Eco Challenge: What It’s Like Training for the World’s Toughest Race Fiji

Posted on December 13, 2022

Michael Hughes
I don’t know about you, but I’ve been binge watching the world’s toughest race eco challenge Fiji on Amazon Prime. Guys. It’s been absolutely insane now imagine covering 420 miles in 11 days, barely eating or sleeping and hiking through dense jungle paddling an open ocean hiking through rain forests and storms and mountain biking in thick mud, paddleboarding on bamboo rafts that don’t really go anywhere. Rock climbing next to huge waterfalls and whitewater rafting through amazingly beautiful gorgeous. So would you believe that over a year ago, we had an elite endurance athlete woman named Sonya Wick walk into our doors and seek us out to help her train for the world’s toughest race eco challenge Fiji, it was an incredible opportunity. And today, you’re going to get a take and a peek behind the scenes not just about what Sonia experience. But how our director of programming CJ designed her training program her movement program, I want to give you trainers a glimpse into CJs mind. He’s an absolute movement genius and coach Sonia through her preparation. I also want you to hear from Sonia, what her big takeaways were from the experience and what advice she give athletes wanting to train for something like this amazing, epic experience. So without further ado, here’s an interview with Sonya wick and our Head of Programming, CJ Kobliska. Welcome to the Gymnazo podcast where you get to peek behind the curtains of what it takes to create and run a seven figure fitness facility that ranks in the top 5% of boutique fitness studios for revenue. But to be honest, that’s the least important thing about us. Founded by me, Michael Hughes, Gymnazo has created an ecosystem of services that blend performance with restoration techniques and attracts top coaches to its facility hosted by its owners Paden and myself and our top coaches, this podcast shares our best practices on everything, from how to build a sustainable fitness business, to how to program for maximum results to how to build a hybrid training module that’s online. And in person. We have marketing secrets, movement, innovation, and breaking down trends in the industry. If you’re a fitness professional, or fitness business owner, this is where you learn how to sharpen your skills and to see maximum results.

CJ
First off, I just wanted to say I’m incredibly honored, humbled and inspired to just be in your presence. Give me a break. I think everybody should know that. Since the first time you came in, to Gymnazo. Just yeah. You showed up saying I am ready for whatever you’re willing to train me through. And I here’s what I’m gonna do. And it’s it’s the eco challenge. It’s the the world’s toughest race, the race that eats Ironman for breakfast, right?

Sonya
And I’m an Ironman athlete. And you

CJ
also said, my body is built for war? And yeah, bring it on. Yeah,

Sonya
I did. But I was scared. That’s why I walked in the door here, because I was scared about whether I was ready to compete in such a challenge. I didn’t know if I had upper body strength, or I mean, I, I was scared on a lot of levels. So I came here, because I knew that I would be in good hands.

CJ
Appreciate that. I want to know a little bit more about kind of what you came in with before you came into Gymnazo. So if you don’t mind telling our listeners about your training experience, your performance experience. There’s a lot of Ironmans. And

Sonya
yeah, so I’m an 18 time Ironman athlete, and I raised the Kona Ironman World Championships six times, trying to win my age group. There other world championships, and in 2014, I got second and that kind of like that. Yeah, that’s probably good enough for now. So I had really spent most of the time training as an Ironman athlete, which meant swim bike run almost every day. Stretching if I had the time mobility work if I was getting maybe a little bit injured, but not a lot of time spent on staying very functional and most of my time spent literally swimming, biking or running. So I didn’t have a lot of experience in a place like this. And I was always nervous about it. And the swimming biking running kind of kept my fitness and endurance going. But yeah, I knew that wasn’t going to cut it for taking on the world’s toughest race. I knew I needed something else. I just didn’t know exactly what it was.

CJ
So you heard about ego challenge you said I’m going to do this because he called me I called out everybody’s done arm and said I want to take this on. I’m going to eat it for breakfast essentially or see what it has in store for me more than that. Yeah,

Sonya
I just felt pulled Yeah, when they said this is the race that he’s I remember breakfast. I was like, oh, that’s me. Like they’re calling me out. I’m gonna go find a team of Ironman athletes and we’ll just see if they eat us for breakfast. You know, we’re physically strong, but I had a feeling like there’s more to it than just being like four individually strong Ironman athletes.

CJ
You Did you have any idea what was in store for you? As soon as you said, I’m going to call me out, I’m gonna go do this, we’re gonna get a team. And we’re gonna go take it head on

Sonya
to have any knowing what was in store for me know, like the race, let us know sort of throughout the months, what we were going to be in for, you know, they had us get certain certifications for river rafting or rock climbing, like ascending fixed ropes. So I started to be like, Oh, we’re doing that we’re going to be doing these sports. I mean, we did 10 different sports, and I do three sports. So there were seven sports in the race that I didn’t know how to do and didn’t know if I was trained to do. But we started started to know that those were the things that were going to be involved which I got to come to you and be like, CJ, I have to do these things. And I don’t even know how to do the sports much less how my body needs to be ready to do those sports.

