Sparta Chicks Radio: Mindset | Confidence | Sport | Women

Selene is a professional health and fitness writer who is also the author or co-author of 6 books including the incredibly popular ‘Roar’ with Dr Stacy Sims.

Selene is also an extraordinary athlete in her own right. She’s been a semi-professional athlete since her late 30s and has competed in everything from Hawaii Ironman to 7 day mountain bike stage races and 200 mile (that’s 320km) gravel classics.

And she hosts the popular podcast ‘Hit Play Not Pause' for active performance-minded women in their 40s and beyond.

In this conversation we discuss:

* how riding her bike helped her find herself after a series of abusive relationships and a really bad eating disorder left her feeling lost,

* the line between having a healthy drive and an unhealthy one,

* her advice for women interested in mountain biking or off-road cycling, and

* how she came to meet and work with Dr Stacey Sims, and the changes she made as a result of what she learnt.

Plus we discuss the new project she’s working; another book with Dr Stacey Sims on menopause.

Leadership expert and outdoor adventurer, Ingrid Messner, joins me on Sparta Chicks Radio this week.

An avid hiker, she has travelled to over 50 countries and most recently hiked Australia’s 10 highest peaks, carrying about 18kg of gear and equipment, over the space of a week.

She’s come along way from the story she shares in this episode of twice having to learn to walk again. 

The first time after a hiking accident in 2017 (which took 11 months of recovery) and the second after contracting a viral infection in 2019.

In this conversation, we discuss:

* the hiking accident that resulted in needing to learn to walk again (for the first time),

* the importance of being patient and persistent during your recovery from injury, especially when you don’t have a timeline for recovery (and why she outsourced her patience),

* why you need to be careful about who you get advice from (ie, experts or people who have the same experience), 

* why she says walked (pun intended) out of the experience physically and mentally better and stronger than she was before the accident, 

* the viral infection that forced her to learn to walk again (less than a year after returning to full strength following her accident) 

* the importance of having a sequence or series of goals to maintain your motivation through your recovery (and training process) and

* how she has been inspired by ancient wisdom and traditional knowledge in her work and life.

A few weeks before recording this episode, Sparta Chicks Radio celebrated its 4th birthday. 

And there is no-one I’d rather share that celebration with than Lucy Barnard! 

Lucy is attempting to become the 1st woman to walk the length of the world.

She set off in February 2017 from Tierra Del Fuego in Argentina to walk to Barrow, Alaska; a journey of 30,000km /20,000mi across 15 countries she anticipated would take her 5 years. 

Yes, years.

Lucy was first on the podcast in March 2018.

When I was preparing to speak to Lucy for that episode, I realised we share a unique connection; we both started our respective journeys - Lucy started walking and I published the first podcast - on the very same day in 2017.

That conversation turned into our first anniversary / birthday celebration and we agreed to catch up each year for an update on her progress! 

This is our 4th annual episode and Lucy joins me to share how 2020 unfolded for her.

In 2019, Sarah Davis became the first woman to lead an expedition along the length of the Nile and joined me on the show in episodes 34 and 134 to discuss it.

This time she returns to share her next epic adventure, in which she’s swapping her paddles for pedals and will ride 5,000 unsupported across Australia!

In this conversation, we discuss:

* why, just 8 months after finishing her Nile expedition, she decided to paddle the length of Australia’s longest river, the Murray - a journey of 2,500km

* where (and when) the idea to ride across Australia came from,

* the logistics involved and how she’s preparing her body - and butt! - for the ride,

* what she the Nile expedition taught her about risk management and how you can manage the risks associated with your adventures, 

* mental health challenges, eating disorders and developing a deeper appreciation for what your body can do, as opposed to what it looks like.

Tara Diversi is a woman of many talents.

A Sports Dietitian and an Accredited Practising Dietitian, Tara is also an accomplished athlete and marathon swimmer, having completed the English Channel, the Gibraltar Straight, the Rottnest Island swim and the Palm Beach to Manly swim here in Sydney (amongst many others).

But the focus of today’s conversation is on her most recent, and coldest, challenge - becoming the first Australian woman to complete an Ice Mile. 

That is swimming one mile (1.6km) in water that is 5 degrees or less. 

To put that into perspective, ice baths used by athletes to help with recovery generally sit around 14 degrees.

So why does a woman who lives in tropical Far North Queensland set a goal to swim a mile in ice water?

Let's find out!

Mimi Anderson started running at the age of 36 (after a long battle with anorexia).

Over the next 20 years, she went on to set multiple Guinness World Records.

Her achievements include: 

* completing the Badwater Double; the return trip from Death Valley where the race starts to Mt Whitney, and back - a journey of 469km,

* winning outright the 6633 Extreme Ultramarathon, a self-supported non-stop race over 560km in the Arctic Circle in which you drag on a sled everything you need to survive that took her almost 6 days to finish, and

* setting Guinness World Record for the fastest time by a female running the length of England and the record for a woman running across Ireland.

Now it hasn’t all been smooth sailing.

In 2017, she attempted to set the record for running across America - that’s over 5000km. Sadly, that attempt ended due to injury and it also brought an end to her ultrarunning career.

But you can’t keep a woman like Mimi down for very long!

So in her late 50s, she learnt to ride a bike, overcame a life-long fear of open water and finished her first triathlon.

