levels.
So like I don't give too much. I don't favour one or the other
necessarily. I think it's just I.

(48:06):
Like variety within it because Ithink that keeps me sharp as a
coach versus getting too hyper focused on anyone population
that tends to kind of like create biases in my mind of like
what works and what doesn't workversus having exposure points to
like, you know, just about everything.
Then within that, like there arethings that I think are worth
paying attention to, regardless of whether you're the front of

(48:26):
the pack, the back of the pack, new or very experienced.
And that's just figuring out where your strengths and
weaknesses are based on your historic training inputs,
whether that be a little to nothing or a lot of something
that's non specific, a lot of things that are specific.
But the way I usually do that aswe do some assessments that are
like and identify where your strengths and weaknesses are on
like the aerobic intensity spectrum from essentially like

(48:49):
about as easy as you can go to as high on the anaerobic
intensity spectrum as as we're going to typically train, which
comes in the comes in the form of some field tests I'll have
them do that will allow us to kind of make, make some I.
Mean if they. Could go in and get a metabolic
car test done and we get all this data to from that.
So if they are open to that or have done that and we use that,

(49:11):
we can use that as a starting point.
But often times we're doing somefield tests and things are just
figuring out like where the important point.
So like I like to look at it as like if you look at the aerobic
intensity spectrum, if we want to really simplify it, we have
easy, moderate and hard, and there's crossover points from
each of those. So when you crossover from easy
into moderate, you're crossing over your aerobic threshold.

(49:32):
When you crossover from moderateinto hard, you're crossing over
your lactate threshold. And when you get up to the top
of that aerobic intensity spectrum, you're hitting like
your VO2 Max. So I want to try to get a data
point on like, what is the pace that you're producing in a
controlled environment at your VO2 Max, at your lactate
threshold? And then we can use some of that

(49:53):
data to or just prior training training data and things like
that to figure out what pace you're running at around your
aerobic threshold. And that usually gives me a map
of like where the strengths and weaknesses are, where they're
more heavily adapted to or what maybe they have limited exposure
to. We pair that up with prior
training. Usually they speak the same
language. If someone's doing a lot of
something in the last couple months, then usually the field

(50:14):
tests don't suggest their strengths in the opposite
direction. But I like to have multiple
things all speaking the same language because then we can be
put a lot more trust and faith in kind of our starting points.
But that that gives us a spot tobe like, OK, now based on what
you've been doing, we can start deciding where we distribute the
training load your body's ready for.
I look at it through kind of twothings. 1 is like the proper
training load, whatever that's made-up of and then what are the

(50:38):
best inputs to hit that trainingload based on where your
strengths and weaknesses are at.For example, let's say that I'm
working with someone in their current training load is
somewhere in the neighborhood around 10 hours per week.
That is like, you know, 80% low intensity and 20% moderate to
high intensity. And that's going to be kind of

(50:58):
our starting point that we're going to build from.
And then within that framework, we're going to maybe move around
those distributions between easy, moderate and hard based on
what we want to move the needle on more because there's more
opportunity there. And then also looking at what
event they're training for, because if they're training for
100 Miller. Versus a 5K, our race day
demands are going to be quite a bit different and generally all

(51:19):
held equal. I'm going to be training from
the context of a strong aerobic base then.
Things that are important that are least specific moving
towards things that are more specific.
So if they're doing a 5K more specific might be short
intervals, if they're training for 100 mile, more specific
might be longer long runs. So that kind of develops or kind
of gives us some insight into the order of operations that

(51:43):
makes sense. And I know we're getting closer
on time and I want to be respectful of what what you got
going on for the rest of your day.
You know, we were talking about,you know, Lionel, Lionel Sanders
a little bit earlier, but I kindof wanted to get close to
wrapping this thing up in here in terms of like where do you
see the future of endurance sports going and where do you

(52:04):
see the future of endurance nutrition going specifically?
Yeah. I mean, I think personalization
is where we'll see it going because we didn't really dive
into this too much. But what I see, one of the
biggest issues I see with some of the really high carbohydrate
fueling strategies is people want to like see what their
favorite athletes doing and justsort of plug it in.

(52:24):
So it's like if I see someone doing 120 grams of carbohydrate
per hour for their race and I'm going to do their race, but my
workload is entirely different than theirs, then I'm sort of
plugging in the wrong formula, even if the process or even if
the concept that they're doing is sound.
So I like to look at workload and intensity to kind of like

(52:45):
start with people. And I just think we're going to
get way more exact as to what that is at the individual basis
because we'll just have better data points for people that are
more exact versus US making assumptions based on population
level data. Because right now it's kind of
like what we kind of look at is if someone's on a moderate to
high carbohydrate diet, they're going to have about a 5050 split
between fats and carbohydrates at their aerobic threshold.