CJ
You came in in March, you said in September. That’s when the race starts. All right. We got we got less than six months. Need to be there every day. I was like, okay, yeah, on top of your running on top of your swing, maintaining the endurance that you’ve built,

Sonya
out biking, paddleboarding, outrigger canoeing, running, hiking, and then also in Gymnazo.

CJ
I remember when you came in, it was kind of like, well, how did like where do we start? There was so much it was so many unknowns as well, not just for the athlete, but as a coach. Yeah, knowing kind of the stages of, you know, we got to have the endurance, we gotta have the strength. We got to have the power, we’ve got to have the coordination and mental grit to truly Yeah, put them all together. Yep. And so having not known you, I needed to put something together to test you to essentially see where that baseline was. Yeah. When you told me that you were built for war. I said, How do I? How do I challenge somebody to war? Like, I didn’t want to I didn’t want to push you outside of your zone too much. And yeah, injury right was right. We don’t train. Yeah, we had to train a lot overload the tissues. Yeah. And build some foundational strength in the upper body and core and maintain what we hadn’t lower half. So at least on my end of it, what I saw was alright, we had off the foundations. And we had to challenge essentially 3d or the challenge the unknown. Now that you’ve got the foundation, what does it look like when the conditions are imperfect? Right? What does it look like when you have no idea how your body is going to perform in this next setting? How do you mentally prepare for that? Yep. And beyond that, then building the endurance in those unknowns? Exactly. Those, you know, the balancing challenges that we did on the Bose know, the crawls that we had on the outdoor, I think that was really found, yeah, when I wanted to cry, but I didn’t cry. You’re like, Give me more. I was like, Oh, my gosh, in this hour, two hours, you’re gonna be in here.

Sonya
Yeah. And I think the thing you really had to navigate all the time with it, too, was I was coming at you somedays first time first thing in the morning, so rested, fresh, like, oh, let’s hit it, CJ. And then other times, I would walk in here after I’d been on the bike for six hours and just run for 90 minutes. And then I’d be pulling in, and you’d have this plan that you had orchestrated of like, really what we needed to be hitting, right? And you’d be like, Oh, my gosh, she’d quickly have to realize like, No, we can’t do that today. Like she’s got to be on the table. We’ve got to release machines, we have to restore. So have like, that was that push of having the plan, but then also having to deal with athletes and all the other pieces that we’re working inside of that

CJ
be written. It’s being ready for that? Yeah. You came in and said, I just can’t I’m hurting my ankles. My shoulder. I did a 50 mile ride the other day, and I can’t turn to my left. Yep. And so we basically had to scratch the whole routine. Yeah, but how do we don’t start from scratch brand new, how do we still stick to that routine that gameplan and keep you on track where you’re not going to get more injured? You’re going to continue to feel stronger and be able to rebuild yourself internally. Yeah. to physically handle whatever.

Sonya
Yeah, I one time I had eaten it on the bike. I had like endod and crashed my bike,

Sonya
and just get me scraped. I

Sonya
remember being like, I crashed my bike. It was right by my car. And I was like, I don’t have time to crash my bike like I am, like a minor two months before a month before. Yes, but I don’t have time for you. Like I need to be at my appointment with CJ in like 14 minutes and I’m up on Cuesta grade. I just remember being like, you don’t have time to get your bike, you need to get to CJ. And I walked in like I’m here. I’m ready to train. And you’re like, what, what you are all scraped on that just fell off my bike.

CJ
Just now. 10 minutes.

Sonya
Yeah, you’re like, Whoa, whoa, like, let’s see what we’re dealing with here so that we can train hard tomorrow because I’m going to be in tomorrow. Like I’m always going to be in tomorrow. So being able to adapt that.

CJ
Were there. Were there instances in the race where you felt like you had to obviously get to the checkpoint before the time ran out. Yeah. Where you were hurting. You would been maybe rolled ankle or just were sleepless, right. Yeah. For days on it. Yes. All right, talking about some of those moments. Yeah,

Sonya
I I had a moment on one of the trekking legs coming into Camp three, so pretty, you know, advanced in the race before we got to the real Craxi via falls crazy bed and we were going through a river. And I put my foot on a rock. And I mean, we had probably I had rock hopped about 40 million times in the race so far. But you know, you just put your foot on one rock, and it’s it slips off, like it had a million times in the race. But my knee went one way and my foot went the other way. And I tore a ligament in my knee. And I felt I’ve never torn anything. I mean, again, built for war, but I, I heard something and felt something that was not a feeling I had ever had before. And as I continued, it was a fifth five kilometer trek, so like 32 mile trek. And as I continued and kept walking, I realized, like what was going on with the knee that something’s not right. Something doesn’t work. And I just remember thinking like, oh, my gosh, I wish I had CJ like, ACG would tell me what was wrong be like, if CJ was at camp right now, I probably would feel better tomorrow morning, like because he knows what’s going on. And something would get released. And we would tape it up and I’d be off. But I, you know, I did just continue through the rest of the race tape the heck out of it and and gutted it out. But I attribute that to the rest of my structure being so strong. I mean, I structurally was stronger than I’ve ever been in my life. And I needed every bit of that structure in the race. If I didn’t have it, that that knee would have taken me out because the rest of my structure couldn’t have compensated for what happened with the knee. Had we not worked together in the way that we did.

