Before launching the new OLLIN endurance program, I opened a Q&A to the membership and answered what came back. This is that conversation.

The through-line: most endurance programs make you good at one thing — one movement, one event, one finish line. That's a finite game. This program is built to develop aerobic ability generally, the capacity to provide oxygen and blood flow across anything you ask your body to do. Running and cycling are in there because they're the easiest ways to extend effort, but so are carries, sleds, rows, lunges, burpees. You build the base; you make it your own.

What we get into: how to find your real deficiency (nine times out of ten it's base, not intensity); what the German team that broke the four-minute team-pursuit barrier actually did in training, and why it was mostly low intensity; whether nasal breathing and conversational pace are good zone-two cues (they get you in the neighborhood, no further); why chasing a precise zone two is close to useless if you're not racing; the minimum dose to maintain endurance once you have it; stable versus volatile traits and why most people defend the wrong ones; wear, tear, and longevity with running; and the hybrid problem — trying to hold strength, power, and endurance at once is how you end up with none of them.

There's a story in here about accidentally hitting my best competition shape ever while training out of a backpack in London — all zone one and zone five, no gray middle — and a friend named Jamie whose aerobic base makes him, in his own words, light-years ahead on the mat. Endurance is compound interest. It's the trait that amplifies every other trait you have.

The endurance program is a 12-week build, live now and included in the OLLIN membership: https://weareollin.com

Got a question I didn't cover? Send it in and I'll do another one of these.

00:00 Endurance is compound interest

00:21 What this Q&A is, and what the program is

05:06 Finding your deficiency: base vs. intensity

06:13 What the German pursuit team actually did

09:53 The London backpack story

12:03 Is conversational pace / nasal breathing good for zone two?

18:10 Why precise zone two is useless if you're not racing

19:15 Building vs. maintaining: the minimum dose

21:18 Recovery and how endurance fits the week

24:40 Stable vs. volatile traits

25:23 Wear, tear, and longevity with running

30:50 Concurrent strength, power, and endurance

31:32 The cookie jar: interference

33:26 The hybrid / SOF problem

35:02 Why "that day" never arrives

38:24 What most endurance programs get wrong

39:44 What this program is (and isn't)

40:36 Fueling and recovery alongside strength

49:33 How many days a week of each

46:54 Jamie Lavelle: endurance on the mat

50:37 Why endurance amplifies everything