(53:07):
So we can, we can anchor their fueling strategy in that and
then look at just like, OK, wellwhat is your workload for the
given thing you're doing? If they're doing something long
like 100 miles, they're going tobe operating at or below their
aerobic threshold. So then we can kind of unpack it
in the degree of like, well, how, how much ground are you
going to? Cover on a per hour basis to hit

(53:28):
your goal. And if that's like 4 to 5 miles
versus 8 to 9 miles, then we've got a different input for to to
try to match the carbohydrate side of their fueling.
And if they said, OK, well, I'm going to fuel like the person
who's doing 8 to 9 mph versus what I'm going to be doing at 4
to 5 mph. You're.

(53:48):
Greatly exceeding that carbohydrate side of the
equation from a need standpoint.And that's where I think you
start acquiring a lot more risk in terms of whether you're going
to get a digestive issue or whether you're just going to
cause more harm than good from ahealth standpoint if you do that
consistently and things like that.
So. I think like the.
Future is just going to be like we're going to have better data

(54:09):
points as to or better ways to access these data points in
terms of what someone's actuallyrequiring from the demands that
they're trying to do. And then they're going to be
able to plug in what's going to be a little more specific to
them versus trying to guess based on the recommendations
that are given by like, you know, like brands and products
and research that's based off ofthose or, or someone else out

(54:31):
there doing doing the event thatthey're trying to train for.
Yeah, makes sense, man. It's going to be interesting to
see where everything is going just in terms of supplements,
nutrition, performance, all these endurance events blown up.
And you know, we were talking about Nick Baer a little bit
earlier too. It's like man, that that last
man standing race he hosted, Oh my God, that was I was glued to

(54:56):
my phone like looking for the updates on those last two guys.
And I think those last two guys like the majority of the racers
like fell off. And it was like the last two
guys I think ended up running like 100 more miles.
Dude, that was so wild and wildly entertaining as well.
So it's just, it's just going tobe really interesting to see

(55:19):
like where everything goes from here and like race is popping
up, events popping up, new things coming down the pipeline.
It's it's kind of exciting to behonest with you.
I don't know what your thoughts are on that.
I'm sure you were watching that race as well.
Yeah, yeah, it was awesome. I mean it get also it also kind
of highlights just the evolutionof the sport too, or like the

(55:40):
the space, because it's like, you know, like Nick Bear is, you
know, he he's a hybrid athlete and he's got a lot of interests
outside of just endurance. So he brings in a whole new
group of people that historically maybe weren't
engaging in ultra marathon or these last man standing events
are relatively new. So there wasn't a whole lot of

(56:01):
people engaging in them up untillike a few years ago in general.
But it's it's it's something that I've seen kind of happening
with ultra running is it's becoming like this sort of like
ground for challenge and human development as much as it is
like, oh, I'm an ultra runner. And when you have Nick put on an
event, he's not your traditionalRd., He's not like.

(56:23):
You know, like like we get used to the general ultra running
media where you follow these accounts like I run Far or Ultra
Runner magazine or Air Viper. Race racing is a huge race
organization. They do a lot of media now too.
You know, those are like, these are like the typical outlets
that people are tuning into to follow like the ultra running
sport, but we also have like these new people coming in who

(56:47):
sort of bring their own. Media with them because they're
big, you know? Yeah.
Another example is like Cam Haines.
Cam Haines. Goes to COCA.
Dona Coca Dona's covered by the traditional ultra running media.
You know, Cam Haines becomes a talking point of that because
he's campaigns. But Cam Haines also brings in a
million other people with him that otherwise maybe aren't
going to pay attention to Coca Dona so.

(57:09):
And his son, his son's blown up too, man.
He's yeah, yeah, his son's wild dude.
But yeah, like, that's a really,really good point.
You got people like Cam Haines with huge, you know, like,
followings and social media teams going to these.
Not like Coco Dunham was small by any means, but like, the
media in the exposure that I gotwas traditionally kind of small.
Like they're blowing it up 100%,yeah.