CJ
Yeah, it’s interesting to explore because when you came in, you’re you essentially, were going forward, straight forward. Moving forward, running forward, biking forward, everything was straight ahead. Yeah, occasionally be. I mean, some uneven ground like rocks or loose gravel or crossing some little creeks or whatever it may be. Yeah, we had to prepare you for even more of that.

Sonya
Totally. The whole race was uneven terrain. Like the jungles. I mean, jungle climbing on the dark means boulders, lipping, slippery stuff, wet stuff, being submerged, going from swimming to pulling yourself up in over rocks and slipping off of them falling. It’s like, you don’t just need to be prepared to to do these. Well, you also have to be prepared to fall down and slip and like, not stay stable, but still say healthy or safe. When you’re falling, slipping, sliding, crashing, etc.

CJ
You can train perfectly so much. But as soon as the conditions become imperfect, yes. How is your body going to respond? Exactly. I think it’s where we came down to a lot of proprioceptive training. I gave you a lot of things that made you stay stability challenged. Yep. Not just on the bozi. But different angles with the wedge board with a board on the bowser that was tilting while getting pulled by a strap to the side. Yes. So it’s, I was watching an episode the other night and it was the people were crossing. I don’t know if was you guys I think it was on their team that they’re crossing the river and it was pulling them very strongly one way and you had to fight against it while searching your feet on the ground on uneven terrain, way uneven. Maybe it’s deeper. Maybe it’s shallow, or just feeling with your feet without any vision. That’s if you’re going in blind. Yeah. Even when it’s light outside, you can’t quite see what’s going out down there. Yep. Did you feel prepared for a lot of that? I know, we talked about Yeah, me being injured and St. Foot went one way to another. But yeah, there was so many opportunities in the race to, to lose your body to that.

Sonya
Absolutely. And all of all of those weaknesses in the race you ran into, like, your body, everybody got exposed to all that you’ll, you’ll see in some of the episodes, I mean, people’s knees are just three times the size. And they showed a few but I mean, most everybody had things like this happen. So I think that was what I didn’t totally understand is, you know, you got to train for all the failures. Like you have to be strong for all the ways you’re going to fall down, slip slide hurt yourself. And I think my body had I didn’t know if I was ready. I didn’t even understand that. That’s totally what we had to be ready for. But I was ready. Like I was ready. And I did handle it well, and even through we had to do some really gnarly stuff after my knee had gotten torn. And I mean, I had it like I still was able to perform and I think my knee didn’t swell. I didn’t have a huge leg blown up knee. I still felt strong and stable, even though a ligament was no longer attached.

CJ
Yet how do you prepare for that? How do you prepare for an injury that your body will probably experience in a potentially five to 10 day race?

Sonya
Yes, unknown injury

CJ
fatigue, no sleep less food your body’s already in very tough conditions. Yes. And so how does it have the time to heal what doesn’t really doesn’t he just has time to go and you go into that mode. Yep, perform, perform, perform. We got to get the

Sonya
next the rest of like all of you needs to be really high functioning because If something goes down, everything else has to be able to compensate. And I think athletes who probably didn’t really think that way, those things into the race for them, you know, like, what that one thing that went bad, because the rest of their body couldn’t compensate. They were done. They didn’t have any other options at that point. So I think that’s where we did well, just preparing. We were prepared for a lot of unknown through like good foundational practices that came in handy.

CJ
Do you remember any specific exercises or even pieces of equipment that we use? Like, I’m sure there’s some that are ingrained? In your mind of that again, you know,

Sonya
oh, well, I mean, I, the great thing about you is that you tapped in really quickly to what I like, get a kick out of, like, the challenge that I get a kick out of, and, you know, we’d be on the BOSU with the board on the BOSU. And then I’d have like, the ball between my knees, you know, like, get her in the most uncomfortable position possible. And now I’m gonna, like, throw the ball at you and follow it and throw it back, like while staying all stable. And we started having this fun rapport with it. And so CJ was like, run, you’d run all around to different locations. And I’d have to, like, get the ball and get it back to you. We and it was, for me, it was like gameplay. Like, you know, we you get the twinkle in your eyes, and I get the twinkle in my eyes, like you’re laughing

Unknown Speaker
when you’re training. That’s a good sign. You laugh and

Sonya
you like, see like, oh, he thinks this one’s gonna get me and that just fires me up to like, No, I’m gonna get back. I will like we did some boxing and almost hit you at all times.

Unknown Speaker
I think you did on purpose, actually.