Alexx Stuart is on a mission to help people want to (not *have* to) make changes for the better in their lives.

She launched 'Low Tox Life' back in 2010 a few years after discovering she had a gluten allergy and going on a personal mission to find out what she was putting in, on and around her body.

Since then, Low Tox Life has become a thriving online education hub and Alexx has become a 4x best-selling author and podcast host (with over a million downloads), by the same name.

This is a conversation about conscious choice, hormones & why you should change your pillow :)

I love that Alexx adopts a judgement-free perspective, that she recognises that it can be overwhelming when you start to realise the extent of changes you could make and that she encourages people to change one thing at a time.

This might seem like an unusual conversation to have on this podcast.

But I think there are two common themes.

The first is around hormones and how easily they can be disrupted (in line with my previous conversations with Katee Gray (Pedicini) over the years).

And secondly around awareness and being conscious of the decisions we make.

I talk about that in the context of our mindset and the stories we tell ourselves about who we are and what we can and can’t do.

Alexx talks about awareness in the context of being fully informed and conscious of what you put in, on and around your body. 

Alexx is a passionate woman with a big heart and I’m excited to share her story with you

Eliza Ault Connell was a (self-described) normal kid with a pretty average childhood until she was 16.

It was then, in 1997, she contracted and nearly died from meningococcal disease.

She spent 2 weeks in a coma during which time her parents had to make the heartbreaking decision to amputate both of her legs to save her life.

Eliza later decided to have her fingers amputated for reasons she’ll share in this conversation.

During her recovery, Eliza was introduced to parasports and started as a runner, before she transitioned across to wheelchair racing - and she hasn’t looked back.

She has since won 3 World Championship medals, 3 Commonwealth Games medals and placed 2nd in a demonstration event at the Athens 2004.

After a 10 year break from racing to raise a family, at the age of 36 Eliza returned to the sport to chase her Olympic dreams once more.

And a few weeks before this episode was recorded in 2020, it was announced that Eliza was one of the first 4 athletes selected to represent Australia at the 2021 Tokyo Paralympic Games.

I’m back 🙂 

Sparta Chicks Radio has (at the time of recording this episode) been running for over 3.5 years. In the early days, through 2017 and into 2018, I was asked multiple times when I was going to be interviewed for the show. And I very strongly resisted for all the usual reasons (excuses?) we come up with when faced with doing something uncomfortable - fear, self-doubt, who am I to do this and feeling like a fraud etc.

But eventually - about 2 years ago, in July 2018 - I handed over the reins to one of the many amazing women I’ve met thanks to the podcast and who I am now grateful to call my friend, Richelle Olsen (also a podcast guest in her own right).

That episode covered my background, the origins of Sparta Chicks and how I got to where I was at that point. 

That was 2 years ago and a lot has changed, personally and professionally, since then.

So I thought it was time to do it again. 

This time I handed over the mic to another woman I've met thanks to the podcast and who I now call my friend, confident, advisor and butt-kicker, Katee Gray Pedicini (another popular podcast guest in her own right). 

In this episode, we cover what’s happened, professionally and personally, over the last 2 years.

As with Richelle’s episode, I gave Katee complete creative control. I had no idea where she was planning to go or what she was planning to ask. Basically, I made her the boss!

So you’ll hear me squirm with vulnerability at times during this conversation.

Funnily enough, before I pressed ‘record’ I commented to Katee that one day we’ll do an episode that doesn’t produce - in one or both of us - a vulnerability hangover.

But then we realised we’d have nothing to talk about because that’s not the nature of our friendship or how we do things! So you can expect the same from this episode.

In this conversation, Katee and I discuss:

* why I talk so much about bravery, shame and vulnerability on the podcast while, at the same time, openly admitting I’m not comfortable being vulnerable myself,

* how my level of discomfort with sharing my story this time compares to the first time I was interviewed on the show 2 years ago.

* the results of my experiment with an LCHF (lower carb, healthy fat) lifestyle two years ago and what was the mental shift or decision that prompted me to experiment with it,

* hormonal shifts and peri-menopause,

* the work I’ve been doing over the few years sharing everything I’ve learnt as a sports coach around resilience, peak performance, personal leadership, fear, self-doubt, courage and confidence with a broader (non-athletic) audience (as well as the new website and brand I'll be launching soon to support it),

* the irony about how much fear and self-doubt has bubbled up in me as I’ve stepped into the role of a Performance & Mindset expert over the last few years, and

* the common thread I’ve seen across my work as a Performance & Mindset expert.

Katee also asks me some rapid fire questions about the podcast and I give some not-so-rapid fire answers! 

Amazingly, Chloë didn’t learn how to swim until she was 11.

Yet within 2 years, she was swimming at State level and eventually had her eye on Olympic qualification.

Sadly, that wasn’t to be.

But during her university years, she discovered triathlons which led to marathon swimming.

The year was 2006 and the rest, as they say, is history!

She now holds multiple world records including for the longest ever unassisted swim by any person - a mind-blowing 124.4km which she swam in the Bahamas in 2014.

At the start of 2020, Chloë arrived in England with 31 crossings of the English Channel under her belt, and a plan to break the men’s record of 34 crossings.

Postscript: this conversation was recorded in 2020. In 2021, Chloe set a new world record for the most English Channel crossings - with an incredible 44 crossings. It's a record that still stands in 2025!