(57:30):
Yeah, yeah. So like with Nick's last man
standing thing, you know, it waslike I don't think there was any
ultra running media covering that event.
Like there was very little. Like actually the talking points
I saw from traditional ultra running media after that was
basically to the degree of wow, there was a ton of eyeballs on
that. I think the VPN Instagram page
gained like 70,000 new followersand they were getting like

(57:52):
30,000 viewers on like their their like pre and post lap
start like tune INS and things like that.
So. In terms of competing with the
biggest media outlets from like the live stream at Western
States, UTMB, Coco Dona, things like it was right up there.
And so like, I mean, that becamethe talking point.
It wasn't like, oh, let's cover this event.
Let's. But it was like, oh wow, well,

(58:13):
we've got some sort of kind of coming in from the outside and
producing as many eyeballs on this event.
That had participants that I would consider mostly non
traditional altar runners too. You know, it was a lot of like
the BPN athletes, a lot of like,kind of like the influencer
crowd. Who are, you know, they, they
weren't the typical people that are showing up to like, you

(58:36):
know, Coca Dona, Moab 240 or Big's Backyard and some of these
more traditional ultra running venues for that type of a
discipline. But, you know, they they were
all up for the challenge. Obviously the two guys that went
on and on until they had that weather kind of throw them off
the course. Yeah, I mean, they were they
were, they were putting up big numbers.
So it's kind of cool to watch see kind of like a different

(58:56):
group of people kind of take on the sport of ultra running.
Not that the people that hadn't done ultra runs before, they had
they I would just consider them like more like varied in their
approach versus like, you know, you don't see like your typical
pro, like you don't see like Hayden Hawks or Jim Walmsley
going and doing a high rocks competition.
Yeah, they're they're training for the next ultra run that's
coming up and stuff like that. So yeah, it was really cool to

(59:18):
see kind of that that kind of come up.
I'll be interested to see like if anyone tries to replicate
that or what Nick ends up doing.I'm actually having Nick on the
podcast this week, so I'm going to ask him about that
specifically and yeah, see what his kind of future plans are
with that or if he expected it to become that big of a thing or
not. Yeah, no, awesome.
And in terms of like what's what's going to be new for you?
Like what's what's coming down the pipeline for you, like

(59:39):
projects or things that you're working on, races that you're
training for now? Yeah, so I'm, I'm gearing up for
a flat 100 Miller. I, I'm, I'm actually like 2
weeks into like the formal training side of things because
I was coming off some Achilles tendonitis.
And I got to a point maybe 2 weeks ago, 3 weeks ago where I
was like, OK, it's in a a good enough spot now where I can be

(01:00:00):
bold enough to put a race on theschedule if I want.
So right now I have like a time frame of what what I think I
need that kind of ranges by about four weeks.
And I'm kind of trying to pick between a couple events as to
which one I'm going to do. But it's going to be a very flat
runnable 100 Miller going to seekind of how the more moderate
carbohydrate approach works versus what I've been doing for

(01:00:22):
the last 14 years. And just just gather some
information on that at an individual level and see where
things are for that. Those are kind of the two big
interests of the, the other one too is just like the training
modalities that I'm using now where I'm doing, I'm doing way
more structured cycling. So when I had the Achilles
tendonitis, I was basically doing all cycling.
As I started phasing running back in, I've started to pull

(01:00:44):
back on the cycling a bit more. But my strategy going into this
next race is also going to be toexplore like keeping a cycling
component in place from a structured standpoint outside of
just like, oh, I feel a little more beat up than I should right
now. Maybe I'll jump on the bike
instead. Yeah, to like every week I'm
going to have these structured workouts that are bike focused
versus running focused and just see kind of how that approach

(01:01:05):
works for a for 100 Miller. So I've got a few moving parts
going on of interest and things like that.
Curiosities. But the constant is flat fast
100 mile, I guess. Yeah, I know.
And that's exciting, man. I mean, definitely keep us all
updated in terms of like that moderate, moderate carbohydrate
approach, how it's working out, how you're feeling.
Like I definitely want to followalong and kind of see how that's

(01:01:28):
going for you. So definitely keep us updated,
man. And, and this was fantastic.
I, I want to make sure I'm respectful of like what you got
going on for the rest of the dayhere.
Where can people find you online, get in contact with you,
work with you? How does that all look?
Yeah, I like a spot where they can find everything between
social media, podcast stuff. Everything I'm up to

(01:01:50):
coachingismywebsite@zackbitter.com.If you're kind of more focused
on social media, my I'm most active on Instagram and acts
Instagrams at Zack bitter and X is at Z bitter.
Perfect. And I'll put everything in the
show notes again, Man, this was fantastic.
Appreciate the time and to everyone else out there, thanks
guys for listening to the Low Carb Consultant podcast.

(01:02:11):
We'll catch you all on the next one.

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Zach Bitter | Low Carb Endurance: Fueling & Training with Zach Bitter | July 24, 2025 Ep. 12

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Zach Bitter | Low Carb Endurance: Fueling & Training with Zach Bitter | July 24, 2025 Ep. 12