Sonya
But that would have been a good opportunity. We, we really worked. So upper body strength was my main fear. I’ve like never been able to do a pull up. I didn’t know about the ropes like climbing reversing rope. Jumar right. GEOMAR ascending rappelling, but the ascending is what had me so scared, because I just thought I would be pulling myself up the things, which wasn’t true like is actually a lot of balance and leg work. It’s not pulling yourself up, you’re really pushing your Ascender up. But we addressed just my worry about my upper body physical strength, which I think helped me mostly in the paddling. My paddling was really strong, because I had come in worried about the upper body strength. And then we really worked on that. And we didn’t just have to paddle like in a fixed environment. You know, we were paddling the thumb of cows, where we’re in this like kind of funky boat, and we’re not always just paddling in beautiful, perfect form. Sometimes we got to paddle, you know, way out here, and I’m the steersman So sometimes I’m like, I’m literally pulling the whole boat and all these weird directions, then we transition to stand up. paddleboards and that wasn’t just like on a nice flat Lake. You know, we’re paddling up a river, that is trenchantly. downpouring. And there’s water coming down at us. So Max stability and having to really move dynamically on the paddle board. And then we get to the Billy Billy raft, and we’re paddling for 13 hours with a toothpick, you know, on this believability raft like non traditional paddling techniques, like we’re on flat water in a canoe. And so I think how we really just focus still on dynamic motion with with the strength positioning allowed me to be very adaptable, upper body wise, which is something I’ve never I’ve never had that skill before this.

CJ
Those were just initially is like setting that foundation. You had it in the lower half. Yeah. could run for days daily, literally. Yeah. I mean, how can we utilize that that mindset that endurance? I mean, just thinking about going for 30 miles for a run? Yeah, on my end, maybe somebody else’s and he doesn’t do a lot of long distance running. It’s like, that’s like a weekend, maybe a couple of years. That’s like, I can do that. And then I’m gonna go for a bike ride like five. So we had that we had that established. Yeah. What I noticed within you was, when we started do upper body activities, there was a lot more freezing brace. There was almost a sphere mechanism. you’d hold your breath. That’s true. And when I address that, you’re like, Oh, my, I am holding my breath. Yes. Like this kind of light bulb went off. Like you notice I hold my breath, but I don’t know what’s going on. Yep. So I know we chatted about how to breathe and there’s not necessarily a wrong and a right way, but there’s more efficiency and there’s more awareness that can come from Yep. Breathing especially while you’re cold in the water or while you’re sweating like crazy and fatigued. Yep. How can you utilize hips? Yeah, core shoulders to go through that paddle and when the waters rising and there’s wind blowing atcha how do you adapt, not just brace Brinkley’s. I think we addressed that quite a bit. I think initially,

Sonya
we totally unlocked like, you talk to me about linking movement chains like being able to make a movement from like the tip of my finger down to my toe to use everything in between to link those patterns. And I that was like, to me, not to mention the breathing but also just my lower half was pretty used to working kind of solo and like yeah, I moved my arms but when I’m on the bike So you really got me to start thinking about, like, How can my upper body really be in relationship with my lower body? And how can how can everybody kind of join the show. And that that was a lightbulb moment for me not not just the breathing, which was a big part of it, but also just that these two, upper and lower halves need to connect and they haven’t had to before but I’m going to be a lot stronger when they do. And we really had to train that like, every every session, every session, it my body was not accustomed to, you know, being in kind of a whole body situation, we

CJ
basically took this rigid rigidity that carried you for miles crazy for hours at a time that we didn’t want to get rid of. Because if we lost that, we ended up losing some of the endurance and strength that we have in those positions to carry you forward, where you just kind of get in your mind. And you’re like, all right now I’m here. And you could just go on that spot. Yep. So what we did we start to branch out into more rotations, we kind of addressed the spirals and diagonals. Yeah, tissue and had you reach your hands always. Sit down. Yeah. And it was, but it was beautiful. Because it was like one of those things that this is what Sonia is going to get a need to expand out. So we addressed those spirals and added weight overhead. And we ended up doing some farmers carries with like, a power block and like this loaded position. And yeah, you were just traveling up and down the turf. Yeah. And it was so cool. Because I was watching on, I was like episode two or something you’re just eyes on. And you’re just like, run up the hill. And I was like, Oh my gosh, I’ve seen that look before. Yeah, so like, and it’s probably one of those days you came in, like I just don’t feel good. I’m not hurting. I just, I’m not in a good mental state. Like, just tell me what to do, like, get me going to do something because I don’t want to do anything. And in those days, it was like, Alright, we just got to keep Sony moving. Just keep her going. Get her to find her zone. And it was absolutely epic. And you talked about getting off her body to move while your lower bodies move in. There was another moment you picked up the mountain bike. You’re walking up this muddy, muddy Hill straight up the hill. Yeah, and the guys are up there. And you’re cruising like I’m coming. Just as buzzing. Yeah. Still happy voice like somewhere inside. And you just stopped and was like, oh, no, she’s done. You threw the bike on you. Yeah, I was like, that looks like what we did on the turf where you threw the weight on your back and just kept truckin. Yeah, also inspired by that.

Sonya
A lot of times the race when I was like CJ wouldn’t be so proud of me right now, that that moment in the bike, I remember that section was really the hardest physical section for me the entire race. We were in the mud. So you know, at times, like the section they filmed us on was one of the easier parts of the mud, we had been in much deeper mud that would go up to like mid calf while just caked on just up at it. So the whole bike we’ve got we’ve just left camp as well. So our petrol loaded for two and a half days with food and all of our mandatory year. So I’ve got like a 20 pound pack on and then my mountain bike weighs like 25 pounds. And then it’s got like 20 pounds of mud on it. So now I’ve got like a 50 pound mountain bike, and I can’t, it’s just heavy. And then I’ve got a 20 pound pack. And I remember that moment, like putting it up at all my shoulders and realizing I’ve got 70 pounds on my back right now. And I wouldn’t be able to have 70 pounds on my back had we not done the stuff that we did and then hike up a muddy hill because it’s not like I’m walking on a sidewalk with like, we’re now going to climb a hill with the 70 pound pack in mud, that I was like, oh, physically, I remember thinking sometimes just have to not make this, you know. And looking back on the footage, what they were doing is taking their strongest member and the strongest member was getting all four bikes up the hill, while the people who weren’t as strong, got themselves up the hill. So I mean, as a woman in endurance sports, it felt really good to be able to do that for myself and not have to rely on impacting my team in a negative fashion while they got my bike up the hill.

CJ
Right then becomes a trade off of all right. I’ve been helping you out for so long. You start to weigh yourself down two ways mentally and physically. Yep, that’s just on you. But on your team. Yep. was another moment in the race where you felt like you basically had mentioned match. And if you looked ahead, you said it’s gonna it’s gonna happen or it’s not. Yeah. And you just got up and did it?

Sonya
Yeah, I, I had a few of them. One of the big ones was actually really late in the game. Leaving the last camp, we headed out on the mountain bikes and I was not warmed up. And we had just slept for five hours in the last camp and then packed our bags. Yeah, it was got a lot of sleep. We weren’t in a rush. We knew we were ahead of the cut offs. We knew that the leg had a lot of mountain biking and we’re really strong riders. So we’re like, wait, I mean, all this mountain biking, we’re gonna slay we can sleep a little bit more. still make it just fine. We pull out and right away literally out of the village we turn around And it’s just like Hill, super steep and tenant at 10am in the morning, about 90 degrees, Fijian humidity, and I wasn’t warmed up. And so I started biking and I started getting that loop in my head of like, I don’t think I can do this. And I was really hot. And the heat always made me think, really negative thoughts. Usually, I don’t think I can do this, or this is really hard. And so once I would get in that cycle loop of I don’t think I can do this. I don’t think I can do this. I don’t think I can do this. Well, I mean, what you think is what is right, so I had a panic attack. And I like got off my bike. And I like did the whole, like, having a panic attack. And, you know, let it calm down. And my teammate came over and was like, what do we do, and I was like, you just have to let it pass. And so I get back on my bike, and I’m just so hot, and not warmed up. Because just he didn’t get it straight up. So then it happened about 15 minutes later, same thing, another panic attack, same cycle of thoughts. And he finally one of my teammates just had to say, look, I can carry your bike, which, you know, no one’s carrying anyone’s I can carry your pack, which no one carried anybody’s packs, but like, he was like, I could do these two things. But like, you have to change your thoughts. And I was like, like, I felt super like whoa, just got called out. Like I thought it was hiding it. I thought I was hiding that I was telling myself, I couldn’t do it. But I wasn’t hiding it because of what was coming out of my body and how I was performing. So it was a person who was like, Okay, I have to find a different thought to think. And I came up with your core body temp is fine. So I just wrote didn’t say good. I just could say fine, because you got to believe the thought. So it’s like your core body temp is fine. Your core body temp is fine. And lo and behold, you know, maybe 2025 minutes later, a little bit more warm up. Few more hills, positive thoughts or at least neutral thoughts. And I was hauling, I was hauling. So I learned from that, like, look, it’s okay to stop in a race like this and take 20 minutes to warm up. Like if you get out on the course and you’re not warmed up and you’re being asked to do this really hard, crazy task, like go through your warmup sequence, it’s going to take 510 minutes, and you’re going to be in a whole different place because your warmup sequence isn’t just for getting you warmed, but also for getting you emotionally warmed up to do hard things. Right. And I had neglected that. And that really like that took me down. And it cost us a lot of time in the end because to panic attacks takes a lot of time off the team and and also changes everybody’s morale on the team. So warmups matter and I never I mean, I always did them here in Gymnazo. Like I’m on time, but sometimes you just think you’re going through the motions, and you never really have a great reason to say that they matter other than like everyone knows you should do a warm up,

CJ
right? It’s easy to kind of have a bypassing comment that’s just like, it’s not going to do anything. Well, especially when you’re in that loop. It’s why get out of the loop. If it’s so strong, and it’s pulling you magnetically towards that. That dark spot really. So change your thoughts. My goodness. And it’s simple. It’s simple words, but it was so deep.

Sonya
Yeah. Yep. And that realization like, yeah, I came home realizing like, oh, my gosh, when we sit on the couch, and we eat junk food, like we know, that’s not good. Like, that’s going to have a consequence pulling yourself deeper. Yeah. But when we emotionally eat junk food, we think we’re hiding it like we can just with those thoughts in our brain, and we’re not hiding it like our life is the manifestation of that junk food. So are you going to feed your brain good stuff? Are you going to feed your brain junk food? Can you recognize when you’re eating one or the other? Can you change it? You can, but it takes awareness. And but it’s worth it.

CJ
So that’s so powerful. And it’s I want to break that down a little bit, because it’s something that we can we can talk about, but it’s much harder to actually put into practice. Yeah, it’s like breaking a habit that you’ve had for potentially decades. Yep. Since you were a kid, right? You can start so young, it can be driven so deep within you that you don’t even recognize it. Yeah. What are maybe a few things that you do specifically that helps you just become aware of those loop of thoughts and kind of disassociate that, that that’s not me, that’s just kind of this path that I’ve set for myself, and I can step away from it, it’s just going to take some grit to get up that hill, it’s gonna take some grit to, to change the habit, what are a few practices that you do?

Sonya
I think the first thing you have to recognize is you have to reverse engineer it, like you have, you have to make the connection that the thoughts yield the results. And so you can reverse engineer it when you’re looking at your results. And you’re like, Man, I’m stinking right now. Or I’m really suffering or you can then be like, Oh, what are my thoughts? So it’s really hard when you’re in the loop pattern to be like, I’m thinking bad thoughts. I need to change them. But it’s usually pretty easy to be like, I’m not performing well right now. And be like, Oh, that’s because of my thoughts. Going I was for a long time tried to do Go from the wrong direction. And once I realized, no, you have to reverse engineer it, like the output is always a product of the input. So recognizing that we all know when we don’t like the output, we all know when we like didn’t perform the thing, or we didn’t lift the weight, or we didn’t finish the run, or we always know that we don’t like the output, but backing it up. And really recognizing that the output is from the input. That’s the first step. And then I think having like, not trying to Pollyanna it, not trying to say like, if you’re thinking oh my gosh, I can’t do this not replacing that with I can do this because you clearly don’t believe you can do this, right. So you have to find a neutral thought that you believe to be true, which might be I can take one more step. Or I can do one more rep or I can, you know something that’s more like believable and neutral about something you can do my core body temp is fine, or I am fine, or this weather is fine. But if you can’t believe it, then you can’t manifest that thought. And then watching the outcome and testing. Because if you didn’t believe the thought, your outcomes not going to change. So you can try a thought and just repeat it for a while. Just go I’m gonna try, I’m fine. I’m fine, I’m fine. I’m fine. I’m fine, I’m fine. And then look at your your performance. And if it’s still lacking, then go back and try another thought. So it’s like this reverse engineering and then saying what is still true for you. But like a baby step above what you were thinking before?

CJ
It’s well said, seriously. You mentioned something about I priming as well or warming yourself up or just getting into that zone and how simple can take five minutes. But when you’re in that loop, how ridiculous that five minutes sounds or how unworthy of those five minutes, right? Yes, we kind of disassociate from that. Yep. What’s something you do to prime your mind? Is it intention setting? Is it visualization? Is it just all the above Oh, and figured out what’s something you find yourself coming back to that as a as a constant prime?

Sonya
Yeah, I mean, meditation is really big for me in my house. You know, doing something spiritual every day is like a practice I’ve taken on I’m not a good person with routine. So I won’t meditate in the same place in the same way every day. All I’ll do walking meditation. And the next day, I’ll be sitting on my cute cushion with my blankie wrapped around me and other day I like will have my Mala be sitting on the beach. So for me it’s been to keep myself primed every day is directly into the spiritual side of myself. Because priming is all about understanding that there’s, there’s a vertical side to ourself along with the horizontal. And when we’re on earth here, that’s all horizontal stuff, when we race races, that’s horizontal, but we can get very attract very quickly if we’re not constantly tapped into that vertical side on a daily basis. And that’s what priming is for me, am I attached to the part of me that knows all this doesn’t actually matter? And it all really matters to but not really like balance? Yeah, am I attached to that side, and I’ve found that I don’t like things to get stale. So it might be reading inspirational passages that remind me of something or a quote, or it might be a meditation, it might be a guided meditation on an app, like I will just switch it up all the time to keep it fresh and fruity. Because I always want to be connecting to kind of different sides of my more vertical self. And if I’m doing that on a daily basis, and I’m usually primed,

CJ
that’s a red. I want to keep going on this because verticality, yes, there’s an analogy that I think we share in terms of how we view life and kind of what’s going on here,

Sonya
Jay, my my Yoda.

CJ
And it’s the spacesuit analogy, do you mind kind of breaking down? Just what’s it look like to or What’s it feel like to be in Sony’s lens of her spacesuit and to kind of compartmentalize these pieces, but also see them as one unit? Yeah, in this horizontal and vertical place,

Sonya
the moment when I realized that I was not the spacesuit. So here’s my sort of analogy for it all. I love analogies. But there’s the spacesuit. There’s the operating system that runs the spacesuit. And there’s the dude in the spacesuit. And for most of my life, I ran around thinking that I was the spacesuit run, and my mind was the operating system. And it wasn’t for a long time that I realized that I was actually the dude inside. And that the spacesuit and the thing that runs the space suit our space suits my body and the thing that runs the space with the operating system is really my mind and my con those conscious thoughts conscious and unconscious thoughts. Until I like stepped out of that and realized it wasn’t either those two things I wasn’t my my mind and I wasn’t my body. I was my soul and my mind and my body. just exist here on earth to help me have like a super awesome experience. I was like, Oh, I had been running around thinking I was just my body and my mind. And so, you know, it didn’t really work. It was kind of aimless and I got confused a lot. Once I had that awareness, I had something else to tapped into. And I could say like, oh, okay, like your spacesuits broken, like your spacesuit needs a patch, your body needs to recover or your spacesuits really strong right now you can your you know, you can travel on this earth very easily, you have a body built for war, but it’s not you I’m not my body, I am not even my my mind, like, my mind and my body work together to make sure that my soul has a really awesome experience on Earth. And when I’m not on earth anymore, like my body, and my mind won’t be there. And I get to like, you know, go pick the next one, or whatever I know you, we all have our different beliefs. But getting that awareness as an athlete was key, because when we’re doing really hard things, the mind and the body oftentimes are like, rip roaring, you know, the body is performing. And so a lot of blood and attention and energy are going into the spacesuit. And then the mind is like the regulator, it’s, it’s saying good things. It’s saying bad things. It’s got an inner critic, it’s got an ego, it’s doing all of this dance. And it’s just so easy to think that that’s it. It’s the interplay between those two. And to be left pretty unfulfilled sometimes and wondering why or is this all it’s about? Or that was that was fun and satisfied my ego, let me go find another thing like that I can go do and for fun to satisfy me. But what’s the point, then once you tap into that, those are the tools for Earth. And there’s this other thing inside of you that gets to use those tools for like, good or bad. That’s like, Whoa, I now know, I don’t need to chase podiums, like, I can use my tools to have an expansive experience and actually enjoy those experiences at a soul level, which is what happens to me more now?

CJ
What’s the key difference between that sensation and what you experienced? Before the panic attack? When you were going for that podium, I felt that it was one of the next and it was numbing, but it was also exhilarating, you get on the podium, and then you’ve up at that point, and then that’s the next piece, you’d express that. Yeah, it is numbing to, in a sense, where it’s self harm it can potentially become can be detrimental to your health. Yeah. What’s the difference between that experience and when you’re, you’re out on that run? And you’re like, I’m, I feel like I’m in it? I’m plugged in?

Sonya
Yeah. Yeah, it’s it’s it you? Are you connected to your soul? Are you not? Are you connected to that thing that isn’t just your ego. When I was chasing podiums, there was this cycle of like, train really hard train really hard train really hard. Why to win? That was it. Like that was the loop. We wake up every day, what gets you out of bed, I want to win. Why do you train 35 hours a week? Well, because I want to win. It was always for that thing. And then if I won the next race I was doing the next day, I would wake up and I would be depressed. And I would just be felt feel loss and without purpose. And so because I’d felt good the other day before from winning, I thought, Oh, I better sign up for something else. And chase it again. Like that’s what life is about, just like chasing podium after podium. And they even have terms for it, you know, your like post Ironman depression, or, Oh, everyone feels bad after the race, it’s normalized, that you’re going to feel crummy after you have a big high that you will then have a big low. And so I didn’t really question it, until I found another way, like slipped in, you know, slipped into a different mode of doing things. Because of what light life kept pushing me in that direction. It gave me a whole bunch of podiums, and then it said, like, you’re gonna need to eventually evolve out of this. So once I got to that more evolved state, then I realized oh, like you actually don’t feel any sort of, you know, if you happen to win something, you don’t feel any sort of dip below because the wind doesn’t. It’s like cute, cute, like, awesome. But what if you look more on like, Oh, what did I learn about myself out there? Or what was I able to access inside of myself? How easy was I able to make it feel because I was really indirect connection by doing something that I was put here to do or experiencing something that I was put here to experience. When you’re coming at it more from that place like you don’t, you don’t have highs of the ego and then lows as the ego has to recover. And your body performs a lot better and it recovers a lot better and you your emotional state isn’t as up and down as we think endurance athletes, they’re high there. Low they’re high, though, that all just kind of fluttered away when I started doing things more to satisfy what the core of me is really about, which is experiencing adventure and beauty all around this world, using my body and mind as a tool for good.

CJ
Oh, so beautiful. Just the ability to see from a different perspective to see from a different lens and to be able to set up that internal environment that’s, it’s like, there’s got this balance this homeostatic piece to it, where your body’s able to come back to center, quicker rebound, yep, we may still kind of ebb and flow, but we’re faster to come back to that center space, so that we at

Sonya
least have access to our center. Like when we get off of it, rather than wandering around aimlessly. Like not really connected to it. I think when you open that up inside yourself, and you understand what feeling good and connected vertically really, really feels like you know, when you’re not there, and you really don’t get very far off the target anymore. Because it’s a, it’s a pretty quick red flag. Something might drag you off for a little bit, but you, you’re always kind of now self correcting back towards that place. Yeah.

CJ
What would you what would you say to somebody who’s maybe in that place where they feel like when they’re adventure racing, or they’re just an endurance athlete, they’re an athlete that’s maybe not doing endurance races, but they are chasing podiums, but they feel like there’s something more in there. Yeah, they’re chasing the greener pastures. When it’s right there in front of them. You just need to look from a different lens. Yeah. If you could say a few words of advice, or just kind of a Yep, a track for them to latch on to a path for them to find within themselves. Yep. Yeah,

Sonya
I would say to that athlete, there’s, there’s more and it’s okay, if you don’t find it until you’re ready. It’s okay to be attached to wanting to win. And, and that’s okay. If you have a stirring in your heart that feels like there might be something more to all of this, that’s there for you, it’s always going to be there for you. So you can chase all the podiums you want and win all the races you want. And when you’re ready to connect to a deeper side of yourself, you will once you connect to that reach a place where you don’t need those podiums anymore. And you will feel okay about it. I, I have talked to some athletes who they feel like they will be giving up something because they’re so attached to winning, they feel like they’ll be giving up something to explore a different side of themselves. And to them, I say just go win a few more races, like when a few more races. And I hope that eventually you run out of things to win, because then you will be forced to look around and figure out what, what’s next or what more, or what’s it all about. The best thing that ever happened to me was that I got to the pinnacle of the sport, because it was only the day after I got to the pinnacle of the sport that I was like, Wait, that didn’t do it. Like, I got everything I wanted. And I woke up the next day going, Why do I feel so empty. So everyone has to find that path for themselves. But for me, it was getting to the top and then realizing it. I don’t think you can shortchange it. You know, I think everyone has a journey. It looks different for everybody. If you’re in a place of struggle, and you’re really dissatisfied, and you’re still kind of showing up and doing like, look at the spiritual side of things, you might really open up something inside yourself that makes you a better athlete who doesn’t even need to win things.

CJ
Wow. Do you feel like you’ve lost any competitive part of yourself or that side that that kept you driving for that next step? Is that competitive drive still within you? Or is it something that’s changed?

Sonya
Yeah, I would say that the competitive drive in me is like, comes out on occasion, but isn’t present every day I wake up to train I think before I use that drive on a daily basis as my fountain to like water, my motivation. And so I don’t have I don’t need that to use that as a motivational driver anymore. So it has definitely like tamped down in me I always just had to compete to be okay. And so when I stopped really needing it to be okay it kind of subsided. Now if you get me jazzed up and we’re you know, it’s almost comes from a playful place now. My sense of competition then from I must win to feel good about myself. Which I prefer, like I love to play compete all the time and I’ll get playful and tough and competitive. But there’s just a different feeling when it you don’t need it to satisfy your sense of self like you can, you can win you can lose are probably not going to lose. But it’s okay if I do

CJ
in the spirit of play in the spirit in the spirit of play. Yeah, you play better you play harder. He plays stronger you play More like you, but you have perspective

Sonya
in at all. And that perspective is just makes for such a more healthy life on healthy trajectory through really letting you be who you’re supposed to be in, in the world. Nobody came here with the purpose of winning everything. Like nobody, like not even Michael Jordan like he did win it but that wasn’t it’s not his purpose. You know, we we come with such a deeper purpose than to to just beat other people

CJ
it’s been an absolute honor to to coach you and just to have you bring this new side out me too. Because I love to do a lot of different things. I don’t I’m not necessarily a endurance adventure racer, but I’d like to get outdoors and you do to coach somebody like of your caliber and it’s has that does that internal drive that knows that it’s an expedition life is this journey life isn’t we’re not trying to get to this finish line. The finish line is there. It’s always there. But

Sonya
none of us make it out alive.

CJ
Right? I’ve never seen anybody not do that. So it’s seriously you got a heart for adventure a heart for laid off Gosh, for for teaching for storytelling. Yeah. I mean, we could talk for hours about this. I know do get to have some more conversations as time goes on. Yeah, we get to go more but I want to encourage other people to check out your blog. gosonya.com Go sign up. Go Sonya on Instagram.

Sonya
Yeah, Instagram from Go Sonya. I got an Instagram so early. So I got the like, you know, go Sonya. It’s kind of a short one. I felt kind of proud of it. Yeah, it’s, it’s got you written all over it. It does. And CJ, I really want to thank you from the bottom of my heart. I got referred like, oh, you need CJ. But it was our work together was so much deeper than preparing me for this race. Like this, this race was just a cool thing I went and did for 10 days. And I’m glad I got the opportunity but I far more value. The what we did here in the gym together and what you taught me along the way, not just Yoda CJ, but also like body Yoda CJ. That to me, that has much better rewards and dividends than then going out and beating yourself up in the jungle for 10 days. So thank you for believing in me and for will being willing to use what you’re really great at on my body. Like get that into me. I’m gonna make me cry. really thankful.

CJ
Thank you so much. Seriously, it’s been an absolute blessing. Yeah, we’ll chat some more we’re sure.

Michael Hughes
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